It looked like a burn to me too. That's why, while I like Galra!Keith, I think the fantheory is based on tissue paper. (Another "proof" is Zarkon saying Keith fights like a Galra. My feel is that Zarkon would have said that of anyone brave enough to fight him, and keep coming at him, even if he also thought they were a very stupid, snot nosed kid.)
If I ever finish it I guess I'll put it up on AO3. I already am awful in every way there. I have no idea if anyone else will enjoy this pure id vomit (or why I enjoy it) but if I do finish it it'll be the first oneshot I finish in, like, a year, so, little proud. Really miserable. Two separate people will cry really hard. A relationship is ruined beyond full repair. Brainwashing kind of? Why am I WRITING this. You have to be in the 'enjoying pain for its own sake' zone though if the mojo ever comes to me I'll write a second 'ok let's hash this out and make things a little better' chapter I like this, I like this theorizing going on They're a HUGE, far-reaching, ancient empire; headcanon that several species that used to be separate are now all Galra and people hardly recall what they were like separate thousands of years ago. Except for like, the original Galra, which ever ones can live to be ten fucking thousand years old, apparently. There would be a lot of internal politics that I currently almost want to write enough about but I have so little canon to work with. Are there supplementary materials about the Galra yet, do they have a basis in Voltron Prime And whoever linked to Sendak's Apocalypse ( @OtherCat I think?) Thank you, this is all hells of good and I'm enjoying it immensely. SPACE MYTHOLOGY
Yeah, I like the idea that the Galra have been around so long that like, eventually we're going to run into a planet of people that Allura and Coran remember as being super-independent or whatever, and be shocked and horrified at how they're all part of the Galra now - but the people themselves don't really get it, since they've been part of the Galra empire for thousands of years, they consider themselves Galra, none of them really know anything about the time being pre-Galra (not even because of intentional censorship, just because it's been millennia) and, yeah, there's issues, but it works out ok. Or something. I just kinda want to see the Galra as a functioning empire, and have the people who live there and are happy to live there expanded on, like the Fire Nation people in ATLA.
...oh, hurr a durr. I didn't realize it was among YOUR fics. This is awesome work, dude. I would never have thought of it myself and I'm really enjoying reading it.
Making Sendak miserable with existential despair is fun! (Pobre Shiro is collateral damage.) I borrowed the format (bullet points with prose) from a homestuck fan fic on Tumblr. I wanted to play with some themes, and culture/worldbuilding.
I just finished everything that's currently up and I'm glad about the inclusion of Pidge. Vegeta arc Sendak Vegeta arc Sendak Vegeta arc Sendak
Ha ha ha ha ha ha alright so the idea is that Vegeta is an asshole, like, he's going to kill you, he doesn't give a fuck, he has no moral compass, he'll destroy the earth, he's a grade A Asshole. So you figure he's the sort of villain to get killed and forgotten about, but instead, he's left alive, for 'protag is too good' reasons. So... he lives to become a bigger problem later, right? Nope. He becomes disillusioned with the fight and switches sides from 'antagonist' to 'apathetic.' And it looks a little like a redemption arc but it... isn't? He's still an asshole. He's a jerk to everyone but he's married now and he's a bit more mellow so he just sort of... is an asshole, without the murder and villainy. Shows up from time to time to make everyone roll their eyes and sigh. Named after him, the Vegeta Arc is an arc a character goes through from villainous, homicidal asshole to familiar, nonthreatening asshole. Like, could probably still kick your ass, but is more likely to show up to the bbq now. It's almost like a redemption arc, but they don't become much better as a person if at all--they just stop being a threat and potentially become a friend. Like, that jerk friend you deal with for some reason. Vegeta arc Sendak.
mental image of shiro and sendak slapfighting at the family cookout over whether weaponized prosthetics are a) badass or b) traumatic (lance: WHY NOT BOTH)
I agree, I think ppl are reading way too much into that line. To me it seemed like he was recognizing that Keith is relentlessly aggressive and won't let up - or as an outsider might describe it, "ruthless." And re: Galra tech working for Keith - did we ever see it not work for anyone else? Like, we saw Hunk and Coran use a detached limb to activate a Galra machine, but did they even try anything else first? Was there any other scene of that kind? What if the point was just to show that Keith isn't the sort to overthink things without trying the stupidly obvious thing first? He's impatient and direct. That's what makes him a good match for Red. I'm gonna have to rewatch those scenes to be sure, but they didn't seem the least bit strange or mysterious to me. Although that might also be a little bc I grew up on the 80s show, and was watching for hints of my own theory. Spoiler: 32 year old spoilers So in Defender of the Universe, Keith was the leader and pilot of the black lion, Lance piloted the Red, and the fifth member, with the black uniform & piloting the blue lion, was Sven. Sven was taken out of the fight - in the US he was badly hurt, in Japan he was actually killed. (weirdly, in Japan his twin brother later showed up in the series, so in the US they just made him Sven returning.) Allura took over piloting the Blue lion. So my theory is that at some point Shiro will be removed from the team - maybe killed, more probably some secret conditioning or implant will be revealed, like we'll find out his entire "escape" was engineered by the druids. This will of course be devastating for Pidge more than anyone. And i think that the team (or the lions) will choose Keith as the new leader & black paladin. He had trouble bonding with the Red, suggesting he's not really the perfect match, he's a paladin of convenience. He comes off as hot-headed at times, but he can also be the voice of reason, and he's often the one calling for the team to pull together. Lance really fits Red's profile better, and we don't know what criteria Blue uses - Lance interrupted Allura before she could explain properly. But I bet well find out its some quality that he shares with her, but which she has in greater abundance. That's my theory, and admittedly it's pretty much based off of nothing bug comparing Legendary Defender with Defender of the Universe, but I feel like the development we see of Keith and the dynamics we see in the team - not to mention all the unanswered questions surrounding Shiro's captivity and escape - seem to support that. I'm sure I'm not the first one to have this theory, but I'm surprised that I've never seen anyone talk about it.
hm, i think they've made a point of showing allura and shiro to be kind of a balanced pair and equivalent to each other, which makes me think if shiro leaves a vacancy it's allura that'd take over. would not be surprised if shiro gets recaptured next season. and allura's character development arc is learning to be a leader.
Yrh, I really can't see Keith leading the team, and reshuffling 3 pilots seems a bit much. Re, the Keith using Galra tech, there was at least one moment with Lance where both he and Keith specifically pointed out how weird it was that Keith could do it all easy like, with a little "slow down and think" pause before transitioning scenes, and I think that's more what peeps are basing the theory off of with all the other junk being supporting thematoc garbage. Woth Keith closing the hanger, right before the quintessence thing, I think. Could be mistaken. Haven't watched that ep in a month or so.
Also the thought of Lance wearing red offends me. And Keith wearing black. With his dark hair, that'd be way too much. And the mullet, gross. You can't have a little dark haired mullet man wearing all black leading a team, it's undignified. /onl kinda joking
That's the thing though, in Defender of the Universe, Keith wore red and Lance wore blue, despite their lions. It would be simple enough to justify keeping their uniforms on the grounds of not wanting to trade pants or whatever, probably played for laughs, given this show's tone. Also Sven wore black, like Shiro; Allura wore pink, which was also the main color of her civilian wardrobe. If Legendary Defender followed suit I guess her uniform would be like purple or something. (although in The Third Dimension, a cgi sequel series in the DotU continuity [aka the Far Universe continuity, apparently], the pilots did change uniform colors to match their respective lions. I have no idea what they did with uniforms in Voltron Force, the third Far Universe series, and I'm only mentioning it here because holy shit you guys, I just found out this existed!) Anyway, I'm going to hold onto my theory for now, partly because I love Keith and want to see him grow into a leadership role like his alternate universe predecessor. I also love Pidge and if (they? Do we have a pronoun consensus?) unexpectedly took up the mantle of leadership I would be filled with sunshine and puppies.
NGL, in all the fic I've written/outlined so far where it's relevant, Pidge somehow keeps ending up in the lieutenant/backup leader role. More crowdsource-y and less authoritative than Shiro, but very "okay I have A [coherent, thought-out, detailed] Plan" much more quickly than the others, and in particular more organized than Keith (who gets super impulsive and seems to forget the rest of the group a bit when Shiro's not steering--I'm thinking of his impulsively going after Shiro in 11, mostly, but he gives me the impression of just blanking out the big picture easily).
That vision of Pidge sounds good to me ^_^ And I agree that Keith needs to do some more growing up (actually, both Keith and Pidge have similar issues in terms of their teen emotions pushing them toward bad decisions, and I feel that we see both make progress during season 1), but I feel like when he does things like dive into the fight without the rest of his team, he's intentionally putting himself in harm's way to keep them safe. But I recognize I may be projecting extratextual interpretations bc I've been basically stanning the guy since I was 4.