Rant under the cut, could be construed as anti-ymichar but more just frustration with how it's treated
Warning for negativity, and scant NSFW elements as I get angrier and angrier lmao
Here’s the thing. I’m not anti-Yamichar. I’m not even anti-Nacht/Ichika, even though I’m not a fan of the ship, because I’m not anti-anything. Even if I don’t like a ship, I recognize good writing and good character development above all else. I’m old enough and I’ve been in fandom long enough that the “camps” don’t really fucking matter to me anymore. I’m a multishipper. Fucking whatever, right? I can appreciate anything you hand me, so long as it’s done well.
In theory, this could be a very interesting and compelling relationship if the right aspects are realized and it’s treated with respect, right? I like the concept of someone who has spent their entire life pushing back against society paired with someone who exists outside of society entirely and is trying to find how he fits in. They stand opposite to each other. There are interesting themes of isolation. Those are really strong starting elements.
What pisses me off, though, is that not even the canon interpretation of Yamichar is good, because Tabata doesn’t run with that angle, and for a mangaka who writes so many excellent female characters, I think this is really where he fell off. This ship as it exists in its canon state fundamentally requires the reader to disrespect Charlotte. That not only sucks the joy out of the dynamic, it is actively detrimental to her character while having no positive impact on Yami’s development either, and it sucks! It sucks. An interesting setup with a lot of potential has just been functionally fucking destroyed, and it makes me mad, and I don’t like the ship and the MAJORITY of the content produced for it as a result.
Let’s take a look at Charlotte’s character. She’s basically dealing with the double-edged sword of the stereotypical girlboss, right? A lifetime of harassment and annoyance from men over her beauty has led to her having an averse relationship to them because she wants people to see her for her strength instead. That’s very cut and dry, and while it’s a character trope that is almost never done right, it’s not a bad start by any means.
And we get so, so, SO close to having a good character for her. Tabata is so good with this stuff!! We get SO FUCKING CLOSE!! Because that’s not all that Charlotte is, she’s not just some man-hating Amazonian right? She doesn’t accept help from ANYONE. Not her squad, not her parents, no one. So, in traditional BC fashion, our expectations are subverted. She’s not a man-hater. She’s been isolated from her community because of her curse, she’s actively perpetuating her own isolation out of a mixture of pride and fear, and because she’s been told that only a man can save her, coupled with the harassment and her avoidance of receiving help from anyone, that’s why she has such a pointed dislike of men. That makes SENSE. That is a complex, well done character. Sasuga Tabata sensei.
So we’ve got this character. What is a good arc for Charlotte? Well, in theory, the development runs from unable to accept help —> able to accept help, and here’s the key part, WITHOUT SACRIFICING HER COMPETENCY. The origin of all of this is that Charlotte doesn’t want to be seen as incompetent. The origin of all of this is that Charlotte has been constantly told that she can’t save herself. That's how she frames it. And it might seem antithetical, but that trauma can absolutely be coupled with an arc that involves accepting help, because those two things are inherently related. In theory, Charlotte goes from a woman focused only on her own competency, unable to accept help from others, to a woman who is still competent, but gets help from the people around her, yes, including men.
You know what absolutely torches this entire character outline?
Making it into a joke.
Now, every story needs comedy, even and especially slapstick comedy. I’m not saying that all of the funny parts of their relationship need to be sacrificed, this isn’t a fucking noir film. But the moment that this falls apart is the moment where Charlotte acts incompetently because of a man. It’s not cute, it’s not ironic, and it’s not even funny, because all of that fundamentally undermines her character arc. This is beyond not understanding the assignment, this is actively feeding it to your dog. And the joke seeps into EVERYTHING, even moments that SHOULD be development for her.
Charlotte getting support from her squad in a rare moment of development for her character? Z’omg, we were all dating anyway, let’s girl talk about the guys we like!!
Someone showing up for her after she gets fucking possessed, seeing her vulnerable, and accepting her for it? BUT WHAT IF HE LIKES MEEEEEEE AAAAAAAAAAA like it’s not only annoying, it’s actively bad, because this kind of thing is fine in small doses, but this is all we get for her. I initially laughed at the post-elf arc scene, but now every time I see it I just get sad, dude.
Charlotte gets drunk trying to impress Yami, and doesn’t show up for the Star Festival. Incompetence. Charlotte slowly acts more and more a fucking idiot around this man, and it flattens her to the point where a character that I actually like quite a lot is almost unbearable to me, and I!! HATE IT!!
Now, how does a relationship to Charlotte benefit Yami’s character development in canon?
It doesn’t.
It literally doesn’t.
There is no juncture at which Yami’s motifs are engaged by him interacting with her. He stays functionally the same throughout almost all of their interactions. Whenever we see Yami getting development (and to be fair, mentor characters don’t get much development anyway, but Yami’s themes of community, self-esteem, and otherization are HARDLY tied up guys let’s be fucking forreal) it’s mostly with Julius or his squad (incl. Nacht). I’ll accept Jack, Morgen, or William, since all of them are foils for him, but the main group is Julius and the squad.
Now, in this theoretical world we’re creating, how COULD a relationship to Charlotte benefit Yami’s character development?
I want to be crystal fucking clear here. Most important people in Yami’s life? The Bulls. The fucking Bulls, and also his father figure. So it is, so it ALWAYS will be. I do not accept notes or corrections on this point and this point only.
And here’s the thing: it's okay for the romantic relationship to be secondary, even if it's the focus of the piece. Yami can still find a meaningful relationship and development with a romantic figure, because while his family is his MAIN source of development, it’s not his ONLY source of development. But when you’re writing Yamichar, bar AU, you are spotlighting and exploring a secondary relationship. Kill the idea that romantic relationships are more important than platonic. Kill it kill it kill it kill it with fire burn it I’m SO FUCKING SICK OF PEOPLE DOING THIS.
Both of them are outcasts from society. That has traumatized both of them, for different reasons. Yami is otherized, and Charlotte is essentially commodified. They’ve been brought together by him saving her, which is exactly what she DIDN’T want to have happen. Like I said, interesting concept!! So how does he develop? Well, he’s already come to the conclusion that he’s never going to be fully accepted by Clover society, because even while he might still be subconsciously trying to fit in, he’s taken a role that really doesn’t allow that for himself. The thing is that in Charlotte, I think he would find that he’s not alone.
The important part of Clover’s society is that it victimizes everyone, it isolates the nobles, kills the peasants, it treats the commoners like expendable garbage, it turns the middle nobility against their own best interests, no one is safe. And Charlotte isn’t divorced from all of that, if anything she’s a prime example of it. So, through his relationship with her, Yami becomes less alone. Yami gets vindication that he desperately needs, vindication that this society is broken, vindication that even if you're the golden child of a powerful family, you can still have almost the exact same massive problems that he does. It’s fine if he develops less than Charlotte, because — remember, Charlotte’s developing all by herself, and he’s not — but he can’t not develop at ALL.
Let me make another thing ABUNDANTLY FUCKING CLEAR: THEY ARE NOT. FIXING EACH OTHER. He is not fixing her "man-hating." She is not fixing his disconnect from Clover. Yami is not getting gentrified, and Charlotte is not getting defanged. And another thing: if I see another fucking fic with Charlotte Roselei barefoot and pregnant down on the farm, or giving up her career for her husband, being the stay at home parent, I am going to start BITING PEOPLE. You know who the nurturer in this relationship is? Who’s been fostering kids since twenty? YAMI. Charlotte's only claim to the "nurturer" role is her vagina, and are we really, reeeeeally doing that in 2024?
And at the same time you also can’t write this as Charlotte being the only capable one between them, because that’s hardly true either. Not just girlbossing, certainly not whatever deranged gooner shit I’ve seen plastered all over Ao3, but a secret fucking third thing!! She’s not just a bitchy pregnant woman with a lot of power! Oh my FUCKING god!!! Every time I see this ship done like this it just exhausts me dude I can’t do this I'm so tired
Wild knows that I’ll write even the most insane of M/F ships when I’m fucking compelled by it. You can make any pairing you want work with the right angle, and the way that Tabata and some parts of this fandom treat this pairing disgusts me, not on a ship-based front, but down to the very fundamental of the craft. You want to write Charlotte getting railed through her bed frame, hyper-submissive, whatever you want? It can be done! It can work! There are no limits here!! I just want to see a little care and consideration taken with these characters, I’m so fucking goddamn tired of wishing for what could have been, and I am most certainly not beholden to a dynamic that is actively destroying itself instead of being interesting just because it's canon.
That's it.
