An Abridged History of Trans and Nonbinary Content in Fire Emblem

[@matariimau]

On the topic of "Fine, fans will do it themselves", I'd like to mention LJ_Reflet, an FE modder who has made Gender-locked Class Removals mods for several of the Fire Emblem games (He has done both Fodlan games, Echoes, Awakening and (although currently obsolete) Engage). He is very cool.

[@noishfanboy1141]

Falcoknight Dimitri time

[@Stachelbeeerchen]

Its just based that Rosado wears fem swimwear when going over that clothing option in the Somniel

[@HazyHolo]

Personally I am against trans femme Forrest. While I do appreciate he thought and I want some trans femme characters, I think it’s actually stronger with him being a cis het man who likes being girly. Also Lucina as Marth had a lot of trans femme vibes and I can only imagine the dysphoria she might have felt having to pretend to be a man, not to mention the legendary hero of all things. Cis people can get gender dysphoria too ya know.

[@SeraSer4phic]

REal. I really vibe with Forrest so much. I'm a straight man that occasionally crossplays for the art of it. I really like him being just a dude who likes to dress cutely and the fact that it;s not the focus of (all) his supports is really great. Partially why I wasn't completely happy with the whole thing that happened to Bridget because they're my feminine bros characters but that's a different thing to discuss. .

[@gxrecxre5085]

@@SeraSer4phic i get what you mean and its good to feel represented which is why its good bridget is who she is. just because she used to be a boy who dressed up as a girl doesnt mean she couldnt possibly have been trans. there are real people like bridget, real people change. she used to be a crossdresser but grew up and found who she truly was. As a gay male its frustrating when i see straight crossdressing characters because of the sheer lack of lgbt+ characters that exist outside of exlusive lgbt+ media. Im glad you and others are able to feel represented by the characters but to me, they express the general homophobia people have. lgbt characters in anime hardly exist but there is a wide array of femboy or crossdressing characters. it makes me feel that my sexuality isnt okay. in the view of fire emblem, we have 2 characters who are crossdressers that are shown to not be gay or trans. the only gay character in fates is niles who is a very bad representative of the only homosexual slot, despite the fact i enjoy him. i dislike the fact there are more well written crossdresser types who express the "its okay to be different" storyline than there are lgbt characters.

[@BestgirlJordanfish]

Honestly as a transfem, I'm in agreement. We just need more of all of it. Queer, nonbinary, transmasc, transfem, gender non conforming, and more. Just more of everything

[@EnderWarlock]

For the Male Byleth with Female Sothis thing, it is brought up in Flayn's S Support. Flayn asks what Byleth's gender is and M!Byleth says he never considered himself to be female even after merging with Sothis. ***Flayn: If I may be so bold, do you consider yourself male or female? I have only ever heard of you referred to as a male, but Sothis is most assuredly female. Am I to believe that you are a male goddess? I am not certain how much sense that makes... I suppose there are circumstances by which such a thing is possible... Byleth: I never said I was a goddess. Flayn: Oh, are you not? But if you have inherited her power, then surely the two of you have become one. Gah, it all makes my head spin. I suppose I will take your word for it.***

[@phytohormones]

Thank you very much for bringing this up, I had no idea! This saddens me a bit, because the devs clearly did connect the dots, but shoved the conclusion away into a single S support. If nothing else, Rhea should have mentioned it in her supports, too, but I would especially have loved to see it come up in the main plot. Good for Flayn, though.

[@cloudy978]

Okay but the real question is, who would S support Flayn ?

[@greendemon905]

I mean, why would male Byleth consider himself female? Sothis essentially sacrificed herself to get him out of Zaharas. If escaping that place would mean male Byleth HAD to become nonbinary, then that becomes a WAY BIGGER issue!

[@raviolibirb8009]

Having a goddess sharing space with your soul doesn't inherently make M!Byleth a female. He's a dude born with a goddess resting in his soul. Why is this so hard to understand for some people. Like, you take a cake and put a cupcake inside it. It's still a cake but with a cupcake hidden inside.

[@squidneyyg]

i’m a big fan of transmasc caspar personally! i think that it brings a rly interesting angle to how he’s often overlooked in favor of his brother and how he both wants to emulate and is kinda scared of his dad. i also think that with him and linhardt growing up together and the sheer amount of gender that linhardt has going on, there’s a lot of potential for them exploring that together :))

[@roboscout64]

As a trans woman myself I’ll say the whole “pegasi don’t accept male riders” can often feel like a trans thing or at least a tool for trans stories. Magical macguffins that can provide you with definitive proof you are trans or not are frequent subject in trans stories for the utility of having a definitive source in your life you can use to say you have ironclad proof of your identity. It also just feels like a representation of “things the other gender had that we were denied”. Hubert’s secret desire to be a pegasus knight comes across as very trans in denial to me and it seems a lot of other people writing trans fan works seem to agree on that.

[@rxincandy_V]

on a related note, felix having a pegasus knight locked skill as an npc also gives off trans energy and it makes me wonder how many 3h devs are also happy to put trans characters in their game

[@limemonkai1837]

The Pegasus literal cock block is bizarre! As in the original myth the male hero Bellaphron rides Pegasus. It has nothing to do with being transexual though, thats just you projecting western identity politics onto asian art. 😊

[@Sylvainjose-satoyumiyato]

​@@limemonkai1837 Anime and Manga are known to be very progressive in terms of gender and sexuality, so I don't think that point stands

[@Impy_Lucy]

@@limemonkai1837 Trans people are just as common in Asia as they are in any other continent though. I know a fair few personally. If anyone's projecting onto Asian culture, it'd be the people that insist trans people are exclusively a Western thing. That's simply not true.

[@casuallycloaked]

Villain: "No man can defeat me" Unaware transmasc: *fails* "Ok that is really reassuring BUT NOT HELPING"

[@exizel2124]

About Kiza and CYL, IS classified Kiza as male in both FEH code and the cypher card game, I looked into FEH's code and the only characters classified as NB are Bramimond, Limstella, Arval and....the flame emperor...( and the hood version of the summoner that appear in book 4 but that's an avatar thing). Edit: I missed young mark.

[@paperluigi6132]

I wonder what would happen if any one of those ever won CYL? F.E. is out of the running for obvious reasons.

[@gabcard2767]

I thought Young Mark and Fomortiis were listed as NB too?

[@exizel2124]

@@gabcard2767 Fomortiis is listed as male....as for young mark...you are right. The fact that they are in a duo mess up my search because both gender of the pair is use rather than just the lead(the gender is listed as "NF" rather than just "N") Thanks for telling me.

[@marysue3927]

Honestly, characters like Forrest and Rosado make me really happy as a trans person. It doesn't matter to me if they're not trans. Cis allies who aren't afraid to express themselves are wonderful. I know they're just fictional characters, but it makes me indescribably happy to see people like them. I have never heard of the trans Jesse headcanon, but the idea of it is amazing to me! I always wondered what would happen to Kyza and similar characters if they had ever got picked for CYL in Heroes, and I had the same thoughts. I guessed they would just stick them in the male division. Or maybe if they were to ever been announced as a winner, what if Feh made a special exception for them *during* the announcement? Not sure how it would go.

[@MrToonlink53]

See I prefer looking up to characters like Forrest and Rosado instead of trying to force them into the trans box because they dress cute.

[@rileyrose5166]

Agreed! As a trans woman, Forrest was very formative to me as an example of someone born a man but with the courage to present feminine, even if met with disapproval!

[@diethylmalonate]

Brain: Rosado is a cis man Big brain: Rosado is a trans woman Galaxy brain: Rosado is a trans man who doesn't see the need to drop his feminine aspects after transition

[@PuuGuySpy]

I love this headcanon! Similar to how trans men can do drag, the way people express their preferences does not necessarily align with their gender.

[@reubenbailey7491]

As a GBA FE player who unfortunately hasn't thought enough about this, I think Dorothy is a neat contender for a queer character. Her mechanically not having the reduced con that some female classes have for... some reason (having the same 7 con as Wolt, a male archer) was a big part of of it, admittedly. Having recently read her support with Clarine though, she definitely strikes me as someone intending to explore their gender who is held back by their beliefs and peers. A combination of Saul's being Saul, being dedicated to the church and being too busy fighting in a war setting Dorothy back in terms of it. [Bill Wurtz voice] I could make a fanfic about this.

[@veestreams]

I guess that explains why I keep getting comments about Jesse’s top surgery results on the bangability polls

[@wannabecinnabon]

While it's obviously a pretty hard sell in the same vein of trans Finn (fe4 children moment), I've recently been devoting some thought to trans Tailtiu. A lot of things like the preoccupation of her family with how she "ashames" them, or the arc of "suddenly being able to see your childhood friend in a romantic light" she has with Azelle and Lex, make for a lot of material for both fun and drama in this headcanon. I mean, shoot, Reptor literally out here claiming his child was "turned against him" where have I heard that one before lol add being transphobic to the list of reasons why hilda is the absolute worst

[@joeyjose727]

Ohhh I’m glad you included that bit about your Dark Magic in Fodlan video, now I understand better what you were trying to say about how the genders are depicted with Dark Magic lol

[@rainyday9174]

I think it's intresting how Arval can use all gender locked classes in 3hopes depending on your current Shez gender for that playthrough. Sothis does not get this distinction

[@airlock7367]

I'll be adding the last bit of this video to the list of things that might eventually finally motivate me to get trans!Annette fic out of my head and onto existance

[@LightCosmos]

Just wanted to say that i love your videos and how you talk about topics that the 90% FE community is most likely foreign to, or worse against. You're really brave to be the one to speak about these things :) (Its also a breath of fresh air since 90% of the fe content creators im aware of are straight men and have the braindead, sometimes queerphobic/Racist/mysoginistic humor that comes with it i guess 😭)

[@FairyBoyFraldarius]

As a trans man, transmasc Felix is super important to me. I strongly believe you can view his story as a trans allegory! I've actually considered making my own video essay on this!

[@josephchacra2840]

Gregor is my canon-husband in Awakening. I can't be swayed otherwise. Love that man

[@Skablergen]

While it's true that M_Alear and F_Alear experiencing no differences at all based on their presentation/gender is kinda silly, playing M_Alear does give Lumera big Boy Mom energy in some later cutscenes

[@MeleysRQ]

I really enjoy your content, thanks for doing so. For my queer canon I just really like Asexual Sonya so much, someone who cares about looks and knows about the benefits of it but its just not sexual its amaizing, part of why Sonya is one of my favorite characters.

[@theravenpirate4744]

I’m non binary and my favourite fire emblem game is radiant Dawn. Hearing the news that Kyza was non binary and went by they/them pronouns in heroes was such an exciting day for me. I hope fire emblem adds more non binary characters in the future

[@solmango1212]

I think this is my favorite video you have made! You can really tell the different perspectives told here and I love it. Good job!!

[@pukozzz]

Great video! the point about how only men characters get to expand or explore their gender identity left me thinking, I didn't consider it before and it makes sense sadly. It made me think of Soleil who's heavily attracted to women but still doesn't get to have romantic supports with women (funny how all of her supports w men end platonic expect for Forrest who she does develop feelings for)

[@drakhaoulazhenkdir]

I may be mistaken, but I vaguely remember the end of the Radiance games saying that Ike and Soren and Ranulf left on a journey together. Also somewhere in the game stating that Soren and Ranulf would follow Ike wherever he goes, forever... Or am I just miss remembering?

[@gascon-en-exil]

Ike always leaves in his Radiant Dawn ending. If Soren or Ranulf have an A support with him, their ending text will change to indicate that they left on a journey - explicitly with Ike for Soren, more ambiguously for Ranulf. That has absolutely not stopped fans for arguing over this for 15+ years, even more so after Awakening gave us Priam. That's why I used them as an example of ignoring possible developer intent when it comes to fan interpretations.

[@LinkachuHQ]

this is why I love Forrest and Rosado 🥰

[@aquano1972]

Both of those characters are not trans though. Gender nonconformity, while ofc with some societal intersectionality, is not really the same. Transness is based on innate qualities at birth while Gender Presentation is influenced from culture. I don’t mind Rosado or Forrest, but I am a little tired that people tend to lump both these matters and people into one issue.

[@veestreams]

@@aquano1972 Trans is an umbrella term, and while IIRC neither Rosado nor Forrest explicitly identify as being under it, it's far from a stretch to interpret them as trans rep. They're two individuals who refuse to engage with cisnormative expectations of AMAB people. In some cases, that results in negative consequences for them (such as Forrest's rocky relationship with Leo initially). We're still in a place where so much queer and trans representation needs to be coded, hidden, or implied, so I wouldn't expect the writers to explicitly have them come out or something. I think it's valid to pull them out as examples considering the context.

[@zerikane]

@@veestreams A really fair point. The two are making a combative role to normal expectations. I do understand aquano's concern for strict definitions. However, Forrest and Rosado are the best for FE's standards. Like no one considers the Bandit Duos as the best representatives. It is better for both heroes and villains to have representatives. Mostly living protagonists nowadays cause tropes in the past are terrible, okama in media being meh. For a out of left field set of examples would be: Kjelle, Isadora, and even Minerva as other representatives who counter culture of the real world. Minerva is literally replacing one of the 'lover' of (New) Mystery of the Emblem for the four Priestess. SIsterly care is important. Michalis would help but well...too wounded.

[@aquano1972]

@@veestreams But even then, I don’t think they were necessarily doing that with either Forrest or Rosado, as compared to actual trans-coded characters (Vivian, Bridget for the longest time, etc), the explicit intent is that they’re gender-nonconforming men. And sure, I understand why for the video but speaking from my real-life experience as a trans woman, it is not great to be compared to people that I am not even remotely the same as.

[@veestreams]

@@aquano1972 At the same time, you could interpret them saying "but I'm totally still a man though!" as the devs just covering their tracks and trying to fly under the radar so bigots don't latch on and give them hate. I get it if you don't want to read them explicitly as trans women (I don't) but they are, in some capacity, defying gendered expectations and norms and that does have a place in discussion of trans rep.

[@RockyTorres43]

Geniunely asking this out of sheer ignorance from a cis man. If they made Jesse specifically a trans man (and not NB or gender fluid), would there be something wrong with simply giving him the male class tree?

[@gascon-en-exil]

I don't believe there would be, and like I said in the video there really isn't an easy answer to this. There could be arguments made for either side, with the male tree being especially easy since those classes are all generic ones that have been unisex in many other games. And as another commenter pointed out, the big sticking point in the female tree, the famously finicky pegasi, could be turned into a source of gender affirmation if IS or (more likely) fan devs ever cared to explore that angle. Of course it could also have just been a mechanics-based choice; thieves are outside the trees because they don't exist in the Valentia games, but because Sacred Echoes is a GBA romhack it can incorporate GBA thief utility into the gameplay. Something similar could be said for Atlas, who now has a unique class based on fighter -> warrior in order to give players a primary axe user...and it's also not tied to the villager promotion system. I spoke a little bit to the lead dev of Sacred Echoes back when I put out my video on the romhack last year. I may send him a message over on Tumblr and let him know that people in the comments here would be interested to know about the project's rationale with regard to trans Jesse. If he'd like to talk about it I'd be curious to learn more about that as well.

[@gascon-en-exil]

Quick update for anyone interested: the dev doesn't have a KZbin account, but he did get back with me re: the design choices behind trans Jesse. You can check it out on my blog now, under the same handle as here, or look up him up under Hypergammaspaces on Tumblr.

[@waddledottz]

why would it be wrong? trans men are men, plain and simple. the same as a trans woman should be able to ride a pegasus in the gender locked games. it's not that hard to comprehend

[@consensuslphisk]

did alear really say "that deserves a like" in a S rank support? Man, that is painful to read

[@aabrightlove]

my soul died a little

[@asterlem383]

Not really FE, but TearRing saga has a character named Bud that I read as a trans man! Of course, he's addressed as a woman the whole time, thanks Kaga.

[@damediadora4160]

Kyza's deal honestly feels very overblown in the west to me. In-game, there is only the one base conversation (which the link in the description has the translated version of), and then the artbook comment, but that's literally it, there are (as far as I'm aware) no other instances of Kyza presenting feminine. Funnily enough, the wiki mentions their support lines (specifically the word "fabulous") as a holdover from the Japanese, but those lines are actually English only. It also seems to me like the heroes pronouns are a one-off decision by the localizer, because there is no reference in any of the japanese heroes text to their gender identity. Forrest really isn't that positive from a transfeminine perspective, there's a reason the writers take pains to emphasize that he is cishet. For quite a lot of trans- and homophobic people, men who crossdress but still unequivocally refer to themselves as men are allowed to exist in media, this is also where you get the trap archetype from, and from the whole thing with Bridget you can see that there are a lot of people who are completely fine with a crossdressing man (though they'll of course make homphobic jokes about it) and get very upset when there's transness involved. Forrest avoids the trap stereotype for the most part (in-game, I'm sure if I were to look to certain parts of the fanbase that was how he was understood), it only kind of applies to the M!Corrin support, but his main gimmick is still '"a crossdressing guy, isn't that weird and wacky!". Ultimately, writing a character whose deal essentially is to act like how cis people imagine trans women to act but who insists whenever it comes up that he is a (straight) man is, in the current context, going to be transphobic. As far as trans interpretations are concerned I personally only think about characters as transitioning into the gender they present as in-game, so no transfem!Hubert, which unfortunately kind of runs into the issue that it only makes sense for very few characters that their surroundings would have allowed them to transition. Like, Marianne's hang-ups can also neatly map onto the ways trans women are demonized, and so do Bernadetta's shut-in tendencies and worries about looking pretty, but would they be allowed to transition? Certainly in Bernadetta's case that seems unthinkable. I don't necessarily dislike the fics that just have certain charcters be trans, but it does imply a Fodlan/Tellius/etc. that is more accepting of trans people than anywhere on earth right now and that just doesn't make a great deal of sense.

[@peferfish3003]

Nice video, very comprehensive and trans positive. I agree fan content definitely is where it's at. There's a headcanon i've seen in fanfiction where Alcryst is a trans man, I think that's pretty neat. And as mentioned, the gay fates mod is pretty good.

[@reddawn1873]

I need way more way more.I must Consume

[@phytohormones]

Great video! I do find that there's a separate category of gender-ambiguous character beyond the one you describe, the expected audience reaction to whom seems to be less "ew, a queer! kind of funny though" and more "HUMANS DON'T WORK LIKE THAT"; with them, the emphasis isn't on the character's "human" (masculine) physicality foiling their attempts at (feminine) gender expression (think the bara bandits, Valtome, Kyza, Excellus), but instead on the "inhumanity" of the success (Limstella, Bramimond, maybe Cleobulus). Eitri (not to be confused with Eitr) from FEH Book V can neatly slot into this second group: formerly a man [EDIT: their original gender is actually unknown], they've since changed bodies countless times across many centuries, and currently look like a young girl. Very little is made of the gender aspect, and they're simply referred to with she/her apparently by default, and yet: considering the type of character they are, I can't help but think this was specifically added for the creepiness factor. I do quite like the character, though. 8:35 Love how, upon hearing Aversa say "yeah, fat pig was a [REDACTED] :-)", Robin doesn't even skip a beat before replying "congratulations! you somehow managed to be WORSE than Excellus!". That's right, any and all queer wrongdoings pale in comparison to queerphobia, thank you for your wisdom, bird boy.🙏/j Anyway, regardless of any discourse it may produce, I eagerly await Excellus' arrival to FEH. I understand the issues many people have with this type of character, but I still greatly enjoy them. I just wish the FE wing of IntSys got inspired by the Paper Mario wing a little and included a more straightforward trans character one of these days... 13:26 So I haven't played FE7 myself yet, and wow, Athos, seriously? "He... She... It..."? Weren't you supposed to be friends??? 17:02 Speaking of Leon, I remember that back when Kyza appeared in FEH, a popular argument used by the opponents of the "they/them treatment" was that Japanese Leon also uses this same effeminate speech style and has the "Maiden's Heart" epithet in FEH, and that HE is universally accepted as a cis gay man. While I do think that the localisation team made the correct choices with both of them, this does highlight that deciding where exactly to draw the line can be difficult sometimes, especially since the way the Japanese language works allows for a lot of ambiguity that simply cannot be preserved in English. Translation is tough. 19:20 Rosado in FEH mentions that he resembles his father and that this makes him extra happy when he gets compliments, because it's like "they're for [his father] too". Very cute, but apparently this doesn't come up in Engage proper at all? Combined with Evil!Veyle's recent alt giving her additional characterisation via daddy issues, I wonder if IntSys has started offloading basic character information onto FEH, instead of actually including it in the mainline games. A bit concerning, if so.🤔 22:48 The concept of trans Byleth has been amusing me ever since I finished VW as my 2nd route (after AM). Imagine Rhea's reaction when the baby girl she's been hoping would become her mother shows up two decades later as a man. Vice versa, imagine her dejectedly putting her mother's heart into a male baby, only for said kid to reappear later as a woman. Absolute comedy gold either way. ...The revelation from SS/CS that Rhea only implanted Sothis' heart into Byleth at Sitri's request, saving Byleth's life in the process, did make this significantly less funny. The initial mental image I had of her experimenting on a random baby was simply delightful, though. 32:08-33:04 👏👏👏 I have nothing more to add, this is exactly correct.

[@Justic_]

About Athos and Bramimond, I haven't gotten to that point in FE7 yet, but from what I understand about Elibes lore, the 8 Legends weren't necessarily friends but comrades, united by their purpose as humanities champions. Another thing to consider is that the current Bramimond isn't really the same as the Bramimond Athos used to know anymore, Bramimond lost all of his humanity due to his research into Dark Magic and its eldritch qualities, so... Athos probably isn't even trying to be rude here but simply unsure about how to accurately describe Bramimonds deal before settling on "it" and just considering his old comrade a mirror.

[@gabcard2767]

Is Eitri's original gender ever confirmed? I don't remember that ever being mentioned, tho I might be misremembering.

[@phytohormones]

@gabcard2767 I took the time to replay the entirety of Book V, and it appears you were right (and I was wrong): it really isn't explicitly mentioned anywhere. I believe I got confused for four reasons: 1) We're told very early on, in Chapter 4, that the (male) inventor of the seiðjárn went on to become the first king of Niðavellir, but no other contemporary co-inventor is mentioned by anyone until much much later in Chapter 13. I think what happened is that, by the time the story got to that part, I could still recall that the inventor was male, but had already forgotten that the inventor and the king were the same person, and thus didn't realise that Eitri had to be a separate character entirely. 2) Because of Fáfnir's... unique... facial expressions, the reveal that, decades prior, Eitri had occupied a male body leaves a strong impression. Additionally, this bit is revealed BEFORE the body transfer thing, so all you know at that time is "Eitri looked like a man at one point prior to now, and doesn't anymore". 3) I hadn't been aware that "Eitri" was the name of a male dwarf in IRL mythology (and so, the fact that FE plays fast and loose with these references wasn't at the forefront of my mind), but I did recognise "Alfrik" and "Dvalinn" (names of some of Eitri's past identities) as such. I believe I assumed that specifically "Alfrik" was the original one, since that name is mentioned first, and just proceeded to extrapolate from there ("Alfrik was Eitri's original name" --> "Alfrik is a masculine name" --> "Eitri was originally a man"). 4) The way Eitri talks about the first king and the lengths she goes to for him imply love, but with how FEH is, had Eitri originally been a female character, this would almost certainly not have been left to subtext like this (even just within Book V, we have Nótt). Additionally, Eitri says she and the king "built [Niðavellir] together; it was our child", which, again, were Eitri originally female, would likely imply marriage between the two, but then THAT would imply that Reginn would have to be Eitri's descendant as well, which would've 100% been mentioned had it been the case. So yes, Eitri's original gender isn't clarified; I was wrong about that part. My main point, however, was that the gender swapping was likely intended as alienating, just like the body transfers, millenniums-long-lifespan (not merely centuries!), and the complete disregard for human life. The lack of clarification may actually also have been intended for that, now that I think about it. Anyway, thank you for correcting me!🙇‍♂️

[@juicyjuustar121]

I don't have any trans or NB headcanons for FE characters (I prefer to write my own original characters than to headcanon someone else's), but I find it funny how the character that the Sacred Echoes devs decided to make trans was the one that I, a cishet man, share a name with. Funny coincidence. Also I love Rosado. I don't care if he's trans or cis or gay or straight or whatever, I just love him.

[@darkjaden-fe]

I personally love the enby Byleth headcanon. I know it's fairly common but idk, it just fits for me.

[@rxincandy_V]

i may be a cisgender woman but as a lesbian the lack of any defiance of feminine gender norms genuinely irritates me, my favourite aesthetic is women in suits and we can't get even that while men get to express gender non confirmity in these games even if sometimes to a detriment of the trans conversation (which is still a cost i'd rather not pay), the only instance i can think of a gnc or cross dressing woman is effie in feh who gets to be the only woman to wear a groom's suit and is reduced to a low value 4 star anyways

[@Justic_]

I mean, if we're talking women in suits, FEH also gave us Ganglöt who, matching Rearmed Lifs business-suit coat look, also wears something that very much resembles a suit at least as the top. As for Valenines Effie, I'm not sure I'd consider her outfit a "grooms suit", I'd consider it something more along the same lines as what Mathilda is wearing below her armor? Or Merrins casual outfit in Engage? Anyways, perhaps not much of a difference to some people but Effie also wasn't a 4 star but a free Tempest Trial-reward so everyone should've gotten a free 5 star copy of her, and despite that meaning she came without prf-weapon she still was considered really good for a free unit and with a really good inheritable for that time, so she really wasn't done dirty at all.

[@rxincandy_V]

​@@Justic_ i can see your points i'm just really sad all of this conversation is relegated to the phone game 🥲

[@cobaltobject1855]

I personally headcanon Alcryst as a transfem egg. The in game explanation for his self-esteem issues is that they come from being unfavorably compared to Diamant growing up, but despite that I never get the sense from any of his dialogue that he particularly *wants* to be anything like Diamant. I find it more compelling to imagine that the root cause of his issues as a broad discomfort with his role as a prince, a discomfort which he doesn't realize stems from gender dysphoria. Ultimately the reason I'm so attached to the idea is that I see a lot of my pretransition self in him.

[@Justic_]

I mean, it's not that Alcryst wants to be like Diamant, but that as a prince of Brodia, Diamant kinda sets the bar for what he thinks people EXPECT him to be, and he himself believes he can never meet that standard. His anxiety stems entirely from what he believes to be the expectations of others, not his own frustration of actually trying or wanting to be like his older brother.

[@cobaltobject1855]

​@@Justic_This only enhances the trans reading in my eyes. Myself and many other trans women can certainly relate to feeling anxiety from an inability to perform the social role that was expected of us as "boys"

[@gwrgamer3606]

not necessarily my head canon, but someone on Tumblr did a really cool comic with TF Dorothea and Ferdinand. Also Dorothea x Ingrid is the best ship we never got.

[@thoughtprism2963]

Rosado's design in a vacuum is the the most blatantly transfemme character I have ever seen. My theory is that the artist behind Rosado intended as such, but the gameplay and writing teams at IS changed them afterwards.

[@MrToonlink53]

Femboys are a thing you know

[@Justic_]

Engages character-designer Mika Picazo is just generally known for over-the-top character-designs, so I wouldn't be suprised at all if Rosados setting remained unchanged but she simply went so wild with the design that Rosado ended up reading as "blatantly transfemme" to people. Perhaps you could see it as her balancing out the more "normal" designs she had to make with more over-the-top ones when the setting allowed for a more unconventional one.

[@PlayerZeroStart]

As a cishet man, I doubt I can meaningfully contribute to the conversation, but I just wanted to say this was an interesting video, and very well made. I do hope to see more explicitly queer characters portrayed in a good light in the future, hopefully with Japan slowly becoming more progressive it's not as much an impossibility as you say it is. I don't have much in the way of queer headcanons in Fire Emblem, Felix X Sylvain is the only one that comes to mind, but Three Houses is also the only FE game I've played to completion so we'll have to see about that.

[@Izanna3]

I think Ike and Soren are confirmed to be gay in outside canon material, at least!

[@IAm9Tales]

Kyza was a trans woman in the original japanese version! an artbook for telius with dev commentary literally describes her as "the body is a man, the heart is a woman", which is pretty much the exact wording vivian uses in the japanese version of the thousand year door remake when she tells mario she's trans, sooo. yeah. but of course fire emblem has to have an extremely stupid approach to queer people like always. the decision to use make her nonbinary in the english localisation also feels extremely sketchy and like a cop out, god forbid we have a masc-presenting trans woman, make her use they/them! oh yeah, and for trans headcanons for me it's bernadetta. tooootally not because she's my fav character and as a trans woman i can relate to constant crippling anxiety about how people perceive me and might want to harm me because of my identity (living in a queerphobic country is fun) and how difficult it is to take care of yourself when you're a sad mess.

[@damediadora4160]

Unfortunately that's just not really true. There are only two instances of gendernonconformity relating to Kyza and that is the artbook and the base conversation (both of which can be found translated in the post in the description). However, both seem to be an extension of the attraction for Ranulf in a sort of okama-ish way (this is how you're supposed to read him, as a charicature/stereotype of a feminine gay man). Whilst now "male body, female heart/mind/brain" is the cis way of explaining being trans, certainly at the time describing someone in this way could just as easily describe them being gay. As for Heroes, the japanese does not mention Kyza's gender identity whatsoever but according to one of the other comments Kyza is coded to be male despite an NB gender existing in the codebase, so this legitimately seems to be the one case where the english translation actually is more queer than the japanese one instead of the reverse. I wish it were better for us too but as far as transfeminity goes in fe we only have unsympathetic transmisogynist charicatures or sympathetic transmisogynist charicatures (Forrest, I can't definitively speak to Rosado because I haven't read his supports) and unlike lesbian (sub)text this does not change across localizations. It's sometimes easy because of all the erasure that the localizations do do to imagine that the Japanese version is much better but that is usually not the case

[@IAm9Tales]

oh. it appears i have understimated the power of japanese transphobia. rosado is actually a really wholesome and positive character, i don't remember his gender being played for laughs anywhere in the game, so he's actually handled rather well for a femboy i think

[@pebbleknight174]

i love trans linhard in anyway like nb trans masc or trans fem linhardt

[@philbuttler3427]

Im queer but like Forrest and Ronaldo arent trans. Like they use he him pronouns refer to themselves as men and have whole conversations about how they just like feminine aesthetics. Gender is a spectrum after all and theyre strictly in the cis part

[@harpsich0rd559]

Literally thank you. These characters blatantly tell you, in perfect English that they identify as male and never at any point and time ask to be referred to otherwise. But everyone acts like because they like pretty clothing they just *have* to be trans. What the fuck happened to clothing doesn’t equal gender? It’s just reinforcing gender rolls by going “You liked dress? GIRL!”

[@Estfireemblem]

Are you the guy that soloed por with ike

[@gascon-en-exil]

I am not. Challenge runs aren't really my thing, and I'm certainly not confident enough in my tactical ability to record them even if they were.

[@Estfireemblem]

@@gascon-en-exil you sounded kinda similar

[@oximoron613]

I think it's unfair to dismiss Libra as being an overused joke about his feminine looks. I think people tend to misremember how often his gender actually comes up, once when Chrom recruits him, and then a mere 3 out of his 14 supports (not including children). Of those three, Maribelle's is just mentioning a past incident and Sully's is a thoughtful conversation about the expectations society places on them. Only Virion's support is played for comical effect. The majority of his supports actually revolves around his struggles with faith, self esteem, and the abuse he suffered from parents who thought he was cursed. Ironically, it's these parts of his character, not his feminine appearance, that made him very relatable to many queer and gender non-conforming people.

[@Silith13]

There is the very slight and mostly fan interpertation of Marty being transmale. (And the second father of Tanya)

[@wjsilas]

I'm both surprised and not surprised that you didn't think about the developers not knowing HOW to write a trans woman considering they barely know how to write cis women and that Forrest and Rosado would be trans women if they knew/cared to write them correctly. Like not even as a headcanon but just reality that those 2 characters ARE women. Both just aren't because trans women are seen as crossdressers and feminine men in japan so why would they make the characters in their game trans??

[@phytohormones]

To be completely fair, IntSys is the very same company who gave us Vivian. You could even argue that Vivian in the original JPN GC version of TTYD was a perfect example of the devs "wanting to but not knowing how to write a trans woman": she gets misgendered at every step of the game, including in party menus, despite herself speaking with a feminine 1st person pronoun ("atai") and sentence endings, referring to herself with feminine terms ("sister") and being visibly devastated when her own sister calls her a man. Compare this to Rosado two decades later, who uses a boldly masculine pronoun ("ore") and (in Japanese) repeatedly asserts himself as a man. Compare this again with TTYD's Switch remake, where Vivian is no longer misgendered by "neutral" info sources like menus and (in Japanese) even explicitly says herself that she "may have the body of a boy", but her "heart is that of a cute girl". Yes, the team that works on FE is different from the one who works on Paper Mario, but I wouldn't expect them to be THAT disconnected.

[@mysmallnoman]

Thanks for using groomer logic

[@wjsilas]

@@phytohormones I see what you're saying, but I think that there is a vastly different fanbase between the two and fire emblem fans are composed of mostly men which heavily impacts the decisions they make in character design (such as fat characters always playing antogonists never protagonists) which isn't the case for Paper Mario. So I think that under regular circumstances for wider audiences, these characters would be women.

[@MrToonlink53]

"Fans has reframed Forrest as a trans women " How is turning a guy who just likes to dress and look pretty into a trans women a good thing??

[@banbanthebandit4002]

How is it at all wrong though, is it wrong to headcanon a character as neurodivergent? Is it wrong to headcanon a character as gay? I don’t understand what you’ve got a problem with here, it’s not like cis Forrest isn’t still a thing it’s literally just a popular headcanon, what harm does this seriously bring you. If someone were to headcanon the Byleths as non-binary for example does that have any effect on you, no one’s forcing you to conform to headcanons so I don’t see how this is remotely a problem.

[@gascon-en-exil]

Seconded. While I can understand the appeal of Forrest as a gender nonconforming cis man, especially since I do some of that myself (in a very different context, however), I can also understand the desire for actual trans characters. One person's headcanon doesn't invalidate someone else's, nor can it have any impact on canon one way or another. And to reiterate a point from near the end of the video: Forrest isn't a person; like all other fictional characters, he's effectively a doll to be played with by the audience. That can apply to which mother you pick for him, what skills you give him, or what classes you put him in - and it can also apply to how you interpret his gender identity.

[@MrToonlink53]

@banbanthebandit4002 I don't have a problem with headcanons, but 99% of the people who headcanon femboy characters as trans will turn around and try to convince you that they are actually trans. If you say they aren't, then you are transphobic. Can't have a single femboy character without the conversation around them being ruined by headcanon brainrot.

[@greenstat1c]

​@@gascon-en-exil I completely disagree. Headcanoning a character more in one way or another in terms of gender expression can feel really invalidating for those who identify as the base. It's like if someone were to just say "Well I just headcanon Vivian from Paper Mario as cis." Doing so feels very combatitive to the character and to those who it resonates with, giving a tone of disapproval. In a similar vein, headcanoning a GNC cis man as transfem feels invalidating to me, a GNC cis man. Representation for trans characters is solely lacking in media, but making every single feminine man in FE headcanoned as trans gives a vibe of "It's not enough for them to be GNC. It was a missed opportunity." It's just really disrespectful to see a character like him and go "Hmm, yes. This already genderqueer person? I'm changing their genderqueerness to one I like more!"

[@cobaltobject1855]

​​@@greenstat1c​Other people interpreting a fictional character differently from you does not materially harm you in any way. You self identify as a cis man, feeling invalidated for your gnc fashion choices is not equivalent to trans women having their core identities invalidated. There are dozens and dozens of canonical gnc cis male characters in anime adjacent media, whereas I can count the number of explicitly canonical trans women on one hand. Let us have our fun.

[@greendemon905]

First of all, Im bi, and I ADORE Lucius, Libra, Forrest, Subaki, Leon, Linhardt, Yuri and Rosado! Especially Forrest and Rosado, BECAUSE they're men unafraid of judgement. I feel like retconning them into transmen just turns them into stereotypes. I am unbothered by flamboyant caricatures like Excellus, because they're usually too ugly for me to want to relate to them. Plus, for every Excellus, there is a Libra. Ugly flamboyant characters are always evil, and pretty ones are typically good. It doesn't come across to me as homophobia. Fantasy literature just has a way of making evil people ugly, and good people pretty. It's a universal writing trope seen in fairytales all over the world. Making Limstella nonbinary sounds a bit iffy to me, since they're meant to be a soulless creation born from dark magic. Making the case that male Byleth fusing with Sothis makes him nonbinary is equally iffy. In Three Houses, Byleth has to fuse with Sothis to escape zaharas. In Three Hopes, Sothis possesses Byleth. In both cases, male Byleth is FORCED into this new state, so claiming him as an nonbinary icon feels really wrong. I wish you went into more detail on why Sacred Echoes made Jesse trans, because in Echoes he's very clearly a dude. I do easily see Lukas as being asexual, based on his support with Python. I also agree with you that Echoes has some sexist undertones, considering you LITERALLY recruit half the female cast by saving them! Silque is saved from bandits, Clair, Mathilda, Tatiana and Est are rescued from dungeon cells, and Delthea has to be saved from Tartarrah. I mainly see Arval as male, since Epimenides is male, but him having access to every class does make a strong argument.

[@Izanna3]

I love this video

[@Estfireemblem]

If your promoting forrest into a butler than theres something wrong with you

[@matthewjenkins4391]

I was getting really into the video, and then you started talking about Three Hopes spoilers with Arval, and now I can't finish the video. Oh well.

[@waddledottz]

"spoilers" JAJAJAJA THE GAME IS OLD AF STOP WHINING

[@greenstat1c]

The game's been out for years

[@matthewjenkins4391]

@greenstat1c For like, 2 years. It barely qualifies for being out for "years". People also got mad at Fire emblem heroes for revealing the black knight, despite radiant dawn being super old at that point. Not only that, but it's still the second most recent game, at the moment.

[@waddledottz]

@@matthewjenkins4391 cry about it

[@matthewjenkins4391]

@@waddledottz 🐛

[@JordiumZ]

That boy ain't right

[@MugenAeternum]

Could've sworn Rosado and Forrest explicitly identify as guys that like cute things 🙃

[@altruisticcomputer4706]

If you actually watched the video you'd know the video is about gender non-conformity rather than just transgender characters (seeing as there's no explicitly trans characters in FE)