Another YOI Opinion Inbound, This Time On The Ending Scene Of Episode 11/first Scene Of Episode 12!!

Victor’s Image, Identity + Sponsorships

I can’t help but think about Victor’s sponsors and how they played into his struggle with his identity. 

In reality, skaters don’t have a steady income— skaters get paid by placing high in competitions. This is why skaters in our reality, such as Hanyu Yuzuru, do collaborations and advertisements with different companies in order to make money outside of skating, as well as having gear and other expenses covered by sponsors. And, despite being widely considered the GOAT of skating, Hanyu’s net worth is only about 2 million USD.

Back to the YOIverse: it’s unclear what sort of financial standings Victor was in when his career began, but it is clear that he quickly rose to fame, as shown by the amount of posters and photo shoots Yuuri has of Victor both pre-haircut and post-haircut. However, regardless of Victor’s own financial standings before he began competing, skating is an extremely expensive sport– coaching fees itself are likely tens of thousands of dollars per year, having good skates and keeping them maintained or replacing them when needed is hundreds, if not thousands of dollars, a minimum of two new costumes each year (which, knowing Victor’s tastes, likely cost thousands of dollars), any competition fees, the thousands of dollars it costs to travel worldwide to compete, not to mention hotel costs. It’s also mentioned that Victor commissions new music to be made for his programs, which is I don’t even wanna know how much. 

All that, plus everything I missed, plus, you know, general cost of living. 

All that being said, sponsors are everything. Sponsors are more than just a company promoting you to the public– they’re paying for the continuation of your career and using your image in exchange to promote their product. So what happens when your image no longer aligns with the image they want to have alongside their product? 

Victor has clearly had to play his cards perfectly right his entire career, with the image of an innocent, delicate, feminine ice prince that evolves into a masculine, champion bachelor. That image also had to play into what sorts of sponsors he had as his career continued, and those sponsors likely increased sharply in prestigiousness through the years, particularly after his haircut. For example, it’s easy to imagine Victor modeling for Calvin Klein after his haircut– he has a spectacular body, he’s revealing a more masculine part of his image, and his fame and attractiveness would no doubt boost sales.

TDLR;

I firmly believe that all of Victor’s sponsors, modeling campaigns, and advertisements were crafted perfectly to create the new image of Victor every single year. 

Like he said in episode 10, he couldn’t build on anything because he started over every season. 

It’s no wonder he lost himself in the midst of all this death and rebirth, especially when his image outside of skating was likely out of his control.

EDIT: Apparently some of the best skaters can receive money from their country, and hotel costs are covered by the competition. Additionally, skaters use ice shows for income. However, I stand by my point that sponsors are important and income for skaters is unreliable.

Watcher google drive

i think the title is pretty self explanitory

Only ghost files on it atm but Mystery Files and Puppet History are next. Watcher has back pedalled on deleteing all their free content to lock it behind a pay wall but y'know what? maybe I just dont want to give them ad revenue anymore, which is evil but screw them. Also they may still back pedal on their back pedalling, which is to many pedals anyways.

tskym fic recs because i have a lot of free time and it shows (all of them are oneshots)

because @mallgothyamaguchi asked for recs and i am always ready to deliver them

Pre-slash Summer, 1997: sort of an AU? but it still feels very canon tskym to me. freaking creative. WE HAVE AKITERU AND KEI BONDING IN THIS ONE. and tsukihina friendship. check ohmymai's works, they are freaking talented and underrated.

The Choice: discussing where to go for high school. it's sweet.

Canon timeline:

Telephone Lines: it's one of the tskym fics that have really stuck with me. it's just really beautiful. childhood tskym intertwined with current tskym.

i wanna make you mine (but that's hard to say): it's hilarious. like, honestly hilarious. tsukki is so real in this one.

Hum Along: kinda long, plot is freaking creative and beautiful. both of them are characterized incredibly. i can't recommend this one enough.

Feeling like I go too slowly: i put it in this category though it does stretch to tskym's childhood, but it too covers their stay in karasuno. REALLY CUTE AND FUN (tho you have to be a registered user to read this one. anyway, i really recommend you to be a registered user. you'd be missing jewels like this one if not)

Behind Your Back: do not read this one if you haven't read the manga. no timeskip spoilers, but spoilers in the outcome of nationals. if you have read the manga or do not mind some spoilers, definitely read this one. it changed my life.

levels of investment: this too changed my life, but because of how freaking funny it was. really, we need more karasuno centric fics. MORE KARASUNO PRATICE MATCHES CENTRIC FICS.

Post-canon:

Fridgespace: if Hum Along is hilarious, this one is straight up hysterical. kind of a crackfic. love crackfics.

I made a video about the whole Watcher Entertainment debacle. As a fan, I had a lot to say. Eight years of loyalty doesn’t seem to be enough for these folks.

Viktor Nikiforov, genderfluidity, and the gendered conventions of Russian language

I've always headcanon-ed that Viktor identifies as genderfluid, and playing around with this concept has been one of my favorite parts of my post-canon, married Viktuuri series, "Gold's On The Inside, Elevated My Feet", which you can read here if you'd like to immerse yourself in a very long (currently 191K) WIP/larger series. I'm currently working on a multichapter story (probably will be anywhere from 1-3 chapters) that focuses on his decision to come out publicly, and it's made me think about the inherently gendered way that Russian language works.

One thing that I like to have fun with in my writing is deliberately having Yuuri and Viktor say 'fuck that' to grammar conventions in Russian and just use whatever pet names/endearments they want, regardless of if they are 'male' or 'female' gendered. As an aside, I find it convenient that 'zolotsye' (meaning 'my gold') is gender-neutral. It's sent me down a rabbit hole of research around what options are available to genderfluid folks who speak/use Russian. As one might guess, they are limited :(

Anyways, just wanted to post this to ask if folks have any favorite Viktor/gender non-conformity stories they can recommend? I would love to see more of it in the fandom (hence, my excitement to post my work when it's done).

SOMEBODY NEEDS TO EDIT VAT7K TO THIS SONG

insta requests!!

OK SO i found this vat7k Spotify playlist and YKK I LISTENED TO THE WHOLE THING IN ONE RUN AND YOU SHOULD TOOOOOO its honestly so accurate 🤭 whoever made this, ilysm please marry me

todd and wallace episode 5 yaoi compilation in hd because i need everyone to understand just how unhinged this was.

Yuri on Ice aka Yuuri's free programme would never have been possible without the beach scene.

In the beach scene, Yuuri opens up to Viktor for the first time. While they have been unintentionally working against each other until that point (exuberant flirting from Viktor and Yuuri trying to avoid him), the conversation on the beach brought them on the same page. That conversation has reassured Yuuri that Viktor's motives and feelings towards him are sincere and he starts feeling safe enough to open up.

Which leads right to the next scene where Yuuri sits in his room and decides to open up more as he contacts the music student who composed the programme his former coach Celestino rejected.

Now fast-forward to Yuuri and Viktor creating Yuuri's new free programme:

Yuuri's free programme is about his skating career. But it's so much more than that. Yuri on Ice also tells the story of Yuuri and Viktor, expressed through the piano (Yuuri) and the violin (Viktor). At 0:55 min, which is quite early in the programme, the violin joins and it dominates the song. This part represents Viktor becoming his coach. (The entire song is 3:41 min, note that a free programme was 4:30 min at the time YOI aired, and that the creators shortened the songs due to time constraints).

Yes, that's right: Most of the story told in Yuuri's free programme, Viktor is Yuuri's coach. Yuuri's programme that is supposed to be about his life as a skater paraphrases his entire career so far in 55 seconds and then tells the story of Yuuri and Viktor.

Then there's this part in the middle where the violin falls silent and the piano slows down as Yuuri has a realisation about love. When the music picks up speed again, the violin re-joins, but instead of doing its own thing now it's support the piano, which can be interpreted as Yuuri and Viktor now being a team, Yuuri and Viktor being lovers (hence, the realisation about love), Yuuri and Viktor staying together (the instruments playing together until the end, these a nuance of Stammi Vicino in that imagery). To be precise, there are many interpretations as this song can be applied to every episode where Yuuri skates it.

Now, as Viktor is Yuuri's coach and choreographer, Yuuri needs to explain to him what he wants to express with this song, so that Viktor can turn this into choreography. Yuuri needs to explain what the instruments mean and how this translates into his story. I can only imagine how embarrassing this must have been for him, even though he has already decided to open up more--it's still an effort he must do and which will become easier the more often he does it. But that first time when he had to explain all this to Viktor, yes that must have been super awkward. He might have tried to water down some parts of the story because he couldn't voice them at this time, then, as Viktor kept prying because it didn't seem to fit the music, gradually had to disclose more.

And Yuuri had to explain all of this to that music student as well so that she could compose the song accordingly, and he had to do this AFTER that first awkward experience when he commissioned a song that got shelved.

Without Yuuri realising that opening up isn't a bad thing, that it's okay to make yourself vulnerable to people who don't judge you and don't see you as weak, nothing of this would have ever happened. Yuuri learning that Viktor is a safe person to be vulnerable with because Viktor is dedicated to give Yuuri his full support and that his goal isn't to get Yuuri laid but that his feelings for Yuuri are of a serious nature ("that's my way of showing my love"), is the start of Yuuri becoming confident and that enables him to create not just his first free programme on his own but a free programme that expresses the different kinds of love he is feeling, most of all his love for Viktor.

If you enjoy my meta posts, please consider giving my blog a follow or checking out my works on AO3 (link in bio). You will find the results of my meta musings in there!