Variger

Variger is the friendship between Varian and Ruddiger from the Tangled fandom.

Season One
Varian first met Ruddiger as a wild raccoon that kept wondering into his house and had set a harmless trap in order to keep the raccoon in one place until he is able to send him back out side. Over and over again, until events between "What the Hair?!" and possibly around "Great Expotations" (as it is before the events of "Queen for a Day"), had Varian deciding to adopt the friendly raccoon he names Ruddiger.

When Old Corona came over run by the black rocks and were putting its people in danger, Varian hated the fact that his father had lied to the King of their problem and later to the villagers that he had sorted things out, Ruddiger walks up to Varian caresses himself around Varian's legs, like a cat, before Varian picks the raccoon up and shares his concerns with it. While Ruddiger didn't fully understand what Varian has said, he does smile at his young owner before Varian begins to do some experiments on the rocks in order to find away to get rid of them. After Quirin was encased in amber and Varian was enraged that the people of Corona turned their backs on them when he needed Rapunzel's help to save his father, Ruddiger could sense the anger that darkened Varian's heart and hid under a table. A few days or weeks later, after Varian learns that the Sun Drop flower still exists, Ruddiger accompanies Varian to Corona, while sticking to the shadows and not showing any signs of being afraid of Varian, before they go into its underground tunnel system with Rapunzel and Pascal.

Because the flower Varian stole had lost its power that were now within Rapunzel, he uses his alchemy to turn Ruddiger into a giant raccoon-like monster to serve as a distraction while his owner kidnaps the queen for his plan. After Ruddiger reverts back to his normal self again, he heads back to Old Corona where Varian is setting things up for his plan. Even though the raccoon his loyal to his human owner, Ruddiger knew that he couldn't stand by anymore and frees Pascal so the chameleon could help the royal family. Once Varian was defeated and arrested for his crimes, Ruddiger willingly accompanies his master to prison and sympathetically consoles Varian as the young alchemist swears to make his father proud.

Season Three
After Varian was redeemed and was finally able to free his father from the amber with Rapunzel's help, both Varian and Ruddiger journey back to Corona in "The Lost Treasure of Herz Der Sonne" as they help a group of its people to repair the damaged throne room. The two later partake in the treasure hunt race after the map to it was found, even though the two were placed in two separate teams. Despite the treasure turning out to be cursed and had nearly doomed everyone in the race, everyone working together to defeat it had brought them together.

When Kiera and Catalina wanted to return the last of their stolen goods, Varian and Ruddiger accompany them, Rapunzel and their animal friends to Narsrina. As Varian wants to get his hands on a coper plant from its mark for his future experiments, while Rapunzel wants to help Ruddiger become friends with Maximus. Since to was Ruddiger, Max and their other fellow animals that had gotten Varian and the rest of their human friends trapped in a magical shell-shaped pendent; that was later stolen by Dwayne. In the shell as they talk about the traits their animal friends have, Varian believes that Ruddiger's resourcefulness would allow them to get the shell back from Dwayne, and to help Ruddiger and the others find them Varian uses his alchemy to lead them to their current location. From within the shell Varian cries out the raccoon's name when he saw Ruddiger fall over the edge of a cliff, before Hamuel catches him. Shortly after Ruddiger and the others got the shell back and placed it into the seas, Varian and the girls were finally able to be free from it.

In "Be Very Afraid", after Varian has a nightmare, he and Ruddiger come across the red versions of the black rocks which the raccoon didn't like while Varian could tell that their presents wasn't a good thing. The two later head to Corona, that is over run with red rocks, and Ruddiger had wondered off from Varian while his owner went in search for the raccoon. When Varian found him the red rocks had caused Ruddiger to turn red as the rocks while being completely frozen in terrified, due to Ruddiger being over come by the fearful visions that the rock gave him. With help from Rapunzel, Varian is able to cure Ruddiger and the rest of the frozen in fear victims by counteracting the rocks. Ruddiger is later seen leaping onto Varian's shoulders before resting his head on Varian's, after the people of Corona finally forgave Varian for his past crimes.

Sometime later, as it led to the events of "Cassandra's Revenge", Varian and Ruddiger had turned the Demanitus Device chamber into a second lab where Varian continues to study the scroll, with Ruddiger by his side. While the raccoon is seen wearing a matching set of gloves and googles that Varian had began to wear after his redemption. When Cassandra returned to Corona in order to get the scroll that Rapunzel placed in Varian's care, Ruddiger tries to help Varian's human friends prevent Cassandra from getting her hands on it, but had failed along with failing to prevent her from kidnapping Varian for the knowledge he holds in his mind. Luckily Varian was able to be recused by Rapunzel and their allies.

Moments
The Alchemist Returns
 * After Varian made himself known to Rapunzel, Ruddiger jumps into Varian's arms and rests himself on his lap.

Fanon
Variger is mostly seen as side friendship ship of the Disney Tangled fandom, due to the little screen time that there has been on the two together.

In some fanart of Beast/Monster Ruddiger from the "Secret of the Sun Drop", Varian is able to clam his four legged friend down and tame the beast he turned the raccoon into. Along with having a few regrets of what he did to him, and even imagined what their shared time in prison would have been like as Ruddiger keeps Varian company in his cell. Which is why most fan artwork of Varian's time in Corona's castle prison has Ruddiger beside him. While in an role swap AU that commonly has Varian as a male Rapunzel, it makes Ruddiger Pascal. There have even been fans who have Varian and Ruddiger join Rapunzel and her friends on their world traveling journey in season two.

After fans found out about the Varina spinoff comic/TV series pitch that was turned down by Disney, but was adopted by many fans who have turned the idea into a well like AU (while hoping that Disney would change their minds and make it canon in the future), fans began to feature Varina and Ruddiger in their Varian and the Seven Kingdoms fanwork (that is based on the artwork that was done by variansgosieczeg and Kritterart on both Instagram and Tumblr). As the two journey to the said kingdoms beside the new friends they have made on the way. Because the turn down pitch would have given Varina and Ruddiger their own Maximus, it made the two their own self versions of Rapunzel and Pascal in their would have been story. That Tangled fans fell in love with through Varian and his friendship with Ruddiger.

On AO3, the ship has only 29 fanfics.

Fandom
FAN FICTION

TUMBLR