#i mean i would be weird i Batman started dressing like a different animal no? bats are his symbol. that is more extreme but ya know | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

maxwell-grant · 3 years

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You have done an (excelent) post on how to reinvent Batman as a Pulp Hero. Do you think you could do one to Superman as well? Or do you think it is impossible to do this with the progenitor of the Super Hero genre without transforming him in a totaly diferent character?

Well, you saying it as impossible only makes it seem ever more tempting of a challenge, but yes, it is a bit harder. I'm gonna link my Batman post here as a reference point.

Partially because Batman's a franchise I've thought extensively about for a long time in regards to what I like about it or how I'd like to approach if given the opportunity, which is not something I can really say for Superman until more recently the Big Blue to start orbiting my brain. I don't have years worth of redesigns or fan concepts saved on my galleries and files to comb through to pick and choose here, and my experience with Superman as a character is considerably different, in some aspects more deeply personal, and not really something I'd like to go into in this blog, at least not now.

Part of the reason why it's harder is also because Batman and Superman have very different relationships with their pulp inspirations. Batman was, ostensibly, a pulp character adapted to comics, a dime-a-dozen Shadow knock-off who picked up and played up diverging traits from other characters and gradually ran with them to gradually forge a unique identity. Superman right from the start was rooted in a much stronger conceptual underpinning: the Sci-Fi Superman and Alien Menace who, instead of being a tragic monster or a tyrannical villain, becomes a costumed adventurer and social crusader. Even the name Super-Man was taken from an early story of Siegel and Shuster about a telepathic villain who ends the story lamenting that he should have used his powers for the good of mankind instead of selfishness. I hesitate to call what Siegel and Shuster were doing “subversive” because that term's picked up a real negative connotation, and it's not like Siegel and Shuster were out to upend their influences (they were pulp aficionados themselves), but rather putting a more positive, new spin on them.

Which is why it also becomes a bit harder to do what I did with Batman and align Superman with some of his pulp-esque inspirations, like John Carter, Flash Gordon or Hugo Danner, without just making it "Superman but he's John Carter", "Superman but it's Flash Gordon", and "Iron Munro / Superman but everything sucks" respectively. It's harder to create a character that wouldn't feel reduntant and derivative at best, and actively contradictory to Superman at worst.

I guess if I had to come up with a "Pulp Hero Superman" take I liked, well first of all I'd have to take steps to distance it from the likes of Tom Strong or Al Ewing's Doc Thunder, those two are as good as it gets in regards to Pulp Supermen. I stipulated for Batman a "No Guns, No Murder, No Service" policy partially to distance my takes on Batman from all the "Pulp Batmen" that just add guns and murder and take Batman back to the barest of basics. Likewise, I'm adding a "No Depowered Science Hero" rule here, which means it's a take that's likely going to veer off a lot more into fantasy and probably enough tampering with Clark's character that it does risk becoming a different character.

Frankly I don't think I'm gonna succeed at doing these without just making it a new character entirely, because with Batman you can get away with just upending the character's aesthetic and setting and even origin and still keep it recognizably Bruce Wayne (in fact Batman does that all the time), which isn't really the case with Superman, who needs those to remain recognizably Superman as he goes through internal changes and character shifts. I guess what I'm gonna do here is more taking the building blocks of Superman/Clark Kent and see a couple new ways I can rearrange them to create a Pulp Superman

Perhaps something we can do is to scale back or recontextualize the "superhero" parts without diminishing Superman's role as a superpowered fantasy character.

One way we can start is by picking on that connection between Superman and the sci-fi supermen/alien monsters of pulps I mentioned earlier and play it up further, to create a Superman who's deeply, deeply alien in a way that no mild-mannered disguise or colorful outfit can really disguise, something so dramatically powerful and alien, that instead you could get tales about the kinds of ensuing changes and ripple effects this has on the world upon the The Super-Man's arrival. And for that I'm gonna have to quote @davidmann95's concept for Joshua Viers' absolutely stunning Superman redesign on the left side of the image above

The red, the goldish-orange and white, the alienness, the angelic, sculpted feeling, the halo, that innocently curious expression: it’s genuinely beautiful. Superman as a redeeming science-angel from beyond our understanding, as much past the uncanny valley of limited human comprehension as a Lovecraftian monster but tuned to the opposite key - you could spend an endless procession of human lifetimes trying and failing to understand this being, but all you’ll ever know for sure is that it is beyond you, and it knows you, and it loves you.

Superdoomsday from Earth 45, healed and transformed into the savior it was originally envisioned as? Some descendant of his, or a future of the man himself? An alien who picked up on a broadcast of Superman from Earth, and so inspired reshaped itself in his image to spread his ‘gospel’ to the stars?

Alternatively, to come back to Earth a little, many, many pulp characters and series were built off the antics and personalities of real people, celebrities getting their own magazines or serials or fictionalized takes on them, so perhaps one way to make a "pulp" take on Superman would be to emphasize a bit more of Superman's real-world roots, trends that inspired his creation directly or indirectly at the time. The Jewish strongman Sigmund Breibart and Shuster's interest in fitness culture, Harold Lloyd's comic persona, the rising "strongman" film genre in the early 20th century, actors Clark Gable and Kent Taylor that supposedly named his secret identity, Clark Kent being a socially-awkward journalist based of Siegel's own school experiences.

Maybe one start to an authentic Pulp Superman, who would still be Superman, would be to just ask the question "What if Superman was a real person and/or a celebrity, and they started making pulp magazines and serials dedicated to him? What would those look like?". You wouldn't even have to restrict it to just a story set in the 1930s, in fact you could even play around with the rise of new mediums over the decades.

This third one is a little closer to some plans I have for my own take on a Superman character, not necessarily what I would do with Superman proper but one of my ideas for a Superman analogue. Superman's a character I'll always associate strongly with childhood and childhood fantasy, and to tap into that I would emphasize the other end of the fiction that influenced Siegel and Shuster: comic strips, in their case specifically Little Nemo and Popeye.

In my case I would bring additional influences from some of the comic strips I personally grew up reading like Monica's Gang and Calvin and Hobbes, and I already talked a bit about Captain Fray in terms of how he’s a Superman character despite being a villain. I guess you could call this one "What if Superman was a public domain comic strip character, stripped of the importance of being the founding figure of a super popular genre or extended universe, and also was kind of ugly?".

He's not "Sloth from the Goonies" ugly, I swear I didn't actually have Sloth in mind when typing out this idea, I've never watched that film nor did I know until now that he actually spends the film in a Superman shirt. That's not really what I'm going for. Visually I was thinking of modeling my take on Superman heavily after Hugo from Street Fighter and his inspiration Andre the Giant, to really emphasize the “circus strongman / freak wrestler” aspect of Superman’s inspiration, particularly in regards to how Hugo’s SFIII version strikes a really great balance in making Hugo ugly and both comedic and fearsome in battle, as well as lovable and even a little dopey (without being outright stupid, like his IV self) in his victory animations and endings.

He's still Superman, he still goes on fantastical adventures to help people, he's still a deeply loving and compassionate soul whose face beams with joy and affection and who's got wonderful eyes and a great smile. It's just that this smile has a couple of mismatched stick-out teeth or some missing ones, and he's got a crooked smile some people take as smug or malicious, he’s got a strongman’s gut instead of a bodybuilder’s abs, his nose is a little busted (maybe he’s had too many crash landings), and his hair is a little wild or greasy, and he doesn't exactly have very good people skills because of how others usually react to him and, y'know, he doesn't get the kind of publicity Superman would get despite doing ostensibly the same things. He’s not deformed, he’s incredibly intelligent and capable, but in comparison to how superheroes are usually allowed to look, he might as well be Bizarro in the public eye.

It becomes a running gag that people tend to assume some nearby fireman or cop was the one who rescued the hundred orphans out of a burning building single-handedly, meanwhile he's getting accosted off-panel by police officers who think he set the building on fire, or think they can bully this weird man dressed funny. He goes to rescue old people in peril and occasionally they yell at him that they don't have any money. He doesn't get asked to lead superhero meetings or teams even though many in the community advocate for just how much he does for the world, he gets censored out of tv broadcasts or group shots (even his face is sometimes pixelated when they do show him), people invite him on talk shows and don't really let him talk or assume they got the wrong guy. He goes to rescue a woman dangling off a building, and then he gets attacked by like three different superhero teams who assume he must have kidnapped the poor damsel. He was the first superhero, he is the strongest of them all still, but he never really gets credit for it, it nor does he even want to. None of this at all stops him or deters him, except for some occasionally funny reactions.

This never really changes for him, he doesn't really earn people's approval nor does he have to, instead the stories, outside of the gags and adventures you’d expect from a comic strip, veer more towards others learning to be less judgmental and him learning ways to better approach people. He isn't any lesser than Superman just because he doesn't look like most people would want him to look and he doesn't have to look like Superman. Really I think we could use more superheroes that don’t look all so uniformly pretty.

Again, probably not a take that would work for Clark proper, but it’s one way I would take a shot at doing Superman with my own

I have other stuff in the works for this character but I'd like to keep them to better work on them for now, but yeah, these are three of my shots at developing a Pulp Superman.

Alternatively here's a fourth idea that's more pulp than all of these: Join up Nicholas Cage with Panos Cosmatos again, or whatever weird indie director he decides to pair up with next, and let them do whatever the hell they want with Superman. Give us Mandy Superman. Superman vs The Color Out of Space. Superman vs Five Nights at Freddy's. Superman’s quest to find THE LAST PIG OF KRYPTON. Anything goes.

#replies tag #dc comics #superman #clark kent #superheroes #comic books #nicholas cage

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moonlitceleste · 4 years

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Here’s one of my (many) Connerette ideas! I could’ve sworn I had already posted this, but I guess not.

Ladybug and Chat Noir defeated Hawkmoth when they were 15

Gabriel, Nathalie, and Lila went to jail

Ladybug and Chat’s identities were not revealed to one another

Ladybug found out Adrien’s, who was horrified

He told her to take the ring back because he didn’t want the burden of it anymore

He admitted that he had thought of betraying her to get his mother back, and if he kept the ring he might try

It was too painful, and the wound was still fresh, so he didn’t want to know her identity

Adrien needed space and time to think about Hawkmoth as well as re-evaluate his behavior towards Ladybug

Marinette needed to get away from the toxic relationships in her life and not allow herself to be held back because of them

The Justice League had known about Hawkmoth all along and came to an agreement when the villain first appeared that they would let Ladybug and Chat handle it

Batman had obviously figured out their identities already, and once the villain was defeated he approached Ladybug

He made an offer to have John Constantine and Diana Prince mentor her

Constantine because of his magical knowledge, and Diana because her mother had been a former Ladybug and it’d also benefit Marinette to learn combat from the Amazons

The Amazons could also teach her life lessons and how to stand up for herself, and Marinette could work on furthering her fashion design skills under Diana’s tutelage

She spends two-three years creating a name as MDC as well as training under them

She meets Zatanna through Constantine and they become good friends

Zatanna is 18 and already proficient at magic, so they work together for a bit

Anyways, the story starts after all this happens

Marinette has her life together and is searching for some of the very last missing Miraculous

You can choose whether or not her identity as MDC is still secret; it won’t make much of a difference

The YJ team is back together, either for a short mission or to just have fun and relax

Marinette is in some country searching for a Miraculous under the guise of MDC work for anyone who asks (not that anyone would, since the only friends she really has are Luka and Zatanna)

But despite not having a huge friend group like she did before, she’s content with the fact that she can really trust them

She hadn’t talked to Adrien in a while; she checked up on him briefly over the years but it was hard to establish a solid friendship again

She was thinking about telling him her identity though

But back to the story!

Marinette is wandering around, looking for both fashion inspiration and any clues as to where the Miraculous could be

Let’s just say it’s a swan miraculous—whatever animal it is doesn’t really pertain to the story

It’s warm outside, she’s dressed in a cute outfit: white tank top, pink plaid pleated skirt, white knee-high boots (or sneakers), a ponytail and looking like her best self

She quite literally bumps into the team

Marinette apologizes before noticing Zatanna

“Z!” she exclaims

They exchange la bise kisses and a hug

Cue the team looking all confused in the background

Zatanna treats Marinette like an old friend, which is weird because they think if she had any friends they’d know them

She asks what Marinette is doing there, to which she replies that she’s “looking for something lost. I think I know where it is, but I’m not sure yet.”

To any outsider it sounds like she’s talking about losing something, but Zatanna understands what she really means

She asks if there’s anything her and her friends could to to help

Marinette says no, but asks her to look out for a silver necklace with a small swan charm

At this point the team is curious, so they butt in and ask for introductions

Someone else from the team definitely flirts with Mari (I mean, how could they not? Someone had to.)

They all speak briefly before Marinette’s phone rings (it’s Uncle Jagged!!) and she has to go

But not before someone from YJ invites Marinette to meet up with them in a day or two so they can all “get to know each other better”

Cue her getting actual friendships and eventually mending the one with Adrien

I wouldn’t have instant attraction with Connerette; maybe just an “oh the other is objectively attractive” but not one of them actively pursuing the other from the start

Personality-wise, Conner is less broody and angsty than he is in YJ but not quite as bold as he is in ROTS

You can decide whether or not SuperMartian was ever a thing, but the less drama the better (plus I’ve heard that their relationship was kinda toxic, sooo)

It’s the snarkiness and personality that pulls Conner to Marinette

Everyone else realizes they like each other before they do

Slow burn, friends-to-lovers but not exactly

They’re friends but don’t start thinking of each other as anything more until something spurs them to

Conner realizes he likes her once he gets jealous

It’ll probably be Jason playfully flirting with Marinette

Like, they get introduced and hit it off so well

This is after three-four months of her knowing the YJ team

Conner gets a funny feeling when he sees her laughing with Jason

He’s snappy towards Jason for some reason, but he doesn’t know why

Platonic Jasonette + a heavy dose of flirty banter = a total BROTP + a jealous Conner

And boom

This could actually go the Jasonette route and be Conner’s POV with his hopeless pining

But again, drama-free route!!

Jason probably notices Conner getting jealous so he does something extreme since he just wants them to admit their feelings already

#maribat #connerette #jasonette #celestewrites

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deaddee-anime-brownfanlady · 3 years

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BATJOKES Vigilantism & Fatherhood DRAMA AU: Bruce Wayne and Jack on Differencing Parental styles also Conflicting Moral issues, Baby troubles bits.

(So before I continue on with the rest of the small details of Joker & Harley Quinn first time meeting & them becoming like this crime spreeing friends duo / also how Joker “Jack" meets up with Bruce again & them reconnecting becoming more romantically involved...yet also having to deal with the Children of Arkham.) [Right here is just a side slice of Bruce & Jack dealing with being first time fathers to their son also along with other regular weird bullshit within Gotham City.] With having little Malik newly apart of both their lives now, lives that are already filled with enough adrenaline fueled high obtaining levels of stress also danger that’s comes with being heroes and doing the whole vigilante thing in keeping Gotham safe. Now double that with a baby within the mix as well, on top of that there still dealing with the after effects of the entire Children of Arkham mess also the possibility of Lady Arkham most likely still being alive also having to deal with other villain rouges & Bruce and Jack now have a son to worry about amongst everything else, so yeah there hands are pretty real full. While Jack might be fully rehabilitated...that isn’t to say that his mental problems / issues are “gone for good” or “ he no longer has them” even though he's been doing so much better also been very good as of late especially with officially moving in with Bruce, he still every now & then prone to getting bad panic attacks or gets way highly overwhelmed or have night terrors sometimes, he has scheduled therapy sessions with Dr. Leland which helps a lot as well as being medicated too which clams his hyper overactive brain. With Malik around both of there routines had greatly changed, especially in terms of nighttime-patroling which before tend to usually involved both of them but now with a infant son they have to take turns or one of them stays behind. Even with Alfred helping out with Malik when Bruce & Jack are out working on a case or dealing with some villain rouge , they can’t help but still worry about their little boy especially Jack, Bruce knows that if there is any danger at the manor he perfectly setup extra protective precautions within every single inch also rooms of Wayne manor, including the nursery most importantly. Also he knows Alfred will always be willing & ready to be on the lookout for Malik who is particularly his grandson. NOW ON BOTH BRUCE & JACK DIFFERENING PARENTING MOMENTS & BABY MALIK TIDBITS : While Malik isn’t yet at the age to talk as of now, but further on down the mouths or so he’ll eventually start calling Bruce "Dada" & Jack "Baba" although that soon will change into "Papa". | When it comes to bonding & playtime, Bruce enjoys lifting Malik up in the air and holding him tight to pretend fly also whoosh him around like a airplane , other ways Bruce likes to bond with his little man is to help him with his little baby exercises or most of all he loves having Malik sleeping & just laying on top of his chest, holding Malik so close & tight to him always calms him down or helps takes his mind off the constant pressure also worries of keeping Gotham city safe. Malik always manage to help grounds him and drives him even more to make Gotham a better place. Now another thing Jack loves to do for his sweet tiny boy is dress him up in all kinds of crazy outfits & cute clothes, such as super bright also colorful onesies with different kinds of fun patterns. Like polka dots or zigzags or ones with animals on them, he enjoys dressing Malik in funny, adorable themed clothing like having him as a bat with the little ears also including with little flappy wings, he’ll have him dress as a bear or an ducky also a shark too. | Bruce sometimes thinks that Jack tends to goes a bit overbroad with the outfits but he tries not to get on him too much about it since he knows how much its means to Jack, ones of Jack favorites things to do in terms of bonding or playing with his dear boy is blowing raspberries on Malik chubby cheeks also on his tummy and play pretending to eat his little feet & toes or making silly faces also other weird faces that would mostly either creep out or put-off anybody else...considering Jack sometimes inhuman unsettling wide full teeth smile & grin that’s freaks some people out ; but for little Malik it tends to get a giggle out of him or hearing his Papa laughing and non-stop off-kilter giggling always gets a excited or happy gurgle/coo out of him because he knows Papa is near or around. | Yet another thing Jack loves to do when it comes to entertaining his boy is to uses one of his many stuffed animals as like puppets and add funny voices to each of them with their own little personalities as a way to either make Malik laugh or a way to comfort him when super upset. | NOW ON SOME MORAL ISSUES / PROBLEMS BETWEEN B & J. | As mention before when Bruce & Jack are out and about as Batman & Joker handling criminals or villains or other hardcore crimes in Gotham, while they tend to usually work well together on a case or being a power house duo. They tend to have their every now and then non-stop back & forth arguments with each other on dealing with Batman/Bruce *No Killing code* , Jack ‘Joker’ deeply feels that some or a good half of most of the scumbags they deal with...especially ones who’ve done things like Rape or child abuse & such would be much better off dead instead of them lock in prison and yet every time when Jack expresses these thoughts or what he feels should be done, its always ends up in a fight on morality or on “what heroes can’t do” with Bruce. Bruce sometimes have to constantly reminds Jack on not going way too hard when they be crime-fighting criminals or even the big names villains since he knows how much violence gets Jack riled up or seriously turn him on or how he tends to enjoy it a bit too much sometimes, Bruce has to reminds Jack that if he does kill or goes off the edge again then all that hard work on bettering himself would be for naught or if he gets sent back to Arkham again then Malik wouldn’t have his loving Papa around anymore. While Jack still seriously don’t believe in the whole “Heroes don’t kill” junk, he wouldn’t for the life of him ever risk losing his little prince; But one thing for sure with Jack that if anybody and he means anybody whether they be mob bosses or low goons or high level super-villains or basically anyone ever tries to do anything to harm his baby boy...then they can kiss their asses goodbye for good because he’ll make sure there killed painfully and horribly in the most worst ways possible...he doesn’t care if it against Bruce code at all, like if someone trying to hurt his son in any kind of way there dead period end of story. He sure that Bruce can at least understands that.

#batjokes #batjokes au #batman x joker #the joker #batman #batman telltale au #dadsbatjokes Au #joker #batjokes headcanons #jack napier×batman #dadbatjokes au #jack napier #john doe telltale #joker x batman #batman telltale #bruce wayne #joker headcanons #bruce wayne headcanon

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alecmagnuslwb · 4 years

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Halloween Wonder

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“I wanna be the wonder ladies for Halloween,” Lian says coloring a picture of Princess Diana herself on the coffee table in the living room. Roy pops his head up from where he’s reading a magazine on the couch. Jason’s out patrolling for the night so it’s just the two of them. It’s nearing her bedtime, but she gave him the doe eyes around eight o’clock requesting she have just one more hour to see JayJay.

“You mean you wanna be Wonder Woman?” he asks leaning forward and looking at the picture she’s coloring. She’s taken some liberties with Wonder Woman’s costume design trading the usual red, blue and gold for pink, purple and silver.

“Yeah! But you and JayJay gotta be the other two,” she declares. She flips through her coloring pages pulling out one of Donna and another of Cassie, the current Wonder Girl. She waves them in his face. “You can be Aunt Donna and JayJay can be Wonder Girl!” she says with glee.

Roy eyes the coloring page and remembers Donna’s old red costume, he’s not sure he’s got the curves to pull it off quite the same way his old flame and dear friend did.

“You sure you don’t want us to be Green Lantern and Superman, make the Justice League or something, kiddo?” he asks, pointedly not mentioning Batman, Jason would never go as Batman no matter how much Lian begs.

“Nope,” she says happily turning back to her own coloring page with a beaming smile. “Wonder ladies!”

Roy sighs looking down at the pictures in his hands, the things they do for their little girl.

***

Jason doesn’t make it home early, so much against her protests Lian is sent to bed only complaining lightly after Roy promises that they’ll be doing her requested Halloween costumes. Jason slips into their bedroom hours later, shower fresh and free of his gear.

Roy sits up from where he’d slumped down into bed trying to stay awake to see him. Jason smiles walking over to the bed and kissing Roy lightly once before flopping over him and onto his side of the bed.

“Lian picked her Halloween costume tonight,” Roy says as Jason pulls the covers up.

“Oh yeah, what dynamic trio will we be this year?” Jason says smiling. They’ve been letting Lian pick what they’ll all be since she was three, surprisingly this is the first year she’s picked any other supers usually sticking more to animated characters. Last year was particularly memorable when she begged to be Maleficent and Jason and Roy sported their best Scar and Gaston. Alfred had made the most elaborate and movie accurate costumes Roy had ever seen which was saying something since he’d done so well with other duos the years before.

“The Wonder fam,” he says with a smirk.

“As in?” Jason asks and Roy smirks.

“Diana,” he says pointing to the wall where two rooms down Lian is sleeping peacefully. “Donna,” he says gesturing to himself. “And Cassie,” he finishes pointing at Jason.

“And before you ask there’s no changing her mind,” he says.

Jason huffs. “Well at least she didn’t want me to Batman,” he says with a shrug. He grabs his phone from where he’d tossed it on the nightstand and sends off some text. It dings almost immediately with a response. “Alfred said he’s on it, we just have to swing by the manor tomorrow so he can get updated measurements for Lian since she’s gotten taller since last year.”

Not for the first time in his life Roy wonders if Alfred ever sleeps considering the late hour.

***

“You know Donna is never going to speak to you again if she finds out about this, right?” Jason says enjoying the view of Roy in his tight red one piece costume, but obviously holding back laughter as well. Roy adjusts his dark wig flipping the hair over his shoulder.

“Yup,” Roy says eyeing himself from every angle in the mirror. He looks good dammit, turns out he does have the curves to pull of the look, Donna can get over it if she finds out. Alfred’s really outdone himself with his seam work this year.

“And you know that there’s a 98% chance we run into Dick and Babs tonight and they’ll tell absolutely everyone?” Jason adds on from where he’s sat on the bed.

“Yup,” Roy says turning away from the mirror to face Jason. Lian had chosen Cassie’s most recent costume for Jason and Roy would be lying if he said Jason isn’t making the black leggings and skirt combo work. “You know they’re gonna see you in this get up and tell everyone too, right?”

Jason just shrugs. “Yeah, but everyone’s afraid of me, so the jokes will end real quick.”

Roy hums conceding the point. Lian comes barreling in a moment later, a pair of black wireless headphones in hand. She crawls up onto the bed next to Jason and settles the headphones around his neck. He flips his blonde wig out from under them and smiles at her.

“You look great Wonder Woman,” he says fixing her crooked tiara.

She smiles toothily at him and flexes her arms kissing her tiny biceps, the little ham.

“Can we go get candy now?” she says hopping off the bed and pulling Jason along to where Roy is still admiring himself in the mirror and grabbing his hand too.

“Yeah, yeah,” Roy says giving himself one last glance as they’re dragged out of the room. “Let’s go get candy.”

***

Trick or treating is a success. Thanks to Dick and Barbara’s well thought out Halloween safety plan for all the kids of Gotham Lian hits half the city before finally tiring out.

They run into Nightwing and Batgirl about halfway through their journey Roy already carrying a damn near full pillowcase of candy and he’s fairly certain Dick’s laughter can be heard from outer space once he’s taken in their costumes. He doesn’t get to cackle long though Lian declaring there’s no time for laughing when candies on the line and skipping away from the silly adults.

Roy’s carrying two nearly full pillow cases of candy now and Jason, wig discarded into one of the bags, is carrying Lian easily like she’s still two weighing barely a thing and not eight. Her little lasso is wrapped around Jason’s arm and her head resting on his shoulder.

“I’ll put her to bed,” he says quietly once they’ve made it into the apartment Roy plopping the two sacks of candy down heavily onto the table. Roy nods, kissing Lian’s hair once.

“Goodnight, Wondy,” he says and she snuggles in closer to Jason. Jason heads upstairs while Roy drags the two bags of candy over to the couch. He throws his slightly aching feet up onto the coffee table and starts digging in knowing there’s no way Lian will notice if a few pieces are gone.

He grins triumphantly when he finds a double pack of Reese’s cups tearing into them. He’s working on the second one when Jason finally comes down the stairs, hoodie, headphones, high tops and skirt now gone. If it weren’t for the Wonder Woman insignia on his top and the star pattern on the leggings he’d just look like he was about to go for a run.

“She all good?” Roy asks as Jason sits down next to him digging into the open pillowcase. He pulls out a long Twizzler opening the plastic with his teeth. Jason nods.

“Our little Wonder Woman is out cold,” he says before taking a bite of the candy twirling it around on his finger. Roy smiles digging back in and taking out a Hershey’s bar this time.

“You and your chocolate obsession,” Jason says shaking his head as he grabs a tiny box of nerds and pours them directly into his mouth.

“At least I have taste,” Roy grumbles eyeing the box of nerds in disgust. Jason shoves at him lightly making direct eye contact as he pours the box of nerds onto his tongue. Roy moves the bag of candy out of his way popping the last piece of chocolate bar in his mouth before crawling over and placing himself in Jason’s lap, bracketing his hips.

Roy leans in about to kiss Jason when he puts a strong hand to his chest and stops him.

“Sure you want to kiss me with this terrible flavored candy in my mouth,” he says feigning annoyance sticking out his tongue that’s now tinged blue. Roy shrugs.

“I’ll risk it,” he says leaning in to kiss him slow and deep the taste of tart Nerds and chocolate mixing together on their tongues. Jason moans his hands going to Roy’s thighs and trailing up along the stars on the side of his costume. He freezes when he reaches the lasso tied to his belt.

He pulls back abruptly leaving Roy chasing after his lips.

“We really have to take off these costumes,” Jason says still out of Roy’s reach.

“That was the plan,” Roy says with a smirk attempting to lean back in, but Jason stops him once again.

“No I mean like before we continue this in any way,” he looks down between them and pulls the long dark wig off of Roy’s head tossing it to the other end of the couch. “It’s too weird.”

Roy looks down himself and can see what Jason means, Gaston and Scar getting it on last year was fine, but being dressed like very real people they know is a different game when the haze of lust clears.

“Good point,” he says settling back on Jason’s thighs. “But you’re carrying me upstairs, my feet hurt.”

Jason rolls his eyes, “You’re the one who chose to wear high heeled boots.”

“Costume accuracy Jaybird, not everyone gets to be the super gal who wears sneakers,” he defends with a smile. Jason leans in pecking him once on the corner of his lips.

“Fine princess,” he says hefting up off the couch with Roy in his arms not even faltering a bit. “Hold on.” He says as he heads for the stairs carrying Roy like he weighs nothing. Roy can’t wait to get these costumes off and continue what he started on the couch.

Hours later, costumes long gone and both sweaty and sated Roy’s phone dings with a message from Donna, it’s a photo form Dick attached with a series of crying emojis.

He smirks, she’s just jealous he looked so good.

#my fic #jayroy #jason todd #roy harper

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rawritzrobin · 4 years

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Angel Amongst Bats Chapter 3

Title: Angel Amongst Bats

Pairing: Jason Todd x Stella Covington (My OC)

Warnings: Cursing, past major character death, a little bit angsty, fluff.

Summary: Familiar faces start to show up, but things in this world seem different. Very different.

Prologue Chapter 1 Chapter 2

Chapter 3: Tim

Stella woke up in a large bed with a slight headache, feeling slightly chilly. Naturally she rolled over to the other side of the bed with her eyes closed in search of Jason’s natural body heat. When she rolls over to find nothing but empty space, she opens her eyes to see she is not in her own bed. It all comes back to her as she remembers she’s not even in her own world. Getting out of bed, she walks around the room mindlessly.

She pauses when she sees a line of photographs on top of the dresser. There were four total.

The first photograph was of Jason and Bruce, both dressed in their Batman and Robin gear. Jason looked much younger in this picture. His eyes held a familiar gleam of optimism. No fear, or anger. Just, hope.

The second photograph, was one of Jason, Stella, Bruce, Barbara, and Dick, at one of Bruce’s fancy galas. Stella remembers taking that picture. It was the first time she actually enjoyed attending a party. She and Jason snuck away soon after taking the picture. They took a bunch of finger food and a few glasses of champagne up onto the top of Wayne tower and spent all night stargazing. She smiled at the memory.

The third photograph was a picture of Jason’s mom. The only photograph he ever had of her. She frowned. She would never forget the day he told her he found his birth mother, and that he was finally going to get to meet her. That was the last conversation they had before he was killed.

The last photo was Stella’s favorite. She picked it up and ran her fingers gently across it. How Jason managed to take that picture was beyond her. It was a selfie of Jason and Stella swinging on a grappling line. Stella had her arms wrapped around Jason’s shoulder, an excited smile painted on her face. Her eyes full of adrenaline and just a little bit of fear, but the good kind of fear. Jason was wearing his Robin costume, with a large grin plastered on his face. They were both genuinely having a good time. No nightmares, no insomnia. Just two teens in love.

She hears hushed voices outside of her door. She gently places the photograph back on the dresser and makes her way toward the voices

“Are you sure it’s her?”

“We ran a DNA test.”

“But how?”

The voices stopped as they notice Stella’s door open, and her head slowly peak out from it. Her eyes widen at the sight in front of her.

It was Dick, Tim, and Conner. Dick was already dressed and his hair was flawless, as usual. How that man woke up everyday and managed to look like a male model was beyond Stella’s comprehension. Next to him was Conner, clad in his black T-shirt and a pair of jeans, as usual.

The thing that made her eyes widen, was Tim.

Who was currently sitting in a wheelchair.

“Um hi. Sorry, did I interrupt?” She said nervously.

Conner looked her up and down. A scowl painting his face. Stella didn’t notice. She wasn’t exactly looking at him.

Dick rushed up to Stella. “No no, not at all. We were just heading into the dining room to have a late lunch. Care to join?” He asked.

“Sure.” Stella said nervously. “Um, give me 15? I want to take a quick shower.”

Dick smiled and nodded. “Sounds good. See you in the dining room!” He quickly made his way back to Conner and Tim, who were still looking at Stella suspiciously. She slowly crept back into the room and closed the door behind her before leaning against the door, and sliding down to the floor.

“What is happening to me?” She asks herself quietly.

————

After taking a quick shower and changing into a pair of leggings and baggy t-shirt, Stella made her way into the dining room to find the entire family gathered around the table. Large plates of delicious looking foods were laid out in front of them.

Bruce sat at the head of the table, scrolling on his handheld tablet. Dick, who sat next to Bruce on his left, was currently stuffing his face with finger sandwiches while talking to Barbara with his mouth full. She was trying not to laugh at his foolishness, while taking small bites of her own food. Damian, who sat on Bruce’s right side, was carefully examining his food, as if to make sure if was not poisoned. Tim was seated next to him, which came as a surprise to Stella, seeing how they usually couldn’t bear being in the same room as each other. Conner was sitting next to him, carefully glancing at Tim from time to time, as if he was watching over him.

“Ah Miss Stella, right on time!” Alfred greeted with his usual preppy tone. “Please take a seat.”

Stella sheepishly made her way to the seat next to Barbara. She sat down and Barbara smiled at her softly. “How are you feeling?”

“Better. Slight headache. But I’m not in my pajamas on the street anymore. So there’s that.” Stella says sheepishly. She grabs ladle full of fruit and places a cucumber sandwich on her plate. She didn’t realize how hungry she was until the smell of food triggered her stomach. She nibbled on her food as an awkward silence filled the room.

Stella glanced at Tim every once in a while. He was still in his wheelchair. It was, weird. She wanted to know why or better yet, how. But, she didn’t feel like it was an appropriate time to ask.

“Did you guys hear about what happened in Star City today?” Dick asked, breaking the uncomfortable silence.

They spent the next 20 minutes or so eating and chatting, everyone ignoring the elephant in the room. Conner kept sending small glares in Stella’s direction, and Stella couldn’t understand why. Back in their world, Conner and Stella had a pretty good relationship. She taught him a lot about earth customs and even introduced him to marine animals. The Conner in this world, seemed to dislike her for some reason. Even though she was supposedly dead or what not.

After lunch, everyone separated and went off to their own business. Bruce assured Stella that they were looking into a way to get her back into her own world, but that it would take a while. He had called in some of his other worldly friends to do some digging, but many of them were off planet dealing with a situation in another galaxy.

“Feel free to make yourself at home. If you need anything, ask Alfred.” He said to her before heading off down to the Batcave.

Dick and Barbara left to go attend to some “important” business and Damian was already off to the training room. She lost track of where Tim and Conner went as they left the dining room rather quickly.

“Looks like it’s just you and I today Miss Stella. Is there anything you would like to do?” Alfred said with a smile. Alfred was finishing up some dishes in the sink as Stella sat at the counter with a cup of tea.

“Nothing much Alfred. But can I ask you one question?” There was something bothering Stella and she just had to know.

“Certainly.”

“Why is Tim in a wheelchair? And where is Jason?” The cat was out of the bag now.

Without turning around Alfred remarked, “That is two questions.”

“Alfred…”

Alfred frowned. His back still facing Stella. “I don’t know if I am the best person to tell you.”

“Please Alfred.” She said frowning at him. Alfred turned to face her. Suddenly, he didn’t see the strange 23 year old girl in front of him. But the 16 year old who would come over after school with Jason every day. He missed Jason. Regardless of the things he has done, he would always be like a grandson to Alfred. He glanced at her face and saw just how frightened she really was. He sighed, unable to say no to the girl who once helped him cook Christmas dinner for the entire family.

“It was after a fight with Master Jason.”

Stella gasped. “What do you mean?” Jason had his anger problems and he had always had problems with Tim being his replacement. But he would never go so far as to hurt Tim that way.

Alfred paused, trying to find the right words. “It was…”

“It was when he threw me off a building.” Tim said. As he rolled in quietly. Stella and Alfred just stared at him. He made his way towards the table Stella was sitting on, and locked his wheelchair in place. “My fault really. I told him that he needed to get over your death.” He adds with a shrug.

He extends his hand and smiles at Stella. “Hi, I’m Tim. It’s nice to finally meet you.”

#Jason Todd #Jason Todd x OC #Stella Covington #Red Hood #DCU #Alternate Universe #Fanficion #iwritethings #nightwing #Dick Grayson #alfred pennyworth #Tim drake #batman

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phoenixpinks · 3 years

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Things Team Lazarus said during EoD starters

"When all else fails, Lex Luthor intends to kill Superman with Death." "HOLY BAT, BATMAN!" "WAIT SO WAIT WHAT???" "We're not in any danger! We're just nerds solving riddles on the internet!" "I ain't dressing up every night to find someone to punch" "I don't need to dress up every night to find someone to punch" "my son won't respond to my texts about wearing a bullet proof best, he is so grounded" "HELLO NAUGHTY CHILDREN IT'S TIME FOR FEAR" "NO FORTS. ONLY JUSTICE." "we're conventing court in the fort" "We pun to forget tears though" "Im gonna release all of these come the end of this, nothing is sacred" "he faked his death to get away from us" "but, it's all in good pun" "This is our life now" "you could have fit a meme in there" "oh god it is going to be a time thing" "yes how dare you say a meme I don't know, or whatever that is" "it only hurts if you let it hurt" "lies, I almost cried last night I will have none of your nonsense" "i am of a sensitive disposition. everything hurts" "Worse than my solving my problems with ___ and cocaine idea?" "you don't mix ANYTHING with cocaine, instant death" "Can I mix water with cocaine" "I may not have a coffee problem but I am surrouned by 5 different types of soda cans rn" "the soccer van, but for super villains" "we can alwats tie some people to the top of the car with bungee cords" "free test subject right here" "Ya'll gnna get yourselves killed" "My guy I'm lowekey terrified 24/7." "you're always screaming" "ARE YOU SURE ABOUT THAT" "I'M NOT SURE ABOUT ANYTHING" "you do not need to focus on that" "bye whoever’s leaving, I can't keep track of all of you" "you're attractive and love crime, I'm attractive and love crime. Let's be attractive and commit crimes together." "Dr we will never send puns again if you promise to stop getting into death traps" "I only said it was nice to see him again with the living. I may not sound it, but I'm absolutely ecstatic" "wow I mean he's probably not the best at running" "Kick him in the knees" "Hes DIED, He'll be fine" "I COME HOME TO PAIN!!!!" "fuck you ____ you suck at taking care of yourself" "Yes now shut up and sleep in a bed tonight instead of a ditch" "Being unconscious does not count as sleep" "IT'S NOT THE PUNISHMENT YOU DESERVE, BUT IT'S THE PUNISHMENT YOU NEED" 'We need justice for these puns" "Honestly anyone int he crowd might have snapped and shit him just to shut him up" "it was me guys" "you did the world a service fam" "YOU HAVE TAINTED HIM" "WELCOME TO THE DARK SIDE, ____" "Nnnnnng that hurt me" "i gtg, I want to finish this report before 3 A.M" "procrastination at its finest" "get in losers we're going spooping" "Why have we formed a cult" "This was not what i expected when i first asked to join the skype group" "All groups of friends make cults at some point" "would it be irresponsible of me to send a message saying 'run bitch run'? "WHEN I TOLD HIM TO KICK ASS AND TAKE NAMES THIS ISN'T WHAT I MEANT" "I GO ON WARCRAFT FOR TEN FUCKING MINUTES AND IT ALL GOES TO SHIT" "I instinctively covered my ears at the gunshots but then I remembered I was wearing headphones" *does the 'I'm so smart' dance "Mother always told me I was special" "I hope we're blowing this way out of proportion but at the same time this would be a hilarious plot twist" "WHOO BOY SCREENSHOT" "He's moved from senpai to fam" "He's probably lughing in his cellar" "dial dow the thirst there my dude lmao, ily thou" "I for one always overreact" "I never overreact. WHY. ARE YOU TRYING TO IMPLY SOMETHING" "___ ARE YOU ON HELIUM???" "I COME BACK AND WHAT DO I FIND" "WHY CAN'T THE RIDDLES LEAD SOMEWHERE SAFE!?! LIKW I DON'T KNOW! A DUCK POND OR I DON'T KNOW!!" "because my mind went from 'do we know any duck themed villains' to that weird French duck from courage the cowardly dog" "SHE'S HATING ON MY BOI JULIUS CAESAR" "it's been 2060 years __ im" "knife to meet your boi julius caesar" "Ok i'll hit you up next year when it's 2061" "YOU CAN HIT ME UP WHEN I'M DEAD FAM" "___ has nominated me as a Fish, or a frog, I don't even know" "if im bill the lizard youre gonna be a fish w me" "MAYBE I LIKE BEING DROP KICKED" "there is so much anger on that voice that is just covered layer of 'fuck this'" "Really? Legwork? Oh, this is grand." "give me your free time im dying in work" "it's a supervillainy way though" "I'm already dating a weeb and then I come here and WHAT DO I SEE" "I'm going to smack you all" "Everyone go stand in the corner" "I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN YOU HAD SOMETHING TO DO WITH THIS OH MY GOD" "I never had an anime phase I win" "everybody loves him but the sentiment is not reciprocated" "i will be ashamed for the rest of my life, but sure" "time to Google... aight Google isn't helping" "Tfw you kill ___, Reblog if you agree" "he looks like you should just start punching him and never stop" "when did we start being about ____'s butt" "We're allowed to be proud because it's obvious the guy is salty and not happy with our success." "I'M DISOWNING YOU ALL, EVEN HIM" "oh hey it's midnight" "you can't cheat the champion of cheating" "you cheated and I shall cheat harder" "I'd hope that I'd at least be captured by honorable idiots" "NO DUMBO RIDES. ONLY JUSTICE." "you and I are on separate wavelengths than" "OKAY STRICTLY UPDATE THEY ARE NOW PLAYING WAKE ME UP INSIDE WHATS HAPPENING" "don't meme shame me bro" "Your memes are stale, and you are stale" "lol what is romantic human interaction" "what is human interaction" "what is interaction" "What is human" "this is the worst thing I have ever created and I will burn for this" "I look at him directly and said fuck you" "I gotta go eat dinner y'all are fucking insane" "I WILL RUN EXPERIMENTS IN THE BASEMENT WHO'S WITH ME??" "Do you have any redeeming qualities" "c'mon skype lemme transer sewing via you...." "are you kidding, this is better than all the tv shows I'm behind on" "MURDER ROADTRIP" "Rosaceae are refuscent, Violas are cerulean, Cane crystals are saccharine, homogeneous to you" "WE ARE THE BEST GROUPIES" "shes not even here, she chickened out of the fight" "Tfw your brain is memes" "Twf yer also an adult" "Yup. Exactly Sad O'Clock" "So sad o'clock is midnight o fifty, got it"

#RP Starters

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tlbodine · 5 years

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A Plea for Some Non-Cringe Native American Representation

There’s something that has bothered me for a real long time, and I haven’t said anything because it didn’t really feel like my place to say it. But if pasty white folks across the country will insist on continuing to make these books and comics and movies, then I guess this pasty white girl can make a plea to do it better.

So. Here’s the deal. Native American representation in fiction sucks.

We’re going to talk about why, and then talk about some ways you can do it better. And it’s going to take a while, so join me under the cut.

PROBLEM #1: Erasure

The first problem with First Nations people being represented in fiction is that it, uh...doesn’t happen very often. It’s pretty rare for a show or movie or book to have a Native character, and even rarer for that character to exist without being a vehicle/mouthpiece for some kind of hamfisted message.

And, of course, Native characters who do show up in movies are sometimes played by non-Native actors, which is just. Um.

somebody fucking kill me I don’t want to live on this planet anymore.

PROBLEM #2: The Same Stock Character Over and Over and Over

There’s this weird thing where TV shows have A Very Special Native American Episode(tm) where a Native American character shows up in a storyline designed to, idk, provide a tidy outlet for the viewer’s white guilt or something. I see this a lot in superhero stories for...some reason:

Batman and Chief Screaming Eagle (ok, it was the 1960s, surely things have gotten better right? oh...) who’s butting heads with a villain over a bad contract for, uh, the chief’s ancestral lands

There was the Buffy episode “Pangs” where a Chumash vengeance spirit is the villain-of-the day after being disturbed by some construction (and this is honestly one of the better treatments of the premise, at least the episode is well-written)

There was the Smallville episode with Kyla Willowbrook, the Kawatche Skinwalker (I know, I know) who for bonus points dies tragically in Clark’s arms (I KNOW) and who was deeply concerned with...with some construction...disturbing her sacred homesite...(this is starting to sound familiar)

And then there was The Flash episode where Barry is forced to fight with the complicated-yet-tragically-evil Native American activist woman whose crimes involve stealing cultural artifacts that belong to to the museum (yes I’m screaming) and also murdering people...y’know, for vengeance and stuff.

I could keep going but I really don’t think I have to. When your only representation of a culture is a character (frequently a smoking-hot member of the opposite sex to the hero) who is an ambiguous villain who is motivated by vengeance and/or justice over having their land/cultural artifacts disturbed, and who has a valid claim but is really going about it in the wrong way and whose tragic death and/or defeat really gives the white character something complex to think about for two seconds.... well. That’s more than a little racist.

PROBLEM #3: These Are Not Your Stories to Tell

You know what white people love doing?

They love appropriating Native culture! Seriously! They love it! And who can blame them, really? Native people have so much rich symbolism and mythology and cool clothes and neat aesthetics. Painted war ponies and buckskin dresses and shapeshifters and monsters, oh my! Indian burial grounds and vengeful spirits (oh for fuck sake enough with the vengeful Indian trope)

But here’s the deal:

The mythology you’re borrowing from belongs to a group of people who are still alive and sometimes practicing the religion you’re liberally reinterpreting

There is no such thing as a “Native American” myth. You’re talking about literally hundreds of different tribes who are culturally distinct from one another and have their own complex histories of interaction, diplomacy, war, friendship, etc. with one another for centuries before white folk got here. You erase all of that when you treat Native culture as a grab-bag of cool things you can mix and match to your liking.

Maybe, just a thought, stop it with the oppression narratives about activists and/or vengeful spirits who are real threatened by white people disturbing their homes? It’s not that there isn’t a lot to unpack in that -- I mean, white people really did conduct mass genocide against a race of people, for starters -- it’s just that this isn’t really your oppression narrative to tell.

It seems to me that folks writing about Native Americans don’t actually have any idea what Native people are like? They either think of them as anachronistic figures, an extinct and ancient group, or they think of them as people really hung up on their cultural past. Because maybe people can’t think of anything to do with a Native character other than use it as a vocal mouthpiece of one very specific part of their cultural oppression.

But please. Please stop. That is every bit as stupid and racist as making a Black character who only talks about slavery, or a Jewish character who only talks about the Holocaust, or giving all of your gay characters AIDS.

So what do you do instead?

Writing Native Characters in a Way That Does Not Suck - A Quick Primer

I can’t write a definitive guide on writing good Native representation, because there is no such guide, and if there were it would take a whole book probably, and I am not in any way even remotely an authority.

But I can give you some pointers that will help you.

(And to be honest, Native representation is so awful that the bar here is really super low, even just attempting a tiny bit is a really welcome breath of fresh air)

Choose a Tribe

Step one: Figure out what kind of Native people you’re writing about.

Because, as previously noted, Native People Are Not A Monoculture.

How do you pick a tribe? Well, start with geography. Where do you want the story to take place? Obviously people move around, so you can find folks outside of their ancestral lands, but they all started someplace, and a lot of people live where their parents and grandparents and cousins all live.

So where does your story take place? Pick a spot. Then find out what tribes live in that region. It’s not a secret. There are maps:

(Source: http://www.emersonkent.com/map_archive/native_american_tribes_map.htm)

Or maybe you want to go about this in a different way. Maybe you have a specific story idea in mind and you want to write it in a way that would be accurate and respectful. Cool! A good first step on that is to figure out what tribe actually does the thing you’re wanting to write about.

Skinwalkers, for example, originate in the Navajo Nation (Dine` people), although there are related myths from surrounding tribes in the area.

If you’re writing a story about Wendigo, then you should know those myths originate with the Algonquin people of Quebec and Ontario.

If you’re writing something with spiritually significant buffalo, you should probably choose a culture that actually interacted with buffalo -- ie, a Plains Indian tribe like the Lakota-Sioux people.

And so on and so forth.

(Note that this is only the first step. You still have to do a lot of research after this to be sure you’re doing everything properly and respectfully. And, y’know, maybe reconsider if you actually want to tell a story respecting that mythology, or if you just want to sound cool and exotic)

Also, personal preference: Please don’t make your characters Cherokee if you’re just going for “character with Native ancestry.” Please choose a different tribe. For a lot of complicated (and sometimes surprisingly racist) reasons, white people have been claiming Cherokee heritage for a long time, and even when it’s true, it feels cheap and cringey in fiction. If you want to tell a story about the Trail of Tears or something set in Tahlequa, Oklahoma, great! Write Cherokee characters! But if you just want a Native American character for other reasons...pick a different tribe.

Choose a Name

Fun fact: Modern Native people that you meet out on the street don’t have names like “Stands With Fists” or “Running Bear.”

If you have an impulse to name your character any kind of descriptive “adjective + animal” name...just don’t. Please. And don’t go to BehindTheName or some other random site to pick out something that “sounds” Native.

Names in other cultures are tricky. Some (but not all!) Native people may have a cultural tradition of having multiple names, including naming ceremonies (often as a rite of passage in adolescence). Some tribes have clan names. Everybody’s different. But these special names are culturally sensitive, often sacred, and are not a thing readily accessible to white people. White folks spent centuries trying to wipe out Indigenous people’s belief systems; they deserve to have some things kept private and sacred.

So what I’m getting at here is that white writers really, really should not touch on the “Indian naming ceremony” trope at all if they can help it, because it’s gonna be real hard to get the details right, and getting the details wrong is going to make you sound like an ignorant racist. And most of the time, it’s not really that important to a story.

Most contemporary Native people have regular English names. They may also have tribal names and clan names (that they may or may not share with outsiders). But lots of tribal members don’t, and that doesn’t make them any less Native.

My recommendation for naming your Native characters? Find real people from the time period, tribe, and region you’re writing in. Find a phone book or newspaper from a town on or near a reservation for your chosen tribe. Look at names of participants in powwows. Look at the sports rosters for Native schools. Look at historical records like census data from the year you’re writing about. Don’t just make things up.

** One Note: You know how “black” names are a thing? You encounter a similar sort of thing in some contemporary Native Americans. I grew up with a lot of kids who had “weird” names like Kirby, Sheriden, Baskerville, Sterling and Precious. (and by “weird” I mean “names middle-class white people don’t tend to use”). There’s also a lot of black-sounding names in Native populations. There’s some complex reasons behind this, and a lot of sociology of naming, and I won’t spend too much time on it right now but just...so you know. It’s a thing.

Write a Human Being

This really is the biggest thing, and it’s true of every writing you do, all the time, no matter what: Write a real person and not a caricature.

Native people are people first. Their cultural heritage affects them the way anyone else’s culture does. The things they eat, wear, do, believe, the stories they know, etc. are all affected. But Native people don’t have a responsibility to be walking representatives of their tribes. And they definitely shouldn’t be a vessel for white guilt.

(Fun fact: “Iron Eyes Cody,” maybe best known for the “Crying Indian” role in a commercial about pollution, was an Italian-American born Espera Oscar de Corti)

Here’s a really, really good article I found while working on this rant that might be of interest to you as wellas you set out on this quest: https://mashable.com/2015/03/24/american-indians-tv/

I still have so much to say on this topic, and maybe I’ll write more in the future, but this is already very long so I’ll stop. I hope this has been at least a little bit helpful for y’all. Go forth and write non-terrible characters, I beg of you.

*Disclaimer: I am not a Native person and do not claim any special knowledge or ownership of Native culture, and I beg you to please listen to Native voices when possible in your creative endeavors. I’m just a gal who happened to have spent most of my life living near reservations and growing up around Native people and having Native friends and being taught about historical cultures by my mother who has a degree in Southwest Studies and has done a lot of formal and informal research due to her own interests in the topic.

If you found this article helpful at all, please consider dropping a tip in my tip jar.

I also have a book coming out! You can pre-order it now! It features a main character of mixed heritage, New Mexico reservation border towns, and zombies trying to get by like everybody else.

Pre-Order now on B&N: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/river-of-souls-t-l-bodine/1131956124

Or on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/River-Souls-T-L-Bodine/dp/1950305015

Or from the publisher: http://journalstone.com/bookstore/river-of-souls/?fbclid=IwAR14Qna5tMgWBV0We2uGSLreBkmyvZ5SoDAzPQpTKeFn4JR4PWSyKGl0VEo

Or add it to your Goodreads library: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/46183381-river-of-souls

#how to write #writing advice #native americans #cultural appropriation #representation #long post #but please do read it #I worked on this all day

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thekytchensynk · 3 years

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Monitor Duty (Fictober Prompt 23)

Prompt number: 23

Fanfiction Fandom: DCU/Booster Gold

Rating: G

Warnings: No warnings

Read this story on AO3

Do we have to?” Two voices chorus in near-unison.

The Martian Manhunter’s face is as much of an answer as they’re likely to get, but to be fair, it’s a pretty complete answer. Yes, you need to take monitor duty because everyone else has actually important things to do. And if you make me delay in taking care of the important things I need to do right now, then monitor duty will be the least of your worries.

“Fine,” Ted says, answering for the both of them, because really, which one of them has the balls to say no to that stern I have looked through galaxies expression?

Which is how two hours later, the two of them are lounging in the monitor room, staring at the evening news. Booster has his feet up and is tossing a baseball he found somewhere up and down, up and down. Ted flips the channel. From the news to a gameshow. Not a massive improvement. He flips again. Sports, nothing he’s interested in. Again.

“-INJURED IN A CAR CRASH AND DON’T KNOW WHERE TO T-”

He flips the channel back to the news, which is coming across at a volume level intended for normal human beings rather than whatever the lawyer ads was. A second later, the baseball hit the floor and bobbled across the tile.

“Jesus, Ted,” Booster says from where he’s only barely caught himself from tipping all the way over in his chair. He still sits at a precarious angle, one hand on the wall to balance the chair on two legs. “What was that?”

“Different signal strength,” Ted replies, scowling at the screen.

On the screen, the man currently on camera in the newsroom is a blue-suited man with gray hair and a startled expression. He looks surprisingly animated for a network news anchor. “It seems as though they are in the buildi-”

Ted switches the channel again. Booster considers grabbing the baseball once more, then shrugs and sets the chair back on all four legs but doesn’t bother to get up.

“Why do lawyers always have to yell?” Booster muses. “Seems like if you need a lawyer, the last thinking you want is them yelling at you. Things are probably screwed up enough, if you’re calling a lawyer in the first place.”

“In case the people watching are old?” Ted jokes.

The two of them stare at one another over the silence that follows the thud of the joke landing like a bag of wet cement.

“Well, hopefully pretty soon someone will-”

This train of thought gets derailed as the alert goes off -- an incoming message. Ted hits the button and some of G’Nort’s face appears on the screen. “Some of” because G’Nort has decided to film this message from about one foot from the camera. Both Justice League members have an excellent view up one canine nostril. It’s not ideal.

“Oh boy, am I glad to see you guys!” Gnort’s nostril says. “Listen, I need help-”

“Can you back up?” Booster asks.

G’Nort pauses. The camera swings wildly. They get a passing view of one hairy ear, a whole landscape of fur and a little bit of motion sickness before things stabilize again and almost G’Nort’s whole face is on screen. “Better?”

“Better.”

He clears his throat, then begins waving his arms in cartoonish, animated panic. “Listen, I need help!”

“What’s wrong?” Ted asks, doing his best to sound professional and interested.

Looking surprised they would ask him that, G’Nort says, “Um… well, you see, I was making dinner. And I heard this noise, right? From outside. And I’m not expecting anyone to come around today, so I’m thinking maybe it’s a door to door salesman or something, but then I remember, we don’t have those on this planet. We don’t have… we don’t have anyone on this planet, really, except me. And so I start thinking then maybe it’s going to-”

As he rambles, Ted looks over at Booster for help. But Booster just shrugs and gestures to Ted. You’re the one actually on the monitor.

“Hey, G’Nort. G’Nort! Hold on.”

The alien paused. “Yeah?”

“G’Nort, what’s actually wrong?”

For some reason, this stumps G’nort. He looks down at the ground for a few long seconds, brow furrowed in thought. “Wrong…” He repeats, as though hearing the word for the first time. Tilts his head. Frowns harder.

“G’Nort? Can you call back once you remember what’s wrong?” And without waiting for an answer, Ted flips back to the TV, then turns to Booster. “What can possibly be happening. Isn’t he in uninhabited space?”

“I guess if someone really is there, that could be a problem,” Booster muses. On the TV, the news anchor is talking to someone off screen. His microphone isn’t picking up any of it. Unprofessional. “But I guess if it actually was an intruder, he wouldn’t be having that much trouble remembering.”

Ted raises an eyebrow. Booster keeps a straight face for another three seconds with heroic effort, before a laugh breaks loose. “Fine. Fine, you’re right. Should we worry?”

“He’ll call back when he remembers,” Ted says. “And even if something’s weird over there, why is he calling us? What are we going to do about a problem in deep space?”

“Maybe he-”

Booster’s thoughts on their abilities in deep space get cut off by the alert flashing again. Ted thumbs the button and says, “G’Nort, unless you have a-”

“Do I look like G’Nort?”

The voice. The accent. Both Ted and Booster turn guiltily toward the TV, where Fire stands, hands on hips, waiting expectantly for an answer.

“... no?” Booster tries.

Moving rapidly along, Fire says, “We need backup downtown. Who’s there right now?”

“Just us,” Ted says, all business now. “What do you need help with?”

She hesitates. “Us…” she prompts.

“Me and Booster.”

“Ah.”

“Something wrong?”

She hesitates again. Glances left. Hisses something to someone else under her breath. Looks back. “So do you know if the Martian Manhunter, or Batman might be back soon, or…”

“Sorry, they’re on some sort of enviro-political standoff thing down in Uruguay,” Ted explains, waving vaguely in the direction he thinks Uruguay might be. “Afraid it’s just us.”

Fire bites her lip. Glances off screen again. “I see,” she says. “Well, sorry to bother you. Good night.”

“Wait, we can help-”

“Sorry, you’re breaking up, bye!” the connection terminates from the other side. The two JLI members sit in silence for a few seconds.

“Am I right to feel offended?” Ted asks after a while. “Because I feel offended.”

“Yeah, that’s fair,” Booster says. “That was a definite passive aggressive ‘you’d just mess things up’ statement. I’d know.”

“Rude.”

“Definitely rude.”

The alert flashes again.

When Ted turns the communicator on again, it’s G’Nort’s nose once more. “Guys, I remembered!”

Ted turns his attention back to the TV with the slow deliberation of someone dealing with a child who has a very important story to share. “What is it you remembered, G’Nort?” he asks.

“When I opened the door I looked out and there was this huge-”

“Hey losers!”

G’Nort’s nose gets replaced with Guy Gardner’s slightly red face, also close to the screen but thankfully not full-scale nostril exploration close. When both Ted and Booster startle back at his sudden appearance, he bursts out in a sharp laugh. “I wake you suckers up?”

“Guy!” Ted is half irritated, half just impressed. “We were talking to someone. How did you override the signal?”

Guy gives Ted an incredulous look. “I’m calling on a Green Lantern Corps ring. You think some Earth tech is going to be able to stand up to that?”

Booster raises a finger, about to start talking, but Ted shakes his head. Absolutely no good can come from telling Guy he’s replaced another Green Lantern call. It’s just going to give him a big head. Big-er, at any rate.

“What do you want?” Ted asks.

“I was hoping someone important was there, but I guess you two can play messenger,” Guy says, not hiding his smirk. “Tell the bigwigs who’re way too cool to call Guy Gardner when they should that I took care of Uruguay. It was only one dumbass. I think the rest might be somewhere else, so call them and let them know they probably better turn themselves around and put those detective skills to work.”

“Uh-”

“Later.”

There's a moment of static, then the news is back. The anchor has left his desk and is standing near the back of the set, ducking away from something overhead. A different man, dressed in a “Use a straw wrapper, we’ll put you in the crapper” shirt, sits at the desk, a stack of papers in his hands.

“And the more we pollute the rainforest with plastic straw wrappers, the more it contributes to the coming ice age that-”

“Wow. they didn’t think that slogan through at all,” Booster notes. Ted squints at the screen and nods his agreement. “I mean, who would buy that. It doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue.”

“And crapper? On a t-shirt? Really?”

“Maybe it was designed by a twelve-year-old?”

“I think most twelve-year-olds have better taste than ‘crapper.’”

“Fair. Fair.”

The man cuts off as another person in the same awful t-shirt flies through the background. Ice went zipping through the scene a moment later. The guy at the desk looks offscreen and shouts something. Whatever he’s saying, it stops abruptly as a green-gloved fist connects with his chin, knocking him out of the chair.

“Is that … Fire’s fist?” Ted asks, squinting at the TV.

“I think so.”

“So this is what she was calling about,” Ted says, bemused. “I guess that’s the guys Batman was looking for.”

On screen, the anchor has run completely out of frame. Fire steps in front of the camera and leans over. She straightens a moment later with the guy’s shirtfront balled up in one fist. “You gonna call your goons off?” she demands of the guy, who’s a blubbering mess and not exactly answering intelligibly.

“Looks like she has it under control,” Booster says critically as the alert flashes again. Ted watches the next punch, wincing a little at the sound of the impact, before flipping back to the alert.

“Hello G’nort’s nose,” Booster says as a familiar image pops up. “Ted, is monitor duty always so busy?”

“Nah, this is kind of a lot,” Ted replies before addressing G’Nort. “Did you remember yet?”

“Yes! Guys. I took my sandwich outside, because I thought I heard something, and when I was outside, I heard something again, so I flew up into the sky. And while I was up there, this meteor passed real close. I guess there was a meteor shower. I was surprised, but then I flew back down, and I think the sound I heard was a meteor, but now my sandwich is missing.”

“Your… sandwich?” Ted asks.

“Yeah! Do you think the meteors maybe had some secret aliens who steal sandwiches?”

Yet again, Ted and Booster share a glance. Then Ted asks, “G’Nort, did you maybe drop the sandwich in space? When you got surprised by the meteor?”

The nose looked as thoughtful as a dog-like nose ever looked. Then after about thirty excruciating seconds, the picture blooped off again. Booster tilted his head as the TV came back, now showing the news set empty but for one unconscious eco-terrorist.

“Is monitor duty always this weird?” he asks at last.

Ted sighs and flops back in his chair. “Nah. Sometimes it’s dumber.”

#fictober 20 #23 #dcu #booster gold #fanfic

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brunhiddensmusings · 4 years

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year in review of parenting

thought i would try and record a few prime interactions ive had with my kids so i remember them as my 3 daughters are just so out there - daughter says shes interested in becoming an animator so i have to line up a list of animations on youtube i know were made by one person, including ‘no evil’ by betsy lee, dingo doodles sips and the karaoke of doom, ‘witches on tinder’, and piemations as examples of the kind of thing one person can reasonably do with a lot of dedication and if you pay close attention you can see how each of the animations are done differently - explaining what skaa was, twice - spending time at gamestop just discussion how some funko pops make sense and some are super dumb. makes sense funko pop would be one of the main characters of a movie thats well loved, dumb ones would be the same but for a movie literally nobody likes but funko pops were released before the movie was so they will never sell, or having 40+ differnt versions of rick and another 50 of morty. even having 15+ different batmans doesnt make sense because given the choice do you want orange batman or classic batman? - no i cannot go to your school to beat up the kid who was mean to you. i mean technically im physically able to but thats not the point - explaining what the music style ‘scat’ is and why its unrelated to the same word used to mean ‘wild animal poop’ - i dont know how to explain to you who freddie mercury is because were in a car and i cant show you a youtube of bohemian rhapsody while im driving - explaining why i am irritated at the kid friendly versions of classic horror monsters, they dont get it so i have to go into detail a- is the wolfman scary? like just a dude thats hairy? no. no he is not. however imagine that someone you know, and you dont know who, may at some point in time turn into a ravenous monster who will attack their friends ruthlessly, its already happened at least once so everyone is on edge wondering who it is. however, secretly it is you that is the monster, living in fear that you could loose control and kill the ones you love most b- the frankenstins monster, just a big green dude with bolts in his neck? scary? no, hes just a larger zombie basically. however imagine someone at college going nutty and then starts to raid the morgue, the cemetery, butcher shops, and surgery wards at hospitals for the human parts he stitches together into a rude parody of a human being and brings it to life. but it doesnt stop there, because he abandoned this new creature that thing now stalks him out of revenge, one by one killing everyone they know - the kids now understand why the majority of the classic monsters are supposed to be scary as balls - explaining COPPA to them because several youtubers we watch together have started loudly announcing ‘not for children’, at which they unprompted start complaining about a youtuber called ‘ryans world’ where a very annoying screaming child tells everyone to buy shit and is repeatedly recommended to them by the algorithm because it knows theyre kids. i should have taken that as a warning so i wasnt surprised at just how much ‘ryans world’ merchandise was in stores this year, like ye gods theres more of it then there was starwars and harry potter merch combined he has his own cereal which is apparently frootloops and disturbing plush animals. we agreed its weird when on his merch theres four different characters but the pink cat girl looks like she was made by someone different then the others because shes got way better detail - explain to kids that ‘green eggs and ham’ was made on a dare, which requires me to recite the whole thing for them to count that there are exactly 50 different words 5 year old- “wheres my sister” me- “in the bathroom, why” 5 year old- “imma hug her” me- “nn.... wow youre - 14 year old in the bathroom- “GAAH!” me- “-fast” - i can do a perfect impression of the ‘huhuhuhuh’ sound sans undertale makes - its been 3 years of me using the phrase ‘sans undertale’ specifically and my daughter who has spent the last 3 years dressing like him and listening to his music hasnt caught on that the way im phrasing it is in fact a joke - kids accidentally stumble uppon a history meme i was part of and i have to explain thats a thing i do - explain to kids what the emu war was - explain to kids who rasputin was - explain to the kids what the problem with hitler was, given the 11 year old is supposed to only get this in the school curriculum this next year i can understand why she was shocked. 14 year old was also shocked becuase she is in the between part of ‘we briefly touched on that war’ and ‘okay now that you are old enough we can explain how shoving people into ovens works’ - they asked, they really did, and only then do i realize that despite it being something everyone should definitely be aware of... figuring out how old and how to explain it really is a tricky matter cause ho-damn most adults get queasy when you explain it and im sure those kids had bad dreams for a week - theyre also aware of the trump concentration camps and were able to draw the connections real quick - pun contest - kid asks me to acquire a daft punk song for her so i can put it on her mp3 player, i have never heard of this song despite her spending 5 minutes describing it and how their eyes are freaky. have to explain to her that when i was about her age daft punk released an entire movie made of music videos. we have to show each other different daft punk videos to understand each other - no, daft punk are the robots, not the blue eye people. literally nobody knows what they look like under the helmets they even show up to music award shows wearing them. the helmets can actually make words and emotes theyre really rad songs we have erupted into together - spooky scary skeletons - narwhals narwhals - another irish drinking song - hubba hubba zoot zoot

#dad things #year in review #dorks

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jason-todd-deserved-better · 5 years

Text

Welcome to the DC Universe - Tim Drake x Reader Headcanon

Request: “I really love your 'welcome to the dc universe' stuff. May i ask a Tim Drake ver? To complete it? Ty”

AN: After three scrapped drafts, four months of delays, and a whole year of planning, I’ve finally have gotten to post Tim’s version of WttDCU. I’m so sorry that it has taken so long, it’s been a long time going and after scraping it three times, I’ve finally figured out the story that I wanted to tell. It’s different than the other boy’s but in all honesty, I’ve grown to love this one so much and even though writer’s block did not help me whatsoever, I’m very proud of what this had become. I hope you guys enjoy, let me know what y’all think, and I love you guys, just want to make sure you guys know that!

Since you were a kid, you were absolutely obsessed with Batman.

Like Batman: The Animated Series was the shit for you, and you were seriously obsessed with it.

Since you were so young, you always loved the Robin character, from Dick Grayson to later Tim Drake. (Unfortunately, Jason Todd was never really in the show from what you remembered.)

Even as you grew older, you often rewatched the series every now and then.

But then you started going for the comics, and oh wow there was a richer story with them.

The Batman series were always your favorite though, you would often read through those the most, especially the ones with the rest of the Batfam.

Hell, you loved almost everyone there, especially the third Boy Wonder.

Oh man did you have a crush on that dude.

To you he seemed the most relatable, especially when you started college this semester.

The sleepless nights spent studying, the constant amount of work that needed to be done, and the ever present need for coffee. (Oh you needed that crap injected in your veins at this point, because you were about ready to crash and burn.)

Yep, very relatable.

Especially now at the most stressful wonderful time of the year, when finals are running rampant and with you craving an end to this misery called a semester.

By some miracle of the gods though, you had just made it out of your last exam of the hell quarter and you were ready to just melt away into nothing. (Or freeze into oblivion because it was way too freaking cold outside to function.)

Since it was freezing outside and you finally had a time to relax, you decided that a long and warm shower would be absolute heaven right now.

So after trudging to your apartment that was five minute walk from your campus, and tugging off your warm layers, you hop into the shower, goosebumps littering your skin from the cold.

You turned on the shower, letting the warm water tug you into bliss.

Which was interrupted by a large crash that sounded as if it originated from your kitchen.

At this, your eyes could be compared to one of a deer in front of headlights.

Absolutely no one else should be in the apartment right then because your roommate left two days ago to go spend time with her family for the holidays.

To make matters worse, you didn’t bring any change of clothes into the bathroom because they weren’t there.

Oh you really wanted to cry right then and there but you stare at the shower curtain rod that you were going to put in to replace the old one, but have now found a new use for it.

Turning off the water, you get your towel, securing it around yourself and grabbing the rod that you were now going to use as a makeshift bat.

Opening the door slightly to check if the coast was clear, you glance out, seeing nothing for the moment and opening the door more as silently as you could walking out with the rod up and ready for anything.

The hallway was clear so then you take the hallway to the kitchen.

You were thinking that it was a dumb move on your part, hell, that’s how people die in horror movies and here you are doing that exact thing.

So when you walked in and saw what was in your kitchen, you screamed.

Mostly out of shock and surprise, plus a tiny amount of fear pinched in there too.

There was a dude dressed up as Red Robin leaning against your counter trying to stay upright.

You weren’t sure what you were expecting but this sure as hell wasn’t it.

Not that you were complaining or even thinking about complaining because you notice that this dude is bleeding all over.

This is when you snap out of your freaked out daze and put down the shower rod and help the guy out.

”Okay my dude,” You pull him to sit on the stool by the counter. “I need you to sit here for a sec.”

He lets off a weak nod, his breathing very ragged, but you already left to get your first aid kit.

Not even a moment afterwards you come back with it in your hands, putting it on the counter as you pop the case open.

You then move to peel off the armor you slowly process the past couple events.

”Oh geez Tim.” You mutter, starting to disinfect the wounds on the front off his chest.

”Wait a sec, how do you know my name?” He states, stiffening under your touch and he alcohol being rubbed in.

”You my dude, aren’t in Kansas anymore,” You stated bluntly.

”What’s the supposed to mean-” His eyes widen, “Oh crap, Wizard of Oz reference-”

”Means that you aren’t in your universe anymore, I think anyway,” You say, moving on to another open wound.

”Yeah, but how do you know my name? Do you know this universe’s version of me?” He asks, looking at your face.

”Uh no,” You glance up at him, “Not exactly.”

”Then how do you know it?” His eyes narrow slightly, causing you to move your eyes away from his and to the work that you were currently doing.”

”T-That's going to be a lot to explain,” You stutter.

”Well I’m not going anywhere soon so please explain away.”

So you do, and Tim got very weirded out.

Not at you, but the whole “My Life Is a Source Of Entertainment” to this universe and the fact that he wasn’t even real here.

You didn’t blame him, this was also weirding you out to the max.

Like it's not everyday that your fictional crush pops out of nowhere in the middle of your kitchen.

Then there was the reason that he got there in the first place.

Turns out that he was fighting with the rest of his family against a powerful warlock, and they were winning when all of a sudden there was a flash of bright light when he then felt himself falling.

Then the next thing he knew, he landed in someone’s kitchen.

So that leads to where you two were at now, sitting on your couch, as you look through whatever DC comics you owned and showed them to him so he could see what you were talking about.

The two of you spent a couple hours reading through them.

You guys stopped when your yawns were growing large in numbers.

So you help him put the couch together for him to be more comfortable and head to bed.

Either way, you guys progressively got closer as the days pass.

Like you guys became friends very quickly.

Often times he really liked hearing you talk about your life, especially your interests and your opinions on everyone he knows.

Like how if Bruce sees an orphan he’s got to adopt them.

Or how Jason and Damian were complete and utter hotheads but still likeable in their own odd little ways.

But one that kinda rubbed him the wrong way was that you thought that Dick was a ten out of ten in almost everything. (Especially looks.)

He just shrugged it off.

What he did like the most though was that he didn’t need to hide anything from you.

It was all out in the air and it was a freedom that was kind of new for him.

Then the holiday rush really started to hit.

You were originally just going to spend a couple days with your family till after New Years.

Now you weren’t sure what you were going to do.

Eventually you got the idea to invite Tim to go with you to your parents house.

There was only one thing stopping you though.

Would he even want to?

Oh man you didn’t know where you’d put yourself if he said no.

Well, you did finally get the balls to ask him to go with you.

And you thanked whatever god was out there that he accepted.

Quite happily in fact.

So happily that he was smiling from the second you asked him to the moment he got into your car to travel to your parents.

That’s when he got a little jittery.

He wasn’t sure on how your family was going to react to him.

Like did they know about his life in Gotham?

Either way, you tried to help him out in that aspect and told him that he didn’t really have much to worry about, since in your family you were kind of the only one who was into the DC Universe.

But you guys did come up with answers to questions they might ask him.

For example;

”Where are you from Tim?” and his answer would be “I’m from New York.” (Since New York’s nickname was also Gotham and the cities are extremely similar.)

”What does your family do?” then he’d say, “My father is a businessman.” (Extremely vague but this was the only way to make sure there wouldn’t be any brows raised that would insure more questions.)

And, “What’s your major?” now this one he’s got a couple answers for but, “Criminal Science” had to be said. (For obvious reasons.)

The car ride went by pretty smoothly and the next thing you guys know, you’re at your parents house.

Oh the nerves were hitting the both of you pretty hard, but you both hid it as you guys walked inside.

Now your parent’s knew that you guys were coming (You called them beforehand.) but they were very curious about him.

It seriously wasn’t everyday that their daughter brought home somebody for them to not only meet, BUT to also stay over.

It was entirely out of character for you.

And they of course thought that there was something going on between the two of you before even stepping foot in the house.

So to say they were curious would be an understatement.

Your whole damn family was there at your house and everyone wanted to see the boy that you brought along.

All eyes were on you when the two of you walked in, hugs were given with kisses on the cheeks and the questions were flying all over the place.

Your mom though was the first one to greet the two of you, bringing you in for a hug and then going and pulling Tim in one right after, welcoming the two of you.

Tim took it very well, and he felt his nerves starting to go away.

The rest of the evening was spent with the family getting to know him and the same with him.

Your siblings liked him, your little brother especially. (He lowkey wished that Damian was more like this, and less on trying to make his life miserable.)

Your dad though was a little standoffish, and was trying really hard not to like him, like he was answering your dad’s questions with ease. (Plus, when the two of them went for a handshake, he wasn’t expecting Tim’s grip to be that strong.)

And your mom immediately liked him, she got a good vibe from him the moment they met.

The night went by in a series of laughs and good stories, but then it was time for everyone to got to bed.

The thing is all the beds were taken, except or yours.

Now when you realized this, there was a prominent heat on your cheeks.

But of course, the honorable Tim offred to sleep on the floor.

“Yeah you’re not sleeping on the ground, it’s freezing,” you state, lifting the sheets to get in, “plus I’d feel bad.”

He couldn’t argue against that so he went to the other side of you bed and crawled in.

Seeing how stiff he was, you decide to put on cheesy holiday movies on your laptop that you brought.

Putting it between the two of you, you only make it 45 minutes into the movie till you crash out.

Thing is, you were now leaning your head on his shoulder sleeping, and he blushed when he felt you nod off.

His heart was doing somersaults when he saw you sleeping, a warm feeling filling his heart.

So he turned off your computer and fell asleep with an arm wrapped around you holding you close.

After that night, the rest of your break went by in a blur.

Then the next thing you know, you were back at your apartment and life went back to normal.

Well as normal as it could have been with Tim now in the picture.

He was a good sport throughout it all.

But he needed to go home.

You guys did try your best to find a way to get him home, but it became clear that someone from the other side needed to open a portal or something.

So waiting was the only option.

It was taking his family a while though.

Enough to the point where it gave you both a bad feeling.

But you gave at least the Batfam the benefit of the doubt, Tim on the other hand, had thoughts about them forgetting him at the forefront of his mind, even as he tried to push them away.

Life goes on though, and days became weeks, weeks became months, and the next thing you knew it was March and school was eating you alive.

Currently you were in the middle of a APA essay on the couch, with Tim sitting with you, his nose stuffed in his own laptop. (Also working on stuff, but he was listening in on police conversations, old habits die hard.)

But then your roommate walks in from her 7 o'clock class.

Tim notices her pull out her phone, but something was going on with the coms, so he wasn’t paying attention to the sly smirk appearing on her face.

You weren’t paying attention, and one minute you were working on the essay and the next you had the back of a phone shoved in your face.

“And now witness the wild geek in her natural habitat, typing her life away as the rest of her sanity boils out of her blood shot eyes,” Your roommate narrates, trying and failing at doing a nature documentary voice over.

Your eyes narrow, “Bro, what the hell are you-”

“Oh but look,” Then she motions the phone in Tim’s, “There seems to be a male Geek, also having the life being slowly sucked out of him.”

She then turns the camera to face her, “Could it be some odd mating ritual? Or something else?” She lets out a dramatic sigh, “The world may never know-”

You each glanced to each other for a brief moment, and a devious smile crawls on both of your guy’s faces as you both got the same idea at the same moment.

It was lightning fast, the camera almost didn’t get it as you jumped on each other, lips meeting in a frenzy.

Cue your roommate.exe has stopped working and is now having an aneurysm because of h o l y s h i t.

Out of all the things that she thought that you’d do, like maybe throwing her phone across the room on to the other couch, she was not expecting that.

So that is basically how the two of you became a couple.

Funnily enough, though, it was all recorded on Snapchat.

Even funnier that your older sister was friends with her on Snapchat.

You had forgotten that until your phone was ringing and you saw her face on the screen.

Oh man, was she freaking out, she was happy though, if not a maybe a little grossed out. (Ain’t nobody want to see their sister like that.)

Tim could hear the whole conversation as he left the living room with you to your room and he was trying really hard not to laugh.

This was basically how the next few weeks went.

Only now there was the addition of you going and working out with him whenever he trains. (Which was legit almost every day, and your thighs have never started to look so good, but oh my god they were never this painful.)

But in all honesty, you guys were happy, yeah Tim was kinda sad that his family never came for him.

Yet he was grateful that you were there for him, through thick and thin, whenever his mind would go back to Gotham, whenever he’d wake up shaking and heaving from a nightmare, you were there to ground him and remind him that it would all be okay.

However, fate still wanted to make Tim’s life a living hell.

It was a normal day where you got up early to head to your 8 o'clock class, everything was just the same as you sat down, but it all started going to hell when all of a sudden your classroom was filled with a flash of bright light.

Your eyeballs felt like they were fried from how bright it was.

But you could still feel yourself falling.

And you just about felt your soul leave your body from how scared you were.

Thank god that it wasn’t a considerable height that you fell.

Well, it was long enough for you to have a bruise on one whole side of your body while you forgot to breathe for a good couple of moments.

With a groan you lift yourself on your elbows, only to yelp and duck as a piece of metal was thrown over your head.

What. In. The. Actual. Hell.

There were more being thrown in all sorts of directions, and you only realized where you were when you saw a couple dudes in colorful costumes fighting it out with a dude that kept throwing white flashes of light, almost like mini suns.

They even left blotches in your eyes as you watched.

But not only was he throwing fireballs, but he was also throwing random objects, which explained the whole iron beam thing.

They kept going, and from what you realized the Batfam kept going too.

Only until the evil discount Doctor Strange threw a light ball at his feet and then he was gone.

“Damn it!” You heard Batman yell dashing to the sport where the wizard dude was but it was already too late.

“Not this shit again!” You heard the Red Hood yell out.

They were all more agitated now, but they didn’t notice you shakily stand up.

“H-Hey!” You yell out.

They all turn their heads to you, not realizing you were there.

“Y’all need to get your head in the game if we’re going to get Tim back.”

This got their attention.

The next thing you know is that you’re getting whisked away to the Batcave.

Lots of interrogation after that.

Your nerves were fried before, but now you could feel them sizzling in your mind.

So was theirs but you were pissed but how long they waited to get to him.

“It’s been months you assholes!” You let the floodgates open now, “He lies awake at night wondering why you guys haven’t come to find him, he’s been in so much pain since fucking December-”

“Woah Woah Woah,” Jason says, holding his hands up, “It’s only been two weeks, and we’ve been fighting that asshole trying to get Tim back-”

“Dude, we’ve been waiting for like four months,” You say, a voice in a deadpan.

This scared everyone in the conversation.

It even scared you.

Time went faster where you were, and nobody knows how much time has passed.

Now you were feeling horrible about leaving Tim alone.

They all got somber after that.

Conversation died off soon after, but they weren’t on your ass anymore.

Eventually, they all were ready to crash, so they all went upstairs.

Which left you and Alfred, so he offered to take you to a room to let you rest.

And so you followed, anxiety making you not really up for conversation as he led you up and into the manor.

He led you to a room, and it only took you a few seconds to realized that it was Tim’s room.

It was as tidy, with a faint smell of coffee in the air and his laptop still open on his desk.

Alfred had a feeling that you and Tim were closer than what everyone else thought, he only took you there to see if he was right or not.

From the look of your face, he knew that he was right.

“I thought that you would be more comfortable here, it seems as if you and Master Drake were inseparable,”

You smile a little and nod, “We were,”

“Then I can reassure you that we will find him and bring him home,” He smiles for a moment, shutting the door quietly behind him as he leaves.

You didn’t sleep well that night, nor the next night after that or the next.

But you didn’t have to wait long before the wizard showed up again.

They wouldn’t let you go anywhere near the action, but you stayed with Oracle in the cave, so you were able to watch the scene unfold.

At first, it seemed as if they were outmatched, but they were slowly gaining ground, and the Discount Doctor Strange saw this, but before he could set off another portal, Nightwing found an opening to his head and knocked him out with one of his escrima sticks.

It was soon after that the man was taken into custody and soon after that was he getting interrogated by Batman.

But days later, he wasn’t budging.

They were getting desperate, and you were their last option on getting information out of him.

When you walked in and saw his eyebrows raise in surprise everyone knew that they hit something there.

“Surprising that you are here, darling,” You feel your gaze narrow.

“Who are you, and why did you send him away,” You say, voice like steel.

“The question is who are you, and why are you here while he’s there?” His voice was condescending.

“You’re the reason why I’m here, and the dozens of people you’ve displaced from their homes.” (A couple of your classmates were also transported to Gotham, just scattered around the city and were showing up at the GCPD ever since looking for help.)

“Oh but you don’t realize that you have this power as well, I could sense it,” he says, and evil smile revealing his grotesque teeth. “It’s small, but it is there,”

“I don’t have-” He cuts you off.

“Ahh, but you do.” The interrogation did not go much further.

But this did end up with you in the Batcave, trying to see if he was correct.

And for the moment, you were pretty sure the asshole was messing with you.

Much to your embarrassment, as Dick and Damian were also in there with you.

Dick was supportive, but Damian was more annoyed than anything else.

“Why can’t you just suck it up and-” Damian was in the middle of one of his many criticisms, but that was the last straw from you.

“I’m freaking trying goddamnit!” You yell out, throwing your arms out behind you, too much at the moment to actually notice the light surrounding them.

It took a couple of heaving moments to notice the look of shock on Dick’s face and the smugness on Damian’s.

“What?” You ask.

“Um (Y/n), look at your hands,” Dick says pointing.

You do and let out a yelp that was half excitement and half fear.

It then took you a couple minutes to turn it off, and a couple more as you figured out how to turn it back on.

You did this a couple more times, getting the hang of it and making sure that you could control them.

Then it was really time to put it to the test, after bringing the rest of the Batfam down, you open a portal that was big enough to get you though.

You let out a nervous laugh, “Wish me luck, guys.”

“We don’t need to, we already know Tim’s in good hands,” Dick says smiling.

“Bring him home, (Y/N),” Bruce says, hope in his gaze (An emotion rarely is ever seen on his face.)

And so you walk through, light blinding your vision as you step though.

For a couple moments, you blinked away the dark blotches left by the blinding light.

You let out a cry of joy when you realize that you were back in your apartment kitchen.

Dashing out of the room, and onto the hallway, you bump straight into a familiar chest, both your eyes widening at the sight of each other.

“Tim!” You exclaim out of breath, itching to hold him close.

At first, he couldn’t say anything, bringing his hands to your face as if he was making sure that you were real and were right there, whole in front of him. “(Y/N)?”

In less than a second, you guys were on each other, your arms wrapped around his neck, and his around your waist, neither one of you wanting to let go.

“Oh my god, (Y/N), where did you go, it’s been over a week, everyone has been worried sick,” He chokes up a bit against your neck.

“Heh, it’s a long story, but I’m pretty sure you want to hear it.”

You tell him everything that happened in the passed few days for you, and while he listened, he felt a weight lift off his shoulders.

His family didn’t forget him.

After you finished with your story, Tim filled you in on what was happening while you were gone.

Your family came when they found out what happened in your class, while he and your roommate were doing all they could to figure out how to find you.

You called them after Tim told you, and then you had everyone make it your apartment in almost no time.

You were pretty sure that you were never hugged and questioned more ever in your life.

Everyone stayed late, but eventually, they went to their hotel room for the night.

Then after a long hug from your roommate, she too retired to her room, and finally, both you and Tim were alone.

That was the first night that you too actually slept decently for a while. (After some you know what.)

But then the conversation came up about what the two of you were gonna do.

Tim had to get home, but you had a decision to make on whether you would stay or go with him.

After a lot of talking, you decided that you were going to go with him, but you would take frequent trips too and from so that you can stay in contact with your friends and family.

The next day you let everyone know what the plan was, at first they were hesitant ut they knew you’d be happier with him.

And the next day, you made a portal that took you and Tim back to the Batcave.

Turns out it a day had passed since you’ve gone back so maybe you could control what time you could get to a place, you thought but were interrupted when you and Tim were legit tackled by everyone, including Damian.

Tears were shed, feelings were spared, and a whole lot of love was pouring into the room.

Once everyone had gotten their selves partially together, you reached out for Tim’s hand, your finger’s threading together.

“Welcome home, Hon.” You say, smiling brightly.

Tim’s smile matches yours with a little amusement sneaking through, “Welcome to the DC Universe, Babe.”

#tim drake x reader #tim drake imagine #tim drake headcanon #tim drake imagines #Tim Drake #red robin x reader #red robin imagine #red robin headcanon #Red Robin #DC Headcanon #dc imagine #DC comics #dc comics imagine #dc #robin #robin headcanon #robin x reader

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maxwell-grant · 3 years

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The apparition of impostor!Lavender Jack make me wonder : do you know if the "I'm like you but evil" villain archetype was popular in pulp fiction or is it more a super-hero thing ?

It's very much more of a superhero thing. Not that it didn't exist before, obviously the idea of villains designed to resemble and contrast their heroes is as old as villainy itself, but the idea of a supervillain who's specifically meant to be an evil version of the superhero, the "Inverted-Superhero Supervillain" as Peter Coogan calls it, was defined in comics.

If you wanna get specific, technically the first supervillain to be specifically defined as an evil opposite to the hero (as opposed to just being an evil take on a general heroic concept) was Moriarty, who's is very strongly defined as almost an evil twin of Holmes. This, I'd argue, is Moriarty's greatest contribution to the history of the supervillain, because he was neither the first, nor the one who popularized the idea of a supervillain or arch-enemy (those would be Dr Jack Quartz of the Nick Carter magazines as well as the grand criminals from the feuilletons that inspired Holmes).

What the pulps had, in turn, was supervillains who were meant to evoke popular heroes, like Fantomas who evokes the gentleman thief and John Sunlight in his original form who greatly resembles Holmes, and supervillains who were protagonists, but not specifically inverted takes on superheroes, because those as we define them weren't around. The Shadow fought several criminals who were intended to evoke him, and as far as I can find Gibson was the first person to specifically coin the term "super-crook/criminal/villain" to describe villains (which does not mean he created the concept).

The grand criminals of the dime novels and feuilletons led to the pulp supervillains, which grew bigger and badder and more outlandish and laid down much of the foundations of what we currently used to define supervillains. And throughout this history, the idea of costume-wearing supervillains gradually starts to show up, first of these being the Wolf Devil from Queen of the Northwoods (1929), likely the first superpowered costumed supervillain in Anglo media, followed by the Klan robe-wearing pulp villains, and then odd costumed supervillains like Bill Everett's Great Question and The Lightning from The Fighting Devil Dogs, until at last we get to the comic book supervillains proper. And with them, the Inverted-Superhero Supervillain, as Peter Coogan describes it:

The inverted-superhero supervillain is limited to the superhero genre, primarily because they have superpowers, codenames, and costumes. Although there are earlier costumed supervillains in comics—such as the vampiric Monk, whose schemes Batman ruins in Detective Comics #31—the Joker and Catwoman are probably the best, early examples of inverted-superhero supervillains.

Prior villains like the Monk draw on masked and robed pulp predecessors and mad scientists like Lex Luthor or the Hugo Strange have a long lineage outside of comics. But the Joker and Catwoman mark an innovation in villainy because they are such direct responses to the superhero by creators looking to expand the superhero genre.

It's a bit trickier to say which exactly would be the first Inverted-Superhero Supervillain, along the lines of what you describe. Coogan claims it's the Joker and I disagree, because while the Joker's contrast with Batman was definitely important to his popularity and he represented a clear break away from the more pulp-esque Monk and Hugo Strange, he was hardly intended as an evil version of Batman (that would be Killer Moth in the 50s), nor was he that different from the common Dick Tracy villains or other villainous clowns in fiction like The Whisperer's Grim Joker or The Shadow's Number One to really merit that kind of distinction. You can point to other Golden Age supervillains who specifically take the superhero image of "caped man with a chest logo and/or cape & mask" like Fawcett's Captain Nazi or MLJ's Captain Swastika. I'm fairly sure there's earlier examples still, probably in the funny animal superhero comics that influenced Fawcett's output, but I'd have to go digging further for those.

Although I will point out that The Grey Claw, who I discovered more recently actually debuted almost a year ahead of Superman (in 1937), was a comic supervillain very much dressed in what nowadays we'd consider a superhero outfit, and also predating the Lightning's own costume. He was modeled quite a bit on The Shadow, not just in costume but also in laugh and mannerisms and radio boogeyman persona, but he was armed with weird sci-fi weaponry at odds with the gritty crime story he's in, and he was dressed in a costume that included not just a cape and slouch hat, but also a mask, a waistband sash, and a chest logo, and even did the classic Superman pose as seen above. Is he the true first Inverted-Superhero Supervillain? Probably not, despite his international publishing, history has not been kind to him. But so far, I'd say he's as good as any candidate.

I'm totally not biased on this regard, though. No, sir.

#replies tag #pulp supervillains #comic books #moriarty #john sunlight #fighting devil dogs #the grey claw #o garra cinzenta #the joker

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dcarevu · 5 years

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DCAU #16: The Cat and the Claw (Part 1)

“Never trifle with the affections of a woman!”

15 episodes into Batman The Animated Series and, hey, we’ve finally arrived at the first episode! Isn’t that something! Yeah, I’ve stated a few times that this show was aired in a very different order than how it was produced. Some people like one way vs the other, although I’m a production-order guy myself, but I’m not gonna pretend like this doesn’t make a decent first episode. It has a pilot quality to it, and the way the episodes sounds in particular make it seem like it would come before episodes like Heart Of Ice. But whichever way you prefer to watch the show, let’s agree on one thing: airing part 2 seven episodes later was not the best way to watch the show. For anyone that’s curious, though, this was done because the way weekend airings vs weekday airings worked. Part 1 was shown on a weekend, so part 2 was shown the weekend after.

Episode: 15 Robin: No Writers: Sean Catherine Derek (story), Laren Bright (story), Jules Dennis (teleplay), Richard Mueller (teleplay) Director: Kevin Altieri Animator: Sunrise Airdate: September 5, 1992 Grade: B

Saying that this episode has a pilot-quality to it isn’t exactly a compliment, as in some ways it feels like we’ve again taken a few steps back here. This episode sits right at home with On Leather Wings, Nothing to Fear, and even The Underdwellers. It’s not bad, but the footing just isn’t there, and the vibes are very similar to those three. Looking at the credits only backs up this observation. Some of the lower-tier episodes we’ve seen have come from these writers. I think that so far this is one of the better ones they’ve worked on, but it didn’t blow me away or anything. Sunrise handled the animation, and it worked for the most part in Pretty Poison. Here, though, there were some weird things. There is a shot of Catwoman climbing up a building that looks pretty damn awful. It’s quick, and most may not notice it, but I didn’t have much choice in the matter because someone working for Warner (probably an intern or something) chose this shot for the DVD menu on disc 3. What the hell? You turn on the DVD and you get this awkward, misshaped Catwoman that gets worse the longer you stare. Like god, it’s ugly, guys. And Catwoman is an attractive character! I can only imagine that they were pressed for time or something. I’m mostly just bringing this shot up because I find it funny, but there were some other things too that stuck out like sore thumbs. This included some weird facial expressions (like the goon at the end or the dude constantly gritting his teeth like an old Looney Tunes antagonist), some overall messier work, and the lighting was all over the place. A lot of shots just seemed a little bit too bright for the show. It’s not all unsightly, though. Sunrise have a weird, weird style, guys. There are some scenes that I think I like the looks of, much like some moments in Pretty Poison, but really nothing I was blown away by. I hear Akom did part 2, so I am actually genuinely excited to compare them. I’ve been okay with Akom so far.

So this sounds like a recipe for disaster so far, I know. But the episode is generally enjoyable, despite. I have no idea how they pulled it off either. Where the visuals fail, the magnificent, ballet-esque score picks up the slack. While the lines don’t always stick with me, they don’t downright flop, and the characters are great. Catwoman really impressed Char (who, once again, is a newcomer to the DCAU), and like some other rogues, I don’t know if she was necessarily expecting much beyond a typical villainess dressed in a distinguishable suit. In fact, I wouldn’t necessarily label Catwoman the villain at all. Yeah, she shows that she has a robbing hobby at the beginning, and I’m not gonna defend that, but she spends the rest of the time attempting to get her way with the animal preserve and genuinely showing that in some ways she’s pointed in the right direction. I’ll talk more about her character, along with Batman’s, in a bit, however. But before diving into some of the more social/psychological aspects, I wanted to note how fun the beginning of this one was too. It was a unique start for the series, and watching these two run around on the night rooftops is fascinating to watch. I was almost sad when it ended. Especially since a lot of the other action in this one was a lot more par for the course. When we cut to a police chase going on, I internally groaned just a little bit. I feel like that is one of the most common things to happen on this show, and there was no real twist on it. Things are calm and casual, then out of nowhere some guys with machine guns are being tailed by the police. Maybe I’m imagining things, but I think it’s getting a little bit stale. Oh, also, just as an observation, I felt like everyone was whispering throughout this one. Catwoman, Batman, and Red Claw all said their lines in such a soft manner, and while inside some of the buildings made sense, I’m surprised they didn’t have a tough time hearing each other on the rooftops at times. That’s what I mean when I say this one sounds like an early one. Anyone else feel me on this? Like, did the actors have to be quiet because another show was being voiced or something? That’s a joke, by the way.

A big plus was getting to dive into our main characters. Batman and Selena’s chemistry is fairly natural, despite them not sharing too-too many lines with each other, at least in costume. Yet it just works. Batman is a man of few words sometimes. I don’t think his ways of communication and relation necessarily rely on English. You get a sense of chemistry from watching them soar among the turbines, free fall toward the street, and basically try to keep ahead of each other in an almost playful way. We even see Batman crack a smile as he talks to his new, curious friend, and it’s not even weird to see. Add in that downright beautiful score, along with them mixing as their civilian selves, unbeknownst to them, and it starts to become a shame that you know that in their current ways, they’re not gonna work. It’s as both of them worked together to say; there is something in between them, that thing being the law. Parts of me reluctantly want Batman to just give in, but admittedly, that would be rather hypocritical of him. Ha. Yeah. Imagine how that relationship would go. “Hey, honey, have fun hitting the Smiths’ house tonight! I’m off to stop a robbery!” Would make for a decent parody, though, for sure.

Even without Batman, though, Catwoman is an interesting character. I love how strong and dedicated she is. She knows what she wants, and she’s not gonna back down until she obtains it. She goes a little too far with taking things into her own hands because, well, she’s literally taking things that don’t belong to her into her own hands, but you get the feeling that she works her ass off with her conservation efforts and doesn’t take shit. This is another factor that makes her relationship with Bruce so interesting. She first flat out tells him that she’s not interested in dating him. He politely asks her if they can just try it out once, she agrees, but she actually ends up cancelling to do something that she sees as more important. She’s not about to feel bad about it either, and why should she? You get the feeling that in some ways she is equal to Bruce, and if she were a lot weaker than him, then their midnight meet ups wouldn’t be nearly as interesting. By the way, a cartoon show displaying a strong, independent woman acting like a hero, but also performing cat burglary? Some parts of me are surprised that at the time this was let through. She is clearly someone to admire in some aspects, but not necessarily in others, which is kind of a complex, abstract idea for kids.

Of course, you wanna talk about strong women, we can’t leave out Red Claw, the terrorist leader. Now this lady, she is not someone I’d ever wanna mess with. She looks like she could pound me into a pancake with one whack. Char was not a fan of her design at all. When she walked into the screen, I heard her go, “That design is shit.” It didn’t strike me nearly that hard, and while I don’t find her to be awesome-looking, her design never really bothered me. Char mentioned it being the way she was proportioned. I did think that she looked a little bit…hm…maybe hefty is the word? But I sorta dig that choice. It adds to her intimidation-factor. She looks like she’d be a challenge for even Batman to square up with (even though this is likely not the case if we’re talking strictly hand-to-hand combat). But maybe the strong reaction to her design was simply Char finding the model off-putting, and maybe Akom can amend this next time. We shall see! I’m also hoping that she’s not wasted potential. I get that most of the emotional depth should be focused on Batman and Selena, that’s obvious. But I at least want to avoid Red Claw being obvious stock. We have a whole extra near-half hour to use, so let’s hope the writers learned from their light mistakes in previous episodes and deliver a thrilling conclusion. Char really loved this episode (she liked it a lot more than I did), and was very interested at what was going on basically the whole way through, plus I think Catwoman is going to be a new favorite of hers. Don’t want it to let her down! Even if this one is an episode that I don’t consider amazing, it brings me a lot of joy to see it getting so much mileage with someone else. This is part of the reason I’m doing these blogs, people, and I hope that many more of you in the future will end up following along and coming to your own opinions that you can compare and contrast with mine. It’s no fun if everyone feels the same way and makes the same observations, right?

Oh, we both agreed that this one had one of the best title cards so far, by the way. And after the episode is finished, you go from thinking it’s a Catwoman reference, to realizing that it almost seems to be referring more toward Red Claw with that scratch mark!

Char’s grade: A

Next time: The Cat and the Claw (Part 2) Full episode list here!

#dcau #dc animated universe #catwoman #the cat and the claw #batman #batman tas #batman the animated series #red claw

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thecartoonarchivist · 6 years

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Weekly Spotlight #5

Welcome, welcome, one and all, to the Weekly Spotlight!

This week’s spotlight is~

*panting... and a weak drumroll*

Batman Beyond!

Some of my earliest memories of this show was watching reruns of it on Toonami at oddball times back just before Toonami got moved to a daytime time slot. During this time period, I found it to be a little mature for me, a little dark, and a little hard to follow since around this time I was about 4 years old. Still, I remember thinking it was cool, simply because Batman was cool, but otherwise, I wasn’t all that interested.

Back a couple years ago however, something in my mind trigger my memory of this show, and it became pretty apparent to me that I had never actually sat down and watched this show all the way through. So, I did some searching, found out Netflix had it on demand and I sat down and watched it whenever I was free to do so. I’d watch it a couple episodes at a time as I didn’t want to binge the entire thing in one sitting and leave me wondering how I was going to fill the void after finishing such a good series. It became a nice treat to watch on evenings and weekends and became a nice ritual for me. I enjoyed it.

However life became a little bit busy not too long later and I put the series to the side for a later date when things got a little less hectic. Besides, I was on the last episode and I really didn’t want to end the series just yet, so stepping away from the series didn’t seem like such a terrible thing to do.

I didn’t get back to it. Netflix took it off streaming. I pretty much admitted I was never going to finish the series and that was the end of that. I knew that it also had a movie afterwards to wrap up the series, since it was suddenly cancelled and since THAT wasn’t on Netflix either, it was pretty easy to just walk away from the show altogether.

However, a couple months ago, I saw a clip on Youtube that went into the origins of Terry McGinnis, the star and Batman of this series. It was in a completely different animation style, so I assumed that it was the direct-to-video movie. I was intrigued. And seeing as there was no hope that I was going to see this movie any time soon, I thought, “What the hell? Spoilers never hurt anyone.” The info, that I’ll get to later, left me so disgusted and outraged that I vowed never to watch the movie.

All of these things swirled in the back of my mind the next couple months and here we are! It’s getting it’s own Weekly Spotlight! So let’s get into it’s background, shall we?

Batman Beyond is an animated TV series that was premiered on Cartoon Network’s Toonami and even showed over on Kids’ WB’s Toonami on January 10, 1999. Yeah, you heard me right: Kids’ WB also had Toonami. So, let me throw down a little bit of history for ya’ll.

Cartoon Network is owned by the Turner Broadcasting Company, which is a subsidiary of AT&T’s Warner Media. Yeah--- that Warner Media. The Warner Media that makes DC comics, and DC TV shows, and just about anything DC under the sun. That means that they not only own the rights to Batman Beyond, they own the rights to Toonami, and Cartoon Network, and Kids’ WB. So as an attempt to diversify Kids’ WB’s afternoon line-up, Kids’ WB “borrowed” Toonami from Cartoon Network and began showing their own individual line-up, separate from Cartoon Network’s line-up. There was a little bit of an overlap, as I recall, since many popular shows were underneath the Toonami name, but overall, they’re line-up was fairly different. In 2002, Toonami was dropped from Kids’ WB and was replaced with syndicate programming and infomercials. (Kids’ WB wasn’t doing the greatest in the “kids” department and eventually, was absorbed by Warner Bros.’s other channel The CW in 2008.)

So, Batman Beyond was interesting in that it was showing on two stations at the same time. My research indicates that it premiered first on Cartoon Network, and then would show over on Kids’ WB not too long later, but there’s a lot of conflicting sources in that regard. Pretty much the only thing I’m certain of is that it premiered new episodes on Toonami, but as far as whose Toonami, I have no idea.

Batman Beyond was an intended continuation of the “Batman legacy,” or more importantly, a follow-up to the legendary Batman: The Animated Series. At the helm of this ship was a man named, Bruce Timm, who was a co-creator of Batman: The Animated Series. He would go on to co-create and produce Static Shock, Justice League, Justice League Unlimited, and produce for Green Lantern: The Animated Series. This guy’s a legend. Although extremely popular amongst fans and critics alike, the short-lived series only had 3 seasons before it was placed on hiatus and eventually cancelled. The simple reason? Time. Having signed aboard with the creation and production of Justice League, Bruce Timm simply didn’t have the time to be working on both series, despite attempting for a little while. All plans for a 4th season were discarded, and as to whether there were any episodes produced or if there were simply ideas on a sheet of paper, only the production team themselves know the answer to that question.

So! Let’s get to the premise!

So, the beginning of this series actually opens up with Bruce Wayne still as Batman. While his company of Wayne Enterprises is dealing with competition by the Powers Corporation, Bruce is on the look-out for a girl who has been kidnapped in association with the Powers Corporation. (At least, that’s how I interpreted it.) He finds her, fights the baddies to save her, but in the midst of the tussle, Bruce starts to suffer a mild heart-attack. He tries his best to continue the fight but is quickly overpowered. Having had the living snot beat out of him, Bruce Wayne does the only thing he can do in this situation (still suffering a heart-attack mind you) and pick up a gun and aims it at his assailant. Freaked out by the fact that Batman is threatening to use a gun for the first time ever, he runs away to meet the cops outside. The girl is freed and Batman hobbles away completely disappointed in himself. He places the suit inside the Batcave, seals it all away and vows never again to have the caped crusader to see another night.

Fast forward 20 years. Gotham is practically a brand new city. There are flying cars everywhere. Tech is crazy and out the wazoo--- think something along the lines of a Cyberpunk aesthetic--- and Wayne Enterprises is now dealing with a hostile take-over by the Powers Corporation with Bruce Wayne surprisingly absent from the whole affair. Gotham, as always, is dealing with rampant crime; one of the most vocal and trouble-making groups being the Jokerz--- a gang with its members dressed up in outfits very similar in style to the original Joker gang. Enter in Terry McGinnis: he’s just your typical teenager dealing with girl problems, bullies, and a real bad habit of placing his foot inside his mouth whenever he gets angry.

Having been grounded by his Dad for punching a kid at school for spitting on him, Terry sneaks out to meet his girlfriend at a local club. While there, the Jokerz show up and Terry quickly comes to the aid of his girlfriend and tries to teach these pranksters a lesson. Quickly overwhelmed by their sheer numbers, Terry steals a motorcycle and thus a good ol’ motorcycle chase begins. Finding himself outside of Wayne Manor, Terry runs into Bruce Wayne, almost hitting him with the motorcycle. Bruce Wayne tells him to get off his property, but with the Jokerz showing up mere seconds later, they team up to fight them off (Bruce doing most of the ass-kicking despite his crazy old age.) Terry turns to thank him but finds that Bruce is near collapse and needs help getting to his manor where his medicine is. Having gotten his medicine, Bruce falls asleep and Terry takes this opportunity to explore a little bit. Finding a bat trapped in an old grandfather clock, Terry stumbles upon the Batcave and all its contents. Bruce finds him in the Batcave and subsequently throws Terry out of both the Batcave and his property.

Terry, miffed about the whole experience, returns home to find the police swarming his Dad’s apartment. Questioning his Mom what happened, apparently, the Jokerz surprised him while he was at home and murdered him. Having fought with his Dad only hours before he was killed, Terry is distraught, wracked with grief, and determined to figure out who it was who killed his father. Looking amongst his Dad’s old possessions, Terry finds a disk with some suspicious looking info on it and goes back to Wayne Manor to solicit Bruce’s help. After a series of events, Bruce agrees to take him on formally as his personal assistant who chauffeurs him around and picks up items that he is unable to get himself, but secretly, he’s training him to become his successor and to become the new Batman!

Whew... I think that’s my longest premise to date! (I basically had to summarize the first 2 episodes because it sets up basic situation for the entire series. It’s a lot to take in...)

So...let’s start off with the animation.

As you can see from the previous gifs thus far, for how old this series is the animation is is really fluid. The fight scenes are clean. The attention to detail is so fantastic. Even the character expression are so subtle and beautiful that it’s just so hard not to feel for the characters whenever tragedy strikes. But... it’s also dated. Since many of the backgrounds are hand-painted, a lot of fights on city rooftops, or bridges, or even sinister laboratories are pretty generic and even recycled from time to time. The color palette, although unique enough to give it its own funky style, is... yikes... And the intro? God, it just screams the 90s.

Since I can’t get any other gifs of the intro to work, if you want to see it in all its 90s glory, here’s a link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMXjtvMAFlI It’s so cheesy and awful and terrible. I fucking love it.

The soundtrack is this weird... 90s punk with a twinge of metal, with its shredding electric guitar and electronically distorted bass as well as some... electronic additions? Honestly, if the intro didn’t sell you on how old this series is, the soundtrack does. For the most part, the soundtrack sounds like an regular action cartoon series, but went that electronic guitar kicks in.... *whistles* It’s bad.

As for the rest of the show? It’s... it’s fucking fantastic. You’d think that writing for a teenage protagonist, especially a Batman teenage protagonist, they’d really hype up the melodrama and the angst to the point that it’s just flat-out cringe-worthy. I mean, all you have to do is google the recent dystopia craze that’s been plaguing teen action movies to see how... cringey the protagonists are. And I mean, how was a 19-year-old action animation not only touch on the stress of being a teenager, but also one whose Dad is murdered in the first episode of the series? It sounds like a disaster waiting to happen.

Turns out... they actually did a really great job of writing Terry. He really does seem like any other male teen you’d meet in high school. A lot of people try to talk about how teenage angst is just so terrible and awful to watch and that it’s flat-out cringey. The problem is that teenage angst is a real thing and if it’s written-correctly, it actually seems believable. The interesting part about Terry’s case that makes him an actually interesting character instead of a walk-talking edgelord is that a lot of his “angst” comes from a place that he believes is injustice. He believes that a lot of people are being unfair (and in some cases, they really are) and so he goes out to fix these “injustices.” Problem is that in his attempt to “fix” things, he actually makes things worse. He doesn’t see that other people’s decisions are actually made to protect him, or made for other reasons that he can’t see. So instead, he rushes in headlong and unprepared, running his mouth because he feels he’s doing the right thing, and ends up getting himself in deeper trouble. I felt a connection with Terry because although he was a punk kid getting into trouble, causing fights and mouthing off to his parents, he’s just somebody trying to make the world a better place and ultimately, failing really bad at it. He makes stupid decisions because he doesn’t think things through. He thinks that he knows best, when in all reality, he isn’t even playing with a full deck of cards. And it’s because of these character flaws that I love Terry and it’s what makes him so interesting to watch. And the best part is? When Terry realizes he fucks up, he admits it. He apologizes. He even cries because he’s made a mistake that he can’t ever undo. He’s not some idiot who thinks he’s better than everyone else--- he’s just an idiot who’s trying to make the world a better place. And that’s really cool. They wrote him with real emotions and a realistic responses to stressful situations that never came across as melodramatic. Instead of writing him as a teen who has emotions, they wrote him as a person with emotions who just happens to be a teen. And that’s just fucking awesome.

I loved Bruce’s and Terry’s dynamic. You had grouchy, old Bruce who’s just way too tired for this shit, helping out sassy, back-talking teenager Terry that made for fantastic snark sessions. Like... the sarcasm was palpable between these two and I loved every second of it. The fact that this series won numerous awards when it debuted isn’t surprising because it’s just a treat to watch the misadventures of these two sass-masters is fucking great.

As far as Terry’s home life, it seems pretty realistic. Terry’s got a little brother named, Matt, and as an individual who has a little brother myself, the interactions are pretty realistic. The little arguments, the nit-picking, the pranks--- all of them felt pretty true to life. Now, the interesting thing about this series is that the martial status of the McGinnis’s are unknown. Although Terry’s Dad gets murdered in the first episode, Terry makes a comment about wishing to live with his mom instead of his dad, which leaves the impression that the two are divorced. However, later on, as the origins of Terry are revealed in further detail, it’s pretty heavily implied that Terry’s parents were together before Terry’s dad’s death so... I don’t know. However, Terry still seems to deal with normal teenage problems: fights with his mom, annoyances from his little brother, stresses of schoolwork, a girlfriend that wishes he was more around, problems with kids at school and his friends. When you layer that on with the grace in which they write Terry’s character, it produces a very believable character that you can build a connection with and feels hella realistic. I completely approve.

Honestly, although all of it is so... dated, the aesthetic is pretty pleasing. It’s weird enough that makes you think, Ew, what the fuck? but also the fact that it’s set in an unnamed (yes, unnamed--- I’ll get to this later) future, makes you go, Oh. Okay. Weird, but interesting. If you want a famous example to compare it to, think Samurai Jack. Otherwise, see Cyber-six for a similar cyberpunk, futuristic tech vibe. Speaking of future timelines, the show’s idea of teenage lingo in the future is just so... laughable. You constantly hear teens say that things are so, “Schway” or let slip a fake curse word, “Frag.” It’s terrible. I legitimately thought it was something that kids used to say back then but after doing some research, I realized how ridiculous it actually was. Just as a tip: if you’re going to change the way people speak in your writing, you’re going to have to change a pretty much all of common speech in order to make something like this natural. Otherwise, it just looks more and more stupid as it ages.

Each episode is a villain of the week with a couple of two-parters here and there. Although there isn’t much in terms of an overarching story, there are references to previous episodes and encounters, so watching these in some sort of relative order is pretty recommended. There were also a number of interesting cross-over/reference episodes, which I found myself pretty surprised by. But I guess it also made sense, seeing as it was a very popular series that ended way before its time. In the beginning, the writing’s a little clunky, and the animation is a bit fuzzy, however, it’s a series that ages better overtime; the pilot is pretty fucking good one-two punch. But as I was watching it, I couldn’t help but laugh at the melodramatic close-ups and the pauses between some dramatic lines of dialogue. I never felt that the drama itself was melodramatic. Just the way they presented it.

In a lot of ways, this series is very dark and mature (especially the movie like holy shit it’s fucked up) which is really ironic considering it was intended for kids. However, they never really showed any gruesome deaths, showed pretty much negligible amounts of blood, and honestly, the majority of the “dark” stuff would pretty much go over kids heads. I say this as someone who has watched this show once or twice as a teeny child. I always knew bad stuff was happening, but I don’t think it ever really hit me as to the gravity of the situation. Yet, I also remember labeling this as a “big kids’ show” growing up so... who really knows. But for the best amount of enjoyment, I’d recommend this more to teens or young adults than for kids. It seems more up their alley.

Now... let me touch a little bit about the movie and subsequent crossover episodes that were released after the series ended.

The direct-to-video movie that “wrapped up” the series so to speak wasn’t what I thought it was. It was a fantastic, dark, macabre, sinister ending to a great series. I think I’ll save my thoughts on that for a different post. But to give you a little taste: it involves brainwashing, a child murdering a fucking adult, a whole lot of guilt and regret, and even a bit of a hostage situation so... Yeah. It’s great. I highly recommend. Don’t be afraid of what I said before.

However. There is an episode in the Justice League Unlimited which is supposed to reveal the secret origins of Terry McGinnis. What supposedly happened is that Amanda Waller (or the lady that ran the Suicide Squad) saw that Bruce Wayne was getting older and would eventually have to retire as Batman. Knowing that Gotham wouldn’t survive without some sort of Batman out there, Waller concocted a plan in which she would make sure that Batman would live on forever. What she did was without Bruce’s knowledge, she took a bit of his DNA and made it into a serum that would overwrite the host’s reproductive code to that of Bruce Wayne’s. She found a neo-Gotham couple that had a psychologically identical match to that of Bruce’s parents, Terry’s mom and dad, and injected it into Terry’s dad in the guise of a flu shot. This means that Bruce Wayne is Terry McGinnis’s father. Waller, then, concocted a scheme to get Terry’s parents murder but after the assassin called Waller out on her shady tactic, the project was dropped. It was just sheer coincidence that Bruce and Terry met and that Terry’s father got murdered in an unrelated incident. Here’s the thing: the great and fantastic aspect of Terry’s McGinnis’s character is that we finally saw a Batman, a successful Batman at that, that was neither Bruce’s child nor a Robin or a Batwoman/girl that he basically housed and raised. He was a completely unrelated kid who took up the mantle of being the next Batman. The Batman was no longer a person, but a symbol, and that’s one of the things that made Terry’s Batman so fantastic! But this episode completely ruins Terry. It’s awful. Especially when you consider the fact that they didn’t even have the guts to make their own movie about it with the original crew, they simply slapped it on as in after thought in series that fans may or may not follow to. It’s terrible! A complete afterthought!

It also comes with some interesting implications. As I said before, when the series begins, we get the implication that Terry’s parents are divorced and he resents the fact that he’s living with his dad against his wishes. If Terry’s parents are a psychologically identical match to Bruce Wayne’s parents (which, what the fuck does that even mean???) does that mean that Bruce Wayne’s parents were eventually bound for divorce? Something to think about.

For those Batman fans out there, I’m not entirely sure where this series fits into the whole Batman continuity. First off, there’s no reference at all to Jason Todd--- especially not in the movie, which seems kind of odd considering that Tim Drake plays a big role in the movie itself. Part of me says that it has to do with the fact that Jason Todd fucking died yo and you can’t really put that in a children’s TV show/movie. But at the same time, with the shit they wrote in the movie and the other dark and fucked up things they put in the movie, it seems odd they wouldn’t at least mention it... An interesting thing to note as well is the fact that this was before the movie Under The Red Hood was made, so the Jason Todd resurrection canonically hasn’t happened yet. So the fact that there’s no reference to The Red Hood makes sense. This is also before the rather... problematic origin of Damian Wayne has been created, so again, no references to Damian Wayne despite the fact that Talia al Ghul makes an appearance in the series. However, the TV show was resurrected into a comic book series that continues to this day. Having not read them myself, I have no idea what the current status as far as Terry’s origins/relevance within the continuity. But I am eager to find out.

Overall, this series was a wild ride! I loved every minute of it, and sitting down and watching not only the episode and movie that I hadn’t before but a couple of my favorites made me fall in love with the series all over again. I’m so upset that it ended.

Rating this series out of 10, this easily earns an 8.5 on my scale.

It’s aged pretty poorly. I can’t deny that. And for that reason, although I want to give it a 9, it really is deserving only deserving of an 8.5. Despite that though, this series is easily one of my favorites. I love sitting down and rewatching it and the intro always gets me hyped despite the fact that I’ve seen it a thousand times already. If you haven’t seen this series already, go fucking watch it. Seriously. It’s sssooooooo gooooooddddd. I’ll always have fond memories of this show. And the moment that they discuss bringing it back, given that they have a good writer/producer/animator and all that, I will be the first person on board for that reboot. It was such a good show for how short-lived it was. It’s simply tragic...

If there are any corrections you’d like to make in regards to this post, please feel free to send me a message with your corrections and I’ll get back to it as soon as I can!

Do you remember a cartoon your friends have never heard of? Got a scene from an animated film that you’re dying to know the name to? Send your questions to The Cartoon Archivist and I’ll see what I’ve got in the vault!

#batman beyond #Cartoon network #kids' wb #toonami #terry mcginnis #early 2000s #weekly spotlight #The history on this show is fucking WILD #It's so looonnnggg.... and COMPLICATED #I just hope I did it justice

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