Currently reblogging Y!!!OI posts from 2016-2017

so everyone loves the trope of yakov immediately reversing the shotgun talk he intended for yuuri and instead warning viktor DON’T YOU DARE LET YUURI GO, HE’S THE SON I NEVER KNEW I WANTED

After Yuuri wins Onsen on Ice, he agonizes a bit and admits to his mother that he worked so hard to make sure Victor would stay, but now that he’s staying, Yuuri isn’t really sure what to do with him, now that Victor’s coaching is one-on-one with no Yurio around. Not to mention, what about the rest of the time! Victor’s just always around and Yuuri doesn’t want him to be bored but what’s he supposed to do, conjure a Eurotrash nightclub out of thin air for him? Fly in a bunch of Russian models and celebrities so Victor has his usual crowd to hang out with?

“I don’t think Vicchan needs much,” Hiroko says. “When you and Yurio were running around and working so hard, Vicchan seemed perfectly content to spend his free time playing with his dog and reading a book.”

Yuuri pulls at his own hair. “I can’t tell Victor NIkiforov to go read a book!”

“Well, no, you shouldn’t say it like that,” says Hiroko. “You should be gentle with that boy’s feelings, Yuuri. He has a lot of them.”

“What am I supposed to do about that?” Yuuri moans into his hands.

“Whatever you decide to do, be kind to him,” she says. “Be careful not to break his heart.”

“Mom. It’s not– there’s no way– it’s Victor.” 

“It’s Vicchan,” Hiroko answers. “And if you let him, he’ll follow you around just like our little Vicchan did.”

Sweet gentle Hiroko just LAYING INTO Yuuri

Like Yuuri and Victor just stand there stunned as she lectures Yuuri in furious Japanese. So fast that Victor can’t keep up. At the end she grabs Victor’s hands and sits him down in the next room and brings him a bowl of Katsudon.

“Vicchan if Yuuri ever hurts you you come to me! I’ll put him to rights” she tells Victor before kissing him on the head and leaving, muttering in Japanese as she goes. Victor only catches Yuuri’s name and the word “Baka”

Yuuri pokes his head around the corner to see a shocked Victor touching the top of his head.

“Is it safe?” Yuuri asks.

So I was looking at these pictures

and I thought “This looks like their joint bachelor party/weekend” and then I was wondering..why is JJ there?

And my brain answered “Because he and Yuuri are now friends and good enough friends that he’s JJ groomsman and then I had to write how that happened so

JJ makes a friend!

JJ slumped against the wall just inside the men’s toilet having slipped away from anyone who might be looking to ‘cheer him up’.  It’s not that he didn’t appreciate his fiancée’s support, or the support of his parents or fans but he’d messed up and they didn’t seem to understand that bronze didn’t help because he didn’t feel he deserved it.

He didn’t look up when the door opened but he scrubbed his face with the back of his arm (when had he started crying) and straightened up to put on his confident face again.

A warm hand rested on his shoulder.

“Hey,” a soft accented voice filled his ears and he turned his head to see warm brown eyes behind glasses, “You don’t have to pretend. It sucks doesn’t it? When the pressure gets to you and feel like your arms and legs are made of lead? I know, I crashed and burned like this last year didn’t I? But you did what I couldn’t. You picked yourself back up and made it. You helped inspire me because I watched you struggle and thought ‘No one has the right to mock the challenge he took on, and I don’t regret the challenges I’ve taken on’. You helped me remember that picking yourself back up is what matters…but I get that it still sucks and the aftermath weighs you down and it’s okay. You’re allowed to be upset and to cry.” Yuuri Katsuki told him and JJ felt the genuine admiration in his voice and that permission to let go and just lost it. Crying out his frustration with himself and his disappointment and he found himself hugging Yuuri who patted his back as JJ let the storm of his emotions take him.

Seriously love how their outfits have their favourite things!

Victor in Poodles, Yuuri in Kastudon, Phichit in Hamsters and Yurio in tigers!

Surprised slightly that Otabek is wearing birds of prey but not at all surprised that JJ is wearing his own initials (and let’s be real Yuuri is the one inviting him to this stuff because they sort of bonded over Grand Prix meltdowns and being too awkward to make friends albeit in different ways)

Welcome To The Madness manga full PT. 2

Welcome To The Madness manga full PT. 1

A person in their twenties is going to look goofy trying to pull that off but a 15 year old edge lord has the earnestness and the anger to pull it off.

That Victor Nikiforov 5 time world Champion we all assumed was a debonair playboy who was way too cool

And it turns out that instead he’s a utter love sick

DORK 

With NO CHILL AT ALL

Me: *shows husband Yuri on Stage fanart*

Husband: I don't understand any of this

Me: look it's very simple. They are drunk, Yuuri says Victor isn't as flexible as a shachihoko which is a mythological fish with a lion head which is can be a statue on buildings. Victor mishears him thinking it's a ex. Kinda like hearing Gayle or Gary instead of Gargoyle. So to prove his love he scales the castle and does naked stretching to prove his worth and his love

Husband: You watch a weird show

Me: this wasn't in the show. It was a dramatic reading with the voice cast

Husband: still you watch a weird show

Me: like you wouldn't watch that. And like you can't imagine that happening on Brooklyn 99

Husband: ...

Husband: Damnit I can completely imagine Peralta being arrested for that and it would be hilarious

Bad jealousy: I’m jealous so you can’t talk to anyone else and I’m going to yell at you

Now that sucks a little because us international folk are going to have to work hard not to get spoiled and have to wait a long time to get the movie BUT yoi has done so well internationally we MAY get an international release.

Victor.

Victor you are not a vampire from an Anne Rice novel.

Victor.

Less ruffles.

- we get a canon gay couple

-who are confirmed as soulmates who can’t live without each other

- and they are basically canonically given a smol angry child to parent

- said smol angry child has a friendship (possible future romance) with a guy who rides a motorcycle

- and is a DJ

- and we regularly get official artwork of this podium family being adorable dorks

- not to mention all the merch

- The two female skaters Sara and Mila are shown together a lot

- as are Mickey and Emil

- so we ship them and get a lot MORE suggestive artwork from the staff

- we get Phichit in short shorts

- and an implication that all the skaters came to visit Yuri’s hometown

This is episode 3. This is after he bombs the Sochi Grand Prix and Nationals. Yuri believes he’s a dime a dozen but Victor already knows Yuri is capable of winning, and has always been capable of winning.

Because they are all as extra and ridiculous as him

And like he had almost daily phone calls of “Are you engaged yet? Does he want more dogs? Does he want kids? Should we buy him a car? Should we send his parents a faberge egg or would they prefer diamonds?”

Now I have talked about the many reasons I love Yuri on Ice from how much I like Victor to how true Yuri’s anxiety is portrayed to how wonderful Victor and Yuri’s relationship is. All of that is still true and really important but in my house that’s all a little overshadowed by the most important thing about the show.

How it portrays gender.

All three of the main characters are shown as having a certain fluidity about their genders. Young Victor with his long hair:

Wearing a costume that was deliberately designed to represent both genders at once. When he announced that it was fondly, Victor was clearly very comfortable with being ambiguous with his gender. 

Then when Yuri heard that he felt a deep connection with that outfit and chose it for his own program. Leading Yuri into learning to move in feminine ways as it was “closer to how he felt”

Even later when Victor tells him he no longer needs to envision pork cutlets or women, that he can skate Eros as himself, Yuri still brings a feminine aspect to the program.

At no point is this blurring of gender lines mocked by anyone involved nor is it played for laughs. 

Yurio has it as well when Lilia meets him and sets a goal for him:

Mila is surprised when Lilia says she’ll turn Yurio into a Prima Ballerina but no one else is and Yurio, angry salty Yurio, is completely comfortable with that. Despite his violence and general angry attitude he embraces moving gracefully and with beauty in a feminine way. He’s totally fine with it except for when JJ says “Lady’s first” because that is the only time his femininity is mocked in anyway.

And here’s the thing, we’re supposed to hate on JJ for that, because he makes a joke about it he’s the antagonist for Yurio and we’re supposed to dislike him in that moment.

As a genderfluid person with a bigender child this show was incredibly important for how it showed the blurring of gender lines. None of the characters were obliquely labeled as non-binary but it wasn’t hard for my kid to see themself in the main characters. It’s part of the reason why they love it so much because they do see the main three as non-binary.  The fact that they decided they wanted to start the process of coming out at school after we started watching Yuri on Ice together may be a coincidence and it may not but I know it has meant the world to them to see characters they love acting in a way that comes across as non-binary and it not being played for laughs.

In fact it’s shown as a strength, Yurio finding a beauty that is all his own past the prima ballerina into a beauty and, I would argue, still partly feminine grace that is all his own won him gold. 

Yuri uses his beauty and strength that I would argue blurs gender just as much to win Silver and of course Victor, 5 time world Champion, was never afraid to move with grace and beauty that again touched on the feminine side. His “Stay Close to Me” program was to my eyes a blend of masculine and feminine as well.

It made my genderfluid heart glad that these characters were able to blur those lines between male and female and find a beauty and strength that was unique to them and distinctly different from each other as well. 

I know it is extremely important to my child as well.

Here is what we decided:

What we like most about Victor: How you start off thinking he’s this genius ice skater who is suave and incredibly charming only to discover that he is actually a huge lovesick dork

What we like most about Yurio: He is so angry on the outside but actually sweet on the inside

What we like most about Yuri: That being in love didn’t fix his anxiety and that he never gave up, not even when his brain really wanted him to. He kept working hard and trying anyway.