

Is a male camel with long eyelashes all it takes to destroy heteronormativity? I don’t get it. The only feminine thing I can potentially identify in Saharah is that they have long eyelashes. Even granting that benefit of the doubt though, it flummoxes me why Saharah’s gender was changed as well. Of course we should also keep in mind that this is a giraffe, not a human woman. Gracie dresses and acts femininely, and it would have been more socially acceptable at the time for a woman to be a fashion designer. I can ostensibly understand why Gracie was changed to a female upon localization of the first game. To be fair, both of these characters were in the original Gamecube game back in 2002, and the world was a less accepting place than it is now.

This is because both of these characters are originally male, but were changed to female during western localization. You’ll notice that I’ve been using the gender neutral “they” to describe both characters. When first introduced into the series, they would give the player special flooring, but they have since been upgraded to also give the player wallpaper. Saharah the camel, on the other hand, does appear in New Horizons.
Flick x cj series#
Gracie is a giraffe fashion designer in the series who often asks the player to complete various tasks to earn a piece of clothing from their own collection. Those who started playing Animal Crossing with New Horizons may not know Gracie as they are not currently in the game. Gracie and Saharahįinally, we come to the characters of Gracie and Saharah.

If the localization team is making edits to appear more inclusive though, they’ve got some explaining to do about Gracie and Saharah. It is worth noting in this specific instance however, that the localization team is somewhat limited by the original script. It’s sort of a one foot in the door situation that can leave both parties unhappy and tends to indicate creators are trying to play it safe rather than standing up for the LGBT+ community. If you’re unfamiliar with the term “queerbaiting,” it effectively means that the creators of a specific piece of media have decided to drop hints that a character or characters in question may be LGBT+, but refuse to outright state it to avoid offending anyone. While the fluidity of the player character is an obvious win for many in the LGBT+ community, the relationship between Flick and CJ, if intended to be romantic, is basically queerbaiting because of how much it is up to interpretation.

Flick x cj professional#
It does then become a little difficult to interpret their partnership as a professional one. They both act independently from one another. CJ’s word choice still seems very ambiguous to me, but it’s true they’re not running a business.ĬJ is a streamer and Flick is an artist. It wasn’t until I saw the discourse about their relationship start to pop up online that I considered interpreting what CJ had said differently. He meant something akin to a business partner in my mind. In the meantime, here's some of the latest fanart - published after the book was released.The sticking point comes from CJ’s use of the term “partner.” When I first read this, I did not even remotely think that CJ meant “partner” in a romantic sense. We've asked Nintendo for further clarification on this. Looking through the considerable number of posts on the subject on Twitter dot com, it's pretty clear fans of the couple are not going to let this get in their way. Just because a chameleon and otter are working together, doesn't mean the two can't smooch on the side, right? According to Animal Crossing: New Horizons - Official Companion Guide, the two are "roommates and business partners" (thanks, DualShockers).īut word that the two are partners in business and not pleasure has not dampened their considerable legion of fans. However, the game's official guidebook, published last week, appears to offer a clarification. It was seized on by some fans as evidence the two were Nintendo's first canon LGBT+ characters in the series. Numerous reports around the release of Animal Crossing: New Horizons leapt on references to the game's chameleon and otter characters being more than just friends.ĬJ, a chipper young otter who hosts the island's fishing contests, and Flick, a punky chameleon who asks you to catch bugs, can be found describing each other in dialogue as partners.
