I once read something that really stuck with me. "Autism is cute until someone grows up." Because that is so true. There are even people that think autism is something you grow out off because it is mostly known as a child thing.

>be me >white "boy" >very early 20s >F*cking love trains >pursue STEM education >socially inept & Bullied for it >accused of speaking weirdly >Be diagnosed with ADHD >told i should look into whether i have ASD at the end of my appointment >mfw i am literally a walking stereotype.

I came for ranpo in the thumbnail. As a neurodivergent myself, bsd is one of my all time favorite series for many reasons, and one of the main reasons is how neurodivergent coded so many of the characters are, and not just in a stereotypical way. Besides Ranpo, Poe and Kunikida also have a lot of autistic traits, and yet they have very different behaviors and personalities than Ranpo.

About the mysoginy, I totally agree. People don't want to admit that also women can be autistic because women have to be always socially acceptable for men, so autistic women are more pressured to mask than autistic men because...you know.... "Boys will be boys"

Lilo and stitch was my favorite movie growing up. I used to watch it on loop everyday. It explains a lot being that I’m autistic I related to her in some ways. I relate much more to autistic coded characters then characters that were explicitly written as autistic.

So many people seem to think that chacters like Luna are naive simply because she is optimistic.

The stuff about female charcters and gender makes a lot more sense once you remember a lot of a AFAB individuals grow up undiagnosed since research of autism on female bodies has been very misguided and lead to gender bias and stereotypes- the symptoms show similar, but if boy is quiet, he's weird. if a girl is quiet, she's well-behaved.

Hope you're watching BSD S4, since they made a great adaptation out of this light novel. You can truly feel Ranpo's anguish (almost a meltdown), it can feel heart wrenching, even. ASD aside, Ranpo can also be a Savant. His perception and intuition are brilliant, while his sense of direction is absolutely awful. His peculiar social skills are also related to both, I think. I'm glad he found the father figure he needed to organize his mind better and to become even more amazing!

I feel like you hit some key details here, mainly being the frustration that autistic people have at the more "straightforward" depictions of "weird nerdy guy," and that coded characters (be it autistic, queer, etc.) can be some of the best depictions of these characters, even if not perfect. Because believe it or not, being autistic isn't a "main story element" in most peoples lives like media portrays, its usually a bunch of little things, Comfy clothes, conversations being a little weird, so on. A coded character works so well because of this. If media goes out of it's way to tell you a character is autistic, then it's probably important somehow to the story, and if it's somehow important to the story, it's probably not a realistic characterization. Also, having writers who have experience or education with or are themselves autistic, queer, etc. is extremely important to having accurate, positive representations rather than the old and pretty harmful "body of a 24 year old mind of a 7 year old" trope that gets applied to so many

I like to think that Kunikida and Dazai from BSD are also autistic coded but in different ways! It just shows how diverse ND people can be

My favorite Autistic coded never officially stated Autistic charector is L from death note, (and to a lesser extent near as well) because L is very strongly autistic coded. To the extent if you read l one day you could probably put him in having moderate support needs (needing assistance with ADLs, such as dressing,and you might assume washing given wateri apparently invented a human washing machine for him with built in drying featur, which honestly reads as support parent who doesn’t want to help with washing multiple times a day like L wants. L also shows a lot of stims and sensory issues, hyper focus on solving cases, cause his favorite things are puzzles that challenge him Unfortunately L does have the sterotyoical savant like intelligence and skills, I mean he is meant to be the worlds hreatest detective, who solves crimes from his bedroom never showing his face, and does it because they are puzzle for him to and this is fun for him, which is very major autism stereotype but not played off as one, or welll it doesn’t give that same Sheldon cooper energy f you know what I mean ButI even with being awkward, doesn’t fall into the burden, and his awkward int generally a joke, though I have seen it make some reviewers uncomfortable, other charectors react l confused that he is L when they meet him, they remark he looks a bit off in one scene when he show up to give a speech not dressed up like people in a crowd would, but he is in the show actually given respect and actually a whole person (as much as charectors in death note are whole rounded people at least) I love that he’s barefoot most of the time and won’t wear socks and barely puts on shoe if he has to wear them, he loves sweets, he wears the same clothes,because sensory preferences, I love that he is alsways subtlety stimming ot stacking coffee creamers for example while thinking, and I love how his awkwardness exists in the space but isn’t standing out it just flows naturally,

I'm not autistic (at the very least I've never been diagnosed with autism anyway) but I can relate a lot to autistic-coded characters like Ranpo, Twilight Sparkle, and Elsa. In that one episode, when Ranpo freaked out because he couldn't understand others, I was shocked yet happy because "omg, someone else gets it!" I thought. It surprised me how this character was able to express and sum up what I've been feeling my whole life sorta, that I'm different, that I can't understand other people. Not in the sense of I don't get other people's emotions (actually I'm very empathetic if I say so myself, and I've always been rather sensitive) but in the sense that I never really understood what my peers were interested in growing up and, like Ranpo, it felt like there was some secret they were all privy to that I was not. It still feels that way sometimes, and it's very frustrating and disheartening. I get the feeling that people look at me strangely, they think I'm strange, and I'm not quite sure why. What is it I'm doing wrong? What is it about me, about my actions or what I'm saying, that makes people look at me like that? Is it all in my head? Sometimes it feels like people kind of treat me like a child, even though I'm an adult woman. I've been called "cute" on a couple different occasions and I guess it's flattering but it also sometimes somewhat feels like I'm being talked down to sort of. I've never once been called "sexy" or "hot" which is frustrating, because I don't want to be just "cute". Idk, maybe it's because of my shyness and tendency to keep to myself. Maybe it's because I don't really seem to know all the things I ought to know by now, things other people take for granted. Maybe it's because of my "naivety", because I try to be nice to everyone and give everybody the benefit of the doubt. Or maybe it's because of my sincerity, because I generally see the good in other people or at least try to, and I get attached to people easily and I'm a little too honest at times, idk. Anyway, sorry for rambling on about this, but thank you for making this video it was very interesting and I think you make some excellent points about autistic people and autism-coding in media! I know this was made a year ago but I hope you got a good grade on this assignment because you deserve it!

I LOVE RANPO! HES SO GOOD AT SHOWING SIDES OF A CERTAIN WAY OF THINKING THAT YOU DONT SEE OFTEN!!

i made this when I was 18 for a school project don't take it that seriously or personally alright

Something that is so funny to me is that every time I feel like a fictional character is literally me, they always end up being autistic-coded. But the character I relate to the most is Ranpo, even snacks and sweets being his safe foods applies to me. I JUST LOVE HIM SO MUCH! (and I enjoyed your video as well)

I’m autistic and I often get frustrated when people say: “sheldon isn’t the right representation of autism” when nobody ever said he was. The _creators_ even said “we don’t diagnose our characters”

What I like about Entrapta is after she talks to the princesses they stop using the leash on her, because they finally understand what she’s been doing. And that she does have people who like her because of her obsession with tech, like Hordak, he loves her no matter how much she likes tech. He appreciates her for who she is and Scorpia does as well. They never get mad at her like the others do and let her be herself.

My personal favorite autistic coded character is Caleb Widowgast from campaign 2 of Critical Role. He is shown to stim by flapping his hands, spinning, and counting objects. He has special interests in magic, books, and cats (and not just "smart books" like other autistic coded characters, he canonically loves other books like trashy romance novels too! Its literally just books and reading them itself). He has a familiar named Frumpkin who often acts more like a service animal. He often misses jokes and other social cues and tends to take things more literally. But the best part of course is that he's a fully fleshed out character outside of all these things. His personality isn't just Autism Trait™ (or any of his other traits that tend to get made into character personalities like him having ptsd or being polyamorous and bisexual (we stan a king)). He is still a person and isn't soley defined by these things, and it makes me really happy to see a character that really speaks to me as an autistic person even though hes only autistic coded. Idk, just wanted to talk about him : )

I don't know why this video was pushed to me considering this is a literal school project, but I enjoyed your points, and this was put together very well.

I love this is a project I stumbled upon! As someone who found out at 31 that I’m autistic, autistic coded characters always made more sense to me before I knew what coding was. You did great ☺️

Good video! Your take on Elsa as an Autistic-coded character is really poignant. The scene where she freaks out in the castle and accidentally hurts Anna is definitely her having a particularly harrowing meltdown. I've had those kinds of meltdowns before, and they are _the worst_ because now someone who was trying to help you is also hurt and confused and it's not just you. For the thing about Ranpo, I think that his sweet snacks could be a bit of a stim. Other than just sensory issues making food difficult, having snacks to munch on or a pleasant and familiar taste in the background can definitely help with self-regulating. I know I personally prefer to have a lollypop or some gum or some hard candy in my mouth while I draw or write to help regulate things! Though that could also be because I also have ADHD in addition to Autism and the sugar gives my brain the extra stimulation it constantly craves, but eh. There's definitely overlap between the two things on that specific front. If there wasn't, they probably wouldn't be comorbid lol I do disagree with some of your points about Entrapta, but tbh that's both okay and expected since us Autistic folks sure aren't a hivemind like some allistic people sure do like to pretend we are! Specifically, I think she's an amazing example of representation of a high-empathy Autistic person. She may not get social cues, but she isn't entirely oblivious to how others are feeling. She empathizes with Hordak's struggles with his physical disability, and even goes as far to help him out with some new assistive devices and making needed changes to his already existing ones. In the episode where she's on a leash (which isn't the best in and of itself, I agree there), it's revealed in the latter half of the episode that why she kept running off into dangerous areas was because they had bits of tech that would be helpful in solving a problem that another character was having. Mermista even tells the others off for being so hard on Entrapta in that episode because she _is_ trying to help, she's just doing it in her own way and wasn't able to communicate it. Hell, she even empathizes with actual literal robots, which is a mood if I've ever seen one. I especially like how they actually acknowledge that she is able to tell when people are irritated with her or find her annoying and bothersome in the "Destiny" two parter. She tries to keep on a happy face because masking and also The War™, but when Beast Island starts dredging up everyone's insecurities and draining their wills to persevere Entrapta practically melts into a puddle of depressed loneliness. When she was talking about how she feels useless and like everyone would be better off not dealing with her and her Entrapta-ness, my brain lit up and went "That's me! That's how I feel all the time when I'm not distracted or entirely in my element!" And Bow doesn't reenforce _ANY_ of her self-hating thoughts when she dumps them on the ground in front of him. He makes sure she knows that she actually is appreciated, even if some of the Princesses are mean to her sometimes or don't really "get" her. That she _is_ necessary, and he _does_ want to be her friend because she's _her,_ and that they came to Beast Island specifically to find her and bring her home. I never got the impression that she was being framed as a "burden". Just as a character who sometimes causes conflict, just like some of the other characters do. This isn't to say she was always handled perfectly or that there's no flaws in how she's presented or anything, but between her being high-empathy, and a functioning adult, _and_ actually being allowed to get a love interest she really did feel like decent rep over-all to me despite the writing stumbles. Edit: got the episode wrong

Im questioning if im autistic right now. I've dealt with a lot of things like taking things literally too much or taking things as a joke too much and vise versa, and not understanding social cues well, and even hiding from loud spaces. When i was younger no one thought much of it, but as of now im 15 almost 16 and my family finds it odd that im not like "typical teens" and I rather hide in my room and draw instead of party or have a sleepover. Videos like these kinda help/ comfort me and i really appreciate this

This is a great video!!! We actually made a show about growing up autistic and the lead character is the exact opposite of Sheldon. It's called What's the Rule

5:31 While I agree that putting Entrapta on a lead WAS very demeaning, the characters were in a literal life or death situation where getting caught could mean their demise - having said that, they should’ve talked to Entrapta beforehand about how important focusing on the task at hand was & be honest with her about how getting distracted could get them killed. One thing I DID like them doing in this scene & later eps was how Entrapta later takes steps to correct this behaviour in similarly risky situations - something many autistic coded characters are portrayed as incapable of doing, which is absolute bollocks 🤦‍♀️ this condition may cause someone to make mistakes more often but they’re not incapable of taking responsibility & making steps to gradually improve over time.

I’m a simple person, I see Ranpo- I click

Cute is my favorite blanket complement so I try to pick specific parts of people to complement. It's easier to say "your hair is pretty" than fight my desire to call them a cute person

I also really appreciate that you made video essays. I’ve always loved video essays, and I’ve never made one, so it’s really cool to see those that you made, especially ones that are so personal for you. Your work comes off as very coherent and passionate. I also just love the little grids at the beginning, and the way you work with example clips, text, and other graphics.

Luna is indeed riculed and bullied by some people but there are also a lot of people in the school that really like here and respect here.

I'm going to be studying ADHD and Autism this school year and this video is going to help me so much! Thank you for making videos that let people know more about things like this

Entrapta is apparently not just autistic coded but explicitly confirmed by the showrunners as to be written as autistic

It's so funny, as someone who's autistic but self diagnosed herself with bpd zuko always struck out as autibpd. He has a very traumatic childhood where his younger sister gets all the attention away, he lashes out at his uncle and due to trauma bonding Ozai was his favorite person. But as time went on and Zuko realized who he is without his favorite persons approval he learned to have his own identity other then being a puppet. Maybe im just projecting idk.

Thank you for the video, now I know that almost all my favourite characters have autistic traits. And I love it. I'm very "high functioning", but it's hard for me to recognise ASD traits. Thanks to ASD coded characters, not only do I learn how ASD can look, but also that unmasking these traits is ok, and I find these amazing characters which I relate to. Here is my take on characters which are created to be autistic. I used to like Sheldon, but the moment I realised I'm autistic, I started to find the show problematic. However, he is a great representation of ASD asshole, and sadly I know some like him. I also watched 2 episodes of Good Doctor and then cried for several hours so I'm not doing that again. I highly recommend Woo Young Woo, because she is a character which made my family more open to talk about autism (used to be taboo). I really like Accountant, and he is my favourite character, but I understand why the film is problematic. Rain Man is really good, but my sibling told me after the film that: "He is not like you, because it looks like there is something genuinly wrong with him, while you just look stupid." And called my diagnosis BS. When I read manga I often find "autism" to be used as a slur, or someone use it as a warning ("He will become autistic if he stays in his room all day" ). If I ever find a partner and would wish to explain ASD to them, I probably wouldn't do it through a film or comic.

i really liked this i cant wait to see a second one!:D

this is such a great video it deserves more views

Seeing Luna Lovegood on the front makes me so happy, I love her so much! ❤

I loved the mention of bsd in here

BTW entrapta isn't autistic coded, the writers said she is autistic.

Great topic selection and breakdown! I hope you got a good grade

My autistic ass saw ranpo on the thumbnail and clicked so fast

I once asked my mom if there was a time she and my dad thought I was autistic, she told me yes but from a scale of one to ten she said 1 and I felt confused later my friend asked me if I had ADHD cause she always saw me fidgeting whenever I sat down and their are time I see that maybe I do have one of those but I was diagnosed with anxiety disorder so I’m confused most of the time whenever I catch myself fidgeting or getting overwhelmed with my surroundings. I wanna get tested but I’m scared that it’s all in my head and it’s not real (autism runs in my family, and I did research on mental health and neurological disorders cause I want to work on a field that helps people with neurological problems)

👏 👏 👏 great job

2:00 do you have actual statistics regarding this pattern?

Tbh idk if i agree with coding being better-while yes majority of creators are NT coding just gives NT fans a free pass to deny a character is autistic just cause its not stated outright Like im a monster high fan and ghoulia yelps in gen1 is very clearly autistic & nonverbal- her bio states she struggles with expressing herself , hates changes and needs a routine shes even shown to have a special interest in tech-she also doesnt talk she just moans and groans which nonverbal fans have said is how they communicate too Yet bcus shes not outright stated as autistic and mattel said she “speaks in zombie” nt fans refuse to accept shes autistic coded even defending mattel removing all of these traits from her in gen3

Lastly I find it hard to believe that most creators are neurotypical, it might be true but a lot of artist do have a type of autism.

Great vid! And I think you're right. Autistic coding characters give off a more rich story telling vs representation. Because when you start to intentionally make autistic characters, it becomes rigid and we're still seeing women with autism as a newish thing. For sure, there are autistic-coding men/boys in anime and seen as heroic. Whereas, autistic-coding women/girls in anime are heavily infantized and are just 'weird kawaii.' I hated this so much. Kino from "Kino's Journey" was the closest I saw as autistic coding but not infantized due to the fact that she dresses like man (like my pfp) Sigh.

Me*to Shera characters sarcastically*:"First Peridot from Steven Universe and now Entrapta. Way to go. Put all disabled characters on leashes. Real classy, people. Real classy."

As a young girl I used to say I had powers like Elsa. Little did I know these “powers” were autistic traits, I didn’t get diagnosed until I was 10

i grew up with my older brother (who is autistic) who acts EXACTLY like sheldon cooper, wild

I've started to realize that as an autistic person a lot of my favorite franchises seem to have at least a couple of autistic coded characters. I have so many examples though probably the one that has the most autistic coded characters is JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. From JoJo's Bizarre Adventure there is Jonathan Joestar, Jotaro Kujo, Noriaki Kakyoin, Josuke Higashikata, Giorno Giovanna, Bruno Bucciarati, Pannacotta Fugo, Trish Una, Vinegar Doppio, and Weather Report (I haven't finished all of JJBA so there could be others that I haven't seen yet. Also some of these may just be projection on my part but eh)

Something I hate about the Rosmen Russian translation of the Harry Potter books: Luna was renamed into Polumna, which sounds similar to the word "poloumnaya", meaning "mentally-disabled" in a perjorative way.

watching this i can't help but reflect upon myself wtf is up with me. i'm defnitely different than almost everyone else but i've always just believed it's because i'm "smarter" than most of my peers. i don't think i'm autistic, but i do spend a lot of time with autistic people. i'm just sort of naturally drawn to them, and i don't like making friends with non-autistic people. that's not a decision i've made, i've only learned my friends were autistic a good while after befriending them. but what does that say about me? watching this video i can't help but feel like some of the points sort of hit home in a sende, yet i can't diagnose myself with anything relating to autism or any sort of disability. except for a few adhd symptoms that i feel like most people can relate to, i'm definitely still far from actuallly having adhd. autism just feels like an answer to why i am the way i am, yet the dots don't completely connect, ever.

I want to add: Hitori Goto from Bocchi the Rock, Maomao from Apothecary Diaries, and Ariga Makoto from Hourou Musuko. One of these is definitely Trans, and the others are ace-spec coded.

I think most of Zoe Deschanel's characters have been more like 'Angelman syndrome coded' if we weren't only looking at them through the lens of autism.

I'm surprised no one brought up Jordan Kent from Superman. They do stated on the pilot that he has some sort of social anxiety disorder and when you take everything to account it isn't really all that big a leaf to say that he could be autistic.

I personally think that Dazai from BSD could be autistic too, specially if we take into consideration that his character was inspired by Oba Yōzo from "No Longer Human". Oba had noticed since early childhood that he was different from the other people. For example, he didn't feel hunger, or didn't know which present he should've asked from his father. He feared humans because he couldn't understand them. Therefore, he tried to do social masking by playing the image of a funny clown in school. This has a lot in common with the anime Dazai. For him, good and evil don't mean much, probably because he is autistic and doesn't feel these social laws like neurotypical people do. And I also think he might have high empathy, since he understands other people's feelings very well and manipulates them based on that.

Im autistic and everyone keeps saying I don't "look" autistic.

No wonder i liked frozen so much as a kid. Lol

Donnie from Rottmnt 9:21

Thoughs who came cause of the bsd hyper fixation like me 7:50

I'm here because of Zuko

We literally get other autistic characters in good doctor alone when dr murphy multiple times mentions it’s a spectrum what more do you need

and some autistic people can be ace in fact I think its common

Relatable i'm autistic

elsa autisitc traits can be explained by other things she probaly isnt autistic but other charcters are

and there is nothing wrong with calling a autisitc person cute and entrapta is shown having a romantic relationship so its like oppistie with entrapta dont call the show right for something they did right

How is Zuko autistic coded?

also someone in another video that they need to be restarined or something or they will wounder of or something

what would luther fall under? he's clearly not neurotypical

Yeah, there are certainly few females. Temperance Brennan is the only one I immediately bring to mind.

What about the other shawhn he isn't codded he is cancily aurstic he is little kid not a adult so whearter he is treated as kid or not doesnt matter cause he is one he has a special interest in trains he is a stereotype kinda but still better charcters/rep than this shawhn as for the leash scene she was able to get of the leash when she wanted and was more usefull of the leash and atleast unlike the other charcters you mentioned she is shown to be able to experience romantic attraction and there other aurstic codded charcters who are obssed with stuff/ there special interest for example marientte is obssed with her crush adrien and seems to have a special interest in him and marcy is obssed with and has special interest in video games and entrapta and marcy were cofiend aurstic except for marcy they said they didn't intend it at first but changed things at the end of the show and it's cofried a mirclous is aurstic but it isn't cofiend who it is though plus just like marcy they never mad there treatment of her seem like a good thing just that she was also in the wrong of only focusing on her tech and nothing else and all her aurstic traits as shown to be both advantages and disadvantages rather than one or the other which really good to this is no a hate comment btw just a correction that's all if normorna didn't realize her crush was evil she would creepy and none will call her out not even herself or her mom so even good charcters can have bad traits I don't hate normorna btw I just find her kinda annoying due to that so now entrapta wasn't shown as a angel entrapta likes small foods ear plus running around even when not in space watching people interact her friends cause the one who helped with social cues is clearly her friend depite being mad at her since why else would she help her with social cues and now they dont treat bad anymore and love interest and madye more but that's all I can think of at the the moment so she likes more things than just tech after all that I mentioned do you still think she is that bad aurstic rep ? She also likes purple and autistic people have refnied interests so do you still think entrapta is bad ?

While there is no way to completely eradicate every single autism stereotype which I know its not what you're saying, I wonder how can writers portray autistic people the right way as characters? Not as comedic devices or secondary characters, but as actual believable characters who just so happen to be on the spectrum? And how can being autistic be a main point to movies, books and shows? If there is a video that covers what I am saying let me know! Or at least the closest to this, like humanization and using quirks the right way to portray a character.

4:48 L isn't seen as acceptable to society at all? Or as humours? His colleagues even have admitted to hate him

you know atleast entrapta is called out for focusing to much on tech unlike norma who isnt called out for being creppy before re finding out her crush is evil not even herself or her mom called her out

Remember being passionate is being autistic. Thats what i got from this

As an autistic guy, I honestly couldn't disagree more with this video. We do not want to be represented in the media like how you're explaining it. Don't get offended on our behalf!

The stuff you said about Entrapta being "problematic" is total nonsense. There's no problem with her portrayal at all. She inconvenienced other characters in the show because of her autism? No, it's not problematic, it's realistic. Autism isn't just being weird and being good at a specific thing, there are times where people with ASD are good at something, but have behaviors that makes things difficult for others. Entrapta was good with machines, it's like a gift, but those abilities come at the cost of some character flaws. That is what autism is, having positive qualities and talents, but major flaws in other areas. The reason why autistic people get infantilized so much is because many refuse to take accountability for their actions and just blame everything on their condition. No, if you want to be treated like an adult, take responsibility as adults and DO BETTER. Everyone should try to do better whether they're on the spectrum or not. Do you think they just put Entrapta on the leash for the sake of it? What else did you want them to do? They had a problem to solve and they saw the leash as the only way to solve it. Sorry that they can't always make autistic characters as perfect as you like, but you are not an authority on this. You are just one autistic person.

why do characters need to be viewed as autistic-coded as soon as they exhibit a trait associated with autism? cause there are people like that who are not autistic.