Status dramaticus

Something about the characters named Arthur

Disclaimer: I only read till NT 16 as I’m writing this. But basically, I don’t see them as a good fit anymore. As a young teenager, I shipped Mikoto and Touma all the way back during the second season of Railgun when Touma saved her (and her Sisters). But I have no idea if I shipped them because I found them to be cute together or because Touma was literally the only male character who interacts with Mikoto. But Mikoto fell for him and well, I was rooting for my girl to get some.

And then I discovered Index, which follows Touma’s life, and found out that our hero is infamous for being a dense boy with all the girls throwing themselves at him. But to be fair, showing interest can be easily misinterpreted by the receiver if not stated cleary. They would think that it’s just a nice gesture and nothing more, nothing less. The girls can do something ‘nice’ and Touma would be nice too them in a platonic way, because he wouldn’t know what they want because he can’t read their minds. Touma strikes me as someone who won't get ahead of himself and think that girls are interested in him (because he thinks no girl will like him due to his misfortune). You have to clearly say it to his face for him to get the clue. 

The only girl, as far as I know, that confessed her love was Index at the start of the series (correct me if i’m wrong). Her feelings, however, were not towards him but towards the Touma before the amnesia, so they left it at that. Honestly, I’m surprised that Index hasn’t brought it up after being this long. But yeah, kinda bitter now that I think about it. Truthfully, even if he wasn’t so dense I doubt he’d be in a relationship. I don’t think love is something that would be on his mind with everything going on in his life. He’d believe that his misfortune would possibly endanger his partner.

Anyway, the longer I was waiting for some progress between Touma and Mikoto, the more I thought ‘this is not gonna work out’. Especially with how the NT was handling Mikoto. I love how Mikoto is herself in the Railgun manga and how she handles herself , but the NT just throws that out of the window and it pains me to see her struggling so much. Volume 13 was especially hard to read as a Mikoto fan. She´s chasing after Touma (figuratively and literally) almost all the time and having admiration for someone is completely fine don’t get me wrong, but she wants to stand by his side so badly to the point that it’s destroying herself. It makes me wanna go up to her and say ‘hey, stop, this is not healthy anymore’. I love her... but just not when she is with him.

As an adult now, I can clearly see the red flags waving. The show makes it pretty clear that he just sees her as a friend/junior and I don’t we’re gonna get a confession from Mikoto anytime soon, because of her tsundere nature. There could be some progress, if she was more honest with herself and with Touma. There are some moments here and there were she bared her heart out, but it is balanced out by shocking him when she is embarassed. A lot of people, including me, don’t like how violent she is sometimes around Touma (thankfully it gets better).