I fully intend on hitting ask limit on you and monkey meta. *pulls up to the askbox like a drive tru* yeah can i get an analysis of Antauri and Otto's relationship through the series with a side of shipping? and a large coke.
(hands you a coke) sorry bro are u ok with a small on the antauri/otto front haha
like. okay. i WISH THEIR RELATIONSHIP WAS EXPANDED UPON WITHIN CANON SO BADLY U DONT EVEN FUCKING KNOW
i feel like given room their dynamic couldve been SO interesting but like. it just. wasnt. and it makes me so sad
im ngl, im like... as diehard a gibson/otto shipper as u can get. but antauri/otto has definitely grown on me over the past couple weeks! otto is able to be actually honest about his feelings (which is something a lot of the team unfortunately lacks) and like. if he hadnt had to run away to protect chiro, OTTO COULDVE HELD HIS OWN AGAINST A FULLY MIND-CONTROLLED ANTAURI SO LIKE.....
otto actually has a LOT more emotional maturity than people give him credit for? he can be a bit of a doofus but when it comes down to it hes MASTERED being calm and taking charge when its necessary. night of fear, galactic smash and a bit of belly of the beast is what mainly comes to mind.
and im NOT just making this an otto meta i swear im just setting up my thoughts and to establish that like. even if he can come across as the Team Dad antauri with his overly-cool ways is like. still on Equal footing with the rest of the team (and by extension, otto, who usually gets the short end of the stick when it comes to how people portray him age-wise. i could go into a thing abt the infantilization of autistic people/characters but that isnt what were here for)
so.... in season one, lets be honest, we really.... dont get much antauri/otto interaction. we get more of antauri and GIBSON, and by season four theyre... barely even friends imho. BUT I DIGRESS!
the first REAL interaction between them off the top of my head? when antauri is reassuring otto of his skills in circus of ooze. so we can see right off the bat that antauri holds a LOT of respect for ottos engineering prowess. “your abilities are unequal in the universe” like HELLO?????? WE LOVE A SUPPORTIVE KING
so like... earlier on, otto and antauris relationship mainly is of otto giving up on SOMETHING and antauri reassuring him. which like.... isnt really the BEST base for a relationship, but u could argue that antauris character arc is about coming down and leveling the playing field with the rest of the team as chiro takes charge more and taking less of a paternal role to the main team and more of a ‘im just the friend who happens to know more sometimes’ backseat. so.
then we get to parts like i, chiro and both parts of the savage lands, where otto is like “hello i am still in the denial stage of grief” which HURTSSS but also. heh. as the mechanical genius of the team of course he would be the one who would believe that you could rebuild antauri via the silver monkey 😳😳😳
i also feel like ottos total faith in the super robot couldve worked itself nicely into antauris whole “machines can have a soul” thing in ghost in the machinder but.... alas.
but!! ottos arc about sort of learning to take charge and stay calm/rational when things are Shit (ie invasion of the vreen) lines up REALLY NICELY with antauris sort-of arc about letting go of the leadership role and taking place among the rest of the team which i think is sexy and epic.
like.... again, otto and antauri have CRIMINALLY low amounts of screentime, and im ngl, i dont.... really pay as close attention to their interactions as i probably could. but will that keep me from thinking about how otto probably became antauris main medic after he became the silver monkey? no. no it will not.
tldr, i think they ABSOLUTELY do not have enough screentime because their dynamic, especially post-sm, couldve been amazing, and WAS from the few bits we got to see. im not exactly an ottauri batter, but its basically the only antauri ship i actually like, which is pretty close, i think.