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#i refuse to acknowledge endgame and infinity war
just-fandomthings · 2 years
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everything you said about Captain Britain on my post on my sideblog, I 100 FUCKING PERCENT AGREE!!!
It also bothered the hell out of me in the first episode of Ms. Marvel that at Avengercon, no one was dressed in Sam’s Cap suit?? And there was nothing to do with him at all?? Like that had ALL that Avenger’s merch/meet-n-greets with cosplayers/signs up and everything but yet they couldn’t do ANYTHING for Sam?? REALLY??
Like, if Ms Marvel is set somewhere in 2024 and Sam became Cap in May of 2023, then there would be plenty of time for people to be fans of Sam! You’d think people would be fans of Sam as Falcon for years anyways (cause he was a Avenger whereas Bucky wasn’t even one and people forget that)! His suit is cool as hell, why wouldn’t people want to cosplay it and have fun with it?? But Marvel Studios THEMSELVES continue to ignore Sam’s presence and importance while they continue to hype of a lady who we all watched literally die in a movie that came out 8 years ago…
The battle to get people and the MCU themselves to care about Sam and recognize his importance is just exhausting… I just can’t wait for Anthony to bring in a stellar performance that knocks everyone’s socks off in Cap4 and hopefully it gets some people to see how incredible he is. It’s sad too that he has to prove himself to the these people when he’s being proving how amazing he is for the past 8 years ugh.
SKY I WAS JUST ABOUT TO SEND YOU AN ASK ABOUT THAT POST BC YOU SAID EVERYTHING I WAS THINKING JUST IN A MUCH MORE WELL-SPOKEN AND WELL-PUT WAY!! Seriously that post was SPOT ON, and it is so infuriating (although not surprising) that this is still a conversation that needs to be had.
I forgot to mention Avengers-Con from Ms. Marvel in my rant but yes!! There was even merch for Groot?? GROOT who was on earth for how many mins in Infinity War and then how many minutes in endgame?? When Sam has been saving earth for YEARS. SAM SHOULD HAVE HAD HIS OWN MERCH/COSPLAYERS/ETC THERE!!!
And looking back at Sam’s time as Falcon, he was involved in the community a lot, both for his time in the VA and as an Avenger. He would have easily been a household name just like Captain America and Iron Man. So you KNOW that people in the MCU definitely looked up to him as their hero, admired him, and created merch for him. Yet we, the audience, don’t see that because they don’t show us anything about Sam. Unless I’m mistaken, we have not gotten a single mention of Sam since TFATWS. Even with Kate Bishop, Peter Parker, and Kamala Khan all being massive fans of the Avengers, there’s still no mention of Sam??
And yet, we get to see Captain Carter. We get to see promotions for her. And we don’t get that for Sam, who is actually Captain America!!! The racism both in the fandom and at marvel is apparent and appalling. Anthony has been fantastic since day 1 and somehow has managed to improve an already stellar performance?? He’s incredible!! He’ll absolutely knock Cap4 out of the park. But marvel and the fandom refuses to acknowledge that SAM IS CAPTAIN AMERICA. It’s so frustrating. Anthony deserves better. Sam deserves better.
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The two rich dudes with super suits (Ironman and Batman) are the dads of the superhero world in their respective universe(marvel and dc).
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dynamicduoofstackie · 3 years
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Fake SamBucky fans: We love Sam and Bucky as a couple if Steve can't have him in Canon. He's not white or a woman. But until someone better comes along, Sam will do. 😅
Me:
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I ship SamBucky because Sam choose on his own to search for Bucky after how badly they treated each other with Sam dropkicking Bucky on the street and Bucky ripping off Sam's wings before kicking him off the hellicarrier.
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Sam literally went from 'I don't think he's the kind you save. He's the kind you stop' to 'where do we begin' in his steps towards helping bring back Bucky. Steve didn't ask it. Sam volunteered. It's sweet that no matter how much Sam acts like he hates Bucky, he was willing to give up his secure job to search for him. Clearly, he saw Bucky was redeemable enough to risk approaching a guy who normally attacked first and asked questions later.
No matter how much they pretend they can't stand each other, they always find themselves drawn together in a crisis. Whether its fighting a teenager in pjs at an airport or dealing with an alien invasion, Sam and Bucky always had each other's backs.
Sam doesnt need to write out in big letters in the sky that Bucky means everything to him. Sam shows his care in little ways and Bucky is lucky to have someone in his corner to treat him like a person and not a weaponized accessory or just Captain America's best friend. He sees Bucky as Bucky and let's his opinions be known accordingly with no ulterior motives.
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Sam is someone who checks in on him without prompting because he recognizes Bucky as a PTSD victim and POW without trying to lecture him like he's one of Sam's patients. Sam defends Bucky automatically against people like John Walker and Zemo. He teases and argues with Bucky like a schoolyard kid with and crush. Fights at his side, trusting Bucky to have his six.
Sam is someone who gives him that little drop of normalcy by welcoming Bucky into his family. He let Bucky around his most vulnerable, precious people because Sam trusts Bucky and wants to show him off to his family.
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Bucky showed he cared with how determined he was to give Sam the shield. The fact he considered that shield his only family and Bucky fought to give it to Sam means something that people fail to notice. Bucky could have stolen it for himself. It was his last reminder of Steve; wherever old man Steve is. But he wanted it for Sam because he believed in Sam and he clearly wasn't ready for that kind of responsibility in Infinity Wars.
Bucky gave Sam a whole suitcase full of Wakandian tech, using his last favor from the Dora Milaje because he believed in his man that much. He knew he was on thin ice with them but he needed something to convince Sam that he was the one.
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Bucky doesn't trust easy. So for him to put all his trust in Sam time after time. They consuled each other in Endgame. Sam was the only Avenger remaining that kept checking on Bucky despite their supposed bad blood. Bucky willingly opened up to Sam about his nightmares when it was like pulling teeth for Dr. Raynor to open about anything.
When they both refused to acknowledge what they had, Bucky was willing to face off John Walker so that Sam could talk to the terrorists. They argued constantly but Sam and Bucky where never vicious to each other like jaded Sharon Carter was to Bucky. Their arguing was their own love language. Whenever they would say 'I hate you' it had no real fire and is said more with fond annoyance.
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Sam worried about Bucky long after Steve disappeared and Bucky gave his blessing the moment he saw old man Steve on the park bench. SamBucky is amazing because they went from two perfect strangers whose only connection was their best friend Steve Rogers; to two petty and in love people who proved they can survive together without Steve as long as they have each other.
Sam Wilson deserves Bucky Barnes and Bucky Barnes deserve Sam Wilson because they can be real with each other and know the other ain't going anywhere.
Periodt.
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whetstonefires · 3 years
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It's been this long and I'm still mad about it; proposal for the film Disney should have made instead of Endgame.
1) Following the Snappening Thanos still has godlike power but is losing his shit without a goal to work toward, is constantly hallucinating Gamora's child ghost which may be actual Gamora from inside the Soul Gem
2) whilst the combined hero cast stage an epic heist of some kind in the effort to get the Gauntlet and Unsnap their loved ones, with numerous subplots that can be resolved positively, since the heist will ultimately be foiled and that can be frustrating.
3) The surviving Guardians get a chance to onscreen recount the story of the defense of Xandar and how they collectively survived wielding an Infinity Stone for about 18 seconds; Peter Quill has been killed per Infinity War so his special heritage can't be leaned on again of course;
meanwhile we get more information about how the planet of Titan became a dead world and how Thanos was involved.
4) The 'Tony Stark's survival will protect the universe better than refusing to give Thanos the Time Stone and is in fact necessary to the One Possible Path To Victory' assertion from Infinity War is much better justified by his ultimately talking Thanos to death
5) in a way which callbacks Tony's entire doomspiral loop of a villain-coded-hero character arc and that moment in Avengers when they figured out Loki was opening the portal on Stark Tower because Tony psychoanalyzed him flippantly and then was like, shit he's basically me he's at my building. Thereby linking what was otherwise a saga of disconnect and flubbed resolution into a thematic whole.
6) And in a way which also gives us payoff on the similar nonsense of Thanos' characterization, where everything about the way he interacted with the world told a completely different story than the way he talked about himself and his actions, demonstrating a literally world-shattering degree of self-delusion.
7) Just seriously if Tony Stark's great universe-saving act could have been a Hannibal Lecture where he's standing in front of Thanos, last Avenger on his feet, armor shattered clean off him, take away all his power and what's left, still pushing, digging into those cracks Gamora's been beating into the whole film, did it work? was it worth it? is anything better now? why did you think it would be?
8) "Of course I understand you! I am you! It hurt so fucking bad, didn't it, and you needed it to stop hurting, so you found something to drown the pain in, something so impossibly big it had to matter. Something that let you hit back at the universe. Something that put you in control of the fear and the loss and how much you messed up, and other people paid for it and left you behind to hurt."
9) Thanos, having been held together by sheer force of will for the centuries or whatever since his planet died for reasons that cannot possibly have been limited to overpopulation, presses the Gauntlet on Tony, as he collapses into dust upon acknowledging that his entire identity is a self-serving lie and he had no fucking right to do anything he's done (and especially no right to Gamora)
10) Tony is one beat-up human dude and cannot possibly Unsnap back the entire universe but as he goes to try anyway a hand closes around his ankle. I don't care which Avenger it is. Steve, Rhodey, and Rocket Raccoon are the obvious candidates.
Team forms a huge hand-holding daisy-chain of Power of Giving A Shit and collectively Fixes The Universe. Insert time-crunchy thing like the planet they're on is about to get blown up so the gauntlet can't be handed over to someone with a tougher body, like Thor, who might survive it.
11) Tony still dies, but in a satisfying and meaningful way that actually saves people instead of just...slaughtering an army of slaves as in canon. The collective make-this-not-have-happened reality warp reaches back far enough to also save the Wakandans and Xandar and the Asgardian refugees, and everyone else murdered in the tempestuous final days of Thanos' push for the Gems, because 'unrealistic solutions to unrealistic problems are childish' is a bullshit moral, especially where superheroes are concerned.
12) His funeral is the only one that matters because it's the only damn one.
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I have this idea for a sambucky fic, where bucky keeps finding sam crying. And sam just, refuses to talk to him or full on pretends it didn't happen, or just walks away from Bucky with no acknowledgment about the crying at all until it boils over one night probably, when bucky hears him having a nightmare and wakes him up for once.
And maybe sam tells him to leave and bucky refuses until sam talks to him. Cuz he clearly needs to talk to someone, about whatevers going on with him. And bucky just, comforts him, and stays with him and sam finally lets out everything he's been keeping in, starting with riley going through catws, and cacw, and infinity war and endgame and just everything. And bucky lets him talk and sits with him and probably just ends up holding him for awhile i haven't gotten the end all planned.
I just... its gonna be so emotionally heavy and i want to use Bucky's POV for at least part of it, cuz he's confused about finding sam so upset so many times and he just wants him to feel better. But i also want to write the emotions Sam's going through and his feeling. And that just makes it longer and when i write long things i run out of steam and i just... really want to write Sam dealing with everything that's happened i just... i am trying very hard to do it correctly and arrange it in my head the right way before i start it.
Tmi:
i should probably wait til I'm off my period and less emotional and over thinky... but i wanna write it so bad it won't stop scratching at my brain.
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couragedearmuggle · 2 years
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I was rewatching AOU (the best Avengers) right after having watched Ragnarok, and I realized something about Hulk.
We assume Natasha is able to get through to Hulk and bring Banner back because she has a connection with Banner, right?
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But what if it's one layer deeper than that?
What if it's because someone has finally shown Hulk-- not Banner-- kindness. Someone has finally acknowledged his part in the Avenger's success. Sure, Nat is kind to him because she likes Banner, but she's still being kind.
We know from watching Ragnarok (and Infinity War) that Hulk has his own set of emotions and opinions about himself and his other half, just like Banner does.
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Maybe those feelings arent particularly deep, but they're there nonetheless.
We even see in AOU itself that there's some level of pain and remorse underneath the rage and smashing. I mean, look at how he pauses after he's fallen through that building and has finally shaken off Wanda's magic.
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Almost contemplative, yes? Ready to walk away from the fight, at least. That is, until someone cocks a gun at him.
It's pretty clear to Hulk after this incident-- after being beat up by a teammate that he fought alongside the last time he was awake, after being hated by Banner and by the world more than ever-- that he's not willing to go on like this.
When Natsha invites Hulk back by pushing Banner off a cliff (rude), he decidedly refuses to relinquish control to Banner. He chooses to remain himself and cut off communication from the one person who's been kind to him.
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He's calm in that jet. We see for the first time that "anger=Hulk, calm=Banner" is no longer true, if it ever was.
Hulk wants to be appreciated, just like "puny Banner."
And in Ragnarok, he gets his chance.
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There, on Sakaar, he shows remarkable control-- and dare I say even glee-- in training, relaxing, making friends, sharing emotions, and "smashing" only when appropriate.
That prison served as a controlled, supportive environment for him to grow as an individual. He learned how to live, think, and feel on his own.
The first time in his existence he's ever even been granted the chance.
But then he sees Nat again, and it all comes back.
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He's reminded of the anger and the pain, yes, but also of his first connection-- and he's caught off guard. We see him fighting desperately against Banner's control, because for the first time in Hulk's life, he's got something other than control to lose.
But he's been surprised, Banner has a foothold, and his instinct of honoring Natasha's requests takes over. His individuality is stolen from him, and he's back to being a burden nobody wants.
I mean, think all the way back to the first Avengers, or even TIH, when we all knew on some level that when Banner invites Hulk out-- without the use of rage or pain-- Hulk is more amenable to reason.
So really, why wouldn't The Big Guy have formed a bond with the one person who routinely invited him out, openly thanked and stated she needed him (at least once), and politely (with the lullaby) requested when he leave?
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No wonder he listened to her.
Banner didn't even realize Hulk had his own feelings until he failed at forcing him out in battle.
Banner took until Endgame to work with Hulk "not as a disease, but as a cure." But even then, did Hulk have a say in their new form?
A symbiotic relationship, a shared form, and Banner took the longest to offer Hulk any emotion other than distaste.
But Natasha, she was the first to show this living, breathing, emotion-filled Big Guy kindness.
She was the first to treat him as an individual.
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speechlessxx · 4 years
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Just Let Me In (Steve Rogers x Reader)
Summary: A year after what was supposed to be the reader’s due date.
Warnings: miscarriage, sad steve/reader, depression, angst, im sorry if this is sad (im in a mood), bad writing, SAD FIC, medical inaccuracies?
Word Count: 1379
NOTE: takes place AFTER Infinity War but BEFORE Endgame.
Feedback is appreciated!
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You had half a bottle of wine gripped in one hand as you flipped through a photo album. Tears were pricked in your eyes as you reminisced on a simpler time.
Months after Thanos snapped away many of your friends along with half the universe, Steve and you got married. “Time is short, and tomorrow is never promised,” he said during proposal. The ceremony was private –many of those who weren’t snapped didn’t even find out until months later. You were both fortunate enough that the love of your life wasn’t snatched away from you. You just had to seize the moment.
The photographs in the album displayed many smiles. It was a happy time despite losing many friends. You took many pictures in the first year of your marriage. You savored every moment. You remembered feeling guilty that you were happy, but Steve promised you that you both deserved it. “It’s what they would’ve wanted for us,” he told you.
Near the end of the album was the first ultrasound picture. 8 weeks. The fetus was so small, barely visible except for the small sac in your womb. It had been two years into the marriage. Both of you wanted to start family.
You remembered hearing its heartbeat for the first time and the silent tears that rolled down your husband’s face. The doctors reassured you and Steve that the pregnancy was viable. Everything was going according to plan. Your hopes were high as your belly grew rounder and rounder as the weeks passed.
You both came up with names. Steve hoped for a girl though he didn’t care about the gender too much. Sarah Margaret Rogers. You were at first apprehensive about naming your baby after Steve’s first love – wanting to name her after Natasha, your matchmaker – but you quickly grew to love the name.
When you were told it was a boy, the initial name was scrapped. You knew what Steve wanted to name it, and you both agreed your child’s name would be James Samuel Rogers.
Then, one early morning, you woke up in pain. Steve had gone to the city the night before – he often visited Natasha, who made it her responsibility to handle all the world’s disasters.
Something wasn’t right.
You lifted up your duvet and saw that your nightgown as well as the sheets were drenched in blood. You called the ambulance and were brought to the hospital.
You received the news alone.
Steve rushed into your hospital room and found you with your head in your hands. He knew immediately.
-=+=-
Now you sat alone in the middle of what would’ve been the nursery. Its walls were painted a soft yellow and the crib was already built, the mobile hanging right above it.
One year.
James Samuel Rogers would’ve been a one-year-old infant today.
Instead of an empty, silent house, you would’ve had the giggles and the cries of a baby boy to keep you busy when Steve went into the city.
However, you had nothing but a now empty wine bottle in your hands.
“Hon?” Steve called as he entered. There was a loud thud from across the house and a crash. Steve didn’t bother to hang up his jacket as he rushed towards the direction of the commotion. “Hon!” He repeated but there was no answer.
He found you in the yellow nursery. A pile of wood scattered on the ground. The room buzzed with the hum of a soft lullaby from the mobile that was muffled in your hands. The glass wine bottle was thrown against the wall as evidenced by the faint scratches on the paint and the shards.
“(Y/N)!” Steve yelled just before you threw the mobile into the opposite wall. The device shattered. Tears were streaming down your face as you turned to your husband. He let out a small sigh as he moved towards you, wrapping his around you tightly. “It’s okay,” he muttered. “Just let it out.”
You sobbed in Steve’s neck as the two of you fell to the floor. You sobbed for what seemed like hours though it had only been minutes.
You were an Avenger. You braved against HYDRA agents, Ultron, and even the Mad Titan himself. None of which were able to break you down. But for some reason, the death of your own baby shattered you. You were able to recover from losing against Thanos – from losing your friends – but you couldn’t bounce back from this.
“I’m sorry,” you finally muttered. “I know you worked so hard on the room and I ruined it. I ruin everything.”
“That’s not true,” Steve said firmly, his embrace tightened. “You don’t ruin everything.”
“I ruined our marriage,” you whispered. Steve pulled away from you, his brows creased in confusion. “Oh, don’t pretend that you don’t notice it.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
You shoved him away and pointed a finger at his chest. “You’re never home. You’re always out in the city. You’re avoiding me,” you said, your voice breaking. “You’re disgusted by me.” Steve’s frown deepened. “You’re upset because I couldn’t have your baby.”
A long exhale escaped him. In truth, he had been avoiding you, but not for the reason you thought.
For the first few months after your miscarriage, you kept pushing Steve away. You refused to talk about it or acknowledge it. You even avoided walking down the hall of the nursery. When Steve tried to hold you at night, you tensed and evaded his touch. So, he gave you the space he thought you needed.
Perhaps, subconsciously, you were pushing him away. You were deflecting your pain and telling yourself that because you couldn’t give him a child, your husband hated you – which was far from the truth.
“I – I – that’s not true!” Steve argued. “(Y/N), I’m not upset at you… You’ve been the one avoiding me.”
“Don’t pin this on me!” You cried.
“I’m not! But… you made it seem like you wanted space, so I gave it to you. I thought you were mad at me.”
“Why would I be mad at you!”
“Because I left you alone that night!” Steve yelled, his eyes beginning to water. He did blame himself. He felt as if he shouldn’t have gone into the city the night before. He should’ve been there when you woke up. He should’ve been there when the doctors told you that the baby was gone.
You both stared at each other in silence. Neither of you knew what to say to each other.
Steve sighed again. “I love you, (Y/N). Baby, or no baby. I married you because I love you. Nothing’s ever gonna change that.” You stayed silent, allowing him to wrap his arms around you again. “I could never be disgusted with you. I love you.”
He didn’t know how many times he could say those three words to you. He didn’t care if he had to repeat it from dusk to dawn. He’d say it over and over again until you realize that his love wouldn’t be taken away as soon as his son was gone. He vowed to love you until his dying breath and even past then.
“I don’t know why it hurts so much,” you confessed. “I’ve overcome so much in my life. I don’t know why this hurts so much.” He rubbed your back comfortingly as you ranted. “I just want it to stop hurting.”
“It will,” he said as he placed a soft kiss on the top of your head. “It will eventually. It’s just been a year. You’re not giving yourself time to heal.”
“A year’s too long,” you responded. “He would’ve a year old today.”
“I know,” Steve sighed. “I know… But hon, you’re not letting yourself heal, either. You’re shutting down, pushing me away. You’re not coping with it either. You’re ignoring it. You’re avoiding the pain and that’s hurting you even more.”
You stayed silent as you began to quietly cry in his arms. “I love you,” you whispered. “I’m sorry if I made you feel like otherwise.”
“It’s okay… I love you more.” He muttered. “Just let me in, okay? Stop pushing me away. Just let me in.”
I need to relearn how to write endings LMAO
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Real quick scattering of thoughts on Loki 1x02 and x03 before I watch the newest episode. I watched them pretty much at the same time so it’s a two-for-one post. Here be spoilers for episode 3! On mobile so no cut again, sorry.
Spoilers ahead. You’ve been warned.
Okay. In no particular order but attempting to start with ep 2 first:
Loki trying to get info on the Timekeepers and the TVA in ep 2 and being blocked by the most bored archive librarian ever was hilarious. The whole sequence of him trying to get her attention only for her to completely ignore him until he rang the bell was creepy but so funny.
Loki’s reaction to getting the details on Ragnarok made me so sad. :( Same, Loki. SAME. I’m also still gutted Asgard was destroyed and I refuse to even watch the movie ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ But him going to look at that in the first place made me wonder if maybe in the back of his mind Loki’s coming up with a plan to save Asgard? (Or at least, one version of Asgard in the multiverse.) I would love that. I want Asgard back in general and was hoping for Thor 4, but having Loki be the one to save Asgard would be SO fitting. He may be adopted but he’s still an Asgardian at heart, truly. Having Loki be the one to save Asgard would be a great way to show him finally acknowledging that and have all the Asgardians acknowledge it too.
We have an official population for MCU Asgard! 9719 people. That fits. It’s about twice the size of a pretty small suburban town. Asgard is SMALL. It just doesn’t have the space for a lot of people. It’s still a city, but Asgard the Realm has other things on it besides just the city, so it can’t have a huge population.
I wonder what the official population of New Asgard is when we see it in Endgame? And how many Asgardians come back post-Blip? This would really all depend on how many people made it through Hela’s rule and onto the ship during Ragnarok- and then half of them would’ve been killed by Thanos in the beginning of Infinity War. Would half of the remainder have been Snapped away at the end of IW, or would Thanos leave them out since he already halved their population? File under questions Marvel will probably never answer. Also file under “Thanos continues to be really bad at math.” (Should probably go look at the New Asgard sign again to check, but I don’t think it listed population.)
Loki annoying Mobius by messing with his salad was great. Loki annoying Mobius in general was great.
Loki letting the goats free in Pompeii made me think he might have a liking for goats, which means I now have a headcanon that Loki was friends with Thor’s goats as a kid and would sometimes let them loose to get their assistance with pranks. Thank you show, for cute kid Loki headcanons.
Tom Hiddleston probably had a BLAST yelling at people in Latin in character as Loki, and good for him!
Sylvie’s entrance sequence at the beginning of the episode with the fight scene vs the TVA set to “I Need a Hero” was amazing. I haven’t seen Shrek in a while but this might just reach the same levels of A+ “I Need A Hero” song usage as the Shrek sequence.
Speaking of the beginning of the episode, the Ren Faire setting was SO good. Great way to get laughs, and it made me want to go to a Ren Faire again.
The Roxxcart setting for the big encounter later in the episode made me flash back on all the times Roxxon’s appeared in the MCU. Two main thoughts: 1. I so want a Jane!Thor movie where the main villain is Dario Agger, evil Roxxon CEO and Minotaur. Preferably working with a better version of Malekith (from another universe probably) like in comics, because as much as I love Thor 2 my one complaint is that their version of Malekith was SO LAME. Especially compared to comics!Malekith. Plus an Agger + Malekith teamup would mean both the Nine Realms AND Earth are in danger, by definition. Thor 5 please, Marvel. 2. I really, really miss Cloak and Dagger and that show deserved so much better.
(Our) Loki’s perpetual insistence that he’s better and that the plot (pun intended) is about him is both funny and also a little sad- because he knows, or at least thinks, that if he stops insisting those things, everyone will stop paying any attention to him whatsoever. And he needs attention.
Poor Mobius probably felt so betrayed at the end of this episode. :(
Onward to episode 3!
This was by far my favorite episode so far. I LOVE Sylvie. I love her and Loki’s dynamic. I love that we get Loki talking to someone he considers an equal about some very personal things, and that Sylvie does the same thing with him. They understand each other in a way nobody else has. Because they’re the same person, sort of. I’ve taken to calling them “alternate reality twins” and that’s what I’ll keep calling them unless told otherwise.
They also annoy each other in a way nobody else can. And it’s hilarious. They look equally annoyed at the other not falling for their tricks and equally annoyed at needing the other’s help before they really start to bond and I LOVE ALL OF IT. I also feel like they adopt each other a lot quicker than either would be willing to admit, and then they’re annoyed at that! Loki yelling “you’re so weird!” at Sylvie made me go “OH they’re bickering like siblings!!!” and that was pretty early on! I’m an only child but that had peak sibling energy to me. Even them trying to trick and outdo each other had sibling energy most of the time.
Their earlier fight when they first get to Lamentis, before they realize where they are, had some VERY quality quips and also really had me wondering who would win in a fight between the two of them. Sylvie seems to have more physical strength, and she’s got a sword instead of daggers so longer reach, but Loki has skill and he has tricks. I think with his skill at magic (he can TELEPORT?! Probably only a few feet and probably limited by where he can see but that’s SO COOL!!! I don’t think we knew he could do that?!) Loki would likely run rings around Sylvie IF there were no people around for her to enchant. And assuming that she wasn’t able to set any traps beforehand, because Sylvie has proven well able to set traps to take down people who should be at a major advantage against her. Otherwise, I think Sylvie would win. She seems to have better physical training than our Loki, and if there were any people around for her to enchant he’d have to contend with them too. And if Sylvie could lay traps ahead of time, then it could go either way (you never can tell with a Loki, much less two) but I think Loki would probably lose. Loki is just as tricky as she is but that seems to be something she’s had a lot of practice in. Loki is more about confusing opponents with illusions and duplicates and talking his way around people. Sylvie sets traps instead, and is more comfortable/better at using brute physical force.
Speaking of enchanting, me while watching episode 2: “Hey, these mind controlling powers remind me of Enchantress’ powers!”
Sylvie in episode 3: calls her powers “enchanting”
Me: “OH.”
So Sylvie seems to be a composite of 3 characters. 1. Lady Loki, as in Loki when identifying as female. (There’s also that time from before they said Loki was genderfluid and a shapeshifter and back when Loki was still evil when he possessed Sif’s body and went by Lady Loki, but we don’t talk about that.) 2. Amora the Enchantress, a major Thor character/villain who uses magic to “enchant” people into doing what she wants-yes this is definitely a cringey “magically enchants people into loving her, consent-issues-out-the-wazoo” evil seductress stereotype in old comics, but it’s gotten better recently. And 3. Sylvie Lushton, the much lesser-known second Enchantress, who was a regular teenage human girl when after a Ragnarok (don’t remember which one, there have been multiple but this would’ve been early 2000s) Loki for shits and giggles decided to make her think she was Amora and give her the powers to match. She was on the Dark Reign-era (aka when Norman Osborn was in charge of SHIELD and the Avengers) version of the Young Avengers, the Young Masters of Evil, and that’s where I know her from. She’s a great character- she genuinely wants to do good and help people, but her brain is a bit messed up by the number Loki did on it, so she gets confused. I believe she’s currently in comic book limbo after Amora found out about her a while back, got pissed at her for stealing her name and her whole Thing, and tossed her somewhere dangerous on the World Tree while saying something about how if she can survive it then she’ll prove she deserves the name Enchantress. She sadly hasn’t been seen since as far as I know.
So each of those characters have similar characteristics with Loki’s Sylvie. Sylvie 1. Is a Loki who is female (Lady Loki), 2. Was presumably raised on Asgard and uses her magic to “enchant” people via a form of mind control into doing what she wants (Amora the Enchantress), 3. Is named Sylvie (Sylvie Lushton, Encanhtress II). Also worth noting that both Amora and Sylvie Lushton have blond hair, and so does the MCU’s Sylvie. All three characters also have green colored magic!
May turn the above bullets into their own post just for informational purposes. Also, when we said we wanted Enchantress in the MCU, this is not what we meant. Stop with the Monkey’s Paw-style wish granting, Marvel! (Looking at you, X-Men comics’ response to us wanting more Wanda.)
Anyway. Will round off with my favorite thing: everything on the train. Everything on the train was WONDERFUL.
Loki telling Sylvie about Frigga and how she taught him magic and then demonstrating the fireworks made me tear up. 🥺 Right in the feels. I miss Frigga a lot. I miss Asgard/the old Thor franchise in general a lot, but this is about Frigga. She was AMAZING and I miss her. Forever love the detail that Tom and Rene came up with the idea on the set of Thor 1 that Frigga is the one who taught Loki magic and fighting and how that informed their characters’ dynamic to the point of it being canonically discussed later. There’s a great Thor 2 deleted scene where Frigga talks to Thor about this exact thing. Frigga is such a fave of mine.
Sylvie telling Loki about her own past in turn made me very curious what her life was like and what the differences are. She seemed to have had a really hard time of it as a kid and I just want to hug her. (I also want to hug Loki, but that isn’t news.) Loki has had a very tough time, but really only after finding out he was adopted. He doesn’t appear to have had many friends on Asgard before (though I headcanon that he was friends with Lorelai before her exile, and since it’s my headcanon I imagine a similar situation with Amora, if not quite as close a friendship because comics Loki gets along better with Lorelai than her sister) but he at least had a family who loved him and who he loved, and a status as a prince that would’ve given him a good life and protection. Sylvie doesn’t seem to have had any of that as a kid. :(
“Surely there were some would-be princesses? Or perhaps a prince?” CANONICALLY BISEXUAL LOKI YES! YES.
Comics Loki is canonically both bisexual and genderfluid! Explicitly discussed on page, multiple times, and expounded on by writers too. (One of the most heartwarming Odin moments for me- yes, Odin does have heartwarming moments!- is when he’s telling his kids he loves them and he says something to the effect of “my son, my daughter, my child who is both.” The latter is Loki, the former are Thor and Angela. I might still be bitter over MCU Hela taking Angela’s place in the family sorry not sorry. This was in Original Sin: Thor and Loki, for anyone wondering.) I tend to default to he/him pronouns when talking about Loki because Loki tends to be male more in appearances, and also partly because it’s what I’m used to, but when Loki is clearly female I’ll of course switch to she/her. I have seen people use they/them pronouns for Loki too. I don’t think Marvel has ever said what pronouns Loki prefers though.
Speaking of which: I realize the “Sex: fluid” on Loki’s info card in episode 1 was probably foreshadowing Sylvie, but I kind of want to also read it as a nod to Loki being genderfluid. (Loki is also a shapeshifter, so gender would = sex in this case.) Whether it would be a nod to specifically comics Loki or also to MCU Loki is anyone’s guess as of now. We’ll find out I guess, or if it turns out to be strictly headcanon than it’s whatever floats your boat. :)
Back to the train scene!! Sylvie loudly protesting that she can’t sleep near people she doesn’t trust and then promptly falling asleep across from Loki a few minutes later made me emotional. ALTERNATE REALITY TWINS. Also VERY much a parallel to Loki falling asleep across from Mobius last episode.
Loki realizing that Asgard was really his home and his family really was his family only to also realize that he’ll never see either again and deciding to handle this by getting ABSOLUTELY DRUNK is SO ASGARDIAN OF HIM. I cannot. He even did the “Another!” *smashes glass* thing just to bring the point home.
Oh gosh, LOKI SINGING IN ASGARDIAN. FEEEEEEELS. I know, it’s actually Norwegian. I wonder a bit why they didn’t use Icelandic instead? Anyway, this was lovely and I love that going by the translation it’s a song of longing to go home, and it mentions Idunn’s apples of immortality. Apparently the full version of the song is going to be on the soundtrack and I’m so excited for that.
Loki’s metaphor of “love is a dagger” was actually quite good, he and Sylvie just lost the thread of it right at the end there. I wrote about this in tags somewhere, I’ll copy it in here later.
Edit: here’s an edited version of what I wrote on this post: This was a great metaphor until it got away from him. So close to the point (heh) and then they veered right away. Let me finish this for them: “Love is a dagger. It’s a weapon for far away and up close. You can see yourself in it. It’s beautiful. You have to give it to the right person.” So what this scene tells us about Loki is that he’s been hurt by love because it hasn’t been real. Or hasn’t felt real to him. Maybe he’s given it to the wrong people, or maybe he couldn’t tell who the right people were. (And if this is in reference to his family then I think he’s still too close to the revelation of his identity to be able to think clearly about the situation. Because his family DID love him! Even Odin. He just lost sight of that with everything happening.) Love is also about trust. And Loki doesn’t trust easily.
I really love this quote and this scene. Kinda want to do a “Love is a dagger” graphic of i ever have time.
I also wouldn’t be surprised if Loki and Sylvie come back to this conversation and come to a more satisfying conclusion. I hope that happens actually.
Sylvie using her headpiece against an opponent in the train fight instantly made me think of Wonder Woman. A+. Also, I haven’t mentioned yet but I love the fact that Sylvie’s headpiece looks exactly like God(dess) of Stories Loki’s from Agent of Asgard. Loki’s Ragnarok headpiece definitely had big AoA Loki vibes, but Sylvie’s headpiece is much closer- mostly it’s smaller, which is very Agent of Asgard Loki in general, but the one horn being cut off is specifically a God(dess) of Stories Loki thing and I love that they pulled from that.
Loki throwing the dagger and missing because he’s drunk was hilarious. Not good for Sylvie, but hilarious to watch. Don’t fight while drunk, Loki. Also, he threw “love” at Sylvie and I laughed when I realized that.
I didn’t realize until I saw a parallel gifset of it why Loki carefully going up to Sylvie after her scream felt so familiar- it’s just like how he went up to Thor after Thor overturned the table in Thor 1. The CONTINUINTY!! Absolutely amazing.
While trying to save the Ark Loki was probably thinking a lot about what he saw in the TVA clips of his own people trying to escape Asgard during Ragnarok and that hits kind of hard.
Loki apparently using telekinesis to stop the column from falling on him and Sylvie threw me off a lot until I saw another gifset that included the moment in Thor 2 (trailers only, I think) when he finds out Frigga is dead and all the furniture close to him breaks and flies away from him. The pose was even the same as when he stopped the column. I think he can sort of... push things away from him? (Almost like a Force Push 🤔) He seems to need to stop and tense up his arms while he does it though. And it doesn’t have the green effect the rest of his magic does, which is odd.
Speaking of Loki’s powers, I’ve said this in tags for sure but I’m so happy they’re FINALLY letting Loki hit people with green magic bolts. He does tend to prefer more subtle uses of magic, but I still can’t believe it took over 4 movies for that to happen. It’s kind of a no-brainer magic attack- probably exactly why Loki prefers other things- but you’d think he would’ve done it at least once after 4 movies.
I saw a post point out that by the end of the episode, Sylvie has lost both her headpiece and her cloak/robe thing, which makes me wonder if she’s going to get a new outfit by the end of the show. Or at least different accessories. I’m also curious if she’s going to take up the Enchantress moniker by the end of the show.
Finishing this with theme analysis and theory time:
The revelation that TVA agents used to be variants and were somehow reprogrammed makes so much sense. There’s something immediately shifty about the idea of 3 Time Keepers dictating the fate of everyone in infinite multiverses, and this just solidifies the hint that the Time Keepers are going to be the overall Big Bads. Which makes sense, narratively! But this shifts the TVA agents from villains to victims. Mobius gets to stay sympathetic and so does Sylvie, AND once the TVA agents find out about their origins it puts the same choice onto them that Loki has. They all have a choice now about who they’re going to be. They’re not who they thought they were, but are they going to let themselves be defined by what other people (here, the Time Keepers) think they should be, or are they going to be who they want to be.
This is exactly what Loki: Agent of Asgard is about, by the way. And I know I said in the last post that Loki’s greatest villain is himself, but I’m going to amend that because I didn’t say it quite right. Loki’s greatest villain is his evil self. Loki the god of evil, the Loki that is the villain. Loki (and all the other Asgardians) in Agent of Asgard is genuinely a god, and AoA tells us that gods are defined by belief- they are what people believe them to be. That’s how they exist. So because so many people believe Loki is an evil villain, the universe tries to twist him to fit that role. The plot of AoA is Loki trying to avoid that fate, to be better, be who he wants to be. It’s a meta story. It’s Loki trying to break free of the narrative he’s been part of up until that point. And eventually he manages to break the fourth wall itself and take control of his own narrative by becoming the god of stories. He controls his own story and it no longer matters what other people think he is, only what he thinks of himself. Nobody else gets to change or define him.
AoA’s villain is a future version of Loki that does go back to being evil. He’s basically the cosmic force- destiny, the narrative itself, etc- that’s trying to fit Loki into the “evil” box personified. Loki is seemingly taking that idea and subbing in a different personification for that same idea of lack of choice: the Time Keepers. We know from the Miss Minutes short in episode 1 that the Time Keepers want one timeline. We don’t know if that’s actually to prevent a multiversal war like the short suggests or if that’s just propaganda. When Loki tries to find out more about the war or about the beginning or end of time in episode 2, he can’t access those documents. Something doesn’t seem right there.
Edit: Also, in episode 2 Loki compares the TVA to Asgard by saying both the TVA agents and Asgardians are equally stupid. The reveal of who the TVA agents are adds a new dimension to that comparison. They both see themselves as guardians of the world around them, special, but really they’re no more special than the people they’re fighting to protect. Or in other words, they’re only as “special” (“heroic,” really) as they make themselves.
Also an edit: damn I just realized the continued stupidity of R*gnarok having Fenris and Odin in the same movie and Odin dies but get killed by Fenris. Asgardians have a saying about watching for wolves’ teeth.
I’ve seen the theory around that Sylvie might be a former TVA agent (which seems to be backed up by the midseason trailer I very belatedly saw, oh my GOD TINY SYLVIE!!!!! But also oh no tiny Sylvie at the TVA :() and I really like that. It makes sense. Maybe she went rogue because she realized the TVA is preventing people from choosing for themselves. Maybe she even knows what it is the Time Keepers actually want. Or maybe she’s doing this just for herself because she didn’t enjoy being brainwashed by the TVA and she doesn’t like being told who to be! That is after all part of “what makes a Loki a Loki,” even if she doesn’t use that name anymore.
I’m also wondering (hoping?) if maybe her being a former TVA agent could explain why she’s a mashup of different characters, instead of it just being Marvel mashing characters together because they can. This is mostly wild speculation, but could the TVA possibly have put multiple people’s timelines/memories inside her head? What if she’s in universe an amalgamation of a Loki, an Amora, and/or a Sylvie?
We’ve had some clips of what looks like a Thor 1 era Loki in front of the throne on Asgard- which looks different to me; maybe Loki redecorated? We’ve also gotten a shot of Loki in front of a ruined NYC skyline, including Avengers Tower. Maybe we’ll get an episode where Loki wins and we’ll see different timelines where he wins in different ways, until he realizes that this isn’t actually what he wants?
Whoops this got long??? Thanks for reading if you read this far!
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Hi, randpm question perhaps, but I seem to remember you or one of your friends here mentioning Marvel's Infinity War and Endgame movies not being all that great. I personally liked them (with some criticisms none-the-less) but it got me quite interested in asking what you think it should have been like and how its story should have gone. I ask this with genuine interest as I believe your take would be interesting and fun to explore.
Sorry to go off but this is what I’ve been able to round up.
A) Cap’s ending where he ends up with Peggy Carter makes no sense because then he’d just be forced to witness all of the atrocities of the past and be quiet about them to avoid disrupting the timeline which is not at all happy beyond a superficial “guy gets the girl” ending since Captain America specifically refused to indulge in any nostalgia for the time period he left behind and in turn left behind all the progress he made in adjusting to this era and his new friends. 
B) The endless fat jokes surrounding Thor which....yeah I shouldn’t have to explain why this is bad, it just is. Because hey, PTSD is funny if they’re less than physically perfect, huh? (And don’t try to turn this into a ‘but he was worthy all along’ thing, they were still making jokes after that) Also just shoving in a new eye and giving him a new “hammer” rather than acknowledging any of the steps Ragnarok made.
C) Our “first gay character” is a nameless talking extra who can easily be edited out for any homophobic audiences.
D) The Marvel practice of telling actors nothing that they don’t absolutely have to in order to avoid ‘spoilers’ which makes the scenes feel off (Tom Holland thinking Tony’s funeral was a wedding, Brie Larson not knowing the context of “Where’s Fury?, the fact that the first script reading was a fake script oh my god how do you fuck up this badly). This isn’t the first time they’ve done it but this is the first time they’ve been so outwardly proud of it like, no, this isn’t good directing, your actors don’t know what they’re doing and that’s impeding their ability to work.
E) The utterly performative girl power moment which stuck out like a sore thumb.
I’m sure there’s many other criticisms to be had but this is going on long enough and they all fall subordinate to my and many others’ ultimate criticism:
F) THANOS FUCKING SUCKS
No seriously. He does. The idea that he’s doing this because of overpopulation fucking sucks. Not only is a bad idea but it’s an outdated ecofascist ideal that the movie itself never actually challenges properly beyond “oh it’s bad to kill people” and even kinda seems to endorse with the whole “the whales are coming back” moment in Endgame. (Hey you know what didn’t change pollution? A lot of people staying home and minimizing their personal pollution for a few months. Amazing how coronavirus popped that myth like a rancid balloon.) It’s utter bullshit and NO ONE CALLS HIM ON IT because adding another character in Lady Death would be “too complicated”. Hey, maybe you can just have Lady Death as a religious ideal or a figment of his imagination, problem solved. But no, we have to come up with a “valid reason” why someone would want to commit genocide. Like any of the people who actually committed it needed one.
Also that super fucking awful scene where his feelings for his abused daughter is treated as actual love enough for him to sacrifice her for the Soul Stone in a scene that’s supposed to emphasize how much of a sacrifice this is for him and how bad we have to feel for him and look at him interacting with little Gamora aw he actually loved her NO HE FUCKING DIDN’T. HE ABUSED HER. HORRIBLY. Yeah I know that abusers genuinely believe they love their children and hey if your definition of love is wide enough maybe they do but when Gamora said “this isn’t love” then the movie should have fucking validated her. Abusive love cannot count as “real love” enough for the Soul Stone to consider it a sacrifice. Instead they fridged her for the sake of her abusive father. What in the flying FUCK.
Like this is nothing against the actor but goddamn the writing for Thanos is awful and I hate it and it ruins the movies for me because the movies are based on this awful ecofascist myth and don’t challenge it. Like you want a villain with a valid reason to believe what he believes, but who actually gets called on his imperial and genocidal ambitions? Killmonger’s right there. 
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amandaoftherosemire · 4 years
Text
Ice and Moonlight -- Part One
Fandom: Marvel Avengers AU
Pairing: Loki Odinson X Asgardian!Reader
Characters: Loki Odinson, Thor Odinson, Valkyrie, OFC Cassie
Author: @amandaoftherosemire
Rating: Explicit
Word Count: 4,183
Format: Short Series
Warnings: Smut (very light), 18+ only, language, fluff, angst
Summary: You and Loki had been inseparable until his discovery of his true origins and his father’s deceptions. You only spoke to him once more before his sacrifice on Svartlfheim. After his death, heartbroken and left with nothing but unanswered questions, you’d left Asgard to find your fortunes on Midgard. One night, and once again not dead, Loki walks back into your life. The bastard.
A/N: I have a deep weakness for Hozier and this story is absolutely inspired by the chorus of ‘Work Song.’ When music puts a story in my brain, I tend to produce a barrage of words, so this is another one-shot that got away from me. Anyone who has been reading my stuff for awhile will know that this happens to me a lot, but the next part will be up in a couple of weeks at most. I’d be more specific, but I’m still buried in my personal life and eking out time to write so I don’t want to make promises I can’t keep.
This is canon adjacent through Thor: Ragnarok but I split off at that point to keep Loki alive without dealing with the consequences of IW and Endgame. For the purposes of this story, Thanos got super busy playing with a kitten he found, and Infinity War never happened.
Mischief // Malice // Magic
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Mischief
You could smell them the moment they walked in, even over the myriad other smells that inundated the air of the bar. That air was redolent with smoke, liquor, wood, humanity, but when the door opened, the air that followed the men carried rain and ozone, ice and moonlight to your nose and you knew they'd found you. Those scents were as familiar to you as your own face, your own name, as there'd never been a day in your memory that you hadn't known and loved them.
The ice and moonlight would have been more of a surprise if your best friend in this realm and any other, Cassie of the wicked laugh and mean left hook, hadn't come barreling into your room this morning to show you the news report she'd been watching on her phone. You'd seen the royal brothers, plural, and the shriek of rage and betrayal hadn't quite clawed its way out of your throat before the rest of the report left you breathless with grief.
Asgard, of golden spires and shining seas, was gone, destroyed in prophesied Ragnarok. Your people were a remnant, refugees in an uncertain universe. You may have left Asgard, but you had intended to go back home, someday. Now someday would never come.
You would have gone to your people right away, offered your comfort to Thor, whom you loved as a brother, except Loki stood at his side and you hadn't yet decided if you were going to acknowledge his second return from the dead. You still hadn't really dealt with his first return.
You didn't look up, merely continued to flick your fingers over the keys of the piano, an instrument you'd taken to almost as soon as you'd set foot on Midgard. Heimdall had set you down in the parking lot of this bar, owned by the sharp-eyed, smart-mouthed Cassie. She'd taken one look, seen a babe in the woods, though a babe that could bench press a semi, and taken you under her wing. In return, you sang for your supper, kept her bar safe and entertained.
You'd found your voice here, a very different one from the ethereal thing that had once lifted out of you like angel song. You could still awe Midgardians with a soaring soprano, but you much preferred the richer, rawer voice you'd found here in the smoke and the dark. Your voice no longer lifted, but poured out of you, fueled by heartbreak Midgardians couldn't fathom, nor could they resist. You packed them in every night to hear the angel that fell to Earth, to witness the magic you made with your voice.
Loki couldn't understand why Thor had dragged him halfway across this horrid little planet to visit another horrid little corner of it. He would have much preferred to find some place plush, comfortable, and quiet to escape, tired of humanity after less than a week in their presence. He enjoyed the fact that he was infamous but would have preferred a little less breathless terror and a little more deferential respect.
Thor immediately sauntered up to the bar, leaning in to grin at the bartender. Though he was wearing jeans and a t-shirt in red that stretched across his massive chest in fascinating and delicious ways, there could be no doubt that he was more than an ordinary man by the scent of ozone and power that hung on him. Cassie merely lifted a brow, wishing she could allow herself to be charmed, but she recognized the pale man behind him as the one who'd, as she thought of it, set you on fire. Loki, gorgeously out of place in a smoke gray suit, sneered at the dark woman whose equally dark eyes were judgmental as they rested on him. Hostility rolled off of her in waves as she stared him down.
Which is how she saw the change come over him when your voice began to wind through the air, twining around the smoke with the same rough warmth. She wondered at the stricken look of hope and despair that chased each other across his face; she'd heard the story from you and knew your last interaction to be viciously ugly, shortly before his supposed death.
Thor was trying to charm the bartender into giving him an unusually large quantity of liquor for Midgard, experienced with human bartenders doubting his usual order. Cassie was letting him, laughing at his earnest explanations. She lived with an Asgardian and knew well their capacity for drink, but he was cute, and she couldn’t resist teasing him.
Cassie didn't know that you'd rarely overindulged on Asgard, too often responsible for the song part of the wine and song celebrations. Thor had known you were here, but he'd remembered his naïve and sheltered friend and Loki's devoted beloved. He didn't know Cassie's rough and tumble bouncer and backup for every ridiculous thing that came out of her mouth.
You'd finished so, so many fights Cassie had started.
Loki, meanwhile, was staring at you as your voice wound into his head, sinking into his gut, sending shivers of heat over his skin. There'd once been a time when the only way he heard your voice this rough and wild was when you were moving under his hands, your body prey to his mouth and rocking him to madness. Now your glorious voice was mated to that sensual rasp and dragging him back to happier days.
'Loki.' He smiled but didn't open his eyes. He could feel the petals of the flower you were toying with brush over his lips. The sun was shining and all he could smell was the warm scent of flowers and you. 'Loki. Are you sleeping, Loki? Loki.' He could hear the laugh in your voice and the sound was so pretty he kept feigning sleep so that you'd keep playing. When he was alone with you, basking in your complete and absolute devotion, he could forget everyone else.
Then you were leaning close, whispering 'Loki' in a tone so sweet it made tears prick at his eyes. You brushed your lips against his, even softer than flower petals, and the low hum in your throat was seducing him, beguiling him. His arms lifted, one hand cupping the back of your head while the other snaked around your waist. In the next moment, he was rolling with you until you were giggling on your back in amongst the flowers, Loki braced over you, green eyes laughing.
'I knew you were awake," you murmured as you drew his mouth down to yours.
 "Loki." Thor clapped him on the shoulder and brought him back to the present, on the Earth you'd escaped to rather than live in an Asgard where you were forever reminded of him, of everything you'd lost. Loki had allowed Thor to believe that Heimdall had been charged with dereliction of duty because he had discovered Loki was impersonating Odin. Rather, Heimdall had let you leave through the Bifrost and refused to say where he'd sent you. Loki had completely lost his temper that day, and when Heimdall went on the run, he'd lost his chance permanently to find out where you'd gone.
Loki saw immediately, however, that Thor had known exactly who he'd find here.
"This is the lovely Cassandra," Thor told Loki, his remaining eye gentle on Loki's shining green. "She has been caring for our Y/N while she has been here."
"Ha!" Cassie barked the laugh and made both Thor and Loki frown at her. "Bitch can take care of herself." Loki's mouth opened to snarl at the insult to you when Thor's hand restrained him. Cassie was already lifting her voice over the applause that broke out at the end of your song. "Hey, Y/N! I got some boys back here think I take care of you."
A rumble of laughter went through the crowd, most of them regulars, many of them witness to at least one of many, many occasions upon which you'd saved Cassie from a fist in the face, and in one case so far, a knife in the gut. Thor and Loki looked around in confusion at the good-natured sound.
"Now, Cassie," you called back, your fingers moving into the opening notes of a more suggestive song, one you sang on a regular basis, "those boys are Asgardians." You smirked and sent a hot look over your piano at your audience. "I was a Lady, before I fell into this den of iniquity." The crowd cheered when you launched into the song and Thor and Loki shared a look, Thor gleeful, Loki shocked.
 Loki stood next to his mother, watching his idiot brother work the crowd, the conceited ass, and fought the urge to roll his eyes. He glanced across to where you stood in the crowd, so close to the royal dais that he could be at your side in half a moment. You were applauding politely, but you didn't bother to resist, rolling your eyes at every ridiculous stunt of Thor's. Loki knew you were going to mock his brother relentlessly for all of this for years to come.
He could hardly wait.
He kept his eyes on you as much as possible, your smiling face keeping him calm even as his heart jumped and jumped with the excitement of his latest mischief. Any moment…
Trying to settle, he focused on the demure neckline of your dress, imagining brushing his lips over the discreet swell there. You were always demure, always a perfect lady in public; he knew one day you'd be a perfect princess, though most important was that you were perfect for him, for each other. You even laughed at the pranks he played on you.
Of course, he was always careful not to play too rough with you. You were too precious to treat with anything less than reverence.
Which is why he felt a rare pang of remorse when he heard his father say, 'The Frost Giants," and he saw terror flash in your eyes. He cursed himself for a fool when he remembered that you'd lived in fear of Frost Giants for years as a child after hearing the story of your father's death.
Your eyes stayed on his face, wide with fear and worry and he could see your hands clasped together in front of you, the knuckles white. His lips curved slightly to reassure. The sight seemed to help as you smiled back, if only a little, and he felt a rush of pride that you, glorious creature that you were, preferred him above all others.
He knew some whispered that he'd ensorcelled you, that there was no other explanation for the fact that the brightest jewel in Odin's court draped herself on the dark Prince's arm. There was no doubt you could charm anyone, including the elder Odinson if you so chose; it was incomprehensible that you should choose the younger.
You'd been raised in the palace alongside them when your father had been killed saving Odin during the War with Jotunheim. You'd been a babe yourself and had grown up with the royal brothers. Even as children, you'd always sought Loki's company, and the whispers of enchantment remained only whispers.
Loki felt another pang of remorse at using Frost Giants to ruin his brother's day when he remembered how much you'd feared them as a child. He made a note to himself to make sweet love to you later to distract you from old fears, find a way to assure you that the monsters couldn't come back. Above all, he'd use other tools in the future.
 Your eyes met his, as though no one else existed, snapping him out of his reverie and bringing him hurtling back to this place where the lady you’d been was dead with your homeworld. He was unsurprised to discover he was rock hard. If he'd ever been able to resist temptation, it hadn't been when you tempted, and he was far less virtuous than he used to be. He was enthralled by the sharp edge to your voice and the wild storms in your eyes, would also be unsurprised should he fall in love with you all over again.
Your eyes were hot with old memories and he wondered if the same ones tormented you. He no longer heard Thor flirting with the angry-eyed bartender, unable to care about her hostility. He recognized her as another that you'd enchanted by being yourself and appreciated the Midgardian's protectiveness, since it was you. He easily ignored the sexual by-play behind him; all he could hear was you, and the ache that hot rasp inspired in his gut was sharp and painful. He wouldn't beg for much in this universe, but he thought you might be the exception.
Loki paused in the hidden corridor behind the wall of your bedchamber, looking down at the hand the Jotun had touched. He could still see the striated blue racing up his arm and the memory was making him feel cold deep, deep inside. He wasn't sure he would be here now if he hadn't promised to come see you. He could hardly believe it had been only a few short hours ago that he'd last spoken with you, pausing a moment to kiss you on his way to Thor. You'd whispered sultrily in invitation that he'd have to sleep with you until they discovered how the Frost Giants had gotten in; he'd whispered back that if he'd known that would be the consequence, he'd have let them in himself.
If he'd known how this day would end, he'd have done anything but.
'Loki?' Your voice was a raspy whisper in the shimmering dark as he slid in between your sheets. He'd promised to come to you as soon as he'd calmed everyone down, expecting to be here hours ago, not really anticipating that it'd be so easy to taunt his brother into going to Jotunheim. Even if he hadn't promised, upon the return from that icy land and the shocking discovery there, followed immediately by the confrontation between his brother and father, he needed to find some semblance of peace. You, if nothing else, remained constant.
For a moment he hesitated, unwilling for reasons he didn't want to examine to touch you with the hand touched by Frost Giants. That hand had betrayed some secret, some hidden aspect to himself that he'd never suspected, sending whispers of fear through him. But after everything that had happened that night, he needed you. His arm slid around your waist to pull you close. 'My love,' he murmured, burying his face in the skin of your neck and breathing deep, his heart racing with a terror he couldn't, wouldn't name.
'Was he that bad?' You turned in his arms to offer comfort, able to hear plainly the lost and broken tone in his voice. Thor could be thoughtless in ill temper and often hurt Loki because he saw only his own pain and frustration. You had long ago become accustomed to tending to Loki when he’d taken a stray lightning bolt.
'I can't--' His voice choked off, but with an emotion you weren't certain you could truly name. You wrapped yourself around him, burying your hands in his hair to hold him close, worried at the pain you thought you heard. As you opened your mouth to ask why he sounded so upset he took a deep breath. 'Please, love. Let's not speak of it tonight. Let me--' His voice cut off when his mouth met yours.
Part of you wanted to pull away, to demand he tell you what happened that put this desperation in his touch, the fear in his kiss, the pain in his voice. But there was that desperation, that fear, that pain and you couldn't stop yourself from reaching, opening to comfort, to reassure. You loved Loki with all of your heart. If he needed you, all he had to do was ask. You gave him all he wanted and more, eager under his hands, diabolical with your own.
'Love me?' he gasped once you were straddling him, connected, your hips driving him out of his mind as you twisted and rocked against him.
When you and he were alone together, all the realms fell away. 'More than anyone in the universe.' You moaned it, your eyes direct on his; you loved the way his hands tightened on your hips the more vocal you were.
Except tonight he looked wild, urgent, like he needed you to convince him. 'Forever?'
You leaned close, leading with your heart. Your body flowed against him in a graceful wave, your eyes soft in the shimmering light from the nebula streaming through your window. 'And always.'
'Do you promise, love?' Loki's arms came around you, pressing you to his chest, his heart clutching in terror even as your skin against his drove him higher. 'No matter what?'
'Oh, love, I promise,' you whispered gently, your hands cupping his beautiful face. 'Even if you got stuck pretending to be Volstagg.'
Loki's heart lifted in wonder when the laugh lifted out of him at the wicked look on your face. Only you knew when and how to tease him when he was most hurt, most insecure. Only you could make a solemn vow into a loving joke. He was reassured even as the laughter eased the tightness in his throat. With a burst of movement, he was tumbling you onto your back, to stroke into you more forcefully, wanting to forget everything but you.
'Ah, love,' he purred in a chuckle, 'no wonder they think I put a spell on you.'
 Loki could have sagged when your eyes released him to turn with a smile upon your audience. He was pleased to hear the enthusiastic applause, gratified that you were as adored on Midgard as you had been on Asgard. He relented, a little. He could not hate a people that recognized your worth.
The memories were still dark in his eyes when you stood and he could have knelt in supplication at the sight of you, not in demure Asgardian garb, but in casual Midgardian clothing that revealed the body he'd never stopped dreaming of. Clad in denim that hugged your legs, reminding him of the way they'd felt wrapped around him, and a sweater in bright, Asgardian gold, you looked strong and capable, like you'd found a power and purpose that had eluded you at home. He wondered now what singing for humans did for you that singing for your own kind had not because your voice had turned to fire and fury, and he could hear a passion that hadn't been there before. 
"Because I get the question on a regular basis," as you spoke you circled the piano and leaned against it, crossing your legs at the ankle and bracing your elbows on top, “yes, I know Thor.” You smirked hen the man in question turned to look at you. “And I'm about to prove it. Get your ass up here, you big, beautiful bastard," you shouted with a growl at the grinning God of Thunder, who responded with a running leap onto the stage to snatch you up into a bear hug. You laughed when he squeezed you tight enough to make you squeak, and the people who'd seen you wreck worlds with your fists snickered at the sound.
 You stared at Thor, your mind blank with horror. Loki couldn't be gone, couldn't have done what Thor was saying he'd done. He'd been upset and hurting the last time you saw him, only a couple nights before, but he'd been himself. He'd left your bed with a kiss the night of Thor's banishment, claiming he needed to speak with his father, and you'd understood. Though you hadn't seen him since, his continued absence from your company made sense with the news of the Allfather's sudden collapse after Thor's exile.
Thor had found you in Loki's rooms the night he’d returned to Asgard, where you'd been waiting. You'd intended to talk to Loki, comfort him, when he was able to finally rest and had snuck in so you wouldn't miss him. You'd fallen asleep in his bed, comforted by his scent. You'd awoken to a new world, a new life and you wanted to climb back in, go back to a world that made sense, a world where your dearest love wasn't a mad monster that tried to kill his brother or destroy an entire realm.
A world where your dearest love wouldn't leave you.
A year later, you stood with your hands in Thor's, your eyes fierce and wild on his. 'I know I'm not being fair,' you said, and though his eyes stayed hard, his hands were gentle around yours. The two of you had become the dearest of friends, grieving the man you'd both loved and lost. Only Thor could truly understand the confused betrayal left to you in the wake of Loki's death. The news that he was still alive had left you feeling only more confused and betrayed.
'You may ask the unfair of me, dear one,' Thor murmured as he lifted your hands to his lips. He was about to leave, the Allfather amassing the energy to send him to Midgard.
'Please, bring him home. Tell him…' You paused, a thousand things both devoted and bitter choking you. You'd save those things for Loki's ears alone. Instead, you looked at Thor's face with shining eyes. Your voice a little angry, you went on. 'Tell him I still love him. No matter what.'
Thor's lips curved at the fury that colored your tone. Loki, if he could be reasoned with, would be coming home to a much less accommodating Y/N. 'If anything can reach him now, it would be you.' His father shouted and he squeezed your hands before letting go. 'I'll tell him.'
You watched Thor run toward the portal of energy His Majesty wielded, and hoped he was right. The moment Loki had let go, deliberately falling from the Bifrost, you'd begun to doubt.
You cupped Thor's pretty face in your hands, looking over the shorn hair, the patch covering his lost eye, the grief in bright turquoise. "Sweet Prince," you said, softly, your old nickname for him falling easily from your lips and making tears prick at Thor's eye. "You've traveled a long way without rest, haven't you?'
The wry understanding in your eyes had Thor huffing out a weary laugh. "Oh, Y/N. You have no idea."
"Come with me," you said, briskly, turning with Thor and sliding your arm through his to lead him back to the bar. Your audience was dismayed but understanding. You’d started your set with a song honoring and mourning Asgard. "Cassie knows how to water an Asgardian. If she said otherwise, she was fucking with you."
Loki had been watching from the back of the room, his gut curdling with jealousy as he saw how familiar you and Thor were with each other. You'd considered Thor family your entire life, but you'd never been close, your preference for Loki leading you to find Thor irritating a lot of the time. He hadn't seen Thor's humility, his remorse after his time on Midgard, hadn't seen the two of you, siblings in all but blood, become friends as well.
When you turned in his direction, he felt the urge to flee, to hide from the bleak amusement curving your lips, the condemnation in your eyes. You and he had never been anything resembling siblings. His feet were planted, however, his knees weak and in the next moment you were next to him, leaning on the bar to tease your Midgardian friend. Your scent wound into his head and left him dizzy as you took three glasses and a jug with no label from the other woman. If Thor hadn't clamped a hand on his shoulder, he didn't know that he would have been able to follow you behind the bar to a small room in the back.
You gestured the brothers to the couch against the wall, handing both of them a glass filled with the mead you'd taught Cassie to make. You still hadn't acknowledged Loki as anything more than Thor's companion, had decided being rude would be less insulting to Loki than pretending you didn't know him at all. Once you'd filled your own glass, you dropped into the chair behind Cassie's desk and propped your feet up. 
"So. What did you do?" Thor's grin flashed at the stern disapproval aimed his way, twisting your eyebrows over a mouth twitching with mild amusement. Then your face softened with sympathy and sadness, and jealousy burned under Loki’s sternum. You'd once shown him all this loving kindness, now you'd barely glanced at him. Until that stern eyebrow lifted in his direction and he felt pinned, like an insect. "How'd you boys manage to set off Ragnarok?"
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Part Two: Malice
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captainchrisfics · 5 years
Text
Endgame Interviews and Special News
About: As per the request of @rororo06 , Chris Evans and the (first person pov) reader are married and going through a round of press interviews, although the plot of Endgame isn’t the only thing they’re worried about spoiling (hope you don’t mind that addition to the plot!)
Words: 2,600
A/N: Featuring the lowest key hint at what could possibly be considered a spoiler, lines lifted straight from Chris and RDJ’s dialogue in The Avengers, and a reference to a quote from my favorite author, Jandy Nelson.
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“So, this is potentially the last time we’ll see the two of you in the MCU. I’d imagine that feels pretty weird, huh?” The interviewer asked, sitting a little closer to us in her chair that looked so much comfier than the folding ones Chris and I have been sitting in all day. I felt bad for omitting her name from my memory. I really did try to remember, but this is our seventh question session of the day and there reaches a point where they all kind of blur together and you forget things. I made an effort to push the thought of exactly why forgetfulness was plaguing me way worse than usual out of my mind in the hopes that it wouldn’t accidentally slip from my mind to my mouth during this Q and A.
“I think I can speak for the both of us when I say that after shooting so many of these, getting back on set sort of feels like coming home,” Chris said with his Boston accent accentuating his vowels in a way I would’ve laughed at if it were just the two of us. “Granted, it’s in the same weird way a high school reunion does.” The interviewer giggled at that and tried to hide her blush behind her notes, but I’ve gotten pretty good at catching the flirty eyes women gave my husband and how their voices raised a couple octaves around him. I couldn’t blame her, Chris has always had this disarming charm about him and I was secure enough to know he wasn’t entrancing her intentionally. Chris intertwined his arm with the one I had sitting on his armrest, never knowing where the blurry boundary of my personal space ended and his began, and held my hand. “What do you think, babe?” he asked, turning his baby blues to me with his attention and perching one eyebrow higher than the other. I nodded in agreement and added, “We’ve watched them grow so much over the years, it feels more like sending our kid to college.”
The interviewer cleared her throat and turned to me, more serious now. “I mean, I grew up watching these movies over the last decade. Being one of the first female heroes in the series, you’re someone little girls everywhere have been looking up to for a long time now,” she said, eyes boring into mine the way they do when conveying the kind of admiration someone had when they saw you as a hero, despite the fact that all I did was pretend to be one. The appreciation people who could see a reflection of themselves in your mirror, one that the screen didn’t show them too often, wasn’t something I’d ever get used to. “Thank you,” I said earnestly, placing a hand over hers. “I can only take so much responsibility, though. The most amazing women in this industry from the cast to crew work on these movies, standing alongside them has been one of the biggest honors.”
Chris smiled down at me as I spoke and stretched to wrap his arm around me and I leaned into his side comfortably, giving into the giant magnet always pulling us together. “Your relationship has been something so many fans loved seeing develop on and off screen as well. Any clue as to how your characters will be affected by the Endgame?” she asked, tucking one index card behind another. I started twisting my wedding ring around my finger unconsciously, thinking about how crucial this franchise was in bringing us together for the first time in a while, with a new sense of nostalgia. It wasn’t a secret that our contracts were up and, as excited as we both were to move on to new projects, there was a bitterness sprinkled in with the sweet when I thought about hanging up our superhero costumes for the last time.
Chris was established as Captain America in his origin story, but I was a new addition on the set of The Avengers. Still, the role wasn’t as second nature to him then as it is now. He didn’t feel as though the shield felt right on his arm. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t attracted to Chris, but that’s not why I invited him back to my trailer after a particularly stiff scene, even though when he tells the story it’s because his blue eyes and high cheekbones ignited an irrevocable love for him within me and a burning need (not desire, need) to be in  his presence every moment I could. It was an exceptionally humid day, made worse by our heat-trapping supersuits, which grew into a sticky summer night spent sat in my trailer going over our lines for hours on end. There was something I noticed about the way Chris was carrying himself during our scenes together that was so unnatural, I just hoped to help him grow more comfortable with me so the camera wouldn’t pick up on whatever was bugging him next time we were on set.
We were at this part where everyone’s arguing, shouting over one another while Loki’s scepter glowed behind them. Chris and I were standing a little too close for comfort, sandwiched together by the counters in my thin trailer, which made it increasingly difficult to stay in character. “Why shouldn’t the guy let off a little steam?” I said with faux nonchalance in reference to Bruce’s growing temper, slapping my hand on his broad shoulder. Chris shook the script in his hand to stiffen the pages, staring at it intently before turning to me with a dramatically furrowed brow and tight jaw. He slapped my hand away, shoulders heaving as he breathed heavily with acted anger, and said, “You know damn well why so back off.” Chris took a small but threatening step toward me, looming just inches away. Although the harsh lines of his bone structure and intensity in his stare made Chris that much more intimidating, I tried to rely on my character’s own unabashed smugness as I rolled my shoulders back and crossed my arms, playing his challenger. “Oh,” I said, eyes dragging from the frown on his lips to meet those gorgeous blue eyes. I tried to step back, as the script directed, but my back hit the cabinet. “I’m starting to want you to make me,” I said lowly, conscious of my breath fanning across his face.
Instead of saying his next line, Chris threw his script down on the tabletop. He closed what was left of the little space between us by reaching out and caressing my cheek. His other hand slipped behind me, resting on the small of my back. Our chests rose and fell together, brushing against each other with every breath. His eyes searched mine, looking for permission. When his mouth opened and closed like a fish, trying and failing to find the words, I kissed him. It was slow at first, soft and uncertain as our mouths melded together, but before I knew it everything was on fire. I felt hot, every inch of skin Chris touched burned for his attention again. So did he, with the way his blood rushing turned his skin into a radiator. I wasn’t thinking about it as Chris pushed his hips into mine and sucked on the skin of my neck, leading me to the trailer’s sorry excuse for a mattress, but I read somewhere that when people fall in love they burst into flames, which I think is as true as the sky being blue.
Although, watching the movies now, it’s clear there was always some sort of tension between us if you know what you’re looking for. In the scenes we shot before that day, Chris stood straighter around me and puffed out his chest while I walked with an embarrassingly prominent sway in my hips. After though, even by the next morning, it was clear to everyone we’d grown more comfortable together. We found our rhythm and it showed, causing the directors to pursue an on-screen relationship between our characters. Chris and I didn’t complain too much about getting paid to do what we already were anyway.
“Would you agree?” Chris inquired, tracing the tip of his thumb along my shoulder to regain my attention. I nodded absentmindedly, focusing on trying to keep the blush in my cheeks to a minimum. My hand floated to where it rested on my stomach without me noticing while I was reminiscing, which I pulled away quickly and prayed no one would notice in the recording’s shoulders-up shot. “So I think we’ll see a new side of Steve,” Chris reiterated the point I’d missed. “At this point, I’d say he’s willing to stop at nothing to get her back after she got dusted in Infinity War,” he elaborated, moving the light line his finger brushed against my shoulder a little higher to draw shapes on my exposed skin, sending shivers down my spine. Chris either didn’t know or didn’t acknowledge the effect he was having on me as he kept talking without breaking the interviewer’s eye contact. “It’ll be interesting to see how he handles really losing everything for the second time now.”
She nodded solemnly and gave his words a minute to hang on suspense in the air before leaning toward me as she shifted her attention again. “Your chemistry is so clear on screen, you two get along effortlessly. I was wondering if it’s like that in real life as well?” I couldn’t stop myself from laughing at the assumption, knowing that suppressing my anger every time I had to pick up the socks Chris strewn all over the apartment since he refused to put them in the laundry each time he peeled off another pair sure as hell wasn’t even close to resembling effortlessness. “Sorry, it’s just… of course it isn’t,” I said, causing Chris to feign hurt as he pressed his hand to his heart and joked about me twisting the knife. “No, really. We’re real people. We fight over the stupidest things,” I insisted. Chris nodded, bringing up how the third world war almost broke out in our kitchen this morning after I discovered he finished my favorite cereal and put the box back. I fired back by mentioning the time he lost the screaming match over whether we should record the Patriots game or the premiere of my favorite show.
“At the end of the day, I love him,” I said, as Chris placed his hand over mine. “It’s like stumbling through the house when you’re sloppy drunk,” I paused to allow Chris the time to throw his head back in the laughter I knew was coming, the kind that pulled his hand to his pec as he sunk into his seat. “Really,” I implored once he finished. “Sometimes it’s dark and you have no clue where you’re going, but you figure it out. It isn’t perfect, you forget to take your makeup off, we fight, but you put on your pajamas and choose to land on your soft bed instead of the floor, which feels like exactly where you’re supposed to be. It’s where you fit in the world but you have to make it work, too.” I turned to Chris who met me with a quick peck on the lips. The interviewer cooed, calling that the sweetest thing she’d ever heard though her tone told me that wasn’t the case. “You wouldn’t think it was so cute if you poured your heart and soul out in your vows and she stood at the altar and compared you to a drunk night in front of your whole family,” Chris dramatically pinched in between his eyes to drive the joke home to the woman across from us, who genuinely believed him for a second until we both burst into laughter.
“I’m sorry on Marvel’s publicists’ behalf,” I apologized, wiping a tear from my eye. “They really should know better than to put us together for these things, being twenty-two movies deep and all.” The interviewer chuckled lightly and I could tell her patience was running thin as she tried to reign Chris and I back in. She asked the usual concluding question: if there was anything more we could say about Endgame without losing our jobs.
“Whatever you’re expecting, I guarantee you’ll still be surprised,” I promised. The interviewer raised her eyebrows and laughed, joking about how ominous that sounded. I just shrugged, letting my answer speak for itself in an attempt to be mysterious. And to avoid breaking my contract, spoiling the movie, and being sent to that training camp they made Ruffalo attend. Chris contemplated the question a little more than I did before saying, “It’s definitely an ode to the fans, which is my favorite thing about it. I’ll guarantee,” he said, shooting me a pointing look coupled with a knee-weakening smirk, “that they’ll love watching it as much as we loved making it.”
Chris thanked the interviewer and excused himself to the snack table while I shook her hand. We were only afforded short breaks between shots, which he intended to make the most of by stuffing as many grapes into his mouth as possible. I met him there and took a donut that disappeared in mere minutes. “You know what else I really loved making?” Chris whispered to me with incisive eyes aimed at my stomach, taking advantage of our few moments alone today to poke fun at me. “That’s such a weird thing to say,” I remarked, crinkling my nose at his comment. “I know,” he laughed, popping another grape into his mouth. Before swallowing he cocked his head toward me and said, “You know what’s worse? I actually almost said that.” I rolled my eyes as I giggled at him. “Imagine if that’s how everyone found out we’re pregnant,” I entertained the idea, laughing harder at the absurdity. I could just imagine the YouTube comments now. Maybe even an E! News headline that went something like: Chris Evans Spoils Pregnancy Instead of Endgame. Chris shrugged sheepishly, taking a step toward me as he wrapped an arm around my waist and pulled me into his side. “I can’t help it, I’m just so excited,” he grinned down at me, staring at me with soft eyes. My gaze met his, making me melt from the inside out. “Me too,” I said quietly, wrapping my arm around his waist and bumping our hips together as we fused. “Don’t you think it’d be a fun way to tell everyone? Like hey guys, we’ve got some special news- here’s the link to our pregnancy announcement!” Chris tried to get me to give in. “It’s still way too early and-” I started, until the director cut me off.
“You two, back on set!” he called Chris and me back to our chairs to start the next round of interrogation. This time the interviewer was a young kid who gaped at us with a grin so big it looked like it ached. He was dressed as Captain America, which Chris kept insisting would be our baby’s first Halloween costume, so I knew he was about to be putty in this boy’s hands. “Don’t slip now,” I reminded him, shooting Chris a threatening look. His head ping-ponged between me and this kid who sat in a folding chair, legs dangling above the floor. “But-” he started, until I squeezed his hand a little harder than necessary to prove my point. “Fine, but this is harder than not spoiling the movie, you know?” Chris groaned playfully before walking toward his seat again, ready for another Endgame interview.
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The one where he blipped and you didn’t (Ch. 1)
Pairing: Peter Parker x Stark!Reader
Summary: Peter blipped. You didn’t. Now you’re both the same age and he’s confused by the kid he used to know and the girl you are now.
Word Count: 3k-ish
Warnings: Language, INFINITY WAR AND ENDGAME SPOILERS
A/N: Okay, this is Chapter One to this series. It’s a little long, I got carried away (sorry not sorry). Let me know what you think! Remember I also do requests, pls don’t get discouraged by my amateur profile, I’m still figuring it all out :)
Read the intro first
CHAPTER ONE
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"Y/N, get your ass out of bed, you're going to be late." you heard Rhodey scold through your open door. 
"Language" you mumbled sleepily. 
"Goddamn- I don't have time for this." you heard him grumble under his breath and suddenly the fluorescent lights in your room switched on and you yelped in surprise, flinging the covers over your head. Rhodey chuckled and you heard your door swing shut. 
"If I come back in 20 minutes and you're still in bed, I'm going to personally fly you to school." he said through the door and walked away.
You smiled sleepily. Rhodey, though he was tough on you, cared about you like his own daughter. Nearly eleven years ago your mother had died in a car crash and you were sent to live with your father, Tony. You, being so young, were excited to finally meet your father. Tony, on the other hand, was a wreck. He had just announced to the world that he was Iron Man and the last thing he wanted was to take care of and raise a child, whether it be his or not. He had all intention of sending you off to boarding school but, when he met you, he refused to make the same mistakes his father did. You instantly melted his heart with your smile and your big E/C eyes. After deciding to take you in, he asked Rhodey to be your Godfather, not that he was a very religious man, he just wanted someone else to be there for you if there came a day that he couldn't. 
Deciding not to test Rhodey's threat, you rolled out of bed and stumbled into the bathroom. Your reflection in the mirror, in the such loving words of Peter, looked as if death had walked over you...twice. It wasn't a secret that, since the battle and your dad's death, you haven't been sleeping well. Thankfully, nightmares were a thing of the past ever since Bruce gave you something that evaded them. You remembered waking up screaming, tears streaming down your face, causing Rhodey to come and calm you down in the middle of the night. Every night you were forced to relive a part of the battle, and every night you were forced to see your dad die. Now, your sleep was a void that, although lacked the trauma, was a difficult place to find peace.
You scrubbed your face and brushed your teeth, avoiding your face in the mirror, and walked back into your room. Not really in the mood to dress nice, you pulled on some black tights and a big sweatshirt that was draped over your desk chair. You slipped on your converse and walked back into the bathroom to put concealer under your eyes. The last thing your need is for one of your teachers to send your to the counselors office because of your physical appearance...again.
Deciding you looked presentable, you slung your backpack over your shoulder and started downstairs before rushing back to your room to grab your phone, still charging on your nightstand. You found 6 new messages. 
(1) Spider-thing: Hey are you gonna go to Flash's party tonight?
(2) Spider-thing: Don't tell me you slept in again
(3) Spider-thing: ok nvm I'll see u at school
(4) Ned: Hey Y/N u wanna go to Flash's tonight? 
(5) Ned: Peter might confess his undying love for u, u never know 
(6) Flash: Hope to see u at my party tonight I'll b waiting ;)
You rolled your eyes at Flash's text, and clicked the notification form Ned. 
Y/N: yeah right after he confesses his undying love for Flash 
He replied immediately, making you chuckle. 
Ned: I'm telling u, he's got it bad 4 u 
You rolled your eyes and slipped your phone in your back pocket. You found it funny; Ned's obsession with the idea of you and Peter as a couple, and sometimes you went along with it just to tease Peter, but that's all it was, teasing. Sure, he was hot and sweet and funny and, before the snap, these things nourished a major crush that bloomed in your little pre-teen heart. But things changed, you got older and, when he came back the same age as you, you had to remember that he probably still saw you as that little girl he used to babysit. 
~TIME SKIP~
"Bye Happy, I'll see you after school!" you said, blowing Happy a kiss as you closed the car door. Happy rolled down his window. 
"Call me if anything happens. Just call and I'll come and get you." 
"I will." you said watched him drive off. Happy was, despite the fact that it's been a few months since everything happened, still worried about you. You didn't mind it though, you loved him for it.
Sighing, you walked into the building that leered over you. For the first time today, you realized how heavy your backpack was and you made a beeline for your locker. You smiled sadly and recalled how Nat would always get after you for carrying too much and you would get the lecture about how, even though you were an Avenger, you still had to take care of yourself. You stacked the books in your locker, slammed the door shut, and found yourself face to face with Peter. 
"SHIT!" you shrieked as he howled with laughter. 
"You shoulda- you should have seen your face" he said between breaths. 
You rolled your eyes and shoved him into the lockers. 
"This isn't funny you idiot, I could have attacked you" you said despite the smile growing on your lips.
"I can take you Stark" he said, regaining his breath. 
"In your dreams Parker"
It was his turn to roll his eyes. It was then that you noticed the two coffee cups he held. You sighed in relief and gratefully took one from him. 
"Anyway, you ignored my texts this morning. You wanna go to the party?" he said falling in step with you as you walked towards your first class. 
"I don't know. Flash's parties always end with someone almost drowning in the pool or jumping off the roof." 
"Oh c'mon, let's go. Maybe this time it'll be Flash jumping off the roof and it'll put us all out of our misery." 
You couldn't stop the giggle that bubbled from your lips and you were about to reply when someone called you from behind. 
You both turned to see Brad Davis walking briskly towards you. You smiled at him and slowed your pace so he could catch up. 
"Hey Y/N, hey Peter." he said walking up beside you. 
"Sup" Peter grumbled. You sent him a sideways glare and turned to up at Brad.
Despite the numerous times you questioned Peter about his silent grudge against Brad, he could never give you a straight answer on why he hated him. "I don't trust him" he would always say, but you could never figure out why. Brad, like you, survived the snap and, because you were both in the same grade, became friends. 
"Are you guys going to the party tonight?" he asked.
"Jeez, is that the only thing everyone cares about?" you said jokingly.
"Well, it is the only good thing about high school" he said, making you laugh. 
Over the past couple of years, Brad was the person who got to hear all the complaints you had about high school. He had always been an annoyingly upbeat guy and he took all your complaints in stride, turning them into something that you should be grateful for. The last five years gave you very few things to be grateful for, but Brad was one of them. 
"You're definitely right about that. But, yeah we're planning on going" you said, slightly nudging Peter next to you.
"Awesome. I'll see you there then." Brad said and waved as he turned down a passing hallway. 
"Aw, I love Brad" you said fondly as you watched him disappear in the growing crowd of students. You looked up at Peter just in time to see him roll his eyes at your comment. You frowned at him, annoyed of his attitude. 
"Dude, seriously, what the hell is your problem?" 
 "Nothing. He just rubs me the wrong way I guess."  he said with a shrug.
It was your turn to roll your eyes.
 "Oh c'mon. you're just mad that he became hot while you were gone and now all the girls want him" 
"It's just weird. One day he was this tiny annoying kid and the next he's huge." Peter said before bringing his coffee to his lips. 
"Well it wasn't like that for all of us." you reminded him. "And how is that weird for you? You literally got bit by a spider and became hot overnight." 
At your words Peter choked on his coffee and coughed furiously, trying to breathe through the hot liquid. 
"Y-you think I'm hot?" he spluttered in disbelief 
For about the millionth time this morning, you rolled your eyes at him. 
"Dude, have you seen your abs? I had the biggest crush on you and your stupid hot spider muscles" you said with a smirk.
Peter stopped in his tracks in the middle of the hall and stared at you with huge eyes.
 "You had a crush on me?" 
 "Yeah, when I was like 13. You don't think I actually needed so much help on my algebra homework, did you? What's the matter with you?" you said laughing
Peter was staring at you like you had just dropped from another planet.
"I-I just never knew you felt that way about me." he said, eyes still wide.
You rose your eyebrows at him. 
"Yeah, well, I was a kid. I also thought the tooth fairy was real. I grew up. Anyway, let's forget that I was once a pre-teen and move on."
Peter furrowed his eyebrows at you, but let the subject go. He walked quietly beside you and barely even acknowledged you when you turned into your calculus class, telling him you'll see him later. Confused, you shot a text to Ned.
Y/N: Dude Peter's being weird
Ned: He's always weird what's ur point? 
Y/N: true
Y/N: ur right, nvm I'll see u at lunch
Ned: cool
Accepting that Ned was right, you chose to forget about Peter and try to focus on the party that awaited tonight as your teacher started the lecture. 'Derivatives' you thought with a smirk, 'what child’s play”.
~TIME SKIP~
"Alright losers, we'll meet at Peter's place at 7 then, right?" you said as the three you you walked out of the school's parking lot.
"Yeah definitely. I'm thinking about bringing back my hat. Betty says it compliments my face structure, whatever that means." Ned said, earning a laugh form you. 
"Earth to Peter. You are being uncharacteristically quiet" you said to Peter who was staring into space as you walked.
"Sorry, right. My place at 7." he said, jolting from his daze.
You eyed him, but, before you could question his behavior, you heard a familiar honk and turned around to see Happy waiting for you. 
"I'll see you guys tonight." you said with a wave, and walked toward the car. 
Peter watched the car drive away, and as soon as it disappeared down the road, he turned to Ned. 
"Y/N used to have a crush on me!" he blurted out. 
Ned furrowed his eyebrows. "Okay, and?"
"What do you mea- she used to like me! Like, like me like me" Peter said 
Ned smirked 
"And you're so freaked out about this why?" 
Peter stared at him. "I don't know. It's just weird"
"Or is it because you just found out that the girl you are head over heels for used to have a crush on you?" 
Peter rolled his eyes. 
"I do not have a crush on Y/N, how many times to I have to tell you. And, anyway, I'm not freaked out, it's just weird." 
"Sure Peter." 
~TIME SKIP`
You knocked on the door to Peter's apartment and dusted yourself off, waiting for someone to answer. You were excited to get to the party and relax for the first time this week. You looked down at your outfit for about the millionth time and inspected it. You were wearing a black sheer long sleeve with a solid black stripe around your chest and a pair of distressed light wash skinny jeans and black platform doc martin boots.
You were adjusted the hem of your top when May opened the door and immediately enveloped you in a big hug. 
"Y/N how are you? I feel like I haven't seen you in so long." 
You had actually seen her last week, but you smiled at her comment. 
"I'm good May. Are the boys here?" you asked, walking into the apartment.  
"Yeah they are in Peter's room. Maybe you can help Peter find something to wear, he's more indecisive than I am." she chuckled. 
"I'll see what I can do." you said with a chuckle and walked toward his closed door but stopped when you heard them talking.
"It's obvious that you like her Peter, all you have to do is tell her.” you heard Ned say through the door. 
Peter had a crush on a girl? Why hasn't he told you about it? You didn't really know how to feel about this new information. Peter was your best friend and, sure he had every right to like who he pleases, but you couldn't help but feel a little hurt. You were always the only girl in his life, even when you were younger, and you couldn't imagine Peter with anyone else. I mean, you’re not dating or anything. But, it was not your decision to make, and with that final thought, you pushed your feelings aside and opened the door to reveal Peter standing in the middle of the room in just his boxers.
"Y/N!" he shouted, his face turning beet red. 
"Oh relax Peter, it's not like I've never seen you like this" you said with a playful smirk.
It was true, you were always the one to patch him up after a bad patrol. 
"Anyway, May told me that you couldn't figure out what to wear so I've come to the rescue." you said and walked past him to his closet. 
Peter, for the first time, realized what you were wearing and his face flushed even darker. He took in you sheer top that showed your stomach and back and the skinny jeans that accented your...
"Y/N you look really nice" Ned piped up from the bed, wiggling his eyebrows at his visibly flustered friend. 
"Aw thank you Ned" you said, turning from the closet with an armful of clothes which you handed to Peter who refused to meet your eyes.
 "Okay, put this on" you said to Peter, and walked out of the room to chat with May in the meantime. 
"May, has Peter talked to you about any girls recently?" you said as you walked into the kitchen where she was drying dishes. 
She looked up and gave you a faux look of surprise. 
"No, not recently. Why do you ask?" she said, handing you the plate she was holding. 
She, like Ned, also had her suspicions about the relationship between you and Peter. She’d always noticed the way Peter looks at you and the way his face just lights up whenever she mentions you. She, too, thought the pair of you would make a great couple.
You went to put the plate in it's respective cabinet and shrugged. "I don't know, I was just wondering." 
She smiled at you. "I don't know, I always thought he would end up with you." she said slyly, picking up another dish. 
Your eyes widened, and you were about to answer when Peter appeared in the doorway. He was wearing the simple outfit you had picked for him: dark blue jeans and a black tee shirt. You couldn't help but admire how the shirt accented his abs and his toned arms. 
"You look good Pete." you said and chuckled at the light blush that dusted his cheeks. 
"just one more thing" you said as you walked up to him and reached for his head. He leaned back and looked down at you in confusion. 
"Oh c'mon, don't you trust me? I won't bite." you said, smiling. 
He narrowed his eyes at you playfully, but leaned back toward you and you carded you fingers through his hair, mussing it up. 
You fixed you attention on his hair and you missed the way he closed his eyes and leaned into your relaxing touch. He was also acutely aware of how close you were to him and the intoxicating smell of your perfume. 
"You guys ready?" Ned said suddenly from behind, and you pulled away, ending the moment Peter was relishing. 
You stepped back and admired your work. "What do you think May?" you said without taking your eyes off of him. 
"He's never looked better" she replied teasingly and Peter rolled his eyes as you laughed. 
"Yeah, can we just go already?" he said, faking annoyance and smiled at you. 
"Yeah, let's go!" you said and you grabbed his hand and dragged him towards the door, Ned and May trailing behind you, sharing a knowing glance. 
You led him through the hallway, toward the exit and Peter tried his hardest to ignore the tingling in his hand as it held yours. He didn't want to admit it, but, recently, he couldn't remember what is was about you that reminded him of a sister. It was becoming harder to see you as the little 13 year old he used to know, but he couldn't tell Ned that yet. He didn't want to have to deal with any 'I told you so's right now, so he just relished the feeling of your hand in his and, for the first time this week, began to really look forward to the party. 
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perpetuallyfive · 5 years
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some thoughts on Endgame
I always find it a lot easier to write very long rants about things I dislike than praise about things that I like. It just feels like the good things are obvious, you know? So compiling them in lists feels a little pointless.
It’s why I haven’t written anything about Endgame yet. I honestly thought Infinity War was pretty average at best, so the fact that I fucking loved practically every single minute of Endgame kind of caught me by surprise. It checked so many of my boxes that it’s almost hard to even articulate. 
So much of what was good about it honestly felt almost inevitable.
Mark me down as pretty confused then as I read some of the negative responses. Like... obviously, I’m just being dense. Nothing exists, especially on the internet, without some negative response. And I don’t even mean that in a pithy way. People are really different and what works for one person doesn’t work for everyone.
Which brings me back to my earlier point.
Just because I thought some of this stuff was obvious or amazing doesn’t mean everyone did, so here are a few observations, in an unordered list:
The way that time travel works in the movie is deliberately left a little vague, in my opinion, to allow wiggle room for the multiverse moving forward, especially as they expand into streaming services.
They do however clearly say that you cannot change your own past. Bruce says it. This means that Steve absolutely is not in our timeline, whatever the writers might say about it now. He’s not. In our timeline, he knew Peggy married someone else. That’s in his past. He cannot change his past in his own timeline. Therefor he cannot change who Peggy marries in his own timeline.
Seriously, he’s not in our timeline. They’re just wrong.
This means you have a million possibilities in fanfic for all the things Steve did that sent out ripples in his own new timeline or the many multiverses he could have created. It’s a fucking candy shop.
Try not to be too hard on the writers for having no idea what they’re talking about, I guess; it’s hard writing characters that are way smarter than you.
Am I less than charitable toward the writers because of their dumb takes on Natasha in defending why she’s not a part of the funeral at the end? Yes.
Just put a fucking second wreath there, god damn, would it have been so hard.
Framing Nebula’s storyline as a bad thing, which I’ve seen a few times now, is frankly insane to me. She isn’t, as the daily dot put it, killing herself. She missed her chance to save her sister five years ago and has regretted it every since. The second Gamora is at stake this time, she makes it clear that she would sacrifice anything (even someone who looked like her), to prevent losing her sister again. That’s great shit!
I am bummed we don’t get original Gamora back, but I’m also intrigued by the soft reset this does on her relationship with everyone in the Guardians. I wonder what their plans are with that in Vol 3. In many ways, her healing process away from Thanos was sidelined in the first two films and this allows the possibility of reframing that as more central to the focus in the third. Fingers crossed.
More Gamora and Nebula in general but especially in Guardians 3 please; I might threaten to retroactively like this movie less if this is the last we get of this much attention on their relationship, please and thank you.
The problem with the MCU crossover movies is they have to exist as two things at once. They have to be a movie that works as its own thing with good timing, pacing, structure, and an end that feels conclusive. They also have to pay off minor characters that mainstream audiences might not care about, as part of larger world building and the stories shared across an entire universe. Endgame, in my opinion, did a much better job of it than Infinity War or Ultron. (it’s hard to compare it with Avengers, when the scale was much more intimate.) 
No but really, I don’t think a lot of us in fandom have an appreciation for how many people don’t know any of this shit we take for granted. A shocking number of the people I have spoken to IRL who are entirely apart from fandom didn’t even know what “on your left” was a reference to and were actually a little confused by that moment. 
Just think about that and understand the levels this movie has to operate on at all times. It’s almost enough to make me feel bad for the writers, except they still said dumb shit about Nat, so I’m good.
I did actually love all the more subtle callbacks, like Natasha’s necklace and T’Challa knowing Clint’s name, but the direct quotes were pretty great too, especially Steve’s reaction to “I could do this all day.” Super charming.
Another awkward thing about the crossovers is they have to try to level the playing field slightly and there are some Avengers who are just way more powerful than others. Carol was disappointingly absent, but she’s also insanely OP. It’s why Thor got depressed and it’s why the Russos now say that Hulk will have limited use of one arm. They nerfed some of the classic Avengers, but kept Carol full powered just off in space. That’s preferable, so long as she gets more screen time later and jesus please fix the wig. Or just do the actual haircut now that it doesn’t have to be a secret.
Please dear god the hair is great in concept but seriously if there’s anything about the straight agenda ruining Endgame it’s how borderline soccer mom they managed to make that hair look.
Natasha deserved better and I think we can all agree on that, but here’s hoping that her prequel is deliberately designed to echo the destination we know she’s headed toward and to give her a better resolution more in line with what she deserved. I want to believe that they didn’t give her a full ending entirely because they knew she still had a movie coming up and didn’t want to create that sense of finality that might keep audiences from seeing it. Here’s hoping they can make it work. 
Like specifically with very different writers, please. Hopefully a woman. You’ve maybe heard of them before, one of them wrote Guardians, the movie that nobody thought could work and fucking made it work. Yeah.
Tony and Steve were always headed in opposing directions at the end of their arc. This has been covered. Tony went from living selfishly to living selflessly. He went from a playboy bachelor, to a husband, to a father. His one priority when he decided he had to save the world wasn’t even himself, it was specifically keeping his daughter in existence. He went from a selfish dick with daddy issues to someone whose only priority was being a dad.
it was perfect. Like people can say otherwise... but they’re wrong.
 I’m an expert on this, clearly. Tony’s death was perfect. 
THEY FINALLY GAVE ME RESCUE. I loved everything about it, from Tony planning it carefully for a long time -- like obviously I think it’s because he was customizing the design to be more in line with Pepper’s wants and values, like it is in the comics -- to the fact that it actually does look more defensively focused but still super capable in battle. I want to watch this movie a billion times, honestly, but this scene in particular. I need to know everything about what her suit can do.
Steve was always going to end up settling down. We don’t actually know what he did in his own timeline -- again, IT’S NOT OURS -- so there’s a chance he was still a bit of a troublemaker, but honestly the five years seemed to take a lot out of him. He doesn’t always need a war, and that actually is forward momentum and growth. I get that some people are against the idea and think that getting to be with Peggy was somehow a step back, but I’m not sure I buy that.
Tony taking out the arc reaction at the end of IM3 wasn’t actually about him erasing his trauma or leaving it behind, and Steve getting to be with Peggy doesn’t erase his growth. It was part of it.
Theoretically Sharon was always an option, except the audience (and fandom) response to her was pretty terrible, so actually she wasn’t.
And not to just keep harping on points made in an article that I think is frankly pretty terrible, but Steve going back to the past instead of settling in the present wasn’t about compulsory heterosexuality so much as it was about a franchise that is going to keep making movies needing to keep the next decade of films in mind. 
If Steve is still around in the now, that will always linger as a nagging question. The same way that people can’t shut up about where Carol was for the last decade, Steve hanging around in retirement refusing to help would hang over the next phases of movies like a cloud. Putting him in the past lets him live (which he deserves) and clears the slate.
Let Steve rest but, more than that, dear god won’t you please let Chris Evans rest too.
This goes back to how these movies, especially the crossovers, have to work on almost too many levels and it’s frankly shocking that they manage to do it and still have moments of sincere humanity and sweetness. 
Like I’m not going to try to oversell it, but seriously fucking think about the fact that one of the most successful blockbuster movies of all time actually has quiet moments where people talk about trauma, loss, parental abuse or neglect, failure, and depression. 
Hey remember when the movie gave us acknowledgement of Rhodey and Nebula’s disabilities? In the possibly going to be most successful movie of all time, they had characters with disabilities say how they’re different now but it’s okay, they work with what they got, and they bonded over that and it was so fucking shocking for me and BEAUTIFUL. Just a reminder for us all that THAT happened in the movie that may actually pass Avatar to become the MOST SUCCESSFUL FILM OF ALL TIME.
Just allowing another moment to let that sink in while I try to wrap this up (for now).
ps I can’t believe this movie made me have nice thoughts on Ultron, which I fucking despise with most of my being. 
Actually I might have to take back every nice thing I said, just because of the Ultron thing. How dare you, film.
But still lol at the fact that even talking about Ultron for a few seconds was enough to make Tony Stark pass the fuck out. Hard same, Tony. 
LOOK OBVIOUSLY I LOVED MORGAN STARK. I AM EXCITED ABOUT MORGAN STARK. SHE IS A PRECIOUS PERFECT ANGEL AND I LOVE HER.
SHIT.
So this is a totally incomplete list but here you go. Some of my thoughts on Endgame.
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juliabohemian · 5 years
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I am mourning
I’m not going to lie. In light of recent, very explicit spoilers I am rather dismayed. That’s putting it mildly.
A lot of things are going through my mind right now. I think it helps to look at the entire MCU franchise not as a work of art, but merely a campaign for profit. It makes it slightly easier to accept the ridiculousness of its creative choices.
I’m frustrated by actions taken that I feel were deceptive. Why troll their fans with an "Avenge the Fallen" poster with Loki's face on it, when they knew that no one was going to avenge Loki?
Why have Loki use cryptic dialogue in Infinity War when they knew it didn't mean anything? The sun isn't going to shine on Loki and Thor, not together anyway. And the fact that he's a god appears to be irrelevant to his role in the bigger story.
Releasing a news about the Loki show, 2 years in advance, was done specifically to ensure that Loki fans would fill the seats in theaters for Avengers: Endgame.
Confirming that Loki was mind controlled in Avengers, without actually including that among canon content, was fan-service done to soften the blow of Loki’s death in Infinity War.
I am not mourning the end of the story. I am not even mourning the end of Loki’s story. I am mourning the end of any opportunity for Loki to be understood or appreciated by other characters. I am mourning the chance for Loki to be regarded sympathetically by other characters.
During the first Thor film, we see very little content that demonstrates sympathy for or understanding of Loki. Loki’s mother is sympathetic, but clearly does not understand her son. Thor is sympathetic to some extent, when he apologizes to Loki to stop the Destroyer. But he stops short of understanding why Loki is upset in the first place. Most content that was sympathetic of Loki can be found among the deleted scenes.
When Loki shows up in Avengers, Thor shows no sympathy, nor understanding. Thor goes into it assuming that Loki is wrong. No other character in the narrative regards Loki sympathetically. They are all either threatening him or regarding him as evil or dangerous. The closest we come are the exchanges he has with Erik Selvig and Clint Barton while they are under the influence of the scepter, and when Tony offers him a drink.
In Thor: The Dark World Thor and Loki worked together to defeat the Dark Elves. But very little was said during that scene that indicated a level of understanding between the two characters. Thor is only sympathetic of Loki when he believes that Loki is dying.
As flawed a film as Ragnarok was, it at least gave us some measure of Loki being regarded among the good guys. Though it was minimal. Loki shows up to rescue the refugees and they seem happy to see him. Heimdall greets him with “saw you coming” which could be interpreted as acknowledgement of Loki’s capacity for goodness. But we cannot assume that it was intended to be perceived that way. Thor’s greeting is equally ambiguous. When Loki arrives on Asgard he says only “you’re late” to indicate that he knew that Loki would show up. But no previous dialogue in the film suggests that Thor really expected Loki’s help. And since Thor left Loki in a very vulnerable state, he had no way of knowing whether Loki would even survive to make his way to Asgard.
The only other statement I can think of that demonstrates sympathy or understanding is Odin’s declaration that “Frigga would be proud”. But it is so out of character by that point in the narrative that it stands out like a sore thumb in contrast to Loki and Odin’s previous scene together in which he tells his son that his birthright is to die and sentences him to life in solitary confinement.
Why does it matter that someone in the narrative regard Loki sympathetically? Because it shows us, the audience, that the creators of the content appreciate this character as much as we do. Because of the way things have ended, I feel like the only people who really love Loki are Tom, and his fans. I take issue with this because it seems as though the creators of the content are all too happy to profit from the character of Loki, while simultaneously refusing to award him the same level of personhood that they grant to their hero coded characters. It is horribly ironic to me that Loki is forced to struggle to be recognized as a person within his narrative, and within the franchise as well. Is it life imitating art or is it just a reflection of an industry that seeks profit above all else?
At this point I am wishing I could get the Time Stone and use it to go back in time, before I saw Thor or Avengers, and tell myself not to watch them. Ever. Or any other MCU film for that matter.
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horrorgay · 5 years
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Y'all let infinity war and endgame seal themselves as canon in your minds? havent you heard- retconning entire movies is the future. They can't hurt me if I refuse to acknowledge canon unless its sexy
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tocxmply · 4 years
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you should meta to me about !!! bucky + gaining back his sense of agency !!! --- @toscrve​​ ---
AGENCY [sources: click, click, click, click]
         it’s funny you should ask because — in order to address this, first i have to talk about how the lack of agency is the overarching theme when it comes to James Buchanan Barnes, even more so than the brainwashing/ fragmentation of identity per se. because — when was the last time we saw Bucky making an active, informed, conscious, autonomous choice? it was somewhere in 1943, when he chose to follow Captain America (my bad, he chose to follow that little kid from Brooklyn too dumb to run from a fight). i mean, this is fairly obvious when we think about the Winter Soldier, but… thing is, it’s just as prevalent during “Captain America: Civil War”, “Avengers: Infinity War”, and “Avengers: Endgame” — it’s just camouflaged, which actually makes it all the more dangerous. and all the more disrespectful. and please note: what i am about to state is not out of hatred for any of the implied characters — rather, heavy criticism on the writers of the respective movies — because, by doing what they did, they disrespected Bucky as much as they did other characters such as Steve or T’challa.
for example, in CA:CW: we are led to believe, at the end, that Bucky made the choice to go back to cryo. but did he, really? because making a choice implies having at least two different options to pick from — and did he, at that point? did somebody tell him hey, if you want, you can stay at NYC and i’ll check on you and if you ever have a moment again i’ll help you and we’ll figure something out? did somebody tell him hey, if you want, you can stay at Wakanda but out of cryo and i’ll check on you and if you ever have a moment again i’ll help you and we’ll figure something out? did somebody at all offer him the if you want possibility? because we certainly don’t see it on screen, and i’m hard-pressed to believe it happened off-screen. the way i see this, Bucky basically Stockholm’d himself, at a subconscious/ unconscious level, into retreating back to a cryostasis capsule — because at least it’s familiar, because at least it’s comforting in its own perverse and twisted way, because at least it’s easier than to deal with people like Zemo, because at least this way he won’t be a burden to anybody, because it’s all that’s left to him anyway. is this a choice? no. this is learned helplessness, that nobody bothered to acknowledge and let alone challenge or dispute, as far as i can see.
for example, in A:IW: i probably don’t even have to state anything other than the belief that a man who was tortured, imprisoned, used, and dehumanized for 70 years has rested enough. so let us just grab this asset, we just won’t openly call him so, shove his arm back in because we couldn’t possibly have done this unless there was a war to fight, and shove him back into the fight! — a fight that he technically has zero to do with, and that will only anyway offer two fighting scenes and then another at the end where he’s the first one being dusted so that he can serve as pain fodder for the hero.
for example, in A:E: let’s give him even less, and less relevant, screen time!!! first, we’ll make it clear that this is a damaged and dangerous man who obviously isn’t stable enough to inherit Cap’s shield — but, at the same time, we’ll obviously defend that he is stable enough to be left on his own and to be abandoned by his best (and possibly only) friend. also, it’s not even needed that he talks to Cap when he returns as his elderly self. he’s just needed for the feelsy goodbye scene, where Agony 2.0 has the nerve to tell him it’s gonna be okay, and then he can just stay in the background because, again, he’s only relevant when we have a need for him as plot device.
         moral of the story, i am bitter and salty. but also moral of the story: Bucky has no shred of agency in any of the movies, other than “Captain America: The First Avenger” — and the final, final part of “Captain America: The Winter Soldier”, when he CHOOSES to save Steve from the Potomac, even if he isn’t consciously aware of why he wants to do this. so, to finally answer you ask, how do we attempt to set this train wreck back on track?
         first and foremost, this is not something that Bucky can achieve on his own — someone who has been taught he is no more than a weapon, no more than an object, will have to be again taught that he is so much more than this. will have to be taught that he HAS A RIGHT to choose. to accept or not. to decline. to be assertive. to have preferences, even to be picky. to say ‘no’ without owing anybody anything. and this is when it gets laborious (not difficult, but laborious), because this is a process that will require time and patience and a lot of positive reinforcement — and, heck, even a lot of reassurance. for example, it will take another person’s understanding that, if you ask him if he wants vanilla ice cream or chocolate ice cream, he may not know what to say because 1) he doesn’t remember what his favorite is and 2) for 7 decades he wasn’t even aware he had a right to choose. for example, it will take another person to help him understand that, even if he’s asked to go and turn off the lights, it’s okay to refuse to do it simply because he’s feeling lazy and doesn’t wanna get up from the comfy couch. and this is actually a delicate balance for myself, as far as portrayal goes, because it is never my intention to reduce him to a lost puppy who has No Clue — but, at the same time, it is undeniable that the Soldier’s default is to be compliant. that’s what they created him to be, and you don’t get rid of this in a month or two. if ever.
         so, yes — social support will undoubtedly be very, very important, and all the more during the initial times after Bucky breaks free from HYDRA. with time, he will be able to slowly ingrain this sense of agency more autonomously — by reconnecting with himself and with his own identity, by learning/ remembering what he likes and what he doesn’t like, by starting projects and hobbies and tasks on his own rather than to wait for somebody or something, by interacting with people and polishing his social skills again, by internalizing the notion that he has a right to want and to choose. and, at a certain point, i believe he will start getting very invested in it — because he wants to heal. he wants to recover. he’s well aware that time won’t rewind and miracles won’t happen and he won’t ever again be the same person and, even if he makes progress, there will certainly be times of relapsing (and maybe even of self-sabotaging) — but he can get better and he can improve and he will strive for this. on his own, and with the help of his loved ones.
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