#projectnovos

Sure!

Ships (in rough order)

Nagireo from Blue Lock

my current obsession, going on strong for like more than a year by now. Also the first ship where I actually interacted with fandom meaningfully for a prolonged people of time instead of mostly ghosting. They’re really special to me! I think something I like about them is how core their relationship is to their story, and exploring their characters. It makes fan content and AUs really interesting and fun. In my opinion, a lot of their issues would still exist without blue lock, and they’d have to work them out in any setting, and I think that’s neat.

Satosugu From Jujutsu Kaisen

my past obsession, I spent a great deal of time with them as well before moving on to nagireo. Something I think of when it comes to stsg is the idea of an unfulfilled love that’s not lesser or weaker by virtue of being unfulfilled. I really like the idea that Gojo’s last words to geto were “I love you”, said for the first time at the end for this reason. Well, I am an angst enjoyer. I also enjoy the concept of love not being enough. Gojo and Geto’s individual relationship to power and agency is pretty cool to dive into too, the roles they had to fill in society and such. Their diverging paths. A good ship can’t be made with bad/uninteresting characters after all and I like all the character study fics out there.

those're kinda the two big ones.

Yuudai X Taisei from Sakana

Read sakana here right this moment its very special to me

Ah yes the awkwardness of drunk kissing your coworkers bestie that you're certain is way too good for you. I love love love them so much. They're just very comforting to me. Anxious eel and silly octopus (all of the cast of characters have assigned aquatic organisms). The comic as a whole deals a lot with anxiety, which is really cathartic, but I think in general its really nice seeing Yuudai opening up to people. I also like Yuudai's pessimism and skittery abrasive personality being balanced out by Taisei's optimism and cheerfulness. They also just make for some funny interactions that I've really liked reading heheh

Vanoe from Vanitas no Carte-

It’s the great gatsby vibes, the sunshine character and the deeply traumatized character who doesn’t see themselves as lovable, etc. I really love them and may or may not have made a slide deck presentation on Vanitas no carte for powerpoint night with my friends and 1/3 of it was centered around them.

Ludovica X Luck from Tiger Tiger-

Since this isn't an anime/is probably more obscure, here's the link to Tiger Tiger! Independently published by the artist and free to read, though you can also buy the first book to read in bookstores and such. I genuinely recommend it so much.

Ludovica and Luck are just so funny together, I love them so much. It's an eldritch doomsday god and the hyperfixated-on-sea-sponges mad scientist said being wants to impress. what is there not to like? its chaos x chaos but 2 different flavors. Also the source material is great, and very queer. #stealing your brother's ship to study sea sponges and getting caught up in doomsday. Also him and his 2nd mate are in love but dont realize bc reasons. Its great.

Bachirin from Blue Lock-

grumpy x sunshine always gets me. Plus their parallels and the whole loneliness thing. It’s a great ship- though what really sold me was reading fics like The Sun Will Come up. They really have so much potential.

Kide X Coel from Project Novos

another comic free to read here except this one has.. been on hiatus since 2022.. cries. I think the author has mentioned getting back to it though. Project Novos fulfills my childhood friends to enemies that dont actually hate each other to lovers dreams. The plot follows a government conspiracy and uprising but the story centers around Coel and Kide's relationship, which I do expect to be carried out romantically despite not being explicit so far (in part because it is not a mainstream manga).

This too, also follows the more optimistic character x a more pessimistic traumatized character trope... I have a type ok

... the ship list kinda turned into a bit of a rec list, but with some exceptions, my enjoyment of a relationship tends to do a lot with my enjoyment of the story its in unless I get fixated so...

hmm other ships ive liked... narumi x hirotaka from wotakoi.. hualian from tgcf, bingqui from svsss.... wait actually, there's too many lets move on.

Characters

Let's limit it to one character per show/series/etc to make this easier and avoid me just being like "the whole cast of sakana" or "the whole cast of tiger tiger" or "These characters from Dungeonmeshi..." too many options...

this is in no particular order. Also you might notice a lot of these characters come from the ships above

Yuudai Tanaka from Sakana

I like seeing characters suffer from anxiety, especially in a more ugly way, because I suffer from anxiety, and while I'm a lot nicer than Yuudai, I get frustrated when anxiety is portrayed in a way that may seem "cute" because it really doesn't feel "cute" hahaha. I mean, being anxious can mean being shy sometimes, which I can understand finding cute, but it can also mean being avoidant, skittish, or less friendly.

Ludovica Bonnaire from Tiger Tiger

She's chaotic, she's sweet, she's adorable, she's remarkably intelligent, she's fixated on sea sponges and wants to learn more about them! I really love Ludovica. She feels really refreshing as a character- a woman of science who's bubbly, excitable, and chaotic. She's kind of naive, but not at all dumb or incompetent. She falls into the mad scientist category without it defining her character. She doesn't let anything stop her but isn't somehow perfect, and she's incredibly funny. She's just great!

Nagi Seishiro from Blue Lock

Just.. look at him. he has a cactus, that's like plus 20 points

I have a soft spot for characters that are more subtly lacking in life and struggling, but aren't conscious of it. Also characters that discover that there's more to life than they first thought. Nagi seems fine on the outside, but if you look at some of his habits, they're actually rather concerning - subsisting off jelly packets, thinking life is a pain, getting a cactus to practice talking to people because he hadn't TALKED in so long. One of the nicest/most meaningful things his parents said to him that made him happy being "Don't die".. I also enjoy his disconnect from other people, and how he doesn't really understand the world around him.

I also like the space he occupies within the blue lock canon as a “hidden path”, and the contrast he presents in comparison to the other characters. I think Nagi is made more interesting by being a side character to Blue Lock than if he was the true main character. Idk if that’s a controversial take to have about your fav haha but really I think being the main character of a spinoff is the best place he could be. His situationship with the most important person in his life that he met 6 months ago is great too.

Greed from Fullmetal Alchemist

I LOVE the concept of the friendship is magic character being greed itself. I like the idea of interpersonal love being related to greed. Greed is wanting things, and it is often villainized, but wanting things is the basis of so much more than what we usually associate with greed - and in fact, some of our deepest wants are related to love - in all the forms it takes. Anyways, Greed is very special to me.

Vanitas from Vanitas no Carte

I just love a character who hates themselves so much that they won't let themselves be loved, but they don't have a gloomy exterior to reflect that (making it harder to tell).

Geto Suguru from Jujutsu Kaisen

I think I just love a guy who put so much pressure on himself to torture himself doing the right thing that he crashed out and did all the bad things. I see it as kind of the downfalls of needing everything to be simple and solvable. Geto preserved his sense of control and the livability of his own life, at the expense of becoming a bad person. That's something to explore, to me.

Him being gay (for his bff) is also a plus

Hirotaka Nifuji from Wotakoi

I have a tendency to like characters I find relatable. I haven't watched Wotakoi in awhile but I remember really resonating with Hirotaka. Because I haven't rewatched in awhile it's kinda just a vibe rn tho haha I can't really explain it.. But maybe it has something to do with the muted/quieter way he tends to express himself, despite still having his own inner world.

Anya Forger from Spy Family

I don't really relate to Anya at all, and I don't have any complicated reasons for this. She's just a cutie patootie who deserves the world

Laios Touden from Dungeon meshi

I love Laios and its definitely because I find him relatable. His difficulty connecting with people, his fixation on monsters, his appreciation of food... And I really like how his difficulty connecting with people and him being a weirdo is paired with a genuine desire to connect with them, and do good, as well as leadership skill.

I wanna eat living armor too...

Mafuyu Sato from Given