It’s ya girl, arolace, back at it again with inventing things that relate to being aro. Today’s question is: Are you tired of not being able to see yourself in the media? Well, look no further than this fun game! Help other aros like you discover fun characters that we can actually relate to! All you gotta do is:
1. Write character’s name and what book/movie/tv show they first appeared in
2. (optional) Since this is open to everyone who’s arospec, if you’d like to be more specific about what you headcanon/what is canon, feel free to write it down
3. any other details about the show/book/movie you feel is important
I’ll provide some examples to start it off
Data from Star Trek TNG. I hc him/them as aroace or greyroace and agender/nb, and Star Trek in general is actually a really good show if you’re not to into the romance plots
The Doctor from Doctor Who (specifically doctors 1, 3, 6, 7, war, 12 for aro hc) I think all the doctors are ace, but 1, 3, 6, 7, war, and 12 are super duper aroace. Sixie in particular has the very obvious six/peri QPR. Doctor Who (especially classic doctor who) has some of the most canon QPRs in any show ever. Also the remaining doctors are also pretty easily arospec but I’m too lazy to write them all down right now (later my dudes, later)
Merida from Brave. I mean come on ShE sHoOtS aRrOwS aNd WeArS gReEn AnD hAtEs ThE iDeA oF MaRrIgE. I hc as demiroace because she seems to hate the idea of getting married to some loser she doesn’t know but doesn’t necessarily ever say she wants to be single forever
who do you guys think? Can’t wait to hear your aro hcs!
Lloyd Irving from Tales of Symphonia. I headcanoned him as aroace even before I knew that was a thing. He was the first character I could fully relate to since he clearly loves all his friends and doesn’t seem to be interested in romance. the sequel doesn’t count that game can try to pry my aroace lloyd from my cold dead hands for all i care
Sorey from Tales of Zestiria. Again, an aroace headcanon. Sorry, I just get so excited when I find a character I can actually relate to. Also, Sorey and Mikleo in a queerplatonic relationship is the best thing ever.
Granny Weatherwax from the Discworld Witches books by Terry Pratchett has to be the archetypal autistic-coded non-amorous aro-ace-coded witch woman, at least to my mind. She has that common disconnection from society and its romantic entanglements but she will be there to save it in the end, even if she’s a shade (or a lot) disgruntled by the necessity and there’s nothing soft about her blunt tongue. I personally think her brand of cheerfully living alone combined with her willingness to wade into society’s problems when needed make her a better portrayal of non-amorous aro-ace than Clariel, plus she’s a thousand different types of clever and heroic in a very understated fashion.
(In fact, I feel that the the construct of the role of the Discworld witch and their service to society while living on its edges is very friendly to aromantics. And autistics.)
Granny Weatherwax is in several books, but you can see her as a main character in Equal Rites, Wyrd Sisters, Witches Abroad, Lords and Ladies, Maskerade and Carpe Jugulum, and she’s a supporting character in some of the Tiffany Aching books. But … just read all of Discworld, honestly. It’s not romance-free, so I don’t recommend it for folks who are very romance repulsed, but it’s generally not the central focus even in the books where it’s more of a significant presence, and several books are barely or minimally romantic. There’s heaps of characters who don’t have romantic relationships or, if they do, those relationships don’t have significant page-time. I’ll admit that I’m not a fan of Vimes and Sybil’s romantic relationship (which is against the prevailing opinion of many alloromantics I know) but it still doesn’t occupy too much of his stories!
If you like witty, clever fantasy and stories that are concerned with so much more than their characters’ romantic entanglements, Discworld.
Dean Winchester from Supernatural seems very aro to me. He does often have sexual relationships though so any sex repulsed aces should probably avoid this show.
@aroacestuff, Dean Winchester as an allosexual aro has just blown my mind! It makes so much sense about his character, his relationships and the show! So much sense! I mean, it’s not canon in the sense that they come right out and say it, but there’s so much evidence for Dean as an allosexual aro (who doesn’t know he’s aro) that I feel it’s more coding than headcanon. Hell, his trying to have romantic relationships and it never quite working and sticking instead with family and making found-family, and his primary, defining relationships always being platonic or familial–that feels so aro to me. So aro.
(And Dean and Castiel makes so much more sense, in terms of the narrative, as a QPR.
A romantic relationship between them always felt forced,
between the queerbaiting that it might go there and the evident truth that the show was never going to, but a QPR? That fits. It fits the show and it fits Dean. They just don’t know that’s what it’s called.)
I’m still probably never going to make it past Season 11 because I was starting to find the later-later seasons too repetitive (not necessarily in individual episodes but in terms of season narrative arc) for my enjoyment, but I think I will have to rewatch the Supernatural seasons I do have with an eye for allo-aro Dean.
Thank you so much for pointing out just why I’ve always found Dean to be the more relatable of the brothers. Because he’s allo-aro.
Finn from Adventure Time. His obsession with Princess Bubblegum has no sense of depth, and is much more along the lines of “I think you’re really cool…is that what a crush is? Does that mean I like you?”
He has repeatedly told Jake that he’s not interested in going out with girls, and fails to see why Jake thinks Finn would be into dating.
His relationship with Flame Princess had disastrous effects to everyone, and after getting out of that relationship he describes himself as not really being able to feel anything like that. In one episode, Huntress Wizard tells him directly that “exceptional beasts like us cannot fall in love. That is the secret of ordinary people.” It’s evident in the series that that wasn’t just a throwaway line, and it was so important for Finn’s character to be validated by that.
Jean Valjean from Les Mis. I think he’s aroace and that might be why he seemed a lot happier living in the convent than anywhere else and why he seemed so uncomfortable at the wedding. There is a part in the book that says that he had trouble telling that Cosette had a crush on Marius because he had never had one himself. He and Cosette have this really beautiful found-family story that @euphrasievaljean did a lot better job of describing here than I could.
~Fantine: white clothes, sacrifice, a needle and thread, the memory of a child’s laughter, the faded taste of champagne, factory grease, a failed Paris romance, biting back the fear, soft hands, gentleness, regretful glances, tired feet and a long road to follow
~Jean Valjean: rosary beads, scarred skin, straight black unforgiving numbers, little shards of glass, a ship at sea, hidden treasure, flickering candles, a dark and lonely room, hot food given away, the taste of fruit picked in the sunlight, lost years, found children
~Cosette: song birds, flowers arranged artfully, love letters, a snowy wood, rags and bare feet, childhood friends, hidden things, moonlight, quiet tears, curled hair, a locked gate, the sound of gunshots on a hot summer night
~Javert: midnight, shining silver medallions, righteousness, falling and falling, newspapers, star charts, cool anger, defending the innocent, a chiming bell, a long long bridge, dread, the feeling of being so very very close to your goal, suspicion, loaded pistols, unflinching in dangerous times, unflinching in the dark
~Marius: gunpowder, flowers on an old grave, books and books on languages and law, long afternoons in the park, passionate poetry, shyness, not taking a cent, the french flag flying high, fraternity, eloquence, forgiving the old and grieving the young, a soft voice full of conviction: ‘my wife’
Alright, anyone who knows me knows that I like to joke around a lot about ships, but if I’m being perfectly honest, the kind of love I adore most in fiction is the love that isn’t romantic. Platonic love is great, but I also really, really love familial love, particularly found familial love.
I saw a comment somewhere that said Cosette was “the love of Valjean’s life,” and…it’s true. “Love of my life” is a term that’s usually used for romantic purposes, but when you think about it, it’s absolutely the term you would use to describe Valjean and Cosette. Cosette shaped Valjean and taught him the meaning of love in ways no one else had done before. Yes, the Bishop taught him virtue and compassion, and he felt genuine compassion and sympathy for Fantine and her situation, but true, deep love for another person was entirely alien to Valjean until he encountered Cosette. And Cosette, on the other hand, needed desperately to have a positive parental figure in her life, someone to love and cherish and protect her. The two became so very important in each other’s lives, and I’d argue that their love for each other was at the very heart of Les Mis as a story. Everything surrounding Fantine’s plight and Valjean’s suffering through prison led up to him encountering Cosette, and everything that followed was relevant to Valjean’s story because it involved Cosette in some way. Most things happened because Valjean and Cosette were destined to find each other, and then continued to happen because Valjean loved Cosette and wanted to make her happy.
And it’s beautiful, because their “love story” isn’t romantic, and the central “love story” didn’t have to be romantic in order for it to be powerful and beautiful. You can absolutely get meaningful, emotional stories from non-romantic love. It can be between two friends, it can be love between siblings, it can be a loving and doting father/daughter relationship. I don’t feel like media focuses a lot on deep yet non-romantic relationships as “love stories,” and it’s a shame, because there’s just so much more that can be explored outside of romance.
Update on reading the Brick that was too silly to go in my proper mostly serious liveblog:
Both Valjean and Javert have already run into multiple moral dilemmas and uncertainties at this point and I’ve noticed that they both respond in a different but distinct way
Valjean tends to respond to a problem like this
While our dear Inspector Javert usually responds to a problem like this
¯_( ಠ_ಠ)_/¯ 