The thing that struck me this episode about Chris is how in love with Victor he is. It might be an idolization, but there’s still an infatuation there. I think Chris is meant to be a foil to Yuri and to show why Victor chose Yuri instead of continuing to skate and “belong” to everyone else.
Chris’ style of eros is not “mature,” it’s a demand for attention, specifically, Victor’s attention. This is more specific statement on their skating styles, but since this show is about love and Chris thought about how Yuri’s “innocent” eros had no chance of keeping Victor against his “mature” eros, I’ll use this to expand on my point with their styles of the seduction of Victor.
Victor is used to people demanding and begging for his attention. He’s hot, he’s a brilliant skater, he’s very popular, and many people find him to be their inspiration for skating in the first place. We see in this episode that it’s why Chris pushes himself so hard, and we’ve seen that he’s who Russian Yuri aspires to be. But for Victor, who has seen the best skaters in the world time and time again, this is all background noise. I’m sure he forgot his promise to Russian Yuri in terms of creating choreography for him because he gets requests like that a lot. Hell, he probably doesn’t even remember the above exchange with Chris because that, too, has happened so many times. So it takes more than just being the best to attract Victor’s attention, and, in fact, Victor told us what it takes: Yuri’s ability to move with the music. Not just move in time, but to really feel it, to sink into the notes, the swell, to embody the language and emotion of the music you’re skating to. It takes a routine to an entirely different level when you’re watching someone who believes so much in the story they’re telling with their routine, that you, the audience, picture it as well. Yuri has the ability to make his performance transformative, and that’s what Victor was drawn to. Remember when Victor was scolding Yuri mentally for thinking too much during a routine? Think too much, and you won’t be able to really lose yourself in the performance and it comes off stiff.
With Chris, his performance first performance was a seduction, yes, but an aggressive, demanding one. There was a lot of sticking his butt out, ass grabbing, twerking, very in-your-face movements meant to shine ten thousands spotlights on his ass. He says that Yuri can’t compete with him, that he’ll make Victor come back to the ice. He will seduce Victor through his routine by shoving his ass out there for Victor to notice. Why? Because that’s the only way Chris can get close to Victor. That’s the only way anyone – aside from Yuri – can get close to Victor. Yuri even said in the very first episode he’d been dreaming of being able to share the ice with Victor one day, because that was as close as he knew he’d ever be able to get. Victor is so distant with everyone, while maintaining an illusion that he’s letting you get so close. It’s part of this persona he’s built. Notice how in the first episode, when he sees Yuri staring at him, he doesn’t act creeped out or ignore him or tell him to stop. He assumes Yuri is a fan and offers a commemorative photo. Yuri walking away is probably the first time Victor’s encountered that reaction, and probably why Victor stared after him. Had known about Yuri’s ability to embody the music, he would have probably done more than offer a photo.
So because Victor offers this illusion of being so close and friendly with everyone, people like Chris are angry and jealous about Victor quitting skating. Now they will be unable to grab his attention by their performances. His eyes will only be on Yuri. They’ll be unable to share the ice with him. He only shares it with Yuri. They can no longer stand next to him on the podium. Yuri has Victor all to himself at the kiss and cry. Victor still offers good luck to each contestant, but it’s Yuri he is cheering hardest for, it’s Yuri he’s offering the most hearty congratulation, it’s Yuri he wants so badly to win. Now all of Chris’ illusions are shattered (lots of shattering in this show) and he realizes he was never very close to Victor at all once Victor devotes himself to Yuri. So what does Chris do? Seduce him away from Yuri.
It’s all he knows how to do. No one but Yuri knows why Victor chose to leave. No one but Yuri knows what drew Victor to him in the first place. Maybe they think it’s a goodwill thing, that he feels badly for Yuri and also wants to try out something new with skating by being a coach and making a winner out of Yuri who came in last the year before. What they don’t know is that Victor saw something in Yuri, and he wants to show that to the world. So Chris assumes that once Yuri loses or chokes, or Chris shows himself to be the superior skater, Victor will lose interest and go back to skating (or maybe even coach one of them). That’s why Chris’ first performance was so overtly sexual; if he causes enough of a stir, makes it sexual enough, he can seduce Victor into leaving Yuri.
But this is Victor, who has probably seen every kind of performance out there, from the subdued to the overtly sexual. What interests Victor instead is the subtlety of a performance. Victor choreographed Yuri’s routine of Eros. Eros is sexual love, and yet Yuri’s routine is not overtly sexual. I mean, the boy made it sexual in episode 6 with that lick, but that was his own doing. Victor is more concerned about the movement of his body, the gestures, the way Yuri lets the music speak through him. VIctor was more satisfied with Yuri’s performance once Yuri chose to embody a woman, rather than a man. When he’s learning how to move like a woman, he says he won’t have to change the routine at all, just change small things about the way his body moves. Subtle things. When Russian Yuri was learning his Agape routine, he snapped at Victor that he was performing it exactly the way Victor had shown him, but Victor wasn’t satisfied. He wanted Russian Yuri to embody agape, which Russian Yuri only was able to do when he thought of his grandfather. The steps of his routine never changed but his expression, the flick of a hand, maybe even the way he tilts his head changes. Subtle things. This is what satisfies Victor.
So what does all this mean? I think it’s meant to show us what exactly makes Yuri different from the rest. Not his idolization of Victor, not any physical appearance factor, not whether or not he’s a good skater. I think this is meant to reassure us that Victor chose Yuri because of what he saw in him, the sincerity and rush of emotions in that first youtube video, and what Victor knows Yuri is capable of. Remember, Christophe placed second in the previous year’s Grand Prix, and Yuri came in last, but Yuri is the one Victor chose. No matter what happens, if Yuri chokes and tanks his performance again, if he does his best, but still doesn’t get gold, or if he wins the entire thing, Victor will truly stay with Yuri because Victor’s interest and love started when he saw a glimpse of who Yuri was, and a love like that is something that will last.
Sorry Christophe, but maybe you can talk with Phichit about getting a few videos from time to time of Yuri and Victor when they’re being stupidly cute and sweet together.
@victuurimarch i don’t know if this is what you had in mind, but I hope it’s the kind of meta you wanted.
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