this ship burrowed into my brain on my most recent aot rewatch and i am still incredibly surprised it isn't one of the more popular ones in the fandom. there's just a lot to talk about with these two characters individually and the way they've impacted each other

firstly, i very VERY much believe that reiner was in love with bertholt like you can talk about his wanting to marry historia all you want, but i'd counter that with ymir being able to clock reiner as a gay man means the vibes must have been there during their cadet times. i also do think that jean loved marco as well--i think the idea that jean had of what his future would look like may have been more traditional and so just as he wanted a cushy life in the interior because that's what he thought he was supposed to do and want, i think the same could be said when comparing the depth of his friendship/feelings for marco in comparison to how he admires and loves mikasa far more superficially

and to the inevitable sad part of these two is their complicity in the death of each other's first real love. just the absolute guilt that tears at both of them for it and the thin line of not forigiving each other but still like moving on? that's perfect shipping fodder in my opinion. also because we see jean get his anger out on reiner and then see him shortly after them being okay around each other--fuck, even the epilogue has them joking around like we saw and were told they had during the cadet years.

it's just this really nice blend of two people who have hurt each other so much but neither can bring themselves to hate each other

i also think reiner and jean are so much more similar than most people give credit. like both of them have strong sense of right and wrong (even for reiner if that was coming from entirely terrible beliefs pushed onto him) and will lead/take charge to do what they think is right.

but they also both are fairly selfish in their reasonings too. like reiner becomes a warrior to please his mother and to hopefully get his father's acknowledgement. jean joins the military originally to just to have an easy life where he could get rich, have a family, and not care about the danger everyone else was facing. when push comes to shove though they both care so deeply about others and i think that's the common ground that made them able to become friends again after the rumbling and i think what makes for them as a compelling ship

so really just this is the long-winded way of me saying reijean is a ship that honestly make more sense the more i think about it, and i will be devouring any and all content around it for the foreseeable future.