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Let's talk about the flanderization of Touhou characters

TheM3ds

TheM3ds

Onshi
For the past 4 months that I've been in this fandom I've seen different interpretations of the cast of Touhou from fans, that at one point I used to bought the idea of how characters like Yuuka or Koishi are depicted as "Violent, blood-thirsty psychopaths" or whatnot but after taking the time learning about the characters in canon I realized that wasn't the case at all, I mean sure Yuuka does kill people but that's only if you attack her, set up a trap on her or destroy her sunflowers, then there's characters like Alice who's depicted as yandere for Marisa which in all honesty I'm not a huge fan of, now I'm not against the idea of these two being shipped together (Hell I'm not against the idea of shipping Touhou characters in general, you do you) but when it comes to Alice having on unhealthy obsession with Marisa to the point where she stalks her then it becomes needlessly creepy (Not to mention that I absolutely hate the yandere trope in general), or how about the relationship between Mokou and Kaguya when fans think they kill one other because "oh becuase they hate each-other and there bitter enemies" which isn't true since they have a mutual relationship together, so let me ask you this: what would Mokou have if Kaguya wasn't on earth anymore? She would have nobody to talk to at point and naturally she would be upset about it, I mean I would be upset if my one and only friend would suddenly leave me behind all by myself, but why stop there? 

There's some other examples of how the fandom portrays the characters:

  • Kaguya being a shut-in who's selfish
  • Flandre also being portrayed as a "Psychopath" 
  • Yuyuko eating literally eating anything she sees
  • Byakuren abusing her followers (Or non-followers, I don't remember)
  • Meiling being useless (Which isn't true at all, in fact it's rather offensive)
  • Cirno being dumb (Ironic considering she's smarter then what most people give her credit for)
  • Tenshi being masochist (C'mon guys, seriously?)
  • Shinki being a lazy judge with a short temper (Seriously, who comes up with this?)

ETC

Now with that being said however I don't mind hearing other peoples interpretations of the characters but when they're taken out of context and have their own personalities exaggerated to the point where it becomes hard to distinguish between their canon and fanon counterparts, they start to sound more batshit looney then what they actually are. Hell you could a parody with kind of material and it could work as reminder of how fandoms take there interpretations of characters to certain extremes. It sort of reminds me how people both in and out of the Final Fantasy community thinks Cloud and Squall are "Emo" or "Edgy" which I feel like is an absolute disservice to both of their characters, honestly I can't understand why people would take one look at character without doing any research and going "yep this character is an edge-lord alright", though unfortunately this problem plagues many communities on the internet and Touhou is no exception.

I get that certain characters can be assholes sometimes but I don't think characters like Koishi are insane as some people make them out to be, at least in my opinion.

I dunno I feel like should've look into this a bit deeper before making this post but I'd like to hear what you think.  

Edit: If I'm not making any sense in this post that's probably because I haven't gotten any proper sleep today.

 
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fair enough i just know out of all of them, cirno is the only that's true.

and with flan it was more due to circumstance that labeled her with psycho since she only appeared in 6 until detective satori revealed more about her so people thought "little girl locked in a basement for 500 years wants to play danmaku as a form of playtime", can't really fault the fanbase for the assumption, even if it turned out not to be the case.

rest of them yeah most of them are stupid, especially meiling, fanbase did her dirty

 
Darksymphony777 said:
and with flan it was more due to circumstance that labeled her with psycho since she only appeared in 6 until detective satori revealed more about her so people thought "little girl locked in a basement for 500 years wants to play danmaku as a form of playtime", can't really fault the fanbase for the assumption, even if it turned out not to be the case.

rest of them yeah most of them are stupid, especially meiling, fanbase did her dirty
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I forgot about that at the time of writing this, but yeah that does give me more insight how the fandom portrays her that way, thanks for letting me know.

Also meiling receives too much crap from the fanbase, pretty sad if you ask me.

 
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TheM3ds said:
There's some other examples of how the fandom portrays the characters:

  • Kaguya being a "N.E.E.T."
  • Flandre also being portrayed as a "Psychopath" 
  • Yuyuko eating literally eating anything she sees
  • Byakuren abusing her followers (Or non-followers, I don't remember)
  • Meiling being useless (Which isn't true at all, in fact it's rather offensive)
  • Cirno being dumb (Ironic considering she's smarter then what most people give her credit for)
  • Tenshi being masochist (C'mon guys, seriously?)
  • Shinki being a lazy judge with a short temper (Seriously, who comes up with this?)
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I am not very sure if I am correct, but this is at least what I understood in terms of where these fanon images came from:

  • I guess fans wanted to make Kaguya's isolation more than just staying hidden, so they turned her into a NEET? Especially with the social phenomena of "hikkikomori" being on an alarming surge in Japan, as well as possibly other countries.
  • we have only seen Flandre once, back in 2002, then again properly only when Cheating Detective Satori came to be. However, I heard at least some opinions that CDS actually ruined Flan even more, given what she does at one point. I guess context is required in that situation. Hey, but at least the manga established that she stayed in the basement by her own will, and not since she was some sort of psycho.
  • Yuyuko being the Touhou version of Kirby can be blamed on her dialogue from Imperishable Night. There, she just wanted to eat everything on her way, and is implied she ate Mystia after the confrontation. 
  • I have heard about Byakuren being abusive to her followers in fandom, but I am not sure where it came from. I think it is also something that appeared in the official manga, and perhaps was exaggerated by the fans.
  • Meiling as useless might be coming from a few sources. First, possibly a bit of the racism and xenophobia towards China, if this still exists to this day. Second, the sleepy Meiling part has been apparently generated by her involvement in Hisoutensoku, where apparently her story was just a dream (and she was basically working on her job). But overall, the fans created this image of a Meiling "made in China", and so unreliable.
  • About Cirno being dumb, again, you have to thank ZUN for that. Had he not associated Cirno with ⑨ and the word "baka" in the PoFV guide book, I don't think fans would have had fuel for creating such a personality. 
  • I think Tenshi as a masochist came from her story in the debut game. Again, another fans of fans exaggerating things and turning her into someone who takes pleasure in suffering
  • I think is one of the most butchered characters in the fanon. Her fandom image has almost no connection to her canon personality, maybe even going the opposite way. For this one, I really have no idea how people came up with it, but let's just say official art in Grimoire of Marisa did not help.  
 
CountVonNumenor said:
I am not very sure if I am correct, but this is at least what I understood in terms of where these fanon images came from:

  • I guess fans wanted to make Kaguya's isolation more than just staying hidden, so they turned her into a NEET? Especially with the social phenomena of "hikkikomori" being on an alarming surge in Japan, as well as possibly other countries.
  • we have only seen Flandre once, back in 2002, then again properly only when Cheating Detective Satori came to be. However, I heard at least some opinions that CDS actually ruined Flan even more, given what she does at one point. I guess context is required in that situation. Hey, but at least the manga established that she stayed in the basement by her own will, and not since she was some sort of psycho.
  • Yuyuko being the Touhou version of Kirby can be blamed on her dialogue from Imperishable Night. There, she just wanted to eat everything on her way, and is implied she ate Mystia after the confrontation. 
  • I have heard about Byakuren being abusive to her followers in fandom, but I am not sure where it came from. I think it is also something that appeared in the official manga, and perhaps was exaggerated by the fans.
  • Meiling as useless might be coming from a few sources. First, possibly a bit of the racism and xenophobia towards China, if this still exists to this day. Second, the sleepy Meiling part has been apparently generated by her involvement in Hisoutensoku, where apparently her story was just a dream (and she was basically working on her job). But overall, the fans created this image of a Meiling "made in China", and so unreliable.
  • About Cirno being dumb, again, you have to thank ZUN for that. Had he not associated Cirno with ⑨ and the word "baka" in the PoFV guide book, I don't think fans would have had fuel for creating such a personality. 
  • I think Tenshi as a masochist came from her story in the debut game. Again, another fans of fans exaggerating things and turning her into someone who takes pleasure in suffering
  • I think is one of the most butchered characters in the fanon. Her fandom image has almost no connection to her canon personality, maybe even going the opposite way. For this one, I really have no idea how people came up with it, but let's just say official art in Grimoire of Marisa did not help.  
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I like the idea that meiling sleeps to stretch her chi across the border of the SDM so she can better sense intruders.....well intruders not named Marisa because I think Marisa will get patchouli's books one way or another

 
CountVonNumenor said:
I am not very sure if I am correct, but this is at least what I understood in terms of where these fanon images came from:

  • I guess fans wanted to make Kaguya's isolation more than just staying hidden, so they turned her into a NEET? Especially with the social phenomena of "hikkikomori" being on an alarming surge in Japan, as well as possibly other countries.
  • we have only seen Flandre once, back in 2002, then again properly only when Cheating Detective Satori came to be. However, I heard at least some opinions that CDS actually ruined Flan even more, given what she does at one point. I guess context is required in that situation. Hey, but at least the manga established that she stayed in the basement by her own will, and not since she was some sort of psycho.
  • Yuyuko being the Touhou version of Kirby can be blamed on her dialogue from Imperishable Night. There, she just wanted to eat everything on her way, and is implied she ate Mystia after the confrontation. 
  • I have heard about Byakuren being abusive to her followers in fandom, but I am not sure where it came from. I think it is also something that appeared in the official manga, and perhaps was exaggerated by the fans.
  • Meiling as useless might be coming from a few sources. First, possibly a bit of the racism and xenophobia towards China, if this still exists to this day. Second, the sleepy Meiling part has been apparently generated by her involvement in Hisoutensoku, where apparently her story was just a dream (and she was basically working on her job). But overall, the fans created this image of a Meiling "made in China", and so unreliable.
  • About Cirno being dumb, again, you have to thank ZUN for that. Had he not associated Cirno with ⑨ and the word "baka" in the PoFV guide book, I don't think fans would have had fuel for creating such a personality. 
  • I think Tenshi as a masochist came from her story in the debut game. Again, another fans of fans exaggerating things and turning her into someone who takes pleasure in suffering
  • I think is one of the most butchered characters in the fanon. Her fandom image has almost no connection to her canon personality, maybe even going the opposite way. For this one, I really have no idea how people came up with it, but let's just say official art in Grimoire of Marisa did not help.  
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Yeah I might've made a few errors with this post when I made it last night.

  • I mean sure I've heard jokes about Kaguya being a N.E.E.T. from fans but what I meant to say was people portayed hear as a shut-in instead so that's on me. Besides nobody in genesokyo would know what a N.E.E.T. is to begin with. 
  • I'm aware of the general xenophobia towards china that some Japanese fans might have, though I wasn't aware about her involvement with Hisoutensoku, I'll have to look more into it, thanks for the context.
  • I very will aware of the ⑨ and Baka jokes by now, still it does get annoying after hearing the same joke over and over again
  • Honestly I think shinki deserves much better then being treated as short-tempered, lazy, short(?) judge who gets angry at someone just because they have larger boobs then her, Christ that shit gets on my nerves.

Thanks for the info, I knew that I made a couple of mistakes here and there but at the time I didn't had much context to work with but now I understand, context really is a magical thing.

I should've done more research before making this post TBH.

 
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VonNumenor's post about the origins of fanons is pretty accurate.

Glutton Yuyuko comes from her various comments about wanting to eat things throughout Imperishable Night. Honestly I think that Glutton Yuyuko can actually be quite funny and is hardly the most offensive flanderization, I've seen a lot of instances where hungry Yuyuko is done well in a funny way. It doesn't get weird until imagery of Yuyuko literally eating other characters (Mystia) starts to be involved.

Lazy Meiling comes from her story mode in Hisoutensoku, where it is revealed at the end that the events occurred in a dream and she was sleeping on the job. Don't have much to say about this one regarding fanon, I just wanted to say that Meiling's story in Soku is hilariously amazing.

I have no idea where masochist Tenshi comes from.

Now, onto some new stuff:

Is it just me who notices that fanon Komachi is literally just a copy-paste of fanon Meiling?

Also, despite claiming to be into the "Touhou Lore"... I actually have no idea about Yuuka's canon personality, I literally only have fanon to go off LOL.

 
Quoting from White L's post:

Huh, I didn't know about this till now but yeah I should've read the script for the official games beforehand.

Thanks for pointing that out.

 
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buskerdog said:
VonNumenor's post about the origins of fanons is pretty accurate.

Glutton Yuyuko comes from her various comments about wanting to eat things throughout Imperishable Night. Honestly I think that Glutton Yuyuko can actually be quite funny and is hardly the most offensive flanderization, I've seen a lot of instances where hungry Yuyuko is done well in a funny way. It doesn't get weird until imagery of Yuyuko literally eating other characters (Mystia) starts to be involved.

Lazy Meiling comes from her story mode in Hisoutensoku, where it is revealed at the end that the events occurred in a dream and she was sleeping on the job. Don't have much to say about this one regarding fanon, I just wanted to say that Meiling's story in Soku is hilariously amazing.
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Yeah, honestly I'm fine with Glutton Yuyuko as long it's funny then I really don't have a problem with it (as long as other characters aren't eaten alive).

I've mentioned this already but I'll have to look into Hisoutensoku, so I'll get around that sometime hopefully.

buskerdog said:
Is it just me who notices that fanon Komachi is literally just a copy-paste of fanon Meiling?

Also, despite claiming to be into the "Touhou Lore"... I actually have no idea about Yuuka's canon personality, I literally only have fanon to go off LOL.
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Hmmm... that does bare some consideration as I haven't looked into it myself, still I think you might be on to something. 

Another thing I might add is that all you need to know about Yuuka is that she's not really a blood thirsty monster as some fans make her up to be, but rather she tends to be on the playful side and she can rather a nice person sometimes, though as long as you don't piss her off then you should be okay.

 
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buskerdog said:
VonNumenor's post about the origins of fanons is pretty accurate.

Glutton Yuyuko comes from her various comments about wanting to eat things throughout Imperishable Night. Honestly I think that Glutton Yuyuko can actually be quite funny and is hardly the most offensive flanderization, I've seen a lot of instances where hungry Yuyuko is done well in a funny way. It doesn't get weird until imagery of Yuyuko literally eating other characters (Mystia) starts to be involved.

Lazy Meiling comes from her story mode in Hisoutensoku, where it is revealed at the end that the events occurred in a dream and she was sleeping on the job. Don't have much to say about this one regarding fanon, I just wanted to say that Meiling's story in Soku is hilariously amazing.

I have no idea where masochist Tenshi comes from.

Now, onto some new stuff:

Is it just me who notices that fanon Komachi is literally just a copy-paste of fanon Meiling?

Also, despite claiming to be into the "Touhou Lore"... I actually have no idea about Yuuka's canon personality, I literally only have fanon to go off LOL.
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For Tenshi, I believe its from a few throw away lines about wanting to be defeated, but I'm not sure. I will check them out later.

For Meiling, not only is she portrayed sleeping in Soku's ending, but it also appears that she sleeps here and there when watching the gate. Check out Perfect Memento in Strict Sense.

For Komachi, the entire plot of Touhou 9 is that things happen because she was slacking off. Literally. I'm not kidding. Check out a few scenarios in the game. Pretty funny to see when I played it.
For Yuuka, well... I would say it comes from 3 things.
1. She's often seen smiling and it actually scares a lot of people.
2. She's strong as hell
3. "if anyone disturbs her, be they youkai or human, she eliminates them with tremendous power no matter what." (Took this from Perfect Memento again).

The only thing the fandom does is exaggerate this to another level.

 
Meiling's the funniest one for me because she's just like that in canon, not only in Soku. And yknow, the whole thing of bringing your fists to a gun fight (the possible xenophobic aspect among fans is a different story).

Cirno's just as smart as any other fairy afaik. Which is not much, basically they do not think things through very much. But Cirno stuck because, yeah. There was that recent EoSD exhibition where a comment by ZUN said something like "Sorry for making her an idiot". Not to be taken too seriously but I found it funny lol

"Funny Yuyuko eat a food" has been referenced in canon few times I think.

 
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While we're on this topic, I want to get something off of my chest.

I don't really like how the fanon portray Sakuya, Remiu, the Watatsuki sisters and the list goes on.

  • Remiu isn't getting that many donation but is always getting alcohol in the donation box. She is often seen as a very poor miko but portray as a gold digger that will always throw her dignity away for some sen. The fandom goes as far as letting her eat dirt. Yes, Remiu is not wealthy but not poor enough to dirt. She was once a youkai exterminating miko in the old Pc-98 era and not some gold digging miko in the present.
  • Sakuya, she is the maid of a strong vampire. Oh wait, there's something fishy here, her chest size magically increased in the eyes of fandom. What? Exactly she must be wearing "pads". Why? To be honest, It was a bit funny at first but now it's just annoying and overused. I'm not going to tackle the "Sakuya is a JoJo reference". I don't mind the latter that much but the former was a bit infuriating for me. Both are overused though.
  • Saving my favorite for the last. The Watatsukis, Yes, they are very over powered. Mostly everyone in Touhou is over powered. Both of them are very stubborn but usually called "The Moon Bitc*es". The fandom acts as if they were Naxis of Touhou. Thus, they're often in the bottom tier & get the "worst character treatment." Two leaders of the moon without them the moon would be overran. They both are pricks, and I won't deny it. 

I'm getting a bit tired, although felt a bit better afterwards. About the fandom, I don't mean all of them. You can enjoy whatever you want.

 
CountVonNumenor said:
I think the Youmu & Yuyuko sprite from 13.5 says this perfectly: 

View attachment 2405
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Ah yeah I was gonna mention that. Look at her go.

TheM3ds said:
Hmmm... that does bare some consideration as I haven't looked into it myself, still I think you might be on to something. 

Another thing I might add is that all you need to know about Yuuka is that she's not really a blood thirsty monster as some fans make her up to be, but rather she tends to be on the playful side and she can rather a nice person sometimes, though as long as you don't piss her off then you should be okay.
Click to expand...
Though it is worth noting Yuuka was more sadistic sounding (and potentially acting) back in PC98 times. Among other things she outright says genocide is just a game to her in MS. She seems to have cooled down by 9 though. Now she seems to just like being intimidating. I guess spellcard rules help too.

 
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