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kylesvariouslistsandstuff · 5 months

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Here we are... Best Animated Feature noms...

My predictions were 4-out-of-5...

THE BOY AND THE HERON, NIMONA, ROBOT DREAMS, and SPIDER-MAN: ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE all got in...

The one I got wrong was TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES: MUTANT MAYHEM, which to be fair, I did say in my previous post that that one was the wild card out of my predictions. Despite the high praise and tons of nominations TMNT:MM got elsewhere, in addition to a single win, I guess those who were nominating it for the Oscar just didn't think the oozy gross-out turtle action-superhero movie cut it.

Instead, we have ELEMENTAL, so Disney Pictures gets at least one slot this year. The last time they were shut out entirely was for the features of 2011, the year they released the critical dud CARS 2 and the completely dumped WINNIE THE POOH. I was pretty sure that this year, they also wouldn't make it. ELEMENTAL's critical reception was fine at best, nowhere near the acclaim MUTANT MAYHEM got. WISH was both a critical and commercial dud, so that had no chance, only ELEMENTAL did... Maybe the Academy just didn't feel like pulling a 2018 and nominating two superhero action animated movies. Maybe they decided to have just one IP-based movie in the race, and opted for an original story. (As NIMONA and ROBOT DREAMS are based on pre-existing source material, BOY AND THE HERON references a novel that plays a part in its story.) Maybe something else about it wasn't all to their liking. Maybe Disney is just that powerful that they got themselves a slot.

I still think this is a strong line-up, and again, it speaks to how robust this year was for features both mainstream and independent.

And I will admit, even though I wasn't in love with the movie, ELEMENTAL getting into the race is very nice, I feel. Director Peter Sohn's first Pixar feature, THE GOOD DINOSAUR, was both a box office flop and didn't get a nominated for the Oscar (it shared the year with sister Pixar movie INSIDE OUT). It was also a film that he inherited after its original director got removed from it. ELEMENTAL was his personal project from the ground-up, and after a rough opening and all the press jeering that it was going to be this big flopperooni, it had excellent legs at the box office... and now... It has a Best Animated Feature nom. Talk about staying power! Maybe Pete Docter should think twice about that statement he made back in the summer, about trying to go back to Pixar's "roots" in trying to figure out what audiences supposedly want from this studio.

Anyways, Pixar usually gets a nom every year. For 2022's animated features, TURNING RED was in the running. 2021, LUCA. 2020, SOUL, which won for that year. Last time Pixar didn't get a nom at all was for 2016, their sole feature that year was FINDING DORY. Got good reviews and made beaucoup bucks, but it shared a year with Disney Animation's ZOOTOPIA and MOANA, two heavy hitters which ended up getting the noms. So, outside of FINDING DORY, MONSTERS UNIVERSITY, and CARS 2, Pixar usually never misses a nom whenever they release a single movie in a calendar year.

Most of Paramount's Oscar noms in animation were for DreamWorks movies they released circa 2006-2012, which are all now Universal movies since Comcast owns all of DreamWorks Animation outright. Funnily enough, the inaugural Best Animated Feature nominations included Paramount's JIMMY NEUTRON: BOY GENIUS, which was up against eventual winner SHREK, and MONSTERS, INC. Paramount then began distributing DreamWorks movies in 2006, and scored nominations with KUNG FU PANDA, HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON, KUNG FU PANDA 2, and PUSS IN BOOTS. For a non-DreamWorks nom, there was RANGO, which won for Best Animated Feature of 2011... Ever since then? Only one movie, ANOMALISA. The films they released from 2015 to now just never made it: SHERLOCK GNOMES, WONDER PARK, SPONGEBOB 3, RUMBLE, etc. MUTANT MAYHEM really had a good shot at getting in... Maybe TRANSFORMERS: ONE surprises later this year, I don't know. Paramount's animation history post-80s is so weird...

Anyways, congrats to everyone. I'm personally rooting for either BOY AND THE HERON, or NIMONA.

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thevindicativevordan · 3 years

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Why isn't Nightwing a bigger deal? He has all of Batman's skills and Superman's faith in humanity and is arguably the most beloved hero in the DCU, but most people seem to know him either as the leader of the N̶o̶t̶ ̶J̶L̶ Teen Ttians or just Robin.

Thank you for asking me about Nightwing, I've been wanting to write a piece about him for a while now. The short version is that everyone who claims Dick becoming Nightwing was him "moving out of Batman's shadow and becoming his own man" is completely wrong.

Dick Grayson is a fantastic character, someone who saved Bruce Wayne in-universe both by forcing Batman to grow up a bit, and the countless times he saved Batman's life as his partner whether as Robin or Nightwing. Dick saved Batman in the real world as well, hard to believe but Batman was actually in danger of being cancelled due to poor sales early on. Enter Robin, a young daredevil audience stand in the creators hoped would get kids interested in reading Batman. And it worked! Sales on Batman doubled once Robin showed up which is crazy to think about, but Dick Grayson has always been a popular character. Cartoons like Teen Titans, Batman: The Animated Series, and The Batman only helped grow his audience.

Character-wise, Dick Grayson really does fill a number of crucial roles in the DCU. For Batman, Dick is proof that Batman is a positive force. Meeting Batman helped change Dick for the better, helped him heal after his parents died. With Dick, Batman can take comfort in knowing that yes, he has made a difference in the world for at least one orphan boy, which is all he wanted when he lost his parents himself. To the wider DCU, Dick is a friendly face who convinces others that Batman is competent and not a complete asshole. He took this kid in, trained him to be one of the best heroes the DCU has seen, and did it all out of the kindness of his heart. That someone like Dick can confront the evils of Gotham and not break means there's still hope for that city. As Robin, Dick has led the Titans and is an icon in his own right as The Sidekick, the original, the one every other Robin is built around copying or contrasting. The one all other superhero sidekicks are drawing on as a basis. As Robin Dick Grayson is very much on Batman's level.

Just not as Nightwing. As Nightwing, Dick has been a second rate Daredevil which means he's a third rate Batman (fully prepared to get hate for this but I've read and enjoyed the Miller and Bendis DD runs so I feel entitled to my opinion). A typical Nightwing run tends to go like this: Moving to Bludhaven (which is Gotham... but WORSE!), Dick Grayson usually enrolls in a pointless job we don't care about in order to provide some meaningless soap opera drama that doesn't go anywhere. Patrolling the city as Nightwing, he fights a variety of bad guys who are usually rather lame and unthreatening, with his big bad being a Kingpin knockoff called Blockbuster. Villains are fought, long running plotlines are set up, then everything is abandoned because it's Batfamily event time, and Dick has to run back to Gotham in order to play sidekick again. Usually his involvement is completely superfluous and it would've been better if the writer had gotten to opt out. By the time we finally get back to Nightwing's solo plotlines, the audience has usually ceased to care and the run gets cut short.

That's how Nightwing has been since the New 52 at least. Anyone who thinks that's "becoming their own man" is out of their mind. Dick is so thoroughly in Batman's shadow that he got shot in the head and spent a longer time as "Ric" which everyone fucking hated and sold like shit, than he did as Agent Grayson which was extremely well-received. Reiterating: Ric went on longer than Grayson because of a fucking Batman plotpoint Tom King wanted where Bruce was sad and cut off from the Batfamily because of Dick getting shot. Not just calling out King either, how many times was Kyle Higgins Nightwing run derailed because of Scott Snyder's crossovers? Or how about that entire run getting dumped to the side because Johns wanted to out Dick during Forever Evil, a Justice League/Lex Luthor story? DC has repeatedly made their contempt for Nightwing clear, he's Batman's sidekick still in their eyes, and he serves whatever story role the Batman writer wants.

Hell his best stories tend to have been the ones where he's not Nightwing. He was Robin in a good chunk of the Wolfman/Perez New Teen Titans run. Morrison really showcased his depth as a character when they wrote him as Batman, their time with Dick under the cowl was actually one of the first Batman runs I ever read, and no Nightwing run has ever matched it in terms of quality in my humble opinion. Scott Snyder's work with DickBats also was a high point for the character, showing Dick as competent and examining his relationship with Gotham and the Gordons. King and Seeley gave him one of the best comic runs with Grayson, a series where he wasn't even a "superhero" technically! When it comes to actual pre-New 52 Nightwing runs that are highly recommended where he *is* Nightwing, there's Chuck Dixon and uhhhhhhh... Tomasi's brief run before Dick became Batman? It's not exactly an overwhelming list.

Look there has been good work done with Nightwing, I'm not claiming there hasn't been. Tim Seeley wrote a great run with Nightwing Rebirth. Seeley fleshed out Dick's Rogues Gallery with cool new ones like Raptor, he brought back old foes like Dr. Hurt (why oh why couldn't you have brought back Flamingo too?), he gave Dick's world some character it solely needed. Bludhaven under Seeley is pretty much the only time I've really felt like it lived up to being Dick's city.

The problem with fictional cities is you have to put in the work to give them the character of real cities. You have to make the cities feel like characters in their own right. Gotham is the best example of this, it's a character all it's own, one that tells you a lot about Batman and his cast. In contrast Bludhaven is usually one of the worst. Any place that wants to claim to be worse than the city that is built over the gate to hell and gets wrecked every other month by the Arkham freaks has to really put in the work to compete. Simply put, Bludhaven typically fails utterly. There's nothing about it that makes you really buy it's worse than Gotham, I mean does anyone really think Nightwing's Rogues wouldn't get their lunches eaten by Batman's? No, no one genuinely buys that. When Bludhaven claims to be worse, it just comes across as tryhard, an attribute that does end up telling you about Nightwing in unintentional ways.

So Seeley didn't do that. Instead he created a city built for a hero like Dick Grayson. Someone who is bright and flashy, but does have an element of darkness to him. Someone who loves the spotlight, but often uses it to obscure. Seeley turned Bludhaven into Las Vegas, and that was the fucking best concept for Bludhaven I have ever seen, it makes so much sense. Las Vegas is the "Entertainment Capital of the World" and isn't that the perfect city for a hero who got their start working in the circus? Isn't the aesthetics of the gleaming casinos, the glamorous sex appeal of the performers, and the spectacle of the shows, all being used to cover up the seediness of mob bosses meeting backstage perfect for Nightwing? It's so utterly unlike New York City, yet Las Vegas is still dangerous, it's got a crime culture all it's own. Seeley used it to great effect, as did Humphries during his brief run, and I will always be pissed that DC didn't continue to use it. That should have stuck around and been the definitive look for Bludhaven.

How Seeley's take on Bludhaven was treated feels like a small scale version of how Nightwing in general gets treated. Whenever creators pitched ideas for him, if editorial thought there was potential to break big, they asked for those ideas to be repurposed for Batman instead. Anything big or good gets repurposed for Batman or tossed to the side so Nightwing can go back to his default: having irrelevant adventures in a city that is supposedly worse than Gotham but can't live up to it. Just like how Nightwing is supposedly better than Batman but never gets to show it. Goddamn it's so frustrating seeing his potential get wasted like that.

The Nightwing book should be one of DC's most ambitious books in terms of storytelling. You can go from traditional superhero stories, to romantic soap opera, to spy stories, to crime noir, to horror, to cosmic adventures, and ALL of them would fit because Nightwing is someone who has a foot in both Gotham and Metropolis. He's got friends everywhere on every team, and has been a hero longer than most Leaguers have at this point. No reason DC should still be afraid to let him loose and insisting on hewing close to what Dixon established almost over 30 years ago is only holding him back. At the very least get him some better Rogues, why the hell didn't he get to keep Professor Pyg? That's Dick's villain not Bruce's! Bullshit that they didn't let Dick keep him. Hopefully Flamingo comes back, with a slight revamp I think he'd make a great reoccurring Nightwing Rogue.

Luckily it does look somewhat like Nightwing fans have reason to be optimistic. While Taylor isn't to my taste, DC clearly views him as a "big" writer, and that they put him on Nightwing says a lot. Taylor has been selling well so far, so hopefully he gets to tell his story, hilarious that even he lampshaded having to write Dick running over to Gotham for another tie-in after Taylor's big opening arc was all about Dick committing himself and his money to Bludhaven. Scott Snyder is apparently working on a Black Label Nightwing book which will explore how he's a different detective than Bruce. The Gotham Knights video game has him as one of the main stars, and while Titans is... controversial, it's one of the most popular streaming shows and Dick is the main character. There's a lot of content coming that features him in the starring role, and that will only help his star rise further.

For the first time in, well, ever it feels like DC may be serious about elevating him. Time will tell if it pays off, but I for one choose to be optimistic that the 2020s will be a turning point for Dick Grayson where Nightwing becomes hugely popular in his own right. Not just as Batman's sidekick.

#nightwing #dick grayson #batman #gotham knights #titans #dc comics

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katierosefun · 3 years

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convoluted superheroes but make it disaster lineage au, some thoughts on their origin stories and how they would become a team:

��caroline shouldn’t you be writing or reading for your irish lit class”

“yes but i had a thought”

no, this isn’t necessarily a marvel au because i feel like crossing.......the mcu and star wars, which are already big franchises, just messes with my head? plus,,,,the mcu just has such distinct character archetypes that i can’t really fit neatly with the clone wars, so here’s just a super convoluted au that could honestly just work as an entirely different story on its own and probably only has enough in common with tcw by like,,,,a thread, but ANYWAYS I AM HERE WITH MORE THOUGHTS OF AN AU AND YOU JUST HAVE TO SUFFER WITH ME!

okay, so anakin’s story is kinda bizarre:

i mean, he’s the chosen one in star wars and all that with all these freaky far-reaching abilities with the force so i’m not gonna take that away from him--so idk in this universe i’m just gonna say that he’s gonna be like....a mimic. i feel like he would be the kind of person who just steps into a room and absorbs / can mimic the abilities of any other powered human in the room, only like,,,amplify it. he’s tricky to catch because of that, because no one knows what power he might absorb next.

but i feel like while anakin can certainly show off with this, i think he’ll also at least attempt to be a little private about this? (lmao we know he’s gonna fail though, because ily anakin but you’re the worst at keeping secrets). i feel like he would compensate for all the fancy gadgets + stuff, or sometimes just swing into rooms and be like “anyways guys i came up with a new thing” and everyone always stares at him because for some reason, everyone forgets that anakin skywalker is, in fact, a genius who doesn’t necessarily need his powers to be extraordinarily powerful. there’s more to him than just his weird powers, you guys.

right, so obi-wan:

every superhero team needs the wise intellectual, and i feel like obi-wan will always be that one person. i feel like his powers would have to complement anakin’s rather well though, since they’re,,,y’know. the team. oh wait shit--

okay okay okay (sorry, this is me really just kinda liveblogging my stream of consciousness), but like?? if anakin can amplify powers, i think of obi-wan being the one to muffle them. like, i feel like just touching someone and suddenly boom, no more powers. you’re now forced to fight obi-wan on even ground (lmao). obi-wan doesn’t necessarily absorb the powers like himself, he just...knows how to quiet them enough so that for the next little while, the opponent is absolutely useless.

i feel like a lot of people wind up underestimating obi-wan that way,,,at first. everyone makes that mistake, but then everyone realizes that oh yeah, anakin skywalker? dangerous dude. but obi-wan kenobi? if you don’t catch where you’re looking, you could very well end up dead if he wanted.

our feral gremlin ahsoka:

well, every team needs the youngster who everyone on the team loves, right? idk maybe it’s because of the togruta biology and something about togruta being more balanced than like,,,humans that makes me want ahsoka to be the ultimate stealth person. when i say this, i mean like duh she’s got incredible balance, but i think it would be super cool if she was able to just like.........move through walls. no one ever sees her coming because first of all, she’s kinda small, but second of all,,,,again: you could just be chilling at your computer and suddenly there’s a short girl standing behind you because she just phased through the wall what the--

like most teenage superheroes, ahsoka def. seems kinda excited about being the superhero? also mildly exhausted. idk dude, you try doing calc homework and writing a history paper when you’re also trying to keep the world from being taken over by....robots or zombies or whatever.

some other thoughts that i have but have yet to flesh out because i should probably actually get back to work now:

rex also absolutely has superpowers, but don’t you dare call him a sidekick. idk why, but i kinda want rex to be one of those people who creates literal earthquakes, kind of like quake from agents of shield.

cody’s sole superpower is putting up with all the bullshit the rest of the team has. he doesn’t really care he doesn’t have powers, and tbh, everyone’s mildly terrified of the day cody ever gets hit with a freak accident that might make him have powers.

well, every superhero story needs some reporter of some kind, right? ceo of some big news company padme amidala, who occasionally talks to anakin skywalker and absolutely knows his secret identity within like 2 minutes.

actually, i totally forgot about whether the superheroes in this world would have secret identities.

i’ve decided. they all have secret identities.

anakin’s the disaster engineer research person. no one really takes him seriously at work because he’s so freakishly young, but joke’s on them, because he’s saved everyone from evil robots at least ten times now.

obi-wan by default is always going to be the tired english professor. he knows anakin because anakin’s research facility is literally within the same radius of the university campus.

ahsoka goes to the high school nearby the school. she absolutely did not mean to meet anakin and obi-wan and rex, but okay, she just saw the fire in the school library and someone had to pull the students out, so it had to be her, and she might have tried to pull obi-wan and anakin out before obi-wan accidentally muffled her powers and then anakin got her powers, and then they were all SCREECHING AT EACH OTHER BECAUSE

“WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO”

“I DIDN’T DO ANYTHING”

“WAIT YOU HAVE POWERS?”

“WAIT DO YOU?”

“CAN WE DO THIS LATER???”

#caroline talks #oh god #plot bunny? plot bunny

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davidmann95 · 3 years

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So RWBY/Justice League is apparently a crossover that's actually going to happen. Of the little we know right now, how do you think that's going to pan out?

Anonymous said: Those questions about Superman and Batman in RWBY seem prescient, because I'm hearing that an official crossover is in the works

Anonymous said: Um, so there's a legit Justice League/RWBY crossover coming

Anonymous said: So, that official DC/RWBY crossover, huh?

Anonymous said: So, how about that DC/RWBY cross, eh?

Anonymous said: No more speculating how Superman would fit into RWBY when DC themselves are providing their own answer XD

The immediate thing that leaps out beyond the Kingdom Hearts* level of utterly out of nowhere berserk this premise is: while the RWBY comic had a couple minor sequel hooks, and I don’t know how it did in its original digital chapters or in trade, as a monthly periodical it was selling poorly enough that DC didn’t bother to print its last physical issue after the return from the Coronavirus shutdown, and while I thought it was great a lot of fans complained about its art and characterization throughout. I hoped for that sequel, sure, but I wasn’t expecting the book to be regarded internally as anything but a sales failure, nevermind not only continuing it but tripling down in the most extreme and bizarrely specific way possible that’s neither intuitive (unless you have special interests like me) nor surface-level ridiculous enough like Batman/Elmer Fudd that people will buy it just to see how it works. I don’t understand why this comic is happening when no one but me wanted this.

(* The Kingdom Hearts comparison is apt because they were similarly close to the top of things I’d love to see cross over with the DCU that would obviously never, ever happen because that’s too precise and random a combination of my interests. Even if this is legally possible where that isn’t, that would still be conceptually simpler.)

I was asked a couple times in the past about how Superman or Batman could make sense in RWBY’s setting, and it turns out I was closer with the latter than the former - that rather than a dimension-hopping traditional crossover, this is reverse-engineering what the assorted members of the League would look like if they had always been part of Remnant ala JLA/Planetary, some of the old DC/Marvel crossovers, or the more recent Batman/The Shadow. Which actually fits really well with the series regularly evoking assorted fairy tales and mythologies with their characters; this bunch is just one more set to be added. Though that raises several more thoughts and questions:

* The solicit refers to them as Clark Kent, Bruce Wayne, and Diana Prince, but will they actually be referred to as such in the story, and will people comment on them not fitting with the color-based naming conventions of that world? Or will they be renamed and evoke their sources purely through iconography, ala Ruby not literally being Little Red Riding Hood?

* How much will the origins of the assorted characters be changed? Batman, Cyborg, and Aquaman would all make perfect sense within the ‘rules’ of the setting with few major alterations, but will Superman still be from Krypton and Green Lantern a space ranger, or will they simply be ordinary humans with thematically reminiscent backstories and Semblances/weapons that evoke the classic powers? I think the latter could work, but I imagine the former is more likely (even if Bennett might keep it vague on some of the details to preserve the aura of mystique and avoid changing the shape of the world too radically) simply because everyone’s surely aware that fans would complain about being ‘ripped off’ for getting the characters ‘in name only’ otherwise.

* Speaking of changes to fit the setting, between being a Faunus and the apparent low-tech traditional armor look of his suit, is Bruce Wayne in here not operating from a position of wealth? You’d just think as a given the Wayne family would be easily plopped in as business rivals to the Schnees and Alfred would be on a first name basis with Klein, but it seems Bennett might have something very different in mind. Also, little disappointing he simply has a katana rather than those collapsible batarangs that turn into swords that Ellis always gave him which would fit perfectly here. And, as so many have already asked: how miserable is he every second of every day in a world where everything is also a gun. At least this isn’t a universe where anyone’s gonna think he’s irresponsible for training teenage sidekicks.

* And if we’re going into individual characters: RWBY Barry Allen is adorable, what the hell. He just looks so dopey and hapless, I sure hope he doesn’t ever have to die to stop the Anti-Monitor. We’re definitely getting a meeting with Harriet that retcons in that he’s the other person with a speed Semblance she mentioned running into, and if he’s tapping into the Speed Force then the jokes that that’s what Harriet does are probably gonna become at least a little bit canon.

* Are the Themyscirans magic, given all magic has a very important common root in this world?

* I don’t think there’s a dud redesign in the bunch? These are all really inspired in their own ways, which is good because unlikely as it seems this is I believe the first time we’ve really gotten any sort of official interpretation of “here’s what the DCU would look like as a Shonen”. Go ahead and say the hell with it and make it Earth 28, I’ve thought before making that an anime Earth would fit with the map.

(By Ag_Nonsuch)

* Bunch of obvious ways these characters can play off of each other: Ruby is paralleled with Wonder Woman on the cover, and I’m curious how Bennett will play that, but she makes most sense next to Flash, a super-fast fan made good, or Superman, a character she so deeply if unintentionally evokes on so many levels I felt I had to make clear when describing her that I didn’t solely appreciate her as a psuedo-Superman analogue. Weiss makes sense up against Batman either as a wealthy heir or a Faunus who’s likely faced his share of pain from the Schees who either way are cold perfectionists defined by inner pain stemming from their families, or Wonder Woman/Aquaman as fellow ‘royalty’. Yang is paralleled with Superman on the cover and that makes sense with the two country bruisers with issues regarding their lost parents, though she’d also make sense with Aquaman as the ‘temperamental’ members a lot of the time of their respective teams, or Cyborg as they both deal with their relationships with their bodies after requiring prosthesis. And Blake pretty much has her pick: like Superman she uses an article of clothing to ‘pass’ and shares the commitment to justice, she and Batman are dark children of privilege (or not in this case, though in this world they’re both Faunus), she and Wonder Woman both left the island homes where their people were safe to try and make the rest of the world better, she and Aquaman are both Faunus royalty, and Green Lantern is about overcoming great fear and in Jessica Cruz’s case specifically about the guilt of running away.

* Will this be entirely flashbacks to the pre-series/Beacon years, or will those be flashbacks set from a ‘present’, and if so when? What happened between the siege of Haven and the train setting off for Argus is the most loosely-defined period in the story and is right on the heels of the end of the original RWBY mini, so I’d imagine it fitting here. And given they apparently join together “to take on a force unlike anything they've seen before” rather than purely the character work of that previous book, what might that be?

* Hey, superhero comics/superpowers as an idea already exist in this universe, will that come up?

* If we can get one single scene in this and it’s going with a “yes they’re still aliens and magic and whatnot” premise I want Clark, who hasn’t thought of being Superman yet and therefore is still at least somewhat hiding his powers, being wracked with guilt over not pursuing becoming a Huntsman and therefore not being there at the Fall of Beacon. Which is a ridiculous thing to take the blame for, but of course he would, he’s Clark, culminating in trying to apologize to JNR for Pyrrha dying he feels in part because he was a coward (when they don’t even have the faintest concept for why he would think he should have been there or could have done anything).

* Once all’s said and done, how is their presence in the world justified as not being a factor in the series proper? It’s simple if they’re ‘ordinary’ analogues who can go off to quietly have adventures elsewhere, but if not then some of them either have to be shuffled off stage or presumably left with their stories incomplete, with a little afterward of “and they went on to be the greatest heroes of all...later, after the scope of team RWBY’s main adventures so that we never have to directly address them again” to avoid them becoming unavoidable major factors in the war against Salem.

In the end, will it be DC’s best comic? No, though I imagine one of their better ones this year. Will it be among the ones I look forward to most each month? Right up there with Yang and Reis’s Batman/Superman baby, this is a miracle freak of fate and I’m gonna appreciate the universe bending over backwards to make entertainment for me and me alone while it lasts. Given I finally checked out RWBY in the first place because I was curious about Bennett’s original comic, this is a heck of a full-circle moment.

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nightwingmyboi · 4 years

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Dick Grayson Comic Recs

I’ve been getting an increase in requests for comic recs, so I finally caved and decided to list a bunch of comics and series I recommend about Dick Grayson and put it all in one convenient place. I also wrote out a little description/review, to try to give people an idea if the comic sounded appealing and they wanted to check it out. Some of these are just single comics, others are some series to check out, pretty much in chronological order.

Robin:

Robin (1993) Annual #4: One of my preferred Robin origin stories. Fairly solid characterization, and a more reasonable timeline for events than other tellings. Provides an inside look at Dick’s thoughts during this time.

Batman: Dark Victory #9-13: All of Dark Victory is excellent, these are the issues that Dick appears in. It could be considered another Robin origin story, though it is not solely focused on Dick. Everyone is characterized very well, especially Dick. The plot is very engaging, involving Two Face and a crime family, along with tracking down Zucco. As the name implies, it is a bit grimmer than your usual retelling.

Batman Chronicles: The Gauntlet: Dick has been training to be Robin, and he thinks he’s finally ready, but he has to pass Batman’s final test--to keep away from him for a whole night. Of course, the test goes off track, and Dick soon finds himself the target of a ruthless mob boss, his deadly gang of thugs, and the GCPD. Batman chases after Robin, trying to save him before it is too late.

Robin: Year One: This is a four issue run that gives you a snapshot of the time where Robin is just introduced in the crime fighting scene. It features villains like the Mad Hatter and Two Face. The art style is really fun and dynamic, and we get to see Bruce and Dick start to figure each other out. Lots of Alfred as well!

Scarecrow: Year One: Another fun look at Dick and Bruce’s relationship, a little further along the road. Dick is very small and cute, and has also basically become Bruce’s therapist lmao! Not a great Scarecrow origin story though.

Legends of the DC Universe #6: The first time Superman and Robin meet. An absolutely delightful team up, I still have cavities from reading it because it is just so sweet. This one is so good, read it.

Teen Titans: Year One: A short little origin story for the fab five (ie Wonder Girl, Speedy, Kid Flash, Aqualad, and Robin). A cute introduction to the original titans.

The New Teen Titans (1980) and (1984): Forming the Teen Titans was a really important part of Dick’s development as a superhero, and some of his best stuff is when he is in a team setting. This run has the team you’d be more familiar with if you watched the animated Teen Titans show: it has Raven, Starfire, etc. Dick decides that he is going to leave Robin behind in issue #39.

Nightwing:

The New Teen Titans: The Judas Contract: This is the infamous run where Terra betrays the Titans. Dick dons the name Nightwing for the first time in this run (discowing style), and goes off with Joey Wilson to save the rest of the Titans from Slade and Brother Blood.

Batman #416: Dick meets Jason for the first time, and eventually the two bond over beating up some baddies.

The New Titans (1988) #55: You can read this series too for some Titans action, but even if you don’t you should skip over and read issue #55. It shows how Dick reacted to Jason’s death, and how Bruce and Dick had a huge falling out. It’s heartbreaking to read honestly.

Nightwing (1996): If you want to read Nightwing, it’d be best to look at his solo run also. It starts with him moving to Bludhaven, and continues from there. If you’re looking for Batfam cameos, I specifically remember issues #6 and #25 for its really cute brotherly Tim and Dick moments. Issues #13 - #15 have Dick and Batman working together. #105 and #106 have Jason (as Robin) working with Dick. There are a lot of solid Barbara moments throughout with her as Oracle. #138 is when he meets Damian for the first time. There’s a lot here, so I would just pick and choose the arcs that interest you, and go from there.

Action Comics #771: Another comic where Nightwing and Superman team up. Sue me, I love their dynamic!

Gotham Knights #17: Dick finally gets adopted in this one.

Batman (1940) #615: This one is smack dab in the middle of the Hush arc, an arc that focuses on Batman’s relationship with Catwoman and a mysterious new villain named Hush. I like this arc of comics (they recently made it into a movie!) so if you want to read the whole thing it starts at #608. This is just one that features Nightwing a lot. I include it because I really enjoy the dynamic Dick and Bruce have. It’s good stuff.

Titans/Young Justice Graduation Day #1-3: It’s fun to see Tim and Dick’s generations interact and deal with growing up as superheroes, and there is a lot of drama. Pretty important crap goes down in these comics: several people die, including Donna, and as a result Dick disbands the Titans. If you want to read Outsiders, you should really read this one first.

Outsiders Vol 3 (2003): Dick is mourning Donna’s death and self-destructing, so Roy forms a team called the Outsiders--a team that is meant to be just business rather than a family. Dick is more stern and his temper is shorter than usual, but I think it is all pretty in character for him, especially since he is grieving. Highlights include Roy and Dick’s lovely relationship.

Teen Titans (2003) #6: Ok, I almost didn’t put this one on here because it is very self-indulgent, but I couldn’t resist. This series has the Teen Titans starting back up again without Nightwing, but in this issue he makes a little cameo. If you’ve seen those panels around where Nightwing lectures the Justice League? This is where it happens. He’s just really cool here.

Batman:

Batman #687-688: This follows the Batfam’s initial reaction to Bruce’s death, and how Dick begins to approach being Batman himself. It is technically an epilogue to Battle for the Cowl, but that doesn’t have to be read for these comics to be understood.

Batman and Robin (2009): This is the series where we see Dick and Damian transform into people forced together who can barely tolerate one another, to some of the closest partners in the Batfam. They develop their relationship very nicely, and we get to see how Dick approaches a lot of the emotional and physical challenges that come with being Batman. Some of the arcs are good, some of them very much miss for me.

Batman: Black Mirror: This is a collection of Detective Comics #871-881. I’d say these are my favorite Dick!Batman stories ever. All the cases are very good (really chilling), and the characterizations are top notch stuff. Lots of Gordon, Barbara, and some Tim also. I won’t spoil who it is, but the big villain they have for this book is one of the best I’ve seen for Dick, an almost perfect foil in my opinion.

Batman: Gates of Gotham: A good story, it’s interesting to see how Dick interacts with his siblings as Batman. I think this may be one of the first times Cass and Damian meet, though I’m not positive about that.

Just as a heads up, I’ve left out some significant events and this isn’t an exhaustive list on everything there is to know about the character. These are just some comics I enjoy. I hope they help you get a start on who Dick Grayson is, and how he figures into the Batfam and the larger superhero community.

#dick grayson #dick!robin #Dick!Batman #nightwing #DC comics #comics #comic recs #my comic recs #batman #long post

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wehavethoughts · 3 years

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Zack Snyder's Justice League Review!

Zack Snyder's Justice League dir. Zack Snyder (2021) Warner Bros. Pictures, DC Films, Atlas Entertainment and The Stone Quarry Science Fiction, Action, Superhero Movie

Rating: 3.5 Waves

Summary: Tormented by visions of a dark future, Bruce Wayne aka The Batman attempts to gather a team of superheroes to defend the planet. When alien tyrant Steppenwolf arrives on Earth seeking a long forgotten technology, this group of heroes must do everything in their power to keep him from locating all three Mother Boxes and destroying the world.

Content warnings: Violence, Death, Body Horror, Gore

This review DOES NOT contain spoilers for Zack Snyder's Justice League

A bit of background for those of you thinking “Didn’t Justice League come out years ago?” You are exactly right! Justice League was released in theaters in 2017 and is the fifth movie in the DCEU (DC Extended Universe). The same company that produced Justice League then funded Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021) which is a different version of the story that was released in 2017. Zack Snyder was actually the original director of Justice League (2017), but he stepped away from the project during post production and the film was handed over to director Joss Whedon. Whedon’s creative decisions led to rewrites, heavy editing and a notorious reshoot that required removal of Henry Cavill’s mustache via CGI. Therefore, Justice League as it premiered in theaters in 2017 was Joss Whedon’s vision of the story. As some of you might remember, Justice League (2017) was considered a “flop” as it lost the studio ~$60 million overall and was received by fans with mixed to negative reviews (6.2/10 IMDB, 40% Rotten Tomatoes). But since Zack Snyder had left so late in the project, there were rumors that his version of the film had been nearly finished and there was hope that the movie Snyder filmed was actually better than what Whedon had created. Fans took to social media to demand that Warner Bros release the “Snyder Cut'' of Justice League and in a move I personally find baffling, Warner Bros actually gave Zack Snyder another $70 million to finish his version. Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021) which was released on HBO Max is the final product.

While understanding the context of how this movie came about is neat and honestly pretty hilarious, I never got around to see Justice League (2017) so I cannot give any commentary on whether this new film is any better. For those who are curious, my fiancée who has seen both says that the movies are extremely similar in plot, but there are significant changes to characterization and pacing. This review will solely be on the merits and shortfalls of Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021) in a spoiler free context since the movie was released just over a week ago (if you want to talk spoilers DM me I have So Many Thoughts).

Honestly, I was surprised how much I enjoyed this movie. My expectations were quite low considering what I heard about the original 2017 version and the fact that I’m more of a Marvel fan. The most surprising thing for me was that I sat through the entire 4 hr and 2 min runtime (for reference the runtime for Justice League (2017) is 2 hrs). Aside from Lord of the Rings (Return of the King runtime 4 hr 11min), I usually don’t indulge in movies that require me to block off an entire day, but I was curious and I love bandwagons.

The highlight of this movie are the characters. Each of our main characters had a deep, solid backstory that drew me in and made me invested in what was happening in this world. One thing lacking in a lot of ensemble superhero movies is balanced screen time between the main cast, but Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021) uses its time wisely to give each character depth and critical purpose in the narrative. Even the villain had compelling motivation as to why he is on earth doing dastardly deeds, and while I wasn’t rooting for him, I respected his motivations. I also appreciated that the writers of this movie made the characters intelligent. Sure, some decisions were driven more by emotion than logic, but the way defenses are set up and how our heroes use their unique powers left me incredibly impressed.

The characters’ interactions with each other was also very enjoyable. Snyder took the time to include scenes centered around the team chilling with each other in ways that were refreshingly low stakes and mundane. The story was interspersed with scenes like Wonder Woman and Alfred making tea, Aquaman and Wonder Woman musing over cultural differences, and Cyborg and Flash digging up a body where you could really see the characters grow from strangers to teammates to friends. These scenes also peppered in some light humor that kept the movie from becoming too dark without distracting from the tone.

Since Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021) is technically an action movie and it is rated R, I feel like I should touch on the action sequences. Overall, the action was incredibly fun to watch! It was made for the big screen so watching the epic battles for the first time on my TV at home was a bit underwhelming, but the well choreographed, high stakes fights were still visually pleasing. For a rated R movie there was not as much gore as there could have been, which I appreciated and the level of violence was pretty much what I expected from a comic book movie.

The action scenes also do a fantastic job with power escalation. By that I mean the action illustrates the limits of one character’s power clearly in relation to other characters’ powers. This way you are aware of exactly how impressive the characters and their powers are on their own and so when someone or something stronger shows up we have context for how big of a threat we are dealing with. The clean way the story shows us everyone’s respective powers and their limits makes it so the stakes feel more tangible and it's not just unfathomably strong characters beating the shit out of each other with the winner decided by chance.

There are a few reasons the movie didn’t get a full five waves from me. First was that the Amazon’s outfits were very clearly made by horny men based on how much skin they were showing. I, a bisexual, personally love to see superheroes in less then full coverage, but when the Amazon warriors have their entire stomachs and cleavage out of their armor for no reason it exhausts me. What happened to the tasteful and stylish armor from Wonder Woman (2017)? This feels like a step in the wrong direction.

The next concern I have that has kept me from recommending this movie to people is the overall pacing and length. While there were some great uses of the extended run time like the action sequences and team bonding I mention above, there were so many scenes that were way too slow for me to stay engaged. I found myself editing the movie in my head, like did we really need 2 full minutes of Bruce Wayne and his horse climbing a dreary mountain? I don’t think so. This was a narrative where I needed to pay attention lest I miss critical pieces of the story, but the random scenes that dragged on too long had me going to get snacks and checking my phone throughout. If I could rate the movie by halves the first half would get 2.5 Waves because of how it dragged and the second half would get closer to 4.5 Waves since the story really picks up and fun things start to happen.

The final part of this movie that kept it from getting a higher rating was how closely it was tied to Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. In fact, the first scene of Zack Snyder's Justice League is the final scene of Batman v Superman. There were many plot critical tie-ins to previous movies that left me feeling confused until I googled my questions during the slow scenes. If you have never seen Batman v Superman or Man of Steel then you will miss a lot of this movie, which I thought was unfair because other DCEU movies came out before the first iteration of Justice League like Wonder Woman and Suicide Squad and while events in those movies are mentioned in passing they are not nearly as important as the Batman and Superman-centric films. If the DCEU is going to pick favorites, the least it can do is pick movies I actually like (Wonder Woman (2017) remains my favorite DCEU movie to date). In general, superhero movies seem to be trending toward sagas and I prefer movies that you can just watch and enjoy without needing to see a bunch of other movies first.

Overall, I did very much enjoy this movie, but based on the run time alone it is not going to be for everyone. Measuring movie success during the pandemic is trickier than looking at box office numbers and labeling it a success or a flop, but it does appear that Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021) is doing well as far as critical reception and viewership. I hope that this success will allow the DCEU to explore all of the fun nooks and crannies of the universe Snyder pulled together. In fact, half of the epilogue of this movie felt like set up for future movies. I hope they come to fruition because there were some pretty compelling teasers at the end that I would love to see played out on the big screen.

As I mentioned before, I’ve never seen the original cut of Justice League, but Snyder’s version left me fulfilled and satisfied with the narrative, so I am happy to have seen this newest cut first. This is a movie for people who love DC, love superhero movies or are just really invested in the hype.

~TideMod

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hellzyeahthewebwieldingavenger · 5 years

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The Anti-Spider-Girl Agenda within Marvel

In 1998 Tom DeFalco, former EIC of Marvel, created Mayday Parker/Spider-Girl. Her debut did gangbusters and a first edition of it still fetches a lot of cash. She got a solo series in 1999 which launched an entire interconnected universe of characters, the MC2 universe.

The universe ultimately wrapped up in 2010 but throughout that time Mayday was being regularly published in one format or another, she was even the FIRST ever Marvel character to get a digital ongoing series before it went to print. An impressive accolade to add to the fact that she still holds the record for the female Marvel solo protagonist with the longest running continuous series. That is to say no breaks or relaunches, just over 60 straight monthly issues...

... And THEN she went another 40 straight issue for good measure before finally being continued in a relaunch.

So, given how the anniversaries of both her debut and the debut of her series/the MC2 universe have come and gone I have to ask...why has there been 0 acknowledgement from Marvel?

We’re in the middle of a 2099 celebration, and that imprint (that lasted less time and was arguably less successful) was an on and off presence between 2013-2017.

We’re going to get something acknowledging Iron Man 2020 a character who is hardly in the zeitgeist of Marvel fandom to the same extent as Spider-Girl.

Now in fairness both of those examples are reliant upon the literal names of both properties. It does make a certain amount of sense to celebrate the 2099 line in a year ending in the number 9, thus bringing us ever closer to the real life year 2099. Equally it makes sense to revive Iron Man 2020 during well...the year 2020.

But then you get to Marvel celebrating the Earth X stuff. Now for all you out there who haven’t read the Earth X stuff I want you to ask yourself a question and be very honest with yourselves. How much do you actually know about the Earth X universe just via osmosis, without having read it. I’m willing to bet it ain’t much if anything and what you do know probably amounts to:

It was Marvel’s answer to Kingdom Come

Alex Ross did art for it

MAYBE you know Norman Osborn was the President

Oh and you probably remember that really cool Venom/symbiote looking character who was a version of Spider-Girl!

Golly, it’s almost like if Marvel are going to celebrate the not-that-well-remembered Earth X line (which like 2099 also lasted for less time than the MC2 universe) then they should do SOMETHING (beyond releasing some trades) to mark EITHER of the appropriate anniversaries for Spider-Girl and/or the MC2 universe as a whole.

But no. We get some trades and also Mayday appeared in Spider-Geddon for a few issues...at no point being solely in the spotlight...

This my friends is simply the latest in a very, very, very, very, very long list of instances where Mayday/the MC2 brand is mistreated.

And a lot of that mistreatment I think is due to Tom DeFalco’s hand in creating Mayday and the MC2 universe. Because frankly, in particular relation to the MC2 universe, DeFalco’s work has also been mistreated in recent years.

The facts are:

Mayday’s ongoing (Spectacular Spider-Girl volume 2) was turned into a mini in spite of solicits

She was cancelled so Anya Corazon could get the name Spider-Girl

The very next time she shows up her Dad is killed off, thus fundamentally wrecking the whole premise for her character

The guy who killed her Dad proceeded to treat her as an abused babysitter

That same guy finished things off by removing her unique name and costume

That same guy (Slott) in the same run before and after Spider-Verse wrecked other elements from DeFalco’s ASM work AND threw shade at his origin for MJ, calling it reductive

Slott also was hired by DeFalco and had to uncomfortably admit he’d conned the man. Which combined with everything else makes me wonder if DeFalco maybe threw some shade Slott’s way back when he was an intern. Like he looked upon him as underhanded and unworthy of his place in the company, and Slott knew that and resented DeFalco for it. And again, being EIC earns enemies and DeFalco was the EIC when Slott started

Slott also wrecked Ben Reilly a character DeFalco did not create but had strong associations with.

During secret wars the story focused HEAVILY upon Hope Pym, Stinger and Ant-Man at a time when coincidentally the Ant-Man movie was happening.

During Secret Wars the same writer who wrecked her in Spider-Verse COINCIDENTALLY happened to a story about the daughter of Spider-Man who was born during the 1990s, but it was his own OC

During Secret Wars, Mayday appeared on the cover of one of the ongoings she was set to appear in, but it was then revised to be Anya

Mayday when she began appearing regularly in a new title was seemingly killed off early into it and didn’t appear for awhile, not getting much spotlight when she did

Mayday had to share her spotlight moments in Spider-Geddon with Anya (again), still wasn’t allowed to be called Spider-Girl again, and the story was mostly about Annie not her.

She was going to appear in the USM cartoon but then that was totally changed to be a gender flipped Peter Parker

Eric Masterson/Thunderstrike, another well remembered DeFalco creation, has also gotten little-no attention this decade despite it being a 20th/25th anniversary of him too. One of the more notable acknowledgments of his character was turning him into a Neo-Nazi for Spider-Punk to beat up.

Spider-Girl’s VERY SUCCESSFUL digests were discontinued but conveniently other digests for other Marvel properties either continued or started up after Mayday’s were discontinued.

The ‘complete’ Spider-Ham trade paperbacks ‘conveniently’ do not include Spider-Ham’s equivalent character for Spider-Girl, Swiney-Girl

Gee that’s an AWFUL lot of coincidence, especially when you consider fucking Spider-Ham has been getting more attention from Marvel than Mayday; and that was BEFORE Into the Spider-Verse came out.

I’m sorry, but it’s really, really, really, really, really, really obvious that there is an anti DeFalco/Spider-Girl/MC2 sentiment within Marvel.

But why you may ask?

There are a few reasons for that. The biggest one though is that Tom DeFalco is the former EIC of Marvel comics.

At the time of me writing this, Axel Alonso recently stopped being EIC of Marvel and no bad words are muttered about him. People in the industry equally have little bad to say about Joe Quesada, especially those within Marvel.

But then again...Joey Q is still working for Marvel and in a position ABOVE the EIC. He never stopped working for Marvel even when he stopped being the EIC. And Alonso, one of Quesada’s right hand yes men conveniently took over for him and do you know he didn’t run the company all THAT differently to his former boss. Funny that right?

It’s almost as funny as how other former EICs of Marvel absolutely don’t have the same treatment. Jim Shooter is routinely BLASTED by countless fans and creators, especially the ones who worked under him, even though he oversaw arguably the height of Marvel comics’ creative history. Bob Harrass and his decisions are often talked about less than flatteringly. Tom DeFalco meanwhile had a whole disparaging phrase named after him.

Yes. That is is a real life Marvel letter page from the mid-2000s literally using the term ‘DeFalco’s Folly’ in reference to a former Marvel EIC and outright BLAMING HIM for their bankruptcy in the 1990s.*

When you are the EIC you make enemies. It’s rare that the boss of any business isn’t resented on some level by their employees. And your words take on much more meaning that what you simply say, being subject to misinterpretation.**

But now imagine you are the boss of a bunch of creative nerds (for most creators of superheros are nerds). Creative people A LOT of the time tend to be fairly sensitive as is, it’s likely critical to their craft. Nerds historically have tended to be sensitive (that’s neither a good nor bad thing). If you are the boss of those people, hoo boy will you ever make enemies. Tom DeFalco in fact once told a fellow editor that an innocuous comment about how an artist under said editor’s employ drew a character was being taken by the artist as an insult to their whole career.

NOW imagine all that and also under your tenure the company goes bankrupt and a lot of people lose their jobs?

Enemies. Enemies galore.

Even if it wasn’t necessarily your fault, you are the most visible person in authority so you get the blame. If the internet wasn’t that much of a thing do you really think that Ike Perlmutter would be the guy who got the blame for deep sixing the X-Men and F4 in the 2010s? Hell no, it’d have been Axel Alonso and/or Tom Brevoort.

So yeah, Mayday was DeFalco’s baby and the MC2 universe more than anything was the logical extrapolation from the Marvel universe as it existed under HIS tenure as EIC. It’s very much seen as representative of DeFalco himself. Thus if people have an issue with DeFalco, they’re not going to do all that much positive as far as his stuff is concerned, in particular if it gives him anything like royalties.

But on top of all of that I think Spider-Girl and the MC2 universe simply conceptually lean against Marvel’s ‘party line.

I didn’t notice this, but it was pointed out to me by an acquaintance that the MC2 universe is VERY similar to DC’s Earth 2 concept, wherein the classic heroes are older and/or retired with their immediate descendants picking up their mantles. Marvel and DC have this petty and asinine pissing contest between them, with many within Marvel even outright hating the fact that they have numbered universes like DC. It’s likely (definitely) the reason Earth 616 was rebranded as ‘Earth Prime’. This of course won’t stop them ripping off DC if they think it’ll make bank

The MC2 universe was a universe of OPTIMISM. In particular in the 2000s, and this attitude has definitely lingered, there is this emphasis upon cynicism and at best Pyrrhic victories within Marvel. Partially this is due to a misinterpretation of what ‘realism’ means, but partially this is due to misguided belief that controversy sells and pissing the fans off makes bank.

The MC2 universe is very old school. It’s deliberately designed to be nostalgic and feel Silver Age in it’s sensibilities. this is why the violence is not all that gory, the sexual references are at best reserved and tasteful and there’s that optimism I talked about. not to mention it kicks back hard against the decompression/writing for the trade storytelling model Marvel typically employs and has typically employed for almost 20 years now. Whether it’s simply because the universe doesn’t conform, or because Marvel views anything ‘retro’ as bad because it isn’t ‘modern’ (with no inspection of whether the modern trends are a GOOD thing) the end result is that the MC2′s sensibilities are not in line with how Marvel WANTS their comics produced.

Then you have Mayday herself. Mayday is a living symbol of both the Clone Saga and the Spider Marriage. Whilst Marvel are NOW willing to more openly reference the Clone Saga, few people i any kind of positions of power look upon it (or even aspects of it) with anything but disdain and embarrassment. Dan Slott for instance openly hated it. As for the Spider Marriage...I mean do I even need to explain that one?

I’m sure a frustrating fact for Marvel during Spider-Girl’s publication, and something likely passed down to Axel Alonso when he was handpicked by Quesada, was that the book refused to die. Spider-Girl was scheduled for cancellation multiple times and defied the odds multiple times. Marvel 90% of the time won’t kill a book if it’s making a profit (especially in a day and age when they were still feeling the fallout from bankruptcy) so they kept Spider-Girl around, but because it was so against the party line I’m VERY sure they’d have LIKED to have had the justification for killing the title. That’s likely why they shuffled her onto a digital platform in 2009. Amazing Spider-Girl did poorly enough to justify cancelling it but not so poorly that they couldn’t still make money from it. Another relaunch would’ve boosted sales for the series, but making it a digital series at a time when hardly anyone read digitially (let alone PAID for it), now that’s a shrewd manoeuvre. You make SOME money from it, you pay lip service to keeping it alive and appeasing very upset Spider-Marriage fans, but you’ve essentially guaranteed it’s failure long term.

Part of that annoying success was those incredibly successful digests that were possibly indoctrinating a lot of young impressionable readers on a character/brand Marvel wanted to bury and aspects of their flagship character (read: a married older Peter Parker) that they wanted to bury. Hence Spider-Girl digests disappeared but conveniently there were still digests for Ultimate Spider-Man sold featuring a young, buffoonish, Avengers worshipping Peter Parker.

Oh...and she also had the incredibly brand sexy name ‘Spider-Girl’ that Joe Quesada wanted for his own precious pet OC character, Anya Corazon. In fact Mayday was going to be rebranded as Spider Woman in Spider-Girl #75, specifically so that Anya Corazon could be given the name Spider-Girl. Years later Mayday was cancelled specifically for that purpose.

tl:dr There is a VERY OBVIOUS anti Tom DeFalco/Spider-Girl/MC2 agenda within Marvel.

My hope is that it’s rooted out, hopefully as a result of the 20 year nostalgia factor kicking in sooner of later (her series was most prevalent in the 2000s) and more female creators coming into the industry.

*Which is very much unfair. There is rarely one singular decision that results in bankruptcy. So whilst DeFalco making a single purchase might’ve been a contribution (emphasis on ‘might’) the idea that it was THE ultimate cause of Marvel’s problems is ridiculous.

Marvel were heading for the shitter the moment Ron Perleman purchased it in the 1980s. They were the victims of a ‘pump and dump’ scheme wherein sleazy yet clever financial people showed up, created a bubble to make a load of money, then moved on to the next thing when the bubble burst. To my understanding a similar thing occurred with baseball cards.

** In fact DeFalco’s friend, Ron Frenz, has spoken about how he was witness to DeFalco saying one thing and the people listening to him hearing and acting upon it in a totally different way than was intended.

The same happened to Stan Lee when he made an aside about Iron Man’s lack of a nose, which resulted in his employees believing Stan wanted them to give Iron Man a nose.

P.S. You know in the 1990s when all the 2099 books got cancelled sans Spider-Man 2099, they never got a second bite of the apple.

But between the late 90s and 2000s the MC2 universe was seemed successful enough that around 2006-2007 both Spider-Girl AND the wider MC2 universe were given second volumes, even the ones that only lasted like 6 issues.

Since then there’s been at least 3 attempts to revive the 2099 universe, we’re living through the latest one.

And yet Mayday doesn’t seem to even be worthy of a spotlight issue in the current Spider-Verse series.

#Spider-Man #Spider-Girl #Mayday Parker #mc2 #mc2 universe #Tom DeFalco #Ron Frenz #Thunderstrike #Eric Masterson #Dan Slott #Joe Quesada

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9worldstales · 3 years

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INTERESTING POINTS TO PONDER FROM INTERVIEWS 3

Interviews might not remain forever available or not be easy to find so I’ve decided to link them and transcribe the points I find of some interest so as to preserve them should the interview had to end up removed.

It’s not complete transcriptions, just the bits I think can be relevant but I wholeheartedly recommend reading the whole thing.

And of course I also comment all this because God forbid I’ll keep silent... :P

Title: Kevin Feige (President of Production at Marvel Studios) On Set Interview THOR; Read a Massive Interview Done on the Soundstages of THOR!

Author: Steve Weintraub

Published: Dec 10, 2010

BEST BITS FROM THE INTERVIEW

ABOUT THE ULTIMATES INFLUENCING THE SCRIPT

So you guys aren’t taking from The Ultimates standpoint where there is supposed to be a recreated Asgard on Earth.

Feige: There’s some… No, is your answer. But there is certainly influences of the [J. Michael] Straczynski run over the course of the film. It is, as I said, Kirby/Lee, for some aesthetic and characters, Simonson for aesthetic and characters, and Straczynski for our inspiration of the Earth-bound stuff, but not Asgard floating above.

Question about the comic art we saw earlier. It’s a lot of the classic Thor panels up there, but he definitely has more of an Ultimate comics look. Were any of the Ultimate comics consulted or were those books consulted for this look?

Feige: I don’t know about consulted, but we certainly pulled and looked at all of the renditions. Frankly, the Thor costume you see is closer to the JMS comics than the Ultimate comics.

So none of the actual artists or writers are active consultants on this?

Feige: We wanted to talk with [Olivier] Coipel but he was just too busy. Walt [Simonson] and Joe [Michael Straczynski] were, and Stan [Lee]. The way we usually do.

ABOUT THE WORLD OF “THOR”

What’sthe difference between the comic book look and the historically Nordic…

Feige: The comic book wins, in most cases. We’re going with the theory in the comics which is there, in your face, and sometimes it isn’t, that these are being who live in another realm, who live on another planet, who had a way to travel to here and has travelled here in the past. Specifically, a thousand some odd years ago, in which the locals interpreted them as gods and started mimicking some of their clothing and some of their helmet and weapon designs. But they didn’t have access to the building materials that Asgardians did so they made it out of wood and horns and fur. That’s not a whole lot of this movie, but that’s a lot of the backstory that we’re coming from. Which is why Odin’s bed, there, for the Odin sleep, yes there’s sort of a Viking-esque [feel]. The head of the bed there, the Viking-esque longboat ends. But they weren’t inspired by the Vikings, the Vikings were inspired by them.

This has a lot of elements that are probably a little more difficult to get onto the screen to combine with Spider-Man and the other Marvel things. How much of a consideration is that with managing and combining all these universes?

Feige: Well we’re not combining Spider-Man but we are… it led us to the movie we are making. That consideration you brought up led us to the film we’re making. The theory behind it and the science behind it. Was it Arthur C. Clarke or Asimov who said, “Technology significantly advanced would be indistinguishable from magic.” That quote is what we used a lot and continue to use with all of this. Something that looks like magic to us, but it’s not magic to them. That is where we are coming from and when these worlds eventually collide, it will be in a pretty scientific manner. Not a boring scientific manner, I hope, but in a cool one.

On that note, you did say that science is basically going to be mistaken for magic, and you are hot to trot for Dr. Strange, so is that how you are going to try to ease audiences into this other kind of realm beyond just the superhero stuff?

Feige: Yea. Absolutely. I mean, most of our characters are rich enough that they can carry their own movie. Instead of just combining them together at first, we do want to introduce them in a movie, and within each of them they will break open other avenues. Iron Man is entirely about tech. Hulk starts the break open the idea of biological enhancement which clearly goes into Cap. This cracks into the cosmic and other worlds. Dr. Strange will eventually get into the supernatural.

Producer Craig Kyle: Once you step inside the observatory, you basically tell Heimdall where you want to go. The sword Heimdall uses is not only used to defend Asgard, but it’s also the key to this device. We looked at Tony Stark and that movie, Iron Man had holograms and was stepping inside virtual worlds. Asgardians have kind of “been there, done that” when it comes to that kind of stuff. So for them to send you across the universe it’s as easy as turning a key. It’s why it’s a system of gears and wheels. It’s a machine. Their technology is only as sophisticated as it needs to be to do extraordinary things. Once you’ve said you’re going to go, the outside of this building begins to spin around, while the inside is stable and the rainbow bridge pumps energy inside this place. Then this major steeple that fills up the top here begins to lower and it points in the direction of the destination of the world you choose to go to. You step out on the edge and BOOM! You’re fired across the universe. You get the rainbow bridge when you arrive or leave Asgard, but when you want to get from this side of the universe to ours, you need to step through this gun that will fly you across the universe.

ABOUT THE FROST GIANTS

Feige walked us into another room filled with artwork and images of the Frost Giants.

Feige: Early versions of the...frost giants play a major role in this movie. What you’ll see today are legacy versions of the frost giants. Some of it will be in the movie, and some of it will be enhanced through Digital Domain. So these are early molds. We wanted there to be practical frost giants for the actors to interact with, we have a wonderful actor named Colm Meaney* who plays one of them. I think a lot of his stuff and his face we wanted to be him. A lot of them will be further enhanced from what you’ll see today.

Does this character have a specific name or is he just referred to as a frost giant?

Feige: He has a name. I’m not going to tell you what it is but he has one.

* (I think Feige actually mean Colm Feore, who played Laufey, as there’s no Colm Meaney in the cast and Laufey is the only Frost Giant who has a name)

ABOUT CHRIS HEMSWORTH AS THOR

Feige: Thor is not here today. Do not judge the Thor double as Thor. When Chris is Thor, well, let me just say there are certain individuals who begin questioning their sexuality. [laughs]

MY TWO CENTS

Well, for start this confirms my feelings that people expected a “Thor” based on “The Ultimates” and I bet they made the trailer in that way to use this expectation and raise viewers’ interest.

It also confirms what said in other interviews by other people, that Feige was interested in giving “Thor” a scientific look... though I’ve to say in the final product there’s very little of it.

And this also confirms my feelings Frost Giants were meant to be more than what we just got. I mean, in “The art of Thor” they mentioned how they wanted them to be characters, not monsters/creatures, but in the movie they seem to be there mostly to be killed and be considered monsters by the Asgardians. So it’s nice to know they originally were meant to be more... although it’s a pity this more disappeared somehow.

I really, really really would love to see the very early plans for “Thor”. I know of course of the old script that had been shared and on which the novel “Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase One: Thor” is based but, well, call me greedy but I would love to see the previous ones as well, and especially look at how they were planning to handle the Frost Giants. It’s a pity their role had been cut so much.

Last but not least, this is not the sole interview in which I get the feeling Marvel was more interested in Chris Hemsworth/Thor for his look than for anything else.

I mean, okay, he’s very nice to look at to say the least and this is something I surely apprecciate but sometimes I wish they cared more about his character and his interpretation than about his body. He’s not in the story to be just an eye candy after all... but whatever, maybe that’s just me.

On a sidenote it’s not the first time I see Feige mentioning “Doctor Strange” way before the movie was done (we’re in 2010 here, “Doctor Strange” will be released in 2016) so it seems he really wanted to release it.

#thor #laufey #heimdall #interview #kevin feige #craig kyle #mcu thor #chris hemsworth #thor odinson #asgard #jotunheim #midgard #mcu doctor strange #9 worlds interview study

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whitmore · 4 years

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new-52 was godawful for a lot of reasons and it was almost really awful for courtney but matt kindt salvaged her from geoff johns’ and let me tell you why.

new-52 meant that courtney’s entire storyline was reset. johns rewrote courtney’s origin as this: it was implied she never left los angeles, and that she was a youtube phenom who was a poster girl and poster girl only. she still saved people, but her addition to jla in-universe was because she was a good poster girl and could talk to public and be perceived well. even when johns tried to write courtney as “not just the poster girl” and standing her ground in the jla, it fell flat in authenticity and lacked the character depth needed to be believable.

issue #8 of the justice league of america series marks the beginning of the forever evil arc and a change in writers from geoff johns to matt kindt. the arc focuses around the justice league being kept on their own levels in a prison, filled with illusions and seemingly the only way out is down, through the levels. courtney whitmore and j’onn j’onzz are on the surface level. matt kindt took this version of courtney who had been undeniably messed up by both new-52 and johns’ rewrite and wrote her with more respect than i’ve ever seen anyone write courtney before in my life.

kindt portrayed courtney as smart, and capable; she despised her role as just sitting off to the side, but did as j’onn wanted out of her respect for him. she keeps looking for an exit to the prison because even if she is told to just stay, she will try and do everything she can on her level to help. courtney’s not past finding loopholes. courtney loses the psychic link with j’onn and immediately decides to go and find and help him, even though she’s aware of the dangers. she shakes her own memories from her mind in order to stay focused and doesn’t stay on any of the other leaguers prison levels for a second longer than she has to; she sticks to her goal and doesn’t let anything hinder her.

the deepest level is revealed to belong to j’onn, and courtney saves him. j’onn is then no where to be found (hint: he’s in her head.) and courtney breaks free of the prison. she’s confronted by the secret society but is slipping between her own memories of stealing the staff and the reality in front of her. j’onn pulls courtney out of her memories and into the fight, which she defeats most of the society apart from deathstroke, instead choosing to flee because it’s the smart option. the flashbacks in this issue portray courtney in an almost spiteful light, but still manage to retain her character as well as having courtney apologize to and have a GOOD conversation with pat! it’s a wonderful character moment.

courtney and j’onn split and courtney leaves to protect her family, before returning to save j’onn again from clayface. they make the rounds and head towards l.a. to stop firestorm from blowing up, but know they will have to part ways as courtney desperately seeks to protect her family in these apocalyptic times.

anyway that was just a small recap but here’s where it gets interesting. courtney’s never had excessive trauma in her “origin” story. which i’ve always been happy about, because courtney whitmore is not a hero that needs trauma to motivate her to become a hero. but when the justice league of america arc seeks to understand WHY courtney is the heroine of the story, why courtney is able to break out of this prison, why courtney is able to save everyone in the goddamn story, it’s her youth. kindt gives courtney a trauma (her first confrontation with evil; the villain ransacks her house and kills her brother. she WANTS to give up stargirl, but pat and barbara don’t want her to) that FURTHERS her story instead of solely being her origin or being a useless and ignored trauma; courtney has one memory she would love to forget, to put in a box, but it turns into the reason she won’t give up, and the reason her youth and optimism is so powerful. she doesn’t let the memory hold her back. it powers her.

kindt respected courtney and her storyline. he gave her real motivations and character and relationships, especially her friendship with j’onn. j’onn speaks of courtney in such a high regard i tear up, because the respect the two have for each other is astounding. kindt gave courtney moral dilemma, a choice between her and her family, and kindt let courtney be selfish. kindt let courtney be smart and funny and witty and sad and lonely and respectful and powerful and youthful and a teenager and a superhero and all the things courtney whitmore should be at once, without giving up any of her qualities or sacrificing any part of her character. kindt acknowledged how johns started courtney’s new-52 arc and let her bloom, let her absolutely grow from it and added in his own segments to her origin to make her into a real, whole character. where johns’ new-52 court fell flat, kindt’s court felt whole, and wonderful, and beautiful, and i loved every moment of it.

#stargirl #*essay #courtney whitmore #SORRY I JUST THINK ABOUT MATT KINDT'S COURTNEY AND I SCREAM #HOW DID HE SALVAGE HER FROM JOHNS' DUMPSTER FIRE SO WELL #HE DID SUCH A WONDERFUL JOB #KINDT COME BACK #WRITE COURTNEY AGAIN #I LOVED IT #also kindt gave her such good development and then set her up to be the next LEADER of the justice league of [unspecified country]#and then lemire took over with justice league united (canada) and just... ignored that i guess #COURTNEY'S THEIR LEADER. COURT SHOULD HAVE BEEN THEIR LEADER #THAT'S HOW IT WAS WRITTEN #THATS HOW IT SHOULD BE #long post /#JAJSJ sorry this has been in my brain for a while i just really liked kindt's courtney

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callyrose1986 · 4 years

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my reality is a fantacy

MY REALITY IS A FANTACY

Its beginning of April and I've been hearing voices since my birthday last September, I can't say I had the best time of my life... I decided to type it all down of what I went through, let me break it down for you, one day around my birthday I decided to read a few tarot cards online and the more I did they showed the same outcome, that I was to meet my twin flame, twin soul or/and soul mate, not sure if it's all in one or if it's just one of these, that I'm not sure of, now for those of you who don’t know what that is a twin fames or the others twin flame is when one soul splits into two, not sure exactly what twin soul is other what it sounds like, seems to me it is the same thing like the twin flame, soul mate is just that, a mate for your soul, look it all up for yourself.

For some odd reason I begin to hear voices of a women and she helped me get better at hearing them I can't say exactly what she did I can't remember, I have the worst memory anyway though this times of readings I figured out who my other flame was and I don’t know if it was fate or dumb luck but it was my celebrity crush.... Imagine that, I have no idea who or why it turned out to be him but I was constantly told that I could manifest my desires and welp.... take that as you may I have no idea myself what is truly going on in my life right now..... only the gods and answer that messed up bit of information, not that I'm a religious person I prefer to spiritual instead.

I tried to contact him online his name was Tom Hiddlston, I had a crush on him since I first saw I'm in the superhero movies when he played Loki in the Thor, tall dark and handsome was my type, I then fell for him even more once I got to know the actor, well as much as I could get to know him behind the silver screen. Anyway, I was reading pictures from his hashtags on Instagram like you read tarot cards and then I would post a reply and put it in Tom’s @page and I would get something like a reply... I could hear him in my head too and then for some reason he told others it turned into something like a little game them who turned out to be the cast of avengers.

it went over pretty good on his side, but unfortunately on my side when I broke it to my mother.... I made one of the biggest mistake I ever made...deciding to walk from my small town of Coulhurst all the way to the city of Lethbridge to go to chapters. Where I thought the tort card where hinting I would meat Tom, not that I actually though I would I just wanted to go, and they were egging me on to go, something else that I could inform you all about is that there is many different realities not just the one you live in and unfortunately that mean that there are many, many different versions of ourselves and unfortunately, I did not contact just my version of Tom Hiddlston but I contact all of the others two, I have no idea how I managed that... the one that came was not my Tom from my world but from another and that means I could not see him.

I still don’t know if I have talked to the Tom from my world, I guess I won't know till I get the chance to meet him in person, if that ever happens of course, let's see... I died in other reality's more times than I could count, mainly because I can't remember, being stabbed in the back by a trickster god called Loki a few dozen times and I don’t mean from the Norse mythology I mean by the Loki from the marvel movies, ya because that’s a thing....

Everything you watch is a window to another reality and dreams are something of the same, now there is more like I can put myself into movies and shows I watch and I can hear what the characters are thinking and saying, not to mention in the begging I thought whatever I do in my mind what actually happen in the other reality's I was thinking I was in, now I changed that it just everyone imagining it but not really having it happen, I did a lot of not so nice stuff and still do but at least it's not real, I was sent to hell a few times wish I know what heaven was like, think I got jipped on that one, worst thing I ever did really was sole chock from when I was at school and church, I did watch some porn that was not meant to be watch by anyone's eyes and played some pornographic games but I don’t think I'm meant to go to hell for it...

Apparently the ‘devil’ just wanted someone on one time, I brought myself back to life as soon as I knew I was dead, well eventually sometimes, it was just tiering having to do that all the time, oh by the way I can do that bring myself back it along with anything else you can think of, I can do anything I want too in other realities, does not work in my reality but then again I can't be killed by other people from other realities in my reality, also I got murdered on my way to chapters stabbed and molested by some random guy still not sure about the whole story behind that one my mother found me walking still to the book store in my reality, that was a trip I tell you, before I was picked up I somehow jumped into other bodies of the actors who had flown down with Tom and had found me at my house.

I did end up at the store but of cause no one showed up, that was one journey I won't soon forget, I found out that my other selves where from other realities and that characters I created comes to life, like since tv and movies characters where once created, I was not sleeping and was not eating but I was not tiered or hungry but for a girl who did not have the waite I didn’t need to louse more of it.

I was seeing signs of that my house was evil and that the color red was bad and everything that was ‘dark’ needed to go so I got rid of mostly everything I had in my room that was considered ‘dark’ on top of that lost a caption America sweeter and Tom Hiddlston doll and Spiderman figure and almost lost my phone, it was found thankfully but not the others.

Among all the other versions of me there is a few evil characters evil clowns evil demon things a robot some zombies some vampires and a dnd character and an original character called Cally, among others I'm not sure about, one of them is called the moon goddess who has the power to have everyone fall in love with her looks, and it leaks out into me so others from the other universes feel overly attracted to me because of her, there is an off switch but it keeps turning on and she says it's not always her doing it, I'm not sure if I should believe that, Tom has the same thing but I won't know that till later, names the sun god, I'm not too fond of that one, my fault for calling him the sun to my moon, nether one of them where exactly what I though them to be.

it wasn’t just that everyone was attracted it was harassment and no one would take no for an answer I was raped in a lot of realities, it's gotten better but still not perfect yet, they are lucking they didn’t die from doing that to me. right after I when walking to the book story my mother had me admitted to a mental health facility, where they drugged me up to take away the voiced, it worked but on the down side I could not eat I could not sleep, I was shaking uncontrollably and it was worse than when I was home, I just didn’t feel the need to sleep or eat at home.

I was drooling from the shot they game me and I was losing wait because I could not swallow the food, it was not a fun time, I was there for about a month after that I want in to shasha house and I was therefore a day or two and they took me to the hospital to see if they could figure out what was wrong with me, they gave me something for the shot I took to get rid of the voices since that’s what was making me have side effects, it didn’t take long for me to feel better, I was in the hospital for about a week or something close, after that I was at my sisters for a few days, meanwhile my mother had got something called global amnesia from the stress.

Then I was back to shasha house I was there for about a week or two and was thinking of the voices again, I haven't heard from anyone since I had that shot but even with everything that happen I still wanted them back I was lonely I liked talking to them I liked talking to Tom, you may think I'm stupid to start this all over again but I don’t give a damn! This time I would tell no one, have it be my little dirty little secret, don’t really remember how I got them back but I did, I didn’t get the right ones though I didn’t know that, I have been going through so many to find the one from my reality, there is no real way to find out who is Tom from my reality I've told Tom who loves me by now that maybe we should meet at a comic expo somewhere where I can get to, so in Canada hopefully in Alberta.

let's see this second half I got stepped a few times again and mind f*cked a couple of time no more evil things like seeing red and thinking devil is after me, no more going to hell or dyeing, we tried merging all the realities but didn’t work tried to merge all the Toms still don’t know if that works to our advantage or not. I still have my highs and lose, I've run across the first group a few times and they are merged with a Tom who is now called God... btw I HATE HIM!!! Fuck the sun god GOD, ‘GOD Tom’ IS THE WORST!!! I will MURDER THIS BASTERED WHEN I SEE HIM because he lied about being the ‘REAL’. I also decided to stop giving ‘second’ chances to the villains, they just don’t learn.

I'm sure there is more I could say but that’s it for now, I still haven't seen anything of Tom going to a Con near me yet, I still have a few weeks to go till I go.

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thewritewolf · 5 years

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Four Times (And the Lucky One) Chapter 1: Understandable

Hello and welcome to this short, five chapter story about Adrien, where the universe tries its best to test the extent of his patience! I'll be updating this story once a week, so sit back and enjoy this little adventure.

Although it doesn’t bear a lot of symblance to the original source, this story was inspired by this comic by @sweetsweetsweetie! The concept of Adrien sneakily trying to get Marinette on a date really got my imagination running. I thought to myself: Why is he being so stealthy about this? What could have happened to make this his go-to idea? A long talk with my beta later, and the outline for this story was born!

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5

Enjoy!

Read on Ao3

Adrien’s heart pounded in his chest as he vaulted over buildings in his haste to check on Marinette. Normally, he’d just accept that the Ladybug cure would have fixed anything that was wrong, but these last few months of frequent visits to her balcony as Chat Noir…

...Well, they’d helped him see her in a different light. A light where he got worried about her safety even when there was no logical reason to be besides her home being kind of close to an akuma battle. He was conflicted over it since his feelings for Ladybug certainly hadn’t gone away in the meantime, leaving him torn between two amazing women.

But that was a problem for later. For now, he just wanted to make sure that Marinette was alright.

He landed on a building across the street from Marinette’s home and took a moment to catch his breath in the shade of a rooftop umbrella. He snuck glances through her bedroom windows, trying to see if she was there. The akuma battle had been a tough one, and had even required that he recharge in the middle of the fight. Come to think of it, while he hadn’t used his cataclysm towards the end, Ladybug had definitely used her lucky charm. She should be transforming back any minute now. Hopefully she was alright.

A shadow passed over his hiding spot. As if summoned by his concern, Ladybug herself landed on Marinette’s balcony. Adrien frowned - were Ladybug and Marinette friends? Did Ladybug think Marinette was in danger? As he watched, there was a brief flash of red and Marinette was pacing her room, followed by a floating red and black creature.

His eyes flew open and he let out an involuntary ‘eep!’ before making a beeline for his home. All his energy was focused solely on getting him there. It was only once he rolled into his room through his window that he allowed himself to begin to process what he had just seen. Almost immediately, he became a panicked wreck. So much so, that it took him a few minutes to even realize that he’d been pacing his room as Chat Noir ever since he got back.

“Claws in.”

Plagg yawned and stretched before plastering a wicked grin on his face. “Well, well, well. Looks like loverboy has finally figured out who his dear sweet love is.” He watched Adrien pace before adding, “Sit down, kid! You’re going to drive me crazy.”

Adrien did as he was told and absently fidgeted with his ring. “This isn’t good, Plagg…”

“What?” The kwami scoffed. “I thought you’d be thrilled about this! You finally know who ladybug is - it’s like a dream come true for you!”

“She’ll be so mad when she finds out!”

“Oh like Ladybug hasn’t been mad at Chat Noir before.”

“Marinette doesn’t get mad at Adrien though!”

“...I guess?”

“Besides,” he said with growing dread. “I had a chance with Ladybug, you know? I figured maybe I could get her to fall for me eventually. We spend a lot of time together, we have great chemistry, we’re both heroes…”

“Yes,” Plagg drawled, “I am aware of this.”

“But Marinette…” Adrien stared off into the distance, ignoring Plagg. “I barely had a chance with Ladybug. But Marinette is totally out of my league.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me-”

“Plagg. Ladybug is one thing, but brave, selfless, kind, beautiful, student council president, helps everyone she meets, Ladybug-without-the-spots MARINETTE? How can I hope to be cool enough for her?” Adrien leaned back in his chair and whined, “Chat Noir isn’t cool enough for her!”

His eyes widened and he sprung out of his chair. "Wait... oh no, Plagg! Ladybug said she likes another boy, remember? What am I gonna do?!”

There was a long silence and eventually Adrien risked looking over at Plagg, who was staring at him in stunned disbelief.

"It's you.”

Adrien frowned. “No, she’s made it clear she doesn’t have feelings for Chat Noir-”

Plagg waved a paw irritably. “No, no. You. Adrien Agreste. She is crushing on you. Big time, kiddo.”

“No,” he said, crossing his arms, “She made it very clear that she isn’t. She’s even said as much.”

"Kid, she has photos of your face taped to her WALLS.”

"She likes my father’s label!"

"And I can’t believe you bought that the first time, let alone all the other times!" Plagg rolled his eyes. “Listen - trust me on this, pigtails has a big ol’ crush on you and the only one who doesn’t know it is you.”

Adrien was about to protest, but everything began to click into place. The stuttering that had gotten better during their friendship. The photos of him scattered throughout her room. The time she confessed that she loved him when she thought he was a statue. He’d brushed it all aside because she always assured him that she didn’t have feelings for him, but if he disregarded that… the evidence was clear.

Stunned, he collapsed into his desk chair, slack jawed. “She… loves me.” He lurched to a sitting up position. “I need to tell her that I’m Chat Noir.”

“I mean, yeah, probably.”

“But I can’t just tell her.”

Plagg gave a tired sigh. “Why not, kid?”

“Because she might get mad at me for finding out, but she can’t be mad if she finds out on her own too!”

“That… doesn’t make sense.”

“It makes plenty of sense! I just need to get her alone so only she gets the hints. I can’t give Alya clues too.”

“What about taking her on a date?” Plagg suggested half-heartedly. “Plenty of time alone there.”

“That’s perfect! This will be easier than I thought.”

“Maybe.”

“What do you mean ‘maybe’?”

“Well… you have been awfully insistent that you two are just friends. It might be tough to get her to think otherwise now.”

Adrien ran a hand through his hair and bit down on the rising panic. He could do this. He was Chat Noir, superhero and famous romantic. How hard could asking out one girl be?

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

The next day, Adrien waited outside the school for Marinette. He wanted to be sure there were as few eavesdroppers around as possible. While there was the matter of secrecy, it was more the romance of it that Adrien was after. If he allowed himself to hope, then this first date would be the start of a long and loving relationship. It had to be absolutely perfect and that meant getting the perfect opportunity to ask her out. Even if he had practical matters to worry about when they were actually on that date, like delicately and subtly destroying their secret identities.

While he was lost in his thoughts, he very nearly missed Marinette leaving the school. Nino and Alya had already left together, which meant that Adrien had a golden moment where neither of their friends would be hovering over them. He could speak from his heart without being afraid of looking foolish.

“Hey, Marinette!” He called out to her as he rushed over to her. “I need to ask you-”

She turned around and his tongue stopped functioning. He became lost in her piercing blue eyes and he belatedly wondered how he had ever managed to talk to her before. Was she always this pretty? Had he just been too blinded by Ladybug to notice? Either way, his train of thought crashed and burned.

Her eyes became concerned. “H-hey, Adrien! Cool meeting you here.” She winced. “Not that I, uh, didn’t expect to see you here. At school, I mean. It’s just, uh, you- you usually leave. Pretty quick. Once school is done. So… y-yeah. Wh-what did you want?”

How could one person be so endearingly precious?

“I, uh… um, that is, you-”

Her face became clouded with concern “...Are you okay, Adrien?”

“Y-yes.” He took a deep breath. “I just wanted to ask-”

A roar interrupted him and he scanned the horizon. Screams were heard soon after and he narrowed his eyes. No doubt there was an akuma out there, but he had something important to do first. He turned back towards Marinette…

...Or, more appropriately, where Marinette had just been. No doubt, his dutiful lady was already on her way to the akuma. Better not keep her waiting. He ducked behind a bush. As his transformation washed over him, he kicked himself. It was so close, too!

Hopefully next time would be easier.

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

There was something definitely wrong with her kitty.

The fight was taking longer than it should, mostly because Chat Noir seemed distracted. That wasn’t anything too noteworthy. They were human beings, after all, with civilian lives and all that came with it. Sometimes they would have an off day, and that was nothing to get too worked up about. Both of them had plenty of those kinds of days

But the sudden lack of flirting from her partner? That was worrying. Even in life-or-death situations Chat Noir took the time to lay it on thick as he tried to woo her. There had been a few compliments from him, so she knew he hadn’t been replaced in some weird akuma scheme, but something definitely felt off-kilter.

The weirdest thing of all was the shyness, though. It wasn’t much - just a little tremor in his words, the way a blush would creep out from under his mask if their eyes made contact in the heat of the fight. It wasn’t something she was used to from her bold kitty. He was almost acting like she did out of the mask.

When the fight ended and the Ladybug cure had been released, she eschewed the usual fist bump in favor of pressing her hand to his forehead. He jumped at the unexpected contact.

“M-my lady?”

“No fever,” she mumbled. “So you probably aren’t sick.” She put her hands on her hips and watched him carefully, noticing the way his fingers twitched at his side and he could only steal glances at her. “What’s up, kitty? You usually aren’t this… skittish.”

He gave his most charming smile and she could see the nervousness dropping away from him like a cloak. “Sorry. I guess I’ve just had… things on my mind. Civilian things. You don’t need to worry about me, m’lady.”

The way he put emphasis on civilian made her curious, but she knew she couldn’t prod any further. If he wanted to talk about it, maybe she’d find out when he visited Marinette soon. For one reason or another, he was more open about his feelings then - at least, the feelings that weren’t his affection for Ladybug, which he always wore on his sleeve.

“If you’re sure…” She offered her fist, which he gladly bumped. “I’ll see you later, chaton. Take care of yourself.” Her yoyo flew out and soon she was flying above the city once again. She risked a glance behind her, expecting to see Chat Noir’s back as he made his way home, or wherever it was that he went.

To her surprise, he stood in the same spot and watched her leave.

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

Adrien landed in his room and called off his transformation.

“Well. That could’ve gone better,” Plagg commented drily.

“I’ll say. But I’m not worried. It just means I’ll have to try again - and next time, it will work.”

“Planning on being less of a stuttering mess next time around?”

Adrien shot Plagg a dirty look, but instead of being chastised the kwami simply cackled. “Yes, I will be. It’s just… been a lot to take in. I’ll be better next time. You can count on it.”

“What makes you think it will work any better?”

“I’ll have it planned out! With how my schedule is, I won’t have another opportunity for a while, so that means I have plenty of time to figure out my next move and set up the ideal scene. There’s no way anything can get in the way this time!”

While Adrien struck a pose and stared off into the horizon, full of hope and energy, Plagg rolled his eyes behind him. That boy’s romantic notions were gonna bite him in the butt really quickly.

#Miraculous Ladybug #Adrien Agreste #Plagg #Marinette Dupain-Cheng #Ladybug #Chat Noir #Ladynoir #Adrienette #Marichat #ml fanfiction #my writing #Four Times (and the Lucky One)#The Lucky One series

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thevindicativevordan · 3 years

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How do you feel about the way New Krypton was resolved? To me it felt really callous. Like DC was just sweeping it all aside with the Kryptonians being genocided, and then the whole world moves on a week later.

Two words: Wasted potential.

This should have been Superman's Sinestro Corps War, his big event/storyline that completely rejuvenated his sales and brought in a ton of new readers. It had all the hallmarks of being the big shakeup that the Superman franchise desperately needed: it gave Superman a big conflict that allowed him to punch stuff while also not being something he could solve solely by punching, it centered all of his big villains and gave them the revamps they needed (particularly Zod as I'll get to later), it involved all the other members of the Superfamily (bar Conner who was dead at the time) and gave them stuff to do, it even brought in the Legion of Superheroes at one point! The setup was all there to do something great, to give Superman that big event storyline he hadn't had since Death of Superman (or President Luthor if you're feeling generous).

And DC completely fucked it up.

First you had Busiek and Johns, the guys who were doing the actual setup and who had been doing great work beforehand, both leave the books right as the event was kicking off. Busiek to go do Trinity and Johns to go prepare Blackest Night, both leaving their big event to be executed by new writers who had not been involved in the process of conceptualizing this event. Then you had Clark taken out of Superman and Action Comics, those titles given to Z-Listers, and Clark himself dropped into a brand new mini. No offense to those who like Mon-El but there was never a chance in hell of him sustaining his own book as the lead guy unless Johns was writing it. Then you hilariously had the first son of Clark and Lois, Chris Kent, aged up in a bizarre way and made a costumed hero himself with a romance to boot in a deeply unpopular move (funny how history repeats itself, although I like what's unfolding with Jon a lot more). So of course the sales tanked, and what happened next was inevitable.

DC panicked and hit the reset button so hard a planet exploded and everyone died, except for Kal, Kara, and Zod plus some of his loyalists.

God I was pissed because while the side books may have floundered, the main mini itself following Clark on New Krypton? That was really good in my opinion.

Clark was forced into an interesting position: a second chance at life with his people, at the cost of renouncing ties with his adopted homeworld. Can Kal-El find a way of keeping the peace between the two worlds, with the leadership on both ends preparing for war? That's an exciting and enticing premise or at least it was for me! I loved the storyline also because it took the usual cliche storyline of Superman losing his powers and flipped it: what if there was an entire new planet full of guys who were just as strong as he was? What makes Superman special then? And we got to see the answer: his brains and his experience.

It was cool seeing Clark kick ass, seeing him navigate the politics of the Guilds and Kryptonian society. There was so much worldbuilding going on at the same time, old Kryptonian animals and plants being recreated on New Krypton, the dissatisfaction within the Labor Guild, the military spoiling for a fight, Kal's internal struggles with everyone seeing Zod as a hero and him having to try to work quietly to change that, it was all really fun to read about for me. There were also those hints of long term plotlines being set up, such as those aliens from Saturn who were also super powered, and were letting the newcomers know they were keeping an eye on things. I seriously thought we were going to get a Solar War with every race in the Sol system fighting each other for dominance. And the Superman/Zod dynamic has never been better than it was in this storyline.

The two did not like each other, but there was a grudging respect being built up between the two. Kal was coming to appreciate that Zod genuinely cared about protecting the Kryptonians, and Zod was coming to respect Clark's skills and insights. Zod was sympathetic and understandable in his goals while also still being a ruthless son of a bitch, which is exactly how I prefer he be depicted.

In all honesty this was the first big Zod story I read and it shaped my perceptions of how he should be. You also had General Sam Lane on the other side, putting together Project 7734 to tackle the Kryptonians, drafting Lex Luthor, Metallo, and others to his side. Hell this was the last and as far as I know only story to pit the Big 3 of Lex, Brainiac, and Zod against one another, something I would dearly love to see tried again. All these major players working their own agendas simply isn't something you usually get in Superman books. Lex working to kill Superman and the other Kryptonians of course, but also out to steal knowledge from Brainiac and secure his freedom. Brainiac wanting to recapture the Kryptonians. Zod and Lane out to preemptively destroy one another, with Zod seeding Kryptonian sleeper agents back on Earth. Superman's Rogues got good showings as the dangerous threats they are in this story, I'll say that much.

All of it torched in the end alas. DC definitely wanted it all swept under the rug and forgotten. I liked the retcon of Grounded really being Superman suffering a massive case of PTSD which is why he was being an asshole under JMS, but I doubt that was the original intention. You're right, Clark having to experience the pain of losing his people as an adult, and Kara having to re-experience it along with the death of her mother, really should've gotten more focus. But they wanted it gone and done with.

You know what kills me? Not even a few years later they'd reboot the whole damn universe anyway, so what was the point of taking Superman back to his "status quo"? They should've just said fuck it and let the writers go wild in the final years before the New 52, let New Krypton play out as it was intended to, it was all going to get rebooted anyway. Of course New 52 was a rush job I understand, so they didn't know ahead of time what would happen, but I can't help but be bitter.

The potential New Krypton offered is one I would 100% love to see revisited, in an animated movie or in that upcoming My Adventures With Superman cartoon. The animated side keeps changing the stories as they adapt them anyway, and I would love to see the ending to New Krypton get changed. Give me the original Johns/Busiek plan for the event, or give me something else entirely, it can't be a bigger disappointment than what we ultimately got anyway.

#superman #new krypton #supergirl #dc comics #general zod

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thehollowprince · 5 years

Note

You mentioned that MCU!Peter is basically Peter as Miles. How so? (I haven't read any comics with Miles yet, but I'm guessing there's some correlation there?)

Sorry it took me so long to get to this. I work third shift and so I got this just before I went to bed, and I wanted to be able to do it justice.

Before we start, I would like to say I have nothing personal against Tom Holland. He's a great young actor and I can't wait to see what he does once he finally leaves the MCU behind him. I would also like to say that I'm not a Spiderfan. Spiderman is not my favorite character in the comics, and it sounds mean, but he doesn't even make top ten. That being said, I still like this character and I understand enough about him that I was upset by how the MCU has used the character since his introduction.

I feel like I may have made something like this before, but for the life of me, I cannot find it, because Tumblr likes to eat my posts and tell me they're not there, so this might feel a bit repetitive to some people.

With that out of the way, let's get started.

Oh, and note: slight SPOILERS for some of the comics.

Peter Parker is one of the most interesting characters in Marvel Comics. Aside from being one of their biggest heroes and sellers, compared to all the other "big name heroes" he's pretty unique, in that he's entirely self made. After getting bitten by that radioactive spider and developing his powers, after witnessing his uncle's murder, he decided to be a hero, but unlike the Avengers or the X-Men or the Fantastic Four, Peter Parker was just a teenager living with his aunt. He didn't have millions at his disposal. He wasn't a royal being, or a government agent. There was no grants or funding to allow him to become Spiderman. No, he was entirely self-made, as in he made his own suit, he made the web fluid that he swings from and ties up bad guys with, as well as the web shooters. He had no help and still managed to become one of the biggest and most well-known superheroes of the Marvel universe.

Now, enter Miles Morales in the Ultimate Marvel Comics (Earth 1610), who took up the mantle of Spiderman after Peter's death during the Ultimatum (I believe). It's been a minute since I've read the first few issues around Miles, but it does involve Miles trying to live up to Peter's legacy as the next Spiderman (should sound familiar to anyone who watched the FAR FROM HOME trailer).

Now, I don't know if Sony/Marvel did this deliberately because of how many times they've done a Spiderman movie in the last twenty years, but almost everything about MCU Peter is taken directly from Miles' story, from big stuff to the most trivial

Attending a private school

Living in an apartment (as opposed to the house in Queens that Peter always lives in with Aunt May)

Speaking Spanish

Getting his costume from another "hero" who was keeping close tabs on them from a distance (Nick Fury for Miles and Tony Stark for MCU Peter)

Trying to live up to the legacy of another hero (Miles with Peter Parker and MCU Peter with Tony)

Having a girl be into them but he's so focused on another that he doesn't notice (MJ in the MCU is basically Barbara Rodriguez from the Ultimate Comics)

Their best friends...

Okay, that last one was really what made me realize this and was what pissed me off the most. Below, I'm going to post two images as a visual aide in this.

On the left, we have Ned Leeds in the MCU, and on the right we hand Ganke Lee, best friend of one Miles Morales. The fact that they're almost identical I'm sure is totally coincidental, right? Just for emphasis, here's an image of Ned Leeds from the original comics.

Doesn't even look remotely similar to the Ned that we all know and love from the movies, does he?

What's really aggravating about all this is that Peter Parker had a best friend in Harry Osborn, which they could have cast a MOC for the role if they'd wanted a diverse film, but no, they went with this. Like I said, that's what really pushed this over the top and just confirmed MCU Peter as being Miles Morales, except white. I don't know if they went this direction because of the production Sony was doing on INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE or if it had something to do with Sony's demands that Peter Parker only ever be played as heterosexual and white (per the Sony leaks) but its really insulting to both characters. Peter Parker had one of the most unique origin stories of all comic superheroes, and it was completely ignored, I'm sure for fear of oversaturation because they'd told it twice already within fifteen years of each other before bringing Peter fo the MCU.

Whatever the bullshit reason, it's a real disservice to Peter's comic legacy, as a lot of people will watch the movies over going back through decades of comics, as well as insulting to Miles Morales and his fans, because even if they do eventually introduce Miles to the MCU (and that's a big if) they're going to have to come up with a whole new way to do it. They can't use Miles' actual origin story, because they already gave it to Peter, and people will bitch a fit if they repeat themselves.

At this point in time, I'm hoping that Sony just keeps Miles away from the MCU and keeps him solely in the Spider-Verse animated movies, because I don't want to watch Marvel Studios ruin him the way they ruined Peter.

#you've got mail #miles morales vs peter parker #miles molares #peter parker #anti mcu peter parker #ned leeds #ganke lee #spiderman

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highgaarden · 4 years

Text

fic | 12:51

or: Bonnie, Caroline, and a superheroes origin story. Not set in an alternate universe.

PART ONE | PART TWO | READ + COMMENT ON AO3

for @ishenwulf

----------

Part Three

The Adults Are Talking

—

The weekend just after Winter begins, Damon updated WatchOutVillainz.com with a renewed vigour.

He made sure to check for typos, and found with satisfaction that there was only 1, even in his disastrously drunken stupor. So far, this was the best post he’d ever written, and the traffic it was getting was crazy.

The next day, he got a text message from an unknown number.

BLOCKED NUMBER sent at 10:25am: Might want to type with your eyes open next time, mate.

Unperturbed, Damon went to check on his blog stats.

He was pleased to see that there was a 26% increase of traffic since his last posting.

He took a swig of his coffee mixture – Caroline calls it a mixture because he makes it while fighting off the hangover pounding in his teeth, and mixes in any liquid that didn’t require him to stir, mix or slosh. Today’s mixture was coffee, orange juice and leftover wine from Bonnie’s glass from the night before.

With a wince, he swallowed and clicked on his blog.

He’d made the post exclusively to showcase their new winter additions to their superhero outfits. Attached at the top of the latest post was a picture of Feisty Fire and Blonde Distraction with fur-trimmed capes. The text underneath, which went on for quite a few minutes of scrolling, was just the number 9 typed over and over again.

—

Caroline kicked open the door to the warehouse with unnecessary force: the new boots she was wearing was much suited for winter, with heavy leather flat soles that gripped debris-littered rooftops securely.

She kicked it with unnecessary force because it had been four years, and Lizzie and Josie were turning twenty, and she’d just gotten a text from Alaric telling her with regret that she probably shouldn’t come, seeing as her daughters now look older than her.

It takes her mere seconds to text back her outrage that they’ll be celebrating with close family and friends who all know of her nature, and that it’s really not his place to say whether or not she should be there for her own daughters—

“Good for you,” the vampire she was stalking praised, nodding profusely. “Darling, I can’t be-lieve you even let him keep your own kids away from you like that!��

“The lawyer you recommended was really good,” Bonnie smiled. “We were all really grateful.”

“That fire you’re aiming at me doesn’t imply appreciation at all, sweets.”

“Kol,” Caroline groaned. “I’ve had a long weekend, alright? It’s cold, this cape is heavy, and you breached contract—”

“There was nothing in the contract that said I couldn’t open a fight club,” Kol snarked, his voice extra annoying because it’s amplified. His voice was amplified, because he was speaking into a voice amplifier in the middle of a boxing ring. He had to amplify his voice, because the roar of the crowd almost drowned him out.

“It clearly said no more fighting.” Bonnie snaps her fingers; one of the werewolves that was about to lunge at his opponent, a banshee, is tossed off trajectory with a long, wet whine.

—

“You girls got boring,” Kol whines. “I regret paying for my WOV platinum membership.”

Bonnie and Caroline didn’t answer, busy as they were immobilising him with a variety of ropes, velvet, and chains.

“Seriously,” Kol continued as if Bonnie wasn’t using the toe of her boot to flip him onto his stomach, “the only upgrade I got was being able to choose the colour of my font.”

“Damon is a scammer if there ever was any,” Caroline lectured him. “You should know better, dumbass.”

Kol finally scowled. “I resent that.”

His scowl melted into a look that was parts amazement and arousal when Bonnie turned her palms upward and outward, and he levitated into the air.

Bobbing gently in front of them like a peaceful yacht out on a dawn excursion, Kol asked, “It’s not nice to accost a lad on his first night out on the town.”

“It’s your second night. You said the exact same thing yesterday, just before you signed a contract that said you’d quit it with your assholery,” Bonnie said with an eyeroll. “Do you need to sign up for our twelve-step programme?”

“Oh, so you’ve expanded! Congratulations are in order.”

“Thank you,” Bonnie and Caroline responded automatically, because while they were vigilantes, they were still southern belles raised with good manners.

“Anyway, I’m only going at it because I’m expected to be on my best behaviour this weekend.” It was a testament to the sorta-kinda friendship he had since the days of their mismatched Mystery Gang vs. Whatever Shit the Originals Schemed That Week that he was even explaining himself. He used to maim first, offer explanations never.

“And why’s that?” Caroline maintained the conversation, just because she could. And because she was feeling a bit useless now that Bonnie was doing most of the womanpower.

“I’ve got to attend a children’s birthday party,” Kol said, as if he was going to be having an operation to remove his liver without anaesthesia.

“Say that again.”

“I’ve got to attend a children’s birthday party.”

“Sorry, again?”

“I said, I’ve got to attend a children’s birthday party.”

“One last time for the audience?”

“I said, I’ve—”

“How the hell were you invited?” Caroline seethed.

“Everywhere Hope goes, we go,” Kol shrugged. “What, you weren’t?”

He bobbed a bit in the air as Bonnie flicks Caroline a quick look of mild panic.

There was a storm brewing in Caroline’s eyes – or whatever you could see of them behind her mask, which she’d taken care to cover most of her face now that it was winter. “No.”

“Who’s ‘we’?” Caroline asked with narrowed eyes.

Kol sighed. “Looks like we are down for one magnificent family reunion, sister.”

So horrified was Caroline that he had called her that, she barely registered knocking Kol out with the heel of her boot until he lay crumpled –

Or would have, if he wasn’t still floating.

“Caroline,” Bonnie began. “We do not exercise too much authority over the boots. They’re YSL.”

#klaroline #bamon #hannah writes things #fic: 1251

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bigskydreaming · 5 years

Text

LOL so I’m gonna say something that a lot of people are gonna HATE, because of what it does to the usually preferred canons or headcanons of how Dick goes to live with Bruce after his parents die.

But there is one more reason that I prefer the juvie origin for Dick, beyond what I’ve said in the past, and its that....

There is no possible way for Dick to go straight to living with a single billionaire in his early twenties RIGHT after his parents died, or even just a week or two after that....unless Bruce abused the FUCK out of the system himself, in order to get Dick in his house.

And I don’t see any reason why Bruce would go to the lengths of bribes or calling in ‘favors’ that would be needed to expedite the OBSCENE amount of bureaucratic red tape he would need to navigate before any judge would let him become a minor’s sole guardian - especially considering he undoubtedly had no paperwork or had undergone any of the interviews or visitations or hoops demanded of prospective foster parents BEFORE they take in their first kid....

Unless he really truly had reason to believe that every viable alternative to him greasing the wheels like he HAD to have, in order to get Dick there with any kind of swiftness.....like, I honestly don’t see a mid-twenties Bruce Wayne, with his myriad of issues and his own self-image, honestly thinking that he’s SUCH a better candidate for taking care of this traumatized eight year old kid that he’s going to cut any corner he possibly can to speed up the process....unless he was utterly convinced the alternatives were so much worse.

Like say, if he found out that the system had decided the best thing for Dick was to be tossed into juvie.

I mean....the process for fostering a kid, becoming a legal guardian, ANY which way you go about that....its not as simple as just, signing a few papers. No matter WHO you are, UNLESS you leverage that ‘who you are’ bit to get people to step on the gas to a degree far beyond anything they’re supposed to allow.

It takes TIME.

And even in scenarios wherein Bruce takes Dick in as a kind of witness protection while Zucco is on the loose - first off, that’s far more unrealistic than even the juvie take because like....the police HAVE protocols for that sort of thing. They don’t just hand over a kid to the first civilian who steps up and volunteers.

Honestly, the canons and headcanons where Bruce just ‘arranges’ for Dick to come stay with him almost immediately after his parents’ murder....like, they honestly skeeve me even more than the juvie thing, because of how matter of fact people are about it? Y’know? Like nobody seems to see anything wrong with the idea that a billionaire just, with zero prior experience or qualifications just says “oh I’ll take this boy home with me” and everybody goes “yes sir, well you’re a billionaire so if you want him, you got him,” like....it treats Dick like a toy. That’s not how things work, and its not how things SHOULD work....and most importantly IMO, I can’t fathom Bruce thinking that he’s the best option for Dick to such a degree that he’d break all the rules in order to get custody that fast. For that matter, if he really could arrange all that, in spite of the way the process is supposed to go, then shouldn’t it beg the question “why couldn’t Bruce pull similar strings to ensure Dick could stay with the circus, the people there who clearly loved him and wanted him to stay?”

And honestly, I kinda feel like the way people have reduced that whole process to the shorthand of “well Bruce is the good guy and we know with the benefit of hindsight that he’s Dick’s dad in every way that counts, so of course Dick has to end up living with him, so why NOT quicken the process to just a few days”....like, I feel like that actually contributes a lot, albeit unintentionally, to this tendency to take Dick for granted both in universe and out of universe, because it lends this air of like...’only the destination matters, the end result.’ Which is usually how Dick gets screwed in most cases....because people only ever look at the end result of his stories, the last position he ends up with...and completely fail to consider any of the steps in between that happened along the way, and all the things that might have happened alongside each of those steps, that lends important context to his final position in a given story.

Like this idea that well Dick has to end up with Bruce, that’s the part that matters, so its not really all that important how or why.....I feel like that really has a lot to do with how it so often gets just accepted at face value that Dick’s the one in the wrong for keeping his distance from Bruce at later points in life, or for leaving the manor, or for digging in his heels with stuff....because it all loops back into this mindset that “everyone knows Bruce loves Dick, the best place for Dick is in the manor with Bruce, ergo, everything else - like how he comes to live with Bruce or his reasons for storming out of the manor - are semantics, irrelevant details, etc.”

Except...they’re not.

And so again, as an example like....you can’t really just cut out the entire process of Dick coming to live with Bruce...because it really, truly, EXTREMELY doesn’t make SENSE for Bruce to get custody that fast without having SOME kind of leverage.....and it similarly doesn’t make SENSE for him to think he’s so clearly the most qualified person to take in this traumatized kid (no matter how much he empathized with him), that he would circumvent the system he USUALLY is so militaristic about upholding as much as he possibly can, while still being a vigilante. And that last bit sure doesn’t feel in character for Bruce, from that particular angle.

UNLESS.

Unless he’d discovered the system had MASSIVELY FUCKED UP with Dick, and he no longer trusted it with him whatsoever....and so THEN he took matters into his own hands, and did whatever necessary to get custody of Dick ASAP - realistically helped along by the MASSIVE leverage Bruce would have had at his disposal if he threatened to publicize what they’d done to this eight year old orphan.

THAT, to me, feels far more realistic, and far more in character for Bruce....and it at no point takes for granted any of Dick’s own personal journey along the way, or renders it irrelevant or an unnecessary detail.

Idk, maybe its just me, but I’ve always been super uncomfortable with the level of detail fandom puts into fleshing out Jason and Tim’s backstories (and with precedent established by his taking in Dick, any of his later kids would have had very expedited custody arrangements....but that makes it MORE likely that the FIRST kid and the process of gaining custody of him would include hoops that later kids’ stories wouldn’t), while at the same time, hollowing out Dick’s origin story to a barebones outline of ‘well his parents died and then this and this happened and then he lived with Bruce and became Robin and happily ever after until he hit his teenage years and developed an attitude problem.’

Like, there’s just something very....unsettling about how much fandom has romanticized the idea that this billionaire with a quite frankly TERRIBLE public reputation, like this is a guy who has DEDICATED himself to appearing totally irresponsible as far as the rest of the world can tell.....and just....being like ‘oh hey, no big deal about this guy of all guys just being like hey I see you have an eight year old orphan there, howzabout I take him off your hands for you’...and fandom’s like....swoon. Y’know? I mean yes, WE know Bruce is a superhero, WE know that years of cute Batman and Robin and father and son bonding would lie ahead of those two after that.....but...ANY scenario in which Gotham is like....yeah we see no problems with just letting Brucie Wayne take a traumatized orphan home to live in his big old manor with him....like..yeah.

I mean, even as I’m typing this out, I’m thinking that yeah, there is something to be said for streamlining the process in the name of escapism, so that there’s a smoother, easier transition for this poor kid and he doesn’t have to go through so much.....BUT like at the same time, its one thing when we’re talking cute fluff stories and others when the angst is clearly a focal point of the story and yet the story STILL romanticizes this....Daddy Warbucks swoops in to save little Orphan Annie and like, this is definitively treated as like....nobody should be raising objections to this or being like wait a second....

Because the latter feels less like its being done in the name of escapism and more, like....in that sense I was talking about where it all loops back to how often Dick gets reduced to a prop within his own narratives like...things happen because they HAVE to happen, not because like....he’s a person going through things that inform the choices he makes and the things that happen from there, yknow?

Or maybe its one of those things where its like....I feel like that story is one that’s meant for a different time, at this point? Like, there WAS a time when the billionaire swooping in to take the poor orphan off to live in a manor was the kind of escapism people were looking for, but we do live in a different time now where I think most of us would agree like...wait, a decision that big deserves more than being treated like the billionaire just stops in to shop around for an orphan to accessorize with, kinda?

Idk, I feel like I’m not explaining this well, the precise reasons this disturbs me so much, which is why I’ve never posted about this particular angle before, but its been on my mind a lot lately, so maybe it makes more sense than I think it does here? LOL.

*Shrugs* Idk, I just honestly do feel in the long run and in the big picture, Dick’s personhood is ironically better preserved in the scenario where he was definitively stripped of it by an uncaring system and thrown into the last place he should’ve been....with Bruce then, upon discovering this, moving heaven and hell to see that personhood or awareness of personhood, more accurately, restored to Dick, no matter what it took, even if he had to do it himself. Because again, I also think that there’s a heeeeell of a lot of hubris in Bruce thinking that he was equipped to care for this kid right off the bat....and its not even that I don’t think he is (because I think Bruce really was a good father to Dick in their early years, and the majority of their problems arose later, when Bruce was unable to reconcile that this kid he’d once thought himself so alike to was growing into a man with his own ideas and choices that Bruce couldn’t understand or relate to).

Again, I think its more that I don’t truly see BRUCE actually having that degree of confidence that he’s truly a good fit for taking care of Dick, not being more worried that all his issues and his focus as Batman would be a deterrent....unless he had an external kick in the ass that made him feel like no, I don’t trust this job to anyone else at this point, so I HAVE to be up to the task myself, its that simple.

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