I'm Always Coming Out Of Someone's Television Emotionally.
drawsaurus tagged me on Tumblr for a meme:
List your Top 5 Canon and Top 5 Non-Canon OTPs.
As the below was originally written for an audience that doesn’t read my Dreamwidth, it might occasionally restate things I’ve said in previous entries.
This is tough, actually! I ship pretty much everything on a low level; it’s hard to pin down the ships I have more intense feelings about.
CANON:
Nathan Drake/Elena Fisher (Uncharted)
These guys are so cute! They balance each other so well; they have such good chemistry! What a great adventure duo. When I saw I’d been tagged to do this meme, Nate/Elena was the first pairing that came to mind.
I love that Nate and Elena have fun together and they make fun of each other, but they also have moments when they’re vulnerable with each other. In particular, I love that Nate, the big action hero protagonist, is allowed to be vulnerable with Elena, and not just the other way around; Uncharted 3 is great for this.
The sequence in Uncharted 4 where Elena just mocks Nate’s videogame skills is my favourite part of the entire series. I would buy a full Elena Fisher Mocks You While You Play Videogames simulator in a heartbeat.
Jeff Winger/Annie Edison (Community)
The episode ‘Debate 109’ is the fastest I’ve ever gone from ‘I’ve never thought about this pairing’ to ‘I ship this with every fibre of my being’. Jeff Winger and Annie Edison have, by far, the most ridiculous chemistry I’ve ever seen in fiction. It’s absolutely absurd. He’s almost twice her age and I just can’t care!
I was not expecting them to kiss for real in the first-season finale, and I flipped out when it happened.
Mukuro Ikusaba/Makoto Naegi (Danganronpa)
THERE ARE CANONICAL IMPLICATIONS THAT SHE HAS A CRUSH ON HIM; I’M COUNTING THIS FOR THE CANON SECTION.
Danganronpa IF gave me a lot of feelings about Ikusaba/Naegi. I’ve got a huge weakness for redemption storylines, and Ikusaba sort of breaks my heart as a character who has the potential to be redeemed but never had the chance. I also tend to like pairing up cynics with the idealists who make them a little less cynical (other ships I have that fall into this pattern: Jeff/Annie, Sora/Riku, Satoshi/Daisuke, the Ninth Doctor/Rose Tyler), and Ikusaba/Naegi is a rare example of that dynamic with a female cynic.
Abby Griffin/Marcus Kane (The 100)
In the early episodes of The 100, I got into the habit of referring to Kane as ‘Councillor Dickface’. I was very confused, during the second series, to realise that Councillor Dickface had at some point become my favourite character.
A lot of the canonical pairings on The 100 follow the formula ‘they have a couple of scenes together with some contrived furtive glances and then they make out’, so Kane/Abby, where they had loads of scenes together and loads of chemistry and persistently didn’t make out, really stood out to me. Taking the time to build the dynamic up made a huge difference. I had such intense feelings when they finally kissed.
One of my favourite parts of the buildup: Abby kissed Kane just by the mouth! And I love kisses by the mouth; they create such a strange tension. They’re halfway between a kiss on the cheek and a kiss on the lips: too intimate to be considered normal, not quite intimate enough to be unambiguously romantic. I rewound to watch it seven times.
Chloe Price/Rachel Amber (Life Is Strange: Before the Storm)
One aspect of Life Is Strange I really love is its portrayal of very intense, slightly unhealthy relationships between psychologically damaged teenage girls. There’s genuine love between Chloe and Rachel, but there’s also manipulation, and things can get a little dark sometimes, a little frightening. Sometimes there are beautiful moments: sharing earbuds on a train and watching the scenery pass by, a kiss on an empty street at night. Sometimes Rachel drags you out of school while concealing her real intentions and ends up starting a forest fire while you watch in helpless alarm.
I love that the Chloe/Rachel pairing isn’t overly idealised or included in the game to titillate; they’re humans, sharing intense experiences, and it’s complicated and beautiful and painful and interesting. Chloe/Max is also great, but Chloe and Rachel make this list because their chemistry is slightly stronger in my eyes.
NON-CANON:
Mike Munroe/Sam Giddings (Until Dawn)
Do I ship these two just because they look like Nate and Elena? I’ll be honest: it’s probably a factor. I was so thrilled when the two of them met back up after their horrible experiences, and suddenly they weren’t alone in this terrifying situation any more. I love that they’re clearly not close friends when the game starts - they just happen to move in the same circles - but they bond so intensely and become such a strong team over the course of this terrible night.
If both Sam and Mike survive, the game ends on a shot of Mike clutching Sam’s arm like it’s the only thing keeping him anchored to the world, and I can’t get over it. It’s also possible for Mike to sacrifice himself to save Sam in the last few minutes of the game; he knows full well he’s going to die, but she’ll die if he doesn’t do anything, and he can’t let that happen.
I have a lot of feelings about these two, and I’ve always been sort of amazed they’re not a more popular pairing.
Mark Corrigan/Jeremy Usbourne (Peep Show)
I shouldn’t have actual feelings about these awful people, but somehow I do. These terrible, terrible men who incessantly ruin each other’s lives. They’ll never escape each other. They sort of hate each other, but they wouldn’t be able to survive apart. It’s the bond of knowing that someone else knows what an absolute mess of a person you are, knows all the worst aspects of you, and yet is somehow still willing to associate with you.
Patrick Jane/the entire CBI team (The Mentalist)
This may not technically be a pairing, but I’m listing it anyway. Jane is so casually flirty and tactile and intimate that I’m convinced he’s in love with everyone he works closely with: Lisbon, Van Pelt, Cho, Rigsby. (I love the episode where he buys all of them ludicrously expensive presents out of his blackjack winnings.) I also feel he’s in love with Hightower; it’s a shame she couldn’t be the boss for longer!
I really wanted to put this in the ‘canon’ section.
Noctis Lucis Caelum/Prompto Argentum (Final Fantasy XV)
I’ll happily ship all the FFXV boys with each other, but I’ve got a particular weakness for Noct/Prompto. Prompto falls intensely in love with anyone who’s even vaguely nice to him! There’s all the ‘I’m a commoner; he’s the prince’ insecurity! They’re both kind of useless with their emotions! Plus their interactions are just really, really cute.
Hajime Hinata/Nagito Komaeda (Danganronpa 2)
If I say I ship two characters, it could mean either ‘I genuinely think these characters would work together’ or ‘I think these characters would be a fascinating disaster, and I want to watch it all burn’. Hinata/Komaeda definitely falls into the ‘fascinating disaster’ category. I love that Komaeda adores Hinata (and all their classmates) and expresses that adoration by manipulating people into murder; he just wants to help everyone achieve their full potential! I love that Hinata is simultaneously repelled by Komaeda and sort of fascinated by him. Trying to keep Komaeda at arm’s length, trying not to think too much about him, never entirely succeeding.
(I’ve also got a soft spot for Hinata/Koizumi and Hinata/Kuzuryuu, which are slightly more functional.)
Honourable mention to Shay Cormac/Aveline de Grandpré (Assassin’s Creed Rogue/Assassin’s Creed Unity), which I considered, because I do ship it a lot, but decided against because the characters, er, aren’t from the same game and never meet in canon. I wrote a huge Sense8 AU for Assassin’s Creed once and accidentally landed myself with this stupid nonexistent pairing.
And I just remembered Arthur/Merlin! I need to stop thinking about ships, because I’m just going to come up with an endless number I regret not including.
If you're reading this and think it might be fun, I encourage you to steal this meme for your own journal! I'd love to see you talk about your ships.