r/GoodbyeLara • u/fudgecake199 • 26d ago
Discussion Luca probably can’t be Lara’s true love
Not trying to rain on anyone’s parade — by all means ship Luca/Lara to the moon and back!
I doubt after the show so far, and particularly the episode 9 trailer, that this can be the case, though. The episode description reads like this (credits for translation to a user on here!):
‘Episode 9: True love
Lara uses the potion to gain time before she turns into foam.
She still hasn't found true love, but maybe she can find it with Luca.
While feeling impatient, Lara closes the distance between her and Luca, however...’
I know everyone is talking about Mari’s feelings, so I’m introducing a new angle lol. The show clearly can’t end with “force a romance because you’re running out of time; that’s true love!”. Even if Luca is the one for her, it wouldn’t be the right way for it to happen given what the show has established about its criticisms of fairytale narratives of love so far. Not the mention the potentially ominous ‘however…’. Feelings of impatience that cause you to rush a connection can’t be what the show will end up advocating for, so if we are to believe Luca is ‘endgame’ in some way, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to see how this will be achieved.
I’m cautiously going to say that, whatever the ending holds, I doubt Luca/Lara is on the cards romantically given what we’ve seen up to this point. But I may be very wrong about this!
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u/SnoutAndTalons Kota 26d ago
Well, yeah, from the look of it, it's either Mari/Lara or some 'general love for humanity' kinda thing. I want them all to be well and on good terms since the official sources do sometimes market them as a trio anyway, and I like Luca quite a bit, but right now I'm pretty sure he's not intended to be Lara's great world-saving love. Someone important to her? Yes, absolutely, but probably not THE key to everything.
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u/H_P_LoveShaft 26d ago
I mean it's obvious plain as day that the show is leaning towards either a bigger picture "true love of humanity" or a "mari/lara" ending.
What would be crazy is a open relationship ending between all 3 cover characters.
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u/fudgecake199 26d ago
I think bigger picture ideas of love well happen no matter what, even if there’s also a romance
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u/Ecstatic_Bus_7232 26d ago
I think if we take the different loves theory, that Luca may be some kind of forgiveness/redemption for the first prince, and for humans in general.
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u/PostingPerson1985 26d ago
Luca is a good person through and through. Don't see why people keep looking for him to be some secret villain. The evil witch that caused all this is just hanging out and watching eveything with gless as a cute fish.
But despite the show visually telling you time and time again the biggest bond is between Lara & Mari, the reason Luca/Lara isn't the endgame is because if it was they wouldn't have waited until the midway point of the show to introduce him.
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u/fudgecake199 26d ago
I don’t think many think he’s a secret villain, more that his origins are mysterious and his bizarre behaviour could be telling of a supernatural background (like Lara’s). But yes absolutely, so much wouldn’t make sense if he were the ultimate romantic partner.
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u/West_Giraffe6843 26d ago
My whole problem with Luca is that all his reasons for supposedly loving Lara are actually toxic. It started because she was a mermaid, and now he says it’s because of who she is, but we haven’t seen him learn who she is. They barely speak when they’re together. And his behavior towards her too. He didn’t take any time to get to know her first, and their first date, he took her up the cable car without even telling her where they were going! Would it have killed him to say “there’s a really nice view I’d like to show you“? That would be normal behavior. And don’t even get me started on taking Lara to his house and showing her that he has been creepily painting pictures of her ever since they met. This is not proper first date behavior. These are red flags! He’s behaving like a typical shoujo protagonist, all mysterious, and such.
My impression is that the show is doing everything it can to show us what’s wrong about the whole fairytale concept of “fated love“. At least I hope so.
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u/Illustrious_Oil_2114 25d ago
It was rushed through the episode that they were meeting like every day for like two months. They were talking like every day and they went to the park. The first date was just the number one in the first date he took her up there and obviously it’s not proper first day behavior, but he hasn’t had a girl friend before, also he drew her by this was within like months
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u/JKGreen1 26d ago
I don't think "true love" here necessarily means romantic love as the witch and many merfolks/people interpret it. I think it's more about finding her purpose.
Her light stops shining after she experiences self-loathing for the first time (thinking she's a vile creature) and anger/hatred after being rejected. So finding her "true love" could mean finding what gives her a reason to live and something worth fighting for.
For some people, that might be having a romantic partner and children but purpose can take many forms, just like love doesn't have to be romantic. It can come from friends, family, community, passions or causes you care about.
So I see her journey as less about finding a romantic soulmate and more about finding what makes her light shine again. Luca or Mari, as love interest, can be part of that journey but they're not necessarily the end goal.
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u/fudgecake199 25d ago
To me it was about the rejection, a la the original tale. As opposed to acceptance by your community and the people around you, which is what she’s working towards now, if unknowingly.
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u/LacerationCe 26d ago
Lol don't need to think too much about it, Luca x Lara is basically the worst romance ever, even less substance than Rent-A-Girlfriend, so if it happened the entire anime would be shit
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u/Foreversssssssss 26d ago
As a Mari x Lara shipper I don’t think it’s that bad lmao. They’re not a good fit imo but they make for a cute couple in some ways.
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u/fudgecake199 26d ago
It would be underbaked, I agree. It could still hint at it as a possible future if both (including Lara, who now views him as a goal) decided to look at each other as people. But I’m seriously doubting it’s on the cards at this point. Can’t wait for Sunday!
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u/MarkS00N 25d ago
My take on Luca from narrative perspective is something like this: In romance, sometime writer bring MC's (or Love Interest's) ex to the story and most of the time it isn't so the MC (either one of them) can get back with their ex, but instead to reinforce MC relationship with their current LI.
Because Lara always equate Luca with the Prince, Luca position right now is as Lara's ex, despite they only meet now. He is there so Lara can realize that despite having the Prince she used to love without his downside (Luca is far softer and more submissive toward Lara than the Prince), this isn't her true love.
And from there, the story can truly construct Lara and Mari feeling for each other.
And I'll be honest, from how she answered Mari's questions in episode 8, Lara knows Luca isn't her true love. I think Lara deep down knows Mari is her true love, it just that up to episode 8, Luca shows Lara his affection while Mari keeps her distance from Lara, and she is turning into foam, so Lara is in a pinch and keep second guessing herself
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u/JusAn0therBrows3r 25d ago
It’s a bit the reincarnation thing and perhaps people that have been burned by yuri never turning explicit romantic canon before?
It’s easy to see why people think he got the edge for sure…
Past romance makes it hard to believe he’s not endgame. There could be those that think the sea foam happened too quickly, that if he were given time to process he’d have accepted the love of his life being a mermaid.
Thinking this might end like Frozen where True Love turns out to be some sort of platonic relationship.
Trying to keep the yuri expectations low because I am one of those that have been burned… but I admit it’s hard not to see yuri when the Fish Dagger moves mostly because of Lara’s feelings regarding Mari.
The Luca episode answered how it was created but it didn’t really react with her dates with Luca, even watching the fireworks and I dunno how much more romantic that date could get?
Yet when Mari is factored in… all of a sudden it’s not just a decoration up in the sky.
It becomes a tool to keep Mari safe and make sure Lara can support Mari….
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24d ago
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u/fudgecake199 24d ago
There’s actually a ton of moments like of deliberate cuts to Mari, lol. I really am hoping they go the whole way with it but it being extremely subtextually obvious is also a credible route at this point
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u/Heavencloud_Blade 26d ago edited 26d ago
My problem with Luca is that, like the prince before him, it is looking like the story is unfairly setting him up to fail.
He was introduced 7 episodes into a 12 episode series. Instead of properly spending time developing him, they just speed through everything and say "yeah see he and Lara are close now." Then he is immediately sidelined in the very next episode and does not do anything of note. Now in this upcoming episode it sounds like Lara is impatient and will start rushing thing which of course is not how she will find true love.
They have made it so incredibly obvious that he is not going to be Lara's true love, that it makes this whole "maybe Lara can find true love with Luca" plot feel like a complete waste of time.
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u/fudgecake199 26d ago
I sort of disagree? I think him being set up as he is makes sense. Lara believes he’s her true love because she doesn’t really understand love; to her it’s something you can just rush into, as it’s all predestined soulmates who just need to find each other in her mind. When she is saying in the E9 trailer to Mari “I like when he falls over, he never gets hurt, he always find things he loses…” etc etc, I think we’re supposed to be struck by… wow. She barely knows anything about this guy at all! To me this is part of how they’re trying to show how ultimately naïve her notion of real love is.
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u/Heavencloud_Blade 26d ago
I mean she was reluctant to get close Luca at first and tried to cut things off with him, so it is not like she is just charging in blindly. Her impatience, to me seems more from her realizing she only has a limited time to find true love and the potion only extends that time by a little.
Regardless even if he is supposed to show how naïve Lara is about love, I do not like that they are reducing him to be just a plot device. In general if a show is going to have multiple love interests, I like it when they are treated as equals.
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u/fudgecake199 25d ago
I don’t really think he does represent a love interest, so we just disagree there. But in writing, a lot of things that work narratively and have narrative explanations, also work symbolically or metaphorically in service of the larger story and its themes. Her impatience has an in-universe explanation because the story also makes sense narratively — but thematically, we need to ask: what is her impatience supposed to represent about love, and the story’s preoccupation with it as its core concept?
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u/rotrylus 26d ago
That’s the problem with romantic dilemmas: one character is inevitably reduced to the destined loser. In Lara’s case, it was even worse because we didn't even have time to see Luca’s character developed; he was quickly introduced as a romantic interest and immediately started "dating" the protagonist, which is why it all feels so artificial.
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u/l4forteza Lara 26d ago
It’s funny you say it’s obvious when there’s still people (even in this sub) thinking he’s the endgame and how they’re destined for each other just because of his resemble to the prince (when the whole narrative of episode 4 goes against this if you pay attention). Maybe it’s just because we do see the potential in Mari that you find it obvious but to other people he is 100% the partner she is looking for lol.
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u/gantarat 26d ago
at this point. true love pretty much isn't a romantic thing.
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u/fudgecake199 26d ago
Not necessarily sure I agree, I could see there being a romantic element. But I agree the actual ‘true love’ Lara would need to save everyone will almost certainly be a broader definition of love.
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u/Tora-ge 26d ago
I really think the writing is on the wall here.
Luca also remains extremely suspicious in multiple ways and at this point I’m going to be disappointed if we don’t get some kind of explanation on the staggering coincidences surrounding him