3C 48: Reporting from Outer Space | QSO Media

Canon be damned, she’s a lesbian icon in my heart

Ace Attorney is a franchise best known for three things: intense courtroom duels, astonishingly audacious gay/bisexual men, and a cast of colourful characters. In a lineup full of fantastic faces, Adrian Andrews stands out as one of the most memorable, being a star witness in two notable cases. In both appearances, she’s an easy highlight – it’s no surprise she’s a fan favourite.

She’s also quite clearly a lesbian. And it would be great for Capcom to acknowledge her as such.

The remainder of the article includes spoilers for Ace Attorney: Justice For All and Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations.

When you first meet Adrian in Ace Attorney: Justice For All, she’s a major suspect in the case of Juan Corrida’s murder. As we delve deeper, we discover her connection to the case is deeper than expected – a connection built through her relationship with the late Celeste Inpax.

Celeste was Adrian’s friend, mentor, and in Phoenix’s own words, “everything” to Adrian. This is notable, as Adrian avoids close connection with others, being distrustful of most of the game’s cast. Until the very end of the case, the only character she warms towards is Franziska Von Karma, another legend of lesbianism. While some of these themes link back to Adrian’s codependency issues, it’s also strongly suggested that things go deeper than that. Specifically, that her connection to Celeste is more than strictly platonic.

The 2016 anime adaptation muddies the metaphorical waters further. While Adrian’s on-screen character is mostly loyal to her in-game self, Celeste has undergone a radical change. She’s no longer Celeste Inpax – she’s Celeste Andrews instead. Sadly, it’s not because we’ve been blessed with a lesbian wedding. It’s because Adrian and Celeste are now sisters.

I don’t think it’s a stretch to call this erasure.

Even if we overlook the plot holes this change creates – for starters, why didn’t Matt Engarde realise he was hiring his ex’s sister? – watching this unaware of the retcon left me feeling deflated. It’s not as if the anime, or the series as a whole, has avoided queer coding altogether. While it’s far from being perfect representation, characters such as Jean Armstrong are heavily coded as gay, and there’s plenty of tidbits for Narumitsu truthers to enjoy.

Intentionally or otherwise, the anime even ups the ante in some ways. There’s plenty of additional dialogue that wasn’t present in the games, including loads of innuendo and flirtation. Don’t get me wrong, I loved watching Miles Edgeworth and Dick Gumshoe almost literally bouncing off each other – but sequences like this stand in stark contrast to how Adrian and Celeste are handled. Arguably, it seemed like the series was happy to play up the queer coding of its cast of men, while it was stripped back from some of its women characters.

Thankfully, the fandom at large understands Adrian Andrews for the icon that she is. A quick search of AO3 reveals that her two top ships are sapphic, with a whopping 130 fics dedicated to her relationships with Fransiska Von Karma, and at least 20 more fleshing out her and Celeste’s bond. For comparison, I could only find 10 fics which ship her with a man. Where canon won’t provide, fanon’s got you.

While I’ve not completed my Ace Attorney collection yet – I’m yet to touch Dual Destinies onwards – the series really has a lack of representation for queer women. However, to me, Adrian Andrews is a lesbian icon – and not even the anime can change that.

(For crying out loud, Celeste’s original Japanese surname literally has “yuri” in it!)

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AC is the Head of Written Content at QSO Media. Read more of their articles here.

The lesbian flag used throughout this article was designed by Emily Gwen. Find out more here, and directly support her here.

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