#blue theory

That makes purple.

Which means!

Mm, cheesecake 🤤

WRITE THAT DOWN WRITE THAT DOWN oh im hungry too share some

It seems.... bluer....

Like he saw Langa's awed face and was thinking, "Yeah, I know that look, doesn't lead to anything but heartbreak."

That frame is one of my favourite shots. It belongs right in a “Sk8 No Context” video. In fact, that’s probably why it was included.

I see it as caution, and instead of seeing himself in Langa, he sees Adam*. There’s the “Blue Theory” that I’m yet to write out I full, only backed up by that after-credits scene with Kaoru/Kojiro in episode nine. And while what Kojiro and Kaoru say about the matter contradicts what I just said, perhaps Kaoru’s stance on Kojiro “overestimating Langa” wasn’t that to begin with.

*I can quite unfortunately see a whump fic somewhere about Reki breaking up with Langa, or something, and pushing him into becoming the “next Adam”, either alongside Adam himself or against Adam’s desires (now that he’s all “reformed” or whatever… spoiler alert: he really isn’t), though given the circumstances of such a fic being created I can imagine it’s alongside Adam. (Eve goes a bit crazy, for real.) It’s shipping. I don’t want to find out if such a fic exists unless the ship, if included at all, is depicted negatively and as a “grave mistake”, or something. So, I’m not looking.

I see it, with episode nine in correlation. Kaoru is studying Langa, and Reki, and seeing himself, Kojiro and Adam from when they were kids (with a few differences, of course). Reki in this situation is Kojiro and Kaoru, and Langa is Adam. Makes sense, right?

Well, there’s a few shifts that I think Kaoru has studied (as the “smart one” of the group, I’m sure) Langa and Reki as to assure his suspicions of the similarities, or a lack thereof.

In fact, when I’d first seen this ask a few days ago, I’d gotten the idea to make a Venn diagram of all the similarities I could remember without rewatching the show:

Incidentally, Langa’s exclusive qualities are also connected to Adam — but he’s not included here, for obvious reasons.

The immediate parallels in terms of “Renga vs. Matchablossom” would be Reki/Joe and Langa/Cherry. Though, outside of ship dynamics (I’d so badly wanted to put “bisexual” and “gay” in the diagram, but withheld my compulsions — though, I did allow myself the “Lovestruck Stare”, as that’s canon compliant enough, with Kojiro giving several to Cherry and Langa to Reki, breaking the “obvious parallels” immediately, giving Langa and Joe more leverage as counterparts over Langa and Cherry) the parallels, as I’d just mentioned in parentheses, are more complex.

TL;DR: I really need to write my Blue Theory out in full, but here is the “character parallels” in the main cast (which doesn’t play into the Adam/Langa parallels as much as the Blue Theory does, with some Cherry on the side, and maybe some Tadashi/Reki parallels to compare with how they nurtured their own foils with Adam/Langa respectively).

The parallels aren’t as straight forward, but I think the main takeaway is just: