icouldntthinkofabetternamesook

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

As my favorite comic book meta person why do you think that the superhero genre crosses over so much with the noire genre (Batman, Daredevil, The Question) is there something intrinsic about them both like the sci-fi mystery crossover or is it something else? Btw I just wanted to let you know how much I love your analysis you really seem to know the heart of the superhero genre.

Thank you, that's very nice of you to say!

The answer to this one is pretty straightforward- Superhero fiction, during it's initial development, was fundamentally cooking in the same pot as what would become Noire fiction, along with everything else that saw publication in the bloody pulps, and it absorbed a lot of aesthetic elements of non-costumed detective fiction in the process of firming up into its own thing. In a similar way to how Superman is borrowing heavily from things like John Carter and Flash Gordon as an inverted planetary romance hero, Batman was rather famously inspired heavily by The Shadow, a radio-and-pulp-novel based vigilante from the 30s.

Batman was also predated and informed by adjacent gimmick-crimefighter characters like The Green Hornet and the Clock, and there's a slew of other golden age heroes like Will Eisner's Spirit and the Wesley Dodds version of Sandman who are sitting on what was at that point an ill-defined spectrum with "full-blown costumed hero" at one end and "mundane hardboiled detective with a gimmick or a nickname" at the other. There wasn't yet a totally clear split in the genre.

(You can find a lot more examples of this archetype- and modern pastiches of this archetype- under the Coat Hat Mask and Proto-Superhero pages on TVtropes; I've described this kind of guy as the quote-unquote "missing link" in the evolution of the superhero, which a pithy and somewhat uncharitable read. But the point is that it's a recognizable archetype, and you'll see it around if you go looking.)

Now, I don't think any of these characters were meaningfully Noire, because at the end of the day, all of these are still part of the big blob of Goodies Winning Out Over Baddies, and my (limited) understanding of Noire as an aesthetic is that it was in part a reaction against that moral clarity. But it ultimately isn't an accident that Question/Rorschach look the way they do- they're a deliberate throwback to this protosuperheroic archetype of the golden age. And if Noire plot beats are a reaction against more clean-cut "traditional" detective stories, it makes sense that when the superhero genre starts to react against its own assumed moral clarity it's going to hit on similar beats- they came from the same place, evolved out of the same things.

And, as I always do when this particular subtopic comes up, I'd also recommend checking out the blog of @maxwell-grant, who's significantly more informed than I am about the pulp heroes specifically, and how all of these archetypes and their developmental timelines are tangled up in each other. Very informative blog there

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

So why don't you like The Bride in Creature Commandoes?

Oh, I liked The Bride fine. What I didn't like the show's treatment of Frankenstein's Monster, whose misogyny and toxicity with The Bride was essentially invented out of whole cloth and turned into his single character trait for the sake of the story. In the comics the two of them are separated but on reasonably decent terms as coworkers, and he's got his own thing going on. He fills basically the same niche as Hellboy and is, if on aesthetic grounds if nothing else, one of my favorite superheroes, for reasons this cover should make obvious:

By contrast, the show had a sight gag during the "American Wedding" montage where he was shown having thrown in with the Nazis during World War 2 in order to hunt The Bride. Borderline unforgivable to me. No greater character assassination was possible here.

I do want to stress that making him an evil douchebag is a perfectly functional decision in regards to the story they wanted to tell in Creature Commandos regarding toxic masculinity, the bride's agency in the face of men who want to control her, and so on. The pacing was all over the place but thematically the thing was tight, and Frankenstein's butchery was a vital component of that. But they did butcher him. The double-edged sword of Gunn's tendency to elevate D list characters to the spotlight is that he (usually correctly) assumes that their obscurity gives him license to functionally turn them into an OC he can use to do whatever. Sometimes that's basically correct (Polka-Dot Man, Bloodsport, Nina Mazursky) and other times there actually was something worthwhile that got displaced, and if you were one of the five fans of that thing you can just go get fucked. We're never gonna get the deconstructionist psychological death-spiral take on Adrian Chase as Vigilante who ruins his life and kills himself, and now we're never gonna get Seven Soldiers of Victory or Frankenstein: Agent of S.H.A.D.E.

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

Recently I found Infinite Crisis at a used book store at "well, it would be stupid not to" prices, so I finally picked it up and read it so that I could stop bluffing around the Infinite Crisis shaped hole in my knowledge of the timeline. And like quite a few of the DC crossover events that they've assigned Geoff Johns to, I'm not going to go so far as to say that it was good. But as a commentary on the overall progression of the medium I will say that Superboy Prime actually does compel me. What if we took a superhero defined in the popular understanding as emblematic of the wholesome good old days and then had him embody the protagonist-centric, self-righteous, editorially-enforced myopia and incuriosity about the world that was the reason that the quote-unquote "good old days" were able to remain so wholesome.

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

Thanks for the clarification on Frankenstein's Monster. I get where you are coming from, but I tend to think of adaptations as separate. It reminds of reddit debate about who was better: pre-mcu comics starlord or post. It literally just came down to which one each person preferred with one person saying starlord was better as a stoic soldier then a goofy guy and the other guy said that the way he described starlord made him sound really boring compared to how he was after the movies came out. Ultimately, it's subjective and I like taking them as they are in the context of their series, but the prior-context is still there for plenty of ppl

See, I get what you're going for here, but the thing about Star-Lord is that the new version of Star-Lord becoming the only relevant version in the public consciousness didn't result in me having to go "wait, come back, the version I'm talking about wasn't a vicious incel!" every time I talked about being a fan of the old version. And also I wasn't a fan of him, like most of the planet GotG was how I found out about the character. But you see what I'm going for here

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

"I'm not reading all that" is one of the most egg-on-your-face responses you can give to something you disagree with. You are under no obligation to read something you don't feel like reading, but you don't exactly get to act like refusing to read bolsters your position.

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

Or, to be a little more succinct- the premise of Superboy Prime is that 1950s superdickery, when introduced to a setting that isn't built from the ground up to accommodate it, caches out as mass murder. And 1950s superdickery wrap-it-up-with-a-bow endings, where every insane thing gets undone and time travel or whatever is used to restore the world to a state where everything is fine and nothing you did matters- something that would be presented as a straightforwardly heroic goal in that context, because keeping the hero "good" is all that matters- well, that also caches out to Mass Murder. There's a reason we stopped writing superhero comics the way they did in the 1950s

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

so after, when he whispers, “you love me. real or not real?” i tell him, “real.”

prints + merch + commission info pinned to profile :)

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

I find it interesting how Janet clearly can't separate herself from Hank mentally after all these years and still sees Hank as an extension of herself and vice versa despite probably being divorced for longer than they were married. She adopts his daughter, she manages his estate, she seemingly takes over his lab division, she organises his funeral, she's very involved in his life before and after his death and I imagine is going to become more involved now that he's back. She is her own person, and she's made being the Wasp her own, but I think a part of her will always think of herself as And The Wasp, and not just Wasp. She has owed so much of her life to Hank and he has been such a major figure in her life for so much that even though they're divorced and she has some very good reasons to remove him from her life entirely, she'll never do that fully, because Hank is a part of her as much as she's a part of him. And from a purely pragmatic perspective, I think Janet is aware other people will also always associate her with Hank on some level even if they don't say it, because she does it herself, so it's important to her to have some control over his legacy and over his life, in a way.

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

Hetbait kind of goes harder than queerbait sometimes. Queerbait you understand that the creators very rarely could do it even if they wanted to so implication and suggestion was better and safer than being explicit. Hetbait though there's no such justifiable reason they just want to fuck with you.

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

ultimate cherik + normal!erik solos because if i have to work with this group project longer than i have to im going to actually genuinely eat concrete

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

The return of Chappell Roan star trek videos

[video description: a video made up of clips of Uhura from Star Trek: The Original Series, set to Chappell Roan’s Super Graphic Ultra Modern Girl]

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

third time because I'm on a role and have a lot to say about this and don't want to sleep:

Viktor has shadow powers while Mel has light powers. like in the cloak and dagger tv show, Viktor can see peoples negative thoughts, fear and despair, while Mel can see their, hopes, aspirations and desires. this makes it really easy for Viktor to help people though their issues and really easy for Mel to figure out how to best manipulate them. when together they can both visit the astral plane and have full emotional sensing, empathy abilities. this can verge into full telepathy and mind control when in agreement for what to do.

Viktor has a shadowy cloud effect, that allows for invisibility, intangibility and minor healing. Mel has her glowing golden shields that burn to the touch and increased durability to physical damage. when in Cloak and Dagger mode they have semi matching outfits, with hoods and full face masks, except Viktor's is a floor length dark blue cloak, and Mel's is a white knee length dress.

Viktor can drain people of their sadness for a on the minor cost of having to experience himself, but it leaves them happy, hollow husks and he has some trouble seeing the problem with this. what do you mean this is bad? I'm taking away their pain.

the empathic abilities really mess with Mel because now she knows her best friend has a crush on her and she has to work really hard to not just manipulate everyone. doesn't always bother. what do you mean this is bad? I'm giving them what they want.

Viktor specifically saves Jayces life by talking him off the ledge by being able to see and understand his despair and the stress he's under being a scholarship student and not having a safety net to fall back on. He felt he couldn't talk to Mel because her life seems so perfect from the outside and Mel didn't know she needed to talk to him because she can only see the positives. hearing about what almost happened from Viktor serves as bit of a wakeup call to make her understand that sometimes what people want aren't always what they need.

when apart from each other for to long, Viktor gets cold to the touch. he starts having trouble breathing. everything aches and moving his leg becomes even more of a challenge. the bags under his eyes become unnaturally prominent, and his skin gets grey and clammy. give it a bit longer and he can barely move, barely breathe, just him and the pain and when that stops he knows it will be over

Mel on the other hand starts running a fever, can't stand still, starts almost glowing. all her senses start getting to much, the noises to loud the textures to intense, the colors sharp, the smells overpowering. give it a bit longer and she can't think, she's blazing like the sun, and she absolutely can not sit still for even a second, just her and the pain and when the stops, well....

thankfully giving each other a brush in the hallway between class twice a day keeps them completely asymptomatic. that said it got really bad the first weekend after they broke into the lab. Viktor passed out in the church and Mel ran straight out of yoga class looking around for him like a maniac. this is also how they found out they can track out other, and thank goodness for that

they are at their best together. this mostly applies to Viktor and his life long physical illness. being with Mel and using their powers together clears him up of all his mundane symptoms as well as stopping the magical ones. Mel doesn't notice much affect at first and even when she finds herself more at peace and less anxious than usual, she just assumes its the change in circumstances. as I said in my first post, for all they are bound, they are not equal

hopefully my next random inspiration windfall will be Signed and Ambessa shaped

Arcane/Cloak and Dagger au

Viktor is Cloak, Mel is Dagger. Viktor is gender weird in the middle of transitioning. him and Sky are childhood friends and are entering extremely weird territory in their relationship. Mel is dating Jayce. Viktor was semi recently adopted as Dr Reveks son, and Dr Revek is working for Ambessa. Mel and Viktor met through their parents and are now in a situation where they have to feed on each other to survive and also stop their parents from hurting more people. they don't like each other very much.

Viktor was homeless for a while and the abandoned church he lived in becomes their meet up place. Kino isn't dead he just went off to college and doesn't get home to visit often. Sky is very uncomfortable with the new beautiful woman Viktor is spending so much time with, no matter how many times Viktor tells her he's just not interested in women because obviously that doesn't make her feel better because she wants him to be at least a bit bisexual so he could be interested in her and if he's not attracted to the most beautiful women she's even seen then clearly she has no chance.

Jayce and Viktor meet like three times and have no relationship. this is crucial. One of these times was Viktor saving Jayces life, so Jayce has a hero worship crush in his hero identity, but Viktor hasn't noticed. Mel think this is extremely funny

unlike in marvel, Viktor's darkforce has limited healing properties to slow down the damage wounds can do and Mel's lightforce does shields rather than daggers. if Viktor is away from Mel for to long he starts becoming more corpse like and if Mel is away from Viktor for to long she essentially starts catching on fire. they have two days tops on their own, but Viktor starts feeling the affects harder because of his pre-existing health issues, so despite the codependency they are not equal. Mel also has the option of going to live with her brother when getting her mother arrested, but Viktor would just go back out on the streets, so they start butting heads on how to deal with the issue. they both want to help people and make the world a better place, but have different views on how to get there, but also literally cannot live without each other.

on top of trying to stop their parents from nebulous evil actions, Viktor plays street hero with Sky as his back up and Mission Control. Mel eventually joins in because if he dies she will shortly follow bt winds up enjoying it despite herself. Sky is the only person who knows their secrets and is being driven into an utter tizzy. Mel is considering looping in Elora, but doesn't want to put her in danger because her family is also in close proximity to nebulous evil actions

Sky, a baby bisexual, looking at the two powerful creatures she's stuck in the middle of :). She plays Evita's role from the tv show

Eventually they end up defeating the big nebulous evil(the black rose in some form probably). Sky gets a portion of both of their powers and her and Viktor somehow get a lot of money and go to a fancy college, and become famous scientists, and help a lot of people with their medical and environment technology work, while Mel decides to become an artist rather than going into law like she always planned, and starts dating Elora, who almost died during the main plot which it made her rethink her priorities, and Elora goes to college with Sky and Viktor, and all four of them live within a couple blocks of each other forever. Sky and Viktor are not together romantically because he is aro-ace, and Sky goes through a lot of different partners, before deciding she's actually married to her work and the concept of science.

Jayce eventually joins Sky and Viktor's research team, rekindles a friendship with Mel, though they never get back together because she's married to Elora, and get the entire plot dumped on his head after a few drinks. He then tries to suffocate himself with a pillow, because he still has a poster of Cloak on his wall, he drew himself after that one time he saved him, and now Viktor is laughing

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

to be clear on the dynamics:

Sky and Viktor were in the same shitty rundown part of town as little girls. they were very much attached at the hip and were both weird little autistic children who adored science, info dumped to each other, and preferred sitting together reading books to hanging out with the other children. two weird little tomboys. after Viktor's mom died of cancer his home life got bad and then a couple of foster homes fell through due to his health issues. it was a few foster homes in a figured out he was trans, which made the situation worse and he wound up making his way back to his hometown to live in a dilapidated church. he saw Sky from a distance but didn't get in contact because she seemed to be doing well and he didn't want to drag her down. Meanwhile, hanging out in his home town, he runs into Dr Revek, who he already knew as a kids because he was his moms primary Doctor and Revek got a bit overly attached thanks to projecting his daughter on his patients little girl.

Dr Revek puts in a bit of effort to take care of Viktor due to nostalgia, and winds up finding that the little gutter queer is actually brilliant at science despite his spotty education record. He decides to adopt Viktor and try to groom into a scientific successor to the extremely sketchy necromancy work he's trying to do to get his daughter back. Ambessa is his primary funder because she wants his research for military weapon reasons. She's searching for something to give her a leg up on the Black Rose and can't do itself, fleeing with a few magic artifact to keep her children safe.

Viktor winds up going to the same fancy private school that Mel and Elora are at, and Jayce has a scholarship to. He is wildly, noticeably weird to everyone and has no friends because no one wants to make eye contact. he does wind up running back unto Sky though, and after a bit of post transition confusion they strike up a friendship. Sky can't quite get a scholarship to the fancy place because she's also already working full-time to try and help her family and they wind up spending time together, officially to study but actually just to spend time together. Sky thinks it's entirely unfair that her cute childhood girl crush has turned into an extremely hot guy, who is now also several social rungs above her. She is double lost on Viktor.

Viktor meanwhile is trying really hard to fall back into their childhood dynamic like nothing happened but it's not working, due to the everything. Viktor is sex repulsed asexual, entirely aromantic but hasn't quite found that label yet and is working around more to understand the gender thing which is he/they/it and also dealing with the utter freak that has adopted him and is the only person to show him kindness and understating in years but still clearly has something wrong. he is doing his level best to ignore Sky's crush because he does not and cannot reciprocate but if he looses her friendship he really has nothing.

Meanwhile Elora is the first friend Mel made after her family had to run from the Black Rose. not the only friend by any means but in many ways the only one that matters. that was about freshman year of high school and they are tied at the hip kinds of bonded. Elora is the only one Mel trust with all of what she's feeling with moving to a new country, how much she misses Kino, the ways her mother is abusive but she can't say anything about it due to the role her mother has in society, the pressure she feels to live up to the Medarda name but also how she wants to runaway from the concept of her family as far as possible. Elora has a crush the size of the sun on her drop dead gorgeous friend and will never tell her because she wants to remain a safe space for Mel way from her family and doesn't want to risk messing anything up.

Jayce is a scholarship student at their fancy academy and is desperately wants to become a famous scientist to make his single immigrant mother proud. He is all studying all the time and has not noticed that puberty made him extremely attractive and still thinks of himself as the awkward, outcast nerd that spent his childhood getting bullied for the autism and love of magic tricks. Mel zero's in on him immediately because she always has a love for the underdogs and outcasts. She helps him integrate to the new school, make new friends and after a while she kisses him and they start dating. She doesn't have the same emotional intimacy with him as she does with Elora, but he's extremely sweet and intimate because it's his first relationship and his shear belief in their love mostly convinces her too. Elora is heartbroken but trying to be supportive.

Mel and Viktor meet through their parents. Mel tries to reach out and make friends like she always does but Viktor is very skilled at being anti social. they wind up with suspicions about the work being done at about the same time and wind up breaking into the lab to try to investigate after a partially strange experiment and half overhead conversation between their parents. the magic item goes crazy in their matched proximity and whoops, now their bonded for life

Arcane/Cloak and Dagger au

Viktor is Cloak, Mel is Dagger. Viktor is gender weird in the middle of transitioning. him and Sky are childhood friends and are entering extremely weird territory in their relationship. Mel is dating Jayce. Viktor was semi recently adopted as Dr Reveks son, and Dr Revek is working for Ambessa. Mel and Viktor met through their parents and are now in a situation where they have to feed on each other to survive and also stop their parents from hurting more people. they don't like each other very much.

Viktor was homeless for a while and the abandoned church he lived in becomes their meet up place. Kino isn't dead he just went off to college and doesn't get home to visit often. Sky is very uncomfortable with the new beautiful woman Viktor is spending so much time with, no matter how many times Viktor tells her he's just not interested in women because obviously that doesn't make her feel better because she wants him to be at least a bit bisexual so he could be interested in her and if he's not attracted to the most beautiful women she's even seen then clearly she has no chance.

Jayce and Viktor meet like three times and have no relationship. this is crucial. One of these times was Viktor saving Jayces life, so Jayce has a hero worship crush in his hero identity, but Viktor hasn't noticed. Mel think this is extremely funny

unlike in marvel, Viktor's darkforce has limited healing properties to slow down the damage wounds can do and Mel's lightforce does shields rather than daggers. if Viktor is away from Mel for to long he starts becoming more corpse like and if Mel is away from Viktor for to long she essentially starts catching on fire. they have two days tops on their own, but Viktor starts feeling the affects harder because of his pre-existing health issues, so despite the codependency they are not equal. Mel also has the option of going to live with her brother when getting her mother arrested, but Viktor would just go back out on the streets, so they start butting heads on how to deal with the issue. they both want to help people and make the world a better place, but have different views on how to get there, but also literally cannot live without each other.

on top of trying to stop their parents from nebulous evil actions, Viktor plays street hero with Sky as his back up and Mission Control. Mel eventually joins in because if he dies she will shortly follow bt winds up enjoying it despite herself. Sky is the only person who knows their secrets and is being driven into an utter tizzy. Mel is considering looping in Elora, but doesn't want to put her in danger because her family is also in close proximity to nebulous evil actions

Sky, a baby bisexual, looking at the two powerful creatures she's stuck in the middle of :). She plays Evita's role from the tv show

Eventually they end up defeating the big nebulous evil(the black rose in some form probably). Sky gets a portion of both of their powers and her and Viktor somehow get a lot of money and go to a fancy college, and become famous scientists, and help a lot of people with their medical and environment technology work, while Mel decides to become an artist rather than going into law like she always planned, and starts dating Elora, who almost died during the main plot which it made her rethink her priorities, and Elora goes to college with Sky and Viktor, and all four of them live within a couple blocks of each other forever. Sky and Viktor are not together romantically because he is aro-ace, and Sky goes through a lot of different partners, before deciding she's actually married to her work and the concept of science.

Jayce eventually joins Sky and Viktor's research team, rekindles a friendship with Mel, though they never get back together because she's married to Elora, and get the entire plot dumped on his head after a few drinks. He then tries to suffocate himself with a pillow, because he still has a poster of Cloak on his wall, he drew himself after that one time he saved him, and now Viktor is laughing

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

So many thoughts about Sky, Maddie, Viktor, and Caitlyn, and I have no patience to articulate them. If I had the patience, there'd be words about power imbalances, favoritism, bias, and an extra helping of autonomy.

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

[icouldntthinkofabetternamesook]

Mel: I never realized dating Jayce would be a package deal. For this relationship to work, it seems like I have to date two smart, handsome scientists instead of one. However, for love and legacy this is a sacrifice I'm willing to make. *readjust her lipstick*

Viktor: I'm not sharing Jayce with you nor will I make out with you, Mel.

Mel: >:(