#kantchrist

[akkpipitphattana]

my personal headcanon is that kant never actually deletes the footage he has of the captain bribing the principal. he keeps it in order to blackmail the captain anytime he needs help for years just like the captain did to him

[akkpipitphattana]

I've seen a lot of ppl frustrated at Kant/the Captain for meeting up outside the bar, but my take on it was that was a deliberate power play by CC (not that I don't think he's inept enough to do so out of sheer stupidity!) - Kant had clearly been ignoring his calls, as implied by his convo with Style and explictly seen in his convo with Bison (and when he says he's sick of his 'customer' flip-flopping and doesn't want to talk to him anymore, that's obviously a declaration of intent vis a vis continuing his relationship with the police), and what do cops do when their informants aren't co-operating? They pile on the pressure. And one way to do so is to turn up in front of their informants in public spaces, because they are happy to use the threat of blowing their cover as leverage - talk to us, or else we'll make sure everyone sees/knows what you are. Wouldn't surprise me if they had someone tracking Kant and CC sent him a message along the lines of 'either you come out or we come in.' Look at Kant's body language - he doesn't want to be there, he's frustrated, he's on edge, but at this point he's also visibly exhausted and probably on some level thinking slightly self-destructively - if he gets caught then at least it'll be over, at least CC can't use him anymore, at least he doesn't have to tell Bison himself and see with his own eyes what the truth does to him.

I know fandom in general is sympathetic to the ACAB sentiment, but I'm getting the feeling ppl don't fully appreciate just how fucked up the dynamic between a handler and an informant can be at the best of times, let alone when the handler is corrupt or at the very least abusing their position! I've seen (valid) accusations of grooming levelled against Lilly, but it's not something that only happens to children - all it takes is a significant power differential and someone who is at risk. And we've seen CC using the classic combo of praise and pressure - he switches from flattering Kant ('I know you can do this', 'you certainly lived up to my expectations') to threatening him (which goes beyond the initial outright blackmail - when he says stuff like 'you think they'll let you live once we arrest them?', that is a threat, that is him saying to Kant: we won't protect you - you quit now, you're on your own).

I really appreciated your tags on the height as power play thing, because that jumped out at me when I watched that scene, and it was so sad seeing Kant desperately trying to wrest back the upper hand and suddenly looking so much younger and more vulnerable as soon as CC stood up. And I admit we're veering into fanon rather than canon now, but it just makes me even more curious about his timeline - how old he was when he got caught? Did CC start off as a sort of quasi-father figure? Is that how he reeled him in? Did it begin, not with blackmail, but with manipulating Kant into wanting his approval? Perhaps my most burning question, however, is: what if this isn't even the first time he's been used as a honeytrap?? And I know it's most likely just First being incaptable of not having ridiculous chemistry with every single man who so much as breathes in his vicinity (let's face it, there's a reason the top three 'ghost ship' pairings on that poll are all First-based! But isn't it also because of the potential Kant brings as a character - the potential backstory tween him and Style/CC, the potential hate-sex with Fadel...), rather than anything deliberate but...the *vibes*! If you lean into that side of things and headcanon that yes, Kant did in fact fuck that cop, then phew, there is SO much to unpack there!

This is why I don't get viewers sleeping on Kant - imo he's the most interesting character! There are so many layers! Out of the main four, we probably know the least about him, and part of that is because we can't even trust that what we've ostensibly learned is even true! That whole riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma thing? That's him! And not even because he's that complicated a person deep down - most of the meta I've read here has, I reckon it'll turn out, already nailed it. It's just that a combo of the tricksy and subtle way he's been written/played and the narrative role he's been given requires us to do some of the legwork ourselves (by which I apparently mean, you know, actually paying attention and caring??) to determine what in his words/actions/feelings/face is authentic and what's not, and when, and why, etc (heaven forbid we have to read between the lines!). Maybe some more casual viewers aren't used to that in their bls, and I totally get that ppl go into shows for different reasons and some just want the light entertainment/aesthetic appreciation of it all and aren't interested in deep dives and 10,000 word analyses, and that's absolutely their prerogative! We've all been there! But equally, you don't then get to complain about the writing/acting/characterisation when, by choice, you've skipped/missed/misinterpreted what's being put onscreen (disclaimer: I'm not saying no criticism allowed - there's things I'd have tweaked - just not when it's unfounded cos it's based on viewer indifference/ignorance). I don't want to use the term 'spoon-feeding', it feels ungenerous, and yet...!

Eek, this got away from me. Long story short: don't underestimate the lengths CC will go to just to keep Kant dancing to his tune, including risking his cover by showing up outside his favourite bar!

first of all, thank you for such a long ask, i love getting things like this in my inbox and be prepared for an equally long essay of my own shskdhd i will put it under a cut since your ask in itself is pretty long, but i agree with everything you said basically

i feel like every complaint i hear about kant just leaves me so very baffled. like at a certain point, you’re just coming up with reasons to be mad at him. and like i really wish that people would just fess up to the fact that they just don’t like him. that fundamentally something about him annoys them and that’s okay! you don’t need to like every character, but it pisses me off when people try to justify their dislike of anything by pulling reasons out of their ass. and like, okay, i understand that i obviously over analyze the shit out media i enjoy, and there are a lot people that don’t do that and watch with their brain turned off or just don’t put all the little things together. and that’s fine, but if you’re gonna complain about things at least make sure you’re complaining accurately. like some people didn’t even realize that christ was a cop until ep6 and apparently thought kant was doing it all for money?? when in their FIRST scene together, it is made explicitly clear that not only is christ a cop, but that kant is being blackmailed into this in order to keep his brother in his custody. you may not personally agree with everything he does, you may disagree how much of a choice he has in everything he does, but that does not change his motivations or the power that christ holds over him - and if you don’t realize at least those things, it’s not even a matter of media literacy, you are just not paying attention! or you’re skipping scenes and like, im not telling you how to enjoy shows, if you wanna skip scenes go ahead! but you can’t then complain about things that aren’t actually happening just because you tried to piece together what happened in the scenes you skipped 💀

and this complaint is especially silly because not only does kant explicitly emphasize that he’s been avoiding the captain and therefore we can assume the captain showed up to put pressure on him, but i feel like it’s been made pretty obvious that he doesn’t really have a choice in the meet up spots regardless? like they either meet at the police station/christ’s office, or he shows up in places that kant already is to talk to him, like the pool or the bar. so, i feel like getting mad at kant for that is so stupid? especially considering even IF meeting at the bar had been kant’s decision… he didn’t know bison was gonna show up?? he thought bison was in hiding and it’s his friend’s bar, so it’s a perfectly reasonable place for him to be and to be willing to meet up with the captain like?? he could not have predicted bison showing up after disappearing for a week post-failed murder attempt. like be serious.

when it comes to the acab aspect, i think trying to dive into people’s actual beliefs on that is a can of worms that will not end well shskdhd but in the very least, looking at it from a media perspective, i think in general people expect us to be supposed to root for the cops. like whether or not what you personally believe, the general sentiment in most media is that the cops are the good guys - because that’s the way we’re trained to believe that in society at large, so more often than not, it’s assumed that the cops in most shows are the good guys.

however, when you walk into a show like the heart killers, where 3/4 of our main protagonists are criminals (two murders and a former car thief) and the genre is explicitly a romcom, you have to also understand that the cops in a show like that are not gonna be the good guys! and i think in general, you have to be willing to understand that your personal morals and beliefs are not going to line up with the things these characters are doing. this is a show about assassins! if you’re going to try and argue for who’s morally in the right or who’s the most fucked up one, maybe this isn’t the show for you. and that’s okay!

all that to say you SHOULD be suspicious of the captain and his intentions - you should not trust him as some morally good figure because he’s been explicitly shown to be blackmailing and manipulating kant in all of this! he is a villain, explicitly so. and while i know we don’t have an exact age for when kant’s parents died and he had to start raising babe or for when he got caught, it’s very safe to assume this has been a long time thing. kant says their dad died young, babe says that kant raised him, so kant had to have been young when he had to start taking care of babe, and i’m assuming also pretty young when he got caught for his car thefts. so, it would not at all shock me if the captain saw a young, college-aged kant, who’d just lost his father and was desperately trying to keep himself and his pre-teen brother afloat, and saw an opportunity to put on the mentor role and mold this kid into what he wanted and needed. i think the lilly comparison makes perfect sense - because we’ve already been shown time and time again the similarities between the captain and lilly and the ways they manipulate kant, bison, and fadel. this being another way theyre similar would be no shock to me.

nor would it be a shock if the captain also made the relationship sexual at some point and kant having daddy issues and therefore being into it makes perfect sense as well shskdhd like you said i think it’s a combo of first having insane chemistry with everyone but also just kant’s character making these dynamics interesting - which is why first was the perfect casting choice they could have made shskdhd kant’s character in general is exceptionally fascinating to me, but i feel like i’ve made that pretty obvious with all my kant posting, and i don’t get how anyone can just write him off or view him as being one dimensional in anyway when he has SO MANY layers to him. he’s incredibly complex and that’s what i adore about him.

[akkpipitphattana]

im just saying if they could have lilly come back just so that fadel and bison could get to actually kill her, kant should have AT LEAST gotten to slap the captain once

[akkpipitphattana]

i still think if bison and fadel got to actually kill lilly that kant should have gotten to shoot the captain point blank

[akkpipitphattana]

god okay wait. rewatching ep6 and the directing in the scene with the captain is SO FASCINATING. i've already talked a little bit about it in the tags of this post and how kant's power is often shown through height and how specifically in this scene, kant towers over the captain when he's seated and tries to take his power back, but ultimately the captain stands up and he's taller than kant and he takes away kant's agency. but what's crazy is that christ barely has any actual height on kant.

there's no actual shot of them standing at their full heights close enough to measure well. this is the best screenshot i could get and even here it barely looks like christ has any height on kant - not to mention kant is hunched slightly. christ has MAYBE a few centimeters on kant, if he even has that when kant is actually standing fully upright.

so why does it FEEL like the captain is so much taller than kant in this scene? camera angles.

after the captain says that he thinks kant actually fell for bison, the rest of this interaction with them close together has all of kant's closeups shot from above. like the captain is looking down at him. (and down on him.)

and the closeups of the captain, while the change isn't as drastic, are shot from slightly below - as if kant is looking up at him.

they displayed the power dynamic through camera angles alone. jojo your fucking brain!!!!!

[akkpipitphattana]

Hello hello hello ✨

So, in keeping with my new tradition, I would like to probe your brain about the one scene that, surprisingly, stuck out to me this episode: the Kant and Lily interaction/proposition. (What I wouldn’t give for Bison to have overheard their conversation 😭)

I have so many whirling thoughts about this scene. Once again, I’m reminded of conversations surrounding Kant’s relationship with control, and, more directly, the nature of his arrangement with Captain. I’m honestly a bit surprised that the show included this section so openly, given the rather sub-text only nature of Captain’s, for lack of a better term, pimping of Kant. Honestly, I wish this was discussed further, but alas.

For what little screen time they have, Captain and Lily are fascinating characters, and their methods for manipulating and using others have captured my interest lately.

Additionally, if you have the time, I’d love to hear more from you about Kant/Bison’s dynamic, based on what we got this episode. (Apologies again for bugging you on this topic, I’m just desperate for solid, reasonable and coherent takes on the matter 🤣)

Best 💜

hiii, okay, so there's already been some discussions floating around about that and i've shared some of my own thoughts in the tags of this one by @hurlumerlu with additions from @deliriousblue and this one by @veliseraptor with an addition from @ameliarating

and i think it's just. a FASCINATING scene on a number of levels. like, i was also surprised they were talking about it so explicitly but also, it makes sense doesn't it? this is lilly, not the captain. she raised fadel and bison to kill people, she didn't beat around the bush about that, either. we also see fadel and bison being "pimp"ed out in their own ways as well! in the first scene of the show, bison is playing honeypot, and then he complains about not wanting to do it again in ep3 to fadel, so fadel does it. none of this is new for them! lilly pimping them out has been explicit from the very beginning

and it makes sense that she would be because she doesn't really NEED to sugarcoat anything, especially not with bison and fadel. she's a crimelord basically, why would she need to beat around the bush and mince words when it comes to that stuff?

but with kant and the captain, it's all a lot subtler. you have to pay close attention to notice that dynamic and put together that bison is likely not the first person that kant has had to seduce to get information from. like, there was plausible deniability at first because obviously he and bison had slept together, so what other tactic could he have really used. but like. then you think about how easy it was for him to fall into that role (i still stand by kant being an exceptionally bad liar regardless but that doesn't change the fact that he's charming, he can flirt, those things don't require lying in the same way a lot of things with bison did) and also how the captain didn't seem to question this tactic at all? that he encouraged it so readily? and the way he met kant at the onsen and slapped his thigh? it's all very.... icky, to say the least.

but like, of course the captain wouldn't say any of that explicitly. he's a cop, and a crooked one at that, he has to pick his words carefully. he's not gonna tell kant "you have to sleep with this criminal to get info" but he'd imply it. he'd put the idea in kant's head and then when kant does it of his own accord, well he never told him to do that did he? he just told kant to get the info, kant is the one that decided to do that by seducing them.

but yeah. the captain and lilly are very fascinating and truthfully, they're genuinely just alike. the unfortunate thing is, though, that the captain will probably not get any karma cause they'll probably have to end up working with him in order to take down lilly. i just want kant to punch the captain at least once tho, like is that too much to ask? he deserves it.

as for the other part of your ask, i'm always happy to talk about kb and their dynamic so please don't apologize sjdhfsdjf i'm gonna link a post that @sunsetsover made about their dynamic (specifically in the titanic scene) here cause i agree with everything she said!! i am still holding out hope that we'll get another more explicit negotiation or discussion, but i'm also very happy with the little scenes we've been getting. also, this episode did very much prove to me how much of a brat kant is skjdhsdf like his comments to bison when they reconnect about him forgetting he was a narc and bison immediately asking if he wants another scratch? kant attempting to get bison to stop distracting him in the car but then immediately getting all cute with bison when they're at the golf course? also kant immediately listening to bison telling him to stop vs bison who was definitely gonna keep distracting kant had lilly not walked out? oh yeah thats a brat and his dom if i've ever seen it sdkjfdsf

[akkpipitphattana]

Hello hello hello 👋

Gosh I have so many things to say and questions about this episode, but I’ll try and condense them the best I can 🤣 (unsuccessfully ✨)

1) Kant letting Bison tattoo him 💜💜💜 I was so so happy they included something like this, again, reading into subtext as I am ought to do, I can’t think of a more lovely way (within their dynamic specifically) for Kant to display his belonging to Bison. I’m curious if you had any nuggets of wisdom regarding this scene 👀

2) On that note, I find the choice of, essentially, tattooing his Safeword to be a rather striking one. I have mixed feelings on this, however, again I find that this could be interpreted as a branch of trust offered by Kant to Bison.

3) Captain 💀 (enough said)

4) I’m also a bit curious about your thoughts on the Lily-Kant scenes. Surprisingly, I found their interactions to be one of the more compelling parts of the episode for me.

Anyway, thank you again for always taking the time to write lovely responses to me rambling asks!

Best 💜

hiiii!

ugh god the tattoo scene was a LOT. like needing to suspend the disbelief of the actual tattoo healing process aside, it's just. such a sweet scene. like i understand the mixed feelings about kant tattooing his safeword, but i also feel like kant asking bison to tattoo him is, like you said, an act of trust and a way for kant to display his belonging. it's an act of submission! he's saying "tattoo me, brand me, make me yours." which is why i sort of feel like the safeword was the perfect choice for that. because while it's a way of kant being able to tell bison "stop," it's also in place because of the trust and love that exists between them. it's a representation of that dynamic between them, the fact that kant is willingly submitting to bison - that bison gives him the choice, which he's never gotten. and the fact that kant has a safeword he can use to tell bison when he needs to stop is proof of that choice and why i think it does work perfectly as the tattoo choice.

and then well, of course bison got the puffin, which i think is another representation of their relationship. not just cause puffins are obviously very similar to penguins, but because it's another promise they've made for a future together that they both want to fulfill. yes, it was from a night where kant was still lying and the future was uncertain, but now they are both sure of it and committed to it. for kant, having bison tattoo the penguin is an act of submission and trust - for bison, having kant tattoo the puffin is a promise of the future together. in many ways i think it WAS a psuedo wedding night like they talked about! a tattoo isn't a ring, but it is a permanent mark they're using to show their devotion and commitment.

the stuff with the captain was just. ugh. like kant and style meeting up with him while he's half-naked was yet another sleezy moment that makes you wonder about the things he's made kant do. and like. i'm glad that kant was able to get blackmail material on him and give a taste of his own medicine and i loved how adamant he was about the brothers getting their freedom even if fadel and bison were ultimately willing to take the deal he was offering. however, i do very much wish they could have taken down the captain too cause man i hate that bitch. in the very least kant should have gotten to slap him. which, side note, it did kind of annoy me that they had STYLE be the one making all the comments about not trusting the cops? like i'm not saying style's dumb, i don't think any of it was out of character, but kant is the one that has dealt with christ the most? he knows how untrustworthy he is, so i would have liked to have kant in the very least acknowledge that he knows style is right but also that there is really not much else they can do. like i know fuck the cops and what not but also realistically if kant has a sort of in with the police, why would he not try and use that? it is genuinely their best case scenario of helping keep the brothers out of jail, even if he shouldn't trust them. and i think it would have just been another way to acknowledge how kant tends to do things out necessity and not so much by choice, but i digress

i found the interactions between lilly and kant to be very fun lmao! like i think kant was a total badass in those scenes, i loved getting to see him absolutely destroy her reputation and then sit down to gloat about it smdhsdf the little cheers him and style did after she ran out was gold! i also found the way lilly's mood shifted when talking to nuch vs when she was talking to kant to be really interesting. like with nuch she was all smiles and sucking up, but with kant she was all business and very serious, making sure he knew she was in charge. but she wasn't! which i found VERY interesting, considering that he was placed above her in all of those scenes to show he had the upper hand! the use of height to show power in this show my beloved <3333

and thank you for always sending me these! it's always so fun to get questions like these <3

[akkpipitphattana]

“for the sake of this old colleague” is such a funny line to me. it sounds like a line said by a man in his 60s about to retire asking for one last favor from his old partner. kant you are 29 and you guys were not even colleagues he was blackmailing you baby