Here’s how ‘Super Smash Bros.’ helped a trans TikToker come out

Coming out can be tricky, especially to longtime friends. But a lot of times, friends are more tuned into our gender journeys than we realize. 

That’s what singer-songwriter Julia Flynn discovered when she came out to her best friend as trans, as she shared on TikTok.

“I wasn’t really worried that his reaction would be bad,” she shared. “It was just, like, not the reaction I was expecting.”

When she and her friend were hanging out, she decided to rip the bandaid off and come out. “I was like, ‘Alright, I’mma just say it,’” she said. “‘I don’t know how to say this, I haven’t done it a bunch, but like, I’m trans, whatever. If you have any questions, let me know.’”

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“He just looks at me in my eye, and he’s like, ‘Yeah, I figured,” Flynn continued. “Like, what is that supposed to mean? Like, out of all the reactions he could’ve said, the last thing I expected was like, ‘Yeah, I know. I know that.’”

When Flynn asked her friend how he could tell, he said her video game habits were a massive giveaway.

“He was like, ‘Dude, every time we play Smash Bros., right? You either pick Zero Suit Samus or you pick Daisy, bro. Like, no dude does that,’” Flynn recalled. “I mean, fair enough, I guess.”

For the uninitiated, Zero Suit Samus and Daisy are two of the most hyper-femme (and many would argue trans-coded) characters in the entire Super Smash Bros. franchise. Lots of folks in Flynn’s comments section pointed that out, saying her Smash Bros. selections were, in fact, a fair predictor of her transness.

“Maining Zero Suit Samus is such a transfemme thing to do,” wrote one commenter.

“Zero Suit Samus and DAISY?” commented another. “Homegirl throw Luigi in there or SOMETHING.”

Other comments came from trans folks sharing similar stories from their own coming-outs.

“One of my friends just went ‘called it’ and moved on with the conversation,” shared one commenter.

“My friend said that it wasn’t a coming out if I was the last person to find out,” wrote another.

It’s a mixed bag of feelings to have other people assume your identity (and assume it accurately), as Flynn or any of the folks in her comments could tell you. As one commenter put it, “It’s both affirming and insulting to be clocked so accurately.”

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