Board Thread:Questions and Answers/@comment-24.23.3.218-20130811062647/@comment-1454424-20130928174838

Chs soare wrote: RinHaru was supposed to be canon from the start, even the OPs and EDs reference this. Idk why the anime became MakoHaru all of a sudden. (RinHaru shipper here btw)

One important thing to notice is that in the ED animation, when Haru runs to the spring and sees Makoto, Nagisa and Rei, he just stops and gets surprised. But when he sees Rin reaching out his hand to him, he instantly jumps and his eyes shine like the times he's obsessed with water.

In fact, the ED might also be a spoiler to the later episodes (figuratively, of course).

All of a sudden? That's not how original animes like these work. Most of the anime was probably written and fixed long before the first episode aired. Indeed the OP was a "summary" and hint to the entire series and wasn't anymore RinHaru then the series overall.

The ED was a metaphor for Haru's return to competitive swimming. Competitive swimming is literally the only aspect of Haru's life were Rin holds a LOT of sway because they have been rivals for a long time in swimming and Rin motives Haru. Since it was Rin's antics what guilted Haru into quitting in the first place, it only made sense and Rin and his antics would prompt Haru to return to competitive swimming.

But even that alternative universe "MakoHaru" is strong because below is the leaflet from the Volume 1 DVD. As you can see, even alt vers Haru is pretty all over alt vers Makoto.



Both Makoto and Rin are important friends to Haru and in canon they are just friends and will only remain friends because Free! isn't BL and certainly not Yaoi. However, if you want to put them on a "scale of importance to Haru" - just remember that Makoto is Haru's best friend and has been for 13+ years, while Rin is his friendly-rival who was absent from his life for 4 years and even after episode 12 spends far more time with his (Rin's) own friends then Haru (some of the drama CD 2 tracks are set after the end of episode 12) while Haru literally plays house with Makoto and his siblings (drama CD track 13). I think you'll have to be pretty delusional not to realise its Makoto >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Rin and everybody else (the other's are important to Haru too) in the world of Haruka Nanase.