#i stopped watching x-men movies after The Wolverine sorry

[dimestoretajic]

"sorry, how many cards in hand?"

#magic the gathering #mtg #memetg #magneto #x-men dark phoenix #or whatever that movie was called #... i think #i stopped watching x-men movies after The Wolverine sorry

[bludhavents]

Lover

pairing: Eddie Munson x timetraveler!reader (no use of y/n)

summary: 4 times you have to cover after accidentally revealing the future, and the one time you don't.

word count: 1.8k

never seen a timetraveler x eddie fic but it truly speaks to my heart.

1.

You knocked on the door of the trailer, furrowing your eyebrows at the sound of commotion coming from inside before the door quickly swung open to reveal Eddie. There was a wide smile on his face and his hair was windblown despite him being indoors. 

“Hey,” he greeted coolly, motioning for you to come in. You raised your eyebrows, following him through the kitchen. 

“Hi,” you replied. There was a mess of cereal across the counter and you figured that had been the cluttering you heard when you were waiting. It was best not to say anything about it as he lead you into his room. A small grin graced your face as you saw The Fellowship of the Rings face-up on his bed. He hurried to swipe it away and clear you a spot to sit. “You’ve read The Lord of the Rings?”

“Uh, yeah,” he answered, surprised. “You know about The Lord of the Rings?”

“Of course. I mean, I haven’t read the books, but I’ve seen all the movies. Kind of confusing at some points, but I think I understood most of it.” You laughed lightly, but stopped when Eddie’s face fell. It startled you, and you quickly realized your mistake.

How could you be so careless?

“What do you mean movies?” He asked as if you’d struck him over the head out of nowhere. He was completely frozen, hunched over the bed with the book under his palm. 

“Sorry, um-- I think maybe I’m confused. Are Star Wars and The Fellowship of the Rings the same thing?” You questioned, internally suffering from the greatest bout of embarrassment you’d ever experienced. It was an idiotic question, quite possibly the worst thing you’d ever said out loud in your entire life. Eddie’s stature remained stoic in front of you, but his eyes narrowed judgmentally. 

“No.”

“Oh. Well I think I was thinking of those. Have you seen them?” Your attempt to recover the conversation was pathetic, truly.

“Yes.” 

“Great,” you said after a moment. “So about the project…”

2. 

The lunchroom was loud, and you had your backpack on the floor under the bench as you sat there, silently eating. The table was empty except for the boy sitting on the far right corner on the other end of the table. Usually he wasn’t there, and you had to wonder what could’ve happened for him to be banished to the recluse's table. 

“You read comics?” Eddie’s voice startled you and you accidentally poured your water over your trey, cringing as your food got soaked. “Shit, I’m sorry. Shit.”

“Don’t worry about it.” You turned to face him with a smile that fell quickly as you realized that he was holding your bag in his hands, holding up your Wolverine comic and taking the seat next to you. “Put it back, Munson.”

“Oh, last-naming me, I must’ve messed up,” he teased, simultaneously put the book back in your bag with the rest of your supplies. “Okay so why didn’t you tell me you were a freak, too? What if I wanted to borrow your comics?”

“I would’ve said no,” you deadpanned. “And I’m not a freak. I’m so very cool and mysterious and perfectly unfreaky.”

“Who’s your favorite x-men?” He ignored your joke. 

“Gambit.”

“Who?” He asked, stealing a soggy chip from your plate. 

“Remy LeBeau,” you tried, watching his face contort. Apparently Gambit wasn't an 80's hero. If he was, Eddie surely would've known about it, and judging by his face you were speaking a foreign language right now. “Shit. Uh, I mean, Pyro. St. John Allerdyce.”

“Pyro sucks. Who the fuck is Gambit and why don’t I know about him?” He called you out, looking at you with raised eyebrows. Usually he brushed off your dodgy behavior, but apparently today he was feeling extra confrontational.

“Sorry, Munson, gotta keep up my whole mysterious thing. Can’t share my intel. Surely you’ll understand,” you spoke with a fake casualty, grabbing your bag and leaving him sitting at the table with your soggy lunch.

3. 

Steve’s car was crammed with you, Eddie, and Robin in the backseat as him and Nancy sat upfront. The three of you were rummaging through his cassettes, groaning at the lack of diversity within his taste. 

“I’m surprised he even has cassettes,” Robin admitted. “He always struck me as just a listen-to-what’s-on-the-radio kind of guy.”

“Now that you say that I’m gonna agree.” Eddie pointed to her sharply, tossing another trash album into his lap.

“Word.” You said, picking up an old Christmas Tunes tape and laughing. “Dude, this is hella weird. No rap, but you have Christmas Tunes?”

“Did you just say ‘hella’?” Nancy turned around in the front seat to face you with an amused look on her face. Your eyes widened, looking at Eddie and Robin to see if they would come to your defense, but both looked just as confused as her. 

“What? You guys have never heard of the word ‘hella’? Slang, like, for really?” You questioned, desperately trying to figure out what was going on. Shit. Hella was from the 90s, most definitely not from the 80s. Not that they could call you out on it, they'd just make fun of you for the rest of eternity because the only way to play it off was to make yourself look stupid.

“No.” Eddie said. “You mean like Hell? Hell-uh?”

“Must have heard it wrong on the TV,” you excused with a wave of your hand. “Forget it, where’s your music, Steve? This has to be a joke.”

“Hella-fucking-shitty choices here, Stevie-boy!” Eddie winked, tossing the tapes up front, earning a loud groan from Steve. 

4. 

The batteries in your Walkman died during the middle of third period, and you rushed to find Dustin in the lunch room as soon as the bell rang. He was exactly where you expected, sitting with a sandwich in-hand at the Hellfire table with Eddie and the rest of the club. You walked there quickly, nudging him in the shoulder to get his attention.

“My girl!” Eddie greeted, but he shut up when he saw how serious your face was as you looked at Dustin.

“Do you have two AA batteries?” You asked without greeting. He stared back at you with wide eyes, swallowing the bite of his sandwich and nodding quickly. “Can I have them? Please? And thank you.”

“Sure, let me get them.” He grabbed his bag and dug around in the front pocket, pulling one out and then fishing for the other for a solid minute before finally finding it lodged in his pack of gum. 

“Dustin I have never loved anyone the way I love you,” you cheered, grabbing both sides of his head before turning to face Eddie. “Edward, I need a screwdriver.”

“What makes you think I have a screwdriver?” He asked, a teasing lilt in his voice. You stared back unamused. 

“Give me the damn thing before I take it and shank you.”

“Jesus, what the hell is even going on right now?” Mike asked from across the table. It was easy to ignore him. 

“Seriously, what’s it for?” Eddie asked, screwdriver now in hand. Of course it was inside his jacket. He wouldn’t give it to you unless you told him. 

“I’m gonna stab Carver,” you deadpanned. He didn’t budge. “Eddie! My Walkman broke and I need to replace the batteries. Please, give it. I'm having withdrawals.”

He unclipped the Walkman from your waist and unscrewed the battery cover himself, taking out the old and putting the new ones in before closing it back and putting the headphones on himself, pressing play and smiling when it worked. 

“All fixed.” He handed it back. “I didn’t know you liked Black Sabbath.”

“Yes, Dehumanizer is their best album,” you replied, still stressed. You put the headphones on for yourself and threw a fist in the air when the sweet sounds of Paranoid filled your ears. It took everything in you to not kiss Eddie right then and there. “Eddie Munson you are the love of my life and I am forever in debt to you. Dead serious right now, I’ll do anything for you. Eternally grateful, lover.”

“Glad you’re so excited about this.” He raised his eyebrows. “But Dehumanizer isn’t a Black Sabbath album. What’d you mean to say, lover?”

“Hell if I know!” You were too happy to correct your mishap. Your legs carried you away from the table, but your voice still shouted. “Edward Munson, I will jump your bones one of these days. Say the words, lover, say the words!” 

And he laughed hysterically as you ran out of the cafeteria with Black Sabbath blasting through your headphones. 

+1

“You don’t have to be a good guitar player to be successful,” you told Eddie. “Look at Kurt Cobain, he’s the most popular grunge musician of all time, and he sucked at guitar.”

“Kurt Cobain? Grunge?” He asked, eyebrows raised as he gently tuned your guitar for you. 

“Sorry, I made all of that up.” It was a lame ass excuse. You were getting sloppy, constantly slipping up and saying things that weren't appropriate for the time period

“I don’t think you did,” Eddie said seriously. “You always do that. Are you a fuckin’ alien or something? Always saying words we don’t know, songs that don’t exist, superheroes that aren’t part of the X-Men as confirmed by Dustin who owns every single issue of X-Men.”

“I don’t know what you mean.” Your heart was beating out of your chest as he set the guitar down and walked over to you, leaning his back on the foot of the bed. 

“You’re lying,” he whispered, looking over at you. “I’m not mad, I just wanna know. Where are you from? Why do you talk about all of this stuff that doesn’t exist?”

“I think telling you will completely mess up the course of humanity,” you said, voice shaky. 

“You’re a time traveler.” His voice was matter-of-fact. You dropped your head in your hands and blinked hard. Of course he’d figure it out. “What year are you from?”

“I-I’m not a time traveler, Eddie.”

“What year?”

“2022.” Your stomach twisted. “It’s currently 2022 in my timeline. Then, I was taken one day, by this guy. And he sent me here. I don’t know why, and I can’t leave. I’m just stuck here, where I don’t belong. Without my family. My mom is fucking ten years old right now!” You cried, sobbing into your palms. Eddie wrapped his arms around your shoulders, pulling you into him. 

“I don’t know what to say. I’m so sorry that happened to you,” he said. “What do you want me to do? Should we be trying to find a way for you to get back home?”

“I’ve tried. Succeeded, and been thrown back in here. It’s impossible. Just-- I don’t really want to talk about it. Ask me something, I’m sure you’re dying to know everything about the future. Fuck the timeline, ask away, lover.” You chuckled sadly, leaning out of his hug and letting him wipe away your tears. 

“Does Black Sabbath break up?” He asked, eyes wide.

“Yes, in 2017. But a lot happened before that, people came and went and it was a lot, they weren't the same. Next question?”

“Shit, ok, hold on." He paused. "The Lord of the Rings movies, you knew they weren’t Star Wars. They’re real?”

“Totally. Each book gets made into a movie. There’s also 3 Hobbit movies. Plus, the Star Wars franchise is still making stuff. They’ve got a ton of shows and movies. Also, superhero movies are at an all-time high,” you confessed. “Jesus, I’ve wanted to tell you all of this for so long, Eddie.”

#eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x timetraveler!reader #eddie munson #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson imagine #eddie munson x you #eddie munson x y/n #joseph quinn #eddie munson lives #eddie x reader

[wh0re4gambit]

🂡 ʀᴇᴍʏ ʟᴇʙᴇᴀᴜ 🂡 ᴰᵒ ᵘ ˡⁱᵏᵉ ˢᵗᵃʳ ʷᵃʳˢ?

ʀᴇᴍʏ ʟᴇʙᴇᴀᴜ x ꜰᴇᴍᴀʟᴇ!ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ

x-ᴍᴇɴ ᴛʜᴇ ᴀɴɪᴍᴀᴛᴇᴅ ꜱᴇʀɪᴇꜱ

²:³⁴ ᵃ.ᵐ

»All X-Men to the War-Room. Immediately.«

The not so unfamiliar sound of an alarm echoed through the school in the middle of the night to wake up the X-Men.

Y/N lifted her head up after the alarm repeated itself and stood up with a grown. As much as she would love to stay in bed and keep sleeping, she had job to do now.

Or more like probably, because sometimes the professor wakes the whole team up just to see how fast they'd react.

She put on the nearest leggings, which were just some simple black ones, figured out how to put on her bra with still a t-shirt on and grabbed her grey sweatshirt-jacket, because it can be cold sometimes down there.

On her way to the War-Room, she came across a certain thief she had lied her eyes upon some time ago. But what she didn't know was that the feeling was mutual.

The Cajun and her met each other before they became X-Men, due them both being exceptional thieves and having the same targets. They eventually teamed up, one being able to blow things up with a single touch and the other one being able to turn stuff into dust, as well just with a single touch.

Most of the X-Men gathered in the War-Room all with look on their face like they could still remember their dreams.

The last one to arrive was the man himself who started the alarm; professor Charles Xavier, leader of the X-Men.

»I am truly sorry for interrupting your need and well deserved sleep for just a training.«

You could hear The Wolverine growl.

»You can go back to sleep now, all of you arrived just in time.« And then he went out of the War-Room like he didn't just wake us up after a long exhausting day.

»Going back to sleep, my ass« Y/N muttered under her breath and went to the kitchen to grab an energy.

Because something not many know is, the moment you hear the sound of these serenes, all kinds of scenarios go through your head. Whether its the school being on fire for the 79210 time or another crazy villain on their way to kill humanity or whatever. Just simply going back to bed after this rush of adrenaline is nearly impossible.

»Why didn't ya' go back ta' bed, chere? I'm sure you could need some sleep.« Gambit asked while stepping into the kitchen.

»Still asking questions you already know the answers to?« Y/N asked with a bit of sarcasm and turned her head into his direction and saw how he grabbed a bottle of water.

»Actually...« he started to say while sitting down in front of her »... der' is one question ah' have no answer for.«

»And that would be?« She asked curiously.

»Promise nothings' gonna' be weird after that.«

Y/N just nodded which was enough of a response for Remy.

»I've been thinking-« he started but stopped when he saw how Y/N started to raise a brow »ah' didn't even start.«

»Yeah didn't like the part of you thinking, but go on.« She told him sarcastically with grin on her face which made him smile.

»I've been thinkin' we know each other for a long time now and ah' was wondering if, this gon' sound stupid but its still important, do ya' like Star Wars?«

'He's kidding, right' Y/N thought.

»Yeah, of course. Who doesn't?« She overplayed her disappointment.

» Ah great, so ya' wanna watch a movie before da' rest of da' school wakes up?«

»Yesssss«

###

After ten minutes of discussing wether they should watch a prequel or original movie they finally agreed on prequel.

The not really sneaky, but still sneaky person gambit is, he only took one blanket, because he had a plan B which has to work, because he already messed up plan A. He was about to tell Y/N that he has strong feelings for her, but instead he decided to ask a stupid question.

In just the first 30 minutes in, they already started to become closer, until the Cajun man felt the weight of Y/N head laying on his chest.

He looked down to see a peaceful sleeping

Y/N. He tried to enjoy the moment, but got interrupted by him falling asleep as well.

Moments later the youngest of the group, Jubilee, happened to catch this moment and didn't hesitate to take a picture.

###

ᴡᴀɴɴᴀʙᴇ ᴍʏꜱᴛɪQᴜᴇ

ᴶᵘᵇⁱˡᵉᵉ:

You owe me 10$

*picture*

ᴹᵒʳᵖʰ:

😑

#remy lebeau #gambit #xmen #x men comics #comics #marvel #remy lebeau x reader #remylebeau xmen #xmentheanimatedseries #remylebeauoneshot

[captain039]

Secrets of mutation PART 2

Logan(wolverine) x reader

Warnings: Age gap, student/teacher, AOB, trauma, swearing, sexual, intimate, a little forceful

Xmen X new mutants

AOB will be referred to second gender xD

Last chapter <-

Getting use to other people was difficult. You stayed with your little group most of the time, but when classes were sorted out you were separated, Rahne and Danny seemed eager to get into the whole school while Sam just tagged along and Roberto tried to find Illyana. You felt like the odd one out, trying to figure out your mutation, second gender, your past, things seemed to pile on, and why that man, Logan or the wolverine, had such a strong scent to you, nobody else did. The professor said he would help once you got settled, you didn’t settle well, not in this situation, not knowing anything. After a few days you went to find the professor, rummaging through students before sighing at his office.

“Come in” he said before you even got to knock.

“Ah Y/n” he greeted as you looked to the other person in the room.

“Sorry- do you want me to come back?” You asked.

“No come in, it’s alright” the Professor smiled beckoning you to sit. You avoided eye contact with the man at all costs, the same strong scent coming off him.

“You’re here for answers” the Professor said and you nodded.

“You’re much like Logan here, though you didn’t take a bullet to the head” he chuckled and you snapped your head to look at him in shock. He raised his eyebrows sighing, his arms crossed also. You’ve heard about his mutation, claws and quick healing apparently. You glanced to his fists seeing nothing and frowned.

“You wanna see them?” He asked noticing you eyes.

“Sorry-“ you flushed looking away.

“It’s ok kid” he scoffed a smiled on his face. You heard a slicing sound and looked. You stared wide eyed at the silver claws coming out of his knuckles.

“Doesn’t that hurt?” You said wanting to go closer.

“You can go closer” the Professor smiled assuringly.

“I won’t scratch ya” Logan said as you stood. You looked at them in awe, you hadn’t seen many mutants besides the ones you were with.

“It hurts every time they come out” he said rather quietly.

“Oh I didn’t mean to make you hurt yourself-“ you glanced between him and the professor in apology.

“I’ve just-“ you sighed.

“I haven’t seen a lot of things before” you mumbled lifting your hand to run your fingers along the blunt edge.

“Is it steel?” You asked as the man stared at you.

“Adamanthium” The Professor said.

“An indestructible metal” he added.

“Woah” you whispered.

“So is it just your claws that are metal?” You asked.

“His whole skeleton is” the Professor spoke again.

“Were you born with metal in you?” You asked softly and he chuckled his claws going back in.

“No I was bone before I went into an experiment” Logan spoke this time and you frowned.

“Not like your programs though” you nodded at his words and backed away.

“Thank you for showing me- I guess I’m a new kid learning again” you said a little embarrassed.

“I think they’re cool” you added sitting down with your eyes cast down.

“You’re in a good place now kid, the Professor will help you out” Logan rested a hand on your shoulder before leaving and you watched.

“Seems he likes you” the Professor chuckled.

“What-?” You mumbled.

“Take it as a compliment dear, he’s usually a grumpy old man” he chuckled again.

“Oh” you said glancing to the door again intrigued.

“Shall we start at the beginning?” He asked catching your attention again.

“What’s the beginning?” You asked.

“Simple things, age, name, last name” he shrugged.

“My names Y/n Y/l/n” you said and he nodded. You were confused but said your age and he nodded again.

“I’m a mutant?” You shrugged.

“Good, do you remember anything about your family?” He asked and you frowned.

“I only get glimpses of people without faces, laughs and a house” you said fiddling with your fingers.

“Do you remember their names?” He quizzed.

“No” you whispered sadly.

“I have feelings of happiness when I remember, family happiness, I don’t know if that helps?” You sighed.

“It’s a start” the Professor smiled.

“What do you remember from waking up at the program?” He asked.

“I was on a hospital bed, well I was cuffed to a hospital bed, um the room was creepy like in a horror movie hospital. Dr Reyes came in said I was a mutant and I’d just shown” you thought a bit going through memories.

“I never showed my mutation though so I doubted I even was one, Magik didn’t like me kept picking on me, Rahne said that she could smell me? Like I had a different scent to the others. I don’t know why” you mumbled the last bit.

“It wasn’t a program more of a prison, I remember having horrible nightmares but that was from Danny apparently” you trailed off.

“Yes her mutation is quite unique I’ve never seen anything like it” the Professor spoke.

“Yeah, I don’t really remember much” you said softly sighing.

“That’s alright, that’s why you’re here, to unlock your past and create a future” he smiled at you.

“Can I ask something?” You said and he nodded.

“Of course” he smiled.

“About our second gender” you mumbled.

“Ah with that, I can go through your mind and find it for you, it’ll be like you never didn’t know it” you nodded a little confused.

“It may sting though” he moved to sit in front of you and you took a deep breath as he pressed his fingers to your temple.

Memories flashed by and your mind scrambled while you gripped the chair. Your heart sped as voices and images flashed through your memories.

“Y/n” you didn’t realise he had stopped as you shook on the chair. You had cried out as too many things flashed by, memories flooding, people, places. You sobbed softly at the memory of your parents being murdered before the men took you. You remembered changing and running into the woods before the tranquillised you.

You groaned in pain as you tumbled on the floor, body shaking uncontrollably. You heard Rahnes voice close but couldn’t focus on what was happening as your bones changed and reshaped.

You laid on the floor, eyes closed and breathing steady. You heard faint voices as you slowly opened your eyes and lifted your head.

“That’s why you could sense her Rahne” you heard the professor say. You went to speak but it came out a distorted meow almost. You frowned looking to Rahne as she stared at you.

“You’re a cat” she said and you froze.

“Like a big cat” you looked to Danny behind her who spoke.

“Is it Y/n?” Sam asked.

“Yes” the Professor answered for you as you looked back to him.

“She’s got her memories back too” he said and they all looked surprised.

You felt your body change again and sighed as you laid on the ground naked.

“Here” Sam quickly covered you with a blanket and you thanked him softly.

“Seems we unlocked a little more than expected” the Professor said and you nodded not bothering to get off the ground.

Next chapter ->

#x reader #aob #hugh jackman #wolverine x reader #xmen #the new mutants #Logan x reader #wolverine #logan howlett

[bamfdaddio]

X-Men Abridged: 1981

The X-Men, those back-to-the-future mutants that have sworn to protect a world that hates and fears them, are a cultural juggernaut with a long, tangled history. Want to unravel this tapestry? Then read the Abridged X-Men!

(Uncanny X-Men 141 - 152) - by Chris Claremont and John Byrne, Brent Anderson, Dave Cockrum, Jim Sherman, Bob McLeod and Josef Rubinstein

While I also committed various fashion atrocities at the age of 14 (tye-die and fauxhawks, oh my), even Liberace would find Kitty’s outfits too much. (Uncanny X-Men 149; Uncanny X-Men Annual ‘81)

We dial back from the v. epic scope of the last few arcs. Instead, 1981 is just a lot of fun! We get:

Storm and Emma doing a Freaky Friday!

the X-Men vs. Magneto (again!)

A surprisingly effective Alien rip-off

An dystopian future! (OoOoOoOo)

Last year was the year of the Dark Phoenix, this is the year of Kitty Pryde. That’s not to say Jean’s death is swept under the rug: all throughout, we see her friends mourning her loss or remembering her fondly. (Scott even gets to have a demonic adventure about it.) But in general, Claremont puts Kitty in the forefront, fleshing out his YA-addition to the team. And what would a YA heroine be without a grim dystopia? Roll out the iconic Days of Future Past!

To be fair, 2013 was a dark time for all of us: What Does the Fox Say somehow got to the top of the charts and I was still watching Glee. (Uncanny X-Men 141)

How cool would it have been to see a name like Jonothon Starsmore or Eva Bell on those tombstones?

Anyway, that’s Kate. Kate’s had it rough. Mutants are at the bottom of the foodchain, most X-Men are dead and only a small cadre of resistance fighters remain, Sentinels dominate, and while she is married to Piotr, her children have been murdered. Bleak. Luckily, the rebellion has concocted the plan to shunt Kate’s spirit back in time to prevent this awful future from happening. (You’ve seen Days of Future Past, the last passably good X-Men film, you know what’s up.)

Let’s do the time warp again! 1981!Kitty’s mind gets taken over by 2013!Kitty, who promptly tries to convince the X-Men that a new Brotherhood of v. Evil Mutants will try to kill Senator Kelly, a presidential candidate who tries to put the mutant menace on the agenda. (Mutants tend to blow stuff up when he’s around.) Since the X-Men recently took a literal trip to Dante’s Infero and also befriended a cosmic world-ending entity, they basically shrug and go: “Yeah, this checks out.”

Off to Washington they go (zoommm) and there, they happen upon the Baddest Bitches in Herstory:

“How dare you hate mutants, senator Kelly! We’ll fix that by killing you!” (Uncanny X-Men 141)

This All-New, All-Different Brotherhood consists out of:

Destiny, a blind woman who can see the future. Definitely the eeriest member of this group. Badass lesbian, though that won´t be canon for years.

Avalanche. Greek who makes things shake. Is a long-standing member of the X-Men Rogue’s gallery, but rarely features in the spotlight. I think he got more characterization in four years of X-Men Evolution than he ever did in the comics.

Mystique. Shapeshifter. Ruthless and unhinged, the Cersei Lannister of the X-Men universe. Absolute legend, secretly the wife of Destiny, currently not as unhinged as she’ll be later. Immediately implied to be related to Nightcrawler: it’s the yellow-eyes-blue-skin-combo.

Pyro. Can manipulate fire, not create it. Absolute pillock, in all the best ways of the word. Originally intended as gay, but they decided to make him Australian instead. (?!)

Blob. Big, strong, immovable. We’ve seen him before.

One of the details in this fight I enjoy is that Storm is still struggling with her leadership, although she has a better grip on things than Cyclops:

Wolverine then proceeds to use those iconic but deadly claws about twice per issue for the next, oh, forty years. (Uncanny X-Men 142)

While the X-Men fight the Brotherhood in the present, we cut back and forth to the future. There, the X-Men consist out of some familiar faces - Storm, Colossus, Wolverine - and some surprises: Magneto (in a wheelchair), Franklin Richards (son of) and an unfamiliar ginger girl called Rachel. (She’ll be important later.) We even learn (one of) Magneto’s names: this is the first time he’s canonically called Magnus.

One of the strengths of Days of Future Past lies in its brevity, the way it tantalizingly taunts us with a brutal but familiar future without giving away too much. It’s single-handedly responsible for all those dark future timelines the X-lines are so fond of which will eventually culminate in time-displaced grandsons from alternative dimensions and the impossibility of a succinct answer to the question: “Who’s Cable?” Too much of a good thing and all that.

Still, what Days of Future Past does so successfully is:

Put the idea of the mutant menace back at the forefront, hammering home the metaphor of mutants being a minority. Mutants being put in camps and being forbidden to breed should - regretfully - make us think of all too many real life equivalents. (Specifically, all of the imagery harkens back to the Holocaust.)

It starkly shows what happens should the X-Men lose, reminding everyone of the stakes. The X-Men are here for a reason: bridging the gap between mutants and humankind. If they fuck up, we end up with mutant concentration camps.

It helps that the X-Men in the future almost all die horribly: Franklin is incinerated, Storm is impaled… It's brutal stuff. The only one to survive is Rachel, who wonders if their plan actually changed the future or if they created an alternative timeline. (It did the latter, sorry ‘bout it, Rachel.)

In the present, Kate chases after Destiny, who trains a gun on senator Kelly. I always wondered how this works: if Destiny saw the future, she knew that killing Kelly would trigger a terrifying future. What in the current Marvel timeline made her decide that the Days of Future Past was better? Did she see her own death? Did she see the Onslaught-crossover coming? The Chuck Austen run? What was it?

In any case, time-anomalous Kate stops Destiny from killing Kelly and the future is safe! For now. Kate disappears, Kitty returns to her body and some of the Brotherhood are apprehended. All is well, for now.

After being a key figure in DoFP, Kitty is also the main character in the Christmas special, which is basically a straight up horror and a pastiche of the Alien-movie.

Seriously, John Byrne still isn’t sure why he wasn’t sued by Ridley Scott for this. (Uncanny X-Men 143)

If you love Kitty Pryde? Read this issue. If you’re not convinced you like 80’s Kitty? Read this issue. It’s not continuity relevant and it’s basically Kitty playing the part of a Final Girl in a horror where she’s being chased by a demon, but it’s so good. It showcases all her strengths and her foibles. Kitty’s intelligent, cute (sometimes preciously so) and brave, but she’s also young, self-conscious and hot-headed. And it's not as if the other X-Men automatically adore her: Storm berates her all the time, she’s afraid of Kurt because of the way he looks (though she grows out of that) and she fights with Professor Xavier a lot. Moreover, she has a clever power-set for a young superhero who faces menaces on a daily basis: a thirteen year old who can go intangible is far less likely to have reality ensue on her and be dramatically offed because she's better at protecting herself.

I’m sure there are people who thought Sprite was hogging the spotlight, but I, for one, say she brings more to the table than, say, Angel. She’s not the Dawn Summers of this franchise.

Scott also gets a side quest. Poor guy can’t catch a break: first the love of his life dies, so he quits the X-Men, then he realizes he can’t do much else than be a superhero. He becomes a sailor on the ship of spunky captain Lee Forrester, is drawn into the sadistic plans of a demon unironically named D’Spayre and then shipwrecks in Bermuda with Lee.

The X-Men, meanwhile, are tormented by a team-up of Doom (who’s currently Latverialess and working on a comeback) and Arcade, that annoying crony. Locke, Arcade’s dom, has kidnapped the loved ones of the X-Men (Moira MacTaggart, Jean Grey’s parents, Illyana Rasputin and Amanda Sefton) in order to blackmail them into getting Doom to free Arcade. Apparently, Arcade accidentally insulted Doom and DOOM DOES NOT FORGIVE THAT FOLLY.

While the B-Squad (Polaris, Havok, Banshee and Iceman) goes to save Arcade’s hostages, the X-Men sneak into Doom’s castle. Well, except for Storm, who doesn’t give a single fuck and simply flies up to Doom, demanding an audience. Doom likes the cut of her jib and invites her to have dinner. (This is pre-Tinder, so this is a legit way of scoring a date.)

If Storm has a flaw (I said if!), it’s got to be her atrocious taste in men. (Uncanny X-Men 145)

The X-Men find Arcade’s cell empty, while Arcade casually saunters up to Storm and says hi. Storm realizes too late that this is a trap: while the X-Men are all trapped in Saw-like traps, Storm is encased in ‘living chrome’.

If you remember she’s claustrophobic, you know why this is a bad move.

While the X-Men free themselves from their traps - Polaris hilariously has to deal with a murderous merry-go-round - Storm is slowly driven mad in her prison, triggering a worldwide tempest. (She causes Lee and Scott to shipwreck.) Under the threat of Wolverine’s claws, Doom releases Storm - or rather, unleashes her.

“Instead of a Dark Lord, you would have a queen, not dark but beautiful and terrible as the dawn! Tempestuous as the sea, and stronger than the foundations of the earth! All shall love me and despair!” (Uncanny X-Men 147)

The memory of Jean brings Ororo back to herself and she starts undoing the superstorm she created. (If only climate change were reversed that easily.) Their confrontation ends by Storm easily forgiving Doom, because she apparently trespassed on his grounds without adequate cause.

Mkay.

All of Arcade’s hostages return to their homesteads, except for Illyana Rasputin, Piotr’s sister: she’s staying at the mansion for a while. Angel, who’s sort of been a part of the team since the Phoenix thing, has had it with Wolverine and his ‘tude, and decides to quit the X-Men : he doesn’t want to be a part of an outfit that has a killer like Wolverine on it. (Or maybe he’s just mad Claremont didn’t give him any storylines: his presence has been mostly pointless.) It’s too bad he left before Kitty started experimenting with her outfits: I bet he would have loved her ugly-ass costumes.

Equally inconsequential is the introduction of a brand new character, who then proceeds to disappear from the narrative for the rest of the year:

Black Tom has tried to kill you at least twice, but him sending you a long-lost daughter doesn’t give you pause? Ugh, Sean, you deserve Moira. (Uncanny X-Men 148)

Intrigued by Theresa? TOO BAD, WON’T SEE HER AGAIN ANYTIME SOON.

Another new character is the lonely, decidedly mutant looking Caliban, who can sense “people like him” and is on the lookout for companions. Like many lonely people who try and grasp at friendship, he decides to overshoot his shot and ruin the night of Storm, Kitty and Jessica Drew at a Dazzler concert. Because he tries to kidnap Kitty, the girls react a trifle aggressively. When they realize their mistake - the eerily pale Caliban is a simpleton rather than a menace - he’s already fled. No mention is made of the Morlocks yet!

There’s also another dull annual where the X-Men team up with the Fantastic Four to save Arkon’s dimension from the Badoon and yaaaaawn. Far more interesting is the landmark issue #150. Slowly, through the adventures of Scott and Lee Forrester, Claremont has been setting things up for the return of a favorite villain. While the X-Men investigate Magneto’s old base in Antarctica on a hunch of Professor X and tangle with Garruk, Scott and Lee survive Storm’s tempest, only to wake up next to a strange island that seems to have been raised from the ocean.

It’s apparently some ancient citadel from a long forgotten civilization with a fondness for squid statues. (I don’t know man, I’ve never been to the Bermuda Triangle, maybe this is just super-accurate.)The tentacles make Lee Forrester feel very amorous, but before Scott can tell her he is way too repressed to just have sex with an attractive someone he’s known intimately for a month or two, Magneto saves his ass by revealing he, in fact, raised this island from the seafloor.

Oh, Magneto. So extra.

My ambitious little mutant demagogue then proceeds to take the entire world hostage, showing how much he’s grown from the pompous, raving madman from the sixties. (Sure, Magneto is still a bit of a madman, but increasingly, he starts being on the right side of history.)

“I’m trying to make Magneto more sympathetic.”

“Just put him on a page with some bigger villains who are less noble, like the Vanisher, Count Nefaria, or…”

“Reagan, Thatcher and Brezhnov?”

“Er.” (Uncanny X-Men 150)

It’s obvious Magneto is being pivoted as a more noble villain, codified into the well-intentioned extremist we know and love today. Not only do we get the first hints at his past, fleshing out his motivations, he’s also not wrong. Humans are historically not great at taking care of the planet or each other.

When the Russians call his bluff and launch nukes at Magneto’s new island, he quickly disarms them. His retribution is swift and ferocious: the entire citadel is a machine that massively amplifies his powers. He sinks the submarine that launched the missiles, condemning the entire crew to death, and he casually erects a vulcano in a Russian city in Siberia.

Damn. Not messing around this time.

Despite his good intentions, Magneto is still definitely in the wrong: not only because of his methods, but as Scott points out: if Magneto unifies the world under his kind of benevolent dictatorship, all of that will simply fall apart as soon as Magnus dies.

In a way, Magneto is just as big a dreamer as Charles is: Charles believes in peace and integration, whereas Magneto believes his iron fist will be enough to make a perfect world happen. Both of them ignore the reality that acceptance is difficult and messy, because you’re trying to change essential human nature: the fear of the other. Magneto believes in big, sweeping gestures that will fix the world in move, while changing the world is also boring, hard work. One step forward, two steps back. Magneto just wants to leapfrog to his ultimate goal.

The X-Men fly over the citadel, returning from Antarctica, and their plane crashes into the ocean. (Magneto does not brook planes over his territory, humans!) The Professor is also nearby, looking for Scott with Moira, Peter Corbeau and Carol Danvers. The X-Men sneak onto the island, but to their horror, their powers are nullified by some machine of Magneto. They reunite with Scott, who formulates a plan to thwart the would-be ruler of the world.

While the rest of the X-Men go to trash the machine, Storm, Kitty and Lee infiltrate the control chamber where Storm finds a sleeping, shirtless Magneto. Once again showing her terrible taste in men, she is not weak in the knees at the sight of a sleeping Magnus: instead, she contemplates killing him.

Storm knows how dangerous he is, but she also knows that he’s a great man who’s fighting for ideals, no matter how misguided. She hesitates too long: Magneto stirs, suspects an attack and tosses her out of the window, to her death.

Magneto quickly undoes the sabotage the other X-Men have wrought to his machine. A fight erupts. Storm, meanwhile, has managed to grab hold of a ledge. She crawls back up and smashes an important-looking computer, restoring everyone’s powers.

The battle turns grim, but Scott sends Kitty away to wreck Magneto’s machinery. She sneaks off, following Scott’s orders and destroying both Magneto's power-up device and all of his plans by phasing though the computer circuitry. Magneto senses this and furiously gives chase. Overcome by rage, he attacks Kitty and disrupts her phasing power with a magnetic bolt, seemingly killing her?

Everything about this story beat is great: mama bear!Ororo, mournful Magnus and even the fact that Kitty’s godawful outfit serves a narrative function: highlighting to us (and Magneto) just how young she is. The fact that Kitty’s Jewish is just icing on the cake. (Uncanny X-Men 150)

And thus, the softening of Magneto commences. 1981 might be a year with wildly varying narratives, but it has given us at least three enduring legacies to the X-Mythos: a new kind of Magneto, a fondness for dystopian futures and the character of Kitty Pryde, who's really come into her own this year.

Ugliest Costume: Kitty! Purposefully, but still. Best costume, by the way, goes to Destiny, with her creepy, creepy golden mask. Just imagine this lady casually strolling across a battlefield, eerily calm and collected, dodging everything you throw at her. Awesome design.

Best new character: I usually pick one character - what good is having a shared award when declaring the best of anything? - but this year, it’s going to one of my favorite couples: Mystique and Destiny. Can’t wait to see more of them.

Most audacious retcon: Blob somehow retroactively becomes a member of the original Brotherhood, which is not what happened. Ever weirder is Xavier pondering that he never met Magneto before his attack in X-Men #1, while their cordially adversarial relationship rooted in a youthful friendship would soon become a cornerstone of the X-Men.

What to read: Uncanny X-Men 141 - 143 and 150 - 152

#x-men abridged #abridged x-men #uncanny x-men #professor x #cyclops #storm #nightcrawler #colossus #kitty pryde #wolverine #magneto #days of future past #dr doom #arcade #chris claremont #john byrne #dave cockrum #angel #syrin #banshee

[mcustorm]

In Defense of a Black Cyclops

In case my username didn’t make it clear, the single most anticipated visual project for me is the MCU’s interpretation of the X-Men, which hasn’t even been announced yet [officially]. And ladies and gents, I have found your Cyclops:

Good ol’ Alfred Enoch, who we all know from Harry Potter and How to Get Away With Murder. If you’re not familiar with HTGAWM, know that his character goes from the de facto leader of the ragtag (murderers) and most cherished protege of Viola Davis’ Professor X to taking more of a grimdark turn after his girlfriend’s death. Sound at least somewhat familiar?

Enoch also embodies the physicality of the character well, seeing as to how he’s “slim”, 6′4(!!), black, and notoriously lanky. Wait, one of these isn’t like the others.

In general I hate fancasting. Everyone generally picks from the same pool of about 30 actors (Peeps, neither Taron nor Daniel is a good Wolverine choice. Argue with your mother!), and most all of it is based on physicality, except when it absolutely should be (like say, choosing a ~5′10 dark-skinned black woman for Storm).

And I think there’s some malarkey afoot. I think there needs to be some serious consideration on part of fancasters and actual casting agents alike to rethink race when it comes to the [white] X-Men, especially since they’re the X-Men of all teams. So I’ll make the case for a black Cyclops: 

1. There is no quota on Black X-Men: There’s a bug in your ear that’s been whispering lies to you for years, it says something to the effect of “We need a black person on the team for diversity. How bout Storm?” And you’ve gotten complacent. Storm does not have to be the only black person on your X-Men roster.

2. The X-Men represent diversity: Iceman is gay, Cyclops and Prof. X are disabled (sorta), there are plenty of women, oh and everybody except Storm is white. Of the A-List X-Men, there is only *one* POC character. I’d argue that an MCU X-Men needs to champion diversity like never before.

3. The X-Men represent minority struggle while being mostly white: There’s a cognitive dissonance in the metaphor that has always been there, and for the most part, nobody cares. To appeal to the white readers of the 60′s, the X-Men were all initially white. That way, the message of the mutants could be related to the audience with a familiar face. We don’t need to approach the problem that way in 202?

4. Just because that’s the way it’s always been, doesn’t mean that’s the way it should be: The first line of defense. Sorry, that will never be a good justification for literally any idea. It’s time for some more critical thinking.

5. We don’t all want to be Bishop: So say you’re white and you have a kid who for his birthday having a costume party. You’ve bought some X-Men costumes and you want each kid to pick one. 9 white kids and one black kid show up to your house. As the kids deliberate who gets what costume, be it Cyke or Wolvie or whatever, you yell at everybody to “STOP!”, point to the one black kid and tell him “You’re gonna be Bishop. That’s it, end of story!” 

We don’t all want to be Bishop. The black child could have the best Cyclops interpretation within him, but you’ll never know if you don’t let him try. And that’s no different from the Black actors of Hollywood. There’s no reason why all of the black talent should *have* to compete for the role of Bishop or Storm, which I’ve discussed, while Joe Schmo can walk up and audition for literally anybody he wants.          

Jharrel Jerome is 23 and has an Emmy to his name. He needs to be in the MCU in some capacity, period. Stephan James is another. How bout Damson Idris. Ashton Sanders. But no, no, let’s fancast Dacre Montgomery or Ansel or Joe Keery again as [Human Torch, Wolverine, Iceman, Angel, I’ve literally seen it all.]

6. Nobody wants to see the B-team if it comes down to it. The next line of defense from your racebending naysayers after “That’s the way it’s always been!” is “Well, what about Psylocke, Bishop, Forge and Jubilee?” who are otherwise known as B-tier X-Men. The problem is, we’ve got limited time and limited spots.

So since the X-Men is all about wonky metaphors that make half sense, let me give you another: Let’s say somebody approaches you and says “Hey buddy, I got two free concert tickets for ya! You can either see Michael Jackson Sings the Blues, or you can go see Justin Timberlake. Free of charge!”

Now, are you used to MJ singing the blues? No! Do you have a problem with going to see Justin Timberlake? No, he’s fine on a Wednesday! He had that one little diddy we liked that one time. We’d love to see him eventually! But are you gonna say, “fuck that, I’m going to see MJ Sings the Blues” regardless? Hell yes, because that’s still Michael Jackson. He’s gonna give the same amazing performance he always does, it’s just gonna be the blues. And speaking of blues...

7. Black is not Blue, Brown is not Blue: Raise your hand if you’ve ever heard this one: “I don’t care if you’re black, white, purple, or green, I’m going to treat you all the same!” I will not say all have this intention, but some fancasters have noticed that the racial diversity is kinda low within the A-List X-Men, so they oh-so-generously give the following roles to a black or brown person: Iceman, Nightcrawler, Beast. 

Notice the pattern? It’s a microaggression, and it’s bullshit. What these fancasters are implicitly telling you is that, yes the actors will be black or brown, but when the action starts we can ignore that. They’ll be blue by then. In other words, you in fact do care if they’re purple or green. Nobody will cry foul if Dev Patel gets to play Nightcrawler (because that’s a common one I see), but should Anna Diop be Starfire or Michael B. Jordan be Human Torch, I bet there’d be backlash. Oh wait. If that’s you, please stop acting like you actually value diversity. You don’t want to see black or brown skin, period. Unless of course, it’s Storm (refer to point #1).

But wait, there’s more! When brown characters get whitewashed in these movies, it’s crickets! So eventually it’s revealed implicitly that proclaimers of point #4 only care about it one way.

8. Professor X should not be black if you’re not willing to change anyone else: The next line of defense is that some people say the professor should be black, if anybody HAS to be racebent. Something something MLK Jr., Civil Rights or some shit. Number one, I’m not reducing Professor X to being a magical negro for 9 white people (and Storm!) who for all intents and purposes get to have all the action. Number 2, the Professor X/MLK/Magneto/Malcolm X comparison is an oversimplifying disservice to ALL FOUR of those people. I hate that line whenever I see it, please watch a documentary my friends. 

9. The Candidates for Racebending: For me, the A-List X-Men are Cyclops, Jean Grey, Iceman, Angel, Beast, Wolverine, Storm, Gambit, Rogue, Colossus, Nightcrawler, and Kitty Pryde. Now, who should be exempt from the racebending? Storm, she’s our designated minority. Gambit, he’s Cajun and they’re white (generally speaking, that’s a fun bit of research). Wolverine, Colossus, and Nightcrawler, because their nationality/ethnicity was the whole point of the Giant-Size premise in the first place. Angel, because his character embodies a privileged white male. Beast and Iceman, I don’t care one way or another (Point #7).

That leaves Cyclops, Rogue, Jean Grey, and Kitty Pryde. Now Jean Grey is a redhead, and we all know that every time a redhead is racebent people sharpen their pitchforks (Mary Jane, Wally West, Iris West), so I will cede the ground on Jean if only so that my ginger friends can get their rep. Kitty Pryde is Jewish, but Jews of color exist. Rogue is from the South. And Cyclops is, well, just Cyclops. That makes those three characters good options for more diversity. But allow me to make the case for Cyclops, specifically.

10. It’s not just diversity for diversity’s sake: If you had to pick who the main character of the X-Men is supposed to be, most would say Cyclops. And so in a series that highlights racial discrimination in society, it makes sense that our main character be black. While changing Cyclops’ skin color should not change who he is as a character, it *should* recontextualize it. Now, as an eventual increasingly radical leader of the X-Men, Cyclops would evoke real life figures such as Colin Kaepernick or, shall I say, Martin Luther King, Jr.

Not that most X-Men fans and writers truly think about what it means to be black anyways. Storm’s minority status is almost always put through the lens of her being a mutant and not her being a black woman. In other words, you can’t argue that making a character black will fundamentally change his or her character when you haven’t even analyzed the racial context of the black character(s) you already have. Another concept that the MCU X-Men should tackle: intersectionality.

11. Representation matters: I have to say it: Chadwick Boseman’s Black Panther hit different. And now he is tragically gone. At the end of the day, the MCU moving forward is down its most prominent black male superhero. Which has implications beyond just the movies themselves.

The women are in good hands. Shuri, Okoye, and Nakia are badasses in Wakanda, Valkyrie is ruling Asgard, Storm is almost assuredly on the way, RiRi Williams has already been cast, and Monica Rambeau is here and she’s not even at her most glorious yet. That doesn’t even include variable Δ, or the number of characters who can and will be racebent. And I’ll note again that to me, Gamora doesn’t count, because she’s green (#7 really pisses me off because it’s so blatant. I hate it). Of course from a behind the camera perspective we love black women getting work.

The men are a completely different story. Imma just go out and say it, I can’t stand Falcon and War Machine [in the MCU] because they’re not characters, they’re just two of a slew of MCU minority sidekicks who have essentially been at the beck and call of Captain America and Iron Man, respectively. You cannot tell Falcon’s story without mentioning Cap. The reverse is not true. There’s a whole essay that could be and have been written on “Minorities in the MCU, pre-Black Panther”. Remember, there’s a reason BP made so much noise in the first place.

So excluding those two we have, let’s see, M’Baku, Blade, and Fury who aren’t exactly the most superheroic superheroes, Eli Bradley is proooobably coming, I doubt Miles Morales is coming (because he’s just Peter Parker in the MCU), Luke Cage(?) Bishop(??), Sunspot(???), Blue Marvel(????). Not only are they not A-List, I would not put money on any of them being in the MCU any time soon.

Cyclops is thee Captain America of the X-Men. He’s the frontman. He’s the poster boy. He’s the “boy scout”, which in other words means he’s the hero, if there has to be one. It would mean a lot right now, and specifically *right now*, if he were to be black. The MCU needs it. It NEEDS it.

12. The X-Men is the Summers Story: I’ll even make the case that if just one character needs to racebent, then it should be Cyclops, because that of course implies that other related characters need to be black because half of the X-Men universe is in fact a part of the Summers family. 

So now Cable is black. Corsair is black. Havok is black. And one of the most central stories in the X-Men mythos, the Summers family drama, is now a black family drama set in space or the future or where the fuck ever. The concept is boundary pushing. When white families have drama in the media, it gets to be Game of Thrones or Star Wars, while when black families have drama in the media, it has to be black people arguing in a kitchen or living room about their various earthly traumas (I’m @’ing you, Mr. Perry). I mean, that’s all fine and good often times, but I want my black family drama in space, dammit.

And again, this is the X-Men, the series that’s all about *minorities* and their struggle, so again, why not?

Oh, and I’ll even throw out a Havok fancast for you: How bout Jharrel Jerome?

#cyclops #scott summers #the mutants #monica rambeau #X-men #xmen #marvel #MCU #fancast #jharrel would actually be a better sunspot #but you get the point #my man would have OPTIONS

[portsidewonderland]

Okay, I’ve been wanting to write this for the last three weeks, but I’m finally - finally - sitting down to do just that.

First, I’m a Rogan shipper. I’ve been a Rogan shipper for the last 20 years, but in that time, I’ve grown, I’ve experienced my own sense of love, and I’m a writer so I’d like to think I’m familiar with structure, characterization, and the like.

Second, I’m focused on the film franchise, strictly speaking. Just wanted to make sure that is clear.

Having said that, when I discuss how utterly wrong the X-Men franchise is, I’m talking about from a story standpoint. When I speak of Logan and Rogue, if that ship isn’t your jam, fine, but the points I make still stand.

Finally, spoiler alert for all of the movies.

Okay, I think we’re ready to jump in.

1. After the first movie, everyone forgot the heart of what made the first movie so special: Wolverine & Rogue

I don’t necessarily mean together. I mean, the movie focused primarily on Logan’s story and Rogue’s story. It was told through THEIR POV. This is important because, essentially, we’re asked to connect with these two characters AND WE DO.

The dialogue, the acting, and their stories (which reflect each other’s as well as stand on their own) draw us in and we are hooked.

Even the critics thought some of the best scenes are the ones Logan and Marie share together. Multiple critics discuss chemistry, how they add to the scene, etc.

Regardless of whether you ship them or not, there’s a compelling story between the two. This vulnerable, slip of a girl is the most powerful X-men out there (or one of) and this growly, fierce angry, broken man who’s been alone for so long that out of everyone he’s met and seen, THIS girl brings him to his knees.

And it’s because she isn’t scared of him.

Even after watching him beat the shit out of his opponent, even after seeing the claws threaten humans and slice through a barrel of a gun, she still thinks, I can trust him.

And when he catches her in his trailer, she STILL isn’t afraid of him. She gives him lip. She calls him out on his shit.

That’s how she manages to slide through the cracks.

And that is BEAUTIFUL.

I’m not here to talk about the performances, but Jesus Christ, I love this scene so damn much. The chemistry RADIATES. The glances, the confusion, the curiosity, and the attraction. (Sorry not sorry, it’s there on both parts, I’ll die on this hill.)

Anyway, the first movie is about how this girl brings the savage, feral Wolverine to his knees. How she gets him to STAY. How she gets him to open up.

Yes, Logan wants info on his past, but he’s staying for Marie. We all know it.

When he threatens Jean after first waking up, Jean is scared. And for good reason, obviously.

But Logan STABS Marie with his claws, and guess what? She’s still not scared of him. She’s worried about him.

This is THEIR story.

Do you really think Wolverine is going to go running around in leather for anyone but Marie? Yeah, I don’t think so. I mean, he literally STABS HIMSELF IN THE CHEST to free himself and get to her.

He PROMISES her that he’d take care of her. Do you think Wolverine bullshits? Hell no, he doesn’t.

And that’s why....

2. The whole Jean thing was just not great.

Okay, can I tell you something?

I don’t see Jean as a sympathetic character. She’s engaged to Scott and suddenly, Wolverine comes strolling in and she can’t get her shit together?

I mean, okay, I get it, let’s be real.

But Scott isn’t a bad guy. He nay be a dick, but he treats Jean well. Because we’re not in Cyclops’ or Jean’s head, we as the audience don’t see any marital/romantic issues between them. Hence, when Jean gets flustered by Wolverine to the point where she lets him goad her into reading his mind, she knows what she’s doing. She likes it. She likes Logan’s attention.

Not because she likes Logan.

(I read this fic where basically Jean tells Logan he could have been anybody, and I thought that was so perfect)

But because he’s giving her attention. He makes her feel desired.

And she leads him on.

Right there, I don’t like her, and I think that’s why a lot of Rogan shippers don’t like her is that she has no problem toying not only with Logan’s feelings, but with Scott’s.

But that’s not even the worst part of this.

At the end, when Logan asks for Marie and Jean makes her comment, she adds, “I think she’s taken with you.”

Like - why would Jean say that? Why mention it?

That’s petty ass shit right there.

To me, what she’s trying to do is align herself with Logan as adults and belittle Marie for having a little crush on him. Like it’s so juvenile.

And the worst line of this whole movie is when he says, “Tell her my heart belongs to another.”

Want to know why?

Because the writers/director haven’t SHOWN this. This line is forced here to TELL the audience that we should be shipping Jean and Wolverine. It’s sloppy writing. It tells me they think the audience are idiots.

Really, Logan?

Jean has your heart even though you completely go against Tall Dark and Feral to pick up a girl, then stay at the school with her, leave a fucking mansion to bring her back, make a promise to her, go after her after she’s kidnapped, stab yourself in the chest, fling yourself on the Statue of Liberty AND RISK YOUR FUCKING LIFE TO SAVE ROGUE’S JUST BY TOUCHING HER and you want me to believe your heart belongs to Jean????

Please, tell me, why the FUCK should I buy that?

Oh, because they’re the same age?

LOL no.

Anyway, I didn’t like Jean’s characterization because of that. Because she’s leading people on, because she needs to put down Marie’s feelings after her ordeal because of her insecurity, because of it all.

Which is why I’ll never ship them together.

Logan is at his worst when he’s around Jean.

Anyway.

And Jean is just the worst.

3. They took something meaningful and they fucked it

Logan promises to take care of Rogue. Do you know important that is for both of them as individuals and their relationship?

Rogue only goes back because of Logan. Not for anyone else. Not even Bobby. She comes back, she stays, for Logan.

Where do we see that after the second movie?

He’s so goddamned focused on Jean, on everything about her, that he barely notices that Rogue is ready to get the cure.

I’m GLAD they got a scene together. Because of their looks.

I am.

But shit.

It’s like Logan has completely forgotten all about Rogue, and I’m sorry, but after that first movie, I just can’t buy that.

I can buy that he leaves to check out his past. The dog tag scene is one of my absolute favorites. That’s perfect. Makes sense.

(Also, side note: Fic is so beautiful about this but he isn’t afraid to touch her. Like, he doesn’t HAVE to play with her hair but he does. It’s playful and flirty. It IS. He could have just said he liked her hair BUT HE HAD TO TOUCH IT. And this is HUGE for Rogue because honestly SHE’S afraid to touch and of herself but if Logan isn’t afraid, she stops being afraid - if that makes sense.)

But seriously? He’s not calling the mansion, not writing to Rogue?

I don’t believe that for one second.

This is why I will never watch The Wolverine after that first time (I refuse especially after the director said he was contemplating adding Rogue at the end and didn’t and FUCK EVERYTHING.) because he just leaves because he’s upset about fucking JEAN

I’m sorry but the Wolverine isn’t ABOUT Jean.

If that was the case, we should have had point of views between Logan and Jean in the first movie, not Rogue.

We should have SEEN their development, but we didn’t.

We’re TOLD it.

I’m sorry, but how do you want me to believe that the big bad Wolverine runs off to Japan because he’s sad about Jean? Like, so he’s just going to leave Rogue alone with all of those threats? Are you fucking kidding me?

Show them keeping in touch or SOMETHING. You can’t expect me to see such a huge transformation arc in Logan in the first movie that just gets shit on in every other movie (besides the second). Because that makes Wolverine look like a big, gigantic ASSHOLE and I get that he’s supposed to be that way, but NOT with Rogue.

Which is why Days of Future Past pisses me off as much of the rest them (I’m only discussing the Rogue Cut because I refuse to acknowledge that Bryan Singer - who gave us the first movies - regulated Rogue to such a fucking small cameo.) because Rogue was treated as garbage.

Now, I’m going to assume Logan doesn’t know about what really happened to Rogue because no one told him. But honestly? If he cares about Rogue the way I know he does, he should be asking about her every single time he and Xavier talk.

I love that Logan can sense Rogue when she steps in to help. I love that Rogue refuses to let go of Logan’s mind even in the heart of danger (@bigfrogbestfrogs has an awesome breakdown of these scenes). But I’m appalled at how Kitty is chosen before Rogue? Like, even when coming up with the idea for this movie, why not involve Rogue more?

I refuse to discuss Bobby and her together at the end.

Fuck that.

4. The timelines

Look, I’m not even going to go into the shit that is the timelines.

But honestly?

Fuck everything about that.

I get Singer wanted to retcon X3, but I don’t care.

Based on Apocalypse, the future still sucks so everything failed and then the movie LOGAN takes that shit and amplifies it.

5. LOGAN (the movie)

I’m sorry, but this movie is amazing in some ways and sucks in others.

Want to know why?

Because it takes everything about what made the first movie great and emphasized it.

Laura is too young to be a love interest, so clearly, it’s paternal, and I’m here for it.

But there are so many parallels between logan and Laura and Logan and Rogue that for Logan not to say anything or feel anything in a way tgat tells the audience he’s feeling something just boggles my mind.

Even if he carried HER picture or played with the dog tags and thought of her, something that shows the audience he remembers her, dammit, and she MEANT something to him.

But FUCK how could he NOT?

And that’s why the scene where he’s reading that comic book and he sees himself saving Rogue is so poignant.

Because his gaze lingers.

I mean, obviously I’m assuming she’s dead (which is bullshit but whatever). But still.

And then when he’s dying and Laura is holding his hands and you get that prophecy of him dying with his heart in his hand and I loved how they paired it with the Logan and Rogue song. I loved that callback.

And if the films in between them weren’t such shit, it would be enough.

But it’s not enough for me.

There was so much potential and everything got shit on and it angers me soooo much.

Anyway.

That’s me venting.

Luckily we have so many talented Rogan fic writers and that our ship has survived 20 years.

But still.

What could have been...

Shit.

#logan x marie #wolverine x rogue #Logan x rogue #Wolverine x Marie #Anna Marie #wolverine

[pop-pop-pop-popculture]

What decade do you wish to go back to (or relive) and why

2000s! Why? I really can’t explain it, but it was just a great time to be alive. I really can’t explain the feeling, I’m sorry! I was super cringe in elementary school, but I got my shit together once I started 6th grade.

Even though I was young, the 2000s were a great time to be alive. In regards to pop culture, here are some celebrities, toys, songs, etc. that I grew up with:

Hugh Jackman (it was X-Men Origins: Wolverine for me)

The television show House

Ryan Reynolds in The Proposal

Razor A Kick Scooter

The Hangover

Lindsay Lohan

Avril Lavigne

I can't remember now for the life of me which ones, but there were quite a lot of teen magazines that I read

'Seventeen' Magazine

The Pussycat Dolls

Pogo Stick

Dakota Fanning

Britney Spears

The Office, but I never got into the show

2000s Disney Channel

Heath Ledger

Robin Williams

Kid Cuisine (the blue box with the penguin)

Natasha Bedingfield

Jesse McCartney

Michelle Branch

"Cupid Shuffle"

Sean Kingston

Arrested Development (too young for the show, but I still watched it anyway!)

iPod Nano

Jason Bateman

Teletubbies

Backstreet Boys

'Teen Vogue' Magazine

"Wicked" with Idina Menzel and Kristin Chenoweth

'dELiA*s' Magazine

Abigail Breslin

Kanye West (honestly... "Heartless" and "Love Lockdown" still slap)

Steve Carell

Nintendo GameBoy Advance

Nintendo GameBoy Advance SP

Josh Hutcherson

AnnaSophia Robb

Nintendo GameBoy DS Lite

Nintendogs (I was OBSSESSED with this game!)

Neopets (I was OBSESSSED with this website!)

"A Thousand Miles"

Wii

The Blindside

Grey's Anatomy (I started watching it in 2008, and then stopped after the plane crash episode)

Patrick Dempsey

Green Day

Will Ferrell

Enchanted (2007 Disney movie, and it so great and underrated!)

Radio Disney (I stopped listening once I started 6th grade)

Jim Carrey

Floam

2000s Saturday Night Live

Justin Timberlake

Emma Watson (I was never a fan of her and *the seven films*)

Blockbuster

“Magic Tree House” book series

Heinz EZ Squirt, which was colored ketchup

Danimals

Go-Gurt

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe

Polly Pocket (I never owned one 😊)

LimeWire

Bratz (I never owned one 😊)

Gripz

Element shoe brand

Fruit Gushers

Capri Sun

Fruit by the Foot

NOW That's What I Call Music

Carrie Underwood's album 'Some Hearts' (the only songs I liked are "Before He Cheats" and "We're Young and Beautiful")

Carrie Underwood

Destiny's Child

“Junie B. Jones” books

Beyoncé

M•A•S•H•

Tom & Jerry

Rihanna

"Pon De Replay"

Rihanna's album 'Good Girl Gone Bad'

Akon

Steve Irwin, a.k.a. The Crocodile Hunter

Kool-Aid Bursts

Usher

Gwen Stefani

"1, 2" Step

The three ‘X-Men’ films (I didn't watch them in my youth, though)

All three Spider-Man movies with Tobey Maguire

The book "Soul Surfer"

2000s Disney movies

2000s Pixar movies

“Chicken Soup for the [XYZ] Soul” books

JoJo

Livestrong silicone wristbands (there were other colors, prints and patterns that either had a word or phrase)

Super Mario Sunshine (I was OBSESSED with this game! 🤣)

The 'Star Wars' prequel films

'LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga' XBOX game

Abercrombie, Hollister, American Eagle, and Aéropostale (my go-to spots in middle school)

Tank top or cami with a plaid flannel shirt

Etnies

Fall Out Boy

Linkin Park

Straight bangs with curly hair, which I wore almost every single day

UGG Boots

Juicy Couture velvet tracksuits

There are tons of more songs, celebrities, etc. that I would love to list, but I will end the list here. Thank you for sending this, I had fun reminiscing on the good days when Instagram and TikTok were nonexistent!

(gif)

#ask #answered #2021 #pop culture #2000s

[justfandomwritings]

Like a Human (Erik Lensherr - Part One)

Pairing: Magneto/Erik Lensherr x Mutant!Reader

Word Count: 3.5k

Warnings: none yet.... spoilers maybe? Do you have to warn for spoilers for movies that are old? This takes place entirely inside Days of Future Past

Summary: “Our roles are nothing more than how the times choose to cast us.” -Magneto

Notes: The summary is just an epigraph of a Magneto comics quote, but it does more to explain the inspiration of this fic than a proper summary would. This one goes out to some of the 38 Magneto fic requests I got when I put up a post asking for some.

Charles had wanted to go himself.

Charles knew the world Logan was going back to. He knew what he himself was going through, where Erik was, how Mystique thought. Had Charles gone, he needn’t worry about Logan convincing him of the future, pulling him from his despair, reuniting him with his abilities. Had Charles gone, he would have been in control of his own body. Breaking Erik out and stopping Mystique would have been far easier. 

It was with a heavy heart he admitted that Logan was best suited for the task at hand. The task before Logan was more monumental than he knew. 

The three of them, Charles, Erik, Logan, they were all very different men at the time.

There was no telling where Logan would wake up, what situation he was in, how far he would have to travel. He was no one to Charles, and Charles may as well have been no one to him. Logan would have to convince a total stranger he was time travelling to save the universe. Not to mention if the link broke too soon, they would be throwing a wild, unpredictable man into the heart of the action and could leave the situation far worse than they’d found it.

Charles was without his abilities, and he was a long way from getting them back. He was weak, depressed, and alone; even with Hank around, he was alone. He would need to be rescued from the brink in a way Charles wasn’t sure Logan would be capable of, not because Charles doubted Logan but because he doubted himself. Logan would turn up on his doorstep, and Charles wouldn’t know if he was lying or not. Charles would need to be convinced of everything, and even if Logan managed that Charles would be of almost no help whatsoever unless he stopped his treatment months before he ever had in this timeline. 

And Erik? Erik was miles away from Charles. He wasn’t just miles underground; they were miles apart emotionally. They blamed each other, hated each other. 

It had taken a miracle to get them speaking again. 

A miracle with a name.

“You’ll need help,” Charles voiced the thought before he could stop himself. “You can’t do this alone.”

Kitty sat up in her seat, back rigid as a board. “Charles,” her tone was warning again, “I can’t send you back. Even if I could send two people…”

“You won’t need to.” 

Charles wheeled his chair around to face the corner. Bedecked in all but his helmet, Magneto sat on the sill of one of the window, looking out into the blizzard without really seeing anything past the glass. “Erik,” Charles called to his friend.

Magneto didn’t turn at the name. He didn’t break the glaze that seemed to have washed over his face. Wherever he was, it wasn’t in the room. 

“June 1973.” 

The rest of the room was silent. They’d been bustling around. Iceman had been barricading the other entrances for what good it would do. Storm had been agitating the sky, bringing in mountains of snow for some kind of cover from the approaching army. Warpath sat at the doors, watching for anything that might be coming, and Kitty and Bishop had been explaining the process to an unflappable Wolverine. 

There was something about the way Charles spoke. Whenever he opened his mouth, they all stopped to listen. His words were for Magneto, but for some reason everyone felt the need to hear them.

Magneto turned his head, meeting Charles’s gaze. They sat like that for a moment, watching each other. Those who didn’t know them, would be forgiven for thinking that was all they were doing, but the subtle nods and gentle shakes of Charles’s head told the rest of the room that they were talking amongst themselves. 

Whatever they were discussing, it seemed to be frustrating the older mutant. Magneto’s face contorted in further discomfort at every hint of movement Charles made. They spoke without words, and Magneto clearly didn’t like where the conversation was heading.

Only Magneto seemed to know what Charles meant by telling Kitty, ‘You won’t need to.’ All the rest were baffled, not only at what Charles could be implying but at how Magneto had understood it instantly from nothing. 

They argued in silence, and it was unmistakably an argument. Magneto was more on edge with every moment that Charles stared. 

“She could help, Erik.” Charles pleaded quietly. “June 1973.”

There was another long pause as the men squared off, the other occupants waiting to see whose will would bend first. 

Magneto sighed and pushed to his feet. It seemed a sign of resignation. The desperation still touched his brow, but he was done debating. 

“After you find me,” Magneto addressed Wolverine, even though he still faced Charles, “Stop in London, on your way to Mystique.” 

“What’s in London?” Wolverine asked.

“A girl.” 

Not a very helpful explanation. There were many girls in London; Logan would even wager there were many mutant girls in London. “How will I find her?”

“You won’t.” Charles rolled back to Logan’s side with a sad smile. “She’ll find you.” 

“Why does he need her?” The question came from Kitty. It was probably one Logan should have asked, but in truth it hadn’t occurred to him. 

Magneto walked over and shared a long side-eyed look with Charles, as if they hadn’t whispered in front everyone enough that night.

Charles answered, hedging on how to explain without giving Logan too much. “She may well be one of the greatest mutants to ever live. If you find her, she could save you all.”  

Magneto’s lips twitched up, only slightly, into a sneer. “She’s more than that,” he argued before turning to Logan. “She’s my wife, or at least she will be.” 

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Are you Logan?” 

The man came running up to their group while they exited the plane. 

Logan paused on the steps as the man approached Hank at the bottom of the stairs. 

Hank glanced back up the steps towards the rest of the group, clearly pleading for help, for how to respond.

“I’m Logan,” Logan pushed by Magneto and made his way down to join the worried Hank.

“Of course you are. I should’ve known.” 

The frazzled young man, clad in a jacket that labelled him ‘landing crew’, was clearly flustered. He fumbled around, patting over his chest and down to the pockets of his jeans. 

“Here,” He tucked two fingers into his back pocket and produced a piece of paper. “She told me to give you this message.”

“She?” Logan snatched the paper from the man’s hand and unfolded it quickly.

‘It’s rude to yank things from another person’s hand, Logan. Do apologize to Tim, but make it quick. You need to meet me at the address on the back as soon as you can.” 

“How did she…” Logan froze. He read the words twice, mumbling them under his breath to make sure he got them right. “I-I’m sorry,” Logan half-heartedly said to the man, side stepping past him onto the tarmac, “but we have to go.”

“Yes, she said that too,” The younger man pointed into the distance where a black van was speeding off the road towards their chosen hangar. “That’s for you.” 

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The van pulled to a stop in front of a block apartments not far from the airport.

“Third floor,” The driver didn’t bother to turn around but instead pointed up at the building just behind his parking spot. 

“Do we even know who this woman is?” Magneto growled as he slipped out of the car.

Logan eyed the peeling yellow facade of the apartment complex. He stuffed his hands into his pockets to hide the claws that were slowly beginning to push out of his skin. “I think I have an idea,” or at least he had the start of one, and it was not at all an idea he liked.

Charles, Hank, and Magneto filed along after Logan through a heavy metal door, which the metal wielder pulled closed behind the group.

They slogged up to the third floor where Logan glanced down at the paper the airport employee had handed him. “317.” 

“This way,” Charles pointed out a sign and headed off away from the landing. 

Apartment 317 was six doors down on the left. It was the only number placard that hadn’t been defaced with some form of graffiti or stolen all together. The otherwise dingy hallway was slightly brighter in front of the door, underneath the only bulb that was actually shining as opposed to flickering out its last burst light. 

This was the sort of place Logan was used to before he met Charles Xavier. Shady tennants, dirty floors, questionable facilities. This was the sort of place most mutants were used to outside of the school. Even, apparently, the incredibly powerful ones.

Charles lifted his hand, but before he could knock a voice inside shouted, “It’s open!” He hesitated for a moment before he tested the knob.

The door swung wide on an incredibly bare apartment that looked just as old and lackluster as the hall outside, albeit far cleaner. 

There was nothing more to the room than an oversized couch shoved against the opposite side of the room and two doorways, both open, on the right-hand wall.

The old wooden floorboards squeaked in protest when the men stepped over them to enter the living room. 

“In here,” A voice called from one of the open doors.

Logan caught Charles by the shoulder as he made for the voice. “Behind me,” Logan whispered, stepping ahead of his would-be mentor.

Logan led Magneto followed by Hank and Charles into the room from which the voice had come. 

Instantly, the smell of food overwhelmed them.

The kitchen was similarly bare to the living room. A stove, an oven, a fridge, and a hodgepodge of mismatched counters took up most of the tiny room. There was only just enough space for the rickety round table and the five chairs shoved under its lip. A door against the back wall, no doubt, couldn’t be opened without entirely removing the nearest seat from the room.

In amongst the shabby appliances was the back of a young woman. She moved busily between two burners on the stove and the plates and utensils cluttering the table. As they entered, she turned and deposited a healthy portion of eggs on each of the four plates. 

Her eyes didn’t even look up at their approach. It wasn’t like she could’ve missed them. The floor groaned and creaked with every move made by any of the men, a built in alarm against intruders if there ever was one.

“That really wasn’t necessary Logan,” The woman didn’t bother to check who was in the doorway and continued cooking. “I don’t bare Charles any ill will.”

Seeing there wasn’t an immediate or hostile threat, Charles took an uncertain step around his new found bodyguard and asked, rather skeptically, “Then do you mind telling us what we’re doing here?”

“Well,” The woman picked up a pan and began dispensing bacon onto three of the plates, “You’re in London because Charlie wanted Logan to come and find me, and Erik told him where to look.” She dropped the empty pan back on the stove. “And you’re in my apartment,” speaking absently, she fiddled with the knobs to turn off the burner, “because I know none of you have eaten since you broke Erik here out of his cell.” 

The woman in question wiped her hands clean on a dish rag before finally turning to properly face the group of men for the first time.

She was pretty. Most people would even call her beautiful. Though, she was by no means otherworldly as Logan had been expecting; there was nothing about her appearance that conveyed to him that she was a mutant of any real power. 

Logan wasn’t particularly enchanted by her voice or drawn in by any of her features. Sure, she had a kind smile and an even complexion, lips colored a shade of red that could go from sophisticated to sinful in a heartbeat. But she was just a woman, a beautiful young woman, a seemingly normal one at that. She looked human.

“Telepath?” Charles asked, moving cautiously towards the nearest chair. “How else could you know where we just came from?”

The woman laughed, though it wasn’t a very hearty sound. It tinkled half-heartedly then died in the air. “If I was a telepath, I would’ve had to read your mind across the Atlantic for Tim to be waiting for your plane to land.” 

“Then what are you?” Hank asked.

He and Erik both moved to join Charles at the table. Their steps were both slow, cautious. Neither of them trusted this woman, and while Hank’s expression seemed worried and concerned, Erik’s was deadly.

“A mutant, like all of you.” She chirped. 

“And do you have a name?” Erik stood behind the seat he’d claimed. 

Something told Logan he was waiting for everyone else to sit down, waiting for everyone to be well within range of the metal knives their host had placed on the table. 

“(Y/n),” The woman slumped into the chair without a plate in front of it and motioned to the empty chair. “Do join us Logan. You’re not actually worried about me killing you. We both know poison couldn’t do the trick.”

“No,” Logan agreed, taking one deliberate step after another, “But I’m pretty sure you can.” 

A smirk tugged the edge of (Y/n)’s lip, but it was gone as quick as it appeared, and Logan took his seat. 

“Bold assumption,” She mused, “Would it settle you at all to know I have no intention of hurting any of you?” 

“No, not even if I believed you.”

“Fair enough,” She shrugged.

With the rest of the table occupied, Erik took the final chair at the woman’s side and an uncomfortable silence settled over them.

No one made a move to eat, and no one seemed to know what to say to fill the silence.

No one except (Y/n), perhaps. She lounged comfortably in her chair, pushing it up on the back two legs. There was a content grin on her face, and she was inspecting her nails with a deep interest that Logan was fairly sure was fake. Something in her expression told Logan that she was amused by all of this. A glint in her eyes as they scanned over her fingers, an arch of her brow. 

Over the years, Logan had, out of necessity, gotten good at reading people, and he didn’t need any powers to do it. She was enjoying this, he could tell. How uncomfortable she made Erik and Charles, she was revelling in it. 

“I know who you are.” Logan pressed her. They didn’t have the time for these games, or at least he didn’t think they did.

Her eyes flitted up to him quickly. “Well obviously,” she hummed, “you wouldn’t be here if they didn’t send you.” 

Logan leaned in, hovering over his plate on the table, as if getting closer would help get his point across. “I know who you are, what you did. Erik told me everything.” 

There was a loud bang as the front two legs of her chair came crashing to the floor. Even as she brought herself crashing back to earth, (Y/n)’s expression didn’t change. Her features froze as they were before. The life didn’t leave her eyes, but it seemed, for a moment, to pause its merriment. 

“Then he really must be in dire straits.” Her tone had cooled off, slipped into an emotionless droan of words. 

“Would you mind,” Charles cut in, “explaining it to the rest of us?”

(Y/n) trailed her eyes over Charles, “It’s sad you have to ask.” (Y/n) let her sentence hang in the air with genuine grief before she pushed to her feet.

Charles, likewise, looked down, pained.  

“Eat while I talk. This will take some time, and we don’t want to waste a moment.”

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(Y/n) returned to the table with a paper and pen and set it out before the men who were hesitantly chewing down breakfast. 

“So,” She drew two parallel lines coming up from the bottom of the paper, “Think of time as a road, and we, the universe, are a car.” A boxlike shape joined her sketch between the lines. “The road is one way, and while we’re on it, we have to be moving forward.”

As she talked, (Y/n) began to add roads, branches coming off every inch on both sides of her original path. “Everyone, young and old, is inside the car and has a hand on the wheel.” Some took steep angles away from her first road; others ran virtually parallel to it; others still branched off from the branches she was adding. She was, slowly but surely, making a web of lines across the page. “And every time any of us make a decision, we turn the wheel.” 

She traced an arrow from the car up one of the roads running parallel to it. “Most decisions have little effect on the world beyond the person who’s made them. We’re so close to where we were before that when we look out the window the scenery and direction haven’t changed, and none of us can tell the difference.”

(Y/n) continued  arrow, this time following a branch off the parallel that took a far steeper angle. “Other decisions, turns of the wheel, change the world so emphatically that everyone feels the effects, and our course is forever altered.”

(Y/n) went back to doodling in lines, slowly filling up the bottom of the page as she carried on. “Every turn off the first road is a decision someone made, and every decision someone makes results in a turn. The only question is how drastically it removes us from where we began.”

Ceasing her doodles for a moment, (Y/n) drew their attention by circling three times around a section of road she had just added, two parallel roads in the bottom corner, both taking a sharp curve away and off the edge of the page. 

“There are, however, some things that are beyond decision. Bends in the road, as it were. Things that, by virtue of being on the road we are on, will happen; things no one decided and no decision can avoid. Call it karma or fate, whatever suits you, but they’re there. Some of them are small, only happening on a few paths we create. Others are so colossal,” (Y/n) vigorously shaded in a strip of paper an inch above the end of her highest road, “that by virtue of moving forward in time, we will encounter them, and they will happen. The difference between a bend around a hill, only taken by roads that come at it from a certain angle, or the inevitable need of a bridge crossing over a river.” 

(Y/n) drew in a road, a bridge presumably, going over the shaded strip and continuing up to the end of the page. 

Her pen ran off the top of the page, and with it she went silent, and a long moment passed as she stared at it, unseeing.

She hadn’t looked up or ceased once during her entire explanation, not as they ate, not even when Hank let out an audible huff.

“This is an interesting theory of time, but what does it have to do with why the future sent us here?” Hank pressed. There was a subtle inflection to the way he said the word theory. He was far too kind to call anyone wrong to their face, but Hank was a scientist in heart and in mind. He didn’t generally stand for rambling misinformation. 

(Y/n) returned his expectant look with an equally expectant smile, as if she’d already known the answer to his question before he even thought to ask it. “Darling, I’m the map.”

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Next Time on Part Two…. Coming Soon

Taglist

Forever Taglist:

@maybe-a-fangurl / @libbymouse /  @geeksareunique / @deathbyarabbit​ / @spilltheearlgrey / @ryanbarnesrogers / @bloodorangemoonlight​

Marvel Taglist:

@the-high-queen / @iamverity / @darktownairspeed / @radicalstars​ / @hermione-is-my-queen 

#erik lensherr x reader #erik lehnsherr x reader #magneto x reader #x men #x men imagines #xmen imagines #marvel imagines #marvel fanfiction #xmen fanfiction #x men fanfiction #erik lensherr imagine #erik lehnsherr imagine #magneto imagine #magneto fanfiction #magneto x you #erik lensherr fanfiction #erik lensherr x you #erik lehnsherr x you

[postmodernmulticoloredcloak]

No, I get it. You don't have to and sorry, if it seemed like I was asking you to cuz I am not. I get it. If Fatws came out last year I wouldn't have been able to watch it. Endgame disgusted me so much and then I saw this Ace Comic Con panel from '18 where Chris stopped himself from elaborating on what S-B mean to each other cuz he got into trouble with Marvel earlier for that. It had made me completely disengage with MCU stuff for 2 whole years (a thing that I usually struggle with if I hyperfixate on anything) and even didn't go to watch the movie for a second time even though I had already paid for the tickets beforehand.

X-Men movies are different sort of bad 😂 maybe, the 2000s one had lowered my expectations so much that I actually enjoyed the new ones. The ones with James McAvoy. The movies don't make much sense but they're sweet. It felt like an elaborate plot of getting Erik back to Charles 😂 Oooh, but Logan (not the other Wolverine movies) is actually quite good and if you ever find yourself so inclined to watch any of the movies, that would be it. It absolutely doesn't need you to watch anything before or after it. Very sweet and poignant. Almost didn't feel like a superhero movie. Perhaps, you know that already.

Ah, this is getting long again. I'll stop bothering you with these long Asks 😂 Just read a comics where Steve is a gladiator-like super-soldier who kept doing Bucky Bucky every other line. Felt kinda embarrassing 😂 He calls him a mate, friend, brother-in-arms, brother. I was annoyed when he called him a brother but then he even called the dinosaur brother so that assuaged me 😂 I read it only cuz someone told me the writers had confirmed they had written them like a couple. I'm just writing these too long cuz I don't wanna bother you with too many Asks :P

Ok. Have a nice day.

Oh no prob I just take any opportunity to rant :p

I never quite got out of Stucky (as, well, you can tell) but I suppose I never was really into the MCU as a whole so much that it came as a shock to detach from it. I just moved to my fanon bubble and stayed there ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I mean it’s probably also a thing that my bad breakup from the MCU was in 2016 so different conditions from people who got hurt by Endgame.

I actually dreamt a Cherik fanfiction basically some time ago. The power of tumblr XD

I had almost decided to read the dinosaur comics when they were being published but then they ended and the finale was disappointing so I just shrugged and forgot about them...

#superwholockian93

[moonlit-imagines]

High School Crushes In Your Clutches

Steve Harrington x reader

warnings: cussinggg

a/n: lets see how bad i can fuck this up (tysm for the request!!) also i made it gender neutral bc i started writing it and did it subconsciously and didn’t feel like changing that i hope its okay!

prompt: @assistant-carolyn-potts-91: “Hey, could I have a Steve Harrington x reader where the reading went to high school with him. She was in the track team and everyone thought she was just a jock. She works at the mall and comes to visit him at work. But when Dustin comes she nerds out with him and makes Steve love her even more. She helps fight when the mind flayer and is badass. She gets knocked out at a point so Steve freaks out and accidentally admits his feelings. Then have a happy ending. Thank you! I can’t wait to see it.”

Steve watched you jog around the school track, you were on your fifth lap. He was impressed by your determination, and he was excited to see you compete. He knew you were going to absolutely kill it, and all he wanted to do now was ask you out. Steve had a crush on you for a while now, and other than his light flirting, he hadn’t done much about it. You didn’t really think about it. You were too focused on your extracurriculars.

Summer ‘85, you started a job at the mall like everyone else. It wasn’t a bad idea, you had to start somewhere. One of the perks of working there meant seeing Steve Harrington, an old friend from high school. You used to have a crush on him if you were being honest, but right now you were alright with hanging out with him as friends. The Gap was a fun place to work, but you loved visiting Scoops on your break. Robin and Steve were quite the characters.

You and Steve were having a nice chat, but he paused when he heard a voice from behind the window. He stared at the door and hushed you, trying to figure out if it was true or not. He waved for you to come with him, then burst out the door.

“Henderson.” He said in disbelief. “Henderson! He’s back!” He cheered.

“I’m back! You got the job!” The boy exclaimed. You moved towards Robin and gave her a very visibly confused look. You both watched as the boys jumped around and did an intricate handshake.

You sat with the pair while they caught up, and even got the know the kid a little better. His name’s Dustin, he’s a nerd, he likes Star Wars, Dungeons and Dragons, science, and comics. You liked...some of those. Your favorite subject was science and you did love Star Wars and comics.

“Hey, Dustin, you like the X-Men?” You asked the boy. He gave you a smile and an exaggerated nod. “What do you think of that new character they just came out with? Firestar.”

“She shows potential, I must admit.” He sat up and folded his arms.

“And Rogue? Nightcrawler? Shadow Cat, Wolverine?” You started listing X-Men. “(X-Man) is my personal favorite, but those are definitely some badasses.” You’re face was lit up talking about something you were passionate about. Steve couldn’t stop staring at you. Dustin was having a blast actually talking to someone with shared interests. He had a lot of input on all these things that you loved to hear.

“So, y/n, how do you know Stevie here?” He asked, taking a bite of his ice cream. Steve glared at him and you watched him do it.

“Oh, Steve and I went to high school together. He used to come to all my track meets.” You smiled and looked down at your watch. “Awe, damn, my break is over. I’ll catch you guys later, nice meeting you, Dustin!” You scooted out of the booth and headed back to work.

“That was y/n? The track star you liked so much?” Dustin was shocked. “They’re way too good for you.” Steve rolled his eyes and put his head down.

“Anyways, how was your first day back?”

—————

On your next break, you walked into the breakroom of Scoops to find Steve pacing and listening to a recording of some Russian speaking. Dustin was patiently waiting for the tape to end.

“Am I interrupting?” You looked at the two boys. They explained the entire situation about the Russians to you. And in came Robin, arguing with Steve about how it was his turn to do his job. Robin started helping translate and when they finally got a sentence, you were ecstatic. “And now, for the fun part.”

—————

You guys figured out the message, deciphered the code, had the stakeout, got a child to climb through vents, got stuck in an elevator for a day, discovered a secret Russian base, watched Steve knock out a Russian (and may you just say, damn, that was hot), shooed the kids away to save them, and got captured to top it all off! What a week?

They had some fierce interrogation skills. Asking the same question over and over was quite the tactic.

“Who do you work for?” They asked again and again.

“The Gap. It’s a clothing store, I could get you some clothes, if you want. Green really isn’t your color.” You deadpanned and then got smacked. “Thanks, I needed that.” You groaned.

“Take them to the others.” A soldier took you on a walk to another room and threw you in with the others. You started struggling and fighting the guards, and after you jumped on top of one of them, he threw you to the floor and knocked you out.

“Shit,” Steve rushed to your side and tried to wake you up, “y/n, hey, get up.” He started panicking.

“Steve, calm down, they’re just unconscious. Don’t worry, y/n will be back up in a while.” Robin assured him.

“I have to worry! I have to!” He threw his head back and groaned. “I like y/n, okay! I like them a lot, sue me. I don’t want to see them hurt! What if we die down here? What if I let y/n down?” He leaned over you. Right before Robin could open her mouth, a soldier stormed in and tied they three of you to chairs together. You finally regained conciousness. “Oh, thank god, welcome back!”

“Damn, what a headache.” You sighed. Suddenly, a doctor and a few soldiers came in. Here come the needles. “Are you gonna kill us?” You asked the doctor. He drugged you while you guys screamed.

“No, please don’t.” Steve begged. When the drug kicked in, it was a whole different mood.

“Hey, Steve, if I die down here, I just want to let you know...” you paused, “you’re an idiot.” The three of you laughed, but a guard came in and interrogated you again. Until the children came back to save you guys. “Yay! The babies have arrived.”

The five of you made a daring escape to the ground and Dustin forced you into the movies. Steve and Robin were constantly talking, but you were fixated on this movie. Back to the Future was a wild ride, you were obsessed and it had only been five minutes. Unfortunately you were overcome with nausea and your trio had to floor it to the bathroom.

A nice little heart-to-heart was what you guys needed after that. The drugs were out of your system and here you were, sitting on the disgusting bathroom floor, covered in puke and blood. Happy to be alive. Then the kids rushed in the bathroom. It was time to get out of here. Only problem: getting past the Russians at the exit. You had to bolt, but in the nick of time, the other children show up!

“What the fuck is happening? Am I still drugged?” You asked. Steve grabbed your hand.

“This is real, I assure you.” Your eyes widened when he told you that. Some adults finally showed up and you got a new mission. Your crew got comms duty. Racing to a remote location. You started to doubt if it was even there. Your group started panicking and Steve rushed to save the day. You followed quickly behind him, and Robin behind you. Steve sat in the drivers seat, you hopped in the passengers seat, and Robin crawled in the back. Steve peeled out and sped back to Starcourt.

“Steve, I’m not gonna lie, I’m a little scared.” Your tension released slightly when he held your hand.

“Don’t worry, we’ve been through all of this before. And lived!” He nervously chuckled. “I know this is all super freaky and shit, but I won’t let anything happen to you.” Steve squeezed your hand and you shut your eyes, trying to convince yourself it was all a dream.

When you opened them, you were at Starcourt Mall, heading straight for another car. You couldn’t contain your screams. The car spun around and when it came to a stop, you stared at Steve, at a loss for words.

“Are you guys okay?” Steve questioned. You gulped and nodded.

“Ask me tomorrow?” Robin replied. You fell back into your seat, but as soon as you saw the Mind Flayer, you jumped out of your car and into Jonathan’s. Your half of the “Scoops Troop” squeezed together in the back, you and Steve sitting side by side. The Mind Flayer was chasing after you guys. You curled up in a ball, trying to grasp what the hell had happened tonight. Then you felt an arm wrap around you.

“Hey, this’ll all be over soon, trust me.” Steve pulled you into a well-needed hug, you almost couldn’t let go. Your grip was tight, and Robin noticed. She gave Steve an approving thumbs up and all he could do was hold you tighter. That is, until Dustin and his not-so-make-believe girlfriend started singing over the walkies.

“Who the hell are these children?” Robin was puzzled. All Steve could do was shrug.

The monster turned around and headed back to the mall, and so did you. And then it happened. The creature had fallen. The gate was sealed. The damage was done. You were beyond a shadow of a doubt scarred. You all exited the car and were escorted to emergency services for check-ups. Blankets were wrapped around you and Steve, you sat next to each other, completely silent.

“Could you, um,” you broke the silence, “I don’t know, stay with me tonight?” You asked Steve. “I’m sorry, I just...”

“Don’t think you can sleep tonight? Yeah, me neither.” He scooted closer to you and you rested your head on his shoulder. Your parents were out of town for the week, so the two of you headed back to your place. You fixed some dinner, turned on the TV (and all the lights), and tried to distract yourself from the horrors of your night.

“Hey, do you want to take a shower? You’re kind of covered in blood. And dirt. And puke. I have some clothes you could wear.” You offered him. He agreed and you prepped the shower for him. While he was in there, you searched for some blue flannel pajama bottoms and a white t-shirt. After half an hour, Steve emerged from the bathroom, hair wet and slicked back, beads of water dripping down his chest. You couldn’t help but stare. “The clothes are on my bed, I’m gonna take a shower and clean myself up.” You walked into the humid bathroom and stripped down, waiting for the water to heat up. You watched at the blood from your wounds washed down the drain, you took a deep breath and let the warm water soothe your aching body. You washed your hair, your face, your everything. You felt disgusting. The water went cold, so you were forced to exit the shower. You had already finished, it was just comforting. You reached for the towel on the rack and wrapped yourself in it, and exited the bathroom to get some clothes.

“Doing alright?” Steve asked in a concerned tone. You dug through your clothes and replied with a weak “yeah, you?” He said he was fine. You were both lying. You went back to the bathroom to dress and grabbed some dessert from the kitchen.

“Cookie?” You handed him a plate of cookies from the night before, which he accepted. “I’m really wiped out, but I really don’t want to sleep.” You sat next to him on your bed, staring at the wall.

“That’s how I felt the first time this happened. Compared to this, that was nothing.” He told you. “I just hope this is the last time. I don’t know how many more times I can go through this.”

“How many times have you gone through this?” Your eyebrows furrowed.

“This would be number three. Third times the charm, right?” Steve joked. “And hey, you need your sleep. I’ll be right next to you if you want me to be.” You nodded at his offer and got under the covers. He got closer to you, but when he stopped moving towards you, you went towards him. He pulled you into the little spoon position and held you like no one else had before. You felt safe with him near. But that didn’t mean you could sleep. After an hour or so, you spoke.

“Hey, are you still up?” You asked to the darkness. Steve hummed in response, so you flipped over. His wide eyes stared at yours for a moment, you just didn’t know what to do. After tonight, what could you do? It reminded you that life was short. Life was unpredictable and unforgiving. It reminded Steve that he had waited too long to do the thing he wanted to do the most. How he could have never had the chance after tonight, but it was right in front of him, looking him in the eyes. So he did it, he pulled you forward and kissed you like he had kissed no one else before. With all the feeling he had, all the pain and fear and adrenaline he had tonight. He let it all pour out into you. And you wanted it. It was all you wanted for a long time. You were scared, still severely shaken from tonight’s encounter, but Steve’s warm embrace and passionate kiss was all that was keeping you grounded, and maybe he would be willing to keep you grounded for more than just tonight.

#steve harrington imagine #steve harrington #steve harrington x reader #stranger things 2 #stranger things x reader #stranger things imagine #stranger things #stranger things 3 x reader #stranger things 3 imagine #stranger things 3 #robin stranger things #dustin henderson #robin stranger things imagine #dustin henderson imagine #robin buckley imagine #robin buckley x reader #robin buckley

[levelofdepth]

Tag! Get to know me!

Rules: Always post the rules. Tag 11 new people you’d like to know better!

Tagged by @opalxempress

Tagging (with no pressure to do it): @haospart, @hoiist, @toomanyoperatives, @the-sith-in-the-sky-with-diamond, and @lanabenikoisagodess. Sorry if any of you were already tagged.

1. Dogs or Cats?

It doesn’t matter to me as long as I can cuddle it and it will cuddle me back.

2. YouTube celebrities or normal celebrities?

I enjoy the curated content on Youtube, but I think @opalxempress put it quite nicely: “Don’t put people on pedestals, they will inevitably fall off and crush you if you’re standing too close.”

3. If you could live anywhere where would that be?

By my girlfriend’s side.

4. Disney or DreamWorks?

I like to mouth off about the conglomerate mouse

5. Favorite childhood TV show?

The Last Airbender as well as its successor, The Legend of Korra. However, there are a lot of shows I enjoyed when I was younger. Funny, since I don’t really watch any shows anymore.

6. The movie you’re looking forward to most in 2020?

Like shows, I don’t watch many movies. I’m going to cheat a little and say The Rise of Skywalker, because it’s practically 2020. It’s also the only movie I’m probably going to go out and watch for the next year.

7. Favorite book you read in 2019?

White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo. I’m a leader in my school’s club for “social justice” (for lack of a better way to describe it), so this book has been incredibly helpful and enlightening in educating myself and others on how to talk about racism with white people.

8. Marvel or DC?

Marvel

9. If you choose Marvel favorite member of the X-Men? If you choose DC favorite Justice League member?

Rogue, Jean, or Storm. I also kind of like Professor X, Magneto, and Mystique. 

I watched the X-Men movies a lot when I was younger with my dad, and the themes of these young adults/teens struggling with their identities in the face of societal oppression (essentially) hit close to home for me. I haven’t watched any of the movies in awhile, and I never finished the Wolverine series, but I still get that warm feeling one experiences when they wax nostalgic.

10. Night or Day?

Any hours outside of school hours are friends of mine. Except the entire day of Sunday. 

Sundays give me anxiety.

11. Favorite Pokemon?

I never really got into Pokemon. Walking around and suddenly getting stopped to fight really pissed me off. I liked riding the bike around in Diamond and Pearl though.

Anyways Snorlax.

12. Top 5 bands/artists:

I have a niche music taste, but...

Tesseract

Bring Me The Horizon

Nightwish

Gorillaz

Phantoms

The top three I listen to religiously. The rest just happen to be bands I listen to consistently; most of the music I enjoy is just a song I liked and saved to my library or added to a playlist of similar songs.

13. Top 10 books.

I’m gonna be honest, I read more fanfiction than I do books, however some books/series that I enjoyed were

Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

The How to Train Your Dragon series by Cressida Cowell (read these concurrently with my father when I was younger, those were fun days)

The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison

White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo

Things Fall Apart/The African Trilogy Chinua Achebe

The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas

Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

1984 by George Orwell

The Terrorists Son by Zak Ebrahim

14. Top 4 movies

In no particular order

Rogue One

The Hobbit

The LotR Series (all of them yes)

Toy Story 1-3 (I have not seen 4)

and because im a sucker for melodrama i liked revenge of the sith

15. US or Europe?

Ask me again after 2020.

16. Tumblr or Twitter?

Don’t even have a Twitter.

17. Favorite vacation destination?

My family is big on Disney World.

18. Favorite YouTuber?

Lindsay Ellis. She makes very engaging video essays on media, particularly movies and shows. I’m not a film lit student, and yet she manages to bring me back for all of her videos, and then some! 

19. Favorite author ?

I look at authors like I do music; I like books, and if I happen to click with a particular author, they’re an outlier. However, Cressida Cowell paved the road for my reading habits to take off on for many years as a child, and I love how much I bonded with my father over her books.

20. Tea or Coffee?

Coffee all the way.

21. OTP?

Not counting ships with OCs (sorry SWTOR), and the order is intentional

Rizzles - I believe there might be some controversy with this ship, but I never actually watched the show. A long time ago, I stumbled across a fanfic author named colormetheworld who captured my little, lesbian mind with her rendition of this ship, so it’s a bit personal, to be terse.

Clexa - Again, I never watched the show. There wasn’t really a single author that got me interested in this ship, but Lightning Only Strikes Once 

Whiterose - I’m just a fan of the opposites attract trope.

Wayhaught - It’s nice to have positive representation (knock on wood).

Bumbleby

22. Do you play an instrument/sing?

I can play the guitar, piano, drums, though I’m incredibly rusty at the latter two, and unfortunately I had a run in with the recorder back in middle school.

Also “unfortunate run in” would be a good descriptor for my singing voice, because that would be an accident. Or just a straight up disaster.

[bamfdaddio]

X-Men Abridged: 1981 - Bonus: Avengers Annual 10/What If? 27

The X-Men, those Claremontian mutants that have sworn to protect a world that hates and fears them, are a cultural juggernaut with a long, tangled history. Want to unravel this tapestry? Then read the Abridged X-Men! [more here]

(Avengers Annual 10 & What If? 27) - by Chris Claremont and Mary Jo Duffy, Michael Golden and Jerry Bingham

Avengers? You’re not here for Avengers! Let me make the following counterpoint:

Holy eye shadow, Rogue!

See, Avengers Annual 10 is less about the Avengers and more about three other things:

The rehabilitation of Carol Danvers who, after this, has had her fill of the Avengers and becomes an honorary member of the X-Men;

Spider-Woman and the X-Men trying to figure out what has happened to Ms. Marvel;

Mystique trying to spring her Brotherhood from prison, using a secret weapon: Rogue.

Depending on my mood that day, I might name Rogue as my favourite-ever X-Man, so I really could not skip her debut issue. Instantly iconic, all of this:

Her streak;

Her signature green outfit with hoodie;

Her accent.

Queen.

I love how Claremont once again almost effortlessly introduces a strong female character, one that single-handedly takes down three of the strongest Avengers. Also note how free Rogue still is with her powers: fun, flirty, without the tragic can’t-touch-anyone-angle that will define her for the next three decades.

I’m sorry, am I getting ahead of myself?

This story begins as a whodunit: who pushed an amnesiac Carol Danvers off the Golden Gate Bridge and stole her mind? For that matter, where did she came from? Wasn’t she happily married and pregnant in some alternative dimension last time the readers saw her? Spider-Woman rescues her from the choppy water and calls Professor Xavier to help out. He manages to retrieve the Jane Doe’s identity and knows who attacked her: a woman named Rogue.

Rogue, meanwhile, skulks about the Avengers Mansion, first taking out Captain America and then attacking Thor.

Considering what this comic is about, I don’t believe Hawkeye’s throwaway mysognism is accidental here.

Rogue’s powers work as follows: through touch, she can steal other people’s powers and memories. The longer she touches someone, the longer she’ll have them - with the looming threat of the theft becoming permanent.

After absorbing Thor, Rogue is faced with three Avengers who’s powers she can’t absorb - Spider-Woman (covered in a suit); Vision (robot) and Wonder Man (being of pure energy? Idk, I’m not really familiar with him other than his bromance with Beast). Hoping the three powers she has in her arsenal - Ms. Marvel’s, Thor’s and Cap’s - will be enough, Rogue flees.

Mystique, meanwhile, has duped Iron Man by pretending to be the Wasp and has paralysed Tony Stark in his suit with some sort of device. She picks up the powered-up Rogue and their plan becomes clear:

Rogue immediately earns her place in my heart by using billionaire Tony Stark the way the Coyote uses anvils. (Also note the odd way of spelling ‘sugah’.)

I love how both the Brotherhood and the X-Men continually pull focus from the Avengers: for an Avengers-comic, it's surprising how much they're pushed to the background. Again, this makes sense if you know what this issue really is about, but that won’t become clear until the epilogue. I don’t mind, it means we get a ton of great moments, like the Blob calling Mystique ‘Misty’:

My God, this era’s Destiny/Mystique is even more obvious than 90’s Rictor/Shatterstar.

A battle erupts. One funny moment is actually seeing Destiny fight. I’ve never really read comics about this incarnation of the Brotherhood and my collection mostly takes off after Legion Quest, so I mostly know Destiny posthumously. I always figured that, as a villain, she stood somewhere off on the side, delivering cryptic messages. I never realized she was the one to almost shoot Senator Kelly, nor that her powers are this practical.

X-Men drinking game rule 11: Drink anytime someone fatshames the Blob.

The fight is pretty evenly matched until Spider-Woman releases Iron Man from Mystique’s little trap. Soon, the Avengers overwhelm the Brotherhood. While Mystique and Rogue manage to flee, Destiny, Avalanche, Pyro and the Blob are detained again.

With the main antagonists sorted, we return to the actual storyline: the rehabilitation of Ms. Marvel. Professor X has managed to tease her out of her catatonic state and offers her therapy to restore her missing memories and powers. (The ones stolen by Rogue.) The Avengers, not fully understanding why Carol won’t ask them for help, eventually come by for a house call.

Carol asks the X-Men to leave while the Avengers gingerly confront her. It’s very awkward.

“Fuck the Avengers. Taking my beer.” - Wolverine, probably.

See, what all this refers to is the rape of Ms. Marvel. I haven’t read the particular comic in which this happens (Avengers 200), so if you want all the details, I’ll refer you to this article. Before I get into the details, it’s important to note that Claremont was the writer for Carol Danvers in her solo-series, giving her agency and turning Ms. Marvel into a three-dimensional character. The title was then cancelled and Carol was shuffled off to the Avengers. (Rogue was, in fact, planned to make her debut in that the solo-Ms. Marvel series, as one of Ms. Marvel’s new antagonists. Presumably, Rogue would steal her powers there, too. We all know Claremont loves to strip his heroes and heroines of their powers to show they’re even more badass without them.)

As an Avenger, Carol was wooed by some other-dimensional dude/entity named Marcus. He courted her by giving her flowers, worshipping the ground she stepped on and, oh yeah, ‘subtly’ influencing her mind to make her fall in love with him and consequently impregnating her.

Yes.

Now, Claremont is no stranger to putting his characters through their paces and he gleefully makes use of the whole mental manipulation-trope. In fact, telepathically coercing someone to fall in love with you is absolutely what Mastermind did to Jean Grey: he probably violated her just as much as Marcus did Carol. The difference is how it’s treated in the narrative: Mastermind’s actions are never laughed away or apologized for and are the direct cause for his downfall. They help trigger Jean’s transformation to the Dark Phoenix, whose first deed is taking out her fury on ‘Jason Wyngarde’.

That’s… not what happened with Ms. Marvel. There, the narrative condones Marcus’ actions by framing it as ‘her happy ending’ (married and pregnant, yay!), something which is celebrated by the Avengers.

This is where Carol calls them out for their bullshit.

We call this ‘The Reason You Suck’-Speech. It’s a thing of beauty.

The Avengers depart, tail between their legs, and Carol hangs out with the cool X-kids from now on. For now, at least.

So, this issue is not only a landmark because it’s where Rogue debuts, but you can also see Chris Claremont going to bat for one of characters: he (presumably reluctantly) gave back the character of Carol Danvers when her solo was cancelled, proceeded to see how terribly they massacred his girl and then claimed that ownership right back.

Good for you, Claremont.

***

The “What If… the Phoenix Had Not Died”-issue is kind of boring, because it’s basically a rehash of the Phoenix Saga. Why am I paying attention to it? Because of the (mild) gore (and because the Avengers Annual wouldn’t fill a whole post). Anyway, it’s like watching a Final Destination-movie: it’s silly, light on plot and never a particularly thought-provoking movie, but it’s still fun to see all those people inventively but haplessly die.

Plot! Instead of committing suicide on the moon, the Shi’ar strip Jean of her powers after her trial. Jean is trapped in a barren mental state, almost feeling like she's a veggie. But Jean's powers refuse to remain dormant: slowly, her telepathy returns.

When Galactus threatens the Shi’ar homestead, Lilandra summons the X-Men as her champions. Jean embraces her Phoenix-side and defeats Galactus. Everyone is grateful and super-convinced Jean can handle the Phoenix this time! Yay!

And, because that battle with Galactus took a lot out of her, Jean decides she can have a little asteroid. As a treat. She keeps slipping up on her diet, supping on the occasional meteor and lonely planet to keep her power levels up. It turns out to be a slippery slope: finally, she consumes another star (in an uninhabited system! And a small one! How dare you judge her!), but when she returns to the mansion…

The absolute worst moment to forget you have powers, Kitty.

Xavier attempts to bind the Phoenix, but last time, Jean helped him fight from within. This time, there's not much Jean left. Without breaking a sweat, the Phoenix wipes his brain. But she doesn’t stop there. Maybe the Phoenix remembers that, last time, she was undone by the principles of “friendship is magic”. This time, she’s determined to not let it get so far.

It’s absolutely bone-chilling.

And the stars blinked As they watched her carefully Jealous of the way she shone - Atticus

I wonder if there’s a rhyme or reason to the way Jean murders her friends: is it random? Does she go for the ones she loves the most first? Does she save Cyclops for last, knowing killing him might trigger Jean to respond?

The narration mentions that the three remaining X-Men are the most powerful ones: Polaris, Havok and Cyclops. (I would’ve swapped in Storm for Cyclops, but whatever.) They have formulated a quick plan: Polaris pulls focus while Havok and Cyclops shift into position. Phoenix disintegrates Polaris while Havok and Scott try and blast Phoenix to smithereens.

But at the last moment, Scott can’t. Havok’s blast alone is not enough. Phoenix shoots him through the heart and then, finally, kills Cyclops. That’s when Jean resurfaces, realizing what she’s done. She can’t take it - she’s in the mood to dissolve in the sky, as per Virginia Woolf - and she lets the Phoenix take over.

Phoenix finally lives up to her potential: The End of All That Is.

It's a mediocre plot with a lame ramp-up to a terrifying conclusion. In the regular universe, the thing that triggers the Phoenix is the utter violation of Jean’s body and mind; here, it’s being confronted by Kitty. One is the proverbial red cloth in front of the bull, the other is being assaulted by an ineffective wet cloth. The Phoenix Saga is iconic because all the pieces were carefully put in place; this just feels rushed an unearned.

Also, the Watcher is full of shit. You can’t say you don’t pass judgment whilst simultaneously comparing the merits of one tragedy to the other. Shut up, Uatu.

Check back next week for your regularly scheduled X-Men Abridged! It’s time for 1982 and the brood saga!

#x-men abridged #abridged x-men #x-men #rogue #mystique #destiny #carol danvers #ms marvel #wolverine #cyclops #colossus #phoenix #storm #angel #iceman #beast #nightcrawler #kitty pryde #polaris #havok

[godofstoriessuggestion]

A Fan-%#&#$-tastically Good Story: A Reading Guide to Marvel Comics Loki

In other words: every Loki appearance in my collection of Marvel comics, in chronological order. (It's not everything in the past ten years, but it's really close, and I've tried to make a note where there's stuff I haven't read yet -- I'll get to it all eventually! Minimal spoilers, and I've tried to list the trade paperbacks where I can rather than single issues. Updated 6/27/2019.)

Old Loki

Thor by J. Michael Straczynski (aka the Lady Loki ones)

Thor, now king of Asgard and wielding the Odinforce, is returned from the void after Ragnarok. He decides to bring back the rest of the Asgardians and establish a new Asgard floating above Broxton, Oklahoma, but Loki plans to bring it -- and Thor -- crashing down. (There’s a lot in these, but particularly there’s a good amount of time devoted to Loki’s origin and how he came to be adopted by Odin.)

Thor by Kieron Gillen

Contains the leadup to and fallout from Siege, including Siege: Loki, a one-shot prequel that shows the deals Loki was cutting behind the scenes from his perspective.

Siege (aka the one where old Loki dies)

With the help of Norman Osborn’s Dark Avengers, Loki brings down new Asgard -- but the heroes bring chaos that not even Loki is prepared for.

Kid Loki

Thor: The World Eaters by Matt Fraction

In the wake of Siege, Thor misses his brother -- enough to bring him back from the dead, despite his many crimes.

Loki: Journey Into Mystery by Kieron Gillen (aka the Kid Loki ones)

The old Loki is dead and in his place is a new Loki, a child with no memories of his predecessor’s evil. But Asgard doesn’t trust him, and old Loki left behind plenty of schemes.

A+X 005

Loki manipulates Mr. Sinister into retrieving the sample of his DNA that Doom’s been using to try to clone him.

Young Avengers (2013) (aka Young freaking Avengers)

Loki schemes to manipulate a bunch of teenage superheroes into helping him regain his full power. Chaos (predictably) ensues.

Loki: Agent of Asgard

Marvel Now! Point One 001 (one-shot)

Loki hunts down a magic sword on the orders of the All-Mother of Asgard. A prequel to Loki: Agent of Asgard.

Loki: Agent of Asgard (aka THE Loki Comic)

Loki makes a deal with the All-Mother of Asgard: for every mission he takes on for them, they will strike one of old Loki’s crimes from the books. But he’s not the only one trying to rewrite his story.

Ms. Marvel 012 (one-shot)

(takes place during the first volume of AoA) Loki makes some mischief in the Valentine’s Day issue of Ms. Marvel.

(Original Sin) Thor and Loki: The Tenth Realm

(takes place between volumes 1 and 2 of AoA) Loki takes a break from dealing with the All-Mother’s missions by accompanying Thor on a mission to the sealed-off tenth realm to find their long-lost sister.

Angela: Asgard’s Assassin

(takes place after Original Sin but before AXIS) Loki has a brief part trying to help Thor hunt down their sisters when Angela steals Odin and Freyja’s new baby daughter, Laussa.

The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl 008

(takes place before the end of AoA but after AXIS -- the timeline is a little wonky here) Loki helps Squirrel Girl trap Ratatoskr -- never mind that he’s kind of the one that let her out to begin with!

Avengers & X-Men: AXIS

The inversion event is a big part of Agent of Asgard, but if you get the AoA trade paperbacks, it’ll be pretty well-covered. I haven’t yet read all of these.

Loki: God of Stories

The Mighty Thor (2015) (aka the Lady Thor ones)

Loki’s been out of the game for a while, but now he’s back doing the bad guy thing -- or is he?

Vote Loki

(takes place during -- and is referenced in -- the second volume of TMT) Loki runs for president.

All New Guardians of the Galaxy 012

Loki has a brief (but pretty!) cameo in which he impersonates Cable to prevent Drax from meeting the real one, and spies on the other Guardians as they meet other heroes, trying to track down the Infinity Stones. Kind of starts the ball rolling for Infinity Wars.

Marvel Legacy

(takes place during TMT) Loki gathers a group of frost giant runts -- the Black Ice Berserkers -- and sends them after a mysterious crate heavily guarded in a SHIELD warehouse, while Loki himself takes a trip to South Africa and makes a new friend. A prequel to Avengers (2018) and Infinity Wars (2018).

Loki: Sorcerer Supreme

Doctor Strange by Donny Cates (Volume 1: God of Magic) (Doctor Strange 381-385 aka Loki: Sorcerer Supreme)

In the aftermath of the Empirikul’s attack on magic, Loki takes on the mantle of Sorcerer Supreme.

The Amazing Spider-Man 795

The new Sorcerer Supreme asks for a little help from a certain friendly neighborhood superhero.

The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl (Volume 8: My Best Friend’s Squirrel)

When Tippy-Toe and Nancy Whitehead are abducted by squirrels from outer space, Squirrel Girl gets some help tracking them down from the Sorcerer Supreme. Space road trip? Space road trip.

Loki: ...Double-Agent of Asgard?

Thor by Jason Aaron (2018) (aka the one where they go to Hel)

In the aftermath of the Mangog’s attack on Asgard, Thor is trying to put a stop to Malekith’s War of the Realms and find himself worthy once more -- and Loki  is trying to help... probably. In the far future, things have taken a dark turn for the brothers, and not just because the universe seems to be dying!

Marvel Free Comic Book Day 2018

Odin entreats T’Challa to stop Loki’s plans to call down the Final Host. A prequel to Avengers (2018).

Avengers (2018) by Jason Aaron (Volume 1: The Final Host) (aka the one where he gets the band Avengers back together)

Loki calls down the Final Host, revealing the reason why Earth is such a hotspot for superpowers in the cosmos.

Infinity Countdown Prime

When Logan comes into possession of an Infinity Stone, Loki offers to take it off his hands. Another prequel to Infinity Wars (2018)

Infinity Wars Prime

Loki scours an ancient library for an answer to the question: why can’t he ever seem to win? Someone is pulling the strings of his story, and he’s determined to find out who. Still another prequel to Infinity Wars (2018).

Infinity Wars (2018) (aka the ones where he has a ponytail, finally.)

Aliens fighting over shiny rocks interrupt Loki’s existential crisis, so he does what he always does: puts together a team of superheroes.

Infinity Wars: Infinity

An epilogue to Infinity Wars. Demoralized after his jaunt into the Prime Universe, Loki is deciding what to do next when a fiery old acquaintance from the end of time drags him straight back into things. A prequel to Wolverine: Infinity Watch.

Asgardians of the Galaxy (aka holy shit what is HE doing here?!)

While Gamora’s playing Gotta Catch ‘Em All with the Infinity Stones, Nebula is determined to show that she’s still a contender for the title of “deadliest woman in the universe.” Angela and a motley crew of Asgardians (and adjacent) are out to stop her, but you’ll never guess who’s pulling their strings. (Well... something tells me you might have an inkling.)

Wolverine: Infinity Watch (aka one last hurrah before the shit hits the fan)

Old Logan finally reveals the reason Loki’s plans involving the Infinity Stones went awry and enlists his help to prevent a catastrophe.

The Unbeatable Squirrel-Girl #43-46

When Squirrel-Girl is unexpectedly teleported to New York during Malekith’s invasion, Loki sends her on a mission to destroy a secret Frost Giant base in Canada.

War of the Realms (aka what it’s all been leading up to)

Malekith is finally poised to take over Midgard with the help of his allies. Loki’s failure to stop the War of the Realms culminates in a final, tragic battle with his father -- Laufey, the King of Jotunheim.

War of the Realms: War Scrolls #2

Billy Kaplan has a brunch date with his old Young Avengers compatriot, Kate Bishop. She wants to talk about the good old days -- and what they’re going to do about Loki.

War of the Realms: Omega

What’s next for Loki? An epilogue to War of the Realms and a Prequel to Loki (2019).

Loki: King of Jotunheim

Loki (2019)

After Laufey’s fall in War of the Realms, there’s a power void in Jotunheim that Loki is all too happy to fill. Sorry, did I say happy...?

(to be continued)

Extra-Canon Comics

These aren’t part of the prime Marvel comics universe, but I think they’re noteworthy.

Thor and Loki: Blood Brothers (aka Loki (2004))

Loki has waged war on Asgard and won, and now he sits on Asgard’s throne. Odin and Thor are imprisoned, and all he has to do now is decide what to do with them. So why does he hesitate? An exploration of Loki’s character that definitely informs the movies and the comics, even if this comic itself isn’t canon. (Be warned if you’re looking for a lovely Tom-Hiddleston-esque Loki... this Loki is very, very much not that. This was yours truly’s very first Marvel comic~)

What If? Thor (2018) (aka what if Thor was raised by frost giants?)

The origins of Thor and Loki, in an alternate universe where Laufey defeats Odin and brings his son home to Jotunheim. At least as much -- if not more -- about Loki than Thor, honestly.

#save #guys I worked super hard on this #but people asked for a list of Loki comics and I have a lot of Loki comics and I love him #I know I just did this but here it is again #with screencaps!

[vanimy]

What a clusterfuck

Coming out of my self imposed exile because I had to get this off my chest. Beware. Rant ahead. Spoilers abound. You’ve been warned. 

Forget how I met your mother. Game of thrones takes the cake for Worst. Ending. Ever. 

I’m cackling at how everything was basically spoiled for weeks. I was hoping against hope the spoilers were deceiving, that maybe they shot several endings or there would be a last minute twist in the finale. At this point I would’ve rejoiced at Jon and Dany becoming Night King and Queen. 

But nope... the leaks were all true.

And I can’t even. 

I’m not even going to talk about the previous episode which was full of stupid clichés and featured a complete 180 for Daenerys, or the gigantic plot holes (like Drogon not even attacking anyone after his mother got killed) or the fact that Bran of all people is on the throne at the end. 

I’m going to focus on Jon and Dany because THIS is the hardest pill to swallow and one of the worst pieces of writing I’ve ever seen. 

I’ll start by saying that unlike other people I wasn’t opposed to angsty endings or tragic endings per se. I mean, Hamlet is my favorite Shakespeare play, I love Greek tragedies and I could go on and on. 

Heck, my OTP is Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader and Padmé Amidala and the guy choked his wife in their last scene together so... 

I’ll also mention I’m not opposed to powerful women being corrupted by power either. Heck I wrote an entire AU Star Wars fic with the woman in my OTP becoming a dark Empress. 

But you know what’s the difference here? 

Everything I just wrote about before, yep even my stupid little AU fic made for free in one corner of the Internet, MADE FUCKING SENSE. 

Everything was written to get to those points. Darth Vader’s downfall had been a long time coming, it was the whole damn point of the prequels in the first place and the older trilogy was about to give him a redemption arc. So when Anakin snapped and harmed the love of his life, the woman he had been doing everything for in the first place, it didn’t feel wrong. It hurt but it was logical, it MADE SENSE. Watching the guy I was rooting for become evil felt horrible but I actually empathized with both sides, the good guy who wanted to bring him down because he’d gone off the rails and the good guy turned bad guy.

And you know why I still empathized with the good guy turned bad guy? Because he still felt REAL. He cried after killing people, he showed remorse, he screamed in agony when he’d thought he’d killed his wife. He had a redemption arc later on. 

Here, NOTHING made sense. Daenerys’ fall wasn’t a long time coming contrary to what the writers want us to believe retroactively, especially in a world where EVERYONE has killed and executed left and right. There was NO sign of madness before the last two episodes. NONE.

Am I suddenly supposed to believe that Daenerys, who lived through tons of horrible things, who remained compassionate, who sacrificed her dragons and her people for a cause she believed in, who cried when Jon Snow deemed her his Queen, hoping she deserved it, whose good heart was what made Jon Snow fall for her, who was praised by Davos just in the premiere of this very season was a villain all along?? 

There was no reason for her to burn King’s Landing. No inner conflict was shown. Nothing. By then you could see Dany had ceased to be a full fledged character, she was written entirely from an outsider’s POV. She becomes mad because Jon rejects her (why BTW, we never get inside his head but that’s for later). And then after she snaps, there’s absolutely no remorse from Dany. We never get to witness remorse or sadness or conflict. Which goes to show how much this is badly written. Because you could get the exact same result but it would’ve been slightly better if only they showed Dany as a regular human being instead of an EVIL!QUEEN. 

And how about Jon? Am I supposed to believe that Jon Snow, HONORABLE Jon Snow, who never could harm the chick he barely knew when he was with the Wildlings, could suddenly kill the woman he loved all in the space of literally two minutes ? His family? While she’s open to him and trusts him? While he kisses her? 

KILLING HER THE EXACT SAME WAY HE WAS KILLED HIMSELF? BETRAYING HER IN THE EXACT SAME WAY HE WAS BETRAYED? 

Again, they could’ve written a scene with Jon killing her after IDK, telling her he couldn’t stay with her after what she’d done, Dany going crazy, him defending himself or having to kill her because she was literally killing Arya or Bran or whomever? It could’ve been written in a way that stayed true to the characters. Not that I would’ve loved it but it would’ve made a little more sense. 

See where I’m getting at? 

Shit writing. 

This show is so full of misogyny I can’t even. My sister is all like “but see Sansa’s Queen in the North so they can’t be misogynistic” and I want to rip my hair out. I’m so MAD. This show has been called out on its misogyny countless times from the  very beginning (one of the reasons I wasn’t watching in the first place) for glorifying rape. Here we have two main female characters being BOTH mad queens. The end features a male king and a council full of white men. Dany becomes EVIL with no self awareness, no redemption, nothing. Because her character doesn’t matter in the end. When I wrote my AU fic with my female character going dark, it wasn’t just about the man (it triggered in part his own redemption but that wasn’t the whole point), my character didn’t stop being a character because she was going dark, she had feelings still, agency, self awareness and then a redemption arc. Where is it for Dany? Heck, I disliked the way the X men movies depicted Jean Grey and Wolverine’s relationship and how they destroyed Jean in the X3 movie but AT LEAST she had a little agency when she died, she was given 2 seconds to beg for her death, 2 seconds for us to know she knew how far she’d fallen. Dany didn’t get to have that. She got nothing. After 8 fucking seasons. She got nothing. Only Jon and Tyrion are considered tragic heroes who had to do what needed to be done. She ceased to be a human being. She died in the first 30 minutes of the finale and didn’t even get a funeral. How can you not see this as misogynistic? How?

I’m going to talk about Jon Snow now. Because sure Dany got dirty but Jon sure did too despite what some fans might think. He was given literally NOTHING to do all season long, the whole twist of the whole saga with him being a secret Targaryen didn’t amount to anything, he wasn’t even given ONE scene to reflect on what it meant to him to be a Targaryen or the fact Ned wasn’t his father, HIS story conclusion, the Night King saga, was given to Arya, he came off as weak all season with two recycled lines of dialogue, he had no moment of bad assery in battle, he was made a fool  in the end since everyone and their dog were telling him Dany was eviiil and he didn’t believe them and he was wrong. He killed Dany in a cowardly way, betraying her and his oath, doing a 180 in the space of two minutes. He ends up being exiled going back to where he started. He was done dirty too. They betrayed everything about Jon. His loyalty, his need to do the right thing, the love he supposedly had for Dany. Everything. 

What I thought was constructed writing wasn’t there either. And that’s also a bitter pill to swallow. What was the point of foreshadowing a wedding between Jon and Dany the whole of season 7 and the premiere of this season? What was the point of foreshadowing a child? What was the point of bringing fire and ice together? Of the prince who was promised prophecy? What was the point of Jon (Jon who used to be the moral compass the same way Ned was) defending Dany constantly throughout the season? 

WHAT WAS THE POINT OF NED STARK DOING LITERALLY EVERYTHING HE DID? Like hiding Jon and defending Dany against Robert Baratheon ?

Was the moral of the story “Robert Baratheon was fucking right all along”? 

WHAT WAS THE POINT OF JON BEING A TARGARYEN? 

Remove that and you could’ve basically had the same fucking story. Jon could’ve rejected Dany because she was becoming cray-cray or because he couldn’t marry her or whatever. If he’d stayed a Snow it wouldn’t have changed anything. 

The only good thing I can see after this shitfest is how much I don’t regret never bothering watching the earlier seasons and removing myself a little from GOT before season 8 came out. Oh and the enraged reactions all over the world. That too. 

I’m still mad though. I can’t even picture what some of you might be going through after 8 seasons.  I’m sorry for you guys who spent years watching this shitshow. *hugs* 

#jonerys #got #got finale #jon snow #daenerys targaryen #bad writing #my tv shows reviews

[unavenged-robin]

Idk if this is already a request but Jason taking care of and bonding with injured Damian?

Later than I expected, but here we are. Trigger warning: mention of abuse.

“Stop moving.”

In response the kid flinches again under Jason’s touch and tries to give him a dirty look for it, but he seems somehow instantly aware that his usual glare is not as effective with his face almost cut in half and covered in bruises. He still clicks his tongue at him, though.

“Stop touching me then.”

Jason scoffs and grabs Damian’s chin between his thumb and forefinger, effectively preventing the boy from squirming.

“Unless you have recently developed a Wolverine-like healing factor that I don’t know of, I can’t do that”, he answers, while with his other hand he applies a generous dose of disinfectant to the cut that crosses Damian's cheek up almost to his forehead. Had the kid not had his domino on, he would’ve had to say goodbye to both his left eye and his depth perception.

Damian hisses at the motion and his hand shoots up to grab Jason's wrist. Little fingernails that feels like angry claws sinks into Jason’s skin, but he doesn’t complain.

“Sorry”, he offers.

“What do mustelidae have to do with this?”, Damian retorts. His grip around Jason's wrist loosens a little bit, but he doesn't let go of it.

Jason laughs as he brushes a wet cloth as gently as he can against the kid’s swollen skin.

“Don’t try that shit with me, kiddo”, he teases. “I know you've watched all the X-Men movies with your super buddy.”

Another click of the tongue.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Todd.”

“Sure you don’t”, Jason humors him. ”I have to stitch it now. Try to be very still, okay?”

“I’m not a child”, Damian spats at him, but his voice is bland and his words hold less indignation one would be expecting from him. On the other hand, his face is really a mess, and Jason’s been in the business long enough to know exactly how much pain the kid is in. Which is a lot.

It’s painful to even look at the brat right now, and had not Alfred personally asked him to look after Damian (please, Master Jason), he wouldn’t be here at all, adding necessary pain to the regrettingly avoidable one. He tries not to think about how bad the patrol went tonight for Bruce not to be able to prevent Damian from ending up like this.

It still makes him angry, though. Because if Batman cannot protect his Robin, then he shouldn’t have a Robin at all. (And if Bruce cannot protect his son, then he shouldn’t have a son at all). It’s an old, stale argument. One Jason loses every time. Especially with himself.

“Look at the bright side”, he says out loud, leaning closer to Damian and trying to divert his course of thoughts from the all-too-familiar topic. “You’re going to skip school for a few weeks at least.”

“That would be a good thing”, Damian agrees with a wince, as the needle starts biting into his flesh. “But Father would never let me get rid of that cursed place.”

“Mh, I think this time he will be forced to”, Jason hums, pushing Damian’s hair away from his forehead and working his way down the long cut.

Trying his best to be still (probably in fear that otherwise Jason is going to slip and blind him) Damian only blinks up with his good eye.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, you know”, Jason explains, slowly and without thinking, too focussed on both his handwork and in keeping his mind from wandering too much. “It’s not like you can go out in public like that. Your teachers would call the police or the social services.”

Damian frowns, and Jason stops just in time.

“Shit! Don’t do that!”

The kid swats his hand away and keeps glaring at him with one eye.

“Why would my teachers call the police?”, he asks, somewhat angrily. “I’m going to tell them that it was an accident and-”

“Kid, I can literally count the knuckles of the guy who punched you”, Jason scoffs as he grabs Damian’s face again. “You can’t sell it as anything else, they’re not that stupid, believe me.”

“Believe you on what? I don’t-”

“Do I really have to spell it out? They’re going to think that Bruce was the one who did it”, Jason cuts him off, and by the look he gets in return he feels like he’s just said that the sky is green and the clouds are made out of cotton candy. He raises an eyebrow at the kid. “A child going to school all bruised up, pretending it was some kind of accident in the shower? Kid, this is Gotham. People know how children get hurt here.”

Damian kicks him in the stomach hard and fast. It’s so unexpected that Jason ends up on his knees before even registering the burst of pain.

“What the fuck”, he shouts as Damian jumps down from the gurney and moves away from his reach, suture thread still hanging over his cheek from the last unfinished stitch, but fists already up in the air, ready to fight.

“Father would never do this!”, Damian yells back at him. “How dare you even think-”

“I never said that he would, you little psychopath!”, Jason yells again, propping himself up on his elbow.

“You suggested it!”

“I’m going to kill you”, Jason growls, standing up with a hiss and making his way through the cave and over to Damian. “I’m going to kill you and write on your death certificate “stupidity” as the cause of death.”

“You are the stupid one!”, Damian retorts with the exact level of maturity one could expect from a thirteen year old.

The angry tears shining at the corners of the kid’s eyes are the only reason Jason stops in his stride and doesn’t retaliate with a few, well deserved swats.

“Father would never do this”, Damian repeats and his voice wavers a little, giving a tilt of uncertainty to a statement that Jason would never, ever, deny. That no one should ever have to deny. Except, perhaps, children who were raised by abusive assholes. Except, perhaps, children who happen to have known the concept of violence before the concept of family. Except, perhaps, children like Damian. Or Jason.

So Jason stops, swears under his breath, rubs a hand over his face.

“Goddammit, kid”, he exhales tiredly, feeling like the biggest asshole ever. “Of course Bruce would never do that. I wasn’t talking about him, okay? I would never say something like that about Bruce.”

“You said-”

“I said the teachers were going to think that. But what do I know? You are definitely not going to the same school I used to. And even if you were, Bruce has enough money to pay for all the legal shitstorm that would follow, so what do I even care, you ask? Good question. The answer is: I don’t. Happy now?”

It comes out a little bit more angry than expected, and it takes a moment for it to click, but when it does, Jason sees it straightaway on the kid’s face. He knows that expression all too well. Saw it before, a long time ago, on the face of the kid’s father too. They’re almost identical, Jason realizes with a pang of something that could be either jealousy or affection.

And one the one hand, it’s a relief to know he’s not going to have to explain to this insufferable, spoiled, little brat that going to school with bruises to hide or justify wasn’t just a Robin thing for him, and that when it comes down to fatherhood there are worse thing than the Batman out there. But on the other hand, Jason’s not sure he likes the idea of having inadvertently overshared something so personal about his own past with the aforementioned insufferable, spoiled, little brat.

The awkward silence stretching between them suggests that Damian’s not very comfortable with the situation either. Which is very understandable, from Jason’s point of view.

“Sorry”, the kid mutters after a few more seconds of embarrassed silence.

“That’s not something you should apologize for”, Jason sighs.

“Sorry for kicking you”, Damian specifies with some reluctance.

“That you should apologize for”, Jason agrees, massaging his stomach. “And then some. Now come over here and let me finish those stitches. And maybe, if this time you really stay still, I won't kick you back. No promises though.”

#jason todd #damian wayne #tw: mentions of abuse #3k followers prompt meme #Anonymous #asks #shari writes #my fic