Non-thread-worthy discussions

[Kid Buu]

Random thought:

Cell kills Trunks twice, once when he steals the time ship, and when he returned to the Cell Games. Trunks killed Cell as an embryo and the Imperfect Cell in his timeline.

Zamasu / Goku Black kills Chi-Chi twice. He steals Goku's body, then kills Goku / Chi-Chi / Goten and goes to Trunks timeline, where the entire population including Future Chi-Chi dies

Freeza killed Vegeta twice - once on Namek, and when he brifely blew up Earth. Goku killed Freeza in Trunks timeline, and a 2nd time in ROF.

Bit of a reach, but the Androids killed Future Krillin and Super 17 kills Krillin in GT.

Any other examples like this?

[DanielSSJ]

If you take interviews into account, Mr Satan as nearly killed by Tao Pai Pai, an assassin who was eventually hired by the Red Ribbon Army, and years later was nearly killed by Cell.

[Kid Buu]

If you take interviews into account, Mr Satan as nearly killed by Tao Pai Pai, an assassin who was eventually hired by the Red Ribbon Army, and years later was nearly killed by Cell.

Huh never seen this interview before.

Trunks defeated the Androids in his timeline and in Cell's timeline too.

[DanielSSJ]

It was from Twel-Boo Mysteries:

How did Mr. Satan train to become stronger? Did he have someone like a martial-arts master…?

When Mr. Satan was young, he attended a fighting dojo called “Satan Castle”. Through a combination of considerable power and good luck (his rival fighting opponent would get food poisoning, for instance), he quickly became world champion and was called “Mr. Satan” after the name of his dojo. One day, at a bar in South City (where they were on tour), Satan and his martial-arts master made the mistake of making fun of Tao Pai-pai’s hairstyle. His master was killed, and Satan was heavily injured. From then on, Mr. Satan solemnly swore never to fight anyone whose true identity he didn’t know, or anyone who seemed crazy strong.

[JulieYBM]

Shounen in general would be so much better if the main characters were girls and women. Well, in the case of Goku, he would also have to not be written in Toriyama's usual vacuous manner, but alas, this is where we are.

Gohan as a trans girl would be really interesting, though. Those first 9-10 years of his life are defined so clearly by how he needs to related to the men around him that by the time that he has peace and quiet to himself—those seven years leading into high school in the Majin Buu arc—Gohan would finally have time to figure out who she is as a person, especially when making two female friends in high school in both Videl and Erasa. Both girls were two different types of women, so interacting with them and figuring out how Gohan relates to them in comparison to how he had to try and fit in with his dad, then Piccolo and Kuririn really sets up a lot of groundwork for an interesting high school arc.

Just as Gohan is trying to develop into 'his' own person independent of his family and his dad's friends, she now has to figure out her gender and sexuality at the same time, complicating things more.

Women always make 'battle shounen' more interesting lol

"Lifestyle" literally means the way in which you choose to live your life, I don't know what to tell you. You're trans, so that is part of your way of life, even though it's obviously not a choice. And I'm not going to take that away from you.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/lifestyle
People life a certain lifestyle no matter of they're trans, cis, gay, straight, etc. I know you're prone to taking shit WAY too seriously & personally (I've seen you in several threads many times do this, so don't deny this), but I didn't mean this in a disparaging way & I think you can tell that. This is just how English works & what the word means. Yes, being trans isn't a choice, that's just how the trans community's brains work, same with being gay, same with being cis, same with being straight. If it were a choice, no one would be trans & just go on living their lives as they were born because who actually WANTS to go through that shit & make life harder on themselves when life is already hard enough without that struggle? It's just not logical. To also say this, I'm sorry for how that came off because I didn't mean it that way. So, please, let's not escalate this & just continue the conversation at hand so the mods don't have to come in here & say something. I respect the trans community & I want them to have all the rights they should be afforded & to live however they want that makes them happy. That's as much as needs to be said here.

I'm going to try to be very polite here, while also making clear that I think that you're trying to weasel your way out of taking responsibility for basically trying to delegitimize/brush off my criticism of your manner of speaking about my community.

The term 'lifestyle' is historically used to delegitimize queer people. When I point this out and make clear that repeating this language is not acceptable, I am not "taking shit WAY too seriously & personally." The way that my community is spoken about affects how my community is devalued and harmed through both media propaganda, legislative violence, medical violence, social violence and outright physical violence. Do not come to me with a link to a Merriam-Webster website page with the definition of the English word 'lifestyle'. That ain't what that shit means. 'Lifestyle' mean kids scared of their peers and families beating, raping and murdering them for being queer. It means ostracization in the workplace because your co-workers and boss might tolerate you being a faggot, but they're still going to blame you when someone else comes along and harms you for being visibly queer.

Like, come on. You honestly don't think I would find it a little frustrating that you want to aimlessly accuse me of "taking shit way too seriously & personally" after you decide to—in what is clearly a lack of knowledge and experience with being queer and specifically-speaking, trans—brush off the idea that I might be enough of an athurority on the subject to listen to? Or for you to maybe do a little more research on and thinking about the subject before making a reply where you simultaneously try to discredit me to my face out of one side of your mouth and then out of the other say some bullshit about not wanting to get the mods involved?

Like, if you wanted to apologize to me, lead with that. Don't bury it at the very end of a post that you begin by linking me to a fucking dictionary article for the literal meaning of a word that very much has a much different real world application, followed by accusing me of taking the manner in which minority groups are spoken about and treated as 'too seriously & personally'. That's no way to prime me to accept an apology.

I dunno hon, if you have some actual problem with me, don't beat around the bush and just say it. Being a woman and having to have a man tell you how you're wrong about not only your experiences but the historically-recorded experiences of other marginalized women/people is actually really exhausting to read and reply to. You gotta understand that it just sounds like you're accusing a woman of being hysterical when you do that shit.

[DanielSSJ]

Shounen in general would be so much better if the main characters were girls and women. Well, in the case of Goku, he would also have to not be written in Toriyama's usual vacuous manner, but alas, this is where we are.

Gohan as a trans girl would be really interesting, though. Those first 9-10 years of his life are defined so clearly by how he needs to related to the men around him that by the time that he has peace and quiet to himself—those seven years leading into high school in the Majin Buu arc—Gohan would finally have time to figure out who she is as a person, especially when making two female friends in high school in both Videl and Erasa. Both girls were two different types of women, so interacting with them and figuring out how Gohan relates to them in comparison to how he had to try and fit in with his dad, then Piccolo and Kuririn really sets up a lot of groundwork for an interesting high school arc.

Just as Gohan is trying to develop into 'his' own person independent of his family and his dad's friends, she now has to figure out her gender and sexuality at the same time, complicating things more.

Women always make 'battle shounen' more interesting lol

I'd read the shit out of that.

[angeldreamZ004]

Shounen in general would be so much better if the main characters were girls and women.

What would happen to Shojo and Maho Shojo then???

[Kid Buu]

It was from Twel-Boo Mysteries:

How did Mr. Satan train to become stronger? Did he have someone like a martial-arts master…?

When Mr. Satan was young, he attended a fighting dojo called “Satan Castle”. Through a combination of considerable power and good luck (his rival fighting opponent would get food poisoning, for instance), he quickly became world champion and was called “Mr. Satan” after the name of his dojo. One day, at a bar in South City (where they were on tour), Satan and his martial-arts master made the mistake of making fun of Tao Pai-pai’s hairstyle. His master was killed, and Satan was heavily injured. From then on, Mr. Satan solemnly swore never to fight anyone whose true identity he didn’t know, or anyone who seemed crazy strong.

Ooh quite interesting. Didn't know that.

Shounen in general would be so much better if the main characters were girls and women. Well, in the case of Goku, he would also have to not be written in Toriyama's usual vacuous manner, but alas, this is where we are.

I wonder what is the most famous shounen series with a female protagonist? I suppose Inuyasha qualifies since it was in Weekly Shounen Sunday, and despite what the title says, the protagonist is Kagome.

[JulieYBM]

Shounen in general would be so much better if the main characters were girls and women. Well, in the case of Goku, he would also have to not be written in Toriyama's usual vacuous manner, but alas, this is where we are.

Gohan as a trans girl would be really interesting, though. Those first 9-10 years of his life are defined so clearly by how he needs to related to the men around him that by the time that he has peace and quiet to himself—those seven years leading into high school in the Majin Buu arc—Gohan would finally have time to figure out who she is as a person, especially when making two female friends in high school in both Videl and Erasa. Both girls were two different types of women, so interacting with them and figuring out how Gohan relates to them in comparison to how he had to try and fit in with his dad, then Piccolo and Kuririn really sets up a lot of groundwork for an interesting high school arc.

Just as Gohan is trying to develop into 'his' own person independent of his family and his dad's friends, she now has to figure out her gender and sexuality at the same time, complicating things more.

Women always make 'battle shounen' more interesting lol

I'd read the shit out of that.

I love the way that gender bender comics in Japan can basically just merge a few different genres together to do various types of stories while the overarching story can still be about gender and such. Ranma 1/2 is both gender bender and martial arts, although it's my understanding that Ranma never actually canonically settles on being a woman. Boku Girl is both the story of Mizuki's struggles with gender, accepting that she wants to stay a woman and date her male best friend, and also deals with other school comic shenanigans. Then there's Ayakashi Triangle, which is both gender bender and a ninja comic!

I haven't read those three in whole, though, so I can't account for their quality. These days, I mostly just focus on writing my own gender stories or reading stuff from western writers, but I really enjoy the visual element that gender bender comics bring to the table. More battle-heavy series to use as a Trojan Horse for introducing people to gender and sexuality talk is always something that I'd love to see, though!

Fans often talk about how the high school chapters could have gone on longer. I think mixing in those gender and sexuality elements, while keeping the story fresh with battles, adds a nice balance to help fleshing Gohan out away from just "Goku's son, Piccolo's student, Kuririn's nephew" as his identity. Gohan meets girls! Gohan meets guys! Gohan meets makeup and cute clothes! Gohan uses stops purse snatchers and is complimented not just for being strong but having cute nail polish!

You really can literally just do anything for this kind of story.

What would happen to Shojo and Maho Shojo then???

I would simply not expect them to change.

I wonder what is the most famous shounen series with a female protagonist? I suppose Inuyasha qualifies since it was in Weekly Shounen Sunday, and despite what the title says, the protagonist is Kagome.

That's a good question. Arguably, Ranma from Ranma 1/2 is pretty trans, so one could say that she herself is the famous female lead of a shounen series. At the same time, the writing is very uneven in places and I don't really think Takahashi's grasp on gender is all that keen, unfortunately.

I don't read a ton of shounen series, so I'm not really sure what series are out there anymore. I guess Medaka Box might qualify, given Medaka is the title character? I haven't read the series, though, so I don't know lol.

[DanielSSJ]

Yeah, Ranma ½ definitely doesn't set out to be a queer story, but it does leave itself open to a LOT of different readings without twisting the text very much. As far as female shonen protagonists go, so long as we're not strictly sticking to battle shonen, I'd say Arale is way up there.

[JulieYBM]

Yeah, Ranma ½ definitely doesn't set out to be a queer story, but it does leave itself open to a LOT of different readings without twisting the text very much. As far as female shonen protagonists go, so long as we're not strictly sticking to battle shonen, I'd say Arale is way up there.

I haven't engaged with Dr. Slump enough to know if she or Senbe are the main protagonist but Arale certainly does seem to fit the bill!

Yeah, from what I know about Ranma from the handful of episodes of the current cartoon that I've seen, it's queerness is basically accidental because of the way that it's written. Still, a ton of trans women are into it, so it definitely goes to show that Death of the Author happens pretty easily when you're an author with a less advanced understanding of gender and how certain writing decisions wind up making Ranma look extremely trans lol.

[Hellspawn28]

Random thought:

Cell kills Trunks twice, once when he steals the time ship, and when he returned to the Cell Games. Trunks killed Cell as an embryo and the Imperfect Cell in his timeline.

Zamasu / Goku Black kills Chi-Chi twice. He steals Goku's body, then kills Goku / Chi-Chi / Goten and goes to Trunks timeline, where the entire population including Future Chi-Chi dies

Freeza killed Vegeta twice - once on Namek, and when he brifely blew up Earth. Goku killed Freeza in Trunks timeline, and a 2nd time in ROF.

Bit of a reach, but the Androids killed Future Krillin and Super 17 kills Krillin in GT.

Any other examples like this?

Nappa in GT died from Vegeta. He's the only one who died from the same person twice in the same timeline.

[Kid Buu]

Random thought:

Cell kills Trunks twice, once when he steals the time ship, and when he returned to the Cell Games. Trunks killed Cell as an embryo and the Imperfect Cell in his timeline.

Zamasu / Goku Black kills Chi-Chi twice. He steals Goku's body, then kills Goku / Chi-Chi / Goten and goes to Trunks timeline, where the entire population including Future Chi-Chi dies

Freeza killed Vegeta twice - once on Namek, and when he brifely blew up Earth. Goku killed Freeza in Trunks timeline, and a 2nd time in ROF.

Bit of a reach, but the Androids killed Future Krillin and Super 17 kills Krillin in GT.

Any other examples like this?

Nappa in GT died from Vegeta. He's the only one who died from the same person twice in the same timeline.

Good point. Would you count Freeza killing Vegeta on Namek and ROF the same timeline? Mit buddy as Whis reversed time.

[ZeroNeonix]

Random thought:

Cell kills Trunks twice, once when he steals the time ship, and when he returned to the Cell Games. Trunks killed Cell as an embryo and the Imperfect Cell in his timeline.

Zamasu / Goku Black kills Chi-Chi twice. He steals Goku's body, then kills Goku / Chi-Chi / Goten and goes to Trunks timeline, where the entire population including Future Chi-Chi dies

Freeza killed Vegeta twice - once on Namek, and when he brifely blew up Earth. Goku killed Freeza in Trunks timeline, and a 2nd time in ROF.

Bit of a reach, but the Androids killed Future Krillin and Super 17 kills Krillin in GT.

Any other examples like this?

Nappa in GT died from Vegeta. He's the only one who died from the same person twice in the same timeline.

Good point. Would you count Freeza killing Vegeta on Namek and ROF the same timeline? Mit buddy as Whis reversed time.

Kinda? But unlike a time machine, when Whis rewinds time, it didn't happen.

[BootyCheeksJohnson]

I don't know if it's much of a consolation, but Toriyama did seem to pay attention to some changing societal norms as he got older. If we compare Pan's kindergarten teacher to commander Black from the Red Ribbon Army there's a significant difference in design philosophy on display.
We'll never know how he would've handled a genuine trans character in modern Dragon Ball since he never attempted to design/write one before he died, but I'd like to imagine that there would be some improvements compared to his pre Dr. Slump work where it was very much portraying harmful stereotypes.

[Makaioshin]

I don't know if it's much of a consolation, but Toriyama did seem to pay attention to some changing societal norms as he got older. If we compare Pan's kindergarten teacher to commander Black from the Red Ribbon Army there's a significant difference in design philosophy on display.

I like to think he changed or was at least guided to change. It should be noted though that he also provided the redesign for Sergeant Metallic in that same film so it is hard to get a good gauge of his senses then.

[JulieYBM]

I don't know if it's much of a consolation, but Toriyama did seem to pay attention to some changing societal norms as he got older. If we compare Pan's kindergarten teacher to commander Black from the Red Ribbon Army there's a significant difference in design philosophy on display.
We'll never know how he would've handled a genuine trans character in modern Dragon Ball since he never attempted to design/write one before he died, but I'd like to imagine that there would be some improvements compared to his pre Dr. Slump work where it was very much portraying harmful stereotypes.

It would be nice if a review process existed that would have caught any potential issues for such a character and then educated Toriyama on why this hypothetical character depiction was an issue. I'm not fully confident that one would have existed, though. The existence of and inclusion of trans women in Japanese comics tends to be pretty fraught. I can think of only one off the top of my head that had actually depicted how transition works in real life and that one was written and drawn by an actually out trans woman who was doing a sort of semi-autobiographical comic. Most of the time, from what I've seen, the depiction of a trans woman is either really incorrect about how transition and the state of just being a trans woman works. That being said, I haven't exactly ready every comic ever—not even every comic translated into English lol.

I bring this up because I think it would be more likely that if 'changing' gender was brought up as a thing in Dragon Ball, it would just be done in the mould of the gender bender story. I.e., some technology or drug or magic would turn a 'guy' into a 'girl' and she would be able to get pregnant and her arc would be the usual, "I'm a girl now and the more I get used to it, the more I turn into a girly-girl who wants COCK." Albeit, that's my shit, but the whole archetype typically does everything it can to prop up the idea that real 'transition' does not actually exist and you cannot 'change genders'. It's mythologizing the entire concept of being trans, basically.

Anyhoo, as I said in a previous post, I don't have high-hopes that Toriyama would have been able to successfully depict a female trans character. If I had to guess, he was probably outright told by the production commitee partners or Iyoku Akio to just not include queerness at all. Even Whis is coded as queer, rather than outright confirming it.

There's power in actually saying things directly and I think that there's very much a concerted effort to not let those things be spoken into the world in various commercial art. It's damned near impossible to get an American film or television series to use the word 'bisexual', after all.

[BootyCheeksJohnson]

I don't know if it's much of a consolation, but Toriyama did seem to pay attention to some changing societal norms as he got older. If we compare Pan's kindergarten teacher to commander Black from the Red Ribbon Army there's a significant difference in design philosophy on display.
We'll never know how he would've handled a genuine trans character in modern Dragon Ball since he never attempted to design/write one before he died, but I'd like to imagine that there would be some improvements compared to his pre Dr. Slump work where it was very much portraying harmful stereotypes.

It would be nice if a review process existed that would have caught any potential issues for such a character and then educated Toriyama on why this hypothetical character depiction was an issue. I'm not fully confident that one would have existed, though. The existence of and inclusion of trans women in Japanese comics tends to be pretty fraught. I can think of only one off the top of my head that had actually depicted how transition works in real life and that one was written and drawn by an actually out trans woman who was doing a sort of semi-autobiographical comic. Most of the time, from what I've seen, the depiction of a trans woman is either really incorrect about how transition and the state of just being a trans woman works. That being said, I haven't exactly ready every comic ever—not even every comic translated into English lol.

I bring this up because I think it would be more likely that if 'changing' gender was brought up as a thing in Dragon Ball, it would just be done in the mould of the gender bender story. I.e., some technology or drug or magic would turn a 'guy' into a 'girl' and she would be able to get pregnant and her arc would be the usual, "I'm a girl now and the more I get used to it, the more I turn into a girly-girl who wants COCK." Albeit, that's my shit, but the whole archetype typically does everything it can to prop up the idea that real 'transition' does not actually exist and you cannot 'change genders'. It's mythologizing the entire concept of being trans, basically.

Anyhoo, as I said in a previous post, I don't have high-hopes that Toriyama would have been able to successfully depict a female trans character. If I had to guess, he was probably outright told by the production commitee partners or Iyoku Akio to just not include queerness at all. Even Whis is coded as queer, rather than outright confirming it.

There's power in actually saying things directly and I think that there's very much a concerted effort to not let those things be spoken into the world in various commercial art. It's damned near impossible to get an American film or television series to use the word 'bisexual', after all.

You can see the whole "don't be explicit" thing a lot in mainstream anime. There are so many "yuri bait" shows that try to appeal to that audience, but never allow the main girls to kiss or give a love confession. I'm pretty sure that's done to improve marketability and sell the show in countries that don't allow that content on TV.

[JulieYBM]

I don't know if it's much of a consolation, but Toriyama did seem to pay attention to some changing societal norms as he got older. If we compare Pan's kindergarten teacher to commander Black from the Red Ribbon Army there's a significant difference in design philosophy on display.
We'll never know how he would've handled a genuine trans character in modern Dragon Ball since he never attempted to design/write one before he died, but I'd like to imagine that there would be some improvements compared to his pre Dr. Slump work where it was very much portraying harmful stereotypes.

It would be nice if a review process existed that would have caught any potential issues for such a character and then educated Toriyama on why this hypothetical character depiction was an issue. I'm not fully confident that one would have existed, though. The existence of and inclusion of trans women in Japanese comics tends to be pretty fraught. I can think of only one off the top of my head that had actually depicted how transition works in real life and that one was written and drawn by an actually out trans woman who was doing a sort of semi-autobiographical comic. Most of the time, from what I've seen, the depiction of a trans woman is either really incorrect about how transition and the state of just being a trans woman works. That being said, I haven't exactly ready every comic ever—not even every comic translated into English lol.

I bring this up because I think it would be more likely that if 'changing' gender was brought up as a thing in Dragon Ball, it would just be done in the mould of the gender bender story. I.e., some technology or drug or magic would turn a 'guy' into a 'girl' and she would be able to get pregnant and her arc would be the usual, "I'm a girl now and the more I get used to it, the more I turn into a girly-girl who wants COCK." Albeit, that's my shit, but the whole archetype typically does everything it can to prop up the idea that real 'transition' does not actually exist and you cannot 'change genders'. It's mythologizing the entire concept of being trans, basically.

Anyhoo, as I said in a previous post, I don't have high-hopes that Toriyama would have been able to successfully depict a female trans character. If I had to guess, he was probably outright told by the production commitee partners or Iyoku Akio to just not include queerness at all. Even Whis is coded as queer, rather than outright confirming it.

There's power in actually saying things directly and I think that there's very much a concerted effort to not let those things be spoken into the world in various commercial art. It's damned near impossible to get an American film or television series to use the word 'bisexual', after all.

You can see the whole "don't be explicit" thing a lot in mainstream anime. There are so many "yuri bait" shows that try to appeal to that audience, but never allow the main girls to kiss or give a love confession. I'm pretty sure that's done to improve marketability and sell the show in countries that don't allow that content on TV.

Yeah, it's a recurring element in these titles. Lycoris Recoil has yuri bait for the girls—Chisato and Takina—but an actual canonical gay couple for their two older male mentor figures. Even then, you don't hear actual LGBTQIA+ terms used in the series. It's maddening, given that this is a series being aimed at otaku. It's mythologizing queerness, stripping it of realness for the sake of never having to acknowledge that you can be queer in real life.

Average straight couple: https://youtu.be/mxxZcES-T_0

It's honestly kind of funny, given that even the gay couples in PreCure are more explicit. https://youtu.be/aezY0hfj4aw

In HUGtto! PreCure, there's also Masato and Henri. They're visually shown on screen holding hands and at one day Henri even blows Masato a kiss. It's also implied that Henri has gender dysphoria, which would make them a trans woman dating a cis man, which is It's own kind of fraught relationship both in real life and in media. This blog post is a pretty good write up about the two that's worth reading. https://ogiuemaniax.com/2018/12/18/the- ... ay-couple/

Back to the Dragon Ball of it all: the formation of Kefla during the Tournament of Power felt like such a Sapphic sex moment. In an arc overseen by Nagamine—a director of various magical girl series—I think it's pretty clear that his leadership allowed for at least the alluding to of Caulifla and Kale's relationship. It's hard not to see Kale's struggle as one of trying to express her love for Caulifla through insecurity and then Caulifla's recognition of Kale as a clear Sapphic connection. When they finally begin fighting together—and then eventually merge together into Kefla—we are literally watching their hearts come together as one. Having them kiss in the crowd during the montage in Episode #131 would've been the most natural thing in the world.

[BootyCheeksJohnson]

It would be nice if a review process existed that would have caught any potential issues for such a character and then educated Toriyama on why this hypothetical character depiction was an issue. I'm not fully confident that one would have existed, though. The existence of and inclusion of trans women in Japanese comics tends to be pretty fraught. I can think of only one off the top of my head that had actually depicted how transition works in real life and that one was written and drawn by an actually out trans woman who was doing a sort of semi-autobiographical comic. Most of the time, from what I've seen, the depiction of a trans woman is either really incorrect about how transition and the state of just being a trans woman works. That being said, I haven't exactly ready every comic ever—not even every comic translated into English lol.

I bring this up because I think it would be more likely that if 'changing' gender was brought up as a thing in Dragon Ball, it would just be done in the mould of the gender bender story. I.e., some technology or drug or magic would turn a 'guy' into a 'girl' and she would be able to get pregnant and her arc would be the usual, "I'm a girl now and the more I get used to it, the more I turn into a girly-girl who wants COCK." Albeit, that's my shit, but the whole archetype typically does everything it can to prop up the idea that real 'transition' does not actually exist and you cannot 'change genders'. It's mythologizing the entire concept of being trans, basically.

Anyhoo, as I said in a previous post, I don't have high-hopes that Toriyama would have been able to successfully depict a female trans character. If I had to guess, he was probably outright told by the production commitee partners or Iyoku Akio to just not include queerness at all. Even Whis is coded as queer, rather than outright confirming it.

There's power in actually saying things directly and I think that there's very much a concerted effort to not let those things be spoken into the world in various commercial art. It's damned near impossible to get an American film or television series to use the word 'bisexual', after all.

You can see the whole "don't be explicit" thing a lot in mainstream anime. There are so many "yuri bait" shows that try to appeal to that audience, but never allow the main girls to kiss or give a love confession. I'm pretty sure that's done to improve marketability and sell the show in countries that don't allow that content on TV.

Yeah, it's a recurring element in these titles. Lycoris Recoil has yuri bait for the girls—Chisato and Takina—but an actual canonical gay couple for their two older male mentor figures. Even then, you don't hear actual LGBTQIA+ terms used in the series. It's maddening, given that this is a series being aimed at otaku. It's mythologizing queerness, stripping it of realness for the sake of never having to acknowledge that you can be queer in real life.

Average straight couple: https://youtu.be/mxxZcES-T_0

It's honestly kind of funny, given that even the gay couples in PreCure are more explicit. https://youtu.be/aezY0hfj4aw

In HUGtto! PreCure, there's also Masato and Henri. They're visually shown on screen holding hands and at one day Henri even blows Masato a kiss. It's also implied that Henri has gender dysphoria, which would make them a trans woman dating a cis man, which is It's own kind of fraught relationship both in real life and in media. This blog post is a pretty good write up about the two that's worth reading. https://ogiuemaniax.com/2018/12/18/the- ... ay-couple/

Back to the Dragon Ball of it all: the formation of Kefla during the Tournament of Power felt like such a Sapphic sex moment. In an arc overseen by Nagamine—a director of various magical girl series—I think it's pretty clear that his leadership allowed for at least the alluding to of Caulifla and Kale's relationship. It's hard not to see Kale's struggle as one of trying to express her love for Caulifla through insecurity and then Caulifla's recognition of Kale as a clear Sapphic connection. When they finally begin fighting together—and then eventually merge together into Kefla—we are literally watching their hearts come together as one. Having them kiss in the crowd during the montage in Episode #131 would've been the most natural thing in the world.

Oddly enough I watched through Lycoris Recoil recently and I found it odd that it was being referred to as a "yuri" show when nothing explicit ever happened between the leads. I was even more confused that they didn't when two male characters were allowed to be shown as a couple. Even if that pairing was a doomed romance.
For Super if for some reason the show wouldn't allow them to kiss they could've done a cute thing where Kale gets to be forward and kiss Caulifla on the cheek, and she could blush and smile back. Some kind of acknowledgement that the feelings are reciprocated.