Yuri!!! on Ice would've been a more popular anime if the characters were female instead of male?

Venky_Shetty said:
Thank god it's not all female. I'm tired of these waifus and re:zero gave enough of them for the year. And if it were all female cast, there'd possibly be that one typical high pitched girl which would have probably made me drop the whole show. Phew.. to think about it, we dodged a bullet. No moe crap for me man.

oriongreen said:
I've always wanted a figure skating anime with an all-female cast. That's why I got salty when I saw Yuri on ice. My dreams got crushed.

PokeFanTruffle said:
Men & their masculinity is so fragile LMAO.
Scared of some gays.
Poor them.

OmegaOtaku said:
Don't get salty at what I'm about to say, but I absolutely agree that it should be a female cast anime. As if figure-skating wasn't gay enough as is, the show only furthers it since it's pretty much a fujoshi's wet dream. Not saying it would be any different have it been a female cast instead. I just think it'd make more sense it being all female instead of male.

Gladis110 said:
Okay so like... even if I think YoI is perfect as it is, can you guys please stop talking about how it would have been ecchi or moe trash? Especially if it was made by the same creators who are currently working on Yuri on Ice, I doubt that would have been the case. Just as Yuri on Ice is doing a good job not falling into the typical BL traps, I'm a 100% convinced that with an all female cast, it would have done just as good a job not falling into the equally typical GL and ecchi traps. It's trying to be different now, and even if they switched genders of the characters, I don't think that would have changed.

GangsterCat said:
what are you talking about? the current yuri on ice is ecchi AND moe trash

Seijichan said:
I think that there are a few key things that people are forgetting here.

1. The Creators
This one is pretty important, and it kind of ties into my second point, so I'll make this brief. If the cast had been all female rather than all male, it would have been portrayed with the same respect and dignity, and I personally do not believe that it would have lost or gained anything as a show. The creators wanted to write a figure skating anime in a world where there was no discrimination and their characters could love freely. They did that. And they would have done it tastefully regardless of the genders of the characters. This is where feministic, chauvanistic, and homophobic natures WITHIN THE VIEWERS really makes the fandom of this show cancerous. This is a ground-breaking anime, simply for the fact that there is a canon homosexual couple beautifully and tastefully portrayed within the lead characters--this would have happened regardless of gender and would have been just as beautiful to watch.

2. YOI Isn't Yaoi
There seems to be a fair amount of people hating on the show just because it's "Yaoi" and that's gross; additionally these people seem to take it a step further by citing fanservice-esque moments that only occurred early on in the series which make it seem like the creators were intentionally eroticizing the handsome Viktor Nikiforov (what people don't take into account is that the imagery was designed in such a way to enforce upon the watcher how God-like Viktor is to Yuri, but I digress). I've also seen these same people needlessly picking at other aspects of the show, essentially throwing out hatred just because they're salty about the gay lead characters.

This leads me into defining what Yaoi actually is--the eroticizing, fetishizing, and sexualizing of a male homosexual couple. Yuri is the same, but for females. Yuri!!! On Ice is NOT yaoi. It portrays the pure, progressive, healthy love between the two leads, treating them as if they were any other couple in a series. When you take away the genders, they're just two people in love. There's nothing erotic or sexual about that at all. Having said that, there is a heavy theme of seduction and sexual attraction, but even still it is pulled off tastefully without the entire show being based on that sexualization of the main couple. My point being, if Viktor and Yuri had been lesbians, or even just a good old heterosexual couple, it would have been treated exactly the same--with human beings who happened to have fallen in love.

3. How Figure Skating Works
For the people who want a cast that is equally made up of male and female characters; first of all, I don't know what you're whining about. The female characters that are in this show already are respectable women, who will hopefully be built upon more in the confirmed sequel.

To supplement this, with the way figure skating works, it would not be possible to focus on both male and female competitive figure skating at the same time cleanly without sacrificing the quality of character development and pacing. Normally men and women (and even pairs/ice dancing) compete on different days; men and women do not compete in the same divisions unless it's in pairs or ice dancing. The reason for this is likely that men are physically capable of more technical and difficult routines and compositions, including having several quads in one program. It is an immense strain on the male body that most female skaters would not be able to handle--I am not saying women can't do quads, but they would end up retiring a lot sooner than they already do if they stressed their bodies the same way the men do. That's just a fact. And in light of that, if men and women competed together, the men would likely almost always overshadow the women with their scores and that would just trigger all the 3rd wave feminists. Now, having said all this, I'll continue to point out that the men and women compete on different days most of the time, and I think everyone can agree that this would make for poor pacing, and little room for character development. For this reason, even if the show had featured a heterosexual couple, the gender ratio would have to highly favour one gender or the other to keep itself clean and concise.

IN CONCLUSION

I don't believe that if the cast had been gendered any differently that the quality of the show would have deteriorated at all, with the way that the creators chose to handle the development of this anime. I don't believe that this show is Yaoi, and if it had been all female, it wouldn't have been Yuri either. Do I feel like I would enjoy it as much? Absolutely. I don't think there is much that could be done to the platform to make it less enjoyable as a sports genre love story, but that's also my personal opinion. Do I think that the show would have been more popular with an all female cast? It's actually quite likely, considering that the largely female-based fandom would be able to really relate to the characters on a personal level and may have watched regardless of the fact that the cast was not largely male-based; I can say that with some amount of certainty, actually because I don't usually see fans of the Yaoi community watching a largely female-based anime just to hate on the yuri fanservicing and intentionally try to ruin it for people who enjoy it, while I can actively watch the reverse happen the longer this show goes on.

tl;dr

The only reason this show would be any more popular if the cast was largely female is because fans of "yaoi" tend to be more open and less hateful than the dorks who are triggered because it wasn't actually yuri and hate on it just because they think that the only gays who should be allowed to be together are gay women. The quality of the show wouldn't have suffered, but the quality of the fandom might have seen an interesting change. The point is moot though because it wouldn't have been yuri even if it had had an all female cast, so you can all stop any time.

Seijichan said:
I think that there are a few key things that people are forgetting here.

1. The Creators
This one is pretty important, and it kind of ties into my second point, so I'll make this brief. If the cast had been all female rather than all male, it would have been portrayed with the same respect and dignity, and I personally do not believe that it would have lost or gained anything as a show. The creators wanted to write a figure skating anime in a world where there was no discrimination and their characters could love freely. They did that. And they would have done it tastefully regardless of the genders of the characters. This is where feministic, chauvanistic, and homophobic natures WITHIN THE VIEWERS really makes the fandom of this show cancerous. This is a ground-breaking anime, simply for the fact that there is a canon homosexual couple beautifully and tastefully portrayed within the lead characters--this would have happened regardless of gender and would have been just as beautiful to watch.

2. YOI Isn't Yaoi
There seems to be a fair amount of people hating on the show just because it's "Yaoi" and that's gross; additionally these people seem to take it a step further by citing fanservice-esque moments that only occurred early on in the series which make it seem like the creators were intentionally eroticizing the handsome Viktor Nikiforov (what people don't take into account is that the imagery was designed in such a way to enforce upon the watcher how God-like Viktor is to Yuri, but I digress). I've also seen these same people needlessly picking at other aspects of the show, essentially throwing out hatred just because they're salty about the gay lead characters.

This leads me into defining what Yaoi actually is--the eroticizing, fetishizing, and sexualizing of a male homosexual couple. Yuri is the same, but for females. Yuri!!! On Ice is NOT yaoi. It portrays the pure, progressive, healthy love between the two leads, treating them as if they were any other couple in a series. When you take away the genders, they're just two people in love. There's nothing erotic or sexual about that at all. Having said that, there is a heavy theme of seduction and sexual attraction, but even still it is pulled off tastefully without the entire show being based on that sexualization of the main couple. My point being, if Viktor and Yuri had been lesbians, or even just a good old heterosexual couple, it would have been treated exactly the same--with human beings who happened to have fallen in love.

3. How Figure Skating Works
For the people who want a cast that is equally made up of male and female characters; first of all, I don't know what you're whining about. The female characters that are in this show already are respectable women, who will hopefully be built upon more in the confirmed sequel.

To supplement this, with the way figure skating works, it would not be possible to focus on both male and female competitive figure skating at the same time cleanly without sacrificing the quality of character development and pacing. Normally men and women (and even pairs/ice dancing) compete on different days; men and women do not compete in the same divisions unless it's in pairs or ice dancing. The reason for this is likely that men are physically capable of more technical and difficult routines and compositions, including having several quads in one program. It is an immense strain on the male body that most female skaters would not be able to handle--I am not saying women can't do quads, but they would end up retiring a lot sooner than they already do if they stressed their bodies the same way the men do. That's just a fact. And in light of that, if men and women competed together, the men would likely almost always overshadow the women with their scores and that would just trigger all the 3rd wave feminists. Now, having said all this, I'll continue to point out that the men and women compete on different days most of the time, and I think everyone can agree that this would make for poor pacing, and little room for character development. For this reason, even if the show had featured a heterosexual couple, the gender ratio would have to highly favour one gender or the other to keep itself clean and concise.

IN CONCLUSION

I don't believe that if the cast had been gendered any differently that the quality of the show would have deteriorated at all, with the way that the creators chose to handle the development of this anime. I don't believe that this show is Yaoi, and if it had been all female, it wouldn't have been Yuri either. Do I feel like I would enjoy it as much? Absolutely. I don't think there is much that could be done to the platform to make it less enjoyable as a sports genre love story, but that's also my personal opinion. Do I think that the show would have been more popular with an all female cast? It's actually quite likely, considering that the largely female-based fandom would be able to really relate to the characters on a personal level and may have watched regardless of the fact that the cast was not largely male-based; I can say that with some amount of certainty, actually because I don't usually see fans of the Yaoi community watching a largely female-based anime just to hate on the yuri fanservicing and intentionally try to ruin it for people who enjoy it, while I can actively watch the reverse happen the longer this show goes on.

tl;dr

The only reason this show would be any more popular if the cast was largely female is because fans of "yaoi" tend to be more open and less hateful than the dorks who are triggered because it wasn't actually yuri and hate on it just because they think that the only gays who should be allowed to be together are gay women. The quality of the show wouldn't have suffered, but the quality of the fandom might have seen an interesting change. The point is moot though because it wouldn't have been yuri even if it had had an all female cast, so you can all stop any time.

bottle said:
It depends
Your favorite Keijo!!!!!!!!! only sells a few hundred
I have not watched it
But if it has Plushenko in it I will jump to it. Male skate features speed and spin much more strongly. It's like a different dimension.

Mayuka said:
Actually no. If it was full of females and had fanservice (like Keijo), then the casuals/non-anime fandom wouldn't even watch it. Look at all the professional skaters promoting YOI. Also, Tumblr fandom is HUGE. A lot of the watchers won't even watch it unless it's different to normal Anime. Another example is Shingeki no Kyojin. I knew many people who don't watch Anime who still watched it because it was ground breaking.

Ysad_Ziwezhan said:

@kamuinoyume
saying things like "...in a season that's packed with things like Hibike Euphonium (for shojo ai lovers)..."
makes you as clever as the people dismissing "Yuri on Ice" for being only fujoshi material. I don't think you want to fall that low.
Hibike and YoI are so much more than that.

Seijichan said:

For the people who want a cast that is equally made up of male and female characters; first of all, I don't know what you're whining about. The female characters that are in this show already are respectable women, who will hopefully be built upon more in the confirmed sequel.

Gladis110 said:
THANK YOU. This was an amazing breakdown of the discussion and exactly what I was thinking. ; w ; Couldn't have said it better myself.

MasterHavik said:
I pretty much agree with this but I do find the fasnervice moments to be cringey as fuck. But there are moments that I legit buy them being a couple. like the dance off., when Victor help Yuri create Eros, and getting him the rings. If the show had more moments like that it wouldn't get label as Yaoi.

Ysad_Ziwezhan said:
So there is a confirmed sequel?

Agree that the female cast is great, I like almost all of them except JJ's girlfriend. Nevertheless they are really in the background and we get nearly nothing from them if it's not related with one of the male skater. They are really supporting characters or even supporting supporting characters, if you see what I mean.

Seijichan said:


You're quite welcome. I pretty much live and breathe for defending this show lately, it seems.



As I mentioned before, the reason for the quote-on-quote "fanservice" moments aren't there to blatantly throw naked Viktor in the viewer's face. More like, because of time constraints and because not all the viewers will understand exactly what makes Viktor so absolutely Godlike in Yuri's mind just from watching him skate, they needed a little extra push. Those are moments during a time when Yuri still largely reveres Viktor as little more than his idol--he has a hard time seeing him as any more than a perfect being, and he even says as much, that he views Viktor as a God, as a figure skating genius, etc. So to really drive this home, the creators have kind of shoved it in our faces a little bit, like saying, "Look; do you see how perfect he is?" Because they need you to understand Yuri's perspective and watch how the relationship changes over time.

What I find really funny is that the fandom actually started out largely mirroring Yuri's anxiety about the situation because the creators did such a good job enforcing the way Yuri felt--and with this I'm referencing the whole Viktor is evil/Viktor is going to die theories, even up to the Makkachin Makkachoked phase. And the fandom, for the most part, continues to mirror Yuri's feelings to some degree; which is actually funny considering how annoying the fandom can be, versus how annoying it can be to deal with someone who has debilitating social anxiety--and as someone who suffers from social anxiety, I can relate well to that. It's all about the design of the visualizations and how they're presented to us, and the directors have an amazing grasp on how this works.

Lastly, there are many, many more moments like what you've described. How about at the Cup of China when Viktor tried to help Yuri relax because he was letting himself be utterly destroyed by anxiety--he covered Yuri's ears, told him not to listen. That might not seem like much, but it is. It shows that Viktor understands Yuri's fear even if he doesn't exactly know what to do about it. He cares. Mind, his actions following that weren't the smartest, but Viktor's not perfect, and the fact that Yuri allowed himself to cry in front of Viktor to show his own weakness, first, and second forgave him, shows that they actually do have a very healthy relationship already by that point. And then the episode comes to culmination when Yuri ultimately shows Viktor that he forgives him and in fact loves him, by performing a quad flip at the end of his program--Viktor's signature jump. Hence Viktor's absolute need to kiss that man. And that's just based around Yuri's FS at the CoC; there are so many more moments that I could bring up, but the thing is that they are largely subtle. If you don't understand how someone with severe social anxiety may think and react, and you're not a figure skating otaku, it might be easy to miss a lot of the moments that Viktor and Yuri share that are certainly romantic and certainly not fanservice. I could probably fill a novel with them.

Furthermore, regardless of what you believe, it's still not yaoi. Go watch Junjou Romantica, Sekaiichi Hatsukoi, Sensitive Pornograph, Ai no Kusabi, Kirepapa, Boku no Sexual Harassment, just to name a few. Even some shows that are considered shounen ai, and some actual homoerotic fanservice shows. Then come back to YOI and tell me that they're even close to being alike. Seriously, what is wrong with normalizing a gay couple? That's probably the biggest flaw within the fandom right now.

And I'm sorry if I'm coming off salty; I'm not trying to be. I'm simply trying to state facts and sometimes I end up sounding like an ass.



There is a confirmed sequel, yes. It was literally all over IG, from an interview with Mitsurou Kubo. If I find it again I'll link it.

And yes, the females that are in the show currently may be side characters, but you can't deny that for what they were made for, they are portrayed respectably and actually are given decent structure for their personalities and development.

Also, I agree about JJ's girlfriend. I have this theory that with Yuri's new jump composition, he'll actually be able to beat JJ, and his girlfriend will leave him; I'm not 100% confident that this is what's going to happen, but I feel like it's within the characterization they've built for her so far, to ditch JJ if he's not actually the best. That's purely my opinion.

MasterHavik said:
Slow down now. I'm not calling it a yaoi. LOL!!! I just feel you don't need to show a naked Viktor to make him seem like a god or perfect character. There are many attractive characters in anime who don't need to be naked for people to get how hot they are.

Also yeah I forgot to mention the Cup of China. That was another big moment. It was the perfect build up to the kiss....that got cut because censorship bullshit. It's just my opinion if you omitted those fanservice moments the show would be fine. I'm a guy mind you and I'm totally okay with two gay dudes having a relationship. I'm just being objective and pointing out the flaws to the show. It has flaws and this show is far from a masterpiece. Many of the YOI fans need to chill with their overanalyzing a little bit. As someone who dealt with anxiety and stress since he was in third grade. I can relate to Yuri. That is why I think the dub for this show is really good outside of perfectly nailing the accents for the characters. The guy who plays Yuri really shows just how much anxiety he has and how he has to overcome it.

But yeah the show is in-between a 7 or 8 for me. The declining animation quality and some r events that happen in episode 10 got me going to 6. I really felt the ring scene was badly botched and treated as them getting married when it was just, "Thanks for the help Viktor."

Seijichan said:
I haven't noticed a decline in animation, really; some of the frames during the programs are questionable, sure, but go ahead and name me one anime that doesn't have questionable frames. As for the pacing, I don't think it feels too rushed. I'd like to have more insight into what goes on between competitions, but I think you'd essentially be seeing more of the same from episodes 2 - 4, so it's not really necessary to show that. I'd love to see the Vikturi interactions during those times as well, but that would have the show leaning more toward romance rather than a straight-up sports genre anime, and that's not what the creators wanted.

Just thinking about a dubbed version of Free! is making me cringe. But yes, I definitely prefer YOI's dub over its sub. You hear some interesting little exchanges in the background sometimes that are absolutely priceless, and because it's actually more accurate to the Japanese version I've ended up having a lot of things clarified in the dub that weren't necessarily well-translated by the subs. And that's beside the fact that Yuri and Viktor canonly speak English to each other rather than Japanese or Russian. No, they did a great job on the dub.

MasterHavik said:
Funi licensed it my friend.

Also you haven't been paying attention to all the stills and how every flashbacks is just static stills. There is some painful cringey animations. Funny you say that about questionable frames when a show like Flip Flappers is currently airing and easily the best looking show this season. The decline is there even in the skating performances.

jennico said:


You're right. To be fair, the animators' mistake was blatantly making an unfortunate amount of frames choppy and butchering the faces of the characters at the slow parts of scenes where it's directly in the viewers' faces. Otherwise, the art of the show is nice and had impressive animation at other parts when it needed it. It's terribly hard to animate all that motion continuously so I can't blame them, but if they had just kept it up to make it less obvious, they would get less of these complaints calling their work "cringey."