#so we are just ignoring magneto's identity now

[victoriadallonfan]

um, so, first of all, I want to say that in general, I really really love reading your thoughts and essays on wildbow's writing, especially the parahumans series. It's genuinely enlightening and interesting a lot of the time.

However, I've noticed this kind of pattern where you see someone making a meta-textual argument ("doyalist" reasoning, commentary on the story in the context that it is a work of fiction), and you respond, or attempt to dispute the argument with a textual argument ("watsonian" explanation, talking about the story as events that happened, without the context that the story is fictional).... which ends up not actually addressing the metatextual point?

It's like, ok, one example would be something like magneto: there's an argument that the X-men stories are loosely inspired by the civil rights movement, with Professor X and Magneto being archetypically "moderate" and "extreme". This presents a significant issue when Magneto is depicted as unreasonable, needlessly violent, and antagonist, as, deliberate or not, this sends a negative message about figures perceived as more extreme (with Malcolm X being the most common example).

The is a meta-textual argument.

A meta-textual counter-argument might be "there are other characters in the X men universe who are 'extremists' but who are portrayed relatively positively, and additionally, the fact that (the hero) Prof X's name is similar to Malcolm X indicates the creators might have felt more generous to Malcolm X and similar people than the idea suggests".

However, a textual counter argument would be to ignore the real world connections and context of the original X-men context, and simply double down on talking about how much a villain Magneto is.... which is irrelevant. It doesn't actually address what the original argument is talking about.

melancholy-jouissance was talking about Tristan as an example. He acts in a shitty way towards Byron, crosses Byron's boundaries, and crimes are motivated by a desire for sex and romance.

What's worse is that there's a stereotype (both in fiction and in the public consciousness) of gay people being more sex-motivated and sexual than straight people are. Depicting Tristan as being more sexual, and more sexually motivated than his identical twin brother plays into this stereotype in an extremely damaging way.

Deliberately or not, it sends a bad message, and is a bad representation of gay men.

(on top of this, separate from the representation thing, it's just extremely unpleasant to read as a bisexual person)

However, instead of addressing any of this, your response was to point out, with a sequence of excerpts, what Tristan did wrong, as if he was a real person on trial?

Which, is like, those are well researched, well formatted points, but you aren't actually engaging with the argument being presented to you.

If anything, bringing up these other things that Tristan did wrong kind of proves melancholy's point... doesn't it?

I don't know. I do enjoy reading your ideas and analysis, and this ask isn't meant to be calling you out or anything like that, but I do think that there's a lot here (and in similar debates) that you're missing.

Let me counter argue this in your Magneto way:

Let’s say’s that there is a panel where Magneto is on trial for trying to murder a human. And the human is saying he needs to face justice for his attempted murder. A tumblr post says, “Wow, I can’t believe Marvel thinks that Magneto was wrong for fighting back against his oppressors!”

Now, let’s say that the panel was cut out of a larger strip* and we see that he was actually going to murder another mutant before the human pushed the both of them to safety (the mutant does not know he saved his life). And we learn that said mutant was and is prominent Mutant Rights activist, who was targeted by Magneto for associating with human allies pushing for their cause.

The panel is taken out of context of a particular scene so that Marvel is made to be promoting something that isn’t true. The reality is that Magneto is framed as wrong because he was being a murderous asshole, not for wanting mutant rights.

There is a BIG difference between “Hey, Wildbow is ignorant on tropes and needs to be more world weary before tackling such heavy topics” and “Wildbow is a massive homophobe and the text clearly points to him hating people who want gay sex!”

I agree with the former, but the latter is just dramatization and dishonest to be blunt.

[punkasite]

                                𝐆𝐎𝐈𝐍’ 𝐑𝐎𝐆𝐔𝐄 !

formerly ONLYROGUE — an rp blog for ROGUE OF MARVEL COMICS. Pulling from 616 PRIMARILY but with verses for xmcu, evo, mcu etc and pulling inspo from some of them. PLEASE READ HER BIO FOR DETAILED INFO ABOUT HER DIVERGENCIES.

PLEASE NOTE ! I have not been following the comics at all since at least 2020 or so due to increasing displeasure with how characters like Rogue are written. I do not agree with rog.ue/re.my being married now and I do not like how they're being written as characters now that they're together. I will not rp it or acknowledge it at all in it's canon form. I ignore or edit a lot of events from the last 20ish years of comics at least with her and I don't budge on that.

Rogue is NOT a southern belle bombshell she's a girl from the wrong side of the river. If you look back and how she was originally built in the 80s and nearly any time Clairemont gets a hold of her again she is nothing like you see in more modern comics and TAS — she's actually much closer to her evo interpretation and I stick to that. Rogue is punk and alt and "low class" and coarse and rough on every edge. A venn diagram of her hobbies and Logan's would be almost a circle. Rogue gave up on trying to act like a lady when she was 19 and she ain't making that cringe ass mistake ever again.

    GSITE DIRECTORY  | 𝙼𝙴𝙼𝙴 𝚃𝙰𝙶 | 𝙷𝙴𝙰𝙳𝙲𝙰𝙽𝙾𝙽𝚂 | 𝙿𝙻𝙰𝚈𝙻𝙸𝚂𝚃 | 𝙿𝙸𝙽𝚃𝙴𝚁𝙴𝚂𝚃

written by TRAIN ( 𝙴𝚂𝚃.𝙏𝙃𝙀𝙔/𝙏𝙃𝙀𝙈 ) follows back from @mosiaks ( pinned under minor renovation )

               est. aug 2018 & remade jan 2020 | remade as punkasite jun 2023

Characterization Notes:

Rogue and the X-Men

Rogue has a weird relationship with the X-Men. She goes to them begging for help at 17 and is met with hostility and an ultimatum. She goes from being a child soldier for her mothers to a child soldier for Xavier. Even when the initial hostility dies down, Rogue's relationships are very fraught and she's generally kept at a certain distance intentionally or no. We see on several occasions in comics set during this time and when anyone cares to remember how her powers work and effect her life Storm (and others but I remember Storm the best because it was a plot point) recoil from Rogue and generally be scared of being too physically close to her.

Rogue's powers both make her a mutant and are exactly the kind of thing that make mutants want to keep her at an arm's length. She painfully steals your mutation and some of your identity, it's natural for people to not want to get too close. But it does create issues. She may be considered a valued member etc etc but how she's tried socially inside of mutant circles is inconsistent. Some see her power as inherently evil, some are just scared of being touched and it shows. Even when people do their best to include her she can tell when people are scared and trying to act like they're not and it incentivizes her to stay on the fringes. So while she has a few people in the X-Men she's close to and loves dearly she's largely an outsider from them socially.

Rogue's Politics and Ethics

Following on that last part another reason Rogue is on the fringes of x-society is her politics. While she's unlearned some of the radicalism she was raised on she's still more on the end of people like Mystique and Magneto because no matter what you say about them, their methods etc — they have some very good points. Rogue's own life experiences in places like Genosha and her work as both a member of the Brotherhood and an X-Man have led her to holding some of Xavier's optimism and desire to solve things peacefully when able while also being more than willing to kill if needed. She's usually not as radical as her mother or Magneto but she's also one of the first to suggest something radical or Kinda Iffy as a plan of action.

Along with this Rogue's ethics are inconsistent. She contradicts herself and seems to function almost entirely on vibes from the outside and she knows this. This is in large part a bi-product of her powers. Her powers leave her with huge amounts of accumulated psychic residue from everyone she touches and there's very little indication anyone actually helps her with this in the comics (Xavier even calls himself out on this in the comics lol rip). This means that even while she's working very hard to simply Be Rogue™, her thoughts, feeling, opinions and memories can be affected by that residue without her being aware. So her opinions and ethics can change within a breath. She is aware of this. It's part of why she HATES when people try to use her as a tie-breaker.

Rogue is Mentally Ill

Related to the ethics thing and how psychic residue effects it. Rogue is not stable mentally, even when she's the only person in her head she's not really 100%. While there's literally nothing in real life that maps out to her issues the closest would likely be the very board category of delusion and psychosis related illnesses. Rogue can wake up utterly convinced she is a completely different person and then have a meltdown when she sees her own face in the mirror. Her understanding of the world can be extremely confused and disjointed. For all her propensity to loner behavior and isolation she's realistically someone who actually does need something like a caretaker or Designated Person™ to help her keep track of things and work with her when she struggles.

Rogue has a tendency to Go Rogue

In a lot of ways Rogue is actually very reliable and dependable. If you're on the job with her she will not make any totally bonkers harebrained decisions. Even if she goes off script it's likely for a good reason and is thought thru in her own weird ass way. She's also prone to bugging out when emotionally/mentally distraught or feeling socially unwanted/pressured etc. Her two biggest reactions are "beat the shit out of em" or "runaway and never ever come back". Both of these cause huge problems for everyone. She's been doing this since she was 6 and she's not changing now. She can also just get an idea in her head and fuck off on her own to investigate. Like you cannot guarantee Rogue'll be to the meeting on time but you can be sure she's On Her Bullshit in one way or another.

[lazydoodlesandfanfic]

Translate (Magneto X Daughter!Reader)

Characters: Erik Lehnsherr X Daughter!Reader

Universe: Marvel, Xmen

Warnings: None

May I request a Magneto with a daughter he never knew about imagine? She grew up as german and a non-mutant and she suspects that these will be red flags for her father. Charles her sort of foster father tries to encourage her to talk to Eric but she doesn't dare. Later Eric witnesses her trying to learn his native language, trying to connect with him. But she is frustraded due to the lack of progress. They talk all of it out and he offers to help her learn?

A simple life was something you had grown up with, growing up in a small town in Germany, full of innocence with a blissful naivety to the world’s issues. However, as you had grown older, entering your teenage years, you became more aware of the outside world, and even more aware that your mother had been trying to keep you ignorant to things you were tied into. The biggest secret was your father’s identity: Erik Lehnsherr. 

At first the name didn’t mean anything to you. You had no idea who he was, which just confused you as to why you had to push so hard, ending in a literal argument with your mother to get his name. That was, until she provided you with the name you were more familiar with.

Magneto. 

Now it made sense. 

Everyone of course knew who he was, and more importantly the sort of things he had been involved with. His entire history was well documented- his childhood, how his powers were developed, and what he went on to do. His opinions or morale were clear to see, and despite it all, it was that that made you hesitate to seek him out. So instead, you went to your next best source, his old friend who was known for being more welcoming and kind, Charles Xavier. 

Admittedly as soon as you arrived in New York, you had wished you had took some more lessons in English, being totally overwhelmed and lost in the large city. You’d only learnt what you had thought had been necessary, and had wasted a good day just trying to communicate where you were trying to reach to random people who wanted to help you, only for most of them to give you a dirty look and walk away when you finally got through to them. Eventually you just reached the point of going up to taxi drivers and pointing to a map where you had the manor circled, until you finally got one willing to take you there.

You got there, walking up to the main door and knocking, and as you waited for an answer you realised that you didn’t know enough English to ask Charles questions about your father. You really hadn’t thought this through had you? However, that became the least of your concerns when you got a response to the door and the one to open the door was no other than your father. 

“Hello?” He asked, seeing your mouth open and close like a fish in hesitation, before you stuttered. 

“U-Um… bad… English.” You hesitated, your accent very clearly coming through, and that was when you saw him look you up and down. This really wasn’t going as intended. You looked down, trying to think of your next actions, when you were interrupted by someone else coming to the door.

“Erik, you better not be scaring the poor girl.” The British voice scorned, and when you saw the Professor, you tried not to act to relieved. “How can we help?” 

“She doesn’t speak English very well…” Erik spoke up for you, though you didn’t understand him. . “She’s German.” 

“Ah, not an issue, please follow me.” Charles smiled, his mind translating into yours, surprising you for a moment, before you smiled and followed after him, looking down as you passed by Erik. 

Charles took you to his study, and you came and sat down in front of his desk, though he stayed on the same side of your desk, though gave you space. “Now I wouldn’t usually look into people’s minds, though due to the language barrier it is necessary. So, how can I help?” He asked you, still telepathically. If anything the whole thing made you feel better, knowing Eric couldn’t be able to hear what was being said, and so you didn’t hesitate to start to tell him your whole situation, and you watched his expression shift from intrigue, to surprise, to seriousness, before he smiled reassuringly. “Well it must have been quite the shock when he opened the door. You can stay here as long as you like, and there’s a student here named Kurt who’s German and who might help you as you tried to decide on how to proceed.” 

That led you to where you were now, sat in the Library with Kurt, Jean, Scott and Jubilee. The rest of them were studying while you were trying to learn English with their help, mostly Kurt’s. You had gotten a lot better, but it seemed that whenever you were forced to speak to Erik, your mind forgot it all and you reverted back to German, and then you were too scared to talk to him. You wanted to talk to him in English, the language he was far more comfortable with. It just felt right, and so until you were to that point, you refrained from telling him. However, it would seem that he had picked up that you had information you had to share with him, and he was always turning up and staying nearby to you as you were trying to learn and avoid him, making your life that little bit harder. 

The bell rang through the school, announcing lunch was over and it was time for your friends to head to their lessons, while you attempted to learn alone. “Wirst du alleine in Ordnung sein?” Kurt asked you as he stood with the others, from which you nodded with a small smile, which he returned before they all left for their classes, and you looked back at your notes.

You had been writing down basically a summary of your life- your mother, your up bringing, and how you found out about your parentage and had been learning how to say it in english and also some branched off answers to questions that might get thrown at you, as suggested by your friends. You had also been learning English in general just in case you missed anything, and while school lessons in English were helping and you were doing okay at simple sentences, you were still struggling. You were starting to think if this was really worth it. What if you told him and he wanted nothing to do with you? You had also recently found out you had an older brother who also hadn’t informed Erik he had kids, so you too had quietly been bonding in broken English/German over the awkwardness of being around him with this knowledge and also being siblings, and questioning if there were any more kids Erik didn’t know about, which had become a sort of joke between you two. 

You sighed in frustration, looking at the main sentence you had been trying to learn. 

I have something I need to tell you. I am your daughter. 

You knew it in German, you knew what you needed to say, but it never sounded right when you tried to say it, and you were scared it would come our wrong, and he wouldn’t understand. Why did this have to be so difficult? 

“What are you working on?” The voice made you jump, and on instinct you slid some other papers on top of that specific piece, covering it with other sentences which were a lot more innocent and easy to explain, and you were glad you did as when you turned you saw the man in question. 

“U-Um… trying to get better with my English.” You told him, fidgeting a little, pointing at the papers on the desk, and he peered over at them, and you sat back in your seat to give him space despite how close he was, and your heart was pounding, and your eyes scanned to make sure that paper was covered. 

“What is it you’re struggling with?” He asked, standing back up, though he still hovered.

“Well… mostly saying big words.” You explained to him, pointing to some words. “Like…” You hovered over one word, trying to remember how to pronounce it correctly. Erik chuckled. 

“Squirrel?” He asked, and you nodded. “English is a complicated language, however I can tell you’ve already improved greatly.” He complimented as he pulled a seat up beside you. 

“Thank you.” You accepted shyly, glancing over at him, before you looked down, an awkward silence falling over you both. 

“Are you afraid of me?” He asked suddenly, taking you by surprise as you looked up at him. 

“No- well… it’s complicated. More afraid to talk to you than you yourself… if that makes sense…” You fumbled, playing with the edge of one of your pieces of paper. His head tilted a little, a slight crease between his eyebrows. 

“Afraid to talk to me… is there something you’d like to say?” He asked. You nodded. “You can tell me, I promise I won’t be angry or upset.” He assured.

“I don’t know how.” You told him, before pointing back at your papers, and he seemed to realise what you were trying to say. 

“Is it a particular word?” He asked, and you nodded again. “Which one?” He asked, looking at your sheets of paper, and part of you- no, all of you panicked. This wasn’t how you intended for him to find out- what if he was upset? However, before you could come up with an excuse or back up plan, he had tried to lay out all the papers to see, and saw that piece of paper. The piece of paper with that sentence on it. Your admission. You did nothing but kept your hands in your lap as you watched closely and with a held breath as he picked it up, and read it. Repeatedly. Slowly. You weren’t sure, but he was taking his time, however, as he looked up at you, you wished he took even more time. “...Who is this for?” He asked, though you already knew he knew who it was for. You were worried he wasn’t going to keep his promise, before he took a deep breath in, and put the paper down before looking at you. “Möchten Sie darüber sprechen? Von Anfang an?”

Hope you like it! If you have any questions, please send them in! 

*Not my gif

TAGS:  @klanceiscannon14 @waywardemo @marvelhoeingismyhobby-blog​ @bellamyblakemorley @dummiesshort  @courtneychicken​  @graysonmalfoy​ @bellero​ @originalpottervengerlock​ @supernatural-pan​ @esoltis280​ @lady-of-lies​ @sebstanismylife​ @macbetheliza @mandywholock1980​ @cdwmtjb8​ @caswinchester2000​ @determinedpines​ @huntheimpossible

#marvel #xmen #erik lehnsherr #Charles Xavier #professor x #magneto #erik lehnsherr x reader #erik lehnsherr x fem!reader #erik lehnsherr x daughter!reader #magneto x reader #magneto x fem!reader #magneto x daughter!reader #x reader #x fem!reader #x daughter!reader #reader #fem!reader #daughter!reader #oneshot #writing #story writing #question #request #ask questions #ask me anything #send me anything #send me asks #send me questions

[sammysdewysensitiveeyes]

Marauders #22

I absolutely hated this issue, so be warned that’s a lot of salt here, and my usual whining, so skip this post if you’re not in the mood for that.  Also spoilers below.

First impression - what absolute, self-indulgent horseshit.  I hesitate to use “fanfic” in a derogatory way, but a lot of Marauders has read as being very “fanfic” in terms of self-indulgence, and greatly favoring certain characters while denigrating others.  I actually don’t think that’s a bad thing in fanfic.  It can be annoying to read if that’s not what you’re looking for (or it can be wonderful, if it IS what you’re looking for), but ultimately, fanfic is all about self-indulgence.  It’s about writing what you want to see in a story, and if Duggan’s Marauders was someone’s actual fanfic, I wouldn’t have anything bad to say about it.  I might dislike the characterization, and probably wouldn’t read it, but it ultimately wouldn’t matter because it’s fanfic.  Frankly, I’m just as bad about constantly centering everything around Pyro (and finding ways to work him into stories where he doesn’t even belong), because I’m writing just for myself, so I can be self-indulgent.  But I’d expect much better from a professional writer.  I’d expect much better from someone being paid to write a team book.  I’d expect a god-damn balanced book that actually pays attention to the whole cast and gives a thoughtful interpretation to ALL the characters, even the villains, rather than a book dedicated to shining a spotlight on two already well-established characters, and treating them like queens who step all over the rest of the cast. 

So, we ignore almost everything set up at the Gala, including the attack on Christian and the Marauder (the ship) being set ablaze.  Why aren’t the characters handling that, Duggan?  Is that really being saved for another month?  We don’t even know if Christian is dead or not, you can’t even spare a panel for Iceman reacting to this?  Instead, we tell a flashback story that eventually reveals that Lourdes Chantel is still alive, and Emma helped her fake her own death to escape from an abusive Sebastian.

What exactly is the point of this story, in terms of the overall Marauders arc?  Will Lourdes show up later to play a role?  Is this meant to further push Sebastian along some kind of path to redemption (recognizing that he drove Lourdes away with his actions).  Because so far, Duggan doesn’t seem the slightest bit interested in rehabilitating Sebastian.  This seems like yet another story establishing Emma GOOD, Sebastian BAD, the same message that’s been getting pounded into the readers’ heads for 22 issues.  Like, we KNOW, Duggan.  We know that you think the sun shines out of Emma’s ass, you’ve already well-established that you think she’s a brilliant, wonderful, compassionate, badass queen, through 22 issues of centering the entire series around her, at the expense of EVERY other fucking character in the book (even sometimes Kate, the other obvious favorite).  It’s gotten beyond tiresome at this point.  Like, I feel like even people who love Emma and hate Sebastian are getting bored by now, because it’s not even good storytelling to have a strawman villain who is no real threat just getting repeatedly knocked down.

So, Duggan has taken both Sebastian and Emma, and further removed any kind of complexity or nuance from them.  Sebastian can’t have a kind or tender side, he can’t ever be shown in a positive light.  His relationship was Lourdes was previously part of his tragic origins, pushing him to be a worse person than he’d been in a past, but no, lets retcon him to be a controlling abuser, whom Lourdes is desperate to escape.  Because it makes Sebastian look bad and Emma look good.  Honestly, it would have been more interesting and powerful to have Lourdes come back from the dead, and be disgusted by the person Sebastian has become.  That would actually have an impact.

And by the way, why did Lourdes need Emma’s help in establishing her new identity?  She was already part of the Hellfire Club, she’s the one who brought Sebastian in, she’s rich as fuck.  Lourdes should be well capable of getting away from Sebastian on her own.  She might need Emma’s help for faking her own death, but the rest of it?  Emma should just do a little hacking to access Lourdes’ personal fortune and transfer it into a new account, and then she’s good to go.  But no, Lourdes has to be treated like a little lost lamb, a helpless battered woman for Emma to rescue.  And Emma’s deal with the Kingpin further exonerates Emma for her past crimes, because obviously, she’s just working off the debt she incurred helping poor, innocent Lourdes!  It can’t be that Emma did bad things in the past because she was ambitious, cruel, vain, and power-hungry, she has to be a woke queen who was always there to help other women.

I think Duggan thinks he’s being feminist with all this, with the “women help each other,” message, and either ignoring or villifying all the male characters.  But he’s not.  It’s not feminist to take a very complex, interesting, powerful woman like Emma Frost and completely remove all responsibility and agency for her past crimes by turning her into an abuse victim and repeatedly retconning her to be better than she actually was.  (To be fair, Duggan is just continuing a trend already started by other writers).  Emma is ambitious, power-hungry, cruel, callous, self-absorbed, vain and snobby.  But she is also brave, intelligent, compassionate, kind, protective, heroic, and self-sacrificing.  All of those things are part of Emma.  She is a teacher who loved her students, and the love for those students is part of what sent Emma on her long, difficult path towards redemption.  Yes, she’s a badass queen, but she is also a flawed individual, who has worked to overcome those flaws and become a better person.  And constantly re-writing the past to make her an “always good” abuse victim who only ever committed crimes because the big bad men forced her into it cheapens that redemption.

Speaking of cheap redemption -     

The Wilhelmina subplot: Wow, Duggan really will prioritize ANY character over Bishop, Iceman and Pyro, won’t he?  I know this is me throwing a tantrum, because “Wah, Duggan is writing someone other than my favorites!” but after 22 issues I feel justified in this whining.  Iceman, Bishop and Pyro are supposed to be regular cast members, and so far Duggan has given more serious development and emotional scenes to Callisto, Forge, Dolores (the human contact at the X-Desk), Masque, Jumbo Carnation, Magneto, the Cuckoos, and now Wilhelmina.  I don’t mind the development for many of those characters, I like Callisto and Forge and Jumbo (although I’m a little annoyed at the Magneto stuff, since he’s already front and center in the Krakoa era, and about to star in a mini-series, does he really need more time in the spotlight?).  But honestly?  Fuck Wilhelmina.  I was never that interested in the Hellfire brats, and I’m not the slightest bit interested in watching the retcon redemption of a character that murders animals for fun.  Why does she get a spotlight story while the three dudes on the team STILL haven’t gotten anything more than vague background hints of character arcs.  I mean, compare the very emotional flashback and Wilhelmina’s breakdown to the half-assed, mostly taking place off- panel “redemption” that Duggan has given Pyro.  Just a single line of “maybe this crew is bringing out the best in me,” with no lead-up, no further reflection, no hints about Pyro changing his ideas before then.  Why did you even put Iceman, Bishop and Pyro on the team if you’re not going to use them, Duggan?  Because you’ve made it quite clear that you’d rather write ANY character other than them.  I can’t even look forward to Tempo and Banshee joining the cast next issue, even though I like them (and I really want to see more development of Tempo), because I know they will be yet more characters that get pushed into the foreground, while Iceman, Bishop and Pyro remain the underdeveloped background clown trio.    

Also, it seems kind of offensive to have a cruel, murderous female character, and then say that her cruelty is entirely due to sexual abuse?  What kind of message does that send to sexual abuse victims?  That it will turn you into a monster?  Why do female villains keep getting sexual abuse as part of their backstory?  Why can’t they just be bad?  Or have something else going on?  So the Cuckoos flip a switch in Wilhelmina and she’s magically “fixed,” or at least on her way to better?  Again, I think Duggan thinks he’s being feminist with this, but he’s not. 

At least Wllhelmina has been a recurring villain in this series, so I can kinda see how her potential redemption may move the plot along, but Duggan is still introducing new plot threads, while leaving so many others dangling.  What about Christian?  What about Shinobi and Fenris?  Will Bobby and Christian ever even speak to each other again?  Will the supposed main cast members of Iceman, Bishop and Pyro ever, EVER get a proper character arc?

Or will we get an entire issue of Emma, Kate and the Cuckoos giving Wilhelmina a redemptive make-over, because girl power, amiright?

#not tagging on purpose #not trying to gum up the tags with my extreme salt #but seriously this was my least favorite issue so far #at least the revenge issue just destroyed Sebastian's body not his character #really fuck this nonsense it was terrible

[thebibliomancer]

Essential Avengers: Avengers #235: Havoc on the Homefront!

September, 1983

Welcome to the Wizard’s Mansion of Mechanized Mayhem!

This cover has got it going on!

Where “it” is “multiple things.”

Still, I love covers that are just like ‘here’s a couple things happening today’ and this is a great version of that concept with the things being viewing screens that the Wizard is looking at.

He’s watching the Avengers in various peril channel.

This is a good cover!

So last time: uh, a couple things. Wasp called Vision and Scarlet Witch in as reservists when Annihilus tried to blow up the universe with an invisible dome. The two basically contributed nothing but Vision was thrown into a robotic coma.

Wanda and Vision in a tube moved into the mansion while he recovers and Wanda recapped her entire backstory including new retcon that Magneto is totally her dad.

Then she had a Dr. Strange crossover. Since it also involved Monica, two Avengers makes it notable enough to synopsize in brief. And its titled Assault on Avengers Mansion! so its like its baiting me.

Dr. Strange astral projects to bother Wanda when she’s trying to get some grief reading in. He wants to find the Darkhold and she’s the last known possessor or vice versa because thats when she was possessed by Cththon and had to be saved with a care bear stare from the Avengers. But Dr. Strange really wants the Darkhold to stop Dracula from getting it. Yes, Dracula.

Since the Darkhold is being stored in a vault at Avengers Mansion after Beast brought it back from Wundagore, Dracula’s cult attacks and manages to break into the Mansion. Dr. Strange, Wanda, and Captain Marvel all fight off Dracula’s cult and then Dr. Strange trolls Dracula by teleporting the Darkhold somewhere else.

Also, Avengers Mansion got trashed in a break-in in Fantastic Four #257. Dammit. Whats with all the intertextuality in this era?

So that story there is: mostly a lot of Galactus eating the Skrull homeworld and fallout from aforementioned Annihilus story. Only the last two pages are relevant.

Mr. Fantastic shows up to Avengers Mansion to check on Vision, Wanda goes to make him tea, and then he’s teleported to a space trial leaving a giant melted hole in the mansion.

Honestly, I don’t know why FF got asterisked instead of the Dr. Strange issue. They both messed up the mansion but the Dracula cult was more of a break-in than someone leaving a giant hole in the wall. Although that’s more mysterious.

Anyway, with two different ‘read this also’s between issues that messed up the mansion, no wonder the opening splash has to be devoted to a repair crew patching things up.

Wasp is putting her size-shifting to good use to literally micro-manage. Zipping around at tiny size telling everyone how to do their job.

Captain America who is also supervising and impressing people with how buff he is gets annoyed and goes to tell her to stop but stops himself.

Captain America: No... No. She’s in charge here, and I have to let her handle things as best she can. Her methods do seem to bring results... They’re just not my methods, that’s all. Yeah...

And then he sulks off, ignoring Wasp when she asks what he’s muttering to himself.

Hm. The new leader honeymoon period is off, it seems. Cap was Wasp’s biggest supporter as chairperson and now he’s grumbling and second-guessing.

Dang.

I hope this isn’t snapback to Wasp not being leader because she’s flighty and silly. I hope we’re not just going to do that.

Cap wanders over to where Vision-inna-tube and Wanda are. Wanda is still glued to Vision’s side. And either Wanda can read minds or Cap says something between panels because we have Cap wondering in a thought bubble whether if Vision has shown any signs of improvement and then Wanda answering that he hasn’t shown improvement or worsened.

Cap(tain) America: “Well, don’t let yourself get too worried, Wanda. That husband of yours has been through worse scrapes than this. He’ll pull through!”

Scarlet Witch: “When you say it, Cap, I can really believe it!”

Inspirational Cap! Charisma rolls: Very.

Still, Wanda is sad because Vision is lying in a tube helpless and she can’t even touch him.

Cap wanders off again, without even saying goodbye (rude) while musing how much it sucks.

Cap: Blast it! Those kids were just starting to make a life for themselves, and this had to happen! Why was it that of all the Avengers who went up against the threat of Annihilus -- it had to be a couple of reservists who suffered most?

And then starts musing how weird it is that Scarlet Witch and Vision as reservists since they were active Avengers for so long!

Remember, Wanda joined the Avengers not very long after Cap did! Only a couple months in-universe! She was one of his Kooky Quartet!

Cap: At times I wondered if the Avengers would survive -- but somehow, through all the tumult and changes, the team not only survived -- it grew stronger! I pray it always will... with the menaces we so often face, we can’t afford to weaken. We’ve gone through so many changes lately. We’ve picked up two fine new Avengers in Captain Marvel and the She-Hulk, but we’ve lost Hank Pym... and now we’ve lost Iron Man, too. Even Thor has taken himself off the active roster to pursue a personal mission. I hope he won’t be gone too long.

Cap is clearly in some sort of dour Mood.

A dour and monologue-y mood.

And what’s Thor up to leaving the team roster OFF PANEL?

(Sigh)

Well, since the asterisk is telling me to see Thor #334... oh geez, Don Blake is under suspicion of killing Jane Foster. Thor, and Lady Sif take Keith Kincaid (the non-Thor love interest of Jane) on a trip to get the Runestaff (long story) and restore Jane Foster (long story).

Annoyingly, the Thor issue does show him telling the Avengers he’s going to be gone for a while and to take him off the active roster. And borrowing a Quinjet.

I think that it would have been nice to see at least a panel of that. Or something. I don’t want the book bloated with ‘see alsos’ but I’m confused why it put the most emphasis on the FF one when it was literally two pages where Reed manages to ruin the wall while getting kidnapped.

Whatever.

Anyyyyway.

Even though he thinks the new Avengers are good, Cap worries about having both Thor and Iron Man off the team.

Especially Iron Man.

He was their science/technical guy. And on the current team, the only one with any sort of science expertise is new trainee Starfox.

Who is busy making out and not being on time for his daily training session.

At least he remembers that he has a prior obligation.

And he’s only two minutes late. Or to put it another way, he’s a whole two minutes late. And Cap(tain America) is a notable stickler for punctuality.

Cap: “Punctuality may be an anachronism in this day and age -- and, for all I know, it may be unheard of on the planet Titan -- but in my day, it was something that was expected of people!”

Wow, Cap really pulled a ‘in my day.’

Frankly, I’m surprised he doesn’t pull that more often.

Starfox does seem contrite and apologizes for putting pleasure before business which sends Cap into an introspection about why he’s really being so harsh on Starfox.

Protip: It’s Tony. It’s almost always Tony.

Cap: Pleasure versus duty, that’s what it always comes down to. It was Tony Stark’s ‘pleasure’ which led him to giving up his Iron Man identity... leaving the Avengers. Some ‘pleasure’! He’s crawled so far into the bottle, he may never get back out. And there’s nothing I can do to pull him out... Nothing any of us can do, unless he lets us. That’s what’s really bothering me... isn’t it?

And he accepts the apology with a “just don’t let it happen again.”

You sound so old sometimes, Cap.

Meanwhile, She-Hulk is off on a jog through New York, listening to some Beach Boys’ California Girls.

An overeager driver scoots forward and cuts her off at the crosswalk and (I assume) in frustration, she punches the hood of the car.

And given it’s She-Hulk, she kinda punches a hole IN the hood. And probably engine.

The guy being either an idiot or incredibly unperceptive runs after She-Hulk to grab her arm and yell at her.

She does not care for that at all.

Like, why would you? She’s seven feet tall and green and just punched a hole in the hood of your car.

Luckily for the guy’s skeletal integrity, Spider-Man pops out of nowhere to be Friendly Neighborhood and mediate this conflict.

They both air their grievances.

She-Hulk: “This creep grabbed me!”

Creep: “Hey! She... she crunched the front of my car!”

She-Hulk: “That was you who cut me off in the crosswalk? You’re lucky I didn’t rip out your axle!”

Spider-Man: “Now, now! Let’s keep this friendly! Sounds like you’re in the wrong, chum! The lady had the light!”

Creep: “Lady?!? She’s no --!”

Spider-Man: “I wouldn’t say that if I were you! That’s the She-Hulk, dummy! Remember what she did to your car? Well, just imagine what she could do to you!”

Creep: “Oh yeah.”

And with the power of Spider-Man’s bomb-ass mediation, the guy realizes that he was in the wrong, apologizes, and leaves in a hurry.

(Her skeptical glare cracks me up for some reason)

Moral of the story: Don’t be a jerk. Stay behind the line when the little man is lit up.

After the guy takes off, She-Hulk praises(?) Spider-Man’s amazing mediation skills by saying he should have been a lawyer. And then they catch up.

She-Hulk is still having trouble adjusting to the East Coast lifestyle and lack of beaches so Spider-Man suggests checking out the Jersey Shore.

She-Hulk: “My big problem right now is housing. Avengers Mansion is nice, but I want a place of my own.”

Spider-Man: “It’s tough -- rents are pretty steep.”

She-Hulk: “The real trouble is finding a place I like. With the thousand a week I get as an Avenger, rent’s no big deal.”

Spider-Man: “I guess not, if you’re making a... a thousand A WEEK?!? I passed up a chance to become an Avengers, and they make $1000 a week?!? Oh, NO!!”

Ha ha, that ol’ Parker luck.

Maybe Thor should have mentioned the money when he tried to recruit Spidey.

Meanwhile, at a federal penitentiary in Vermont, a scene change.

Bentley Wittman, aka the Wizard, aka the Wingless Wizard, aka the adult man who thought the best use of his time was bullying a teenager, is being questioned about Plantman Sam Smithers’ escape from jail.

The Wizard claims that he knows nothing about Plantman’s escape and that he barely knows the guy anyway. They were airlifted from Ryker’s in the same helicopter and that’s it.

But a convenient x-ray tells a different story.

And that story is that “the Wizard” doesn’t have any skeleton bones.

... Were we really at the point in 1983 where we didn’t know about the dangers of overexposure to x-rays? They just causally scan both “the Wizard” and the guy questioning him?

Anyway, the ruse being rumbled, the fake Wizard rips the bars out of a window and jumps out to his death.

Or it would be death if he wasn’t just animate wood wearing a fake skin suit.

Kinda gross if you think about it.

Anyway, where is the real the Wizard?

Obviously, he escaped jail a while back. Not only is he a sinister criminal mastermind who has sinister masterminding to mastermind but also he was tired of the prison hair code. Because dammit, he wants to rock the goatee!

(Literally a comment he makes, calling the prison barbers butchers)

The Real Wizard gets a BLIP-BLIP-BLIP priority alert that informs him that the plant-him has been discovered which means that the authorities will be looking for him now.

Wizard: Now every law officer in the nation will be looking for me. Well, let them! They’ll not find me, unless they look here! And if they do look here, they’ll have a fight on their hands! The Wizard will not bolt and run like some common criminal! My home is my fortress! They’ll never get me out of it! Never!

Anyway, within an hour of the discovery of Plant-Wizard, a disgruntled agent of the national security council named Mr. Sirkorski receives a briefing.

Usually, this problem would be Gyrich’s problem but he’s busy somewhere else, probably making mutants miserable if I had to guess.

-checking- Yup, he’s over in the X-books, being involved in Project: Wideawake, the project that will later accidentally shoot Storm with a demutantifying gun that will take away her powers, leading her to kick Cyclop’s ass, leading to him leaving the team and feeling sad about being happily married.

Wow, Gyrich, you’re the worst.

Anyway, since the Wizard is tied to the presidential hostage crisis via Plantman, that makes it Serious Business.

Hence, Mr. Sikorski’s serious business.

And he hates it.

He hates this bonkers superhero universe. He just wants to live in a spy thriller universe without all this specific nonsense.

Mr. Sikorski: “Oh, great! Plant-Men... criminal scientists... prison breaks! Don’t they think I have enough to do, just keeping track of what the Russians are up to?”

Also Mr. Sikorksi, on the following page: “And it’s up to me to call in the appropriate parties. I feel a little weird doing this! It’s hard enough for me to believe there are such things as Avengers! I certainly never thought I’d be calling them for help!”

This guy is great. I hope he becomes a recurring and just continues to be low-key pissed about what genre he lives in.

SCENE CHANGE TO AVENGERS MANSION’s actually looking cooler than ever meeting room.

The table looks enormous and theres a giant viewscreen that they can display stuff on.

Only misstep in my opinion is that the seats don’t have personalized icons on the back.

On the big viewscreen map, Cap(tain America) is displaying for Captain Marvel known properties and hideouts that the Wizard has used in the past.

And then big boss the Wasp comes in with She-Hulk to start the meeting.

Since the government has requested that the Avengers help search for the Wizard, Captain Marvel suggests that she could zoom around and check off the whole list in no time flat by using her lightspeed.

Cap(tain America): “You probably could, C.M. -- that’s up to Jan to decide, of course. It would save us some time. After all, the Wizard could be in any of these places... or none of them!”

Wasp: “You think so? If I’d escaped from prison, I’d want to go home. But that’s just me, I suppose.”

Cool contribution, Jan.

I don’t mean to mock, its just she makes a goofy face.

(Hey, I wonder if her new costume was inspired by the FF’s negative zone’d ones. It’s kinda got a similar palette and rough design)

Anyway, Scarlet Witch asks whether she can be excused from superheroing for the day to keep an eye on the Vision.

Wasp: “Why, Wanda! I should say not! You agreed to fill in for Thor while he’s off in space, and I intend to hold you to that! I’m the chairwoman, and I’ll decide who goes where!”

In fact, since somebody does need to watch the Vision, Wasp chooses the most reasonable candidate.

Captain Marvel!

Who needs her to get the task done in five seconds! She can watch the coma-robot.

You make interesting decisions, Jan!

The remaining Avengers will split up into squads.

Captain America will take Scarlet Witch and She-Hulk to check the hideouts on the east of the map. Wasp and Starfox will check out the western ones.

She-Hulk: “You and Starfox, huh? That’s rich... the All Flirt Squad!”

Pfft.

Cap(tain America) isn’t feeling the humor and tells She-Hulk to save her jokes for when they don’t have a job to do.

Minutes later, the Avengers land a Quinjet on the front drive of the Wizard’s Long Island estate. He has one of those.

Cap: “Come on Avengers -- let’s get this over with!”

Good attitude, Cap.

Wanda notes that the grounds look neatly tended considering that the estate has been empty for the past several years but She-Hulk thinks a gardener was probably kept on retainer.

The Wizard was stupid rich.

When they get inside, Cap changes his tune. The place looks too tidy and ready for occupancy to be empty so maybe the Wizard is here.

So he pulls a ‘lets split up gang’ and splits up gang with each Avenger taking a wing.

Cap: “Oh, and She-Hulk, try not to break anything if you can help it. This is private property!”

Priorities!

Granted, She-Hulk is known to break things. Why just today she broke some dude’s car.

The Wizard is watching all of this on his home security system and springs individual traps on the individual Avengers.

She-Hulk finds herself in a series of identical small non-descript rooms, each more identical than the last.

So identical that its the same room, looping.

Wizard: “Through the circuity in that doorway, I’ve activated a dimensional matrix which will keep your walking back and forth ad infinitum through the same room!”

Except without seeing herself leaving which you’d think she’d be able to see.

It’s a smart way to trap a Hulk, provided they don’t run out of patience or get frustrated and smash something.

Meanwhile, Cap gets locked in a chamber where an anti-gravity field has been activated, leaving him flailing through the air.

Oh, and dozens of high-intensity laser torches pop out of the walls and start trying to carve up Cap.

Meanwhile, Scarlet Witch’s individualized trap is the most individualized of all.

Because She-Hulk’s and Cap’s could be used on any number of people really. But Wanda’s feels like it was created to counter Wanda. Pretty on the ball from the Wizard considering he doesn’t often fight the Witch.

When Wanda enters the room she suddenly starts spinning out of control, flies across the room, and lands in a chair.

Wizard: “Marvelous! I’ve ensnared the Scarlet Witch within something against which her astounding hex powers are useless. My field effect devices have generated a pocket of non-causality within that test chamber! Within the area, all actions have an equal chance of occurrence. Therein, all probabilities are skewed. She won’t be able to stand, much less cast a hex!”

Wow! That’s some high octane comic book nonsense science!

The point being that every time Wanda tries to do something, something random happens instead because its all equally likely. She tried to walk into a room and ended up standing on the roof. She tried to back out of the room, she started spinning. She tried to stop spinning and she flew into a chair.

Sure.

With the Avengers all trapped, the Wizard turns his attention to deciding how to dispose of them.

Except, as cleverly foreshadowed by my snide comments, She-Hulk’s trap is only as good as Jen’s patience.

Which is good forrrrrrr. Two dozens loops.

At that point, she’s sure some bullshit is up and scratches the wall with her nails to leave a tangible mark. When she sees the same mark in the ‘next room’ her suspicion is confirmed.

And now that she knows someone is jerking her around, she decides to ignore Cap’s suggestion to not break private property by breaking private property and rips the doorframe (and the dimensional matrix) to crap.

There’s a backup trap that drops slabs of six-inch omnium steel around her but yeah she’s a hulk and she’s not playing considerate anymore. She starts KRUNGing the walls with her fists.

Meanwhile, Cap uses physics to get out of his jam. He throws his mighty shield to break some lasers so action/reaction will propel him backwards and he can jump off the wall, grab his shield back, and uses one of the broken-off lasers against the others.

Also, meanwhile, Scarlet Witch tries to figure out her own, incredibly specific trap.

Scarlet Witch: This is like a nightmare! Whatever I try to do, something else happens. Just in making the attempt to call on my hex power, I wound up falling flat on my face! I can’t even... wiggle my fingers? I... I can! Oh, but only very close to the floor! Whatever is causing my actions to go awry must be weaker near the room’s outer surfaces! Then there’s HOPE -- !”

Wizard must have gone cheap on the pocket of non-causality projector for that room if it’s not completely covering the area. Sure, the area it doesn’t cover is relatively small but now what’s about to happen is going to happen.

So Wanda gets as low as she can go to the floor and uses her probability-altering powers.

This causes the non-causality field to reverse because why wouldn’t it? And causes feedback through the circuitry which causes the master control to shock the Wizard.

It also causes every logic circuit in the master control to overload and the whole dang thing explodes, Wizard barely flying out of the control room in time.

Right in She-Hulk’s path.

She’s not happy. He’s not going to like her not being happy.

She-Hulk: “After what I’ve been through, it’s gonna be a real pleasure to pound that helmet down around your ankles!”

Wizard nopes right out of her way and decides to abandon fortress.

Then Scarlet Witch probability alters his battlesuit flight controls to malfunction to halt his escape and make him crash to the-

...

I’m pretty sure his neck is broken now.

I mean, it’s apparently not because he keeps talking and moving and living but he look at that panel. Guy should be dead as movie Zod.

Y’know, if the Avengers are going to kill the Wizard, the FF should really get them back and kill one of their villains. I suggest Grim Reaper.

Anyway, surrounded by Avengers, Wizard pulls his trump card.

Wizard: “Your confidence is ill-founded, Captain America. There is one resource I can yet draw upon. There is a thermonuclear devise beneath my house -- powerful enough to destroy half of Long Island and make the remainder very unpleasant for a very long time. Much as I hate to see this place destroyed, I would press the button, so to speak.”

“You being such renowned public heroes, would hate that even more. But unless you allow me to go unharmed, I shall active the timing sequence of the bomb’s detonator.”

And Cap is like ‘do you mean this detonator’ and pulls out one he prepared earlier.

HAH!

You know, ironically, if he had just hidden in a safe room or on the roof or something, the Avengers probably would have came and went without noticing him. Springing traps on them really backfired in oh so many ways.

The threesome return to the mansion, presumably after turning Wizard over to the authorities, and Wasp comments that it sounds like they had a bit of excitement (Starfox grumbling to himself more excitement than he had searching the Bronx with the Wasp ha ha).

Cap(tain America): “You’ll be glad to know, Wasp, that your instincts were correct. The Wizard had indeed gone home. He gave us all a pretty good challenge... a welcome challenge, I dare say.”

Wasp: “Looks like I assigned the right people to search the right place, huh?”

Cap: “Yes, Ms. Chairwoman, I’d say you did!”

And elsenow, Wanda goes to the medical bay to check in on Vision and relieve Captain Marvel.

Scarlet Witch: “Can you hear me, darling? I hope you can. I was feeling awfully blue today... And I was given a duty that first seemed annoying, and later became dangerous. But I didn’t give up... I came back, and I won. I know that you can come back, too, darling! It’s just a matter of time... and hope.”

“It’s funny! I thought the Wasp was silly for sending me on that mission. But -- in a way --it was something I need. I think the others needed it, too!”

Captain Marvel: “Then that’s why she sent you, Wanda... because she knew what you needed! And that’s why she leads the Avengers!”

Secret friend mastermind Janet van Dyne sends you out for punch therapy when you need to punch something.

Reminds me of when Captain America picked a fight with Goliath Hank Pym to lift his spirits. Except with a lot less fighting her own friends and more pointing them in the right direction.

Something I love about this era of Avengers and with the big shift in Wasp after Hank’s court-martial is that while her character has changed she’s still recognizably and uniquely herself. She’s still a bit goofy. She’s still playful. And on top of that, she’s proven that she’s a good leader for the Avengers. It’s not mutually exclusive.

Cap (previously Wasp’s biggest supporter as leader) started this issue grumpy and even had his own ideas what the best tactic for searching for the Wizard would be, but by the end he agrees that Wasp made a good decision.

Despite playing the ditz for a long part of her career, Wasp isn’t dumb. And she’s got a good head for the interpersonal challenges of running a team too.

I’m reminded that during the much later Busiek run, when the Avengers need to expand and modernize to match up to expanding challenges, Captain America turns the leadership of the team over to the Wasp.

My point being, I was worried that there’d be snapback on Wasp being leader because she is flighty and silly. But instead, she can be flighty and silly and still a good leader.

I’m pleased with this take, Stern.

Follow @essential-avengers​ because there will probably be more Wasp being a good leader. Fingers crossed. Also, like and reblog this post maybe if you also like Wasp being a good leader.

#avengers #the Wizard #the Wasp #Captain America #Captain Marvel #Monica Rambeau #Scarlet Witch #She Hulk #essential avengers #essential marvel liveblogging #the great feud between witches and wizards #wasp does a leadership #Cap be like hey don't break this supervillain's doom fortress its private property

[doomonfilm]

Thoughts : WandaVision [Disney+, Episodes 7 and 8] (2021)

Wow... just wow.  The last two episodes of WandaVision have been pure brilliance.  The MCU has shown that their long game formula (in regard to information dispensing) works just as well in an episodic format as it does over the course of multiple movies, and with one episode remaining, the majority of the questions have been given explanations.  Speaking of expectations, mine have been more than met for two of the final three episodes, so I am anticipating sheer epicness for the finale.  With that in mind, I give you my thoughts on the last two episodes leading up to the conclusion of the WandaVision tale. 

Editor’s note : If episodes 07 and 08 are any indication of what the finale holds in store, I am anticipating it needing its own entry that covers both that episode and the impact of the series as a whole.  Therefore, I will only be covering episodes 07 and 08 at this time.

THE STORY THUS FAR

Episode 07 : Breaking the Fourth Wall Wanda (Elizabeth Olsen) wakes up the morning after aggressively expanding the borders of The Hex as a response to outside intervention from Agent Hayward (Josh Stamberg) during Vision’s (Paul Bettany) attempt to circumvent the boundary.  Frazzled and full of existential dread, Wanda lets down her guard in front of  Tommy (Jett Klyne) and Billy (Julian Hilliard) to reveal that she no longer understands or cares what is going on.  Agnes (Kathryn Hahn) pops in, offering to babysit the twins, which Wanda passively agrees to.  Meanwhile, Vision wakes up to discover Darcy (Kat Dennings) is now present inside of The Hex, and employs her assistance to return to Wanda.  As the pair attempts to make their way back to the house, Darcy fills Vision in on his two deaths, as well as Wanda’s role in them, which rocks Vision to his core while simultaneously reinforcing the love he feels for Wanda.  Outside of The Hex, Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris) and Jimmy Woo (Randall Park) rendezvous with Rambeau’s associates and attempt to enter the boundary, but after a specialized vehicle is unable to pierce the wall, Monica steps in of her own volition, which unlocks abilities and alterations that Darcy previously warned her about.  Charged with a mission, Monica attempts to inform Wanda of the costs connected to her actions, but Wanda rejects Monica’s warnings.  Before the pair lock horns, Agnes steps in and ushers Wanda into her home, and after Wanda calms down, she realizes Tommy and Billy are nowhere to be found.  Wanda investigates the basement per the instructions of Agnes, only to discover that she has been trapped by Agatha Harkness, the true identity of Agnes, who is a powerful witch in her own right.

Episode 08 : Previously On Caught in the web that Agatha Harkness has laid out for her, Wanda is interrogated by Agatha to reveal the source of her incredible powers.  Partly due to fear, and partly due to post-traumatic stress, Wanda stays tight-lipped, but after a bit of forceful persuasion, Agatha takes Wanda on a journey through her past.  Wanda is forced to face the loss of her parents via a large munition from Stark Industries, the experimentation performed on her in HYDRA captivity, the roots of her intimacy with Vision in the Avengers compound, her encounter with Hayward at S.W.O.R.D. headquarters in her attempt to reclaim Vision’s body, and finally, her creation of The Hex in Westview (and an alternate version of Vision).  In the wake of this journey through her traumatic past, Wanda confronts Agatha, who is restraining Tommy and Billy, and Agatha drops a bomb on Wanda : the root of her unparalleled powers can be attributed to Chaos Magic, which in turn, makes Wanda a Scarlet Witch.

THOUGHTS ON THE SHOW This series has gone from being a unique take on the MCU lore to being a monumental pivot for some trajectories, and an introduction for others that will have long-lasting impacts.  While shows like Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Netflix Defenders universe were placed outside of the events of the round of MCU phases (with Marvel’s Agent Carter being the sole exception to the rule), a direct line can be drawn in both directions between the events of WandaVision and the events of some of the most iconic MCU films, including Avengers : Infinity War, Avengers : End Game, Avengers : Age of Ultron, Thor : The Dark World, the Ant-Man films and several more.

The public at large has also gone from the position of hesitant spectators to full on purveyors of speculation, with many outright attempting to will appearances from Mephisto, Reed Richards, Professor X and even Magneto based on the sheer bizarreness of Quicksilver crossing over from the X-Men universe.  I was definitely a member of the Reed Richards camp that had to take the L when that potential tease did not pay off, but my joy (and my faith in correct speculation) was restored when Hayward wheeled out his grey version of Vision.  I’d also be remiss to not mention everyone’s favorite character in terms of validated speculation, the mysterious Agatha Harkness.  With all of this in mind, I personally cannot wait to see how these characters continue to factor into the stories we will be presented with.

Monica Rambeau has really and truly gone through the most epic journey of any character short of Wanda, and our experience as collective passenger during her transformation into an enhanced of herself has been a highly entertaining watch.  Introducing the real world into WandaVision via Monica’s return from The Blip not only immediately injected empathy into us as viewers, but it firmly set the events of the show at a specific spot within the greater MCU timeline.  With Photon, Spectrum and even Captain Marvel on the table as her possible superhero iterations, all of us will patiently wait to see which mantle she takes up in the finale (and moving forward), but her sheer determination in tandem with the constant reminders of her past via Captain Marvel soundbites has helped shape her into a major fan favorite. 

Agatha Harkness may have popped up onto the scene as Agnes, but keen viewers who were anticipating an MCU stylized take on House of M saw her reveal coming from week one.  Her reveal was wonderfully hilarious, but the gravity of her presence and the potential of her powers presented in Previously On has positioned her as a formidable foe (or possibly an aggressive teacher) for Wanda, whom she has now appointed as Scarlet Witch based on her use of Chaos Magic.  Is she simply using Tommy and Billy as bargaining chips for her own game, or is there a bigger player in the game that has yet to be revealed, with Agatha using a multilayered bait to pull Wanda in?

Now that Darcy has clued in Vision on his multiple deaths and their impact on Wanda, what will be the result?  It’s become clear that this version of Vision is a construct created by Wanda, so does he have independent will, or is he merely a tool in Wanda’s possession?  If something were to happen to The Hex, what would happen to Vision?  Would he cease to exist, or is this version here to stay?

Vision may be present due to Wanda’s Chaos Magic (or at least a form of him), but now that Hayward has seemingly achieved his goal of weaponizing the body of Vision from the Avengers, what is in store for anyone on the receiving end of his wrath?  Does Grey Vision have any ability to govern and operate himself, or is he under the control of Hayward and S.W.O.R.D.?  Can Grey Vision exist in the same realm as Wanda’s Vision, or will his presence have an impact on Wanda that in turn has an impact on her version of Vision?

THE QUESTIONS

- Based on some of what Vision states in Breaking the Fourth Wall, Wanda’s incredible formation of Vision within The Hex, and the reveal of Hayward’s weaponized Grey Vision, are there multiple versions of Vision?  Can Wanda’s approximation of Vision exist outside of The Hex?

- If Quicksilver is Fietro (fake Pietro, per a hilarious one-line from Agatha Harkness), then where did he come from?  Agatha didn’t take credit for his creation, and we know that Wanda is capable of creating people (plus we know she’s a fiend for DVDs), so is Quicksilver a stress-induced approximation of the Pietro Maximoff she knows, with a bit of adjustment courtesy of the multiverse?  Is he here to stay, or will he fade away?

- How did the Mind Stone cause Wanda’s formation into Scarlet Witch?  Wanda seems to be either ignorant of the source of her Chaos Magic powers, or she’s playing her cards close to the chest, but either way, it seems as if she has a complete knowledge of witchcraft that may have been laying dormant in her all along, waiting to be unlocked.  If a real witch is visibly shook by Wanda’s potential, what happens when Wanda gains an understanding of (and mastery over) her Chaos Magic abilities?

- Is Agatha Harkness housing The Nexus of All Realities in her basement?

- We have been given almost all of the answers we need in regard to the sitcom formatting and commercial inclusion with Agatha’s trauma-infused journey down Wanda’s memory lane, so I am definitely looking forward to revisiting all of the currently available episodes to tie up any loose ends I may be overlooking.

#ChiefDoomsday #DOOMonFILM #Disney+ #WandaVision

[starkidinthephonebox]

Soo.... about WandaVision

I’ve already started working on added tags and words to my original posts about Wanda-Vision about this but I felt the need to make a separate post addressing this too. I am not an avid comic book reader, just really started about a year ago. But my ignorance it’s not okay! I had no clue that Wanda Maximoff was half Romani in the comic books... I always just thought she was half or fully Jewish because of her father Magneto. To be fair, Jewish erasure isn’t okay either but despite being Jewish it doesn’t bother me that much. (probably biases I need to work on) Since she’s not an x-men I assumed that was erased so she was some type of Russian; but I should have done the research. I’ve been reading more about it and holy crap we should not be supporting this show! The white-washing of Wanda’s heritage and then blatant use of a throw away joke (at the Halloween episode) is completely inappropriate.

Sources of Wanda’s cultural erasure: Mic.com DailyDot.com TheMarySue.com TheNerdist.com Romani culture has a rich history that I’m just starting to learn about. I already knew they were also part of the concentrations camps along side Jews and the those in the LGBTQ+ identity during the Holocaust. What I didn’t know was anything about their culture, and I did not know that g*psy is an insult. Right now I need to do my due diligence and learn more. Hope you all do the same.  Sources on Romani Culture: Religious Tolerance.org Ancient Origins.net (and the misnomer of G*psies) WorldAtlas.com

Currently also reading on continued oppression of this culture: Romani woman and access to Health Care, 2003 It has always been my belief that Human rights are for all humans, regardless of race, nationality, ethnicity, gender, or sexual orientation. Everyone deserves the same level of care and decency. Furthermore, everyone deserves a seat at the table in terms of representation. My own ignorance caused me to be blind to this... and for that I am sorry.  Wanda Maximoff is a cool character! The little bit that I have read in comic book form has been great. And I did enjoy the show... but  I cannot in good conscience continue to support this character in the MCU when I know the background now.

#wandavision #anti-wandavision #I made a mistake #Ignorance isn't bliss #wanda maximoff #white washing #poc representation #education #hidden history #things to learn #personal #starkidinthephonebox

[luanna801]

Would you be interested by a romance between a jewish and a romani character? Because I looked for it after a discussion about Magneto and inglorious basterds (ok I was initially ranting about the cringy "jewish/nazi romance" trope) and I wonder how you would feel about it. The jewish/romani romance stuff, I mean.

So I’m happy to answer this, but I want to clarify here that I think some people send me questions like these because I wrote a post about Jewish representation that ended up being pretty popular, but I am just one person who happens to be Jewish and have some opinions. Clearly those opinions resonated with other Jewish people, and non-Jews seem to have found them useful or enlightening as well, which is awesome! Hopefully that means I did something right.

But at the end of the day, nonetheless, I’m not some kind of ultimate authority on Jewish representation and the only person I can really speak for is myself. I guess what I’m worried about here is people coming to me and thinking my word constitutes The Jewish Stamp of Approval(TM) or The Jewish Opinion(TM), and it’s really not. (Insert obligatory joke about how Jews practically never agree on anything!) Especially when you’re talking about a really specific trope like this, and not something broader where there might be more of a consensus, my answer is going to be as much about my personal tastes and opinions as anything else. 

Now, maybe my personal taste and opinion is all you were looking for, in which case I apologize for throwing this whole ramble at you! But I felt like it was important to clarify that, because I don’t want people coming to me and assuming my take on things is authoritative in a way that it isn’t and shouldn’t be. 

To get to the question itself finally, I think to talk about Jewish/Romani romance, you have to talk about the larger connections between the Jewish and Romani communities, and also the limitations if you ignore their differences.

The most obvious connection between Jews and Romani people, in the modern era, is that we were the two groups most affected by the Holocaust, and arguably the only two intended for complete genocide. Beyond that, there’s certainly a shared history of persecution that goes back centuries. Both groups were ‘Othered’ throughout European history, at times forcibly expelled from several countries, and similarly stereotyped as shifty and untrustworthy. 

There are also certain cultural similarities, though I’m not well-versed enough in Romani culture to talk about this at length. Both Jews and Romani people describe themselves as a diaspora, scattered across the globe. Both have a strong sense of ethnic identity and tradition that they’ve struggled to maintain while often being, as Judaism would put it, strangers in a strange land. Some of our traditions are similar, in particular from what I know some of our mourning customs, but again I’m not really knowledgeable enough to talk much more about that. 

I think because of some of these similarities, there’s a certain solidarity between Jewish and Romani people, at least in some cases. Yet I also think it would be very dangerous to conflate the two and ignore our many differences. These are unique cultures, each with our own individual histories and traditions, and despite some similar patterns of persecution in our past, we honestly haven’t historically had much to do with each other, and don’t really to this day. I can certainly say that Jews have often kept to themselves, in segregated Jewish communities and sometimes forcibly confined to ghettos, and maintained a separateness of identity even when it wasn’t enforced by law. From what I know, that’s also the case with the Romani community. 

It’s also worth noting that both groups have rules against intermarriage, although of course not every modern Jewish or Romani person cares to abide by those. That could theoretically be a hurdle for any Jewish/Romani romance, though there’s also no reason that someone couldn’t be both Jewish and Romani, either because they have both in their ancestry, or if they’re, for example, a Romani person who converted to Judaism. From my knowledge, that’s a pretty rare thing, but ‘rare’ and ‘nonexistent’ are definitely not the same thing.

I think a Jewish/Romani romance could absolutely be done well, but I’m wary that there’s an underlying logic here which assumes our groups are more similar and homogenous than they actually are. I also worry that overemphasizing our similarities risks defining who we are solely by that shared history of persecution and genocide, when of course being a Jewish or a Romani person is about so much more than that. If I saw a Jewish/Romani romance, I’d want to see the individuality and uniqueness of both groups respected, not have the two conflated as if going through the Holocaust somehow makes us interchangeable.

(Also, needless to say, there would be a HUGE difference between a Jewish and Romani person who, say, met in a concentration camp - which is how Magneto and Magda’s relationship was written, I believe - and a Jewish and Romani person meeting in the modern day. There’s that shared history, certainly, but above all we’re PEOPLE who generally talk about the same sorts of things anyone else does. I find it very unlikely that a Jewish and Romani person in the present day would just sit down like “Hey, the Holocaust sure was a thing our ancestors went through, huh?” out of nowhere.)

#replies #anons #representation #jews and judaism #romani #... I have a lot of thoughts about this oops #rambling

[sebastianshaw]

🟤 Brown - What is a headcannon you are particularly proud of?

I feel extremely validated that canon had him say he’s bi after I started writing him as such. Fun fact, when I began this blog in 2016, I actually wrote him as straight. I had seen some hints of bisexual subtext, but I decided that he would just be too problematic as representation. Like his son is BAD ENOUGH, dear god. But the more I read, the more the stuff kept piling up, I mean, you’ve SEEN it. And there’s just some things I couldn’t ignore. Like having a literal hard-on when he’s about to fight Magneto.

Like what the fuck else am I supposed to do with that? On a deeper note, canon’s never drawn a direct line between his self-destructively endless greed and his background as a deeply impoverished child, and maybe that’s just because they assume it’s a given but I like to point out and analyze everything, soooo... Shaw is a billionaire by completely legitimate means by the time he begins supervillainy, and a member of one of the supposedly most powerful and influential organizations in the world. He’s really got no practical reason to start shit, and definitely not to CONTINUE to start shit after his first defeat in the Dark Phoenix saga. I mean, think for a second----his supervillainous ventures have doubtlessly cost him a LOT of money at this point, seldom with any return, and he takes the risk of not only further financial loss each time, but also injury, death, imprisonment, exposure as a mutant (a non-issue now but for forty years it was something he wanted to avoid, and successfully did, admittedly), and so on. And again, he is already, to quote Claremont, a “multi-quadrillionaire” just by virtue of his being a business savant (I kind of like how he really is a “savant” in the sense he is super duper good at this one single thing and KIND OF A DISASTER IN ALL OTHER AREAS?) And the empire he’s built is very much the MOST important thing to him, I would go so far as to say it’s his self-identity and he doesn’t consider himself to BE “himself” without it, it’s a tangible representation of his “self-made man” shit... And he keeps risking it. Why? The meta reason is that writers want Shaw as the villain for whatever story this is. But I think it’s that no matter how much money he makes, he’s always going to want more, and once he’s hit the ceiling for legitimate means, supervillainy is going to call to him. So, he’s super duper greedy, we already knew that. But why is he greedy to a point so obviously self-destructive it should be obviously foolish to a man as practical, pragmatic, and economic-minded as Shaw? He should have cut his losses long ago and stopped this shit. But I don’t think he can; not that he doesn’t CHOOSE to but like, I think there is a traumatic element to his greed. He was, again, born in deep poverty, and while that’s never talked about at length, it is a kind of trauma in itself. Money and luxury makes him feel secure in a very practical, physical, tangible way (which is the way he understands most things) but subconsciously he’s always worried about waking up tomorrow in the cold again. You see “food insecurity” with people who were poor and never had enough to eat, where they’ll hoard food irrationally, and I think something similar is going on here. It’s not an excuse for the degree he’s hurt other people, or for how monstrously CALLOUS he is about that, but I think it’s a good explanation for why a smart man like him can’t just stop himself from always trying to ice skate uphill like this.

#shaw thoughts #headcanons

[kurtty-drabbles]

Ocean au (Pool of Blood part 5)

N/A: Moving the plot forward. The heist is in the making.

@dannybagpipesarecalling @djinmer4 @bamfoftheundead

Kokoro was training arduous as always when she sees Meggan talking in the cellphone is paying too much attention to what is being said on the device, which to be fair, is not exactly Meggan´s forte as she´s too airy when talking in the phone(Brian thinks is endearing and Kokoro won´t judge...much) but not today. As the conversation stops Kokoro is peering at Meggan for a solid minute.

"Columbina?"

"I´m not saying anything here"

"The means justify the ends. Ok. What does she want to steal this time? "

"A Pool of Blood"

"Come again?!"

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Gwen Stacy is not a woman who believes in romance, at least, not anymore. She married Norman Osbourne for money and is still receiving the "judgment" from everyone. A shameful woman who sells her soul and body for money will rot in hell. Well, Gwen can´t say it was a nice marriage, but, she knows she likes his money and in this capitalist world...this type of marriage is not a bad deal...if you have stomach for that.

Gwen Stacy does not believe in romance and would like to quit dating and love, sadly, fate has other plans for her and when she did meet Clark Rogers...she decided that maybe, just maybe, romance is not impossible for her. Maybe.

"I know who you are!" Gwen is talking blandly at Clark Rogers who took Gwen to a nice cafe shop in Metropolis. Whilst the ambient is very nice, Gwen suspects he picks this place because it has not a single soul that seems to reconize she was married to Norman Osbourne.

"Huh?" Clark responds intelligently. Still pretending as much one can imagine and Gwen folds her arms bemused. "Oh...I know, it was the glasses?"

"No, the voice. I get why the glasses work. I do, but, your voice is too similar to him..." Gwen responds and Clark is surprised by this small detail, really, when he´s Super Soldier or Clark his voice never changes and no one ever picks up this little detail.

"I also know who your friend is. No, I won´t tell because I know you won´t tell either...but, can I make a question here? Why you help a thief?" Clark asks without any malice, in fact, his tone is completely laced with curiosity. Gwen got a nice divorce deal and is pretty rich and Gwen, by the few weeks they know each other, does not strick the type of being greedy, so, why help a thief?

Gwen offers a small smile, almost unnoticeable. "Well, Heroes can help, but, they are bound to the laws...and sometimes, bad peoples can use the law to get away, however, Columbina does not follow such laws and well, to get an omelette you got to break some eggs" Gwen explains and for a solid minute she was expecting the old speech how superheroes must follow the law and how Columbina is a ticking bomb.

"Well, makes sense. Actually...I understand that 100%"

And Gwen drinks her beverage happily letting her smile reach her face and eyes. Of course, Clark understands, still, Gwen does not want to fall over her heels ...yet.

"Now answer me this, pretty boy. Do you plan to be your ''fursona" for how long?" Gwen asked using the word fursona as the waitress was coming this way and no one in Metropolis needs to know about Super Soldier´s secret identity.

"Well...that´s a good question."

The date went well and Gwen is back home, in New Gotham, Super Soldier super-speed is a nice power if you ask Gwen, and if you ask her again she´ll tell the man in question is too much of a gentleman in all the right ways.

Later, when Gwen is scrolling on her phone notification of a message from Columbina appears. Gwen read one time. Two times and finally, three times. And is not getting so she decides to call Columbina. "Hi, Pool of Blood? Are you drunk?"

____________________________________________________________________________________________

All the ladies of JLX slowly come to terms that Columbina is not exactly subtle, which if you think about her extra-curricular profession, is almost laughable. All the same, faces are present, but, no one can´t ignore the presence of Kokoro.

The Japanese woman does not seem to regard the White Witch in a good light and Wanda has no time to humour Kokoro by pretending she cares for her opinion. Sparrow and Felicia are more than amused and slightly afraid. Columbina has no real fear...and only a few people know why.

"Hello, Kokoro...do you want to steal a Pool of Blood?" Kitty asked nicely offering drinks to the others and the Japanese woman shakes her head and looks at Meggan as if hoping for some support, so far, nothing.

"No, I´m here to see what you´ll try to drag my sister-in-law this time...if this Pool of Blood is indeed a menace as you said then ...why steal it?" Kokoro asked and Columbina nods saying is a good question and she points at her dog, is Cosmo, and her cat, Jupiter, to explain the case. For a moment, Kokoro was sure the woman was joking...but...

"Hello, non-believer" the dog speaks and Kokoro´s world ruins in a few words. "Ok, let´s explain what is the Pool of Blood. It all begins with Mom" Cosmo´s tail wave happily and Jupiter makes some comments here and there. "So to sum up, Mom likes to make monsters and Jupiter´s father likes to use the Pool to make bad stuff...we need to relocate the Pool. Any question?" Kokoro sits down and shakes her head.

"Ok!" Meggan now speaks. "What´s the plan?"

__________________________________________________________________________________________________

Kurt Ryder was researching until by a sheer miracle the man decides to take a break. You know, in movies, thieves like Columbina love to leave elegant clues that certain place was robbed by them, however, in real life this is far from the truth.

"All of her robberies are unknown. By all accounts, she may have stolen the crown jewellery and no one is wise" Kurt explains more to himself and looks at the screen as he continues to finish his sandwich. It was a treat, a nice treat Kitty made for him and this makes a ghost of smile gingerly hits the corner of his lips.

Suddenly, as his sandwich is completely gone, and inspiration strick on his mind. "Let´s use math!" and he makes a calculous to put some numbers on his favourite unpredictable thief.

"If we could trace all the unsolved robberies from the past 5 years it could give me a tip. Now, let´s reduce this number for valuable things as diamonds or any other types of pieces of jewellery then...let´s compare this with the travels Kitty made along those ...now, let´s see...." and now he looks satisfied as the screen shows a different picture.

"Ok, now, Kitty Pryde...what´s your connection with Columbina?"

______________________________________________________________________________________________

"So...that´s the plan!" Columbina states and the ladies are muttering among themselves and once again Sparrow rose her hand. "Uhm, ok, you can speak!"

"How can we be sure the Pool of Blood will accept this deal?" she made this question thinking how untrusty a Pool of Blood who side with Chaos itself must be. In the corner of her mind, Jubilee is sure that if she was a Pool of Blood she wouldn´t honour any deal made by humans.

"A good question" Columbina states and she side-eye her furry companions for a moment. "however, Pool of Blood and many other things made by non-human's hands work in this logic: A deal is the baseline of their power. If they break the trust...they have nothing left" and this concluded her explanation.

Felicia raises her hand too. "And can Polaris truly lift that thing?" and Polaris, who was silent during the whole speech, now raises her head. "Polaris is here and I can control all the magnetic and metallic objects that exist"

"So...you´re Magneto´s daughter?" someone asked, it was Wanda, who is curious as she recalls a video where a younger Magneto spoke something similar.

Columbina and Polaris now speak in total unison. "What? No!" and Gwen is laughing at this. It´s a comical reaction and now Polaris is being more vocal about her parentage. "What do you mean I´m his lost daughter? No, I´m not...The fuck are you talking about?!"

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

Ryder is finally on the corridor of his apartment and is ready to take a shower and sleep, and maybe, try not to think too much about Columbina and Kitty Pryde, however as soon he rubs his eyes all the ladies of JLX leave Kitty´s door and are chatting about something until they all saw him.

Meggan is there along with Kokoro and is really awkward. Sparrow and Felicia seem to be the only ladies who Kurt has a positive past, ironically, Kurt never hit on Felicia even when she was single and right now this is a blessing.

Kitty was talking with Wanda(he swore Wanda said something like "if your dog allows we can cast more spells tonight" and Kurt wants to know the context) in the background but stops once she notices Kurt and Meggan and Kokoro staring at each other awkwardly.

"Ok. Ok. That´s enough awkward enough for everyone. So, Kurt...this is Meggan and Kokoro, Kokoro and Meggan this is Kurt...we all had shit past, it will get shitter if we make more awkward" Kitty states and pushes Kurt to his door and bide him farewell.

Meggan and Kokoro seem to be relieved and starts to carry on for the elevator. Before Kurt even has the chance to ask why those ladies are here, and Kitty knows him enough to know he wants to make this question. Kitty beat him first. Metaphorically.

"We´re talking about selling Ivone´s cosmetic together" Kitty speaks and the other ladies vehemently opposed to this idea.

Wanda and Gwen speak together. "No, this is a book club. Ignore Kitty´s lame jokes"

___________________________________________________________________________________________

"Magneto...now that you locate your daughter, what shall you do?" Emma Frost asked still on the jail and Magneto has ways to communicate with the woman without anyone knowing.

"Me?" and she can see the smirk playing on his lips. Magneto is really that arrogant. "I´ll finish what I started and will finally kill Martian X"

"Good luck...is that what you wanted to hear?"

"Depends...do you want to stay on the prison forever?"

"...I´m listening"

#ocean au #a new heist #kitty pryde #Kokoro Braddock #she joins the heist? #Pool of blood #Kurtty #Math can be use against you #kurt ryder

[multiverseofmiracleshq]

The Avengers held a debriefing meeting to go over Norman Osborn’s announcement about his own Avengers, X-Men and Cabal. Before they were able to find any answers, however, C.R.A.D.L.E. operatives arrived on the scene and demanded  that all underage heroes who were present be turned over.

THIS IS THE OFFICIAL COMPLETE CHAT LOG COVERAGE OF THE IC

CAROL: America’s Avengers — that’s what Norman had called them. Ten costumed clad heroes with masked identities, hidden from public and hidden from them. The last decade had been an opportunity for heroes to gain public trust in a way they never had before. Offering themselves, unmasked, had created a line of trust from hero to layperson. Revealing your identity opened you up to untold threats, and that was before the people you cared about were involved. Carol had never hidden her identity, she hadn’t ever really needed to. Most of her time spent was on a different planet in a separate galaxy and she didn’t have much to protect on earth. People knowing who she was just allowed her to save them in broad daylight and she never really had to think much of it. But then Osborn had stepped into the limelight and floored everyone with his own set of heroes – and Carol was hesitant to call them that. Every bit of information had been pulled on this masked heroes and the database barely offered them crumbs. Super-people running around under Osborn’s authority felt like a power grab instead of a shield, and Carol still didn’t know how to respond to it. At the helm of the table, Carol didn’t say much as people filed, filling their respective seats. She tried not to pay attention to the idle murmuring as it buzzed around her, her thoughts too easily dismantled with her current stress level. This threat was so soon after the war with the mutants and she wasn’t eager to have to face another set of supers. “I would say thank you for coming, but I know most of us don’t want to be here given the recent events. As you all know, President Norman Osborn has revealed a very unorthodox plan to completely level everything we’ve known and built. He has his own set of Avengers, his own intelligence agency, and even his own X-men. He has done this with little regard to the Avengers and the X-men already established and standing, and his dissolution of SHIELD is alarming. Unfortunately, we can only surmise as to what it is he is doing and why — and how he plans on enacting whatever that is. We’re left with more questions than answers, so if anyone has anything to offer, please feel free to share.”

SAM: He didn’t do well in cages. Never had. Sure, there was ancestral trauma that he could talk to his shrink about but the truth of the matter was that Sam Wilson didn’t do well in cages and he didn’t like being locked in. With dislikes like those his career as a pararescuemen made sense, as did the huge emphasis on the freedom that being Cap came with. That being said, he had seen his fair share of bars. There had been the literal ones of the Raft, but Osborn’s new world felt even more constricting. It was terrifying because they were supposed to believe they were free when they were anything but. Sam let Carol talk. He gave her some space while he paced in the back of the room before his arms found a home crossed over his chest. These debriefings never went well. It was like the Sokovian Accords all over again, but this time the ghosts of Tony, Nat and Steve were all too present. He kept scanning the peripheral for a glimpse of red or straining his ears for a sarcastic retort, but they were gone. Whatever was happening they’d go alone. “I think it goes without saying I may not be Norman’s biggest fan,”  Sam piped up from the back wall. “But let’s try not to look at it personally. We’ve done this song and dance before. They may have a harder time touchin’ us, but you guys?” He jutted his head at the minors. “We need to get smart and fast.”

PETER: If there was one thing that Peter valued, it was his privacy– and that was being threatened, big time. Peter glanced over to Sam’s finger as it jutted over in his general direction, the eyes of his suit widening just slightly like he had been accused of something. “I don’t have any ideas.” Yeah, that was definitely worth saying Peter. “Anyone else? Because this really sucks.”

NADIA: Ever since the Coles Incident - which is what they were calling the event where Nadia had potentially lost two of her best friends - she had been doing her best to brainstorm in moderation without  driving herself crazy. “I would say that we try to talk to them, but we did.” That whole hearing had been awful. They had asked questions that weren’t even about what happened, like they could create problems out of nowhere. “I agree with Peter. It sucks.” 10 points for the children being helpful.

IDIE: Idie sat with the other representatives of Krakoa, listening carefully to what Carol was saying. The last few weeks had all felt like a whirlwind – so much was happening so fast. Her eyes wandered round the room as Carol spoke, looking over the familiar faces and the new ones, making a note in her head that these were people she could somewhat trust in these troubled times. She didn’t trust this new world she was living in – even though the people in this room were united against one cause, it was the Krakoa mutants Idie trusted most with her life, and she hoped they trusted her. Her eyes flickered to the new Captain America – who piped up after Carol had finished speaking, and his words resonated with her. He was right. They needed to work harder and smarter than they had before. President Osborn’s new Avenger’s felt like his own personal paramilitary, and she worried how he would use his new X-Men team. “I was a child when I came to the X-Men,” Idie stood up as she spoke, taking a breath as she gathered her thoughts. “I see myself in these young heroes. While they are young, they’re also smart. They are aware of the world around them and its dangers. No one cared that I was a child when my powers mutated, all they saw was a witch who deserved to die.” There was a bitterness in Idie’s tone as she spoke. “What I’m trying to say is, these young heroes are assets, not dangers. With the right training, they can be stronger and smarter heroes. We should be giving them a chance, not turning them away.”

SUSAN: This was, unfortunately, not a new rodeo. The Fantastic Four had always been hyper visible as a group and that had bled into their private life. People who didn’t understand how they operated had tried to have say in their parenting and fighting off CPS while also trying to save the multiverse was exhausting. “Every hero needs responsibility, but I know most of you didn’t choose this. Even if you did, you’re all doing a good thing.  I know C.R.A.D.L.E.  started raids. Is there any kind of sanctuary we can make in the short term?” Susan glanced to her husband and children. “I think we need to be prepared to fight them.”

ERIK: “While I will not argue that the future of our young heroes here is important, there is more to focus on than them. They are more than used to standing up for themselves, no matter their age.” Erik figured that it was his turn to speak now, since there was much to discuss. “The group of mutants parading around under the direction of the President have broken away from the ideas we on Krakoa hold sacred. They threaten the incredible amount of work, blood, tears, and pain we have suffered through to get to where we are now.”

VALERIA: Valeria sat quietly, listening to the other heroes speak. A lot was going on in the room, and a lot of different opinions were being said – it was going to be a difficult night ahead. “My mom is right,” Valeria spoke. “We can fight as well as any of you in this room, but C.R.A.D.L.E. poses a risk to our lives. To our futures. If we are to be put in a sanctuary, we should be prepared to fight. Give us training, don’t put us in a corner and leave us be. That will only end badly.”

JEAN: The announcement of ‘America’s X-Men’ had sounded wrong from the moment she had heard it. Sitting with her son swaddled against her, Jean nodded along lightly as Erik spoke. It was strange. Her own younger self technically fell outside of the law now. “As does his Cabal. Whatever deal he and Emma made is not reflective of the Quiet Council or Krakoa. Kate,” the redhead glanced towards Pryde. “You’re Hellfire. Was that planned?” It stung, a bit. Jean and Emma had grown closer and her decision to drag Krakoa into Osborn’s circle was made without warning. Out of respect the telepath had stayed out of her mind, but the situation had become icy.

IDIE:  Idie nodded as Erik spoke. She could have laughed at the fact she found herself agreeing with Magneto of all people (perhaps Quentin had been right all these years, although she would not be admitting that to him. “For some of us, Krakoa is the only home we’ve ever known. This X-Men group threatens to take it away from us.” She glanced at Jean, an eyebrow raised at her comment. “Ms. Grey, I don’t think now is the time for fighting between us. We need to be united.”

GWEN: “I don’t even live here,” Gwen was slouched over with her head in her hands, “but they’ve made it pretty clear I’m at risk as well when I’m here.” Her identity in Earth-13130 remained a secret to the general public even though at the meeting her hood had been pulled back to rest against her neck. She didn’t just want to ignore people in trouble though if she saw them. “Val’s right. Fighting is our best option. They can’t push us around just because we’re younger.”

VALERIA: A smirk crept across Val’s face as Gwen said she was right. “We may be young but we made a commitment to be who we are, if we didn’t we wouldn’t be sitting in this room discussing it.” She rested a comforting hand on Gwen’s shoulder, squeezing it gently. “It’s our choice, isn’t it? We chose this life. We want to fight this, and if you put us somewhere for our own protection without giving us the tools to fight and protect ourselves, you might as well let C.R.A.D.L.E. find us, capture us, and do God only knows what to us.”

PETER: “We can fight, but what’s that really gonna do?” Peter spoke up again. “If we fight them.. isn’t that just going to make them want all of these rules even more? It’s true that we can stand up for ourselves, but I don’t know if there’s a way to actually get them to stop.”

ILLYANA: “Who said anything about fighting?” Blue eyes were trained on black painted nails. It was ridiculous that she fell under the rule considering her history. Illyana’s words were directed at Idie though, not any of the other people who had actually discussed fighting. “I don’t think Jean did, but the blonde with the big brain - that was Val - seems interested.” Illyana was too.

KATE: Reclining back as far as her chair would reach, Kate had been fiddling with the edge of her coat as people spoke around her. Osborn’s sudden resurgence into society along with his reveal of his shiny new squad didn’t sit well with her. And as Kate understood, it didn’t sit well with anyone. It took a moment for her to register that Jean had addressed her and she automatically wanted to respond with a ‘what’, but Jean’s words managed to sink in before she did. Dark eyes shifted around the room, not really focusing on anyone, before coming to land back on Jean. “You’re asking the wrong person. I wouldn’t work with Norman if you paid me, but considering the affairs of the Hellfire Club, I can only assume there is something to gain. Emma wouldn’t do it otherwise.”

REED: “I see where everyone is coming from, but it’s never as simple as we want it to be.” Reed replied to both his daughter and the rest of the group. “Putting the kids together and making sure they’re safe sounds logical at first, but is it really smart to put all of them together? If something were to happen, they make an easy target that way.”

JESSICA: “Mutants, underaged heroes,” Jessica ticked off the issues on one hand. “the fact that we don’t know who these heroes are. Should we try and pick a topic or do we like bouncing around?” She opposed everything on the grounds that it felt wrong and S.H.I.E.L.D.,  while imperfect, was often more good than bad. Now a mother herself of a kid with super powers, Jessica hated the unease that came with considering this version of the future. “Did literally anyone see this coming?”

IDIE: “All I meant was that we can’t be seen at each other’s throats.” Idie turned to Illyana. “It would only give people reason to support Osborn’s X-Men, and I think we can agree that is the last thing we want.” Her eye glanced over at the underaged heroes for a moment, spotting the blonde Illyana had spoken about, then turned back to the other mutant. “Fighting whatever Osborn is up to. If we want to stand against it, we need to stand together.”

VALERIA: “We’re stronger together than we are apart, Dad.” Valeria stared at her dad, her eyes wide. “We need each other right now. We can protect each other. We aren’t just a group of dumb kids, Dad. We have powers, just like the rest of you.”

JEAN: Deciding to ignore both Illyana and Idie, Jean kept her gaze on Kate. She’d always have a soft spot for her and her inability to get on Krakoa meant that the two didn’t see each other near enough. Part of that was on her, of course, but with the baby and the Council one thing often turned into the next and suddenly a week had gone by. “If Emma had talked to anyone it would have been you, Kate, or Scott.” Her glance didn’t flicker over to the husband who sat beside her. “This Cabal is international. Do we know anything else about it?”

SUSAN: “Of course you aren’t, dear.” Susan’s tone was more patient than patronizing. Valeria was one of the smartest there was. “We just need to be strategic and delicate here. They’re looking for another incident like what happened with Ms. Marvel. You’re all out of grace and chances.”

PETER: “My paranoia saw this coming.” Peter’s reply to Jess was meant to be quieter than it ended up being. “And still, I have no idea what to do other than just.. not register. But I’m not ready for the whole city or-or the whole world to hate me or think I’m the bad guy.”

XANDRA: Her goal had been to remain as innocuous as possible. Although she preferred not to, Xandra had slipped from her chamber and left an illusion in her place. It had taken a great deal of concentration to maintain her own physical camouflage but as soon as she arrived on the premise she allowed that to fall. “My aunt betrayed me.” Feathers ruffled around her face as she spoke. “Which knowing Deathbird should not be a surprise.” And yet, it was. Xandra had truly hoped for the best. “She joined your President’s Cabal without my approval. Her vote does not represent the Shi’ar people.”

SAM: “Sometimes they’re gonna think you’re the bad guy. It’s inevitable when we’re the ones doing the hard stuff people don’t want to deal with.” Sam knew that unfortunately too well. “We fight, we look bad. We don’t and we end up screwed. We’re just all in agreeance that we don’t know enough yet about what’s going on.”  

VALERIA: Val slouched back in her seat, running a hand through her hair as she thought. She was a child to most of these people, it didn’t matter how smart she was, or what she thought. Peter’s remark made her scoff as she held back a laugh. “Separating us and putting us in safe houses where we will feel useless will give them another Ms. Marvel incident,” Valeria tried to be patient, but it felt like her words were falling on deaf ears.

NADIA: “Can we please stop calling it that?”  Nadia’s voice was quiet. She loved Kamala. The two had been close ever since Kamala had tried to help Nadia get her citizenship set up. Hearing all the terrible things the world was saying about Ms. Marvel in Kamala’s name made her sick. There was no way she’d stand behind any of it. “She’s my friend.”

KATE: "I didn’t say we hadn’t talked.“ Kate responded cooly. They had talked. Kate had outright confronted her, but Emma had brushed it off. No big deal. The excuses given to her were easy enough to accept if you wanted to, but Kate didn’t trust Norman, so she didn’t trust that Emma was telling her the whole story. "I just assume Emma has her reasons and I don’t demand people to give me information. I trust her.” Half of that was true. Kate did trust Emma, but she didn’t know how much of a hand Norman had in this.

PETER: Underneath the mask, Peter’s face burned a light red. Sam was right, but that didn’t mean he was going to admit it. He could stay stubborn, clinging to his idealism for as long as he could. “We keep talking about another incident, but that’s the worst case scenario right? It’s not Kamala’s fault.” He glanced to Nadia, expression soft even if it wasn’t easy to read under his mask. “It’s not our fault at all. It’s Norman’s. There’s gotta be something we can do before it’s too late.”

SCOTT:  He’d chosen to remain quiet on the issue thus far. A team of mutants with Madelyne on it already gave him everything he needed to know about Osborn’s intentions, and he didn’t need to chew on it to get the point across. This had threat written all over it — he just couldn’t figure out why Emma would work with him. He almost considered that she was defaulting to who they had used to be, but Scott knew that even if she was, this was not the route to take. “She hasn’t talked to me.” He responded to Jean before Kate had the chance, his tone level. “This is all still fairly new.”

JEAN: It hadn’t really been accusatory, but Jean still needed to make sure everyone knew that Scott wasn’t involved with what Emma was doing. Jean didn’t want to turn people against  Frost but they needed to be clear on where everyone stood. “Emma joined the Cabal and we had no idea. Your aunt,” she turned to Xandra. “Did so without your permission. And then there’s Loki and Maximus. Did the Asgardians and Inhumans know?”

ODINSON: “Loki’s schemes are never ending.” Odinson replied with an eyeroll. “It’s difficult to guess their intentions, but I am not surprised by where they ended up. If teams like this were to be formed, Loki would be drawn to it all like an insect to a flame.”

CRYSTALIA: Even though it may have surprised most, Crystalia had stayed mostly quiet throughout this. New Attilan was almost exempt from the problem but her connection to the Nuhumans and Kamala Khan made it her problem. “My cousin is a snake in the grass.” Prior fondness was dulled by years of backstabbing. Lockjaw was panting in the corner, his massive head nearly in the doorway. “The Inhumans have struggled enough without him causing trouble.”

SAM: “We’re going to figure it out, kid. I promise. There’s no way in hell we’re going to let you guys go down here. But we gotta ask ourselves: who are these people and how did Norman recruit them without us knowing?”

CAROL: "Are we really surprised he did?“ Her question was directed at Sam’s. "He doesn’t exactly strike me as all that forthright. If anything, this is expected. You gather a set of heroes who will follow you and you have a perfect war machine.”

VALKYRIE: “Well, one of them is a two faced wench with a preference for green.” Val was leaned forward in her chair, one tattooed forearm braced against the table. “The Enchantress. Amora has never spelled anything but trouble.”

THOR: “And the Minotaur.” Thor piggybacked off of Val. “I knoweth him, unfortunately. His name is Dario Agger. He runs Roxxon and his bloodlust is… unfortunate, to say the least.”

SAM: “Surprised? No. Disappointed? Yes. There should only be one War Machine, and that’s Rhodes. Taking up the Iron Patriot without saying anything was meant to be disrespectful. What about Star? Wanda, you said you got a reality stone reading off of her. You, Vis and Carol know the Stones pretty well. Do we know her deal?”

KATE: “Look I could be wrong,” Kate had leaned forward at this point, interjecting between Sam’s and Carol’s conversation. “But I think I talked to her. Star, I mean.”

WANDA: “You did?” Wanda turned her attention to Kate, speaking for the first time. She had spent the night picking up on different energies but had turned a blind eye due to how caught up in the Vision she had been. Now, she was regretting her decision. “I admit that I didn’t look close enough. Who was she?”

KATE: “She actually came with you, I think.” Kate said, subtly pointing towards Carol. “God, all I can picture is the atrocious pink dress. In a gala like that, you’d expect opulence or at least something formal. Not mid 2000’s Barbie dreamhouse. I didn’t catch her name, but something about her was off. Like Norman Osborn off.”

JEAN: “Kate,” Jean shifted so she could pass (baby) Charles to Scott. “Would you mind if I entered your mind for a moment to pull the name and face out?”

SAM: “You brought an American Avenger as your date, Danvers?” Sam’s brow rose. He couldn’t place her face. It was a bland blonde mix. He hadn’t been there long at all. Mostly a quick stop in and then bail to try and get home to rest.

KATE: For a long moment, Kate just stared at Jean, her features blank. She didn’t want to give anything away in the moment, but she wasn’t comfortable being in her own head, let alone letting someone else navigate around there. But she’d offered this tidbit of information, so maybe she should see this the whole way through. “If you think it’s necessary.”

JEAN: Thank you for trusting me. Jean’s words were spoken so only Kate could hear. Her eyes turned pink as she carefully dived into Kitty’s mind, dancing around anything intimate to find her way to the night in question. It took a moment to bring a blurry memory to focus, but then “—I thought I said I didn’t want to know your name.” Jean spoke along with the memory as the blonde rose from her barstool and began to back away. “Ripley.” The light died down then and Jean let the image of ‘Ripley’ be projected towards the others. “Do we know who she is or why she has a reality stone?”

CAROL:  She had suspected that Ripley was who Kate was referring to, but Carol hadn’t been struck with the same vibe. “She’s just a reporter.” She said in slight defense. “Are you sure you think it’s her?”

JESSICA: “Jesus Christ.” Jess shook her head, looking to Carol in disbelief. She should have put it together and felt stupid for not doing so, but Jess hadn’t even attended the Gala or seen who Carol had brought with her. “That ‘reporter’ is a psycho bitch. Ripley Ryan. Star. She’s from my reality.” As in, Earth-616. “She had a major bone to pick with you, Carol. Went as far as being experimented on to get back at you. You both almost died, but she was carted off to the Raft. I haven’t been home since then. I had no idea she’d gotten a Stone or came here.”

CAROL: Carol’s eyes shifted quickly, meeting Jess’s. Behind her gaze, there was a twinge of surprise but she did her best to keep her reaction neutral. “And you’re sure.” She didn’t doubt Jess, she hadn’t even known why she bothered asking, but a part of her wanted to believe in the girl. Carol always felt she had great instincts, and to have something be so carefully hidden right before her eyes was a hard pill to swallow. “She does realize that I’m not from her reality.”

GWEN: She had forgot to turn it off. Flipping your phone to mute seemed like a pretty simple thing to remember if you were going to very respectable Avengers meetings, especially when you lived in another reality and your dad couldn’t even contact you on this emergency line. Her phone was so often ignored that she was surprised when it began to trill that awful sound usually reserved only for Amber Alerts. She quickly fumbled with the device, about to turn it off until she caught sight of the picture that had come with the headline. Suddenly, Carol’s murderous girlfriend or whatever was way less important. Nadia and Lana’s phones  went off as well, and Gwen quickly tried to read and reread what had been sent out. “–uh, guys??”

PETER: Peter knew something was off even before Gwen reacted. He watched her reach for her phone but ignored his own that vibrated on the surface in front of him. The anxiety made him freeze, but as Gwen’s eyes stayed glued to her phone he knew he had to see for himself. He reached for his own, clicked it on, and there it was. It took longer than it should have for it to all sink in. What was in reality only a few seconds felt like minutes to him, and suddenly he became hyper aware of everyone focusing in on him. “What?” Maybe his eyes were tricking him? He felt his heart begin to race and heard it echo in his ears. This wasn’t really happening, was it? That was.. him. Right smack in the middle of his screen– and everyone else’s for that matter. It was out. Someone must have been following him, or someone here maybe sold him out.. or– “No, no no no no–!” Everything went cold, and his hands began to shake. His phone would have dropped out of his grasp if he hadn’t held on to it just a bit too tight, causing the screen to splinter at the edges. Right now he was surrounded and it felt like he was in a cage. Vulnerable. Exposed. Terrified. Betrayed. Peter Parker is Spider-Man. And there was no taking it back. Even though they had all just been discussing the future of people like him, suddenly Peter didn’t trust a single one of them. But his brain was in a fog– rage, confusion, terror. He couldn’t get himself to move, but he was at least thankful he had his mask on so no one could see the few tears trailing down his cheeks. “–what am I supposed to do now?” His voice was barely at a whisper.

JESSICA: Well, shit. That had taken the meeting in a way no one had expected. Jessica had to fish her phone out of her bag to see what everyone was staring at. Once she did she almost wished that she hadn’t. Maybe it was her unearthed motherly instinct, but she was quickly on her feet and moving around the table to crouch beside Parker. “Hey, kid,” her voice was low, dark head bent towards him. “Right now? Take deep breaths.”

LANA: “What the actual @#$@#. So they’re just going to out people and endanger them now?” Lana’s hands were curled into fists. She had never had a secret identity in the traditional sense. If the government wanted her they’d likely be able to find her unless she was on Krakoa. “We have to @#$@# do something.”

CAROL: Interesting how the world had just been introduced to a series of masked crusaders and one of their very own had just been forced to reveal who he was. Choosing to stay back, Carol observed the panic and frustration, understanding both but reacting to neither. Turning to Sam, she tried to catch his attention with a soft tone. “Convenient timing, wouldn’t you say?”

SAM: “It’s bullshit, that’s what it is.” Sam couldn’t keep the anger out of his voice. Peter was a good kid. If someone wanted to out themselves it was fine, but a public callout wasn’t. “This is the kind of game we’re going to be playing. I hate to say it, but we won’t have time to sit back. They’re going to come straight at us.”

PETER: The grip he had around his phone tightened more and he could hear the quiet cascade of cracking glass from underneath his fingers. Peter was breathing. But it was definitely not deep breaths. The skin-tight red fabric around his chest rose and fell heavily as he sat there fuming, and he eventually got to his feet. ”I’m breathing just fine!” His voice wasn’t at a whisper anymore, and as he turned away from Jess he slammed a fist against the table. For a split second his mind wandered to Aunt May. How long would it take for her to hear the news and call him? What was he going to say to her? Was it even safe for him to go home? The equal levels of fear and anger had shifted as the seconds ticked by, and Peter found himself seeing red. His empty hand rose up and ripped off his mask, and he closed his eyes as the cool air hit his skin. “What’s the point of this anymore?” The fistful of red he had just pulled off was promptly thrown harshly to his feet, where it stayed and he stared at it. “Who did this to me? Why me? Why now?”

CAROL: She hated how right he was. A tic in the back of her jaw worked as she watched Peter, choosing to keep her personal emotions to herself. There was no reason to amplify the stress in the room. “Then we take the fight to them. Look, I don’t know how the Avengers were run before, but we’re not going to wait until they drop a bomb on New York to react. If Norman wants a war, I say we give him one.”

SAM: “We miscalculate this and we could be over. Osborn doesn’t need much to spin things against us. Whatever we do, we do it right.” If Steve were here he would have told him whatever it takes. But once again, he wasn’t. “If you have a secret identity, you may want to consider telling your loved ones.” Sam addressed the group. “Or if you can’t, let us know and we’ll find away to keep them safe. I’m sorry, Peter, really, but this isn’t about you. Osborn’s making an example out of you and it’s a real piece of shit thing to do. This has got to be our wake up call, guys. Things can turn and fast.”

JESSICA: Jess didn’t flinch as Peter lashed out. Had it been her she would have done worse, green energy tearing holes in everything around her. For a long time she had wrestled with the  fact that she had almost never had a secret identity. She longed for anonymity but was also grateful to avoid things like this. “Norman Osborn is not a good guy where I come from. We can talk about it later, if you want.” As much as Jess tried to keep reality separate it couldn’t be avoided tonight. She and Peter B. had decided long ago that some things should be kept secret. Not lied about, per se, but what happened to Peter B.’s Gwen had never been something this Peter needed to bear. With everything happening now some truths may have been inevitable.  Catching Gwen’s eye over his shoulder, Jess gave her a look before rising and facing Carol and Steve to listen in on their conversation.

GWEN: Gwen wasn’t really sure why she was being passed the baton, but she did know being a teenaged spider person sucked.  She had seen frustration and fear in her Peter and it scared her to see it again, but she did the best to shake the feeling off. Webbing quickly shot the mask into her hands, and Gwen placed it in front of him once more. “The point of this is that you get out there and help people. Your mask is your badge, even if you don’t need to wear it. I think you need some air, Peter.”

PETER: “Well it definitely feels like it’s about me! That’s my face on your phone! Who knows how many people have seen this.” Finally Peter loosened the grip on his phone and let it drop back to the table with a thud. He didn’t want to believe that Norman would do something like this, not something so personal. The harder he tried to ignore that horrible feeling deep in his gut, the worse it got. He took a long glance at Jess as she moved away, not offering her up either a yes or no– but filing away the invitation for later. As Gwen moved closer he fought hard against his urge to move away before she reached him. It would have been so easy to tell her to leave him alone. But he stayed. He let her grab hold of his mask and through the mess of brown curls covering his eyes, he found himself unable to look away as she held it out to him. His lungs were still taking in harsh shallow breaths. He was still angry. But she was right– he needed some air. ”–fine. Peter picked up his phone and turned to head out of the room without grabbing his mask, and without bothering to see if Gwen would follow him. It was hard to tell if he wanted to be alone right now or not. The feelings of loneliness and being completely stifled were too hard to separate. Every feeling was, truthfully.

H.A.M.M.E.R: It started with the peeling of an alarm. Some kind of sirens were blaring and then there was the pounding of boots that never heralded anything good. We’re here under the authorization of C.R.A.D.L.E. in regards to S.315,  the Underage Superhuman Welfare Act, an amplified voice accompanied the sound of the door being ripped open before H.A.M.M.E.R. agents inundated the room. “This is Carolina Washington, C.R.A.D.L.E. officer.” A woman shouldered her way to the front with her weapon raised. “We were made aware that underaged heroes who have not yet complied with the law were converging here. We need to bring them in to register. Please, let’s do this the easy way.”

CAROL: Carol jumped to her feet so quickly that her chair kicked out from under her and landed cockeyed on the floor. The alarm blared in her ears, a torrent of sound that was as startling as it was telling. She didn’t bother paying mind to the introduction; when a gun was raised at her, she didn’t quite care for formalities. “I think the time for doing things the right way has passed, Sam.” Carol tossed over her shoulder.

PETER: Peter made it about two steps before he sensed it. Eyes that were once glued to the floor shot up and landed on the doors just before they were slashed open. He glanced back to the rest of the group, to his friends and the people his age that they were here for. It only took a moment for Peter’s face to harder with resolve, and now he was going to the right (or maybe very stupid) thing. Once he turned back around he shot out webbing and swung himself to the center of the room to place himself in front of the CRADLE officers. “Yeah? Well I’m Peter Parker– but I guess you already knew that didn’t you?” He held out his arms wide out at his sides, almost inviting them to come at him. “I would say that it’s nice to meet you Carolina, but it’s really not. So why don’t you just get outta here, and leave my friends alone. I’m in a really crappy mood.”

H.A.M.M.E.R.: “It’s nice to meet you, Peter Parker.” Carolina replied coolly, one hand signaling her men. “I thought your face looked familiar.” They had brought collars, already prepped and warned by the telepath they were working with on what to expect. It had been a precaution to bring back-up with them, Star of the American Avengers and the Goblin Queen of the American X-Men as back-up. “You and your friends are going to follow the law now and come with us.”

RIPLEY: Carol was here, but Ripley didn’t really feel like saying hi. The hot brunette from the bar was as well but this was business and needed to be treated as such. “Collar.” The word left bored lips as the newly minted Avenger pointed towards a female mutant in a ridiculous coat, a collar solidifying around her throat a second later. “Next?”

PETER: “Yeah, that’s me. Don’t worry, I won’t be offended if you didn’t set that picture of me as your lockscreen.” He took one more determined step closer and then criss-crossed his arms, each hand aiming at the guns closest to him to send webbing flying towards them. It sealed the ends of the barrels. He didn’t dare look behind him, but he hoped this was giving them all enough time to find another way out. “We aren’t going anywhere.”

ILLYANA: Oh, she was so not into this. “C’mon, you. Time to go.” Illyana took a step closer to Scott and Jean, her overall purpose there to make sure they could get the baby back unharmed. There was a flash of light before she dipped and took the Grey-Summers family with her.

LANA: “@#$@#.” Gloved hands clawed at Lana’s throat. “Seriously? Me first?” She looked to Nate as if he had some way to remove a collar.

KATE: No, they weren’t. Phasing through the floor, Kate maneuvered until she was just beneath one of the agents, reemerging with enough force that she knocked his weapon from his hand and took it into her own. Aiming it at Carolina, she tightened her finger on the trigger. “You brought a gun to a mutant fight; I’m not really sure how you planned on winning this one.”

RIPLEY: “With a little extra firepower.” Ripley moved fast enough to materialize behind Kate, crimson eyes trained on the gun.  “That gun doesn’t work.” The red in her chest flared up in a  moment of red intensity before a smile settled over her lips.

GWEN: Her body rippled as the black of her suit overtook the white, pink threading down the material. “Love the energy Pete, really, but maybe less angst and more focus?” Her symbiote always whispered louder in her ear when she let it manifest like that but they weren’t going to rip anyone in half tonight. “Maybe we need to go somewhere as in away from here and their guns.”

CABLE: Nate’s first instinct was to grab his gun and aim it right at the person who put the color on Lana. His second instinct was to try and get the collar off of her. And his second instinct won. He quickly grabbed her and teleported the two of them into the farthest corner of the room, then immediately dove into trying to find a way to help her– even though he already knew that there wasn’t. “I can’t–” Nate didn’t finish his sentence, both hands on the device at her throat as he looked back towards the rest of the action. “I’m sorry.” He was scared– for both her and himself. Getting collared meant that he would be helpless to save himself against the metal clawing his way through his body.

KATE: With an annoyed cock to her brow, Kate pulled the trigger just for good measure and lo and behold, a string of bubbles came out of the chamber. Not exactly the kickback she was looking for. With a frustrated grunt, Kate shifted her grip on the gun and spun, aiming to knock Ripley right in the mouth with it.

LANA: “Oh, @#$@# this. You have to go.” Lana forced herself to say words she really didn’t want to. She knew about his stupid sickness and what it did. “I’ve done this bullshit before. I’m going to be fine.” Because she was an incurable dumbass she fired off one test shot but the hot flash of pain nearly made her vision go black. There was no way she’d be able to get it off of herself. “Please don’t apologize. We’ve already died together once and I’m really @#$@# over this whole thing. So, go.”

CABLE: “I–” Nate cringed when she tried to get the collar off. He shouldn’t have to leave her like this. Frustration took over and his metal hand clenched into a fist before he punched the wall closest to him, leaving a noticeable dent. “Shit. Don’t do anything too stupid, alright?” He forced himself to take in a deep breath and then planted a kiss on her lips before backing away. “I’ll see you soon.” Nate took one last look at her and then activated the device on his wrist, disappearing in a flash of blue light.

RIPLEY: As the gun connected with her face Ripley frowned slightly, grateful she had already protected herself earlier. “Okay, first off, no thank you.” She grabbed Kate’s wrist, twisting it so she could throw the woman backwards towards the wall. Was she powerful? Sure. New to all of  this? To an extent. Her only main fight had been Carol  and everyone knew how that had ended. “I liked you better when you weren’t trying to be a hero.” She hissed, stepping back to survey the room. There was a flash of blue as someone teleported away. Gaze settling on the person left behind, Ripley shook her head. “Time to go to sleep.” The body hitting the ground meant she could move onto the next fighting hero.

PETER: “You go then!” Peter shouted back to Gwen as he webbed two more guns and yanked them out of the officers’ grip. “They already know who I am. This way everyone else has a chance to get out.”

CAROL: The hole the wall made when Kate collided with it suggested that Ripley was more overpowered than Carol originally thought. Honestly, she was surprised Kate didn’t go right through it, either phasing or not. Redirecting her focus, Carol allowed her powers to ignite, illuminating her palms as she aimed the energy blasts straight for Ripley, not bothered by the guards she’d have to go through to get to her. There was a bit of a personal vendetta there, her anger at a lower simmer. “Now’s probably a great time to get out of here.” She tossed at Sam. If it ended up just being the two of them, then so be it.

GWEN: “Oh shut up. I’m not going to leave you.” Not again, her mind filled in. She couldn’t let down yet another Peter Parker. Her dad was completely and totally going to murder her when he found out what was going on. Her suit was moving alongside her webbing but the emission of a high pitched buzz drove her to her knees as the symbiote squirmed and tried to separate from her.

SAM: Shields didn’t work very well in confirmed spaces and Sam couldn’t use it without potentially taking out an ally as well. “I always say no man left behind and these are kids.” That being said, they weren’t looking good. One was already being dragged out collared and unconscious  and the last thing they needed was for anyone else to get hurt. “Any last ditch plans, Cap?”

RIPLEY: Now that one hurt. Ripley’s mouth was tugged into frown as she glared at Carol, pulling herself to her feet. The C.R.A.DL.E. agents were already removing some of the minors but this pointless violence was tiring. “The best thing you can do is let them come with us. They’re safer in a holding cell registering than here where an accident can happen.” To emphasize her point an agent cranked up the volume on the buzz device. “Can we end this now?”

CAROL: Lowering her first, Carol let the charge in her arm die down a bit as Ripley stood back up. She all but shook it off and as Carol’s eyes scanned the room, she almost felt like her desire to push Ripley back was only going to compromise the people around her. And not to mention the building itself. They weren’t outside, they weren’t even in a very large room. As much as she wanted to unload on her, Carol damped the power and shot at Ripley again. Nothing debilitating, but until she focused on her, Carol was going to keep shooting at her. “Leave us and take as many kids as you can. If I can keep her occupied, she can’t control the kids. I don’t know if there’s another option here.”

PETER: Dammit, Gwen. Peter kept his jaw clenched painfully shut to make sure he didn’t snap at her. This was his fight. He was hit hard and he wanted to hit back– and it was better to do that alone. But his anger-fueled adrenaline was beginning to die down, and as it did the rest of the room came into focus. Carol’s blast caught his attention and suddenly, he realized just how stupid this idea of his had been. He wasn’t going to win this one, not without causing more harm than good. He opened his mouth to reply to Gwen when the same high-pitched sound hit him, and he instinctively slammed both hands over his ears to try and block it out. ”No!” She fell to her knees and all Peter could do was watch her and her symbiote struggle. He couldn’t let anything happen to her. “Alright, stop! Stop it! I won’t fight you, just– turn it off!”

RIPLEY: “Would you - knock - it- off??” Ripley raised her voice more than she had before. “Your shots are bouncing back.” Exasperation lined her tone. One day she’d need to learn to rewrite reality without literally having to telegraph what she was planning on doing verbally. “There! That’s the spirit. Let’s all be more like Peter.”

H.A.M.M.E.R: “I’m sorry, Captain, but he won’t be leaving with any of the children. We’re here under direct orders from the United States government.” Carolina said. A gloved agent knelt down to put a collar on the symbiote clothed teenager before another roughly grabbed another underaged hero. “Believe it or not, this is the best course of action for everyone. As an official Commander under C.R.A.D.L.E. I, Carolina Washington, hereby issue the arrests of Peter Parker, Gwendolyne Stacy, Gwendolyn Poole, Nadia Van Dyne, Laura Kinney, Lana Baumgartner and Jean Grey for failure to comply with S.315,  the Underage Superhuman Welfare Act. You will not be read your rights but will be given a full list of legal requirements upon arrival at our facilities. Any further attempts of violence will result in extended consequences. Do we have any other questions?”

GWEN: The sound was gone but they had put a collar on her. Gwen had no powers of her own anymore. Whatever they clamped around her neck was emitting some kind of frequency that stopped the symbiote from being able to compose itself. A few spiders wandered off of her, creeping down across the floor. “Do not be like Peter.” She moaned despite her cotton mouth. As in, Peter go.

SAM: This was a fresh layer of bullshit if they thought that they could waltz in, bang up some kids and then just cart them off to god knows where to do things on their terms. “Some of  these heroes aren’t American, they’re Krakoan. And Empress Neramani isn’t from Earth at all. You better watch what you guys are walking into.”

H.A.M.M.E.R.: “We know exactly what we’re walking into. The law states that any underaged hero operating on American soil is liable and able to be tried. These mutants were born American citizens. They’re under our jurisdiction. But thank you for reminding me of Empress Neramani.” Her gaze drifted over to the feathered Shi’ar. “We have received express permission from Cal’syee Neramani to take Xandra into custody as she is both half mutant and also far underage.” Family politics were messy, but Carolina just followed orders. She was a clean-up specialist, after all. “Your resistance will be noted and recorded.”

CAROL: The glow she was emitting didn’t die down this time as Carol approached Carolina, getting right up in her face. In the corner of her eye, she kept Ridley in sight, ready to send her supercharged ass flying if she had to. “You can take your Act and shove it up your ass for all I care. If you’re going to take these kids, you’re going to have to arrest me too, because I’m not letting you leave with them.”

RIPLEY: Theatrics. That’s all superheroes were. Theatrical little bitches who thought the Earth  orbited around them. Ripley could get into her hatred of Carol Danvers and all she stood for, but at that moment there was more to focus on. The Stone was twitching in her chest and her head snapped to the side to see the Scarlet Witch with magic glowing around her fingers. Could Wanda kick Ripley’s ass? Definitely. Did Ripley get the element of surprise? Definitely. One  word and the brunette went down and the blonde prayed they’d leave before she got back up. With her attention returned to Carol, two words were spoken under her breath before lasers erupted from her eyes and clipped Carol in the temple.

CAROL: If Carolina even made a move, Carol was going to put her fist through her chest. It was impossible not to be seething, to watch the kids, who were barely old enough to even have mastered their abilities, be taken into custody for them. She didn’t battle Thanos or the X-men just for people to be robbed of their freedom, especially not by those who Carol knew were more than eager to weaponize them. Or something worse. In a split moment of distraction, Carol took her focus off of Ripley just in time for her to knock her with a laser blast, forcing her off her planted stance. As she fought to regain her footing, all the energy Carol had been carefully suppressing erupted, engulfing her in one fell swoop. Without thinking, without taking it into care, Carol just shot a mega beam right back at her, her emotions getting the better of her.

PETER: This.. definitely didn’t go as he had wanted it to. Even though the sound wasn’t nearly as devastating to him as it was to Gwen and her suit, it had slowed him down enough that they slipped the collar on her without him being able to stop them. It shifted to a low hum that he was sure was still loud to her, and once he refocused he felt his stomach twist into knots. He looked to her with disbelief and panic as he realized that they were losing. He didn’t want to leave them. Even though he was scared, he was stubborn and defiant and pissed off. But there were other heroes here that were sticking their neck out for them, and because of that.. maybe it was wrong to simply let himself get taken. His mind was full of paradoxes. But Carol was doing a nice job distracting them, which was exactly what he needed right now. “Sorry–” He mumbled a pained last word to Gwen and then took off, aiming for the ceiling to swing over and kick one of the officers down to make an opening for himself. He easily broke the glass on the closest window and then flung through it, not looking back.

ERIK: If there was one thing Erik hadn’t expected to see, it was Wanda being taken down. His daughter was a force to be reckoned with, but this whole situation was new and strange and tonight wasn’t the time to get into what made sense or not. He quickly made his way over to her, ready to fight back if he was met with any resistance as he gently scooped her off the ground. Neither of them were the targets right now, and he was thankful for that as he got them out to head back to Krakoa.

RIPLEY: “Jesus fucking —” the blast from Carol was strong enough to send Ripley tumbling head over heels through the wall. It was yet another reason to despise Carol Danvers even though she had far too many already. For a moment she just laid on the ground spitting out chunks of plaster. She could hear Carolina running her fat mouth and some glass was broken.  Despite the suit and ability to rewrite reality she was new to this. Being some fake ass Avenger wouldn’t change that. Her bones cried out in protest as she pulled herself to her feet, already commanding herself to heal. “You know,” Ripley staggered back into the main room as she  wiped some blood off of her face with one arm. “I really want to kill you. Like really, really want to but they said no. Our rematch can wait for another day. So here’s what’s going to happen: you’re going down. Hard. And when you wake up you’re going to have a nasty headache. Sweet dreams, bitch.” Whatever cosmic power fueled her words took its toll before Ripley straightened and shoved a few locks of hair out of her eyes. “Wrap this up, Washington. Now.”

KATE: The force that Ripley had used to shove Kate back and into the nearest wall had come too fast and too hard and she hadn’t been able to will her body to phase through it in time. Though Kate didn’t know how it would matter — she would’ve either skidded on the floor outside or smacked into another wall. The impact had been powerful enough that it had knocked her out, only coming to to watch Carol crumble and collapse in a heap on the floor. A heart punched in her chest as adrenaline forced her to her feet, pushing through the aches and pains that wanted to keep her ass planted where it was. The impact had been strong enough that she’d either broken her arm or dislocated it, but she just held it as more agents rounded up kids and Ripley kept those who would fight back at bay. “I don’t think we can win this.” she said, not knowing if her voice carried over the commotion.

H.A.M.M.E.R.: The last of the underaged heroes were being collared, cuffed and carted away.  An agent had manage to subdue Sam Wilson and handcuff him to a chair and Carol Danvers was also down. “No, Miss Pryde.” Carolina shook her head. “You’re not going to.”  At her command an agent ambled over to the mutant and grabbed her by the injured arm for leverage before slapping a collar on her throat. “It’s set to turn itself off in an hour. Expect to feel weak and dizzy in the meantime. We very well could have taken you in, but Ms. Frost asked us to avoid doing so if at all possible.” Now that the room was nearly emptied, Carolina regarded the two remaining heroes with a slightly aloof smile. “We’ll be issuing a statement later about the minors. Until then, have a nice evening.” With the heels of her boots crunching over broken glass, Carolina and the H.A.M.M.E.R. agents left.

SAM: Nothing had gone according to plan, and now they had lost six people and an intergalactic diplomat. Carol was out cold and Pryde wasn’t looking too hot either. The Inhumans had escaped with Lockjaw near the beginning and the Asgardians had also left.  Reed and Sue bailing with their kid made sense; they had to get her home. But the others? Sam couldn’t swallow his guilt. He couldn’t even wipe the blood that  was dripping off his temple, the dark skin above his eye turning purple already from the butt of a gun that had taken him down for a few minutes. With both his hands cuffed to the table, it really felt more like a humiliation and a warning. Try to intervene and this is what happens. “Jesus.” He exhaled in one heavy breath. Back-up would be coming shortly to help them assess the situation, but it was too late. They lost. Now they just needed to see where they could go from here.

#event: dark reign #dark reign: avengers debriefing #chatlog: avengers debriefing #momevents

[tepkunset]

Rating Dani Moonstar’s Outfits

The Classic:

A fantastic blend of the standard team uniform with individual elements added, with the explicitly stated purpose in dialogue of wanting to feel empowered by her culture and not assimilate as Xavier pushes her to do. 10/10

Please Don’t Graduate:

“We don’t want Magneto to recognize us, better get out our graduation outfits!” --The New Mutants, about to get more campier than the Met Gala ever could. And in Dani’s case, looks like she took a page out of Elizabeth Twoyoungmen’s book of Sexualized Teenage Native Girl Costumes™. 2/10... But she later gets some actual pants for this outfit at least, so bumping that variation up to 3/10

Fuck the Grown-Ups Lets Make Our Own Bad Fashion Choices:

...I actually do think this one is kinda cool. She looks like a rockstar. Of all their hastily formed new costumes from shit found in Xavier’s attic as a middle finger to Dadneto, Magik’s is the only one who’s outfit I like more, TBH. 7/10

The Knock-off Original Emma Frost:

No words beyond WHAT the FUCK. 0/10

The Sweet Sigh of Relief:

Bless this outfit for replacing the previous one. Love the colour scheme, but could certainly do without the 90′s shoulder pads, weird arm band fringe and extra large pouches. 7/10

The Tomb Raider:

I have a real love/hate relationship with this one. On one hand, hella gay, just look at those waist high, rolled up shorts and those boots... But yeah, this is the opposite of ideal for fighting in? And what is up with the ribbons on her hands and arms that spontaneously appear and disappear? 4/10

The Nurse Teacher:

Is she a teacher or a nurse? Because she’s literally wearing a nurse’s coat with an X over it. But she pretty much never wears this outfit again, and instead just wears her regular everyday cowboy aesthetic, so. 5/10

The XMCU:

Her and Bobby’s Young X-Men outfits are literally just the suits in the original three X-Men films lol. They work, but they’re not exactly... creative. 5/10

Throwback Take 1:

It doesn’t have the same charm as the original, what with the lack of her individual belt and boots (no, I’m not counting just cutting up some fringe.) But it’s still a nice design overall. 6/10

Throwback Take 2:

Kind of hard to see because her jacket covers half of it in this pic, but she got her belt back, kind of! And it’s a practical yet stylish update on the classic look, better than the first take. But I still miss the boots. 7/10

Boobplate:

Ugh. They basically turned her into a Brunnhilde clone. 1/10

Who Needs Cultural Identity When You’re a Valkyrie:

I actually have a lot of disdain for this outfit. It’s taking the original concept of Dani customizing her gear with symbolism from her own culture, as a source of remembering where she comes from and who she is, and replacing everything with valkyrie stuff. But at least it’s not boobplate? 3/10

An Attempt Was Made:

There’s some things I like about this outfit. I like the cape, I like her left arm, though I wish it was symmetrical with the right. But not only does it revert back to boobplate but now with bonus cleavage, pinning a generic dreamcatcher to her collarbone and a couple feathers does not meet the bar that was set back in the 80′s for crying out loud, Marvel. Still, I’m giving a whole point for the use of fabric the same colour that used to signify her illusion power. 4/10

Throwback Take 3:

What exactly is the point of having the New Mutant gals dress in their old fashion outfits if you’re going to forget the modifications Dani made? That was a huge show of her character in multiple ways, and every time the outfit is revisited in some aspect, that part is ignored. 😒 Again, a little bit of fringe on the boots and a random feather does not count. It’s on the same level as the first throwback. 6/10

#dani moonstar #x men #marvel comics

[mrsspidermanmaryjanewatsonparker]

Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows #20-23 Thoughts

Previous thoughts here.

Well I’m almost a year late but I’m finally here, the end of Renew Your Vows.

So did it go out on a high note.

...um...no....no it did not.

 Having finally read the entirety of Houser’s RYV run (but not yet her Spider-Girls work which I am expecting to be a kind of epilogue) there are three perennial problems.

a)      The discarding of the established, yet short live, status quo of issue #1-12

b)      The post-time skip status quo evoking memories and idea from Spider-Girl due to featuring Spider-Man’s teenaged daughter

c)       An over focus upon Annie herself at the expense of Peter and MJ

I’m of the belief that the first point wasn’t Houser’s fault, that the second point was partially Houser’s fault and the final point is entirely Houser’s fault and indeed exacerbates the problem of the second point.

This arc could’ve course corrected some of those issues but it didn’t, indeed it added to them and created yet more problems.

Now this isn’t to say issues #20-23 were a shit show. Dan Slott and BND provided too many shit shows for me to have the heart of lumping this arc with that dreck.

But it is a story arc that doesn’t work much more than it does work.

Let’s talk positives though.

Houser continues to write Peter and MJ in character and believably for an adult couple with a kid. Peter having his share of Dad jokes is very nice in fact. The scene where MJ and Peter discuss the situation in bed was simply wonderfully executed, short, sweet and simple as it was. It was an example of how you can write these characters with maturity in a mature relationship whilst making it interesting. A small but very nice bit was when the couple exchange a knowing look of suspicion for a second before swinging off, you could tell they both knew their daughter was lying to them.

Annie is also believable as a teenager and distinguished in her personality from Mayday. Her exchange with her parents at the start of the arc rang very true. In it Peter and MJ are believably concerned for Annie and want to know what she was doing; if you lived in a world of super heroes you’d be suspicious in that context too. Annie also understandably for a teen gets pissed off. Another nice touch in connection to this was how there were consequences for Annie after her last arc, seeing as she is very much grounded but also in more contact with Normie than she was before.

However the two biggest triumphs for this arc were in how it brought up Clone Saga continuity.

I know a lot of people have Clone Saga sore spots, but this issue addressed the topic in way that bypassed even haters of the story.

Peter and MJ’s pain and anger over losing Ben and baby May is palpable and poignant, entirely earned by the situation. More than this it’s just a wonderful source for drama Houser was brave enough to mine when nobody else wanted to touch the topic for something like 20 odd years more or less. The graveyard scene especially is easily the highlight of the arc.

Peter and Wolverine’s exchange at the diner was also done very well. Wolverine’s advise struck true to who he is and their dynamic here is immensely preferable to Houser’s first issue where Peter was played as something of a beta to Logan. In this series they are both seasoned heroes and fathers with a long history so them talking candidly and personally as they did added up. Peter over dramatically breaking a glass and being indifferent to the shards cutting his hand open though...that was just stupid.

Also for what they were the action scenes were decent enough, the first battle between Annie and her ‘clone’ in particular was well done.

That...unfortunately...is where the positives end though.

The single biggest problems with this arc specifically are that it’s overly focussed upon Annie and features Mister Sinister as the villain.

Now you might argue that there is precedence for this in Houser’s earlier work.

However precedence alone is not necessarily justification.

Clearly building up Mister Sinister as the final boss does little in the way of justifying why, in the final arc of this series about Spider-Man and his family our final villain is...an X-Men character...who’s motivations indeed revolve  around the X-Men. The X-Men taking up page time from the Parker family has been a running issue in this series and I don’t get why, of all things, the post-time skip RYV stories chose that  to be consistent about.

Sinister isn’t even an X-Men villain who’s immediately familiar with general audiences. He’s a complicated and somewhat cryptic character whom, if memory serves, has never (or at least rarely) crossed paths with Spider-Man in any continuity. He’s not like Magneto or anything so throwing him into this series, then not really explaining what his powers even are or much of his background is taking the audience for granted. It’s expecting the audience of a Spider-Man comic to have X-Men knowledge (not even simple X-Men knowledge at that) or worse that they should go do their own homework t find out who he is, which is just objectively bad writing.

It just feels like what we’ve been building to for 10+ issues was essentially an X-Men story that happens to involve the Parker family and Normie Osborn. At least the final pre-time skip arc involved the X-Men in a secondary role to the Parker family, it still revolved around them.

The second biggest problem with this arc is with Annie.

Annie and her relationship with her parents doesn’t really grow or develop much in this arc. Now that could be forgiven because she got a fair bit of development in the last arc. But maybe giving her that development was a mistake as her development in this story, the final  outing for the series as a whole amounts to her coming clean about her Spider Sense visions.

That’d be minor development at best, but what makes this worse is...Annie already told her parents about those.

Now maybe I missed something because I took such big breaks between arcs, but Annie told her parents of her visions back in issue #5!

So it’s just a massive continuity flub for Annie to be acting like she’s been keeping it a secret for eight years.

It wouldn’t be so bad if it was a throwaway line but her concealment of this fact is the crux of her arc in this story and of her relationship with her parents, playing into the resolution of the story and even the very last page.

It just breaks the narrative.

Now in fairness if you ignored every story before Houser’s run, Houser does a good job of realistically justifying how and why Annie kept it a secret and her reveal of it is humerous. But nevertheless...it doesn’t make any sense.

It doesn’t help that between Spidey’s teenage daughter have spider sense future visions and the plot revolving around a possible clone of said teenage daughter created in secret Osborn labs and her wearing a mostly blue outfit this arc is seriously evoking Mayday Parker’s adventures.

Possibly this was intentional as we find up subverting the expectation of clones when we learn that in fact the ‘clones’ are just...genetically engineered beings grafted powers from Annie’s stolen DNA.

Whilst this provides something different it’s also in truth kind of...less dramatic than if they had in fact been clones. That way you could’ve even shallowly touched upon themes of identity and said something about who the Parker family is. Instead they’re about as poignant as Blood Spider.

The arc is further hurt by not really properly explaining how or why Annie was able to see the future/see through the eyes of the mutates with her powers. In fact it tries to claim that this only happens when her ‘clone’ is focussed upon her and yet the first vision she has is when her ‘clone’ attacks some tourists. How/why was she focussed upon Annie in that moment?

The arc’s final major failing is, as I mentioned, with focussing upon Annie at the expense of her parents.

I thought given how Houser’s opening arc was more evenly divided between thee leads and then we got an Annie centric arc and then a Peter/MJ centric issue that we’d wrap up with another arc given over to all of them. But it’s still more Annie’s show than anyone else’s.

Yes we get some inner thoughts from MJ in two issues and a bit more than that from Peter. But it’s mostly there to spice up the scenes they occur in. They offer little insight into the thoughts and feelings of the elder Parkers and they are totally drowned out in comparison to Annie’s inner thoughts.

This is sad because the book isn’t supposed to be about Annie but the family as a whole.

But Houser’s approach in this arc tries to strike this weird arrangement wherein the scheme at play is about the X-Men, but the plot is focussed upon Annie’s side role within that plot, but also tries to give time over to Peter and MJ as severely beta leads to Annie.

And it consequently renders the arc as neither an X-Men story, nor a Parker family story and a weaksauce Annie story.

It’s like this arc is ‘Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead’ but if Rosencrantz got much more focus than Guildenstern....but then their story is a fleshed out side story in like Macbeth instead of Hamlet so they’ve got little reason to actually be involved in the central conflict but are anyway.

It’s such a weird creative choice.

Now I’ll still go to bat for Houser, and still argue she should do more Spider-Man work. Her problems on this book nevertheless show me she gets these characters. But I think now the series is wrapped up it’s fair to say she got the premise of Renew Your Vows but let her preference to write for Annie (the character who’s been around for less than 5 years and who as a teen is practically a blank slate) compromise the job she was assigned to do. Because as I said, it’s not like it’s just this arc. Annie got a lot of focus in every issue under Houser sans issue #19.

Other smaller problems with the arc include:

-          Annie’s dream might’ve been a something of a rip-off of ‘Fearful Symmetry’, an early episode of ‘Justice League Unlimited’ in which Supergirl witnesses the actions of her murderous clone during her dreams.

-          It’s made seriously unclear what Annie’s ‘clone’ did t the tourists she attacked or indeed why she attacked them at all

-          Annie’s ‘clone’ has an okay design but it becomes rather banal when you see it repeated with the other Parker ‘clones’

-          The names for the ‘clones’ are rather over complicated and dull. They do make a nice joke or two out of this though

-          There was little point in having Normie grow six arms beyond cheap tension and a dash of fanservice

-          The climax had some nice jokes about how Peter hated their family car, but it seemed out of place in context and also I find it hard to believe Peter would go quite as far as he did in wrecking the thing

-          The final moments of the arc and series as a whole feel very pat and uninspired. Like Houser had to wrap it up for the sake of wrapping it up because they needed to move onto the next thing

-          The art was a bit sketchy and felt unfinished

My kneejerk reaction was to give this a C- but looking back I gave the last major arc that too and that was definitely better than this.

So I guess...D+I hate sending this series off with that grade but it is what it is.

Hopefully Spider-Girls will be an improvement

P.S. I also just remembered Wolverine referenced Hank McCoy but...didn’t he die back in like issue #6 or 7? wtf

#RYV Thoughts #annie may parker #Annie-may parker #spiderling #Spider-Man #Peter Parker #spinneret #mjwatsonedit #MJ Watson #mary jane watson #Mary Jane Watson Parker #X-Men #Clone Saga #wolverine #jody houser #Mister Sinister

[lycorogue]

Who Wants to Meet My OCs? (Part 3a – Glitches Originals)

Look at me, following my plan and actually having the next part of this series posted on a Sunday! Whoot!

As I have mentioned before, I've wanted to do this series since November, so I'm excited I'm able to actually follow through with it finally. If you're just getting into this series, the long-and-short of it is that I want to introduce you fine people with all of my main OCs. They will each get their own Sunday bio post to introduce them individually, but in the meantime, I wanted to give insight on how I came up with them.

In Part 1, I had given a broad overview of the whole Meet My OCs series, as well as some generic IRL background to the inspiration and creation of my two main worlds:

Gyateara

Glitches

In Part 2, I talked specifically about the IRL inspiration for my main Gyateara OCs:

Amara Yori 

Natalie [Last Name TBD] 

Connor [Last Name TBD] 

Jolene Crisslebalm

Now, in this third part for the series, it's time to talk about my IRL inspiration and creation for my Glitches OCs. This list of characters is MUCH longer than what I have for Gyateara, so this may take a bit. In fact, there were so many characters - this post was 9 pages in Word - I had to split up this part into two more parts. So this first part (3a) focuses mostly on the Original Characters that are characters from the role play game X-Future. The next part (3b) - which will be published in a few minutes - will focus on the characters that started off as X-Men canonical characters, and how I reworked them into originals.

If any of this sounds interesting to you, feel free to keep reading below the break. If you'd rather just skip on ahead to the character bios themselves, my first one should be up next Sunday.

First, I should probably explain how characters are supposed to be formed in the game that birthed Glitches. As I mentioned in Part 1, Glitches started its life as an X-Men role play on a message board/internet forum in a Play-By-Post style. The role play game is called X-Future, and I loved the story we were telling so much that I wanted to re-tell it to the world. However, the more I build Glitches, and the more I try to make the story an original work, the more I realize that only a small portion of the characters and overall role played plot can truly transition over.

Regardless, the way characters are created for X-Future is as follows:

My husband has a lineage chart set up on the forum. There are two lists of available X-Men comic book canonical characters: list of usually male and usually female characters. I say “usually” because there are characters like Mystique, who is usually recognized as a female character, but is technically gender fluid, and has had long canonical runs as a male character.

The players get to choose ONE of the listed characters; therefore choosing either their character's father or mother. This allows the players to have a connection to at least one canonical character of their choice, and/or the potential for a power set they'd like to have for their character.

Hubby then rolls on the other chart to determine the other parent. Therefore, if a player chooses a female character for their parent, Hubby rolls on the male list to find the OC's father. There is also a “Sinister Shenanigans” option where the X-Men character Mr. Sinister created you as a clone of two mutants, in which case your “parents” could be both male or both female as well as the standard “a male and a female.” There is also a chance – again using Mystique as an example – for your character to have “same-sex” parents biologically, since Mystique could also be someone's “father.”

Once parentage is figured out – and Hubby posts the second biological parent on the boards – he then rolls on another chart to determine the character's power set. He does this because it keeps the players on their toes, evolution is weird, and real life is random, so why can't games be? Options he uses for a character's powers include:  --> Character inherits powers from both parents in equal amounts  --> Character inherits powers from both parents, but favors the father's powers with only hints of the mother's powers  --> Character inherits powers from both parents, but favors the mother's powers with only hints of the father's powers   --> Character inherits a variant of both parents' powers  --> Character's powers are a mesh of both parents' powers (for instance, a fire manipulator and a rock manipulator could produce a lava manipulator)   --> Character inherits father's powers  --> Character inherits mother's powers  --> Character inherits a variant of father's powers  --> Character inherits a variant of mother's powers  --> Character inherits neither parents' powers, and instead forms their own powers (I think that's all of the options he uses...)

Once Hubby figures out the mutation the character has, he posts it on the boards. After that, the player then gets (mostly) free rein to create their character. Some other restrictions include the starting age of the character being high-school-age unless special permission was given, the backstory of the character must not counter other character's backstories or the already established history of our Marvel continuity, the character has to be an Xavier Institute student or Brotherhood of Mutants member, and Hubby needs to double check character profiles for any potential issues before they can be posted. (It's rare that Hubby doesn't approve of the profile)

So, those are the basic 5-easy-steps to creating an X-Future character, which comes into play with 2 of the characters I'll introduce today. Speaking of, let’s get to them, huh?

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Chayse LeBeau [Last Name to be Changed]

Ironically, I'm going to start off with a character that isn't mine. Chayse is my husband's character, but he gave me full permission to use him in Glitches. Mostly because he trusts my treatment of his character – most of my Miraculous Ladybug readers will tell you I'm very good at keeping characters True-to-Canon – and because Hubby knows that I'll probably talk about nearly every single one of Chayse's lines and actions with him, just to make sure I'm keeping him in character.

Chayse, being my husband's character, was the first character ever made for X-Future. Hubby's favorite X-Men of all time is Remy “Gambit” LeBeau, so naturally Hubby chose him as Chayse's father. When Hubby rolled onto Kitty “Shadowcat” Pryde as Chayse's mother, we had to do some quick continuity work to figure out HOW that relationship happened. We are HARD CORE Gambit/Rogue shippers. They are by FAR our OTP (with Shadowcat/Colossus as a close second). If Gambit was with anyone other than Rogue, we needed a reason for Rogue to not be in the picture; not a possibility at all. Hubby created an event called The Reaping where Professor Charles Xavier, Jean Grey, Magneto, Mastermind, and Rogue all die in battle. There may have been some other casualties, but those are the main ones I remember...

Anyway, once we realized Rogue had to be dead for Gambit to be with anyone else significantly enough to have a kid with them, we then went back to “X-Men: Evolution”; the show that inspired Hubby to create X-Future. In the TV series, Kitty and Rogue were besties, and so Hubby and I decided that Kitty and Gambit were comforting each other in their grief over losing Rogue. That grew into a tight friendship, and eventually a romance blossomed. The two got married, and Chayse was born.

Chayse is basically my husband without the anxiety and terrible knees. If Hubby could be as athletic and outgoing as he wished he could be, he'd be Chayse.

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Amelia “Lia” Mordeaux [Last Name Still Workshopping]

Lia was my first-ever character for X-Future. Since Rogue is clearly my favorite X-Men – I mean... check the handle and icon – I really wanted to chose her as my character's parent. However, after Hubby and I jointly determined that Rogue had been dead for nearly two decades, I struggled to figure out who else to choose. So many different power sets and great characters. However, in the end I ended up going with Amara “Magma” Aquilla. I am a bit of a fire freak – something that will come up later – so the idea of my character being able to manipulate magma seemed fun to try. In truth, though, the deciding factor – aside from how adorable Magma was in “X-Men: Evolution” - is the fact that her name is Amara.... like my Gyateara character; my oldest OC.

Rolling on the chart, Hubby landed on Jamie “Multiple Man” Madrox. Based on the personality we saw in “X-Men: Evolution,” and ignoring that poor Jamie was only about 12 or 13 when depicted on the show, I lamented at how “lame” Lia's father was going to be. In the end, I did sprinkle in a touch of the badassness Jamie showcases in the comics, as well as whenever he's shown – usually as a villain *sigh* - in the cartoons. However, he's still LARGELY a nerd still for X-Future, and became a bit of a neurotic helicopter parent.

Lia ended up with her mother's powers exactly. The only difference is that instead of just a magma form, Lia encases herself within obsidian skin. I even designed her to look like Amara did in Evolution, with the straight brown hair and Brazilian skin. (It was easier for Evolution to just have Amara be Brazilian than trying to explain the existence of Neo Roma within the Brazilian rain forest so she could remain White with blonde hair and blue eyes) Lia being basically a carbon-copy of her mother – something I headcanon as Jamie's duplication DNA accidentally turning Amara's egg into a clone of her – meant my next struggle was trying to figure out why Lia was at the Xavier Institute. I didn't want her to have been raised there, but why couldn't Amara just train her daughter on how to control identical powers?

In the end, I decided that Amara has to go. Hubby and I came up with a mission where Amara went MIA. She is perceived dead, but isn't confirmed dead, along with Storm, who went missing on a similar mission a few years prior. Without his wife to help train their daughter, and having NO CLUE how to handle a 14yo blowing up his yard with geysers, Jamie sent Lia to the Institute, and promptly signed up as a faculty member so he could still be close to and keep an eye on his daughter: the last family he has left, and a reminder of his wife.

For Glitches, I did end up shifting Lia's race to Hawaiian (Polynesian? Should I specify?). Having her be part Native Hawaiian just felt more fitting with the lava-focused powers. Yes, there are volcanoes in Brazil, there is also one in Washington state. Still, you wouldn't necessarily equate Washington state with lava as much as you would equate lava with Hawaii.

Lia was SUPPOSED to be my naive rebel; a 14yo who was getting her first taste of freedom at the Institute. She was going to wear less-conservative outfits, be flirty, and maybe break a few rules: curfew, being in the guys' wing of the dorms, skipping a class or two, etc. She even started off like that... for about a game session or two. She instantly fell into her main personality though: reserved, shy, maternal, and unsure of herself. While I do love this character and who she is, she also wasn't who I initially wanted to play. Enter: Willow.

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Willow Driver

Originally, we had about a dozen players, which was fantastic. However, Hubby still wanted to “fill out” the school. He wanted a few NPC students the players could interact with when the other players weren't available. He had a small list of NPCs, some of which will make their way to Glitches as background characters. On this list was Willow. Hubby actually created her, designed her, and was all set to role play as her. Then we got to talking about how I loved Lia, but was a bit disappointed that she didn't turn out the character I was aiming for. Hubby knew that Willow was indeed much more like who I wanted to play, so he passed her over to me.

Soon enough, Willow went from an NPC I ran to my secondary character. Since she was the character I wanted to play the whole time, she quickly surpassed poor Lia as my preferred character. In fact, a lot of my “companion stories” that I have written for X-Future center around Willow. Specifically, Willow and my friend Ronoxym's character Devon. They have a.... complicated relationship. Willow is just a much more fun character to write. She's playful, manipulative, unsure, confident, loyal... she's just a walking ball of contradictions as she's trying to figure herself out.

If Chayse is who Hubby wishes he could be, then Willow is me with virtually no inhibitions. She's my playfulness, my confidence, my lust, my impulsiveness, my spontaneity, and the athletic prowess I wish I had.

In contrast, Lia is basically everything keeping me from being Willow: my caution, my fear of disappointing my parents (both the one who passed and the one who raised me), my maternal instincts, my reservations, my critical thinking, my constant knowledge of potential consequences, and my insecurity that I'm ever going to be the best version of myself.

There's one more side of me though. That's where Trish comes in.

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Patricia “Trish” Morrison

Trish did NOT turn out remotely close to who she was in my head. Heck, she even refused to be properly formed while I still was picturing her in her first incarnation. Trish truly did create herself.

Remember my friend Ronoxym's character Devon I mentioned a few paragraphs up? Well, he's the son of two Brotherhood of Mutants characters. In other words, he's the son of villains. He was orphaned as an infant, and when he was a teen at the Xavier Institute he ran into his father Pyro. The man suspected that Devon could be his long-lost son, and hinted that if Devon joined the Brotherhood then Pyro could help Devon figure out who he was. Devon eventually took the bait, and left to join the Brotherhood and discover who his parents were.

At the time, The Brotherhood was just made up of the Marvel canon characters; no one there for Ron to role play against aside from NPCs. I decided to create Trish so he would have a player character to role play off of. Originally, Trish was supposed to be a potential love interest for him.

Trish.... was not a fan. I actually had mental images of Trish gagging at the thought of her destined romance with Devon. Even when I tried picturing her flirting with Devon for the sole purpose of getting close enough to stab him or slit his throat: a sort of Black Widow character. She still gagged and REFUSED to let me have her show Devon anything other than disdain. He became her number 1 rival; her arch nemesis. She was actually in love with Pyro, and hated that Pyro's attention was now torn between her and his long-lost son. Her goal in life, aside from making Pyro fall in love with her; age be damned, was to murder Devon.

She then became more psychotic the more I wrote her. She has the power to create fire, and is completely fireproof herself. She loved playing with her fire, and became a pyrophile; getting highly aroused around flame. She had the stereotypical serial killer childhood of fulfilling her early bloodlust by torturing and killing animals. When she got caught by her twin sister, and her parents threatened to call the Mutant Police to collect her, Trish burnt everyone alive in their family home. She then lived on the streets, killing anyone who got in her way of survival. Eventually, she got taken in by The Brotherhood and Pyro, where her murderous tendencies were aimed at anti-mutant groups like The Purifiers.

If each of my main X-Future/Glitches characters (jointly named simply My Girls) is a part of my personality, then Trish is my anger, my love of fire, my dark desire to be an arson (ya know, if it didn't cause terrible destruction and harm), my ability to hold grudges, and my aggression. I wanted her to be fairly on-par with Azula from “Avatar: The Last Airbender,” but with her manic end-game personality making more of an appearance. I wanted her to be like Minatsuki Takami from “Deadman Wonderland”, or Tanya Degurechaff from “The Saga of Tanya the Evil.” In other words: tiny and unassuming, but terrifying and intimidating if her true self is ever seen.

I don't know if I never played her correctly, or if Ron just couldn't picture a character I run as THAT intimidating, because Devon was always quite unfazed by Trish and her threats...

EDIT: Holy smokes! How did I completely forget that Trish has theme music!? The main reason Trish is yet ANOTHER fire user, when we already have so many in X-Future, is because of her theme song. See, I was fairly obsessed with Fall Out Boy’s song “My Songs Know What You Did In The Dark (Light Em Up)” when it first came out. I would spend days just listening to it and “Radioactive” by Imagine Dragons on repeat.

One day I was rocking out to MSKWYDITD for probably the 4th time in a row or something, and I lamented Lia being so mild mannered. I would have loved to have had a chaotic fire user that would follow the destructive high energy I felt whenever I heard that song. Someone who would as much fun as those women in the music video. I mean, just watch them. I wanted a character with their energy and vibe: 

I wanted another fire user, and Devon had JUST defected to The Brotherhood on X-Future, so I figured it would be perfect to make that more chaotic fire user as a Brotherhood member. THAT was when I figured “She could be a good foil for Devon; two fire users, one more chaotic than the other”... and THAT was when Trish went “Fire yes; Devon fuck no!”

I haven’t been able to control her since...

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So, there you have it, the truly original characters that make up the core cast of Glitches. Next up, as in a few minutes, will be the adult cast of my story: the characters reworked from their X-Men canonical origins. Stay tuned!

#writing #LycoRogue writing #OCs #Meet My OCs #character creation #IRL character inspiration #writing process #long post #Glitches #Chayse #Lia #Willow Driver #Trish Morrison #series post #3 of ? #LycoRogue original

[convervative-blog]

essay preparation, Conservative Judaism: Our Ancestors To Our Descendants by Elliot M. Dorff

alright buds gonna go thru this book, theres chapters and then like essay questions, so im here reading the chapters then answering the essay questions. im fucken ignorant as shit so this is all my stupid opinions that im still developing and it might change as i learn more idk. enjoy, lots of surprise-zionism in here skip if thats not ur thing

I. yes services start early morning we do prelims then shacharit torah & musaf then kiddush congregants range in ages from young to elderly (predominantly older tho) and in observance from super frum (ok like 5 of us lol) to basically secular & very pluralistic no one cares, very close-knit, "maritime personality disorder" very evident, love it

II. never studied at yeshiva or went to hebrew school, looking into doing so (u know when), actually the reason i picked up this book, im inherently drawn to like childrens resources (this is a highschool level book but u get it) bc as an adult i missed out on jewish child education, so im drawn to childrens resources to "learn from the start" so to speak

III. parents are gentiles, no jewish identity really, grandma resolutely denied being a jew though got 'mistaken' for one almost daily due to last name and appearance, 'corrected' people constantly, got bullied for it (i say grandma but its still patrilineal dont @ me), she didnt know anything about judaism and was frequently antisemitic and firmly catholic

IV. conservative judaism means that halachic rules are binding but that they should and must be interpreted via the lens of the society in which we live, in order to reduce suffering and increase overall observance (e.g. women, lgbt+, accessibility), conservative judaism also means an affordance of leniency in individualistic expressions of obligatory mitzvot

V. emancipation occurred from 1776-1880, within western europe (france holland england) during the rise of nationalism jews were considered naturalized citizens of their respective countries & not foreign outliers, allowed to serve in army etc  but had negative impact bc jews at the time began to lose their jewish identity whilst adopting goyische practices (ref. assimilation)

VI. absolutely and i fully intend on making aliyah, learning and speaking hebrew is nourishing for my soul, its an internal secret of mine that “magneto was right” u know, “does mainstreaming work?” and like, i say this not bc i believe jews should be separate (or even that jews should immigrate to israel) but in the interest of jewish protection and continuation, is mainstreaming going to contribute to jewish protection and continuation? mainstreaming needs to include existence. u cant mainstream two groups if one group is only accepted when they dont exist as themselves. “jews and gentiles can exist together! but u better show up to work on yom kippur.” jews deserve self-determination and to have the opportunity to live in their homeland which is the only safe place on earth for jews to publicly and fully express their judaism, to go to a school where they can safely and publicly express their judaism, to go to a synagogue where they can safely and publicly express their judaism, to go to a job where they can safely and publicly express their judaism. u tell me where that is, is it where u live? thats the downfall of mainstreaming, bc sure jews can assimilate but what u see is that ppl who arent jews will only interact with them if they renounce their judaism. sure u want to say jews and goyim living side by side respecting one anothers practices is the ideal, absolutely im "pro mainstreaming" for those ideals, but be practical! that shit aint never gonna happen, dont sacrifice yourself and ur family and ur friends for an academic concept that has never manifested itself in reality

VII. the advent of secularism! secularism is super appealing. movies! tv! books! music. mixed dancing as it were. all the things considered heretical bc they could curse g-d, but appealing on a neurological level. who doesnt wanna sit down and binge drop dead diva for 9 hours, its not me buds. so ofc many orthodox peeps would be drawn to it, but in the interest of maintaining their practices and beliefs, new movements would necessarily sprout up in response

VIII. assimilation occurred bc the advent of secularism drew alot of observant jews away from their practices and subsequently their identities, it was more appealing to be a citizen (a "german" not a "jew") bc it afforded them rights and privileges and goys would interact w them on an equal level, as long as they didnt express being jewish too much, or used their jewishness in a self-deprecating kind of way (alot of jewish comics got famous like this, ppl love listening to jews self-deprecate and in a downward shifting economy u gotta get it where u can get it)

IX. the differences between halacha in orthodox judaism and reform judaism? oh boy well today, because reform judaism looked totally different in the 1800s guys (most american jews were reform, which is why american jewish culture was so radically separate from european jewish culture and far more secular), but at the core orthodoxy believes halacha as it was written and interpreted (and as it continues to be interpreted and debated) is binding, no ifs ands or buts. u can find reasons why things can and cant be done but its always within the established halacha. reform judaism doesnt consider halacha binding but essentially “refers” to it as they develop their individual practices (”im a woman but im not gonna cover my hair if i get married bc blah blah blah” might be a reform opinion, its deciding not to follow the law, but its still referencing the law) and is exponentially more concerned with the idea of jewish peoplehood, identity, nationality, history, outside the world of torah. (yes? no? this is all shit i was spoonfed by 1 guy so like?) 

X. im writing a fucken essay on this man. need to chill out and condense. get my opinions in order. orthodoxy is appealing bc most ppl will believe the same shit u do and put the same weight on it, conservatism is more pluralistic/individualistic, definitely more secular, even tho i wholeheartedly agree with this & practice it in my life, the art of letting people do their own shit without judging them, the art of welcoming ppl into ur space despite their diverging belief systems, just: sometimes u can feel kind of silly when u know ppl probably dont take as literal interpretations as u do. strengths of reform individualism, pluralism, activism, diversity, influx of new opinions/thoughts, ppl talk to me about this i know very little about reform judaism dont get mad at me pls. weaknesses uhhhhhh lol am i gonna go there on tumblr.com 2day... weaknesses i guess would be that its not taken as seriously by outsiders? is that acceptable/right?

endin here for now!

#op #orthodox #reform #conservative judaism #conversion #judaism #theology #israel #zionism

[aion-rsa]

What If…? Episode 3 Ending Explored

https://ift.tt/3mAM15C

This article contains spoilers for What If…? episode 3.

The third episode of Marvel’s What If…? goes in a different direction than the two that preceded it. Instead of switching roles like Captain Carter and T’Challa as Star-Lord, the third episode hides its turning point under a murder mystery. It’s an episode about the Avengers never existing, which has absolutely nothing to do with the actual comic issue What If the Avengers Had Never Been?, but instead turns out more like DC Comics’ Identity Crisis.

In this branch reality, Hope Van Dyne ended up becoming an Agent of SHIELD. Reading between the lines, she was most likely killed in action by the Winter Soldier (the location she died is the same place Bucky wounded Black Widow). This caused her father Hank Pym to go completely off the deep end. Wearing the Yellowjacket costume, he proceeded to murder Iron Man, Thor, Hawkeye, Hulk, and Black Widow. He was ultimately defeated by a vengeful Loki, who then went and took over Earth in a mere 24 hours.

And hey, good for Loki! When it comes to What If…? stories, Loki is up there with Magneto and Kingpin as a villain who rarely ever wins. Sylvie’s decision paid off for this world.

In the epilogue, we see that Nick Fury has not given up. Even with all those Avengers dead, he’s still going to rebel against Loki with the help of Captain America and Captain Marvel. Maybe in the second season we’ll get a continuation and see if Captain Marvel is overpowered enough to take on everything Asgard has.

In the meantime, I can’t help but think about the other players and factors in this brave new world. Who else could help the Captains and Fury?

The Thanos Threat

So, good news! Thanos probably isn’t going to be a looming terror anymore thanks to Loki’s success. The Tesseract is still on Earth and Thanos would still be interested in it, but the difference is that he would not have found Loki floating through space and would not have used him as a minion. That means we’d probably see him outsource to his other top goon, Ronan the Accuser.

In the regular timeline, Thanos gambled on the mission by giving Loki the Mind Stone, only to lose both. He’d probably try the same strategy with Ronan. Remember what happened when Ronan actually got his hand on an Infinity Stone? He IMMEDIATELY betrayed Thanos. That’s definitely the easy option for him, considering the last time he tried invading Earth he ended up escaping with urine trickling down his leg.

Ronan and his mind-controlled Thanos are more of a problem for the Nova Corps. Let them deal with that.

Iron Man’s Friends and Foes

At the very least, we can count on War Machine helping out. He may have missed the boat against Loki in regular continuity, but he’s still ready to attack with…Hammer tech. Ah, crap. Yeah, Justin Hammer’s just going to be a liability in this situation.

On the other hand, one has to wonder where this leaves Ivan Vanko. He wanted to destroy Tony Stark. Hank Pym did it for him. There is no glorious suicide or massacre destroying Stark’s legacy. What’s next for Whiplash? We could really use the know-how of someone who actually understands arc reactor technology.

Who else has Stark pissed off in main continuity…? The Vulture is a non-factor here, as the events of Avengers do little to push him away from the blue collar lifestyle. Aldrich Killian might oppose Loki via straight-up terrorism by sending exploding Extremis soldiers towards Asgardian forces. I don’t expect any collaborations coming from his corner.

Now, Quentin Beck is someone who might actually prove his worth. It’s too perfect. A man using trickery and illusion to go toe-to-toe with the godly expert on trickery and illusion. Mysterio could really become the alternate universe superhero that his mainstream counterpart pretended to be!

Hulk’s Odds and Ends

Hulk is mainly important in the grand scheme of things for being the perfect wielder of the Infinity Gauntlet and undoing Thanos’ scheme. Otherwise, he’s the big supporting character of the MCU and having him gone is no big loss in terms of ripple effects.

It does mean something that the events of Incredible Hulk are half-finished. Emil Blonsky is a super soldier, but Hulk exploded before he had a chance to kick Blonsky into mush. He might still mutate from the serum he took, but he should at least be an asset for Fury. Having Rogers with him would probably be for the better.

Meanwhile, Samuel Sterns gets to continue his gamma experiments. Who knows if such a thing will pay off?

Where Does HYDRA Fall?

The episode does a good job of using HYDRA as a red herring early on when Black Widow is being led away in handcuffs. They’re still integrated into SHIELD and, unfortunately, that’s probably good for Loki. Unless ego means too much to those in charge, Loki’s rule is everything HYDRA could ever want. Not only order through fear and control, but what’s more for a Nazi offshoot to love than being ruled by Norse gods?

The real problem is that the corrupt part of SHIELD would have access to the Tesseract. In other words, Loki would have access to the Tesseract. That’s very bad.

Darren Cross

For once, Darren Cross is interesting. He’s the x-factor in all of this because of how Hank Pym turned out. Cross was the crazy, rebellious son figure in Ant-Man, furious that Pym wouldn’t let him tamper in God’s domain. One has to wonder, does that mean that he wouldn’t be so villainous in this brave new world? Would he still be rebellious, but in relation to a madman, thereby normalizing him?

I would argue that Cross is still bad news. Pym would probably embrace Cross’s attempts to meddle with Pym Particles. Why would Pym care if the technology would go into the wrong hands when he’s already the wrong hands? It could very well be that Cross was already an accomplice to the Avengers murders. It would certainly explain Pym’s costume’s design choice.

Ragnarok

One elephant in the room is the events of Thor: Ragnarok and how they’re affected. Guys, Asgard is doomed, especially without Thor. We’ve already seen how lax Asgard becomes with Loki in charge. Think how bad it’s going to be when he’s spread thin and nobody has been keeping tabs on Surtur. This is not going to end well for that world.

Hela’s arrival is only a matter of time. Then again, I’m not sure how the destruction of Asgard would affect her powers and threat level.

The Heroes Yet to Appear

The new characters from Avengers: Age of Ultron are for the most part negated. There’s no Ultron and therefore no Vision. The Maximoff twins won’t be exposed to the Mind Stone and Stark being dead has to do something to soften their need for vengeance. On the other hand…is Wanda truly off the table?

Read more

TV

What If…? Episode 3 Review: The Avengers Initiative Is DOA

By Kirsten Howard

TV

Marvel’s What If…?: The Huge MCU Ramifications of Episode 2’s Ravagers Lineup

By Gavin Jasper

Wanda already has that magical spark. Does it HAVE to be the Mind Stone that sets her on her path to becoming the Scarlet Witch? The Aether is still out there. Maybe Jane Foster still finds it. Maybe not. It’s also possible that reality simply finds a way for someone who unconsciously controls probability. Wanda becoming one with a red energy that warps reality itself is just too on the nose to ignore.

Falcon only joined the superhero business because he got roped into it. Still, considering his skill with the wing tech, Fury could easily be aware of him and what he’s capable of. Sam being one of Fury’s pinch hitters isn’t too big of a stretch.

That leaves two extremely powerful parties. First, there’s Wakanda. I can’t imagine they were really conquered by Asgard. Not if the whole conflict ended within a day. Wakanda probably fell through the cracks of Loki’s interest, seen as a powerless country with no threats worth caring about. He sees the surface and it’s beneath him. Now there’s something to Earth’s advantage.

Then we have the sorcerers. It’s hard to really measure how much these events would alter things with Doctor Strange and his cast of characters. We’ve seen Strange be pretty damn effective against Loki before, but that was without Loki having an entire Asgardian army at his command. Does Doctor Strange even exist as a sorcerer here? Would Loki’s magical tyranny help nip the Kaecilius problem in the bud? This part is hard to call.

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Yes, there’s a lot to play with in the sandbox of this world run by Loki. What’s important is that Mjolnir is still sitting in that crater. Loki certainly can’t move it. Even if it isn’t Steve Rogers, someone has to be worthy of putting it to good use.

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