Oh yeah, definitely. Especially with requests, it requires a lot of digging and then further research just to fact-check. I’m telling you, it takes me a long time because I want to be sure!
One thing that’s been driving me crazy is that there seems to be several strips that connect Italy and Japan, far before they had ever met each other. This is something I’ve picked up on and have been working on for a long time:
Chibitalia dreams of Japan, and is led to him by some sort of Japanese divine being (or Emperor as he was once referred to). There’s also strips that talks about Japan having clairvoyant-like powers before his ghost/ monster culture changed. The divine being appears a few times, but for the life of me, I’m still trying to knead through its significance.
Possible mind reading or channeling? Who knows. It’s just really strange, but my gut instinct is telling me there’s something much more to it.
It won’t haunt me. I loved making it, and look forward to making other silly AUs/ adaptations with the nations. I’m glad you enjoyed it 🙂
Note: This post will be looking at potential hints of female pairings or same-sex attraction, as requested. For the most part, the nations I will be mentioning have in fact shown attraction to males too. A more complete post on the nations’ sexuality will eventually be made, though. The examples shown are not all of them either. There are plenty of them, believe me.
Okay, let’s get it out of the way right now: Monaco and Taiwan
are hitting up the charts with their heavily hinted – but not confirmed – attraction
to girls. It makes me incredibly happy to see this possible representation in the
comics, and I’m even more excited to share it with you all.
First, there’s the 2011 Christmas event. There, Taiwan
states that she is unable to concentrate due to the amount of cleavage the Western
female nations are showing. Monaco then reassures her and sweetly waves it off.
Taken alone, this may not seem significant, but you certainly see progress with
Taiwan as you flip forward into later strips.
Now, let’s go over some panels included in the Halloween
2013/2014 event. After spotting Belarus from afar, Taiwan literally exclaims “Gorgeous
lady at 12:00 o’ clock!” and then proceeds to complement Belarus with notable
excitement.
And then comes Ukraine.
I mean, there’s really not that much to say. You can see it
for yourselves: there’s a clear blush on Taiwan’s face and she looks just a little
bit too happy to see Ukraine’s (breasts), don’t you think?
Don’t believe me still? Here’s Taiwan blushing, complementing Vietnam,
and just looking plain elated to be surrounded by them. She doesn’t seem to be
so shy about these feelings anymore.
There also appears to be this scheme where Taiwan purposefully
made Vietnam’s costume smaller and tighter than what it should be, as the costume
is her size as opposed to Vietnam’s – Taiwan is significantly smaller than Vietnam.
Lastly, there’s Monaco, who comments that Ukraine looks “modestly
sexy.” Again, when taken on its own, it doesn’t seem like much.
However, when asked if she would wear a revealing costume,
Monaco says that she’s better at being an onlooker and is then compared to an
old man by Taiwan. I don’t know, I read this as Monaco embodying something akin
to a male gaze…an appreciative male gaze. There’s also the stereotype that old
men are more perverted; obviously this isn’t the case, but it’s a pretty common
gag.
Take what you want from what I just presented, but I personally
believe there is enough evidence in the strips that at the very least hint at the
existence of same-sex attraction among the female nations.
If you’re asking about hints, that requires a lot more time and thought. However, there are some similarities between them that I can briefly go over. In my opinion, it makes for excellent shipping material.
For starters, they’re both incredibly insecure individuals. They want to make friends but have trouble doing so, and don’t always recognize that what they’re doing is wrong.
Ex: America being nosy and poking into everyone’s business, and Russia’s cruel treatment of other nations under his rule.
Personally, what I would use as a good focal point for conflict is the fact that they both think everyone hates them:
Aiyah, you wouldn’t believe how much my askbox exploded after this. All right! I’ll put the post up tonight!
Due to popular request, I’ll be starting to analyze the several instances in the series where it’s alluded that Germany is Holy Rome in some way or another. There’s too many of them to include all in one post, so welcome to yet another new sub-series!
You’ll notice how subtle these hints are, as well as how uncomfortable they make the nations feel as they recall certain memories. Without further ado, let’s get started.
First, there’s England. In the “About why there is Italian architecture in England” strip, France shows surprise at the sight of an Italian-styled house in England and even praises it. England then has a flashback of when Holy Rome gave him this house as a gift, despite it not being suitable for the harsher English climate.
Note the expression on England’s face once the flashback ends. Sure, the reminder of Holy Rome’s legacy must be painful to relive, but why become so nervous and uncomfortable? If he was sad, I could understand, but the former two emotions make me think that something is still unresolved in the present; that is, England is reminded of how HRE is still around today except in the more modern form of Germany.
It almost seems as if the nations are aware of Holy Rome’s reincarnation/rebirth/ revival (whatever you want to call it) but don’t have the courage to tell Germany about his past. It’s not really their place anyway.
Then, you have France. We already know from the Napoleonic Wars, the first world war, as well as the German military occupation of France in WW2, that France has every reason to hate Germany, and is even depicted stating so.
In modern times, he still shows an evident aversion to Germany. Call this a stretch if you want, but I interpret a lot of this aversion more so in terms of guilt. Napoleon’s army ended the Holy Roman empire, after all.
However, it’s also important to note that recently France has slowly been starting to spend more time with Germany and is noted to no longer hate him.
In the “Germany’s playing an impossible game” strip, France is shown to be secretly backing Germany, referring to himself as the latter’s Big Brother. (Yes, I’m aware that France considers himself the Big Brother of the world).
What makes me suspicious is that in a few panels below, Hima mentions how France and Germany’s economic relations in the EU isn’t always agreeable and that they don’t see eye-to-eye in a lot of matters.
Why am I mentioning this? Well, flip back to when Holy Rome and France lived in Rome’s house. They used to refer to each other as brothers then too – they’re not actual brothers, it’s just a form of endearment.
Historically speaking, I can understand France’s grudge towards Germany after the Napoleonic wars. What I’m curious about is that even in modern times, well after WW2, France still appears to be hesitant/ walking on egg-shells around Germany.
That’s why I believe France is not completely open in his support for Germany. Again, I think he still feels guilt for causing the Holy Roman Empire’s demise and doesn’t know how to compensate for this.
Lastly, as I couldn’t possibly leave him out of this, there’s Prussia. Prussia is the one who tells Germany all about his past, being his older brother/ father figure. I say father figure sarcastically, because Prussia is lame enough to be wearing a Dad shirt in the 2011 Christmas event.
Anyways, in that same event, Japan and Italy reminisce about how Prussia, as the Teutonic knights, used to be. Germany expresses his confusion towards these stories by shouting, “What is that brother of mine doing?!”
We then get a brief bit of inner dialogue from Japan, who also seems confused over the fact that Germany believes everything that Prussia tells him about his past. Perhaps Prussia is purposefully fabricating parts of Germany’s birth to spare him from the pain of remembering how he had died before.
More notably, Germany remarks that he’s going to cross-examine Prussia, which may mean that the truth (whatever it is) is going to be revealed to him. Now that’s exciting.
On that note, there’s one last thing I want to talk about. In “The Guns of Italy and Germany”, Germany is completely bewildered by the shoddy guns Italy makes, all for the sake of making them easier to clean. When he asks Prussia if Italy has always been like this, Prussia ominously stares off into the distance and tells him this:
Hmmm. Another potential hint that just like Holy Rome had an ‘appreciation’ for Italy, Germany will eventually develop one too? Questions, questions. So many strips and not nearly enough confirmations…
To be honest, I think it’s been hinted that they’re personified, but given how extremely careful and informed you would have to be
in portraying them accurately and respectfully, I don’t think it’ll go any
farther from there.
It would be hard to
fit them into Hetalia given how everything is based off stereotypes. I say this
because of how atrociously these peoples have been treated as a result of
negative stereotypes. Applying more stereotypes just doesn’t seem like a good
idea. If at all, I think it should be more of a matter of self-representation in the
fandom if those coming from these cultural backgrounds feel the desire to share
their customs and ways of life. It’s a tricky subject and should be taken very
seriously.
As for your headcanons? I’ll get into this in another post,
but we’ve seen how the nations are often forced to do things they don’t
necessarily agree with. It’s sad, but true. Also, yes! It would be quite the scene
to have all of them personified.
But, as I said above, there are smalls hints and clues in
the strips that make me think that Hima is alluding to their personification.
First, you have the French-Indian War in America.
That looks to me like an Indigenous personification, as in other
panels that reveal the different sides of each war depicted by Hima, it’s
almost always the nations involved save for the occasional leader here and
there.
There’s also the fact that in “The Battle for America”
America is referred to as more of an “ingredient.” How I interpret this is he’s
simply part of the land at that point. If America’s the ingredient, then
perhaps that’s Hima subtly acknowledging the fact that he’s not the whole of
America. He could have represented the early settlers and then later adopted
the full representation of the land.
This doesn’t mean to say that the Native tribes aren’t
personified themselves, though. They organized themselves differently from
Europeans, so a tribe or band would likely be their equivalent of a nation.
We’ve also seen with Japan’s prefectures and China’s provinces that it’s not
only just the whole nation personified but parts of it as well.
Overall, I don’t think Hetalia is quite the right medium to portray
them. For one thing, their histories are not accurately depicted in the first
place, and on the other hand, Hetalia isn’t the most historically accurate
series either. It just doesn’t seem like a good match.
Ellawritesficssometimes 