Queer Coding vs Queerbaiting in Anime and Cartoons 

As you were explaining the definition of queer baiting, I thought "Hmm... Free! is definitely a QB anime." Lo and behold. I think I can give a justifying reason of why they did so. The town of Iwatobi was based on a real town called Iwami, and that little town was also living off the influx of fan tourists. They have Iwatobi-chan images in the town. There was once a marketing campaign where visitors could go to several places across town to collect or purchase Free! merchandise. Out of respect for the town residents, they probably never explicitly show the gayness but come on, we could all tell Makoto has a thing for Haru.

This is a very great video! A show that I think has a very interesting way of queercoding is Infinity Train. The writers mentioned that they would rather explore some [queer] themes with allegories in the writing rather than have the message be censored in other countries, so that everyone would be able to see these messages regardless. In Book 2, a character fights for their own identity to be acknowledged after branching off from what is expected of them, which can be interpreted as an allegory to the non-binary experience. In Book 4, two characters are written in such a way where it’s very likely that they were implied to be into each other, and presumably factored into some of their struggles throughout the season. I’m curious to know what you would think of it!

Okay this might be unhinged but hear me out (I'm gay) Makoharu is the coded ship in free. They have a million tiny intimate moments together in both seasons. The cpr scene was bait, but the love confession didn't feel the same. Neither did haurka's reaction to makoto moving to tokyo. That in particular sticks out to me as something that is coded rather than bait. Makoto is the one person who can communicate with haru, the one person who gets him to talk, and come out of his shell, etc. I think that RinHaru is the bait ship. They don't have any of those same quiet, intimate familiar moments. They don't have any scenes that aren't played for laughs or tension. Haruka seems genuinely miserable around Rin, and Rin is mostly an asshole to him in return. Their scenes are disingenious, and honestly, I suspect maybe it's there to cover for the more coded scenes. I'm not sure where Reigisa lies, but I like it. I introduced it to my fiancee without telling her my opinion, and she came to her own conclusion about makoharu, and said "she was looking with her eyes" and just saw it written plainly there. I feel the same. I think it's this weird thing where they appeal to the fujoshis to make money but they quietly have the rest of the show and the themes and everything else that isn't straight either, but it feels distinctly different. I think the reason is that kyoani is a HUGE animation studio and very famous and if they made these ships canon they wouldn't get the money needed to make the show in the first place. Like, it wouldn't get approved unless it WAS bait on the surface. anyway thank you, I just started watching sk8 and I wanted to know if it was bait or not. I didn't know that about Yuri on Ice! Maybe I'll have to watch that one too

Yes, it's not even like Free! is run by a Shounen magazine or anything like this ^^° For Free! I guess they might want to let it open since there are several ships with one character: I was surprised that there are two ships (both have many fans) with the main character bc I clearly saw this one as platonic and the other one (with Rin) as romantic and that's why I think they didn't wanna ruin the fun for the other shippers (which is a valid reason). As for Shounen series: I'd love if MikaYuu (from Seraph of the End) would become canon, both wanna stay together forever, crying when they can't, fighting for their future, (spoiler) flashbacks of Yuu talking about kissing Mika to wake him up from his death, and even after Mika dies, he comes back as a demon and Yuu is even more fixated on him, also all the hand holding etc while there is no development with main girl... I hope this kind of series will be more progressive and accepting in the future, not afraid of showing two characters of the same sex in a romantic relationship. (it's kinda funny and sad how manga series are ok with showing how humanity gets slaughtered but is afraid to show love..)

I am 100% 90% of people started watching Voltron because of Klance. And I am one of them.

I was lowkey mad when they J. K. Rowling-style announced outside of canon that Shiro was gay because I absolutely shipped him with Allura. If they made Klance canon and Shillura canon (and overhauled all of season 8), Voltron would have been almost as good as She-Ra.

Great video you should look up fictional crystal about Voltron especially Keith, she breaks it down that is mostly gay and Lance is bi.

hiiii what exactly is the title of the klance analysis on ao3 with over 50000 words?

i def agree!