Shance

Shance is the slash ship between Shiro and Lance from the Voltron: Legendary Defender fandom.

Canon
Lance had a deep admiration for Shiro since the very beginning, calling him his hero, though their exact history is currently unknown. Because of this, Lance is sometimes seen trying to get Shiro's attention, sometimes competing with Keith for it. In the first episode, when Lance sees Keith trying to rescue Shiro, he gets jealous and bursts into the scene, declaring that he would be the one to save Shiro instead. They end up carrying an unconscious Shiro out of the room together. When Shiro wakes up and is introduced to the rest of the team, Lance hesitates before shaking his hand. This could be due to Lance's surprise over Shiro's metal arm, or because his hero-worship of Shiro made him nervous.

During the remainder of the first season, Shiro and Lance are occasionally at odds. Shiro sometimes got annoyed with Lance's constant flirting with pretty girls, and shut him down before it got so far, usually by snapping at him or giving him a light punch on the shoulder. He would also have to occasionally step in when Lance and Keith got into their usual arguments. Despite that, however, their relationship remained friendly, with Shiro encouraging and supporting Lance as a teammate.

When Lance was knocked out by a bomb in the castle, Shiro was the one to stay by his side, holding Lance in his arms and trying to get him to safety, even when Sendak attacked them.

In the second series of the season, Lance still looks up to Shiro a lot. When Shiro needed someone to go to the Blade of Marmora HQ with, Lance proudly volunteers himself. He then gets incredibly annoyed when Shiro chooses to go with Keith instead, and starts going on a rant about it. In a later episode, Shiro and Lance go on a mission along with Pidge to rescue a scientist named Slav. Shiro and Lance tag team and work together throughout the episode until they are eventually separated. During this episode, Lance reveals that he doesn't know his place on the team, due to Pidge shooting down his idea of being the sharpshooter. However, Lance later saves the day with an excellent shot. Shiro declares that Lance is, in fact, their sharpshooter, which makes Lance very happy.

When Shiro gets a haircut upon his return in the third season, Lance's reaction in the strongest, as he declares that Shiro looks better.

When a drugged Coran dubs Shiro as "Shiro the Hero" in The Voltron Show!, Lance is seen smiling widely in approval.

Fanon
Though not as popular as Klance or Sheith, Shance does have a fairly large following in the Voltron fandom. Fans of the ship theorize that Lance's hero-worship of Shiro is indicative of a crush, one that could possibly become requited love eventually.

The Shance fandom's favorite phrases are "that's why we bring our sharpshooter" and "Give love a Shance."

Fandom
AO3

Tumblr

Trivia

 * Shiro's voice actor, Josh Keaton, was the one to coin the ship name, as well as the phrase "Give love a Shance," on his Twitter.
 * Shance placed #15 on Tumblr's Fandometrics ship list on March 5, 2018. (3 days after S5 dropped)
 * The Paladin's Handbook guidebook states that Shiro is 25 and Lance is 17, though there is some doubt as to whether this information is accurate to the canon because the book was not reviewed by executive staff.
 * The show staff previously gave "safety zone" ages of "25" and "late teens" respectively, while agreeing that Shiro is an adult and the other Paladins are not, and Lance's voice actor estimated Lance was around 16.
 * Official show descriptions describe the Earth paladins as "five teenagers", placing Shiro as a teenager in contrast to his published age; Josh Keaton grants some insight into the discrepancy by stating that during production of the show as early as the voice actor auditions, the pitch was "five teenagers", but certain character models ended up looking different than the description, so the writing adapted to the finalized designs. This suggests the book does not take the ages from the original pitch as staff feared and reflects the organic changes they have made, while the official show description is the original pitch that is inaccurate to the canon.