seeing shizusumi characterised as a jealous person kind of bothers me. he's so patient and caring and willing to sacrifice himself and devoted that i can't exactly picture him as jealous. exclusivity is (usually) what you want from a person you love, if we try to explain the way he acted. him being jealous of yuki had a deeper meaning than "yuki makes hiiragi smile" or "hiiragi has a crush on yuki". shizusumi was jealous of yuki because he thought he had it all and was charismatic and attracted people. he was jealous because, like many others, like hiiragi, he also admired yuki's light and couldn't even wish to be this way. he thought that's what hiiragi wanted, but that he couldn't give to him. if shizusumi were jealous of people around hiiragi, he could have been bitter about mafuyu getting so close to hiiragi again. i mean, mafuyu and hiiragi don't exactly have a 100% platonic relationship, depending on how you look at it, and yet it never bothered shizu. because mafuyu isn't yuki, so there's no reason to be jealous.
it's canon that hiiragi is a jealous and possessive person, though. he almost crossed a line by trying to keep the band up ONLY to have shizusumi to himself. hiiragi wants shizusumi to look at him only and never walk away or follow other people. that's what he says when he describes the look shizusumi had for him when he gave him the gold origami paper. he's upset when shizusumi walks away to meet with mafuyu in secret. and there's that one valentines omake where he clearly acts possessive.
seeing them the other way around fuels the stereotypes about their looks/temperaments sometimes, and this is what i hate the most when it comes to given interpretations :')
Hi! You convey your thoughts so well that I wanted to ask you: what do you think about (chapter 48 summary spoilers because I don’t know if you’ve read it from Keru!!!) Ugetsu trying to help Mafuyu reconnect with Ue/music at syh’s show? At first Ugetsu’s energetic mission to get him there felt out of character for me, but I think it’s going to read differently seeing Ugetsu having moved on and moved forward with his life in growing outside of his own codependent relationship with Kaji.
Hello! Thank you for being patient, I am back! I personally think that mix_18/chapter 48 was done ✨~SUPERBLY~✨. @morievna captures it pretty perfectly in her meta on Mix 18. I believe that Ugetsu was very much in character and he is, as you said, displaying some differences due to his growth as a character.
GIVEN | Ugetsu 1.0 and 2.0 similarities and differences
Remember, Ugetsu and Mafuyu are 🎶MUSICAL MIRRORS 🎶 because they both use music as an outlet to express, understand their own AND other people's emotions. Ugetsu therefore knows that Mafuyu NEEDS to attend the SYH concert in order to know how he is feeling.
Ugetsu and Mafuyu's mentorship is mostly Ugetsu taking the lead to drive Mafuyu to confront music. So Ugetsu has always been quite energetic when it comes to talking to Mafuyu.
Code_16 Ugetsu 1.0
Mix_17/Chapter 47 Ugetsu 2.0 👇
However, the energetic attitude back then was laced with criticism and a bitter pain. His liveliness was lined with a sense of falsehood. We see that in Code_16/Chapter 16, Ugetsu 1.0 who organised the Tchaikovsky tickets for Mafuyu and Akihiko. However Ugetsu liked inspiring by showing Mafuyu how cool he was at the violin concert, he was hoping for Mafuyu to also join the "lonely genius bubble" club, to become like himself, to rely solely on music to process trauma and communicate with others to avoid difficult conversations.
Mafuyu doesn't want to turn out like Ugetsu 1.0. And just like you said, having moved on and moved forward with his life in growing outside of his own codependent relationship with Kaji, Ugetsu 2.0 here realises that this
1. stagnation of feeling he has to choose between Akihiko and music 2. never properly communicated with Akihiko on how the other party was feeling
that led to their toxic relationship. Ugetsu smiles knowing that Mafuyu doesn't quite understand that yet. Then Ugetsu says,
"Either way, there is no going back for me."
and later on
"Didn't you pretty much neglect factoring what the other party thinks about this?
Ugetsu is hoping that Mafuyu will learn in his own time that being in shutdown and avoid the other party will ultimately make Mafuyu end up like him. So it's not too late for Mafuyu and Uenoyama!
What Ugetsu 2.0 does differently is rather than showing off or critiquing, he tells Mafuyu:
how he is not great and still working on building his human relationships and taking care of himself
how he has no idea what the future holds, maybe he'll be in NY longterm, he doesn't know
shows vulnerability but is being a realist that he can't go back in time to change things with Akihiko.
What he demonstrates here is the imperfect humanness of being a professional musician. Professional musicians don't have certainty and don't have it all together. He is telling Mafuyu that uncertainty about life is perfectly normal. Ugetsu also knows that Mafuyu, just like himself, connect with others best through music. So if Mafuyu wants to figure his feelings and connect with Ue, he NEEDS to go to the concert. But Mafuyu is putting too much pressure on this event to give him complete clarity. Pre-debut and post-debut is still full on uncertainty. So why not just "learn more about it?" Why not just listen?
I find it so funny that Mafuyu says "did you even hear me" because Ugetsu has been the best listener and actively doing something to help him. Ugetsu is still musically driving Mafuyu to confront music like before. However, he doesn't place himself on a pedestal for Mafuyu, or let Mafuyu process music on his own (like in CODE 17)
or feed into the unhealthy mindset of the "lonely genius".
He holds Mafuyu's hand to face the music together.
Just a sidenote but I LOVE that even though Ugetsu is running and leading Mafuyu, look at how gently he holds Mafuyu's wrist. 🥺 It's like he is holding a new violin bow, understanding how delicate Mafuyu's temperament is right now 😭😭😭
Also observe how tenderly and genuinely Ugetsu smiles now compared to before. It's now grounded in wisdom and self-reflection. Kudos Ugetsu 2.0 also being able to listen to Mafuyu talk about his issues while before, he tended to emotionally dump on Mafuyu about his own issues.
Of course what I love is that the crowd then separates the two and and Mafuyu is pushed further to the front. Ugetsu reassures Mafuyu that he is strong enough as an individual to face Uenoyama, paralleling the "It's okay" in Code_27 where Mafuyu first said to him that he is strong enough as an individual to face a life without Akihiko.
To summarise, Ugetsu in my opinion was very much in character and displayed tremendous growth. We can all learn from Ugetsu:
Face changes in life with vigour and keep facing it despite feeling scared, uncertain and unclear. Change is just a fact of life. Avoidance, rumination and stagnation makes things worse.
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If you like what you read, all I post is basically Given analysis content!
Hi! First, English isn't my first language, so I'm sorry for any mistakes.
I watched the newest Given movie and re-read the mange and I have to think that Hiiragi and Shizu (i know you love them) but I think they are the worst. They know that Mafuyu felt left out when Yuki was still alive. Hiiragi forced Ritsuka into the band and to make the song. Hiiragi said after the first Given concert that he knew that Mafuyu wanted to be included when Yuki was still alive. He knew how he felt. Mafuyu has PTSD and abandonment issues and Hiiragi and Shizu are aware of it. And then, Shizu just said to them basically: If you can't commit 100% for the rest of your life you should quit the band and your relationship. Just because Mafuyu knows that Shizu loves Hiiragi. Mafuyu is frightened because he is reliving his trauma, he thinks Ritsuka will leave him, just like Yuki. And Shizu knew all of this. How Shizu thinks towards Hiiragi is also so toxic, he basically gives everything up, even says, that he doesn't have any dreams of his own- and in my mind, that's toxic codependency. They are horrible friends towards Mafyuyu. Even after 10 years, they didn't find a replacement. I bet they didn't even look. You can see in chapter 4 of the newest Cheri+ that Ritsuka desperately needs a break, that he can't keep playing for 2 bands. Hiiragi wants to bind Mafuyu forcibly to his life - by making his boyfriend play in his band. He doesn't trust Mafuyu to be in his life as his friend on his own. Sure, Ritsuka is also to blame, because he can't quit something he started. But in the end, Hiiragi is still the same selfish person.
isn't that insane to break into someone's asks to say you hate their favourite characters??💀but thanks for the ask, let me fix that!
hiiragi was in denial when yuki was still alive, that's kind of what i explained in my latest post (which i suppose you read?), hiiragi was obsessed with the image of a perfect quartet and thought they were all super close to each other and he was scared to disturb any relationship within their group. actually, hiiragi always shows how scared he is to change any relationship. that's why he wouldn't have confessed to shizu so soon even though he probably knew that his feelings were mutual. he wanted to take things slow because he thought they were good already as friends. so even though he kind of knew that mafuyu felt lonely (and i still think he didn't really, it's just easier to say it afterwards), he couldn't do anything about it without risking one of their relationship, either mafuyu and yuki's, or his with mafuyu. by asking ritsuka to play support for him, hiiragi isn't aware that he's repeating history. he realises it only after mafuyu refuses to eat with them and at this moment, he knows that he's acting selfish. that's why he goes thanking and apologising to mafuyu before their concert (umi e), he wants to do things better that he had done in the past and to not repeat the same mistakes. he regrets that he didn't say anything back when yuki was still alive. is it that easy to confront one of your best friend (yuki) and reproaching him that he doesn't spend enough time with his boyfriend (mafuyu)? even though it wasn't clear that they were dating and that there was clearly unspoken words between them? he did care about mafuyu's loneliness, but he wasn't aware of yuki's emotional/mental health issues so who could've predicted the tragedies afterwards?
then for shizu, he's also not one to take decisions by himself. if shizu tells mafuyu to abandon his relationship with ritsuka, it's because he's aware of how scared mafuyu is and that shizu himself never would have gone straight pro if he wasn't sure to love hiiragi enough. shizu doesn't act if he isn't 100% confident in what he does : the advice he gives to mafuyu is the reflection of his own feelings. when yuki was still alive, he didn't feel powerful enough to change things as well, as he also felt left alone, that's why he didn't do anything about it. he probably doesn't want mafuyu to suffer with ritsuka because of music, that's why he tells him it's safer to quit. for us readers, it sure isn't a good advice because we're just seeing mafuyama about to split and don't like this, but it feels safe to shizu because there's so much more involved than just being in a relationship. and isn't he half right, anyway? what's the point in continuing suffering in a relationship if you don't think it's the right person for your life? shizu thinks it's too hard for mafuyu to pursue in music and in a relationship involving music. he doesn't want that for him.
now, the only reason why shizu and hiiragi aren't toxic to each other is that they communicate, and this is what mafuyu and yuki missed. hiiragi and shizu sure are really attached to each other, but their relationship doesn't take a tragic turn because they decide to talk it out. they choose to love each other and to sort their misunderstandings. they choose to date officially and to confess properly, they express their true feelings to each other to avoid what mafuyu and yuki lived. they're learning from past mistakes and that's beautiful! just because shizu follows hiiragi doesn't mean that they're codependent. first, he expressed to ritsuka that he loves music and takes it seriously, which means it's also his own dream to keep playing as a pro. it sure is coming from his love for hiiragi, but he's got an attachment to music too. second, if you read chapter 3 of the 10th mix, you should know that shizu also developed a passion for acting, he's got a character development that has no direct link with hiiragi first, which you can't abstract from your analysis. even if it does, i don't think that being openly devoted to your partner means you're toxic, as long as you're aware of it, that you talk about it and that it doesn't lead to irreparable suffering.
then, about ritsuka being "forced" to play support even after umi e, let me tell you ritsuka is old enough to take his decisions by himself. sure, hiiragi was confident that ritsuka would accept to stay, but does that mean he forced him to? absolutely not. ritsuka accepted because he liked playing with syh, and even he could've considered mafuyu's feelings a bit more. the thing is, ritsuka can't stop playing in a band he likes just because his boyfriend disagrees. it wouldn't be healthy from mafuyu to stop him from doing that. moreover, hiiragi, shizu and ritsuka all consider that mafuyu's issue is "solved" (we get that it's not completely, but he's doing better) after mafuyu promised ritsuka to make music with him forever after umi e. ritsuka also knows that even if he keeps playing with syh, this time he'll make sure to be there for mafuyu and he found a solution to communicate better with him : music.
about 10 years later, i'll have to give the same answer. ritsuka is old enough to know that what he's doing is tough, and too much for his mental/body health. he needs a break : sure, then i'm hoping that mafuyu will notice and tell him instead of watching him, because mafuyu isn't always the victim. and hiiragi isn't close/affective enough to ritsuka to tell him to get some rest. ritsuka is doing all of that because he loves his job and he loves performing with the two bands. does that mean it's healthy for him? certainly not.
i'll also add that the characters aren't omniscient. just because hiiragi and shizu know about mafuyu's loneliness doesn't mean that they're aware of how traumatised he is. that's why mafuyu tells hiiragi before his first concert that he doesn't get his feelings. it may just be my opinion, but ritsuka is unexpectedly the one who gets mafuyu's feelings the best : just because you know someone for a longer time doesn't mean you understand him better than the others. on the contrary, if you're really close to someone, you're not always aware of how bad they're doing (meanwhile ritsuka clearly knows when mafuyu isn't doing right). hiiragi and shizu know the story of the past, but ritsuka gets mafuyu's feelings better, so it leads to a lot of misunderstandings and they start to get the real problem only once they all share the information they have (when they're eating after mafuyu ignored them).
to conclude, hiiragi and shizu aren't always the best friends to mafuyu. but they sincerely try to be by staying by his side and advising him. they're not in his head, they can't guess what he wants to hear. if shizu didn't have good intentions, he wouldn't have advised mafuyu to quit music, even if it doesn't seem good to us readers. and hiiragi being selfish is part of his character : he's working on it by supporting mafuyu in what he does and keeping an eye on ritsuka may be his way to show it. you can't change someone selfish from one day to another, and i guess mafuyu accepted his nature anyway. you know, hiiragi isn't always acting selfish on purpose, he's just really self-centred, which means he's less aware of his surroundings than the others. the real friendship between hiiragi, shizu and mafuyu started during the series because what they had in the past was factice. 10 years later, they're all doing good together and are able to talk, fight and have fun together.
thank you so much for the ask :) it has a lot of hate in it i feel, but it's okay. tell me if i didn't answer all of what you said but i think it's a lot already... :)
Hello! I hope your having a nice day. I was thinking abt this and I thought that you could give me some insight. What do you think Yuki's and Shizu's relationship was like? We know that him and Hiragi got along very well. As Hiragi admired him. But it seems to me that in that chapter (I don't remember the # sorry!) Were Mafuyu asks Shizu advice for music and his relationship abt Ritsuka. That when Shizu gets WAY of topic and says that the group was super Yuki-centered and how that was irritating. It seems to me that maybe he didn't like how much everyone revolved around him and admired him? As if it irritates him? Idk we don't really have much insight from him what his relationship with Yuki was like. So we might not be ae to tell for sure.
Hello friend! Thank you! Hope you are having a good one too! I'd like to point you towards this meta of mine, Discovering the true intention behind Shizu’s actions in Mix_8 completely changed how I saw the Shizuragi ship! This meta, although it doesn't address your question directly, I think it clears a lot of things up so PLEASE READ before proceeding.
Shizu and Yuki's relationship explained
In my opinion, Kizu never fully goes into the details of the dynamics between Shizu and Yuki but out of everyone, Shizu felt least close to Yuki compared to Mafuyu and Hiiragi. Shizu feels like
Yuki adopted the abandoned Pomeranian and calico cat and he's just tagging along. But Shizu feels like he doesn't belong to the squad/isn't as close to Yuki is his own doing due to:
his own abandonment issues resultant from being a LITERAL foster child
him joining the childhood squad later than the rest of the three
thinking that his three friends as being better than him from birth.
In mix_9, Kizu's placement of Yuki, Mafuyu and Hiiragi on stage is literally so telling of how Shizu felt. Of course he could choose to be on that stage as well, but he needs help to make he feel like he is worthy of being on stage.
Hiiragi is amazing, because Hiiragi noticed that Shizu needed help, Hiiragi had always been leading Shizu ever since he was a little kid. Hiiragi is absolutely that kid who is annoying but makes everyone feel included. And Shizu, is so happy and appreciative of that
to the point of feeling possessive over Hiiragi.
Sometimes, people with abandonment wounds feel possessive and jealous easily. This is because they are always scared that everything good can disappear at any moment. It may result in a person feeling super clingy emotionally. In Shizu's case, he is outwardly nonchalant but inwardly super clingy. Shizu, at some point in his childhood started to romantically idolise Hiiragi.
SO, Shizu's felt irritated towards Yuki because Hiiragi idolised Yuki.
BUT, Shizu's own abandonment wounds clouded his judgement because he mistook Hiiragi's idolisation of Yuki as a romantic one instead of a paternal one. Shizu mistook Hiiragi as being in love with Yuki when Hiiragi actually put Yuki on a pedestal like a child admiring a fatherly figure.
Yuki I think for the most part didn't do anything objectively irritating to make Shizu dislike him. Neither did the squad, they were always hanging out together. Shizu's inferiority complex and attachment towards Hiiragi made him look for someone contrasting his own circumstances to blame, which was Yuki.
Yuki - most panels depict him as the popular kid
Shizu - the literal foster child
Yuki - has both Mafuyu and Hiiragi's attention
Shizu - feels like he has none, but in truth Hiiragi is quite observant of Shizu's hesitation in participating fun things to make an effort to include him.
It's basically like the song Heather by Conan Gray.
Because Shizu also saw Yuki as being better than him in the literal sense, this actually didn't allow Shizu to really understand Yuki as a multi-faceted person. I think Shizu for the most part just accepted Yuki as someone with better circumstances than him, even beyond death. BUT AGAIN, that doesn't make Shizu a bad person. It makes him a human one. On top of that, Shizu's abandonment wounds were exacerbated when Hiiragi continued to emotionally dump on him whenever he wanted to but look towards Yuki for motivation and inspiration. And those are pretty VALID feelings which needed to be communicated and addressed for healthy healing, which they were in mix_4 to Mafuyu and mix_8 to Hiiragi. As you pointed out, Shizu gets off topic with Mafuyu, this is a great thing because for once, he is acknowledging his own feelings outwardly rather than keeping them inside. This then led him to realise that he needed to clarify things with Hiiragi rather than let these feelings of abandonment brew longer.
Currently, I personally think he is no longer irritated at Yuki. Please remember that Shizu also lost Yuki. Grief for him could have also manifested as irritation. It’s all very complicated when you lose someone right? I think Shizu’s probably found the new song “To the Sea” just as healing as Hiiragi and Mafuyu, he’s just not really the outwardly expressive type. But Kizu Natsuki did put in some tender faces in the recent chapters.
Again, please read Discovering the true intention behind Shizu’s actions in Mix_8 completely changed how I saw the Shizuragi ship! (sorry for pasting again, it's just so important, I go into Shizu's insight so much more here).
As for Yuki, we never really get to have an insight into how Yuki feels about anyone, because he's passed away. We are only ever receiving second hand accounts of Yuki. But Kizu wrote it that way to highlight the fact that life is precious and if you're alive,
there is hope for you to tell your story and communicate clearly.
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If you like what you read, all I post is basically Given analysis content!
Do you think if Yuki had never died Mafuyu and him would have broken up? I just get the feeling when we see the flashbacks and when you pull off the rose coloured glasses that they were always heading towards an end granted painfully and reluctantly. I think it'd be easy to say they'd work it out eventually because they're best friends and young but as someone who ended a childhood bff'ship with some I'd considered my soulmate when you step back sometimes it's like 'oh okay' and that isn't bad.
Hello I'm back! I think you're so right! I think eventually, if they were both brave enough, they would have parted ways like Ugetsu and Akihiko. They would have realised that they are not actually super healthy for one another, as I mentioned in previous posts that there is an imbalance of power in the relationship and serious issues of codependency, so I would like to hope that Mafuyu and Yuki would realise that and choose to grow as separate people.
I'm proud of your resilience for going through the end of something and realising "it's ok!" Because it is, life goes on. Friendships are ebbs and flows, sometimes they are closer, sometimes they are further away because we each grow and change. and that's okay :)
SO IT'S ONLY BEEN A MONTH SINCE I JOINED THE GIVEN FANDOM...
On Sep 11th, I watched Given anime and the Given Movie. Then my brain stopped functioning for a whole week. Then I blitzed through the Given manga.
On Sep 18th is when I started this Tumblr to process the pain and joy that Given has 'given' me. 😭❤️🙏🥺
Today on October 18th is when I'm going to be handing in✨my Honours Thesis in Music Composition ✨ that I've been working on for two freaking years. It clocks in at:
- 62 pages
- 11,836 words
And since joining Tumblr and the Given fandom just a month ago, I've been keeping track of all my Given posts on a word doc, clocking in at:
- 113 pages
- 18,749 words
AND THAT'S ONLY THE 12 PUBLISHED METAS, that's not even the QUEUED or DRAFT METAS! I literally have a meta queued every Sunday until Jan 2nd 2022 as of right now. That's a total of 11 unpublished metas still unaccounted for.
SOOOOOO
WHICH UNIVERSITY HAS AN OFFER for a PhD in GIVEN ANALYSIS?
