the gayest skating anime (Yuri!!! On ICE)

(Adopting the Yuri/Yuuri convention from here forward)
Yuri is the angriest little murderkitten and I love him.

Yuuri and Victor being the most embarrassing proud dadsfans might be my favorite thing about this episode. Yuri getting increasingly snarly as they refuse to be proper rivals and why are they cheering him on he is going to destroy them gets funnier every time I watch it.

 

It's doubly funny to me because Victor's doing that deliberately in front of the cameras, so. (I firmly believe The Kiss was genuine, but the skate-kiss in this episode was intentional fanservice on Victor's part IMO.)

JJ's "I'm the king and so awesome!" inner monologue would put me off waaaaay more if we hadn't spent so much time in Yuuri's head during his Eros short program, and in the heads of some of the other skaters when they perform their programs. "I'll be hated as the man who took Victor from the world" and "No one in Russia, maybe no one in the entire world wants to see me win" -- I'm not saying that's a 100% affected persona, because it's not (and I dearly hope to see more tie-grabbing Yuuri in fanworks, because rawr), but it's also not how Yuuri normally sees himself and presents himself to the world.

 

Somehow I failed to consider it this way and now I am completely at peace with JJ. The thought of an absurdly egotistical French Canadian is charming anyway, though.

 

I have a Canadian friend who is THRILLED JJ is the one representing his country, lol. Apparently the tattoos are wink and a nod to Trudeau maybe?

 

Rewatching now that I know these guys a little better, it's really striking how miserable Victor looks in that first episode when he's watching the video. What is going on in that guy's head?

I also love how Yurio's method for finding him is to wander around a strange city and scream his name. He's my very favorite murder kitten.

 

That whole sequence of Yuri coming to Hasetsu and looking for Viktor is just delightful. Tells you everything you need to know about him starting out.

 

Funny thing is that this is a perfect description of most of the Quebecois that I know.

 

I am yuuri's age, and and play a semi-competitive sport, and seeing how he treats his 15 year old rival is too fucking relatable.

 

Oh, I don't doubt he's still extremely egotistical - he did commission a song called "Theme of King JJ", after all. =P But knowing that skaters are often in a different/more extreme headspace while performing helps dial him down just enough that I find him amusing instead of grating.

 

...can i just

Spoiler: nsfw text, pretty weird

I was trying not to mention this because pretty weird, but re: different/more extreme headspace while skating, the way the skaters ramp up their personas and start talking extreme during their routines is kind of... reminding me of sex babble more than anything? The sort of 'ha ha I have plateaued and I'm going to get super weird and intense about the shit I'm saying to you and promise/threaten to do intense shit I would not actually do' sex babble. I might have not come to this conclusion without the facts that a. Yuuri gets more explicitly sexual/sensual/romantic in his skating monologues than anywhere else b. a lot of them seem to be ramping up base instincts in a way, like with Michele's protective impulses, JJ's sheer egoism, Yuuri's possessiveness, ect c. a lot of the skaters framed as innocent, younger, or new to the scene don't do that nearly as much and d. Christophe Giacometti. I do tend to have my mind in the gutter but is it just me noticing that like... they tend to have... a lot fewer inhibitions about the shit they say and how they're saying it on the ice and certain parallels?... anyway.

And also there is pretty explicit subtext about how a lot of Yuri's problem is that he's too young, mentally, to be on the same playing field as the other skaters, he can't do what they do yet, and thus he's always at an emotional remove and doesn't really have a handle on himself yet, I should stop?

Just me?

But it does make a lot of these characters somehow less awkward if you see this as the sort of id vomit that, while telling of what's deep inside a person, only comes out in times of sheer inhibition, I think this parallel may have been purposefully drawn? Maybe this is something they did accidentally but when a significant statistical percentage of 'adult' skaters basically start dirty talking on ice and the ones narratively framed as fresh and innocent don't I'll stop now.

 

Maybe that's part of Victor's problem. We've never been given a glimpse of what's inside his head when he skates. He SEEMS completely uninhibited off the rink, but that feels like an act to me. Maybe there's NOTHING in his head when he skates now....

 

That's a pretty good takeaway from my absolutely absurd post. One I regret not thinking up myself.

I still do not even have a guess what his damage is. Well, I do have guesses, but they're all just as good as each other. I'm going to be putting my foot in my mouth about at least some things once Victor backstory finally comes out (it had better) (please) (I'm desperate) but now you have me thinking about sad sad Victor who doesn't really enjoy anything anymore because he refuses to connect with himself on a deep level and face who he is/wants to be when he's uninhibited which just makes his habit of being flirty and ''''casual'''' in social interactions hurt me a lot, why this.

When can I love Victor Nikiforov, when will that be possible.

Also, he hasn't skated since the beginning of the show. I mean. While teaching, but we didn't get to focus on it. When he showed Yuri and Yuuri their routines, we heard their thoughts, not his. I wonder why. I fucking wonder why. Maybe it's because he's lost all joy in the thing that used to make him a valuable human being as implied by him saying nothing he could do would surprise anyone anymore, who fucking knows, again with my theory that him seeing Yuuri skate his Stay Close to Me routine made him feel a passion for skating he had literally not felt in years, not truly

 

Victor Nikiforov: sexually, but not emotionally, available. Touch him, but like, don't touch him.

Also, leave me alone to rot.

 

So in the end it's gonna be sort of like Yuuri not only touched his dick, but also touched his soul?

/I am making valuable additions to the discussion

 

And now I wanna write fic about this. Great!!

 

I worked this out!

Spoiler: Overanalyzing

The point values for rankings in the 6 competitions are:
1st: 15
2nd: 13
3rd: 11
4th: 9
5th: 7
6th: 5
(I'm guessing on the last two)
The skaters with the top 6 TOTALS from their two competitions advance to the GPF.

Christophe Giacometti placed 3rd at the China Cup and won Paris, for a total of 26, so he is guaranteed to advance. Otabek Altin won the NHK Trophy in Japan and placed second at Skate America for a total of 28, so he is also guaranteed to advance.

Our friend Phichit won the China Cup, but he placed 4th in Skate America, giving him a total of 24.

The absolute lowest total scores the top 3 finishers in the Rostelecom Cup could get are 26, 26, 22 or 28, 24, 22. There are 4 spots available and Phichit already has a 24, so nobody who scores below 22 can advance, period.

The person in the best position to advance from the last event is JJ, with his Skate Canada win. Yuri, Yuuri, and Seung Gil all finished second in their first event, so they need a podium finish to be confident of advancing and they can't advance if they place below 4th. Emil and Michele finished third in their first event, so they need to finish second or higher to be confident and they can't advance if they place below 3rd.

Here are the possible outcomes from the Rostelecom Cup:

• JJ places 3rd. All 3 of the top 3 finishers from Rostelecom Cup advance to the GPF, along with Phichit.
• JJ crashes and burns, finishing 6th (looking unlikely, given his excellent short program score). The top 2 finishers and Phichit advance. If the 3rd place winner is Yuri, Yuuri, or Seung Gil, they also advance. If Emil or Michele takes third and Yuri, Yuuri, or Seung Gil takes fourth, there's a tie at 22 points for the last spot. I'm not sure how they break ties. Combined total point score?
• JJ takes 5th. The top 2 finishers and Phichit advance. If the 3rd place winner is Yuri, Yuuri, or Seung Gil, they also advance. If it's Emil or Michele, there's a tie at 22 points for the last spot.
• JJ takes 1st or 2nd. The top 2 finishers and Phichit advance. If the 3rd place winner is Yuri, Yuuri, or Seung Gil, they also advance. If Emil takes 3rd AND Michele takes 4th (or vice versa), the 3rd place winner advances. If Emil or Michele takes 3rd and Yuuri, Yuri, or Seung Gil takes 4th, there's a tie at 22 points for the last spot.
• JJ takes fourth. This is the interesting case. That gives JJ a combined score of 24. If the 3 skaters with second place finishes take 1st, 2nd, and 3rd, the winner has 28 points, the second place finisher has 26, and there are 3 people with a combined score of 24 - JJ, Phichit, and the Rostelecom Cup 3rd place winner - and only 2 spots for them in the GPF. If Emil or Michele takes third, the top two finishers, JJ, and Phichit advance. If Emil or Michele takes second, there could be a four way tie at 24 points.

Tl;dr: Yuuri and Yuri both need to place in the top 3 to be fairly confident of advancing, and 3rd place isn't completely safe if JJ gets knocked down to fourth in the free skate. There's a slim possibility that they could advance with a 4th place finish, depending on how the Grand Prix Series breaks point ties. Phichit's GPF spot is safe unless JJ finishes fourth.

Edited: added in a case that I left out because I thought it was unlikely for plot reasons. Gotta be thorough!

 

...I have to cheer on JJ to make the numbers make sense?

 

It is my understanding that this is 100% how actual sports work. Or at least that's what my football family says.

 

more depressed, nihilistic viktor and confident yuuri plz

i love suffering