The Way I'm Seeing Bucchigiri So Far Is That The Honki People Feel Coded As Homosexual And As A Kid Arajin

The way I'm seeing Bucchigiri so far is that the Honki people feel coded as homosexual and as a kid Arajin was really into being like that. But he was never open with that to anyone but his one friend, who was supportive and bonded with him over it. And in trying to defend that, that friend got mercilessly attacked while Arajin just ran away. So the way that Arajin so desperately avoids even Matakara is that he feels like that lifestyle reminds him of both that danger and his own personal weakness. And so he finds it safer to overcompensate by trying to act 110% straight.

ooh this is an interesting reading! i've thought about how fighting=an act of love in this show, but honki people=homosexuality could fit quite well into ara's character arc and relationship with matakara.

given how arajin is the protagonist of a brawling show, and I think it would extremely strange for arajin to completely reject his childhood desire to become a honki person by the end. they've definitely played up his refusal of the call so far, so i think we're going to see ara stepping up into his fighting anime protagonist role. if we assume that fighting, in the language of bucchigiri, is an expression of true self/feelings, i think we're definitely in for some kind of reciprocity of matakara's feelings on ara's part. i will be very surprised if we don't get a arajin x matakara fight by the end.

arajin has obviously buried his feelings about his past very deep and has tried to pivot his life in a completely opposite direction. I wouldn't be surprised if it's revealed that his obsession with dating is due in part to his trauma surrounding fighting; possibly him trying to emulate what a normal teenager does instead of 'embracing his true self' (ie. becoming honki). if this is how the story goes, there will be a definite queer reading to be had.

allegorically, the story would read as: young matakara is beaten up for being queer, arajin sees this and knows being queer is dangerous, he runs away and tries to compensate for his queerness by acting 110% hetero, matakara meets back up with him years later and tries to bond with ara over queerness, ara soundly rejects him and tries to distance out of shame, and ara (assumingly) learns by the end that being queer isn't shameful and embraces that part of himself (i.e. becomes a honki person.)

this all makes me a bit curious how mahoro's character is going to be dealt with going forward. i think there's a few things they're likely to do with her:

get over her brocon stuff and get with arajin at the end as his 'prize' for finally accepting his role as a fighter

arajin's moved on from focusing on girls by the end, mahoro gets with matakara

remain brocon to the very end

get over brocon stuff, become friends with arajin

i'm not a fan of option 1, i find it boring and a disservice to ara's and her character. i think option 2 is plausible given the romantic trope-y type scenes we've been seeing between matakara and mohoro, plus them bonding a little over their brothers. however, neither of them seem really interested in each other during those scenes beyond caring that other knows arajin. these scenes seem superficially romantic to me. i'm not really a fan of this ship so i wouldn't enjoy this outcome and i find it a boring thing to do with mahoro. option 3 sucks, but it wouldn't do damage to any other character at least? option 4 is my ideal outcome. it would allow mahoro to finally function outside of being in love with her brother and be a 'look how he's matured' moment for arajin.

there are a few appealing other options (like giving her kickass majin) that i would personally love the show to pull off, but unfortunately i don't think bucchigiri is going to do them with their limited run of 6 eps left. i'll be super excited if it proves me wrong, though.

sorry for the rambling here, thanks for giving me something to think about anon!