Franmaya

Franmaya is the femslash ship between Franziska von Karma and Maya Fey from the Ace Attorney fandom.

Video Games
Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Justice for All

In the intermission of the third case, Turnabout Big Top, if you present Franziska’s profile to Maya, then Maya will talk about what she thinks about Franziska. During this, she states that she believes that if Franziska was not so mean, she and Maya would get along. Before she says this, Maya talks a lot about how much she admires Franziska, tearing herself down multiple times due to how much Franziska has done and all her accomplishments compared to herself. This is even reflected in the animation, where she expresses sympathy towards Franziska for “fighting all alone in America”.

Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations

One of the most memorable canon events was around the end of Bridge to Turnabout, the final case of Trials and Tribulations, after all of the case’s events had transpired, Maya was still acting like her usual, happy-go-lucky personality and Franziska did not understand how Maya was still that happy, even after she found out her mother died. Franziska asks Phoenix Wright how Maya was still so happy, and Phoenix answers that Maya is staying strong for Pearl. Franziska is amazed from this.

Another example of this ship is when Franziska spent all night with Iris trying to open the locks to save Maya. At this time Franziska had the motive of saving Maya from death, despite her usual rude and apathetic personality towards other people, especially people she deems “unimportant”. This is especially noteworthy, as Franziska has stated multiple times that she has no interest towards solving the murder, nor involving herself in any affairs related to this case, until she discovers Maya is locked up.

During the actual court case of Bridge to Turnabout, she is begged by another character, Larry Butz, to model for one of his art pieces. Of course, she rejects this offer and even threatens Larry when asked further. However, despite showing no interest, she eventually caves in and accepts Larry’s offer because Maya was glaring “at her”, showing Franziska cares about Maya’s emotions. In a later game, Spirit of Justice, it is actually confirmed she went through with it.

Anime
Ace Attorney

In Episode 15: Reunion, and Turnabout, Maya Fey and Phoenix Wright has a conversation about Franziska von Karma, where Maya shows a heavy amount of interest in Franziska. Maya seems to have a large amount of respect for her, even feeling degraded herself, comparing herself to Franziska.

In Episode 44: Bridge to Turnabout, upon witnessing Maya being reunited with Pearl at the end of the court trial after releasing her from the locks in Hazakura, she smiles seeing Maya happy with Pearl.

Quotes

 * Franziska — “Even though [Maya] was involved in that horrible incident... How could she still have that bright attitude? If I’m being honest, it’s not normal. ”
 * Edgeworth — “She must be doing it for the sake of someone dear.”
 * Franziska — “Then tell me! For whose sake is Maya Fey putting up such strong appearance!”
 * Phoenix — “It’s you! Maya... it’s because she thinks of you as a dear friend...!”
 * Franziska — “...Me!? Me... Friend...!?”
 * Edgeworth — “Stop teasing Franziska. She’s unexpectedly weak to this kind of thing...”
 * — Ace Attorney 4koma Comic “Tell Me”

Fanon
Franmaya has a large impact on the Ace Attorney community, being one of the most widely supported ships in the fandom, even though both characters don't interact as much. It is popular due to the Girlboss x Girlboss dynamic between the two. It gained attraction also because of the 4koma of the manga, which is seen a moment of the two. It's shipped alongside NaruMitsu, which characters are their older brothers (in Maya's case Phoenix is a brother-figure) and respectively the most popular ship. The pair has over 1000 works, there being 1082+ currently, being placed fourth behind the earlier mentioned Phoenix/Edgeworth, Klavier/Apollo and Asogi/Ryuunosuke.

In 2020, a project called “Franmaya week” has been started by an official Tumblr and Twitter account of the same name. This project intended to celebrate the popularity of the ship by spending one week of every year mass-posting Franmaya content including fanart, comics, fanfiction, etc. The week dedicated to Franmaya starts on May 1st spanning through May 7th, identifying dedicated content via the hashtag “fmweek##”, the #’s changing to the last two digits of the current year. On the first year of this project, 2021, the hashtag has received a total of 3,000 total tweets on Twitter alone.

On Tumblr, hundreds of posts exist under the fmweek21 tag. The #Franmaya tag has over a thousand followers.

Fandom
FAN FICTION

FAN ART

TUMBLR
 * A FranMaya comic by eggtempest in Tumblr
 * A FranMaya comic by eggtempest in Tumblr
 * A FranMaya comic by eggtempest in Tumblr

TWITTER