I don’t understand why everyone is freaking out about it not having romance or not being BL. Queer manga has always existed and queer manga is not BL bc it focuses on themes of being LGBTQ, not love between two boys. TBH, it’s even significantly more vague than that. This has always been that kind of story from the start. I don’t care if people do or don’t call this manga BL. I think everyone makes way too big a deal of it. Both people who wish it was and people who are disgusted by the idea. At the end of the day it’s about yoshiki who’s feelings of love for hikaru were one of the driving factors of the plot and hikaru who’s first emotions were for yoshiki, he’s discovering his ego. Ego in the psychological sense. He didn’t have a consciousness before. His feelings for yoshiki is what is pushing him to develop a state of consciousness, of form and being. If you slap a label like romantic love or platonic love on how the “thing” feels about yoshiki I think it’s oversimplifying it. I imagine it’s a mix of every single type and something no human can ever understand. I mean he literally went from being amorphous to a conscious being solely because of yoshiki’s influence. To call that a cop out because it’s not explicitly “gay” is an oversimplification.
Also the author can’t “back away from it being BL bc it’s more popular now” when they clearly state it’s a queer story. Romance is simply not the focus. It’s horror. Making a weird being like the “thing” be in a romance I think makes it feel significantly less overbearing. At the end of the day I just don’t think it matters if you do or don’t call it BL same as killing stalking. It’s just a genre tag. Adding it or removing it shouldn’t influence your opinion of the work.
I don’t understand why everyone is freaking out about it not having romance or not being BL. Queer manga has always existed and queer manga is not BL bc it focuses on themes of being LGBTQ, not love between two boys. TBH, it’s even significantly more vague than that. This has always been that kind of story from the start. I don’t care if people do or don’t call this manga BL. I think everyone makes way too big a deal of it. Both people who wish it was and people who are disgusted by the idea. At the end of the day it’s about yoshiki who’s feelings of love for hikaru were one of the driving factors of the plot and hikaru who’s first emotions were for yoshiki, he’s discovering his ego. Ego in the psychological sense. He didn’t have a consciousness before. His feelings for yoshiki is what is pushing him to develop a state of consciousness, of form and being. If you slap a label like romantic love or platonic love on how the “thing” feels about yoshiki I think it’s oversimplifying it. I imagine it’s a mix of every single type and something no human can ever understand. I mean he literally went from being amorphous to a conscious being solely because of yoshiki’s influence. To call that a cop out because it’s not explicitly “gay” is an oversimplification.
Also the author can’t “back away from it being BL bc it’s more popular now” when they clearly state it’s a queer story. Romance is simply not the focus. It’s horror. Making a weird being like the “thing” be in a romance I think makes it feel significantly less overbearing. At the end of the day I just don’t think it matters if you do or don’t call it BL same as killing stalking. It’s just a genre tag. Adding it or removing it shouldn’t influence your opinion of the work.