not to be a constant shill for comic Miguel but hear me out
we all love movie Miguel, he's huge and tortured, yes yes. But comic Miguel?
comic Miguel becomes Spider-Man and essentially takes on the role of an anti-corporate double agent. He gets thrown into NYC's downtown (literally down into the depths of the city) and when he comes back up, is disgusted with himself for living a cushy life and he goes back to help protect Downtown. My man practically has a religion based on him. Though he never wanted it, he accepts the role of Spider-man and constantly puts himself in danger and sacrifices his interpersonal relationships so he can keep saving people. He really gives a fuck. And, yes, he is actually funny. He's a wiseass with a dry sense of humor. He's a complex character and the '92 comic run is worth your time
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okay, so casper and nova, right? the casper and nova game is one big metaphor for simon and betty’s relationship. and the last thing we see in it is: nova tries to sacrifice herself so casper can get what he wants, and the choices are to either go with that, or nova lives but casper forgets her. and it’s obviously meant to parallel simon and betty’s situation in come along with me after they get swallowed by golb: either betty can sacrifice herself to keep simon safe, or she doesn’t but he goes back to being ice king. (um, that is, assuming that she was correct to think they might revert to the forms they had before getting digested after exiting golb. which is not something we have any actual evidence for. it was just a possibility that occurred to her and a risk she wasn’t willing to take.)
UM. EVERY PART OF THAT WAS BECAUSE OF DECISIONS BETTY MADE INDEPENDENTLY?
betty decides to jump through the portal when simon is trying to say goodbye to her, betty decides to fix the crown and then try to find a way to cure him even after he’s told her he’d rather die than be ice king again, betty decides to fucking summon golb, betty decides to push simon out of golb before he can react at all just in case the crown goes back to its former state once it leaves and just in case there’s no way to get rid of golb without its wish magic.
IT WAS BETTYS CHOICES IT WAS BETTYS CHOICES IT WAS ALL BETTYS OWN CHOICES THAT SHE MADE IT WAS BETTY BETTY WAS THE REASON THEY WERE IN THAT SITUATION
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I see your tags on the Wocky and Alita art, I would love to hear your thoughts on Alita actually!
I only need one person to show interest in what I have to say for me to talk forever and ever, thank you. HAHA Okay, in seriousness, this won't be as thorough/long as the Klavier post because... there really isn't much to her, but I find it extremely interesting how Alita falls into the same category of witnesses as April May and Dahlia without being — and I mean no offence to her when I say this — stunning? Like, with April and Dahlia, there's a very clear mass appeal to them which most people point out. Contrariwise, Alita's appearance is really only commented on by Trucy, and just glancing at her portrait, you can see that, without her slightly outlandish fashion, she's frankly nothing to write home about.
So why am I discussing this? Surely it's a little reductive to analyse female characters beginning with their appearances? Usually, yes, but that's the thing about this category of witnesses: their pretty faces aren't just pretty faces.
For April and Dahlia, their beauty is part of their arsenal. It functions as both their defence and their weapon of choice; they know how to wield it to bring people under their heel. Alita being ordinarily pretty instead of drop-dead gorgeous deprives her of that weapon and leads you to wonder how she became a mafia heiress to begin with. It also parallels her to Mimi Miney in a way that goes beyond the 'murderous nurse who worked for and killed her awful boss' comparison you get on the surface. Presumably, Alita, like Mimi, only got to where she was because she managed to fool the people around her into believing she was less dangerous than she actually is. Mimi did this by feigning stupidity and inviting people to underestimate her. Alita seems to do this by showing them what they want to see.
When she first meets Apollo and Trucy, Alita stays quiet and spends more time listening to them than she does talking. Once she has a hold on who they are, then she slips into her persona, and I find it interesting how she doesn't even attempt to come across as particularly delicate or lovelorn? Instead she goes for the relatively typical role of a distressed, indulgent loved one earnestly entreating Apollo for help. I'm inclined to say she does this because her read on Apollo makes her realise that he'd likely be exasperated or annoyed by such a person; but it's also almost as if she knows she doesn't have the disposition to pull off that frail, damsel-in-distress archetype and has resigned herself to being ordinary. Like how she looks. The next time she has to reapply her persona, Alita's appearing in court, and again she makes subtle adjustments that best suit her situation. The judge is old, so she takes a chance on expressing her dedication as a wife while balancing her dedication as a righteous citizen, which works. But oddly enough, despite her successes, I don't think Alita is actually good? At donning disguises? Everyone I've seen discuss this case has been able to guess almost immediately that she's the culprit, and maybe we're just prepped by past characters like her that have appeared, but I don't think she's even that convincing in the game.
Both the identities she assumes are risky manoeuvres that happen to fall in her favour, and she's not particularly dedicated to maintaining the front. When she asks Apollo to be Wocky's defence, she admits that marrying him is largely a chance at a more exciting life than some great love story; Plum Kitaki straight up says that there's a darkness in Alita she doesn't like, despite how docile Alita behaves in front of her; and Wocky has moments where he slips up and calls her things like, "imposter" and "fallen angel", implying that at least subconsciously, he knows she's not what she makes herself out to be. Even her general mannerisms don't greatly differ between her actual self and the mask who's blunt her claws — nothing is ever overtly coy or cutesy — and when Apollo brings up the fact she was Wocky's nurse, she drops the facade almost immediately. There's no waffling, no, "Whatever do you mean?"s or, "You're scaring me"s, just the statement, "I don't know what you mean by 'meaning', Mr. Justice!" delivered in a sudden cool, frosted steeliness.
And I think that steel is what really makes her different.
See, the other women are all driven to crime by some defining trait in themselves caused by their circumstances. For Dahlia, it's her desperate need to be free of the Fey clan; for Mimi, it's grief over her sister's unjust death; and for April, it's her fear of Redd White. You don't really get that with Alita. Instead of there being something dark in her life that leads her down this path, she just seems... tired. Tired of being "pretty enough" but not "gorgeous", tired of being the obedient nurse to the corrupt doctor, tired of being ordinary. There's no predatory external force pushing her into a corner, there's no abusive family beliefs pinning her down. There's just an ordinary life, lived dull and ordinarily, and she had had enough. So what does this girl, who's tired and ordinary in every way except the steel that lines her spine, do to get out of this?
She gambles.
Marrying into the mafia was a gamble, seeking Apollo as council was a gamble, shooting Dr. Meraktis was a gamble. Every decision she's made since she met Wocky has been a series of high-stakes gambles that leave her life on the line all so she won't be second-best anymore. This time, she was going to be the one on top. No matter what.
... And I'm sorry for loving evil women, but girlboss?? Girlboss???
I've heard people say they're disappointed that her "breakdown" is just an extension of her usual damage sprite, but it's honestly one of my favourite "breakdowns" in the series ever? Just because it isn't really one? Everything Alita has done up till now has been reckless, calculated risk, of course being convicted for murder is no different than losing in any other aspect of her life. Of course you're not going to get more than her damaged sprite, because this doesn't warrant a more dramatic reaction. She's lived this whole time knowing it could all come crashing down around her, and it finally did.
She made a bad bet. You caught her. Oh well.
The frosted girl of steel, standing tall to the very end. It's kind of sad that, even after all that, she's still seen as only second-best, incomparable to mimi, dahlia or any of the other women who've stood in her place.
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