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batbabydamian · 4 months

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Hey, I started reading Robin son of Batman because of your recommendation (I literally have a print of your post on my phone to not forget lol). Honestly? One of the best things I ever read!!!

Thank you for opening my eyes! Damian has been one of my favorite characters for over a year, but I didn't read/watch much of him because of school, life (and probably an executive dysfunction in the mix).

Maya is incredible. I loved her.

I haven't finished all the issues yet, but do you have any other recommendations?

WAH this makes me so happy, i'm glad you still gave it a shot even with how busy life is!! ;v;

i’d love to give reccs, and i’ll try to go a beginner friendly route! tbh you can pick up whatever here, but since you've read R:SOB i’d immediately follow up with Batman and Robin (2011) #1-8! this first arc is what’s referred to in Maya’s introduction, and it's just. so good.

Main Books

Batman and Robin (2009)

Dick as Batman with Damian as his Robin!

#20-22 Tree of Blood: Dark Knight vs White Knight arc is done by Tomasi and Gleason, the team for the next Batman and Robin series

*Batman and Robin (2011)

Bruce and Damian figuring out their relationship as both Batman & Robin and father & son

imo you can enjoy the ride and read straight through this but i’ll add context to avoid as much confusion as possible since there’s the occasional tie-in or offscreen events, like Damian’s death nbd

Batman Incorporated (2012) #1-10

events leading to Damian's death - affects Batman and Robin (2011) from issue #18

kind of a tough read especially with how Talia's written, but a lot of iconic bits like Batcow, Damian's vegetarian declaration, Alfred the cat, "We Were the Best, Richard."

Robin (2021)

another self-discovery adventure, particularly after Alfred’s death and a fallout with Bruce (and questionable writing choices from his last Teen Titans run)

Batman and Robin (2023)

currently ongoing! after a number of events, Bruce and Damian are back as a duo

Damian Dynamics!

Batman: Streets of Gotham (2009) #7, 10-12

arc where Damian meets one of his first Gotham friends, Colin Wilkes

Batgirl (2009) #5-7, #17

Steph and Damian dynamic! "the bad cop, worse cop" dysfunctional duo

Red Robin (2009) #13-14

early Tim and Damian dynamic that of course includes fighting haha. funny enough, accidentally my first intro to Damian LOL

Teen Titans (2003) #89-92

Dick!Batman has Damian join the Teen Titans. Start of Damian and Rose Wilson dynamic that’s extended in Robin (2021)

Batman: Gates of Gotham (2011)

Damian meets Cass and has a brief team up

Gotham Academy (2015) #7

Damian meets Maps Mizoguchi! they have a few other meetings, but outside of that the series itself is a great read!

Robin War Event (2015)

Robin War (2015) #1, Grayson (2014) #15, Detective Comics (2011) #47, We Are Robin (2015) #7, Robin: Son of Batman (2015) #7, Robin War (2015) #2

Duke and Damian dynamic! not exactly beginner friendly but these are the main issues in order for the event! you can also read the TPB version for everything including Tie-Ins

Nightwing (2016) #16-20, #42, #43

#16-20 Nightwing and Robin arc!

#42 Dick on a mission to save Damian! the one appearance of "Wiggles" the dragon

#43 Dick, Roy, and Damian team-up

New Talent Showcase 2018 "Catwoman: Pedigree"

Selina, Damian, and Alfred the cat

Batman: Prelude to the Wedding - Robin vs. Ra's Al Ghul (2018)

Selina, Damian, and Cheese Viking - Damian's fav game shown in Nightwing: Rebirth (2016)

Monkey Prince (2022) #1-4

Marcus Sun Shugel-Shen's main comic, but Damian features as a fun dynamic here before they're in more serious circumstances in Batman VS Robin (2022)/Lazarus Planet event

Superman (2016) #10 - 11

the beginning of the Super Sons! featuring Maya!

Super Sons (2017)

solitary arcs but there’s a few event tie-in issues later

Adventures of the Super Sons (2018)

literally more Super Sons adventures lol galactic shenanigans yeehaw

Challenge of the Super Sons (2020)

Super Sons time shenanigans feat. the Justice League

Robin 80th Anniversary (2020)

"Boy Wonders" - brief Damian feature as Tim considers his next step in life

"My Best Friend" - Jon's thoughts on Damian and their dynamic

"Bat and Mouse" - refers to Damian's unfortunate Teen Titans (2016) run at the time of release which follows up with Teen Titans Annual #2 where Damian briefly gives up Robin

Extra Comics!

Superman/Batman (2003) #77

Kara and Damian in a Halloween team-up! also the appearance of "Li'l Matches" lol

DCU Halloween Special '09 "Cavity Search"

Damian out on a solo mission for Halloween night. Immediately after is Tim's Red Robin story "Then and Now: Our Father's Sins" which is more somber in contrast but also a good read!

DCU Halloween Special 2010 "Robin the Vampire Slayer"

a Dick!Batman and Robin story featuring the vampire Andrew Bennett

Cursed Comics Cavalcade (2018) "The Devil You Know"

Halloween themed comic with a sweet short story of Damian alongside Solomon Grundy

DC's Terrors Through Time (2022)

"Trick or Treat" a Super Sons Halloween story

"The Haunting of Wayne Manor" Damian and Deadman story - in the end, Boston kinda refers to Nezha's possession of Damian in Batman VS Robin (2022) which was happening at the time of this release

Batman: Li'l Gotham (2013)

lighthearted series that instantly makes me smile with the silliness and Dustin Nguyen’s art i love this dearly

Secret Origins (2014) #4 "A Boy's Life"

a retelling of Damian's origin story

Detective Comics (2016) #1001-1005

Batman and Robin vs the Arkham Knight (unrelated to the game)

Truth & Justice (2021) #6/#16 - 18 Digital First version

cute story of Damian’s birthday! Juni Ba’s art is so fun!!

DC Festival of Heroes: The Asian Superhero Celebration (2021) “Special Delivery”

short story about Damian! and poisoned pizzas. completely forgot the artist Sami Basri drew Rebirth Damian here before catboy Damian lol Cass’s story “Sounds” is also cute! Marcus makes his first appearance in "The Monkey Prince Hates Superheroes"

DC VS Vampires (2021)

Damian makes appearances throughout this elseworlds book, but the one-shot DC VS Vampires: Hunters (2022) is vampire Damian-centric!

Batman: Black and White (2021) #5

“Father & Son Outing” short story written and drawn by Jorge Jimenez!

Batman: Urban Legends (2021) #20-23

#20 “My Son” Talia and Bruce focus

#20 - 23 “The Murder Club” 4 Parts

Tiny Titans (2008) #33, #39, #45, #47

a few appearances but SO CUTE, LOOK AT HIM

*Batman and Robin (2011) reading guide

i'm mostly trying to avoid the "what did i just walk in on?" kinda feeling when i first started reading comics LOL i'll list the comics where events take place, but you don't necessarily have to read them to go through this book since things are usually explained as quickly as possible in the first page or so

#0 Someday Never Comes

Talia and baby Damian before he grows up to meet Bruce

#1-8 Born to Kill

just an incredibly solid arc for Bruce and Damian!

#9 Court of Owls Tie-In Issue

Damian VS a Court of Owls Talon. While Bruce is occupied with a home invasion of Talons, Alfred makes a call for allies to protect targeted Gotham public figures from Talons. During Batman (2011) #1-11

#10-12 Terminus

Damian challenges the previous Robins sans Steph

Batman Incorporated (2012) is occurring at this time where Talia has placed a bounty on Damian and there's small mentions of that

#13-14 Eclipsed/Devoured

mostly solitary arc! end of it leads into the Death of the Family event

#15-16 Death of the Family Tie-In Issues

Damian and Joker face-off... Alfred's been kidnapped by the Joker, and Damian goes looking for him. During Batman (2011) #13-17

#17 Life is but a Dream - Death of the Family Epilogue

a sort of subconscious check-in through the dreams of Damian, Alfred, and Bruce. Nightwing (2011) #17 features Damian encouraging Dick after Death of the Family events

#18 Undone "Requiem"

Bruce dealing with Damian's death from Batman Incorporated #8

other reactions to Damian's death: Dick in Nightwing (2011) #18, Tim in Teen Titans (2011) #18

#19-23 Denial, Rage, The Bargain, Despair, Acceptance

Bruce through the stages of grief with some batfam appearances in each. also introduces Carrie Kelley into continuity as Damian's acting tutor.

Batman (2011) #19-20 also addresses Bruce's loss

#23.1-23.4

these could be skipped - villain stories, also related to Forever Evil event.

#24-28 The Big Burn

optional Batman and Two-Face/Harvey Dent arc, #23.1 is part of this story!

Damian's resurrection and return

#29-32 The Hunt for Robin

Ras took Talia and Damian's bodies from their graves, and Bruce goes after him.

-> Robin Rises: Omega

continues events from #32. if you don't want to jump to this, basically, Glorious Godfrey and a bunch of parademons from Apokolips are here for a chaos shard which Ra's put in Damian's sarcophagus. at some point, Bruce gets a hold of the shard where he sees a vision that leads him to believe Damian can be resurrected. Godfrey ends up taking the shard, along with Damian's body since it was emitting the same energy.

#33-37 Robin Rises

Bruce hellbent on retrieving Damian from Apokolips and reviving him

-> Robin Rises: Alpha

necessary to read and continues events from #37! Damian's back with a bang lol

#38-40 Superpower

Damian adjusting to having superpowers and being alive again

Annual #1 2013 Batman Impossible

sweet (and funny) one-shot of Damian sending Bruce on a meaningful scavenger hunt around the world while Damian gets to be the cutest Batman for a bit

Annual #2 2014 Batman and Robin: Week One

one-shot takes place during Damian's absence. after Bruce and Alfred find a mystery gift left for Dick, Dick recounts a story he had told Damian from his Robin days.

Annual #3 2015 Moonshot

one-shot Batman and Robin adventure on the moon!

...and of course after Batman and Robin (2011), Damian's story continues in his first solo Robin: Son of Batman (2015)!

#damian wayne #ask #sorry for R:SOB promo again but i need this title attached to Damian's name as much as B&R 2009/2011😭#thank you for the ask anon!! really am so happy you were able to find the time to read RSOB and enjoy it!! i genuinely cheered 😭#i hope some of these comics give you many emotions and/or a smile!! <3 #if anyone would like to correct something or include some Damian comics please feel free to comment or add to the post!!#sorry if the reading guide is an intimidating wall of text hhh after i finished it i was like...this does not look beginner friendly LOL 😭#Damian's Teen Titans run is beginner friendly but it's so frustrating to read his character being regressed especially after RSOB #ig i would only recc the first 5 issues just for Mara asdsfg #super/bat 77 comic rlly made me wonder how Williamson could've made Damian sound so stiff now compared to his first time writing him?? rip.#also i love how there's so many Halloween stories here lol #maybe?? i'll do a guide for Damian's intro since those were the most confusing for me when i really got into his comics #i think his most recent appearances are a bit easier to figure out on your own but i don't mind doing a guide for that too if needed!#OOF tags got long lol i may be a bit nervous posting this bc i'd like ppl to read more Damian but worried i may have goofed somewhere #but hopefully this is helpful to anyone curious about peeking at his comics!!

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yorufi · 2 months

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re-upload ;;

i accidentally posted video instead of a picture

#reverse 1999 #r1999 #tooth fairy reverse 1999 #madam z reverse 1999 #tootz #madam z x tooth fairy #re1999 #wlw #artists on tumblr #rip my tags full of my yapping about this ship #i still stand by me saying that i would love their ship name alternative to be ‘bellzhang’#or zhangbell #and also i am really curious about anyone’s headcanons about tf first name #because mine is Mary and Marina #love me some m names #can you tell im hyper #audhd brain going brr brrr #okay go do daily click on arab.org 🫵🫵🫵

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irrealisms · 11 months

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tagged by @arisingonmorningsinnocent

Rules: shuffle your On Repeat playlist and post the first 10 tracks, then tag 10 people

It's All Futile! It's All Pointless! by Lovejoy

In the Shadow of the Western Hills by the Mountain Goats

Nobody by the Crane Wives

Achilles Come Down by Gang of Youths

Never Quite Free by the Mountain Goats

A Burning Hill by Mitski

Hast Thou Considered the Tetrapod by the Mountain Goats

Be Calm by Fun.

Autoclave by the Mountain Goats

His Theme by Toby Fox

tagging @spiritunwilling @circuit77 @risingape @existentialterror @scientificalstories @erstwhilesparrow @adhdo5 @roundearthsociety @lepertamar @wolffyluna and anyone who sees this and wants to-- feel free to say i tagged you ^_^ and on the flip side if you were tagged and don't want to do it feel free to not!

#this is to say: i have pretty basic taste EXCEPT when it comes to the mountain goats. i have good tmg-related taste #which is related to tmg songs being 40% of the list #also i want to listen to in the shadow of the western hills a couple times now #feral cats out by the trash cans / to the true believer everything's a sign! scrape the pigments from the baseboards #therapists dni #trying to decide on people to tag was so hard bro ;-; what a joyous difficulty though!#o to have Too Many people on tumblr you're friends with and curious about the music tastes of!#i considered tagging mutuals i haven't talked as much to as well but i am too shy... alas #know that if you are my mutual i am tagging you in my heart & curious about your music taste though

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jamiesfootball · 1 month

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Technically the Richmond coaches had two chances to move Jamie to center and then didn’t take it: once when Zava showed up and once when they switched everyone at practice.

Both times they assumed he wouldn’t do it

At the very least we know he was willing to do it the second time (he even asked if they meant to give him the same position), but honestly? The Jamie who came to them worried about the effect of Zava on the team might’ve done it too. He is well on board with being a team player at that point, which he also demonstrated many times in season two. He probably would’ve been hurt by it, but he would’ve agreed to do it

(Then we could’ve had a whole season deconstructing how Jamie conflates scoring with winning with value in a way that really isn’t healthy but I digress)

For the record I don’t think this would have fixed anything. They probably would’ve figured out how effective Jamie is in midfield sooner, but they still would’ve had Zava, and after Zava there would’ve been the tension of whether to keep Jamie where he was or have him step back up to striker, especially since they weren’t doing total football yet. In a lot of ways, having Jamie step up and volunteer for it later really sidesteps a lot of drama

I’m more so lamenting the fact that with Jamie, when it came to ‘be curious not judgmental, they chose to remain judgmental of his past behavior instead of curious about his new ones.

#one of my big issues with season three is how ted really stops being curious about people #season one ted was all about giving people the opportunity to step up #jamie tartt #ted lasso #have I complained about the same thing before? also yes #would doing this have fixed season three? not really #so much of season three suffers from just. lack of payoff #which is why it’s so infuriating #there’s no one easy way to ‘fix’ the problems with season three because the problems are all baked into each other #oh you can identify points where the release of tension could’ve been more meaningful #but none of that fixes the shape the conflict took in the first place #anyways #ted lasso meta #I really am enjoying my rewatch of season three more than I thought I would

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words-writ-in-starlight · 11 months

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You could say that I have strong feelings about this ongoing debate

#critical role #we can all have coffee on Ludinus' grave and debate the nature of morality until we're blue in the face. but priorities.#cr spoilers #bell's hells #HHHHHHH false dichotomies are not a friend #the choice is not a binary Gods Or Predathos #and you should not pick Predathos just because you don't like the other option!!!!!#anyway i have uhhhh 15 memes that i made tonight because that is who i am as a person #also. also. hey. guys. everybody.#if your philosophical debate is leading you to go 'idk maybe the murderers are onto something'#boy HOWDY you better have the information to back that up!#the thing is I'm not mad this devate is happening i think it's very realistic that people would get caught up in this debate given the given #i have just painstakingly cultivated the ability to have an argument and i have strong feelings about rhetoric #[bangs on a pot lid with a spoon] CONSIDER ALL ANGLES BEFORE YOU DOUBLE DOWN ON A POSITION #if you're curious #yes i am EXACTLY like this in a real life argument i have been told i am infuriating to argue with #both because of my love of Sources and because of my need to be absolutely dead sure of something before i get in a fight about it #which have the annoying tendency to make me like. not lose a lot of fights.

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beanghostprincess · 5 months

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I wanna know who your favorite vinsmoke sibling is so bad actually please tell me 👀✨

My friend and my brother laughed at me when I told them my favorite Vinsmoke is Niji, and I genuinely was embarrassed that day because I didn't really know much about him at the time (I think I had only watched a few eps of WCI) and it's pretty clear in the show that he's, uh, the worst of the Vinsmokes. And by "the worst" I mean: The one who's portrayed as the worst because he's the most active one when it comes to abuse and supremacism within the family line. Unlike Ichiji (who's more serious) and Yonji (who's more playful, somehow) Niji is the one who has to actually fight for a role in his family and that's why I think he's so fucking annoying all the damn time. I hate him. I love him. I want to hug him. But also I wouldn't mind punching him very, very hard. I have mixed feelings, but yeah, Niji is my favorite Vinsmoke. And you haven't asked why, but I feel the need to do some sort of mini argument about this because I am a very resentful person and I want to show my friend and my brother that Niji is actually a very interesting character!! And my fiancé thinks I just like him because he's hot, and she's right but only like a 20%. Maybe 40%.

I will try to put my thoughts into words, but it's pretty difficult because I have a lot of things to say about this blue evil gremlin.

I like Niji the most because I think he is, between the three brothers, the one who shows feelings and ambitions outside their emotionless selves the most. I know they technically are the same, but I don't think so (btw, please assume I'm not including Reiju in this text because she's canonically different from them and I'm just referring to the brothers).

As I mentioned before, I think Niji is the one brother who is the most annoying and evil because he feels the need to stand out. Ichiji is serious, and calculative and has a secure place in the family. He is the number one, even if Reiju is the oldest (I would like to talk more about how Reiju, being a woman, even if she's the oldest, she's the number 0. Because she is the oldest but she's a woman, so she obviously doesn't and would not be able to wear the number 1 like a man would. She is the oldest and yet, she has less significance in the family line than Ichiji. But, yeah, this is something that has nothing to do with Niji, sorry). Ichiji, like all of his siblings, wants recognition from his father, but he doesn't have to try as hard as the others to be impressive because he is, after all, the oldest. The typical "older sibling in an abusive household who has to deal with all the bullshit to protect their siblings"? That's something Reiju took over. That's Reiju's responsibility as the oldest and the woman. Ichiji literally doesn't have to do anything besides leading the team and being the evil, emotionless machine his father created. That does not mean that I don't think he could be able to develop more feelings, because I think he could and I love the concept of him being the first one to protest against Judge's behavior, but you get me. When you're the oldest brother with an even older sister, your responsibilities are pretty limited. So he doesn't have to be anything but there and himself.

Yonji, on the other hand... He is the youngest. Even younger than Sanji. He doesn't have to try, because Niji and Sanji should be the ones to do so. Little siblings are not expected to do much besides existing because irl parents are usually tired of raising children and they end up either getting neglected or seen as decoration. As a little sibling myself I can confirm that these things affect really badly to your brain growing up, but I got a more Sanji treatment so I can't speak for Yonji here. The thing I can say, though, is that in comparison to Niji, Yonji is just there. He's silly and goofy. He's funny. He's dumb. He has the excuse of being the little one to act that way. Getting lost eating or doing whatever. Even the fact that his powers are more physically focused instead of power/intelligence centered shows that he can just punch away his issues. He's the gym bro of the siblings. Don't expect much from him. <- Thing that's often said about little siblings, btw, and affects real fucking badly in early teenage years. The fact that he's portrayed like that is so on point tbh but after all, they don't have high expectations for him, so little to no effort is everything he does.

Then there's Niji, of course. My favorite. Love him. Hate him. Whatever. Niji is the middle child. And God, do I have to say things about middle siblings.

The thing about Niji is that he actually has to try and make a name for himself in the family because otherwise he'll probably get forgotten. I often wonder if he had that fear of becoming the next Sanji once he "died" (he's the only one genuinely asking if Sanji died on them before Yonji and Ichiji say they don't care) because his role is not as noticeable as the others. Reiju is the woman, Ichiji is the successor, Sanji is the weakling getting bullied (being technically one of the little siblings but still being in a limbo of middle/youngest because the little one is Yonji), and Yonji is the little one. Then... What's Niji?

Niji needs Sanji way more than he's willing to admit, and I love that. I absolutely love how he's written because he constantly shows that he needs Sanji, through both words and actions. He needs him because without Sanji's existence -without Niji being his bully- Niji is nothing but number 2. And there's nothing more frustrating than being the number two when it comes to family hierarchy. Not going to mention every little thing he does, but as I said, I love how well-written he is. He's the sibling Oda uses the most to show the abuse Sanji went through, but that's only because Niji is the only one who needs to do that. Niji is the one to talk to Sanji first, all the damn time. He gets angry when Sanji doesn't respond. He gets angry because Sanji can't be bullied anymore. He gets angry out of fear, in my opinion, because if the weakling can't get abused anymore, then he's not worth anything. If Sanji isn't the third, the second one is left alone. 2 can't fight 1 because 1 has the protection of starting the line. And 2 can't fight 4 because there's a missing link that keeps 2 from 4. So Niji is mad at Sanji because Sanji isn't the same weak crybaby he used to be, and he can't use him anymore to be secure and safe.

That's fucking horrifying when it comes to family hierarchy.

I like Niji because, despite being an asshole, he has reasons to be like that. First of all, because his father literally made him this way. But also, the little feelings he has (selfish emotions, yes, evil. But they're feelings, anyway. Urges. He's supposed to be emotionless and yet he knows how Sanji feels enough to use that to his advantage) are used as a way to feel superior and safe because he feels inferior. I think he's the one showing more emotions out of the three, even if those emotions aren't healthy or good and it's just him being angry all the time. That means that if he has urges and needs like that, even if he doesn't fear his own death, he could end up developing more and more empathy. His type of empathy comes from a place of fear. He feels what Sanji feels. And it's not that he doesn't care (I mean, I am aware that he technically doesn't, but let me dream) but it's just convenient for him not to care and keep bullying him to secure his place in the family.

Also pointing out that I like Niji because, being the one who says he hates Sanji the most, he's the one to protect him with his own body when that scene of the siblings helping Sanji escape happens. The others only clear the way, Niji stays with him. There's a really cool post about this on Niji's tag somewhere!!! I personally think he does this because, as that post said: Niji keeps seeing Sanji as weak, instead of believing in him enough to just clear the way. He protects him because he thinks he can't protect himself. Because he's weak.

And yes, it might sound offensive and emotionless and it doesn't make Niji a better person. But it makes him an older brother. Believing in Sanji would be great, but thinking that he's weak and needs protection after years of projecting on him only shows that the weak one is Niji. That he wants and is willing to protect his brother, too. If he didn't care about his well-being he would've just cleared the way for him, not caring about what could've happened to Sanji. But he goes all the way to help him out and protect him longer than the others did. Idk. I find that a very beautiful way of ending their relationship.

All of this being said, I have to be honest with you: When I said I liked Niji for the first time I only did it because people around me kept saying he was the worst one and it bothered me because I found his design pretty fucking cool. And tbh when he started being an actual character? I loved him even more. Because during WCI he's a fucking asshole but the way he acts towards Sanji is wanting to get a response from him, and I just find that so curious and complex... Like, if he just wanted to be evil he'd be more the Doflamingo type. But Niji looks for a response in Sanji's eyes. He wants to feel powerful because he knows he isn't.

And also, well, he's very cute and I like his hair a lot and he makes me furious sometimes which is great because if a character doesn't make you want to punch him at one point, is he really a good character? Look at him! He deserves to get slapped in the face. But also, I would love to kiss him afterward. What's that Olivia Rodrigo lyric? Ah, yes: "I wanna break his heart, then be the one to stitch it up. Wanna kiss his face with an uppercut." That's how I feel about him.

I really hope it's obvious, with all of this, that "Succession" is one of my favorite TV Shows, because I could go on and on and on (and nobody would listen but idc) about how the Vinsmokes are just the Roy family. Both One Piece and Succession deal with family in which hierarchy is crucial in a very specific and accurate way. It makes me sick. I love it.

Anyway, have some pics of my blue idiot:

I want to hit him in the head with a baseball bat.

#i am indeed so not normal about niji #the fact that i don't talk more about him is just out of fear of cancellation #because i know he's an asshole but have you considered that his father is an even bigger asshole for making him this way #he has blue hair and pronouns #also i am so not normal about the other siblings i could rant for hours about reiju bc she reminds me so much of my brother #i can go into heavy detail as a sanji kinnie about all of them ngl #my least favorite is yonji but i don't have anything against him i just don't like gym bros but he's a cutie pie #if you're curious my top is niji > reiju > ichiji > yonji #the reason i like reiju is bc she reminds me of my brother and the reason why she's not the first one is bc she reminds me of my brother #one piece #vinsmoke niji #vinsmoke ichiji #vinsmoke yonji #vinsmoke reiju #vinsmoke siblings #germa 66 #black leg sanji

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batsplat · 12 days

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Chad reed on always the entourages creating the drama. I cannot believe that is what caused rosquez downfall but also given the level of Vale's celebrity and the way he carried himself, I can totally believe that it was the entourage (iPad stand I'm looking at you) that brought the end

(about reed's 2020 quotes in this) yeahhh I mean the downfall was caused by a whole bunch of factors, not just any one thing... like all great tragic narratives, it feels inevitable from a global perspective and yet thoroughly preventable in its specifics, with loads of points where you think, 'oh, if things had just gone a little bit differently'... there's this tension in how, in the end, maybe it would've always gone wrong, but a lot had to come together for it to go wrong in quite such a spectacular fashion

reed's definitely correctly identified one of the factors - the entourages, and valentino's entourage specifically. though fwiw, I did cut off the article before reed predicted the marc/fabio rivalry was headed a similar way (this was from 2020, obviously before the arm injury):

for better or for worse, fabio has skipped the villain arc to head straight to the depressed frenchie arc

regardless of whether this rift would have happened or not, the idea that marc would have gotten a new appreciation for the situation valentino found himself in is at least an interesting one. though if anything, the rivalry with fabio would have more closely paralleled valentino's with the other aliens (new talent coming through, but with the previously dominant rider still a regular winner). now is the time marc's learning what it feels like to come back from a prolonged absence from being competitive at the highest level - and of course with a new superstar simultaneously making his debut

so yeah, anyway, tragedy, you can point to all sorts of strains and pressures and tension inherent to professional sport that were exacerbated by the personalities involved and the influence of the media and the passage of time etc etc. but never mind all that, let's get back to entourages! I know you mention everybody's favourite b-list shakespeare villain, but I'm going to basically mostly ignore him because it's well-trodden ground. yeah, it does help to have one guy who's whispering poison into your ear for a prolonged stretch of time before showing up at your motorhome doorstep with a bunch of telemetry and a dream. and yeah, there were people in valentino's entourage definitely encouraging this path to doom. but what I'm also interested in is the flip side - why nobody stopped him

I would like to submit into evidence this passage detailing the thoughts of vale's mechanic alex briggs. now briggs in this excerpt blames two groups for how things went down in 2015:

the yamaha side (specifically the press group) for not talking him down from the ledge before the presser

the crew chief and other assorted italians on the team for being too "yessy" and not standing up to him

let's briefly (for a given value of the word) focus on the first one. if you're a random yamaha pr person and you see the valentino rossi run to a press conference (given he was late) with a bunch of papers in his hands (well, he's not actually holding the papers in those gifs, but presumably somebody's got them), it's probably a tough ask to expect you to hold up the valentino rossi and ask him what exactly he's intending to do with those papers. also, is he really going to back off because you, random yamaha pr person, have asked him to please not accuse the competition of sabotage? added context is that some at yamaha were aware of what valentino thought about the race at phillip island (which we'll get to in a sec), but god knows if the pr people did. unless he confided in anyone on the yamaha side what the plan was, a lot of them would have been blindsided too - which does come back to the problem of how big a deal valentino is and how maybe you're a little more cautious about questioning what he's about to do with those papers than you would be with somebody else. it does feel like perhaps a bit too much to expect for them to have launched some last-minute intervention, or to even know what kind of intervention they could have gone for beyond low-level comedy hijinks to stop him from even getting to that room. why did nobody from yamaha place a banana skin in his path

but we do know that at least some in yamaha were aware of valentino's great big phillip island sabotage theory, because lin jarvis has very helpfully told us as much (from the post-sepang media scrum):

Q: Do you think it was a mistake for Valentino to [provoke?] Marc so much on Thursday with a very personal and hard attack? Jarvis: There are always many different ways of addressing different problems - Valentino chose to do it in that way. Perhaps that is what provoked Marc into being quite aggressive on the track. I really don't know, you need to ask Marc not me about that. Every action has a consequence. That's life. Q: And did you know before that Valentino was going to be so aggressive with Marc in the press conference? Did you know before? Did you discuss with Valentino about this decision or you didn't know until it happened? Jarvis: Personally, I was not aware of that. I was aware of Valentino's opinion of the race in Australia, but I was not aware... but I was not aware that he would - Q: Don't you think because Valentino at the end of the day is an employee of Yamaha he should discuss before with you about such an important decision, to attack a rider of another factory in such a heavy way [...]? Jarvis: You can't control every incident, everything that happens and you know, generally we have a very good [...] relation, connection with our riders, we talk to them before about things before, but anyway I think this is something Valentino felt strongly about and it was his decision and that's it.

note the use of the word "personally", which does leave the door open to others within yamaha (outside of valentino's inner circle) knowing what was going to happen. jarvis, unsurprisingly, comes down pretty firmly on the side of 'well what were we supposed to do'. given that jarvis admits he knew valentino's theory and is hardly a stranger to valentino's modus operandi - after all, he was already team boss at the time of another tense press conference in sepang eleven years prior that took place in the wake of valentino accusing a competitor of messing with him - you do have to wonder whether yamaha could not have tried a little harder to stop valentino. but again, accounting for the power of valentino's status and the power of his character, I'm personally unconvinced yamaha could've done much to convince valentino to change his mind

so then: the italians. a little bit of context - briggs started working with crew chief jerry burgess in 1994 and both of them were on mick doohan's team for all of his five 500cc titles. when doohan's injuries forced his retirement, valentino inherited his championship-winning team upon moving up to 500cc. jb was vale's very first crew chief in the premier class, and him as well as briggs have been working with vale since december 1999. understandably, this is a very tightly-knit group. it is one that made the jump to yamaha with valentino - here's just a quick excerpt (also from oxley's valentino rossi: all his races) about briggs' thoughts on that move:

When Valentino decided to defect to Yamaha, he was determined to have his crew go with him. Only one stayed at HRC. "We first got to know about the Yamaha deal in Portugal, I think [September 2003]," Briggs continues. "I wanted to stay with JB, because I hadn't finished learning what I wanted to learn. "I remember a clandestine meeting in the car park at Phillip Island, about salaries and how everything was going to work. It was really exciting. When I very first started working with Honda the whole group was very much a team. Towards the end we felt like it started to become a bit us and them: the engineers and management, then the mechanics and the riders. They'd sort of got too big for their boots - they'd designed this wonderful bike, so it was like it had nothing to do with us. That made it easier to leave.

and also about the move to yamaha, from the 2020 barker biography of valentino:

But with his trusted crew chief Jerry Burgess and most of his other team members from the Honda garage agreeing to defect with him, Rossi had the crew he needed, not only to win but also to enjoy his racing. It was a heartening display of loyalty and something of a risk for all involved. ‘When I announced to the mechanics that I was going with Valentino they said, “I’m coming too,”’ Burgess later explained. ‘Some of those guys were leaving very secure jobs and taking a big gamble.’

the group also survived the move to ducati (obviously a deeply frustrating two years not just for the guy riding the bike) and the move back to yamaha. but then, valencia 2013, valentino announced his decision to fire jb in a press conference organised for the pair of them. his 2013 season had been deeply frustrating - yes, he had gotten a podium in his first race beating both marc and dani, but after that generally speaking he couldn't come close to matching the other aliens when healthy. he was comfortably the fourth best rider that year, scrapping and clawing his way through midfield battles and having to rely on misfortunes befalling the three title contenders to achieve his podiums and his sole victory at assen. he was considering retiring at the end of the 2014 season once his current contract expired, but wanted to try everything he could to see whether he could be competitive again against the world's very best. and so, he made the decision to roll the dice and get himself a new crew chief, the italian silvano galbusera

now I have to say, personally I have a lot of time for this decision (even if it was maybe not... uh, enacted in the most graceful of manners, given how sudden it was). I come from a sports background where a certain ruthlessness in personnel decisions is encouraged and generally praised - if something isn't working, you should have the courage to make a change, even if it's deeply uncomfortable (including on an interpersonal level). also, while it was a sudden departure, it's not like burgess was that keen on sticking around much longer (again from the same oxley book):

Valentino ended his collaboration very suddenly at the end of 2013. Burgess was shocked but not too much, because he already knew that he was coming to the end of his own career. "When it ended for me I'd already been doing it 30-odd years and I'd told Valentino a few weeks earlier that I wasn't going to sign any more multi-year contracts. I was 60 by then, so I'd go year by year. I'd already signed a contract for 2014, but I would've thought if we hadn't had any more success by then that there wasn't much point in continuing. I felt we would win more races but I was more doubtful about championships. "I'd read enough sporting biographies to know that sportsmen change their coaches towards the end of their careers. It can give them a spike in results but it doesn't change the overall story. Looking back, Valentino's career went on longer than I expected. He enjoyed some success but no more championships and that's what you race for. Of course he was in the unique position of being able to get a factory bike until he retired. He was very special and deserved everything he got."

which, look. again, personal bias, but to me it's reasonable to part ways with somebody who doesn't think any more titles are plausible, because at that point it's just somebody who has a very different view on your career than you do and may well not stick around for much longer anyway. also, at the end of the day, jb was wrong! valentino came extremely close to winning another title, and just because he didn't, doesn't change the fact he could have. if it had rained on the 8th of november 2015 in valencia, we might be having a very different conversation. (or if they hadn't changed the bloody qualifying format post-2012.) honestly, if the 2016 and to a lesser extent the 2017 season had gone just a little differently - a working bike in mugello here and an unbroken leg there - he could have been a genuine title threat in two more seasons. in any case, what it does show is that valentino even at the end of 2013 was still as determined as ever, was ready to engage in what was a huge gamble (given how almost all his success had come with the highly decorated jb) on the off chance he might find what it took to win again. this will not have been an easy decision for valentino. here's a write-up of the presser at valencia, that stresses how uncomfortable the occasion was, how surprising a decision it was to jb, but how publicly at least there was a lack of recriminations (which, to be fair, wouldn't be much fun to do in a shared presser):

(you'll note that the phrasing in the presser about athletes attempting to extend their carrers by changing things up is echoed in what he says in that book interview where he adds that it doesn't change the overall story, again suggesting he didn't really believe valentino would be competitive. he also uses the same phrasing in ANOTHER interview that confirms as much, but I think you get the point.) valentino said at the time, "it was a very difficult decision for me because I have a great history with jeremy. he is not just my chief mechanic. he is like part of my family. my father in racing". this is somebody he'd been working with since age 21, somebody who is not only revered within the paddock for his work with several of the sport's greats but is also a man who valentino obviously has a close personal connection to. meeting for the first time when vale snuck into the honda pit to check out the bike he might ride next season, hitting it off immediately, countless rowdy dinners together, parties, jb and another older colleague sitting back when food fights started, watching valentino grow up, working with him throughout all his big manufacturer switches, all his successes and all his failures... as much as anything else, it's evidence of how strong vale's desire to win was, how determined he continued to be, to make this choice at this stage of his career. and jb was open to the idea (at least publicly) that it might end up being a smart call:

the 'dirtiest' part of the whole affair is how it was actually carried out - it's not great form to tell your crew chief the day before you end up doing a press conference together to announce your choice. for whatever it's worth, this is how valentino justified the timeline:

and lastly, which I think is the most key part, is valentino's belief. because at the end of the day, the only reason why he's doing any of this, and the only reason why what was to come was possible at all, is that he himself still thought that he could challenge for another title - as much as that belief had come under strain:

now what this piece also goes on to say is that nobody believes this will work. nobody believes that firing jb will lead to better results. people expect that this is going to lead to his retirement, quite possibly at the end of 2014. it's worth just remembering sometimes how extraordinary valentino's return to the top of the game post-2013 really was, how it went against how we expect a rider's competitive lifecycle to work, went far beyond the longevity exhibited by any top rider before or since - all while going up against riders who are widely believed to be some of the best to ever do it. valentino beat jorge in both 2014 and 2016, and remains one of two people to outscore prime marc marquez over the course of a season. not to engage in too much rossi prop here, but sepang 2015 can't really be understood without all the frustration that led up to it, to this one golden chance, this miracle that everybody had believed to be impossible (sometimes even valentino). this wasn't supposed to be happening. it was happening. and then, so so close to the finish line, valentino could feel it slipping, slipping, slipping away

but of course, we still don't know whether changing crew chiefs is the key factor that made him competitive again. maybe he just needed a bit longer to get back into the swing of things post-ducati disaster. maybe the bikes just started to suit him better. hey, maybe it was that nifty exercise regime he'd engaged in a wee spot of espionage for so that he could pinch it off his teammate. what we can say, however, is that valentino's choice both tells us a lot about his mindset, as well as (to finally bring us back to the actual point of this post) representing a massive shift in his 'entourage'. this is what briggs is referring to in his quote - the italians. the new crew chief. the people who couldn't stand up to valentino. now obviously, as mentioned above briggs had worked with jb for the better part of twenty years and can hardly be considered a neutral party. here were briggs' feelings on the matter (yeah it's from the same oxley book again, I got it new for eighteen quid which is a very generous price, would recommend):

When JB was out at the end of 2013 it was like losing my mechanic dad. I remember being in the garage when we found out about it. Then they arranged a kind of farewell, a kind of hodgepodge farewell. It was terrible, I didn't like any of it. I was just hiding behind one of the bikes in the garage, crying, going, what's going on here? It didn't seem right to me. I think maybe Valentino thought he would get faster again sooner, but I think it took at least a year to get the taste of the Ducati out of his mouth. I think if he'd stayed with JB we would've won the championship in 2015.

which. look. we don't have time to unpack all that. but. the point is that obviously briggs wasn't exactly a massive fan of the change within valentino's team, and his comments about the 2015 season do have to be read with that in mind. as to whether vale really would have done better in 2015 with jb at his side, your guess is as good as mine. all that being said, a part of me wonders how much losing that grounding presence enabled valentino's late-2015 spiral. maybe not in terms of talking valentino out of the great big fluctuating lap times treachery theory - to state the obvious, valentino got himself involved in plenty of drama during jb's time as a crew chief. jb himself occasionally helped add fuel to the fire in those feuds, like his infamous comment about how he would be able to fix the ducati's issues in 80 seconds that casey still brings up every three business days (the comments were poorly phrased but also somewhat taken out of context, in that jb was talking about a specific set-up problem). he's generally been pretty happy to be forthright about valentino's rivals, for instance this about casey:

My feeling at the time was that Casey probably only had one game plan, and having watched Casey over the years, he doesn't have a plan B. If it doesn't go his way from the outset, it's probably one of the weaknesses that he had through the youth that he had, through the lack of experience that he had. That's not a criticism of him per se, he was still only 22 at the time.

(this is about laguna seca 2008 and how he helped valentino win that race, including in plotting out vale's rather ruthless tactics - which casey was of course not exactly a fan of.) or these. uh. harsh comments about dani from spring 2010:

Q: Is that atmosphere or track knowledge? Is it like the Spanish finding something extra at the racetracks in Spain? JB: Well, therein we show the weakness, don't we? If you can get up on that weekend, on the technical racetracks of Spain, why can't you get up on the technical racetracks like Australia, where the Italians do? Lorenzo is a guy who will and does. Stoner has been able to get up on tracks all over the world. Unfortunately, Dani Pedrosa's into his 6th year in MotoGP, and he's won 8 races, Jorge Lorenzo's two months into his 3rd and he's won 6. It's night and day between those two, is the way I see it. Dani's an extremely fast rider, but a shockingly poor racer. Q: Were you surprised at Jerez [2010] when Pedrosa fought back when Lorenzo passed him? JB: When did Dani fight back? With two laps to go, and he didn't even get close enough to try to come back. Dani has never been a fighter in races, he's a lovely kid, don't get me wrong, but you can see that Lorenzo, having Pedrosa in front of him, it was never going to be the way he was going to finish that race. He was going to finish on the ground or he was going to finish in front of Pedrosa. That's the sort of race that we want, we had that with Biaggi and Valentino, and from history with Schwantz and Rainey. All the good riders have always had somebody they have had to put the target on the back of. It was Doohan and Gardner, and Doohan won that battle hands down, and I think Jorge Lorenzo's going to win this battle [with Pedrosa] hands down.

kind of a dick! so his attitude to valentino being valentino has generally been a) well having enemies is good, actually, with an added slice of b) good luck to his enemies :) - see also this quote (from the barker biography) in the context of the gibernau rivalry:

And that made Rossi even more dangerous, as Jerry Burgess pointed out: ‘Valentino is the sort of rider I wouldn’t want to get angry. He can take you apart on the track.’

so yes, jb is also perfectly brutal in his own right, as you presumably have to be to work alongside valentino so closely for so long. he is, however, also somebody valentino has a massive amount of respect for, somebody who helped turn him into a legend and is responsible for a lot of vale's success - not least, of course, in the pivotal move to yamaha. he was replaced by a man of a far far lesser stature in the sport, one who presumably would have been grateful to valentino for the biggest job he was ever going to get. if briggs is right and there was a shift in valentino in 2015, surrounded as he was by italians (derogatory) who could not stand up to him, who allowed valentino to insist on war and peace on the pit boards, to focus more and more on things that had nothing to do with riding... it would be going a little too far to say that valentino was missing an adult in the room given he was, in fact, in his thirties and should have been capable of being that adult. and who knows what jb would have said or thought or done about the great big childhood hero deception theory. but sepang 2015 was the culmination of a lot of things, including a pressure cooker of a season that grew more and more tense and put more and more stress on everyone involved - perhaps for none more so than valentino. maybe, just maybe, if he'd had somebody around him with fifteen years of experience in handling him, who could have just occasionally told him to knock it off, to concentrate on the racing, to keep things simple (always jb's defining philosophy), to maybe not get so wrapped up in the great big spanish collusion theory...

or maybe it wouldn't have mattered! maybe we're getting cause and effect all wrong here; maybe valentino was deliberately fashioning his entourage into one that was only going to give him positive feedback. maybe he would have just stopped listening to jb, maybe the very decision to fire jb makes it clear he was no longer interested in what jb had to say. it's a tragedy, after all! maybe it was always going to go like this. maybe it was always going to end like this

speaking of entourages, marc's manager played a bit of a cameo role in fanning the flames just a little further (article from marca, 26/10/2015):

alzamora obviously will be somebody valentino is familiar with, having raced him in 125cc and also having just coexisted in the paddock over the years. valentino could of course be lying, but idk, why would he? he's already made his case by this point, and what if alzamora were to contradict him? if it's true and this conversation did happen, you do have to say it's a spectacularly unhelpful intervention from alzamora. even if marc was mad at valentino, why the hell are you telling valentino this AFTER sepang 2015? what's the plan here buddy

^ 1999 world champions: alzamora in 125cc, vale in 250cc and alex criville in 500cc. people think motogp lore is complicated but if you know like, five guys, you're set for about twenty years of drama

which does get to the heart of the matter - a lot of these people have big egos and their own agendas and they love to run their mouths. they like talking a big game and getting involved in things they really shouldn't be getting involved in. is reed right that these people in the riders' entourages 'created the drama'? well, no, I think the two men at the centre of this particular tragedy were plenty capable of doing that themselves. nevertheless, you can point to how professional sports (and motogp in particular) forces you to rely heavily on a small group of people to keep you sane at the centre of the storm, and the risks that can emerge when that small group collectively unmoors itself from reality. you can point to the perils of fame, both in making your reliance on your inner circle so unnegotiable as well as in providing you with the status and power and ego to ignore anyone who might wish to change your mind. you can point to specific figures in this story who managed to incite the conflict between the two of them, as well as how the pressure cooker competitive environment they were operating within helped set up the ultimate catastrophe. you can point to how valentino lacked anyone with the power to stop him - both in the direct sense of forcing him to reconsider and the indirect sense of commanding his respect enough to make him see sense. maybe, just like in 2004, valentino had simply been "looking for an excuse" and he was always headed down this path. or maybe if somebody had just held him back a little that year, kept him focused on his riding, maybe if the right person had intervened at the right time...

maybe, maybe, maybe. that's why it's a tragedy

#valentino rossi #rosquez #//#4693 #i get the sense he's unpopular on here but EYE will miss lin jarvis. i think he's funny sorry. him and his certifiably insane employees #i loveeee that media scrum love his very dry lil summary of events acting like we're not so so far down the rabbit hole #anon: man fuck that ipad stand #me: lemme tell you a tale about a man called jerry burgess and the daddy issues he inspired in multiple grown men #and yes the fact that valentino unceremoniously dumped his 'paddock father' is. interesting :) i get him ughhh #also on the flip side i am curious what kind of conversations were going on in the marc camp during that sepang weekend #alzamora's two big contributions to the rosquez saga: 1) trying to stop marc from going to the ranch #and 2) telling vale that marc was mad at him for argentina and assen and in doing so helping back up vale's theory #what was he cooking

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