IsaBubo

IsaBubo is the het ship between Isabela Madrigal and Bubo Márquez from the Encanto fandom.

Canon
Bubo was a deleted character from the movie, showing up in multiple cut scenes, they only exist as voiced storyboards, meaning that the character didn't make the jump to test animations.

In the first deleted scene, Mirabel catches Isabela sneaking out of the house and soon finds out that she has a secret boyfriend. In order to not get caught sneaking onto the Madrigal's yard, Bubo was dressed up as a jaguar and covered himself in urine, to ward off predators. Isabela introduces Bubo to her sister, and two of them kiss passionately right in front of her. Isabela also tells Mirabel that she is planning to run away with Bubo as soon as the miracle dies out and the mountains across the Encanto break. Mirabel manages to talk the both of them out of it, as Isabela and Bubo are shown celebrating along with the rest of the family.

Further deleted scenes show that Isabela and Bubo making out would've been something of a running gag. Many of them show them kissing only for it to intensify, with the other Madrigals being at first moved by their romantic displays, but then growing more shocked/disgusted the longer it goes on.

Fanon
Reaction to the deleted scenes have been, at best, mixed. The most common argument is that Isabela running away due to being fed up with Alma forcing her to be the golden child of the family is a genuinely interesting idea that gives her a lot more depth as a character, but giving her a boyfriend to run away with feels more than a bit tacked on to that story. Many were glad that Bubo was scrapped, even those who normally enjoy the idea of an "ugly" man being in a relationship with a beautiful woman found that the make-out scenes did not endear him to them. Though for some others, Bubo being a male love interest for Isabela was more than enough to set them off, since many like to headcanon her as lesbian since she had zero interest in Mariano without the need of a "secret boyfriend". Others think that her simply choosing not to get married was powerful enough on its own, arguing that she doesn't need an excuse if marriage won't make her happy.

Because one of the concept art of Bubo made him look a bit like Agustín, it gave people a disturbing image of Isa making out with her father, giving them another reason to dislike the ship and mostly Bubo. Which is why some people have changed his appearance to help get that image out of their minds. There have also been people who have placed Bubo as a woman than a man, due to the lesbian Isabela headcannon.

With that said, the ship does have some fans who are hoping that Disney would find ways to bring Bubo back in future Encanto projects. Though many people are dreading the idea of Bubo making it back into the movie's canon in a sequel (like formally scrapped characters in Tangled: The Series), some are interested in the idea of "salvaging" Bubo's charactrer in some way. Some people hope, even if they don't have him and Isa as lovers, that they would at least be friends or simply acquaintance of sorts. The idea of him having an unrequited crush on Isabela, with his arc in the sequel being that he needs to move on from her, is decently popular.

Currently, the ship has 17 romantic fanfics on AO3 and a single platonic one, making IsaBubo a rarepair.

Fandom
FAN FICTION

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