Arsene

hey i just want to say i find it so wonderful and relieving when other xiv fans also see emet selch as a gay man. from the very first moment he walked on screen, the energy of “bitter old Hollywood theater queen” was so strong and such blatant coding i never even had to consciously think about it, it was just a given. but lo and behold, i got into the fandom after catching up on the story, and found much to my shock that TONS of people are shipping him with their female wols??? i allow that fans in japan (and maybe other places, idk) might see him differently because the cultural tells for queerness are totally different there, but i have to raise my eyebrows at the americans playing the english version and still missing it. he’s literally an aging theater enthusiast in a fur-lined robe who quotes Lauren Bacall and wears noticeable makeup, whose signature body language is either a snap or a limp-wristed wave over the shoulder, and they’re somehow seeing someone who might like women? i just have to laugh. and yes, insert mandatory caveat that it isn’t that serious and there’s nothing wrong with how they’re playing barbies, but at the same time i genuinely don’t get how they aren’t seeing it. which is an extremely long winded way to say, thank you for seeing the obvious with me. i don’t necessarily expect you to publish this because it IS kind of swinging a bat at a hornet’s nest and i doubt you want that kind of attention, but i just want you to know some of us also get it. happy pride 🏳️‍🌈

I do think people who say "travel companion Zenos" isn't interesting/realistic are missing that 1.) Zenos would quite literally do anything for the WOLs attention, including sitting still occasionally. And 2.) The comedy of the rest of Etheirys reacting to, and having to deal with the WOL choosing to keep Zenos around is a type of awkward comedy that frankly writes itself. Could you imagine the Scions reacting to the WOL going everywhere with Zenos in toe and having to address the fact that he's in the room? Could you imagine Zenos’s flat commentary in the background to all the silly/ crazy things that happen throughout the course of an expansion? Could you imagine watching all the WOL's friends having to both see and admit to themselves that Zenos attempting to be "good" (i.e. aiding the WOL when they ask) is a thousand times more terrifyingly uncomfortable for them than Zenos being a god-like enemy because it forces them to think over concepts of morality and character growth that are beyond the black and white of "good people are always good and right and bad people are always bad and wrong"?