but shiro didn't have a reveal. they hyped it as one in nycc for marketing reasons, but in narration, it wasn't. he didn't suddenly *confess* to everyone that he had a boyfriend. it wasn't some surprise or a "gotcha" thing in the show. we saw his past and he happened to have a boyfriend. the ILLNESS and his ~sad backstory~ was the reveal. if adam had been a girl, the flashbacks would've played the same. how more normalized than that do you want it to be? none of the queer characters in voltron were reveals in fact. they were treated as shit, that i don't deny, and the lines were vague as fuck because dreamworks. the plot writing is awful. but they all were moments that just happened to be queer. shiro's sexuality isn't treated any different from keith's, coran's, hunk's or pidge's aka they weren't brought up at all unless it was important at the moment it happened. that's normalization. same for paranorman actually. the guy could've said "let me invite my girlfriend" and the scene would've played the same. the punchline was that he was taken, not that he was gay (or bisexual, who knows).
if the characters had been having a talk about hot aliens they met and shiro had stayed silent, you would have a point. but he didn't "casually mention things like any straight person do" because in general in the show straight people didn't casually mention things *in the first place* (except for lance, but he has "flirter growing out of it" as part of his personality. he's the exception in the cast and not the rule). hunk has a cute moment with shay, but he doesn't "casually mention things" during the rest of the series either. keith, coran and pidge are blank states. even allura and lotor's romance wasn't spoken of. they just spent time together and then kissed. shiro's queerness is as normalized as it can be in an action series.
that's how representation should go, that's how naturalization should go. you use a line to establish a person is gay (or lesbian, or trans, or mixed race) and then they carry on with the plot like with everything else in their lives. it shouldn't be something that needs to be "brought up". if the conversation NATURALLY goes there (for example, group of friens talk about old crushes) then sure, it will be mentioned again. but if all they discuss is catching the bad guy, then nobody is hiding anything. it just hasn't come up.
ayrt
if the characters had been having a talk about hot aliens they met and shiro had stayed silent, you would have a point. but he didn't "casually mention things like any straight person do" because in general in the show straight people didn't casually mention things *in the first place* (except for lance, but he has "flirter growing out of it" as part of his personality. he's the exception in the cast and not the rule). hunk has a cute moment with shay, but he doesn't "casually mention things" during the rest of the series either. keith, coran and pidge are blank states. even allura and lotor's romance wasn't spoken of. they just spent time together and then kissed. shiro's queerness is as normalized as it can be in an action series.
that's how representation should go, that's how naturalization should go. you use a line to establish a person is gay (or lesbian, or trans, or mixed race) and then they carry on with the plot like with everything else in their lives. it shouldn't be something that needs to be "brought up". if the conversation NATURALLY goes there (for example, group of friens talk about old crushes) then sure, it will be mentioned again. but if all they discuss is catching the bad guy, then nobody is hiding anything. it just hasn't come up.