I Refuse To Believe This Many Of You Have Seen Darling In The FRANXX

Recently, I’ve been shopping for car merch. I have a bad habit of forgetting my motorcycle key in the ignition, so I’ve been thinking about getting one of those “Remove Before Flight”-style tags as a reminder to take it with me. But “Remove Before Flight” is boring, so I’ve been looking into alternative designs. This, my friends, is where I began to notice a trend.

Most motorcycle jet tags are cringe, in the way that only automotive merch and Target graphic tees could ever achieve:“Kawasexy,” “Bud Did You Die,” or the ever-classy “Gas Or Ass, No Free Rides.” These are dumb, bad, and I do not want any of them on my bike. But when you look outside of these moto-specific taglines, jet tags all seem to coalesce around one single design concept: Zero Two, the deutragonist of 2018 mecha anime Darling In The FRANXX.

Screenshot: Etsy

Zero Two is inescapable. Her pink hair, red horns, and blue-green eyes adorn every piece of automotive merchandise imaginable — jet tags, peeker stickers, even shift knobs and full-car itasha vinyl. Her all-red uniform, unsurprisingly, is less consistently present.

Now, I’m no stranger to the presence of anime women on car merch. Whether it’s Makima stickers or a full Yoko Littner livery, I understand that cars and waifus go hand in hand. But even within the Car Waifu Pantheon, Zero Two is an outlier. Ayanami and Asuka Langley, Android 18 and Bulma, Faye Valentine, Nico Robin and Nami — each of these iconic characters comes from equally iconic media. Zero Two doesn’t.

Sure, Darling In The FRANXX was popular enough on its release. This was Studio Trigger in the 20teens, after Kill La Kill — the built-in fanbase was there and waiting for new content. But, perhaps because of Trigger’s early departure from the series, FRANXX never made the cultural impact of those two shows — now, it’s largely remembered for its conservative pro-reproduction propaganda memes. Gurren Lagann as written by Shinzo Abe.

Zero Two is a genuinely interesting character through FRANXX’s run, her actions, motivations, and relationship with protagonist Hiro always evolving in interesting and believable ways. But she’s outlived the show in such an interesting way, outgrown it in popularity and cultural resonance. FRANXX is always mired in discourse, but the internet remains horny for this half-Klaxosaur teenager. Car culture, apparently, does too.

Do you own Zero Two merch for your car? A keychain, a seatbelt cover, an air freshener? Have you actually watched Darling In The FRANXX, the world’s horniest mecha anime? Do you have strong opinions on that part where the military police interrupted a traditional wedding between teenagers, and did you put a sticker on your car in order to strike up conversations in which you could discuss those opinions?

I don’t know if you need to touch grass, or if I do. Either way, there’s too damn much Zero Two car merch, and I refuse to believe that every single producer and purchaser of those accessories is a big Darling In The FRANXX fan. You can’t have all seen this show.