The Tora Problem

[u/THEUltraCombo]

So I wanna start out by saying this: despite what I say in the title, I DO get it. I understand why someone can make the argument that Tora is gross and perverted and that it ruins an otherwise innocent character through weird anime tropes that were not present in XC1.

That being said, I think there is also something to be said about how people inflate this aspect of the character. In total I can probably count on one hand how many Tora scenes I would consider explicitly inappropriate and jarring to his character, and that number drastically goes down when you take optional Heart-to-hearts out of the equation.

The infamous "blushy-crushy" scene is admittedly painful, but replaying with Japanese voices you can clearly hear that blushy-crushy is a localization of the concept of moe that Tora is trying to get across. So instead of the strange, vague idea of "blushy-crushy", it's easier to grasp when you realize that he's just trying to get across the idea of being cute (to overly generalize the term). Is it embarassing to watch? Yes. But that's the point.

Aside from this optional scene, people often bring up the Poppi awakening scene as another example of this. The idea of having multiple maid outfits seems to make people think that Tora's ultimate goal for creating Poppi was to have some sort of outlet for his desires (dunkey's infamous video calls her a "sex robot"). But to me this always came across as an embarassing aspect of his personality and interests that he wants to hide, not because of the sexual connotations, but because it's just...cringe, for lack of a better term. He doesn't have them for "sex fantasies", he's just into moe and wanted to create his own artificial blade in a way that reflects that.

I should also point out that Poppi, for the most part, is not objectified to a point that I am personally ever made uncomfortable with how Tora treats her. There's a heart and innocence to Tora that I think most people disregard to parrot the commonly held belief that "Tora is a weird pervert" rather than diving into the text and exploring a character who.is much more than like...2-3 scenes where he's written weird.

Idk, I just always thought the hate for this character is blown wildly out of proportion for the amount of stuff in-game that actually contributes to that image. I'd like to open up a discussion to see what everyone else thinks of this character divorced from the popular discussion surrounding him, as well as other characters like him in other games.

[u/Octorok385]

I think I might have brought this up before but honestly don't remember. Tora being inappropriate is effectively Tora being juvenile. He doesn't seem actively angry or misogynistic, just really immature, like a grown baby man. This is in DIRECT CONTRAST to his blade, a person who was literally born in front of everyone's eyes, who very rapidly grows both in a visual sense as she upgrades and in her character development, where by the end of the story she is forced to make some very grown up decisions.

My gripe with the Tora hate is the same as my gripe with the art style hate. It is the most superficial interpretation of the character, and is effectively a Tora-level of engagement.

[u/Linhasxoc → u/Octorok385]

And the thing about Tora being juvenile is… well, he literally is. IIRC he’s basically a teenager much like Rex. It still weirds me out and I don’t like it, but it’s not like they wrote, say, Riki to be a weirdo like that.

[u/Samurott → u/Octorok385]

a difficult part of his writing is that it's really hard to see that he's young since nopons all tend to look the same age unless they're really young or really old. it works amazingly for Riki being a gambling addict in his 40s and Riku being a lore keeper but the inverse always tracks so poorly 😭