Thread:Sonicisawesome2448/@comment-995426-20160128044156/@comment-995426-20160205092944

Why can't it just be bromance? Because of lots of little things, combined with decades of intuition and conventional wisdom, especially in the realm of romantic feelings. Is it possible I'm wrong about who they were? Anything's possible. But it's easier though to talk about what's probable, because then it's something real people can more readily relate to. I guess it doesn't hurt that I never knew any men who were that mentally and emotionally intimate with each other who weren't gay. Note that it also helps to either be gay, or know plenty of gay people, and pay attention a lot, and try not to exercise wishful thinking that can translate into confirmation bias. My parents had gay friends, and some things just become common sense after you live around them enough. And since I know plenty of gay people too, I developed a sense as well. My mom and I would even sometimes watch non-fiction TV shows and she'd say things like, "Do you think they're gay?" And I'd say something like, "It took me all of 5 seconds to tell." I also draw from my experience with women (especially female relatives) I've known in my life. There's a certain way hetero brothers behave...and there's a certain way sisters behave. And none of the women in my family have been pushovers, but the way they are strong-willed and outspoken is still generally different in subtle ways from hetero men.

It needs to be remembered that Raph's development in the first two seasons was filled to the brim with subtle cues that strongly implied a gay streak. These cues need not always be fully realistic, but can also reflect the long history of Hollywood of using coded language to sneak gay characters past the censors. And these have been used heavily in film, comics and animation (especially Disney films, but also with a long history on Nickelodeon in other shows). Here are many of Raph's clues, many of which wouldn't necessarily mean much in isolation, but paint a bigger picture as part of a pattern. Of course, some writers seemed to give it more attention than others.

All in all, Raph seemed strongly "woman-brained" in his thought processes, a characteristic which is rare among hetero men but super-common among gay men. (Similarly, lesbian women are far more likely to be "male-brained" than hetero women.)

And with Slash already yandere for Raph, it wasn't at all far-fetched for Raph to be feeling a genuine gay attraction to Slash, and Raph's emotions were already there. You also need to realize that gay men can be in love and still be each other's best friends. I mean, what kind of workable romantic relationship has two people not being best friends? If they love each other through infatuation alone, then they're effectively still strangers in so many other ways. Raph and Slash knew and loved each other very intimately on a mental and emotional level, and it's not necessary for gay men to actually have sex to be gay&mdash;it's a matter of orientation, after all.

And if you recall, Raph did reject what Slash had become. "You're not Spike. You're some kind of warped monster.  A deranged, hideous freak." Even if Raph had not rejected Slash 100% at that point, it sure as hell looked that way to Slash. And by the end of the episode, we saw that Raph really did still acknowledge him as Spike.

As for Amazing Adventures, I don't know. My main concern is that the writing has been better than not. But the TV series has had very bad writing lately. I don't care which influences what, as long as the writing is good.

As for rebuilding those bridges, I don't know. Maybe if the Ulixes crew all gets killed saving the Earth's main timeline from destruction. :) Their characters have just been derailed too badly for me. Raph has already become a complete stranger compared to the earlier character I knew and loved.  And I don't care for the ramped-up 1987 fanservice at all.  It was one thing for Mikey to be partially derailed in Turtles in Time, but I always pegged him as pansexual anyway.  But Raph didn't trip pandar&mdash;he tripped gaydar.  And he's also not nearly shallow enough to fall for a complete stranger in 30 minutes, so it's all the harder to accept additional plots that try to build on that weak structure.

Which of the brothers would win? In a fight against each other? If it comes to raw ninjutsu skill, Raphael comes out on top. But they all have their strengths and weaknesses, and even Raph can be unbalanced with the right insults, etc.