#|| I can write and have written him seriously but this is funnier. To me.

[m80495]

|| OutOfCombat ;;

Happy Sinday here's a bunch of my best (worst) Mercury tweets.

And my magnum opus:

[physalian]

Character Types: Femme Fatales & Comic Relief

These two have nothing in common except the one thing I hate about them: By design, they exist to fulfil one shallow purpose, so I’m lumping them together.

—

Comic Relief

Characters that only serve one purpose in the cast stick out like a sore thumb. “Comic Relief” characters exist solely to be funny, as if the rest of the main cast is incapable of humor, and that this character is incapable of any serious moments. Instead of distributing different flavors of humor—sass, dry wit, jokers, pranksters, dark humor, dad jokes and puns—the writer comes up with their grumpy group of heroes, then I guess thinks “oh I need somebody funny to cut some of this seriousness”?

But on top of that, as this character exists just to be funny, there’s usually comparatively less development and rich character nuance for the comic relief over the other heroes. They get whatever crumbs are left over after every other more important character has eaten.

If they do have some tragic backstory or any serious moments, they are still the one desperately trying to cut the tension and either annoying other characters and the audience in the process, or being quite tone deaf in their endeavors.

The one everybody hates: Jar Jar Binks

The one some people hate: Olaf

The one that subverted himself right quick: Sokka

Prequel apologists, step aside. The writing is still terrible and Jar Jar even in Clone Wars features in episodes (“Bombad Jedi”) I routinely skip on rewatches. Maybe he’s funnier for little kids? I haven’t seen every piece of SW media out there but I can’t recall a single moment where Jar Jar has any moment of depth or seriousness and he’s frequently the most inconvenient element of any mission he winds up on.

Honorable mention for C-3PO, far less irritating but still largely a bumbling idiot (I love him, to be clear, he’s just always in the wrong place at the wrong time). The droid factory shenanigans on Geonosis comes to mind, as well as when he was so useless, he was riding around in a sack on Chewie’s back because he got disassembled in ESB.

Jar Jar is funny, but he’s only funny, and most often incompetently funny.

Olaf’s dark humor is what saves him for me personally. “I’ve been impaled” still makes me chuckle no matter how many times I see Frozen. Not only that, but he does have the big heart moment of the movie with Anna. He has zero tragic backstory, he was basically born yesterday, but he’s not a one-dimensional cardboard cutout.

Another honorable mention to, like, 8 out of 13 Dwarves, specifically Bombur, in the Hobbit trilogy. A combined 9 hours of movie and they chose to fill it with Mirkwood River Rapids™ instead of making up development for the heroes.

Sokka, on the other hand, looks like he’s going to be the sarcastic comedic relief, but he becomes so much more and wastes no time doing it. Compare him to the version of him written by the Ember Island Players. He’s been essayed about to death and there’s nothing more I can say about him that hasn’t been said before so I’ll leave it here: Sokka (and Toph) is comedic relief done right.

The whole cast is funny when they want to be, serious when they have to be. No one character gets designated “the funny one” or “the hopeful crying one” or “the buff one” no matter what Fire Nation propaganda wants you to think.

Final honorable mention to Leo Valdez. He has a ton of depth and nuance to him, but is very much "the funny one" of the Seven. Comparing Percy's trip to Ogygia with Leo's and one was a rather sullen "you could have this peaceful escape if you left your destiny behind, but you won't, noble hero" and the other was a bizzare romcom that, to me, wasn't funny, and just created a whole new set of issues surrounding Calypso's character.

—

Femme Fatales

Femme Fatales exist to look pretty, kick ass, pretend to be strong female characters, and be something for the male characters and male viewers to guiltlessly lust after because she’s asking for it. This is not a badass woman protagonist. The classic depiction of this trope is the shallow accessory to a male character, a seductress meant to either manipulate the hero into straying off his moral high ground, or to pit him against another man.

So.

Black Widow.

In Iron Man 2, you can argue that she’s supposed to be shallow. She plays it very close to the chest as a spy and has no reason to let any other characters, especially Tony, behind her mask. It’s not her movie.

In this movie specifically, though, she is this trope exactly. The bodysuit, the perfect hair, the whole changing in the back of the car, her provocative fighting style. She is eye candy that can kick ass, the only thing missing is an attempt at seducing Tony but you'll still catch him looking. That’s the femme fatale.

Extremely popular in 80s and 90s action movies as an accessory to the male protagonist but they've existed as long as film has. If he doesn’t have a damsel in distress to save, he has a sexy leg lamp to woo.

But Black Widow shows up in another decade’s worth of movies and dies to motivate the boys (and because her life matters less than Clint’s because he’s got a family while she can’t have kids), only getting a solo film after they killed her off, but in that time, they gave her plenty to do.

Natasha has many moments with depth, most of them in Age of Ultron and Winter Soldier, but she does have them. She laughs, she cries, she jokes, she’s smart and resourceful in moments where she doesn’t have a male character to impress, she has strengths beyond her physical attributes, and she has flaws. And, she and Steve Rogers miraculously weren’t written a romantic subplot in Winter Soldier.

On the one hand, Natasha knows exactly what she is and her fighting style fully leans into using the weapons she has as a woman… but on the other hand, in creating her character, the writers chose to lean into sexing her up.

I love her character, I just don’t love what they did with her.

—

Both of these character tropes tend to feature in scripts that aren’t the best to begin with. A strong, nuanced cast of heroes doesn’t usually have that one outlier that completely drops the ball.

All I’m asking for is to not designate any one character as the bearer of whatever you forget to give the rest of the cast. “Oops I forgot the funny, let me add in a comic relief, here’s Bob,” is a disservice to Bob. “Oops I forgot the women, let me add in this femme fatale, here’s Nyxandra,” is a disservice to Nyxandra.

Let every character have some funny moments.

You want a femme fatale? Go right ahead, honestly, but maybe don’t make her the only lady in the cast? If she’s a femme fatale because she wants to be, that’s great, but maybe have a woman who proves that you do, in fact, know how to write women?

[gloriousburden]

TVA Loki X Anti Loki series blogger!Reader crackfic

(Written in first person because unfortunately it’s funnier in first person and I’m not taking this too seriously. This was going to have very self indulgent smut at the end because I got bored as fuck and tried really hard to forget that I was indeed writing about TVA Loki, so I started pretending I was writing about a less eloquent version of the real Loki and got a little carried away. But, I got disgusted while writing it so I’ve spared you all besides a few paragraphs.)

(Also remember that this is a crackfic Pleaseee I can write better than this and I want to start posting serious fics soon)

I was living my own life, until… I crossed paths with… HIM! That son of a bitch..

I went from being your average, everyday Anti Loki Series Loki fanatic (damn that’s a mouthful LMFAOOO), to being confined to the shackles of the TVA itself.

It all started on June 9th, 2021. I watched the first episode of the Loki series, and.. I’ve never been the same since! I’ve been living in pure AGONY. The tags are now flooded with… HIM. And also Lokius fanart. Mainly Lokius fanart actually. The fandom that was once there, no longer remains…

What once was a self explanatory tag, is now… THE NAME OF THAT CURSED SERIES! I can’t even escape the filthy grip of the series by reading Loki x Reader fanfiction, because the mischaracterization just reminds me of… HIM.

Anyway.. enough about that. One fuck up leads me in the hands of the TVA. Great, I’m a variant. I watch my tape, nothing too exciting… I didn’t get paired with that MOBIUS BASTARD at least.

“Yes, I don’t really need that explained to me. I’m left for dead, aren’t I?” I ask the TVA agent, in a very bitter manner.

As much as I’d like to continue to live my life, I choose to believe destiny brought me here. This is all it ever was supposed to be…

“No, not exactly.. if you comply, of course, Between you and I, your unpaid labor could be appreciated.” She explains, in a douchey manner. They’re all like this, I think.

Oh, of course. That sounds familiar. I wonder if she knows she’s a variant. Which episode are we on? Wait, I think canon divergence was one of the warnings on this fic…

“Sure… and If I comply, my life is spared… but where do I end up?” I ask, sighing with a shrug as I lean back against the orange chair.

… these chairs are uncomfortable as fuck.

“… Don’t worry about that.” She immediately changes the subject with an uncharacteristically expressive smile. How creepy. “Anyway, your life will be spared if you comply. So.. comply?” She reaches her hand out, to shake my own.

I don’t really have a choice. Well, I do. But if I’m killed off, the fic won’t work.

So, I reach out with a half assed smile. Yeah, this could get me somewhere, I guess.. I firmly shake her hand.

“You’ve officially been upgraded!” She speaks all of a sudden, monotonously. Like a robotic announcement… This place is creeping me out. She then hands me a… fuck, that’s exactly what I think it is.

UGLY ASS BROWN TVA UNIFORM!

“… Thank you, um..” I thank her, not even able to force a fake smile. “So… I’m assuming you have a mission for me?” I ask, unenthusiastically. This is all very.. predictable.

“… Oh! Yes, I do. You’re paired and tasked with..” She trails off, perhaps contemplating if she should tell me, or not.. I mean, she did have details of my past. Maybe it was one of my greatest enemies. I should be wary. “You’ll be acquainted soon.” She ends our meeting shortly, grabbing her paperwork, and exiting the theater.

… Whatever. I head to the changing room, changing into that ugly ass uniform. I guess recruiting variants for unpaid labor in exchange for their lives being spared was a common theme now.

Just as I walk out of the changing room, the TVA agent I was just speaking to a moment ago grabs my attention.

“You’re changed? Good. Yes, I would like you to meet someone. Please, follow me.” She spoke, as she began leading me to a large meeting room.

I’m assuming they talk about upcoming missions and stuff, here. Was this even in the series?

I walk into the room, and I’m met with no other than… holy shit… I’M MET WITH…

MOBIUS!!!

That bastard. Actually, it’s a little funny. I’m practically speaking to Lightning McQueen.

He smiles, reaching his hand out to me. “Hello, I’m M-”

“I know who you are.” I cut him off, staring deeply into his eyes. My gaze pierces through his soul. I do not take his hand.

He’s taken aback, but… not taken aback enough for my liking. I mean to incite fear. Hmm, something tells me that he was warned of my ‘difficultly’.. “Wow.” He spoke. “… Anyway, I’m Mobius. I wanted to speak to you about your upcoming mission, if you’ll allow me to finish my sentences, that is.. What are you prepared for?” He asked, totally not in a douchey manner or anything. He’d never do that.

“What am I prepared for? I don’t know, what should I be expecting?” I spoke, looking at him like he was a fucking idiot.

“Exactly, good mindset! You never know what to expect when you’re out there.” He spoke, nodding. “Do you have any kind of previous experience? Do you have any military training?” He asked.

… Weird.

“You read my file, or did you not? Does it seem like I have experience with any of this bullshit?” I asked, harshly.

“Well, I have to ask, you know? It’s my job. Yes, I read through your file. In all honesty, there wasn’t really anything too memorable!” He spoke, with that douchebag smile of his.

Okay, asshole.

“You do know you’re a variant, right?” I ask him, gritting my teeth. I was fuming inside.

“Yes, that’s already been established. It’s a long story.” He laughed, dragging out the ‘long’. “Anyway, I wanted to speak to you about something I noticed on your file. It’s quite intriguing to me!” He spoke, grabbing the file that had every detail of my being on it. Pretty creepy…

“Yeah? What could it be?” I ask, trying to look over at the file.

“So, you’re familiar with Loki?” He asks, as if it were humorous to him.

How dare you speak of him.

“… Yes? Why else would my blog be called Loki-Defender-4-Lyfe?” It was a stupid question, truly.

“Yeah, yeah, you’re right.” He laughed at my words, shaking his head. “Anyway, I’d like to introduce my good friend.” He spoke, turning back to face the door to introduce one of his TVA affiliates.

I slowly turn around, a bit warily.

This TVA Affiliate walked towards the door frame, practically bouncing off the fucking walls.

Holy shit.

“Hey, I’m L-” The TVA affiliate starts, being cut off by..

A piercing scream rips through my chest, as I fall to my knees in pure agony. My face buried into my hands.

Both TVA affiliates are quite taken aback, even a bit horrified by my sudden outburst.

“See, I told you. This is going to be.. a difficult one.” Mobius looked over and spoke to his ‘friend’ who was none other than…

THE GOD, THE MYTH, THE SHELL OF WHO HE ONCE WAS… LOKI, ONCE GOD OF MISCHIEF, TURNED TVA AFFILIATE, HIMSELF!!!!

“Ah, I can see that!” Loki speaks, practically beaming with excitement. Why is he excited? He’s pretty hyper..

What the fuck. What the fuck. What the fuck.

“Nooooo!” I’m on my knees, trembling in pure agony. I lower my hands from my face, looking up at the undeniably handsome Loki variant, who was the bane of my existence.

“Oh, hello!” Loki greets me, all giddy as he offers me a hand.

“LEAVE ME ALONE!” I yell out, backing away with an expression of horror on my face.

“Wow.” Mobius exclaimed, finding humor in my anguish.

“Alright, Look, I just want to talk to you.” Loki reassured.

“You took everything from me..” I grit my teeth, looking up at him. Oh, I was just fuming looking up at the son of a bitch. I mean, I was a little excited. His face is familiar, but so… distant.

“I don’t even know who you are!” Loki shrugged, practically jumping, with a VERY exaggerated look of confusion.

“You are the bane of my existence.” I spoke harshly, as I stood up from the ground. I was stood in front of Loki, with Mobius at our side.

Loki was.. flustered?

“I read through your file, but.. it was a little confusing. What exactly is your problem with Loki? I thought you were an admirer of his.” Mobius asked.

“An admirer? Not of this bastard.” I sighed, gesturing to Loki.

“Bastard?! That’s… harsh.” Loki spoke, looking rather offended at my words. Though, something tells me that he wasn’t too offended…

I examine Loki’s features, trying to make out his expression. I always thought that he’d be unreadable. I didn’t think I’d be able to see through him as though he were glass…

“My issue with him is.. he’s not him.” I admitted, not really elaborating on anything at all.

“Him? Who is ‘him’?” Mobius asked.

“The real Loki. Not the one written by Michael Waldron…” I explained.

“Hmm, that name isn’t familiar to me. I’m thinking you shouldn’t look up his old tweets, haha..” Mobius spoke, chuckling, but it wasn’t funny.

“The real Loki? But, I am the ‘real’ Lo-” Loki began.

“You were. But now, ugh… you’re just weird.” I sighed, evidently disgusted. “I need a drink.” I spoke, walking out the room.

“Hey, you’re not allowed to leave!” Loki called out, gripping my wrist.

I immediately turned back, looking at his face. My heart fluttered for a moment, but then… the rest of the picture appeared. The bob, the TVA uniform… Sigh.

Loki was a little caught off guard by the brief softness of my gaze, which quickly reverted to harshness.

“You think that just because we spared your life that you can run around all Willy nilly?” Mobius asked, in a stern tone.

“No. Whatever, I’m feeling faint..” I spoke, sitting down on the desk filled with paperwork. I sighed, my hand on my forehead. It’s been a long… I don’t even know how long it’s been. Time is weird here.

“That’s my des… never mind, let’s just discuss your mission.” Mobius spoke, sighing.

Loki looked like he was about to start swooning.

“Just.. go on.” I spoke, clearly uninterested.

“So, you are indeed paired with Loki. No ifs, ands, or buts.” Mobius stated.

Great.

I looked over at Loki, almost… feeling bad. He was like, really pathetic.

“… Understood.” I spoke, trying to remain mature though no amount of feigned indifference can hide my dislike of this arrangement.

“I’ll leave you and Loki to discuss. Become.. acquainted.” Mobius teased, leaving the room.

I sighed, placing my face in my hands. I was pretty stressed out.

“Hey…” He spoke, walking away from the wall he was leaned against, approaching the desk.

And on top of that, here comes Loki.

“Hi.” I spoke, looking over at him.

“So, about this mission.. you are prepared, right?” He asked. What, did he care about my well-being?

“I don’t know. I’m not really trained in any way. You, you’re strong, though.” I spoke, looking him up and down. That uniform was ugly as fuck.

“Well, you weren’t ‘spared’ for your strength or abilities. What does the TVA see in you?” He asked.

Rude.

“I could ask the same about you. It was probably your vulnerability, and the way you blindly follow everything.” I spoke, scoffing.

“Ouch.” He spoke, feigning offense. He walked closer to me.

“.. What?” I asked, looking him up and down as he got quite close to the open space between my legs. (Not that one)

“I asked you, what does the TVA see in you? What do you offer?” He spoke, looking down at me.

I bit my lip, really thinking about his question.

“Rebellion? I’ve been vocally against a lot of this TVA stuff, but, I’ve specifically been against.. you.“ I spoke, poking his chest.

… Okay, he was really defined.. Maybe the uniform was good for one thing.

“Ah, makes sense…” He spoke, his eyes lowering to my index finger that was pressed against his chest, then back up to my face.

“Maybe they see something in that.” I shrugged.

He remained silent, just staring at me. There was a lot of sexual tension, in all honesty.

“Loki?” I asked.

“Yes?” He asked, still examining my features.

“Why are you so compliant? With the TVA?” I questioned him.

“Compliant? I’ve defied them.. a few times.” He ‘corrected’.

I narrowed my eyes at him, not seeing through his bullshit.

“Fine, I.. I’m in an unusual position. I’ve never been this alone in my life. I crave their friendship.” He admitted.

“But…” I sighed, and bit my lip. “You do know you deserve better, right?” I asked him, in a genuine manner.

His expression softened a bit. He seemed a little surprised that I was being genuine with him. “… I’m not in a position where I can get anything ‘better’ than them.” He admitted, a bit quietly. As if he were afraid to admit that.

His words were so far from the sentiment the Loki I knew shared. The Loki I knew wouldn’t settle for inadequate love just so he would ‘have’ someone…

“It’s all really messed with your head a lot..” I spoke, looking into his eyes. He was just so.. different. It was sad, honestly.

“Well, I.. I wouldn’t say that.” He nervously chuckled, trying to shrug it off.

“If you had a way out, would you take it?” I questioned.

“…” He hesitated. “I could’ve, but I didn’t.” He admitted.

“I know.” Yeah, I watched that episode.

“It’s been a while.” He admitted, vaguely.

“A while? What has? What are you talking about?” I was puzzled by his words. Why was he being vague all of a sudden?

“Since I’ve felt attraction. Perhaps that’s why I accept it.” He elaborated, looking me up and down.

Attraction??? My heart dropped as he looked me up and down. Please don’t say he’s alluding to..

“You mean…?” I asked, hesitantly.

“You’re right, it did mess with my head. I don’t know why I accept this sort of treatment. From her, specifically.” His voice lowered at that last part.

He was rambling, avoiding questions. Hmm, it was worse than I thought.

“… Is it boredom? Desperation? Loneliness?” I questioned.

“I don’t really have anything else. I can’t mend things with Thor. I can’t… speak to my mother. Everyone I’ve known, is out of reach.” He explained, looking a bit saddened.

“But… you had a way out..” I looked at him, clearly confused.

“Yes, I know. But, I saw how my life was supposed to end up. I lost all the people around me. I think It’s just time for me to form new connections.” He rambled, not making a lot of sense at all.

“But these people don’t care-” I began, being cut off.

“But, you do.” He proposed, looking me up and down.

Huh? Oh, he saw me as a possible love interest. He has pretty low standards, or a thing for degradation.

“What? Loki, you’re making no sense. We’ve just met. I’ve never said that I care about you. How do you know I do?” I was confused.

“You see something that I don’t.” He spoke.

“So, your idea of being cared for is.. others having a different view of you from your own view of yourself?” I asked.

“… I mean..” He trailed off.

“You don’t even know what you’re talking about. You’re trying to justify your… attraction, to these people. But.. you know you’re searching for love in places where there isn’t any.” I spoke, looking him up and down.

“You think I deserve better.” He spoke, trying to get to a point I wasn’t quite catching.

“Anyone with sense would.” I sighed, looking away from him and around the room. The TVA decor was… definitely interesting.

“What are you looking at?” He smiled, his gaze shifting wherever my own did.

“The decor. It’s.. ugly.” I spoke, my gaze meeting his own once again.

“Oh, it’s ghastly, indeed.” He chuckled.

“Yeah.” I didn’t really care about the decor all that much. “… You’re thinking that everything you went through lead you to me?” It clicked for me.

“… Precisely.” He nodded, looking deeply into my eyes.

“But, what makes me any different from them? I think you’re pathetic.” I sighed.

“Your eyes. I mean, the way you’ve been looking at me. You’re yearning for something. When they look at me, it’s as if they see nothing.” He explained.

“Yeah, I do.. I feel for you. I guess that means I care. I..” I bit my lip, cutting myself off before I said something stupid. “I mean, I mainly was thinking about you being a shell of your former self.. You think we’re destined? I’ve spent quite some time on Tumblr criticizing your every move.” It’s true.

“Because, you care to. You’re not just indifferent about me, you’re.. passionate about hating me. That has to mean something, correct?” He proposed.

“I mean, it is… sort of a defense thing. I don’t necessarily like you, but… I defend you.” I explained, my gaze briefly lowering to his lips.

“Yeah?” His gaze mirrored my own.

“.. Yeah?” I asked.

He hesitated, before leaning in to close the distance between our lips. We both felt the tension between us melt away..

He stood in the open space between my legs. I softly moaned against his lips, kissing him back passionately. My hands went to his jacket, my legs wrapped around his waist.

“You’re right… the opposite of love is not hate.. it is indifference.” I pulled away, and admitted.

This was a gloriousburden production.

Jk unfinished smut below bc why not I’ve gotten this far 😭‼️

“Mmh, that’s a good way to put it. I do feel like I’ve heard that before, you know?” He spoke, his hands going down to my hips.

… Haha.

“Can I take this off?” I asked for permission, tugging at his jacket.

“You’re eager?” He teased.

“Ugh, no. It’s just.. ugly.” I sighed.

He chuckled. “… You’re peculiar. You have done this before, right?” He asked.

I flushed. “… That doesn’t matter. Can I take off your jacket?” I tugged at it again.

“Yes, go on.” He nodded, with a smile, backing away and allowing me to slide his jacket off his shoulders, then off his arms, before I dropped it to the ground.

I bit my lip, examining his arms. Then, my eyes went to his chest. Mid shameless examination, Loki spoke up.

“You know little of how this works?” He asked, a little less teasingly this time.

“… Would you stop asking that? I’m just looking at you.” I scoffed, taking my own jacket off and letting it fall behind me on the desk.

“Your file did state that you had no previou-” He began.

“What?! It did?” I cut him off, being caught off guard. “You… read it..?” Aw, that was a bit of a bummer.

That changes everything… he read my file…

“… Yes, I was required to. I was warned of your… difficulty.” He teased. “Hey, I do not at all mind.” He reassured, as he noticed my expression drop.

“… You’re still interested?” I asked.

“I should be asking you that question. Are you still interested?” He asked.

I mean, he was considerate at least.

“…” I hesitated. “Yes, I am.” I admitted, shamefully.

He chuckled. “Good.” He returned to the space between my legs, and placed his hands on my hips once more.

He leaned down, pressing his lips against mine. I kept my own hands on his biceps, caressing and shamelessly feeling up on him over the rolled up sleeves of his white button up. Ah, he was pretty muscular..

I followed his own movements, moaning against his lips. He deepened the kiss, pressing his hips against my own. I gasped softly, feeling his forming erection pressing against me.

His kisses left me dizzy. His cock pressing against me was a little distracting, though… and I think he knew that.

He pulled away, panting softly. “You’re nervous.” He observed.

“A little, yeah.” I admitted, with a pant. But, it was more excitement, than anything. “… You’re big.” I stated, like it wasn’t obvious.

He looked caught off guard for a moment, before understanding why I’d point that out. “… Oh. Yes, I am. Do you fear me hurting you?” He asked.

“N-No, I.. I think I can take it.” I spoke.

He narrowed his eyes at me.

“I can try.” I corrected.

He chuckled. “No, it’ll be alright.” He reassured “May I take this off you?” He gestured to my white button down.

“.. Please.” I begged.

He began to undress me, very gently removing each button. Hmm, I never thought that he’d be so gentle.. He slid the shirt down my shoulders, revealing my bra.

He stared for a moment, before realizing that he should definitely say something.

He never said anything because gloriousburden got disgusted with the realization of what she’s created, and didn’t feel like writing TVA Loki smut anymore. She will write actual Loki smut soon though perhaps..

[drifting-pieces-blog-blog]

Breaking down the comics: BEMIS. Part 1

READING THINGS SO YOU DON'T HAVE TO! 

Alright, I covered "Age of Khonshu" and honestly was so incensed that I had to make a post talking about it. 

So let's get this other bread (and burn it). 

A lot of new Moon Knight fans have heard the cry when asked what to read and where to get started. And true fans everywhere agree: DON'T READ BEMIS. 

And there are long posts and screams and sobbing about why not to read it that come out to "It's so bad!" 

But there are the curious out there. They want to know why it's bad. They want to know what happened. And...well... 

It spans a few issues. I…I was foolish and thought “I can do this in one go! How long can this take? I don’t want to spend that much time on BEMIS.” ….I forgot that doing one of these usually takes me the better part of a day to cover ONE issue. 

I’m going to break this up into Four (fuck you Tumblr) parts and cover both volumes instead of a post per issue. I don’t want Bemis to take up that much space so prepare for a few VERY LONG posts. 

Let's ruin my month! (AKA: Watch me slowly descend into blind rage). 

Marvel Legacy: Moon Knight. 2017. Issues 188-200. 

Part 1: Crazy Runs in the Family.  (Issues 188-193) Published: November 08, 2017

Written by: Max Bemis

Art by: Jacen Burrows

Editor: Jeff Youngquist 

Let's start with: 

WHO IS MAX BEMIS? 

Oh my god he's in a band. He's the lead singer for the rock band "Say Anything". 

My level of disappointment just doubled. 

According to his bio: He was raised in a 'strong Jewish environment'. His grandparents survived the Holocaust. All this has inspired his music. 

(I can't even begin to tell you how much actually looking up who he is has made me ten times angrier). 

In 2013 he started to write comics. More importantly, he wrote for characters that suffered different mental health issues. ('Polarity' at Boom! Studios about a hero with bipolar disorder). 

He then ended up at Marvel. 

For his personal life: He has bipolar disorder and self medicates with drugs (Marijuana). 

He also self identifies as "A Jew who is also a Christian", which he considers a "New age, metaphysical view" on religion. 

Good. Great. Fantastic. Now I know who this man is and I hate him even more. 

What's even funnier? Apparently his music fans ALSO hate him because he's "a sanctimonious hypocrite". 

Seriously, there's a whole Reddit page on why he's a terrible person. I'm not going to site any sources because I can't fact check a lot of those claims and maybe they are false or maybe they are true. I'm not here to slander a life. I'm here to talk about Moon Knight. 

I’ve procrastinated enough. Let’s go…. 

We open on "Ravencroft Asylum". Good start. 

We see a Doctor Emmett talking to a patient in a locked cell that's stylized like a prison interrogation cell. 

"You say remembering your youth is like looking through a layer of Jell-O. Were do things become lucid? When did you become yourself?" 

(I already hate it). 

"I learned who I was in the army, that much is clear." The patient responds. 

"I get it. The army. The incident. Aside from the physical, what did you walk away with on the day you hurt them?" The doctor looks at the files. 

And the patient is hesitant to speak on it, but he tells her that "In the army, I learned that there is a God." 

He talks about how he saw God 'in his fire' and that non-believers, atheists, skeptics, and all that are wrong. How they can't understand how big God is. 

(And now I remember when I first read this how uncomfortable this first issue made me.) 

"They weren't very nice to me in the Army, but why would they be? I had to show them I was more devoted, more significant than they were." 

I'm going to put a pause on this right here after just two pages. There are some Trigger Warnings that need to be discussed real quick. 

I grew up in the deep south and I’ve legit heard talk like this in real life. It’s terrifying. 

I knew a lot of 'born again' Christians who tried to 'save my soul'. 

This comic is going to get VERY uncomfortable for anyone that has had to deal with religious trauma. Just putting it out there. Skip if you can't handle any sort of religious trauma like excessive God Talk, Cultish behavior, Come to Jesus moments, or severe Antisemitism. 

On top of the religions issues, this comic is also going to have significant mental health mishandling. We’re talking about abuse from Doctor figures, use of improper terminology, abuse of the mentally ill, and severe discrimination. 

OH and misogyny. Let’s not forget the misogyny. 

This comic run also gets very…disgusting. I had many moments when reading this that legitimately turned my stomach. There is going to be depictions of self mutilation, gore, suicidal acts, and violence. 

I AM GOING TO CENSOR THINGS. I will not blur images, but I will NOT be posting any of the comic pages that depict any of these violent, shock value, images. I’ll give a brief rundown of what’s going on and tell you that there is an image that I am going to skip. I’m telling you guys, these two runs were disgusting and curdled my stomach many times. Especially issue two. 

So…Those are your only trigger warnings. 

Let’s continue. 

So now we see a narration by Dr. Emmett. 

It is not going to paint a good light on Dr. Emmett. 

She's in her office at night going over files. 

"Sometimes, this job is guiltily fun... To be frank, patient 86 is @#%$ FASCINATING. He attributes his pyromania to a leap of faith. Conversely, I might argue that it was the fifth canteen full of force-fed urine that inspired him. 

Sometimes I get him so fully that it's like I want to have a beer with the guy. 

He wears self-delusion with so much dignity. I wish I had that level of resolve, that I could stop fixating on the...SPECTOR conundrum.

I'm just a failure of a doctor, left without a shell-shocked dissociative bipolar to shove away in a box. 

In any other instance, I'd dial this one in. It's just that one nagging thing. 

Lunatic joins the army. Said lunatic freaks out and ends up spiritually reborn in a near-death experience. 

Sound like anyone you know?" 

OH GOOD. GREAT. I just... Deep breath. Deep breath. 

We’re going to play that angle. Woman psychiatrist/psychologist falls for her feminine desire to get with her patient. She can’t be expected to uphold her standards as a doctor or her doctor patient relationship. She has to dream for that exciting patient. She plays it off as wanting the award winning famous patient that makes her career into something amazing but because she’s a woman she has to play the dreamy sighing “Oh look how amazing he is!” role. And of course she’s after Marc. She can’t have Marc, so she finds this other patient that has a similar start of PTSD military based trauma and she’s going to fail to help him because she wants him to be like the other guy. 

Not to mention she's using outdated terms like "Shell Shocked". 

A term coined in WWI when for the first time, the world witnessed large groups of men coming back from war after encountering new aged weapons never dealt with or seen before. 

Then she calls him Bipolar and links it to his Dissociative disorder. 

I don't have a degree in psychology, but I do have a special interest. From what I've seen in the OG early comics by Moench, Marc Spector is not Bipolar. He does not exhibit episodes of mania followed by deep periods of depression. I'd go further into it, but trust me... He has a LOT of issues, but Bipolar was not one of them to start with. 

In fact, after Schizophrenia, Bipolar was one of the most commonly misdiagnosed mental illnesses. A lot of people with DID were misdiagnosed with Bipolar disorder because of the way the symptoms presented in many cases. You didn't have another person in your brain, you were just exhibiting mania and now you're depressed. 

ANOTHER THING to take issue with! 

This comic is coming DIRECTLY on the heels of Lemire's run. In that run, it was the first time we dealt with Marc's official time in the army and his dissociative states. 

We saw Marc wandering through the desert, dissociating and dealing with Khonshu issues. 

The off handed tick about "Lunatic joins the army. Said lunatic freaks out and ends up spiritually reborn in a near-death experience." 

1. The army did not lead to a Near-Death experience for Marc Spector. He joined the Mercenaries and was killed when his conscious got the better of him and his leader shot him for trying to save someone. 

2. A doctor of psychology should NOT be using terms like 'Lunatic'. 

3. Marc didn't 'FREAK OUT'. He had several dissociative episodes that ended up with him being discharged. 

4. Marc was NOT 'spiritually reborn'. Depending on who is writing and how Khonshu himself is being depicted... An ancient god revived him as his avatar. This is not converting him in any sense of the word. Marc Spector may have issues with his Jewish beliefs and upbringing, but he is still very Jewish. He was NOT 'spiritually reborn'. He was brought back to life to act as Avatar and Marc took this to being Moon Knight, vengeance, paying for the pain he caused, and trying to be a better person. To be a different person. To be anyone except Marc Spector. Jake and Steven took this to just mean that they wanted to help people. 

So... Yeah... Now we move on to the title page. 

This is going well. We can already tell that Bemis either just didn’t read the Lemire run and got the cliff notes, or he just didn’t care and only took away bits without understanding the actual story it had to tell. 

ON THE TITLE PAGE. Ohhhhh man you guys. ON THE TITLE PAGE. 

Every title page has a little blurb explaining who the character is and what's been going on in previously connected issues. This way, people can pick it up and just go without having to dig through old comics. It's also a good reminder for people like me, who have shit memories and have forgotten what's going on after having to wait a whole month for the new issue. 

I honestly have no idea who writes these blurbs. Sometimes you'll get the same blurb that lass for YEARS. (see Bendis run and how that carried over for runs and runs). 

"Marc Spector. Steven Grant. Jake Lockley. Each a distinct personality of one man vying for control. Spector, the original personality, has asserted his dominance and fights to retain that control. But years ago, as a mercenary, Spector died in Egypt under a statue of the Moon God Khonshu. In the shadow of the ancient deity, Marc returned to life. From then on, Marc took on a new aspect in honor of Khonshu, dedicating his second life to fighting crime as....

MOON KNIGHT". 

I want to fight someone. I don’t know who. But I want to fight someone. Whoever wrote this… This is what Marvel took away from the Lemire run. His beautiful run that for the first time, really dealt with Moon Knight’s mental health struggles. That said “They have dissociative Identity Disorder. They are a system. They have learned how to work together. They have found peace in who they are.” And whoever wrote this blurb went “Nawh, but Marc is the dominant and original personality and he’s in charge now!” 

Editor in Chief: Axel Alonso

Chief Creative Officer: Joe Quesada. 

Ah... These guys. These guys are to blame. We meet again Quesada... 

 Alright. We now see Dr. Emmett at some party (birthday party? They're all wearing party hats but they're clearly eating dinner and one guy is wearing a kippah and someone else is wearing a top hat and one guy is wearing no hat. I... I don't even know. This is all a disaster at this point.) 

The group is laughing about things and Dr. Emmett is day dreaming about Marc Spector. 

"Marc, my former patient. And this new one, patient 86. Traumatic experiences in the middle east. The similarity is brazen. Was there something in Marc's experience that patient 86 could..." 

Her thoughts are interrupted as one of her colleagues takes a jab at her. "Still stuck on the hooded leotard guy?" 

She snaps to defense and they tell her to let it go. That she can do better than 'that loser'. 

Back at home, she's angry. Moon Knight is not a loser in a leotard. 

And we see her shrine. Yeah... This is healthy. 

Oh good. Back at work she's dealing with patient 86. She's attempting to explain how his brain works to him. 

Get ready for some grade A psychology here people. 

She explains that on one side of his brain is chemistry and the other is "Personality. Socially ingrained behavior. I want you to see the distinction." 

He asks her that the fact that he's murdered people should label him as insane. 

She disagrees. "I'm not sure the fact that you're a murderer proves anything about your nature." 

Hmm. 

She goes on to explain that "So many have been clinically impared by their unique brain chemistry. They needed help. We failed them. Imagine hearing audible voices that told you to eat a person. These people needed treatment." 

And she points to cases like Sam, Gein, and Fish. 

Yeah... Because Gein needed treatment. I'm just gonna... Just gonna.... ARGH. 

"You developed bipolar disorder during your early adulthood. Moods fluctuating from mania to depression to utterly convincing delusion. Compounded by the traumatic childhood on the street, in state homes, and juvie that you barely recall. None of these things were your fault. Nor what happened in the desert." 

Okay, they're just throwing out things at this point. They're just going to start listing off the sterotypical bad childhood leads to a bad kid and trauma things. 

She then goes on to tell him that she understands what he did. That it was not his fault, that he was looking for something to control and fire was his answer. Not to mention God. "None of these symbols are inherently harmful. I've seen the power of symbolism redeem one of my patients who was literally split apart by trauma." 

oh no. no no no no...That's not how... ARGH. 

"Imagine what it could do for someone who was ready to receive help. Bipolar disorder, when tempered, can produce intense inspiration and creativity. I want to help you." 

And she adds "Kurt Cobain" to the list. 

I'm just going to... To sit here... quietly raging. 

Alright, so now we see Dr. Emmett walking through the Egyptian exhibit at the museum. 

"If Egyptian Mythology worked for Spector...It could work for my mysteriously nameness patient." 

HOW IS HE NAMELESS?! HE WAS IN THE ARMY. They KNOW where he was stationed, they know what unit he was in, they know the trauma he faced and bullying, and they know the group of people he killed! OF COURSE THEY ARE GOING TO KNOW WHO HE IS. 

"As I stand in front of the statue of Khonshu, Marc's main squeeze, I have a very important realization--Marc Spector may be legally insane... But he was never crazy at all. 

Is every priest who hears the voice of their lord crazy? Every shaman? The damn writers of the constitution, invoking god on every page?

Marc manifested the meaning of this icon. His dissociative identity disorder simply brought it more vividly to life. 

He needed an emblem of his inner bedlam and his innate need to protect victims. And the god of these qualities--Khonshu--came to him literally." 

THAT'S NOT HOW IT WORKS. He didn't get DID out in the desert. He's had it since he was a very young boy! He didn't go to Khonshu to try to make sense of it! His DID didn't 'bring it to light'. It didn't make him hear the voice of god! 

So she decides to pick out a god for her patient. 

Cause that's healthy. 

She considers Osiris, Horus, ....Imhotep... 

But of course she stops at Ra. 

You know what's really getting to me right now? This so called Ivy league doctor that clearly has no idea what she's doing, has zero ability to draw the line at doctor patient relationship, her obsessive tendencies, and pushing her obsession onto another patient. 

Furthermore, when you look at Patient 86, you do see a man that recognizes that he did something wrong. That he needs help and is in a place to try to understand how his own brain is working. We see him clinging to her words and trying to understand where she's going with her treatment. 

She explains that Khonshu is Ra's son. 

"I explain my understanding of the two gods' dynamic to 86. Some of it comes from established myth, some from Freudian interpretation." 

FREUDIAN. THEY ARE GOING FREUDIAN. This is a no Freud zone. 

"Amon Ra represented the burning, blazing emblem of masculine virility that is the sun. In many cultures, the sun stands for the sovereignty of masculinity --logic and raw power. But in the New Kingdom of Egyptian lore it was his Adopted son Khonshu who was described as "Greatest God of the Great Gods." 

(Nope. There was a brief Khonshu cult where they briefly played at worshiping the Moon instead of the sun. This was later put down and Ra resurged as the leading deity again. And it certainly wasn't the 'New Kingdom' path to look at him as the greatest of the great). 

"Khonsu of the moon, a universal symbol for the redemptive power of insubordination--femininity and sensitivity. The Ras of this world resent becoming passe. It makes them angry. And they burn harder to spite their own impotence. Established society can't accept change. Can't accept that the old ways don't work anymore." 

Oh good. Misogynistic teachings. Just what he needs. 

"Something happened to you when you were young, dropped you into a sea of lost children. I believe what you're hiding from yourself was most likely some form of abuse." 

She asks him to try to remember and he does remember abuse from the people in the army but also as a child being abused. 

Now we have the utmost breach of doctor patient confidentiality. 

"Finally, I reveal the tale of Marc Spector to 86. How a confused mentally unstable boy drew on the figurative power of the Moon to justify his nature. 

Marc's transformation into the hero called Moon Knight...A role model for the bewildered. 

I pass along all my endless research and documentation of his life since he was under my care, as well as several well-regarded books considering Egyptian mythology." 

AHHHHHHHHHH.

"And madly enough, patient 86 gets it. It clicks in him. He sees how Spector, like him, was not just insane, but was truly immersed in a living myth. It was never the moon's fault that it shone so brightly." 

Now we see Dr. Emmett having a nightmare. 

She sits in a large empty and white office when she's suddenly attacked by mummies. 

Moon Knight shows up to save her and rips apart the mummies. 

But wait, it's not Moon Knight! 

JESUS. I don't know why that reminded me. But this patient is purposefully drawn to resemble the white Christian version of Jesus. So that’s another contention I have with this comic. 

I’m also 90% certain that that cat wasn’t white a few pages ago… 

Alright, back at the asylum, we see a changed patient. He's more confident. More thoughtful. 

She tells him he needs to be present and not dissociating into the void. She wants to continue his 'traditional therapy' as well as his "...studies." 

He tells her that he knows who he is now. 

She tells him that even if "the allegory of Khonshu brings you resolve, you still need medicine. You still need therapy." 

"So, it's just a story now? I suppose Ra never let his wrath rain down on his errant son? That everything you taught me was an illusion?" 

Suddenly she's back peddling. Saying she didn't teach him that. It's not what she was trying to get him to understand. 

He asks her to leave. He has things to think about. 

I mean, honestly what did she think was going to happen? 

She has a patient that believes that he has been touched by the divine and has become godly. So she has given him a god that is involved in FIRE, the thing he is associating with god. She's basically given him a path to his own displacement!! 

She FINALLY realizes that she can just go to the military hospital to try to figure out who he really is. 

At the military medical facility, she talks to another doctor. 

"I don't say this a lot about multiple murderers, but... If you're asking what I thought of the man, I'd have to admit he brought nothing but warmth to this place." 

And that's the thing. He's a quiet and pleasant man. Introspective and not really possessing his own unique personality. He accepts what is put on him. A sort of trauma processing and self defense. 

The doctor then explains that patient 86 signed up for the army under a forged alias. Okay. So that explains why they don't know who he is... But they could call him by that name instead of just 86. 

While she's there, another patient runs up, having overhead who they were talking about. 

He screams about how he was there and he saw what happened. 

"We all know the truth. It was impossible. They had him tied up. Naked. How could he have possibly started that fire? No matches, no lighter. I know what he--" 

The orderlies show up and of course pull him away. 

At the same time she gets an emergency message from her own asylum telling her to get back there right away. 

She gets back to find 's room covered in blood. 

Her response? 

"How could this be? Was it all for nothing? As a doctor, I believed I could make a difference. But again, I am just at the whim of the raw, elemental power of insanity." 

NO. You most certainly are not at the whim of the power of insanity! THIS IS YOUR JOB. Your job is to help people who have mental health issues! Being a doctor in a mental health institution is HARD. You have the lives of people at their most vulnerable in your hands! 

So what happened? 

Another nurse tells Dr. Emmett: "We found him like this and immediately restrained him. So nobody else besides Nurse Hayworth could be hurt. ALso... There was no other way to retrieve her nose." 

Cool. We're going Hannibal Lecter now? For dramatics? For shock value? 

I'm not going to show you the comic picture here. I hate it. It hurts to look at. It's disgusting. It's clearly done for shock value. 

But we see  wrapped up in a restraint jacket with blood all over his face. Behind him he's drawn RANDOM vaguely Egyptian hieroglyphs in blood. 

She asks him why he did it. 

"When I revealed myself to her... She didn't believe me." 

Dr. Emmett is confused. She thought he was a kind and compassionate man who had a terrible upbringing and didn't know who he was. 

He tells her that she should know who he is since she taught it to him. 

"Khonshu." She answers. Because she's an idiot. 

"Khonshu is nothing next to me." 

He bursts into flames, igniting the whole room. 

"I wanted to speak to you before I go, but...I'll have to take leave of you now, Dr. E. Whatever made me the way I am is irrelevant. You brought me purpose. You showed me that I am--and always have been--A God." 

"Dear Lord. Amon Ra." 

He tells her that Khonshu is going to bow to him even if he has to crack his spine and so on and so on.... 

He leaves the hospital, leaving the doctor to die in the flames. 

We see flashes of his past where he set fire to his abusers as a kid and again in the army. Fire caused by his own mind. 

"He was always meant to become this. And now I know what trauma robbed him of his memories. Sometimes the sun gives birth to a bright brilliant Moon, changing us for the better. But sometimes it consumes us... And we burn, it becomes all we can see." 

We cut to a shot of the hospital being on fire and emergency services there. 

Look! They found a survivor in the flames! The commentary between the paramedics is disgusting. And the casual way they move to treat the survivor is also just disgusting. 

We get to see the survivor and it's Dr. Emmett. Completely burned up but still alive. Again... shock value and I'm not going to show you the image here. But it's bad. 

She is laughing and yelling about how she believes. 

We see 86 walking away from the hospital down the road, happy, and also naked. I honestly don’t know why this became a thing in comics with naked guys all over the place. It’s obviously used as a way to elicit some sort of reaction from the reader. One of disgust, something to laugh at, or just “Oh no! The man is naked now!” I hate it. 

Then we get a few pages from Khonshu. A recap on Marc's story. 

It's not told right. But I will forgive it because it's told from Khonshu's point of view, and that asshole probably sees it this way. So... I suppose I'll turn a blind eye to how wrong the story is here. 

You would see it as Marc begging, wouldn't you, you stupid pigeon. 

"He became...A hero. He used my powers to fight crime. To find redemption. It only cost him his mind. You see, the criminals aren't the only thing Marc Spector fights. He also fights... 

"The voices in his head. Marc Suffers from Multiple Personality Disorder." 

I've said it before. It stopped being called Multiple Personality Disorder YEARS ago. This is lazy writing with no research. And coming off of Lemire's run, this is just insulting. 

Also calling it 'voices in his head' is just outright pitiful. 

"But given time, he has managed to make peace with those voices. Including mine. No, together, we are... MOON KNIGHT." 

And that's the end of the issue. 

We get an afterward from the author. 

It angers me beyond words. 

"Writing Moon Knight (not "a book like Moon Knight" or "Writing such a huge project for Marvel"...Writing Moon Knight) is a dream come true. I couldn't pick a better place in the Marvel U to inject my passion into, and it is the pinnacle of everything I've worked towards as a writer. 

Anyone who treats a superhero comic as an easy paycheck needs to check themselves and realize why they're our most prevalent modern myths. Thank YOU (and my fam at Marvel) for letting me write this, supporting my previous work, and allowing me to make comics with someone as esteemed and talented as Jacen. 

I only ask that if you enjoyed this somewhat bizarre issue, keep reading this book. I want to enjoy it with you. Maybe we can claw away at something horrible together. 

It will not, however, be pretty.  

-Thanks, 

Max Bemis." 

We also get an afterword by the artist, Jacen Burrows that notes that they are following in the wake of legends like Smallwood and Lemire as well as Ellis and Shalvey who worked hard to re-awaken Moon Knight after it's cancellation (see Bendis). They note that they are working to tell a new and defining chapter in his character and a thought-provoking, intense, and scary note in Marc Spector's life. 

I'm going to go punch a wall now. 

NEXT ISSUE! #189! 

Here we go… issue two… Let’s get this…moldy… bread. 

We open on... NYC Subway. We see a happy dude driving the subway car. As the car rolls into the station, a large man steps into the cab with him. 

"Happy to have made it to Friday? The stench of your jubilance is offensive. But you're right to rejoice. Today you learn the truth." 

He touches the driver's shoulder and slowly a blue beam over takes him and his eyes turn blood red and start to bleed. ...I'm not posting a picture. 

"Tell me what you've learned by knowing me. I'm living in you now." 

The driver starts to stammer and talk. "H...H..Humanity is perverse. Genocide is the comeuppance we deserve. There is no creator. Undebatable. Love is a contrivance. Undebatable. The white house is the death star. Twitter is a virus. And when the nukes raze everything we know...Only a fool would claim it wasn't our destiny." 

Yeah... The large man calls himself "THE TRUTH" and has the ability to send these visions into the people he touches. It makes the driver hate everything and he starts up the car again, out to spread the truth. 

We are back to Khonshu narrating. 

"My name is Khonshu. Moon God of Egypt. I'm here to tell you a story about a mad vigilante named Marc Spector. Our tale finds us here, on a standard night for Marc, who, when dressed in all white and donning a cape, refers to himself as Moon Knight. 

Marc has spent ten minutes decorating this bar with the blood of these drug dealers and slavers. The cacophony of snapping collarbones and pit-pattering plasma is like whale songs to him. 

As the thud of a man being literally punted across the room sounds, Marc Spector is grateful for his life. 

For the privilege of serving me. Khonshu, protector of travelers in the night. 

You see, Marc Spector is crazy. But in the context of my blessing, he is, well...A 'Super Hero'." 

I overlooked it before, considering it comes from Khonshu's narrative and Khonshu WOULD see things differently.... But I can't. I can't even attribute this to Khonshu. This is just tripe bullshit. 

We're going to start fast forwarding here because... It just keeps going on like this. The old bird just doesn't shut up. He carries on for three pages and there is a LOT of text there. 

We see Moon Knight beating up a bunch of guys to a bloody mess. Then we move down to see a bandaged up Marc heading up to his VERY run down, grungy, apartment building. He waves hello to some old lady behind the glass that runs the place. 

He tells her he'll have the rent for her in the morning. 

Khonshu again calls Marc having just recovered from a 'personal crisis' and taking his problems more seriously, like his struggle with 'multiple personality disorder'. 

Khonshu boasts about how hard it is to live with a demigod in your head and that Marc has learned to 'live with his lunacy and wield it like a weapon'. 

We see Marc ironing his Moon Knight outfit while watching TV. 

Khonshu AGAIN talks about how Marc has learned to use his three distinct identities and that therapy has let him come a long way. About how Marc came to him begging to have his life saved and now Marc is his 'earthly champion'. 

"Or perhaps he was a space cadet whose psychosis was triggered by being shot up and dried out in the baking middle east sun. Your call." 

THIS IS WHAT YOU GOT FROM LEMIRE?! THIS?! How...How... HOW. 

We now see Marc passed out in bed. 

"Marc is ready to become someone else." 

Yeah so… We got him ‘becoming’ Steven. Who talks to Khonshu. Sure. Fine. Whatever. Khonshu calls him Narcissistic and decadent. 

FIRST OF ALL. Oh. You did NOT just come for Steven Grant. Oh we are going to have words now. 

Steven Grant is a beautiful wonderful man who has dreams of charity, peace, and living the perfect life that he was EXPECTED to live as a child under his father’s role. He’s the ideal son he was supposed to be, but he keeps his eyes on what’s right and what’s wrong and has STRONG moral opinions. He takes care of the body because he HAS TO. Marc isn’t going to do it. If it wasn’t for Steven, they’d turn into a walking festering infection with broken bones and starve to death! Steven keeps them alive and HEALTHY. He is the epitome of the one that gives because he believes in living a good life as a good person. 

Oh. Now you're gonna come for my boy Jake?! YEAH. YOU BETTER AVOID DISCUSSING HIM FOR NOW. I’LL BITE ANYONE THAT COMES FOR JAKE. (spoilers: I know exactly what he does with Jake later and I am furious). 

Alright. Back to Patient 86, or RA as he's going to be called later for a bit. 

We see him in a homeless shelter getting soup. He talks to various homeless people, prostitutes and druggies in an effort to locate someone. There are heavy implications in some of these images that he 'did things' to get the information he wanted. I’m not going to post them because of the nature of the way these people are being depicted. 

Back with Khonshu and Steven. He's at some business meeting. He's made them a lot of money. Everyone is happy and celebrating. Apparently Steven goes to struggling companies and makes them VERY wealthy. 

He's decided to donate his portion of the new wealth towards his "Lunar Lives" charity fund that feeds the displaced youth of New York. 

Steven shrugs saying that money is boring and he finds it fun to toss it to places where it doesn't belong. 

Sure, we'll go with that version of Steven Grant being a kind and charitable man. 

The party is interrupted by news reports that a subway conductor committed suicide by crashing the car. The survivors of the crash are now apparently acting strange, "self mutilating" and acting violent towards the aid workers trying to help the scene. 

Steven slips away from the party. 

Moon Knight time. 

But first, we go back to RA. 

He's found the person he's looking for. He's guarded by thugs. After a little encounter, Ra sets fire to one of the thugs and heads up to meet the man. 

Back at the subway crash, we see chaos as rescue workers try to put out the fire, help the injured, and deal with the ones that are suddenly acting violently. 

And Khonshu is still going. It's an interesting choice. I'll give them that. Having Khonshu narrate instead of hearing at ALL from the Moon Knight system. I suppose it gives them bigger leeway when it comes to the unreliable narrator because Khonshu WOULD see things differently. An excuse to not depict Marc and the others correctly? 

....But it still does swing widely and miss far too often. 

"Quite familiar with all the things that make men weep and soil themselves, Marc Spector felt at home in these derelict tunnels." 

We see Moon Knight walk past the crash and into the train tunnels. 

"After too much time confined in a white room, the odor of dead rat fart and fungal growth actually calmed his busy brain. He was in his element-The inspector holmes of king fu madmen." 

See, this is where it falls flat. If Steven is dealing with the business aspect, Marc isn't going to care about that room. 

And again we get ANOTHER jab at Marc being 'insane' and liking the disgusting things and being more at home in dank and terrible places. 

Perhaps Marc is more at home in sewers (there was a sewer man) than Steven or Jake... But it has nothing to do with his mental state. It's because, as Moon Knight, he isn't above things like that. He's not the perfect clean hero that Captain America or Iron man is. He's the man of the people that puts himself down there in the lowest parts because it's where he's needed. 

Moon Knight rightly is able to look at the scene of chaos at the crash site and deduct that it's a psionic attack. 

"Historically, he had found telepaths to generally be meek characters using their sway over the mind as compensation for physical frailty. Like sexually feeble men with muscle cars." 

Unnecessary jab. 

Now, as much as I dislike this art style, it's a choice and there is SOME merit to it. Look, here's a nice page. 

Here’s a badly cropped version. I like the way they drew Moon Knight in the first two panels with the play of the light and shadows. That big angry dude down there is the Truth guy. And I cropped it there because under him is a bunch of guys he’s shown the truth to who are writhing on the ground, bleeding from the eyes and shouting terrible things. 

Moon Knight goes in swinging and lands a few blows, trying to know him out to release the affected people from his psychic attacks. 

The guy is pretty big and he takes the hits easily. 

He manages to grab Moon Knight by the neck and starts to use his abilities on him. 

So what truth does Marc see? 

"I'm a mad circus clown... This is all for myself. There is no Moon God. Just another...Sick... Delusion..." 

I...honestly can see Marc having that issue. It's an issue he's had before where he thinks this is all his own way to keep being violent and that Khonshu is just a product of his need to justify what he does. 

Marc snaps himself out of the psychic attack by punching himself in the face. 

And I forgot that Bemis has decided that Marc Spector is a masochist and he loves it. 

Literally, it has Moon Knight yelling "Ghhh. I #@$% Love it!" 

He attacks the Truth again, slicing him up with his crescent darts and landing blows. 

The Truth remains standing. 

Moon Knight decides to look inward for help. 

"Not having a lot of luck here, Fellas. Khonshu's more of a talker and this guy's power set is the real deal. Grant's useless...Doubt the Truth is looking for stock tips." 

(I forgot that Bemis considers Khonshu to be his own version of an Alter without being an alter? That he just lives in their head.) 

UGH. Yep. Here we go. This is what he's done to Jake. 

"I'm gonna need..." And Moon Knight lets out a scream of rage as Marc steps out and tells Jake to "Do your worst." 

Apparently... Bemis has decided that Jake is the wild card, violent, unpredictable, and brutal. Worse than Marc for some reason. That Jake is the powerhouse of hits... 

I honestly has no idea why he went this route when MARC of all people has always been the one to be the guy that doesn't go down and always hits back. It just makes no sense.

What even. 

Jake comes right at the Truth, spits a tooth in his face, then challenges him. 

"You want to step into Jake Lockley's mind, you gigantic freak? I @#$% Dare you.

You met Marc. Marc's disturbed as hell. Now imagine that he took all the worst parts of himself and let them fuse into a living person. Now go ahead and taste MY truth, you leech." 

I HAVE SO MANY THINGS TO SAY ABOUT THIS. 

DISSOCIATIVE IDENTITY DISORDER DOESN’T WORK THAT WAY. It’s not making people out of things! You don’t go “Well I hate that I burn all the cakes so I’m going to make this person my cake burning person!” ALSO Marc isn’t that bad either! Marc did terrible things, but Marc is also the hardest on himself! Marc could burn a cake and then use it as proof that he’s the worst person in the world! And Jake ISN’T a bad person! Jake is a good kind loving man with friends and a good heart and I’M SO ANGRY RIGHT NOW. 

And the whole time, you see ghostly Marc off to the side looking less than pleased at the situation and reminding Jake that "You're not allowed to kill him, Jake." 

And the Truth pulls away in pain. 

"Dear God. The things...The things you've done."

WHAT?! WHAT DID JAKE DO?! DRINK HOT COFFEE AND BURN HIS TONGUE?! DID HE PLAY BALL WITH ONE OF THE LOCAL KIDS AND MISS THE HOOP!? DID HE DOUBLE PARK HIS CAB!? 

Truth is still reeling. "He has no idea...Does he? You blind him to your foul actions! I'll tell him, you fool! I'll tell him about..." 

and Jake cuts Truth off by shoving two crescent darts into his eyes. Yeah...they got an eye thing in this run. I'm not a fan. 

Jake gives the body back to Marc, who instantly wants to know what Truth was talking about. 

He chastises Jake for his actions and tells him that he's going to get a talking to about this later. 

And Marc makes a bad pun about "The Truth Hurts" over the unconscious Truth. 

Khonshu and Steven shake their heads at him and Marc claims to be the funny man. 

whoopy doo. 

With the Truth gone, the afflicted people seem to be recovering now. 

Back at RA's part of the story, he finally makes it upstairs to to see the guy he's been looking for. 

Oh. Oh no. I forgot about this. I totally wiped it from my mind. 

We see someone sitting at a chair. Ra tells him that he's been put here to destroy Khonshu.......

"As a manifestation of his father, Ra, I am offended that he continues to breathe and spread his gospel of dissent through a foul Avatar. A HEBREW, no less. I want your help to end Marc Spector." 

I'm... I'm going to take a minute here. 

I want to make a few things Very...VERY clear. 

I don't care who the fuck is writing this, how they were raised, or where they stand with things now. 

This is not okay. Not in a comic book, not in real life, and not in any sense of the word. 

We have a figure who is CLEARLY styled to look like a Jesus figure that believes he is the Egyptian god Ra. We have him out to destroy Moon Knight because 1. He works with Khonshu and 2. He is a 'Hebrew'. 

This is just disgusting. 

And to put it in a comic. Where people of all ages read it and think that it's okay. 

Maybe you had some teen or young adult that was identifying with the bad guy. It happens. They see a bad guy that came from a bad situation and they root for them or fantasize what it would be like to burn things like they do. And they start spitting hate like this. Violence towards Jewish people. You are giving them permission to hate a people too. To blame them. To look at them as inferior. 

Or maybe you have a young naive kid that has never heard talk like this before and suddenly "Hebrew" becomes a slanderous hateful word. Congrats. You've just turned that kid into always associating that word with bad and disgusting things. It's only a step away from becoming antisemitic in their life. 

I just... I can't. I can't even begin to tell you how much this is painful to see. To see Marvel allow this as a company. A company founded on Jewish people. To see Moon Knight as a comic, based around a Jewish system that was originally designed to be about dealing with trauma and hate and pain and finding a way to get better and continue to find the light in the dark. 

Anyways... Back to the comic...

The man behind the chair is eager to take down Marc Spector, but he knows it takes more than a man. So Ra sets the place on fire to show off his skills. 

The man stands up, impressed. 

Oh look... It's Bushman.

A very poorly drawn Bushman that BARELY makes it past the caricature of an old racist cartoon black man. And it only gets worse from there. And as much as Bushman is the bad guy and used to (USED TO) be Marc's biggest enemy... This version of him only goes downhill from here. And we've moved on from antisemitism to racism. 

fun times for all.... 

Oh good. This issue is done. 

Can you tell I’m regretting this decision yet? 

You know what? I’ve got a question for you to think about! We can all get mad at Bemis. We can point at his horrible story and all the terrible things he wrote about (and boy howdy are there more and they get worse as we go on)... But what about the art? 

As MacKay said “Art can make or break a comic”. You can have the most beautiful story in the world and then have it drawn like shit. So who decided to make everything gory and bloody and shocking? Who decided to make Bushman into…THAT? Did Bemis say “I want you to make him look like this” and then pull up a 1940s comic? Or did Burrows make this call all on his own? Are there really two people to blame for these comics? Can we be angry at the artist too? 

I’m already pretty pissed at the editors that let this happen… But who drew this? 

Jacen Burrows started working with Warren Ellis in 2000. Ah... That explains some of the gore. 

Also illustrated adaptations of Alan Moore. Yup. That explains the gore. Those two have very specific styles that usually translate into a lot of gore. 

Oh yup. He's also worked a lot with Garth Ennis. 

So we've got three of the four most graphic big name comic writers there. This explains a lot. 

I don't have much on his personal life, or things that would show WHY he drew things this way... Perhaps it was direction or perhaps it was choice. Looking at some of his other works, they don't all look like this. So who knows? 

NEXT ISSUE! #190! 

I don’t want this bread. Send it back. I want different bread.

You know what? Why even bring Bushman into this? 

This is a move designed to pull the old fans back in and to elicite "OH MAN" emotions from people. And it is not done well. 

Bushman started as the big bad. He was the one that worked with Marc as a mercinary and the one that killed him. He's shown up a few times over the years, putting fear into Marc as Bushman threatened his friends. Then Marc killed him (and cut off his face). 

So why bring him back? He's done. Marc has burried this particular thing of the past. He's a memory of a ruthless and brutal time. 

And what they do with him here is just... They mock him. They make that memory into something grose and shameful. 

You'll see in a bit. 

So the next issue opens on some look backs at Moon Knight through the ages. We've seen this before. Other one shots and annuals have touched on the other Knights of Khonshu. 

This time we see it through Ra's eyes. 

"And so it has been since the days the gods themselves walked the earth. Ra and Khonshu, vengeful father and errant son. Warring for the very soul of the world, reborn again and again through earthly avatars. And in every instance....Ra is humbled. Shamed." 

....Did Bemis even do mythological research? Is he just going based on "Ah yes, the sun and the moon!" 

I'm no Egypt mythology expert, but I can tell you this... Khonshu (or Khonsu as it's really supposed to be spelled) is the son of Amun and Mut. Amun and Ra used to be two different gods but eventually merged into Amun-Ra when two big cities rose to power. He was then attributed with being the king of all. 

Khonsu is often depicted as a child! He's drawn with a side-ponytail, which is the "sidelock of youth" and depicts youth in ancient art. 

At first Khonsu was incredibly violent. He absorbed other gods' powers by eating their organs. Eventually, he was changed to a mellow god of Time, Measurement, and prosperity. 

As I mentioned before, there was a brief period when a popular city worshiped Khonsu as the superior god, but it didn't last and Ra was put back in power when that city fell. 

So Bemis clearly didn’t do any research into how the story originally goes. I’m not surprised. 

He babbles almost incoherently about Karma and balance and how Khonshu always wins because the Sun God failed to find a proper Avatar. 

He says Ra is here to break the cycle and bring order back to mankind. Because mankind needs discipline and order. 

"I'm not like those who came before me. I'm not like you, victims of Khonshu's pride. I was born with the flame within me." 

So apparently this is a big speech to some henchmen. Or just a bunch of guys looking to get revenge on Moon Knight? Unclear. 

Ra's speech done, who is now known as the Sun King, Bushman gives his own speech. 

He admits that he now lives his life dealing crack and isn't at his best. 

"Marc Spector...Scares the crap out of me, simply put, I don't want to die again. I wouldn't come near Moon Knight with a ten-foot pole at this point, but with Sun King's determination and power?" 

He tells them that with Sun King's fire, they can take down Moon Knight. 

Sure. 

Back to Mr. Spector himself... We see him meditating and holding a little talk with Jake. 

Still we get Khonshu's narration: 

"The inside of Marc Spector's head is a picturesque, violent landscape touched by Egyptian mythology, Judaic folklore and Fragments of his past." 

I have so much I want to argue about with this that I don't even know where to start. 

So we see an abstract headscape here. Marc has Jake in a boxing ring and is beating the crap out of him. 

He's angry at Jake for keeping things from him and he wants answers. 

And here we get a childish depiction of their argument that holds no research and insulting implications.

It's supposed to be funny. It has a certain charm to it that a much much younger me might have found agreeable, but older me has learned a lot and it just makes me tired. And upset at the character assassination that has been happening to my good buddy Jake. 

I'm also upset at the implication that Jake is just 'a piece of Marc'. The parts Marc didn't want. 

So they continue to fight while Khonshu and Steven watch. Steven is upset at their fighting and tries to get them to stop. 

Jake takes a bad blow. "Look, Steven is the wealthy benefactor. Khonshu is our connection to the bigger picture. You're the voice of reason. And I deal in the grimy leftovers. You BUILT us this way." 

I hate it. Marc didn't BUILD them. He didn't sit down one day and decide to make other people to hold things! It also depicts Khonshu as being an altar. 

While I've often toyed with that idea, it's always been clear from day one that Khonshu is NOT another aspect in their head. There IS a good chance that they have someone that has been formed as a fictive or even a persecutor in the form of Khonshu... But that's an argument for another day. For the sake of this review, Khonshu himself has always been an outside force! 

ALSO. Marc. Marc Spector. The voice of reason?! How do you get a character SO WRONG that you are writing a whole comic book for? When has Marc Spector EVER been the voice of reason? 

Jake puts Marc in a sleeper hold and threatens to "put you to sleep" if Marc doesn't chill out. 

"It's not your fault that your mind ended up like this. All we can do is embrace the crazy and let you move on with your life. Which means you need to trust me, Marc. Capiche?" 

I have always been a huge fan of the implication that because of their unique mental health issues, DID, and dealings with Khonshu, along with repeated trauma and death, that the Moon Knight system has the ability to surpass expectation and use these things as secret weapons. The number of times people have attacked them mentally and just been destroyed is amazing. I love it. 

THIS. This I hate. "Embrace the crazy". This is clearly the message Bemis got from Lemire's run. That they went through all that so that they could be crazier and use it as a wild card. NO. Just no. 

Anyways, Marc and Jake make up and relax while Steven hugs Khonshu in the background in celebration. 

We now to go the Sun King, who is knocking on a door to a fancy looking house. 

And who answers the door? Marlene Alraune. 

For those that don't know, Some time after Moench left Moon Knight, Marlene also left them. When Moon Knight picked up again for the Houston run, Marlene came back, but it was a rocky relationship. She left them again, saying she couldn't be with them for her own health. 

Sun King poses as a charity drive door to door person and while Marlene is getting her check book, he notices a picture on the wall. He freaks out and calls in Bushman. 

Marlene is famliar with Raoul Bushman. He's the man that killed her father, after all. The one that killed Marc and started it all. 

Bushman notices the picture and taunts Marlene. 

He calls her a damsel-in-distress. This has never been the case. Marlene has NEVER been a damsel-in-distress. As much as I harp on her from the old days, that girl could take care of herself! Half the time she was the one rescuing Moon Knight! 

So to see her passive and not knowing how to fight or take care of herself? No. 

We head back to Moon Knight, who is fighting a bunch of "disabled gentlemen", most of which are missing arms and legs and the such. It's implied they work for Bushman and Moon Knight is to blame for their missing pieces. hmm. 

While fighting, he gets a phone call. In typical "My ex" fashion, the caller ID says "Do NOT pick up, Psychopath! Let it go!" 

Hm. 

He answers. Khonshu is not pleased by this but Marc can't help but answer. It says that Marc is still obsessed with her. 

He's super happy to hear from her. 

Marlene tells him that she's missed him and wants him back in her life. 

She attempts to warn him, telling him that maybe it's best if he didn't come over, but Sun King is there and puts the squeeze on her. 

Marc is far too eager to go meet up. 

I'M GOING TO PUT A PAUSE ON THIS FOR A SECOND. 

This is something that has bothered me for AGES and this is the run that started it. (Bemis. Always blame Bemis. But there is also another writer that messed it up too. I'll get to that MUCH later.) 

Moench originally wrote that Marlene was in love with Steven. 

Jake was incredibly indifferent to Marlene. ANy time they interacted, he treated her as a friend, but was more interested in headint to Gena's. Jake was not into the fancy rich life and how she wanted to live. 

Marlene hated Marc Spector. Marc was violent, had a dark past, and was involved in her father's death, her brother's death, and various other tragedies. 

If Marlene was going to do anything, it would NOT be Marc. OR JAKE. It would be Steven. In the whole Moench run, she always insisted in calling them Steven. She wanted them to just be Steven and give up the other lives. 

BACK TO THE COMIC. 

We see a flashback of Marc and Marlene on a raft. 

"From the first time you saw me? Huh. Even though I was some mercenary who hadn't showered for a week?" 

BULL. SHIT. The first time Marlene saw him, he was working with Bushman and had imprisoned them all, then her father had been killed. The first time she spoke to Marc I'm pretty sure she either told him off or he was dying and she was happy because she thought he'd killed her father. 

He's telling her the story of when he had to kill his own brother. (he's not telling the story right). Then he talks about his dead girlfriend and other trauma from his past. 

What makes me mad is that this is conceivable. We have Marc Spector (Marc, not the other two) talking to Marlene about his past, his trauma. It’s possible that over time she could have decided to get to know Marc. That she realized that Marc is not just a murdering scary man and made peace with the fact that she needs to know him if she wants to be with Steven. It’s possible that she got him to open up and tell her his trauma and what made him what he is now. It’s even possible she started to date him too. I can get behind that! It’s growth for BOTH Marc and Marlene.

And I wish this was how it was done. How it was left. I wish that they had this growth. That Marc and Marlene could become closer. That he and Steven learned to trust one another so much that they learned to be with Marlene and share. But this isn’t how Bemis does it. 

We are back in the now and Marc shows up at Marlene's with flowers and a suit. 

He tells her she looks great. He really thinks they are getting back together. Denial is a land that Marc Spector is king of. 

And Sun King is standing in the dining room waiting for him. 

Sun King pretends to be Marlene's boyfriend who has been living with her. 

He tells Marc that Marlene told him all about how he was Moon Knight. It's not like this is a big secret. Marc was only mildly into secret identities. He wasn't very good at it. 

And Marc isn't taking this well. While Sun King pretends to be a guy that's with Marlene, he then starts to talk about how someone else has been 'getting with Marlene.'

He tells Marc to ask Jake Lockley. 

And in the inner world, Marc is a giant monster pissed off and turning on Jake. 

Not how that works. But sure. Why not. Also, let’s propagate the notion that DID promotes distrust in the system and that there’s an evil alter that goes around doing things behind their back like this. 

AND THIS. This is disgusting. 

She claims to have never stopped loving him and was so desperate for him that she got with Jake?! Not the same person! You don't get a hankering for Marc and go for Jake instead!

And then the notion that Jake came to her telling her to keep it a secret?! 

And then telling them that Jake was never "warm". That Jake has evil in him and he just didn't stand up to Marc?! 

WHY IS JAKE The EVIL ALTER!? He isn't. Jake Lockley is a loving kind and caring man. He goes to Gena's every day and asks her how her kids are doing. He feeds the homeless. He makes friends with the people on the street. 

And she tells Marc that she tried to break it off with Jake but it was too late and she couldn't do it alone. 

And that's when Bushman shows up. 

Yep. There’s the daughter. And the fact that she calls him “Uncle Jake” and not “Dad” despite the obvious implication that Jake has been in her life for a long time… 

Maybe they were trying to protect her from the Moon Knight curse but not letting people know she was his daughter… But still… 

Her name is Diatrice. She has pink hair. 

This is the ONE thing that came out of Bemis that is kinda okay. 

It isn't till MacKay gets his hands on her that I actually started to like her. She's a force. 

I admit, change scares me. And I've been jaded by the "We have to introduce a child to keep it interesting!" concept that show-runners and authors seem to have. I was also so incensed by Bemis' terrible writing that I took the stance of HATING Diatrice when I first saw her. 

But it was bad writing. And give her to a good writer and she can do such wonderful things. 

When Jed MacKay got to put her in a story, she was smart, she was fiesty, and she embraced her dad. More so, he embraced her. 

Amazing what happens when someone does something not for the shock value. 

And now we move to the next issue. Good. Great. I hate the art. I hate how weepy Marlene is here. Old Marlene would have been pissed. She would not have put up with this shit. She was smart. She would have found a way to warm him. To do something. I honestly can’t tell if this is misogynistic or just BAD writing? Maybe both? 

Issue #191.

So the cover is the famous picture of the farmers. It's supposed to depict family homesteading life. 

In the real picture, it's not well known, but it is the farmer and the daughter, NOT his wife. Just a little art knowledge there for you. 

So we are back to Khonshu narrating. 

I don't even know what he's narrating. Something about gods and the power structure of gods and his moon battle against the sun. Something about the moon representing mythical and birth and creation and then sun representing the psychopath and the ground and humans. 

Not even mythologically correct in...ANY culture as far as I'm aware. At least none of the one's I've read about. Maybe in some. I don't know. But I doubt very much if there is, Bemis knows about it. 

He also starts talking about evil and angels and devils. Dude has got his theology mixed up. 

Also, Marc should be a bit more upset about seeing Bushman here. They have...HISTORY.

(There she is. There’s the Marlene I know and care about.) 

So everything is on fire. Marc grabs Diatrice and gets her out. 

He tells Marlene to get out. She just stands there DESPITE THERE BEING A SLIDING GLASS DOOR BEHIND HER. 

He tells Diatrice to go find a place to hide, he has to go help Marlene. 

She asks him if he's crazy because you're supposed to run away from fire. 

He just looks at her before going back inside. 

Marlene is still standing there with a sliding glass door directly behind her and fire in front of her. I don't even.... 

Marc calls out Raoul Bushman while he fights the henchmen. 

"You're such a %$#@!!!" 

Roul shoots him in the shoulder. Marc doesn't care. He knocks the gun out of his hand and slams his face into the wall. 

Sun King sets Marc on fire. Marc strips down to his skivvies and throws his burning pants into Sun King's face. 

Yeah. I can see Moon Knight (especially Marc) doing this. It's a good fighting tactic. It's a good depiction of Marc's talent for hard combat with quick thinking. (See? I can see the good too. Still angry, but there is soooooome good.)

See… It isn’t beneath Marc. This guy pretends to know Marc because of the terrible psychologist and being connected to ‘Ra’. But this isn’t beneath Marc. This is classic Marc fighting. 

So they now face one another. 

"What are YOU supposed to be?" 

"I am Ra's chosen sword. Here to strike you down. I'm the Sun King." 

"....Of course you are." 

"My purpose is to make your death a mockery. In fact, I wouldn't be doing my job if I just struck you down. It's gotta be so tragic that it means something." 

He goes on like this for a hot (LOL) minute. Honestly, Marc's heard it all before. This isn't the first time he's fought a guy with delusions of whatever he's got going on. 

At this point Diatrice shows up again and is pissed off that her swing set is on fire. 

Marc grabs her and makes a run for it. 

He asks her what her name is. She tells him Diatrice and that he already knows that. 

Marc is just caught up in the weird name. 

"Mommy let me change my name to whatever I wanted!" 

Which is super just... Considering she could never even bother to get Marc, Jake, or Steven's name right... Way to go Marlene I guess? 

Marc feels the same way. 

It's at this point that he runs BACK into the burning house holding his child for some reason? There's a note on the wall "We have your queen." 

Well, Marlene's been kidnapped. Not the first time. 

Probably for the best, honestly, considering she couldn't figure out how to use ANY of the exits that were surrounding her. 

Back at Marc Spector's apartment, we find Marc failing real hard at talking to his daughter.

So this means that Marlene told her that JAKE was not her dad and that her dad was a super hero. Meaning she pretty much told her that Marc was her father. 

Look. I know a couple of systems that have children. How they choose to discuss their DID with their children is up to them. Some chose not to discuss it at all until the kid is old enough to understand difficult concepts like this. But they also don’t hide it. None of the systems I know hide it from their children. The kids just learn to recognize the different members of the system, and to them, they are all “Mommy” or “Daddy” because that is the role that they inhabit while present. 

It falls back to the whole “Hold your system accountable” aspect of being a functioning system. It means that they hold each other responsible and they all understand that they have a child and must function as a parental figure to protect and care for their child. 

So the fact the Marlene is telling her that one of them is the dad and not the other… Hiding it from one and that Jake hid it from them. There is a disconnect here that is damaging and insulting. 

So we see her argue with Marc about him not being a super hero. He doesn't look or act like Captain America, he can't fly, and he looks tired and smells funny. 

He declares it was an 'off day'. 

But, it's what I love about Moon Knight in general. He's just a guy. He has zero powers. He's even a bit of an idiot sometimes. He's just a guy out there that takes a lot of beatings and has a lot of trauma that he works out while wearing a mask. 

As they talk, we see Jake, Steven, and Khonshu in the background watching. 

Honestly, fair. I have seen systems be put in situations where perhaps a member they don't really trust yet is present in a situation that could be dangerous to them in general. Perhaps a little is present when they shouldn't be. Perhaps a high trauma holder is present in a potentially triggering situation. Or perhaps a persecutor that has a history is out around a member of the family that they don't trust them to be around. 

You'll have the protectors and gate keepers VERY close by monitoring and ready to step in if need be. 

At least this is true in the systems I've spoken to. Feel free to sound off if you have other experiences. I love to hear from systems about their own experiences and how they handle the family situation. 

So now that they've argued on if Marc is or is not actually a super hero, she asks about her mom. 

He assures her that she isn't going to die because he's going to save her and "seriously hurt those bad guys". 

She asks if he likes Katy Perry. He says no. He asks if she likes Dazzler. 

So they put on a record of Dazzler and have some bonding time while Jake keeps watch. 

We head out to a high security prison to find some guards chatting. 

One of the guards is missing an eye and wearing an eye patch. 

He heads to a cell and asks the person inside to head to the city and get revenge for him. He wants him to kill Bushman. 

Hey look, The Truth guy is back. 

Considering the Truth guy ALSO got his eyes stabbed out... I'm not sure how he's walking around like that without any training or aid or anything... 

Also, this guy was seriously not that impressive as a bad guy. He's just big and has a 'scary' design to him. I'm not impressed by this attempt to make a recurring bad guy. It's just not an impressive reveal of a returning bad guy. 

So the Truth heads out of the jail easy peasy. 

Back in Marc's apartment, Diatrice is asleep and Marc is holding a meeting in the head space. 

You've got Marc, Jake, Steven, and Khonshu on a platform with Cthulhu in the background. I don't know. Do they think that the head space can just conjure anything based on need or emotion? Maybe it does? Maybe it doesn't? I Don't know. 

Apparently this is a recurring thing Khonshu does because Jake tells him "Khonshu... Don't you be giving me that "Cthulhu" Bullshit. Not you." And Steven agrees. "He's kind of right. We can't just use squids to explain all weird things in this world." 

You ready for this? I bet you aren’t. 

Yeah I… I’m gonna… I am not touching this. I don't have the time or energy to sit down and type up a whole manifesto on what's wrong with this page. 

And this is where the now famous line comes from:

Also let’s add some eating disorders to the mix. Why not? Do you have a disorder and feel left out? Don’t worry! I’m sure Bemis will get to that too! Not to mention there is a very underhanded homosexuality jab mixed in with that too! Blink and you’ll miss it, but this is a common way for older shows and media to take a jab at how wrong the GBLTQ world was. Make the villain have some latent homosexual tendencies, usually towards the main hero of the show. 

So now we see Busman, Truth, and Sun King hanging out. 

Truth is following them now, though apprently he sometimes accidentally uses his powers. 

They review a map and discuss where they want to go. 

Bushman tells them about a "Backwards tribe that I 'liberated' before we took over." 

Yeah cause that's... Hmmm. 

They decide to go t that island to start a "new eden". 

Sun King tells Marlene the plan in a gloating fashion. 

"You've gone so far as to tie up a super hero's girlfriend and you're bragging to her about your evil plan. 

You're not profound. You're a linkless wikipedia reference waiting to happen." 

Well, at least she gets that jab in. 

"Perhaps that's so. But I'm still going to kill your child while her dad looks on. Just to prove the uselessness of his cause." 

He tells Marlene he's going to use her to lure Marc to his doom. He also asks Truth to create an army. 

Back with Marc, he is telling her about Frenchie. 

Look, I've always been a big Jean-Paul Duchamp fan. I love him. It breaks my heart that things went the way they did and he eventually left Marc and they had a huge falling out. But I am happy Frenchie found love and has his own chance to be happy. 

Do not bring my poor Frenchie into this world of Bemis.

…I’m sorry, did Marc just describe Frenchie as “A father figure”?! In what universe? Who are these people that think he’s a father figure to him?! 

So Marc has called in Frenchie to baby sit Diatrice while he goes off to save Marlene. 

I'm just sighing right now. Because it's been established that Frenchie is not talking to Marc anymore. He isn't adventuring anymore. 

Frenchie lost both his legs in a mission gone wrong. He fell in love with his PT person and now they run a restaurant together. While Frenchie still misses the adventures, he also is tired of the PTSD and the pain that follows Moon Knight. 

This is just shoddy editing by team Marvel. 

Also this...

And this is how they ended this issue. Cliffhanger dead zombie Frenchie. Why is he in scrubs?

(It's at this point that I realized that Tumblr would only let me upload 30 images and I was going to have to break this up into more than two long ass posts. I'm so very very sorry.)

Part two will be linked very soon. Until then, I'm going to thank you for sticking around this long and hope you finish this rage filled adventure with me.

I'm going to admit that I am biased in not just hating Bemis, but also hating this art.

There are places for art like this. I've seen it utilized well in comics where the nature of the comics stands very well with this sort of art. Punisher Max for instance. For those that don't know, Punisher Max is a stand alone version of Frank Castle that was created in order to depict the ultra violence that Frank Castle is capable of in his search for justice and his never ending war.

The problem is that Moon Knight has gotten a reputation for being incredibly violent and unpredictable. You can probably thank Houston for that, but I'm sure the problem dates back to the 90s (always blame the 90s).

On the one hand, Marc is a former soldier, mercenary, and has anger issues. On the other hand, people have been using the excuse that "He's insane, of course he's going to be violent and unpredictable."

This has, most unfortunately, attracted writers like Bemis to the comic and then recruited artists that are more adept at drawing shocking gore or acts.

And even worse, this has attracted in a VERY specific fan base that reads comics looking for the gore, action, and hyper violence. They pick up an issue of Moon Knight, that has traditionally been based around dealing with mental health, classism, depression, and political issues.

These sorts of readers are easy to spot. They will list issues like Bemis, Aaron, and Bendis as their favorite issues. They will complain that newer stuff is boring or that they can't read the old stuff because it's too chatty. They want the action. they want to see Marc ripping a man's face off and biting out their throats.

Things like this are what goad on the perpetuation of Mentally I'll people being dangerous and scary and untrustworthy.

I'll touch on it more next time, but when we see things like this, it's so important that we don't put up with it. That we tell the big companies that Marvel, DC, and so on that we won't stand for this. That they are the problem. Don't put up with things like this. Don't put up with Bemis.

...Also I just really hate this art style. Every page feels SO static. Everyone is always just standing around grinning at things. Maybe I was spoiled by Bill Sienkiewicz, Declan Shalvey, Smallwood, and Alessandro Cappuccio. These people made even standing still look beautiful and full of life. They knew that sometimes just having Moon Knight standing in the rain could say more than words ever could.

PART TWO HERE.

Let's finish this bread.

[azurdlywisterious]

Tell me your fave vaults

Okay, I somehow narrowed it down to a top five (honorable mentions are basically every single other vault) (except Vault 81) ( i wish the experiment actually happened and the overseer didnt shut it down i wanted the psychological horror :/ )

Vault 77- This is the crate of puppets vault, featuring the crate of puppets guy. This Vault wasn't a part of any game, rather it is from a comic that was promo material for fallout 3. and like, penny arcade understood the assignment on demonstrating how fucked up vault-tec is in thirty six panels. Like my one critique is that it's so short, but with the direction they went with the plot and the topics they tackled and it being 2008, it was probably for the best. Anyways the whole comic is free on the Internet Archive and its a nice snappy read (almost to its detriment like straight up plz someone get ari aster on the phone he'd make a fantastic adaptation of one man and a crate of puppets legit)

Vault 112- ooh hoo hoo unlike most vaults that I just remember from reading the wiki blurbs back in high school, this one was fully brought to my attention in a game of magic where i exiled a ridiculous amount of my library to get a winning card and also my missing dad (shout out to adventure costs!!!) and in that game i vowed to find it. I didnt know that it was a part of the main plot of fo3 yet but that didn't take long to find out. This is the creepy simulation one that i see as almost a proof of concept for the evil within vibes-wise (i fucking love the evil within series but thats besides the point). Legit terrified me in a way that should not have been possible (maybe im the one with unchecked issues that people being saccharinely nice to me sets off alarm bells in my head but it could also be that i had to get into a vr pod first) (who knows?) Anyways I proceeded to ignore like half of it and I'm looking forward to the next time i play and actually interacting with it a bit more (also one of my twelve fallout ocs is from this vault i made it work given this vault's canon ending)

Vault 11- Oughhhhhhh epistolary enviromental just altogether wonderful storytelling. the posters. The Posters! The ones that read "I Hate Nate" but the deeper down you go the more you find that have been graffitied to read "I Hate Kate" perfect wonderful amazing. Not to mention granting us with "Don't Vote Glover He Has A Family" which idk I love that out of context but I do. In context it's downright horrifying and the absurdity of it actually adds to the horror. Love love love Vault 11.

Vault 108- Gary. Gary Gary? Gary! Okay in all seriousness the story of this one is bonkers and also I'm a sucker for cloning (I had a cloning phase in third grade). Like, they found a guy that was going to die in a few months to be overseer so that there would be a power vacuum. Okay, normal social experiment for vault-tec. This eventually leads to them cloning a guy named Gary and then all the Gary clones killing the rest of the dwellers so now the only people in the vault are Gary clones. For the life of me I do not remember the chain of events that led to it and no i will not look it up it's funnier this way.

Vault 88- Look this one is boring to most people. Its a mix reviewed Fallout 4 DLC but dammit, I like getting to design my own Vault. As someone who got into Fallout because of the Vaults it was incredibly appealing to get to be the villain for once. And then I saw that my victim was this sweet guy named Clem (and also I was playing a goody two shoes but thats besides the point). Like I can tell they wanted to write Clem to be annoying so that you felt less bad basically torturing him but I found him so sweet and earnest I just couldnt. I fucking love Clem I would die for Clem hes like if a golden retriever was a person that I wanted to make sure kept his agency and autonomy. Plus it was really fun getting to piss the overseer off with some actually decent written dialogue. Like bonus points for that. And I still havent finished building the vault! amazing. absolutely wacky but also amazing.

[localplaguenurse]

Hey so I was thinking about Zhongli and the kind of shenanigans and mischief he would do now that he’s free from his duties and it got me thinking

Morax’s words would be written off as a uneducated ramblings because Zhongli doesn’t have any form of paperwork that would prove he is highly educated in any form of specialty he’s in

Like we know he’s right cause we know he literally shaped Liyue from nothing like a potter who makes vases from lumps of clay, but can you imagine historians hundreds of years in the future reading about how Mr Zhongli would just go “Nuh uh that’s not what happened” to the most respected people of the time with literally nothing but source: trust me bro

Anyways all I’m saying is the museum would totally have an exhibition about “Ramblings of the illustrious Mr Zhong Li, from the Wang Sheng Funeral Parlour” and it’s just transcripts of his writings with future historians talking about how none of his words can be proven so they can’t be taken seriously as historical fact 😭

I'm gonna be honest I almost forgot the museum AU was a thing-

I love him. He's so knowledgeable about literally anything else so it's hard to definitively say he's wrong, but he can also be a bastard and just say shit and again, you can't prove he's wrong either. We love a king who has no sources to back up his claims, yet has no sources that disprove them, either.

His favourite though? When he starts sharing embarrassing stories about the ginkgo kids growing up and the children just glare at him like "if it wouldn't prove the story was true I would Slaughter You." Fortunately, no sources exist stating the stories are true, so no one really believes that Yaling continued to bite people way past the childhood years up until her teen years. Still, Zhongli shares that story with an odd amount of... reminiscence? That's probably just dramatic flair to make the story funnier, though.

[elfdragon12]

Oh don’t get me wrong, my feelings on Skybound are more mixed than negative. I really liked the opening arc and the G1 show (currently watching it again with a friend who’s never seen it). Definitely some good stuff, the artwork! The weird Matrix flashbacks, Carly and Cliff’s dynamic, holy shit its Optimus Prime.

My issues fall more into pacing problems and how a decent few things just feel like payoff with no buildup. Also while I haven’t read the last couple my reaction was immediately repeats of “please don’t make him at all sympathetic” (that’s admittedly more related to fandom stuff. As a person who likes the selfish git his fans often annoy me.)

I have no real interest in IDW so eh.

So overall it’s more an “I’ll check back at some point to see where they’re going” type thing for me. I hope you continue to enjoy it!

All that said, thank you for the pitch! I am a sucker for good character writing! …And also Shakespeare references. Really was put off by the animation but I suppose I should give it a try at some point!

Also I loved Veggie Tales as a kid. That show was funnier than it had any right being.

Pacing is one of the more legitimate complaints. I think that DWJ has a lot he wants to cover, but we know he doesn't want to stay tied to this for longer than he's actually willing to as he has other projects he wants to do. His mini series with writer Riley Rossmo, "The Moon Is Following Us", is pretty interesting so far. To give an impression of the general vibe "parents trying to save their daughter from 'Little Nemo In Slumberland' but everything is night terrors". I currently recommend it. Also, I thought the title was going to indicate something really ominous, but it actually has an incredibly sweet origin within the narrative. I do like Sam and Duncan's (the parents) chemistry. If you have small children you love in your life, you can definitely get how they each are dealing with it.

If you still have some interest in keeping tabs, maybe do so through Void Rivals? The main characters are Darak and Solila, but! The subplots tie pretty heavily into the wider Transformers universe. The story does have a more methodical pace and, despite being written by the guy who wrote the Walking Dead and Invincible, it is currently the most chill. Also, Kirkman gives a joke character from G1 season 3 a lot of depth!

You'll love Dinobot then! He's very dramatic and ready to fight everything! He mentions wanting to go to "Silicon Valhalla" at least once.

Seriously, Dinobot's story in season 2 is fantastic! As long as you stick with it, I really don't think the graphics are difficult to get used to.

My family loves "Lord of the Bean"!

[m1ckeyb3rry]

LMAOOO HACK HIS GAME so true i can imagine him trying to beg Nagi/hiori that’d be so funny…BUT LITERALLY SAME!!! I almost forgot the pokemon ref i was gonna make before was Karasu and garchomp…we were talking about his hair and i was kinda thinking like…the front of his hair…looks like a garchomp head….yk with the pointy triangle kinda shape…he would def have a garchomp….a pokemon au sounds so fun i definitely tried to assign some people teams at some point for the heck of it LOL

REAL anri carrying all of bllk along with like chigiris sister and Bachira’s mom maybe but we barely see them!!

No literally…because of the three i think Karasu has def been the most proactive too? I feel like Karasu and otoya are probably on the same level ish, having been starters since their first match but kaneshiro def emphasizes or adds little panels of Karasu actively involved with the game (maybe just because we never see barcha ugh) so im like….are you reading red key LOL

HIMBO REP AHAHA FR!! But seriously zantetsu please survive..I can’t imagine that after all we’ve seen of him in epinagi and the main series that he’ll get kicked out??? But still I look at the theories and I’m like oh um. Haha! Er. Please don’t. I’m hoping they just demote and kick out some of the u20 players that haven’t done much like fukaku (…? Idr their names) Hoping zantetsu gets his cover next in the event of the bllk cover theory shsgsjwhs

If I were in besties shoes I’d totally get it bc wdym you have the perfect kdrama romance literally just written in the stars for you….like MY TURN??? The crane game scene was a knee slapper the way Otoyas just like “move I’ll do it loser” HAHAHAHA oh I love that dynamic between them

THE ADOPTING OF CHIGIRI WAS SO CUTE TOO I was like omg YES when I read the little interactions and their little moment post ping pong game…also speaking of I had no idea that’s what that was?? Ok I got the ping pong but rhyming?? I’ve somehow never heard of that before nor have I ever tried it with my friends so I was so lost when I first read the manga and Nagi goes orange and I’m like…maybe he’s just a goofy dude who wanted to say orange because it sounds funky so uh. The more you know!

Omg y/n adopting the younger boys with trauma…it’s even funnier to imagine since Rin likes looking out at the sea like imagine y/n is like I’m gonna take a walk by the water! and Karasu begrudgingly is like ok bro…and then bam it’s Rin, idk exactly how it’d go but I just think their affinity of the sea/water would be something they could (mildly) bond over!

IM CRYING THAT REDDIT MEME I remember first seeing that and laughing I felt kinda bad but I can’t with the energy!!

I’m so glad you enjoyed writing it too!! Hopefully it brought you as much joy as it did me HAHA I’m gonna eat up your Hiori works too trust….I’ll be in here giving live commentary too!!

LMFAOOOOOOOOOO IM CRYING THAT TEXT SCREENSHOT IS SO THEM!!! I can imagine Karasu trying to square up with fish through the glass like he sees one giving him the side eye and is like “you wanna go bro??”

But also the game interactions….are so funny…..I’m not sure if these are fully considered spoilers (just for game content) so I’ll shut up first but if you’re interested in knowing some of the dialogue I’ll slap down all of the ones I’ve seen floating around so far….finally got some tabieita content and Hiori interactions too….yuki soon I trust..

-Karasu anon

maybe i’ll make a post assigning pokémon teams to the characters even if i don’t write the au as an entire fic 🤔 i feel like pokémon has sm potential to be ANYTHING like angst fluff slice of life romance you really can include it all depending on how you take it and how you interpret the verse. karasu is basically an irl garchomp HAHA it fits too well

nah because justice for anri she should be at the club not doing ego’s dirty laundry /j…fr though i’m glad the author decided not to include more female characters just because based off of some of those anri panels they would NOT be done well and i would rather have no female rep than have it poorly done. i do like all of the mothers/chigiri’s sister!! the mothers especially actually look and feel like parents of teenage boys instead of teenagers themselves which definitely isn’t always the case

karasu has been up to smth for the entire match HAHA and he was even in hiori’s flashback so i think it’s safe to say he’s not going anywhere…i agree and i’m hoping they get rid of the u20 players (except aiku and sendou, p sure they’re staying) so more characters we care about get to stay in the manga!! i’m hoping giving how much emphasis there was on zantetsu in s1 and epinagi he sticks around but it kinda feels like everything he does, chigiri and otoya can do better, so who knows.

NO BECAUSE POOR BESTIE HAS KNOWN FOR SIX YEARS THAT KARASU LIKES Y/N 😭 she watched their banter turn into a relationship, and she sees how well karasu treats y/n once they’re together (he literally buys her flowers like every week 😖)…then she gets to the u-20 match and is HYPE because CEO’s son reo mikage?? standoffish prodigy nagi?? popular sweetheart isagi?? talented loner barou?? time for her to have her OWN kdrama moment. and then every single one of her dreams is destroyed because she’s shipped with otoya who is quite literally her biggest opp because he kept making out w a girl RIGHT in front of her face while she was trying to watch a movie.

i think the best thing about the crane scene is that otoya straight up says he only wins plushies to impress girls but he’s so obviously done w bestie and not at all trying to impress her and she’s also so unimpressed that it averts the cliche romance vibe completely. honestly they don’t give kdrama (bestie will forever be disappointed in that sense) but they have HUGE 2000s romcom vibes to me HAHA

LMAOO the website i read the manga on translated it as rhyming ping pong so i just went w that?? i made up the rules though but it made sense to me 🤷🏻‍♀️ karasu’s face in the panel when nagi says orange is so FUNNY bro was flabbergasted 😭 I LOVED Y/N ADOPTING CHIGIRI HAHAHA like they were giving very strong cousin vibes to me…honestly respect to karasu because half of the bllk guys want to bag his gf and the other half are like her children but he is somehow keeping it together regardless 😫

y/n saw rin crash out during the u-20 match and was like oh…this is Not Normal…and as soon as she saw rin on the beach she immediately got to work trying to figure out wtf happened 😭 nah because i’ve always wondered why NOBODY showed any concern for rin after the match like he was clearly going through smth?? but if it leads to a goal ig it’s all good 😓

HAHAHA omg karasu starts crying in the aquarium because he thinks the starfish looked at him weird and y/n is like babe…starfish don’t have eyes…he tries to go band for band w a penguin and gets kicked out of the exhibit 😭 truly a menace. the text conversation was SO them though i screenshotted immediately because i got such strong fwtkac vibes from it

YAYY i can’t wait for your commentary on those too!! i need to like decompress from the silliness of fwtkac so i can do the requests properly (was asked to include some angst 😈) because i need to not be in that crack fic headspace for them. but also idk if you’ve seen my otoya shitposting as of late but lowkey don’t be surprised if i drop a lil smth for him at some point 🤫 what can i say writing abt him and bestie converted me into the otoya cult officially 😰 no promises though because unfortunately i have so many ideas but so little time

feel free to drop your fav game lines!! i’ve seen some that are rlly funny HAHA doesn’t nagi call people the opps at some point?? or maybe rin i can’t recall rn 😫 i just know that the ones i’ve seen have been super silly but in a good way

[hyperfixingfr]

Warning: I rant a lot here. If you don't wanna see criticism of KND don't look lol. As much as I love my fixation show, there's some things that need to be said outloud

Nah I'm gonna have to agree with anon on this one. I wouldn't exactly say WEAKEST because both him and Numbuh Three are just as poorly written as the other, but definitely horrible writing. Their ONLY joke was "haha this bitch is fat" and it was so fuckin stupid man. Not only was it unfunny and bigoted as all fuck, but they made this kid out to be this oblivious airhead who had NO CLUE that people were making fun of him 24/7 even when it was BLATANT. He's such a horrible character in canon. I get what they were trying to do, and they failed miserably at it. It doesn't help that he's heavily implied to be autistic so the entire show is just making fun of a disabled kid because he's fat 💀... He has so little depth to him. He lacks proper backstory, his episodes never take him seriously, and he was wasted potential. We could've had some seriously groundbreaking representation of abuse survivors or learning disabled children had they not made his whole character a big fucking joke. Not like they cared anyways, because they tried to make it look like his grandmother abusing him was somehow funny.

And because I mentioned Kuki was the same level of poor writing... Disgusting racist stereotypes. I think that's enough to make you question things. The constant closed eyes? The "flirty but oblivious" nature? Holy shit. I'm so sick of the flirty Asian girl stereotype and KND did nothing to help it. She was made to look like this dainty girl who is easily taken advantage of and that's just disgusting to me. Her innocence felt... Off. Everyone else has typical childlike innocence. She acted like she didn't know a damn thing. She acted like she couldn't tell when someone was hurting her. Even Hoagie would say something about clear advantage taking but Kuki wouldn't and I hate what that implies. Not to mention, she has the same lack of depth that Hoagie does. They looked at her character as this boring love interest for Wally. She has hardly any episodes of JUST HER. If any at all... I'm shocked they even gave Abby lore, because I would've mentioned Abby had they not given her great depth. I bet you her voice actor pushed for Abby to have such depth after they fucked up her character with the "black girl therapist friend" and "masc black girl" stereotypes, which also happened to be just as big of an issue as the flirty Asian stereotype at the time. And obviously, no, I'm not saying masc black girls are bad. I'm saying, it's a stereotype. A HARMFUL one that leads to misogynist and racist views on black women, making people believe black traits are inherently "masculine" or that black girls can't be feminine. I made her enby personally because it felt weird to have yet another masculine black girl character. I don't really mind what people do with her masculinity because tbf... It's already an established trait. I just think the concept of her being that way was OBVIOUSLY rooted in stereotypes

I get it's a kid's show but you can make a kid's show funny without making a character seem like a racist, fatphobic, or misogynistic punching bag. Case in point? Ed, Edd, n Eddy. I will continuously bring up this show when people get mad that I'm criticizing KND's bigotry because that show PREDATES KND and yet was 10x funnier than KND, all without the racism, fatphobic and misogyny. KND is the only kids cartoon at that time that I can recall that has such consistent bigotry at every damn corner. There's the occasional weird joke in other cartoons but KND prides itself on making a fat joke or woman joke every other episode.

I meant weakest written in the last ask, he's obviously just as capable as any of them.

In reference to this ask.

I... I also don't think he's the weakest written of any characters in KND. It's been so long, I'm not sure I'm the best person to talk about Numbuh 2 in any capacity.

[ethereal-engene]

brightest of them all | woozi

pairing: bf!jihoon x gn!reader

genre: fluff // warnings: mentions of food & not proof-read

summary: when dropping by your boyfriend’s studio turns into him making a song of out of your poem // word count: ~1265

note: fully inspired by this post from @imagine-svt everyone say thank you to Aeris for her ideas and happy woozi day <3

100% in love with this concept b/c I is a poet myself so yeah :) (I’m using a line or two from one of my original pieces)

You decided to drop by Woozi’s studio to share some cake together and spend some time with him because you missed him so much. With Seventeen finishing up another stop for their Be The Sun tour, they must be tired but you knew Jihoon would be at the studio for god knows what. He’s either married to the music or the gym.

Knocking on the door until you’re met with Jihoon’s face wearing a somewhat annoyed face. His facial expression softened when his eyes registered that it's you. Right then and there, he opens the door for you to come in.

When you set down your things and look at him. He’s staring at you with tired eyes but still full of love. Noticing it, you open your arms and watch as he leans into them. A sigh comes out. “God, I forgot how much I really missed you. Tour is fun but it’d be funnier if you were there, my love. Also what’d you think of dream?”

A drawn hum is heard from you. “It’s a really catchy and heartfelt song. Honestly I wasn't expecting it but you know I’ll always love your music. I seriously can’t get over how skilled you are in penning lyrics. They’re always so meaningful… okay well most of the time. And you know I wish I could join y’all on tour but unfortunately I have a full-time job that isn’t being an idol.”

He gets up after hearing that because he has to say what he’s about to say next to your face. “My love, I appreciate your kind words and I really believe that you would be great at writing lyrics too. Like have you seen and read the poems you’ve written? They’d make such great lyrics and in fact, let’s go write a song with them right now!”

And with that, he got up first from the sofa and held out his hand. Without a second thought, you took it and tried to pull him back down to sit but failed. “Now, I don’t doubt it but can’t we do that another day? You just got back from Japan and are going to leave in a couple days again. And plus I got us this!”

You hold up the slice of cake with a smile on your face.

“Happy birthday, my red ruby!” You give him a kiss on the cheek before revealing what the cake looks like. The cake has a little ruby guitar and of course the letters spelling out happy birthday to Jihoon. If he could melt into a puddle right now, he would. He’s left speechless for a few seconds before thanking you.

“Uji…I know it’s your birthday and all but could I record a video of you with your cake saying shit this is red too? If you say yes, we can work on turning my poem into a song!”

He should have seen this coming from miles away because you haven’t stopped with the “shit, this is red too” jokes since Ruby came out. Jihoon rolls his eyes at your request but says yes. He won’t ever tell you out loud but he enjoys hearing them from you but also he does want to help you see how good at writing you are too. After recording the video, you send it to the seventeen & you group chat. Receiving multiple ㅋㅋㅋ messages from them. Then you two finally enjoy the cake together.

Not even a minute passes as you two devour the cake, he immediately holds your hand to go to where all of the magic happens. “Alright, my love. Show me one of your poems & we’ll go from there.” You nod and show him the poem.

Brightest of them all

They say to reach for the stars but what if I’ve already caught the brightest of them all?

“This kind of fits dream’s concept ever so slightly and it’s a sweet poem. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say this poem is about me but I don’t think it is.” He wonders about who this is about but is brought out of his head when you answer him.

“Hmm originally I didn’t have a person in mind but now that I have you, you could say it’s about you.” Jihoon turns to you and does nothing but stare at you. He’s so in love with you and he hopes that you know that just like your poem, you light up his life too. Heart eyes are practically shooting out of his eyes.

He responds with a cute awww before returning to look at the poem that could essentially be a verse and parts of a chorus. However, he’s probably going to just focus on what’s on hand right now just to prove his point. So you two spend a good chunk of time going through what Woozi and his mastermind is thinking for this.

Starting to play around with samples of twinkles to emulate a star and being satisfied with the choices, Jihoon works his magic by creating a new rhythm and beat. He’s not doing it alone though, he gets your input at each step. Seeing if there’s something that could be changed to sound better or not. He smiles every time when he glances over at you having as much fun as him doing this. Thinking to himself, he’s got to do this with you more often. Imagine how powerful y’all would be penning lyrics together and more. Y’all would be unstoppable.

Now the final step of this process is having you two singing the lyrics or lines from your poem. Jihoon decided that because this was your poem, he didn’t want to change it unless you wanted to. You took that chance and removed or added a few words to make it flow better. Even if you weren’t the best at singing, he helped you get comfortable with it and guided you as he does with the members. Besides this was all for fun and only for your ears to hear.

Hearing the final product made your heart swell. It was a really cute snippet of what could be a full song. Seeing your reaction made Jihoon fall more in love with you if possible. “See, I told you. Your writing is just as good or even better than I am with song-writing!!” His arms folded and wearing a smirk. You can’t even hate or attempt to look annoyed at him. You’re still in awe of how good this turned out. “Yeah yeah whatever. It’s not like I didn’t believe you, geez.” You ended up pouting a little before he kissed it away.

“I know I know, I’m just saying. If you ever wanted to go into song-writing or the music industry, I’ve got you.”

“Yeah, I know Uji and for the record baby. I think you are THE music industry mister genius singer-songwriter producer dancer performer composer all-rounder woozi of seventeen.” He chuckles and hides into your shoulder. It sounds like today you were on a mission to get him all flushed and blushed with all of the compliments, well at least more than usual. What can you say? You’ve mastered making your boyfriend turn into a ruby. (Not sure if that made sense but essentially making him blush a lot that his face is as red as a ruby)

Little bonus: he ends up re-recording what y’all made with his own voice to share with everyone on twitter with the caption: “the brightest of them all” which is the title of the poem :)

WAH HAPPY UJI DAY GUYS !! I hope you enjoyed this and I love him sm and really love this idea a little too much. Thank you so much for reading 

If you enjoyed it as well please do interact by sending in an ask, leaving a note, reblogging with tags, or even messaging me! Or if you didn’t like it, that’s fine too

signing off with love for woozi

- ash

[anotherhumaninthisworld]

Horace Desmoulins is adorable compilation

You who made vows for our union, who took our hands into yours, you who have smiled at my son and whom his infantile hands have carassed so many times, can you then reject my prayer, scorn my tears and trample justice under your feet?  Lucile in an unfinished letter to Robespierre, written somewhere between March 31 and April 4 1794.

You would be amused at hearing Horace talk about his arrival: he is to rush in and embrace you, frighten his aunt and Mère Laneau, run all over the whole house from cellar to garret; above all he is to make plenty of noise. He says all this with the greatest vivacity, and only quiets down when he remembers that he is far away from you. He’s no longer the same child; he said, with great calmness, “For all that, I cannot get accustomed to not seeing Maman. I cry every evening and morning.” Dear, too amiable child; at his simple and touching sorrow my own tears fall!... You have been informed of the way in which we passed the 30th. I had much pleasure in making the day of parting pleasant, and in spite of the grand people at the house of little Agathe's mama, where we dined, I managed to amuse the little people, the half of whom I took back to sleep with me. The evening passed quickly away; at ten o'clock they still wanted to go on with their little games. At last my carriage took us back, and at eleven o'clock our little friends were lying in their beds side by side in my room, where they slept well; at nine o'clock in the morning they went back to the college, where I took them, happy and contented, and they are quite well. They will write to you soon; my son, Horace’s secretary, is going to beg you to come and see him. In yeilding to their eagerness to have you, you will crown my desires.  Letter from madame Philippeaux to madame Duplessis, February 21 1801, telling her about a playdate between Horace and her son Auguste.

To Citoienne Duplessis, Paris, 10 Ventôse, year X (March 1 1802) Goodness triumphs and Horace is currently more often on his bed than in it. The coughing is diminishing all the time; he will be discharged tomorrow or the day after tomorrow; so you can rest easy. His guard has just given him some lint to occupy himself with in order to prevent him from bugging his neighbors whose stockings and shoes he was throwing in the air. So there’s no longer any danger. I now wish that la maman is doing as well as the child. Salut and respect. I pass the quill to my neighbor. Pierre J. Duplain

An hour after leaving you yesterday, citoyenne amie, I gave Horace his snake (couleuvre), which he saw again with tenderness, and they played together to fully reconnect. He is now only waiting for his two medicines, the first of which may arrive tomorrow. He told me that he was getting mieux en mieux, with the seriousness best suited to persuade me, and without forgetting, when repeating these words, to make the first x ring out capably before the following vowel. He really is adorable: I embraced him twenty times over for his lovable mien and we will all sketch him together (nous le crouqerons ensemble) more at ease in five or six days. We won't do it before then: that's what the supervising pharmacist told me. Goodbye; try to be as well soon as Horace is already. I just saw him again this morning with a marshmallow in the pocket; he is always getting better and better. A thousand hugs from his part as well as from mine.  PS — He's occupying himself with writing for you in a little notebook several drafts of letters that couldn't be funnier. Panis Letter to Annette Duplessis reporting that Horace is recovering well from some illness while at Prytanée français (former Louis-le-Grand), to which he gained a scholarship in December 1800.

I count on the pleasure of seeing you after tomorrow. You will have Victoire and her mother on Sunday, if the weather is fine, and even our Horace, in whose conduct there is much improvement. Be quiet on that part; I swear to you that there are many means with such a child. The slighest assumed coldness from my part, seemed to me to be unbearable for him. He quickly brought me his homework, trying to read in my eyes if he had lost my friendship for good, and telling me such things that I struggled with containing myself to giving him only a mediocre kiss , instead of my usual caresses. I'll tell you the rest on Saturday. Farewell; please take good care of yourself. Always be courageous in overcoming all your subjects of trouble. You can't better repay my strong attachment than by trying to perserve yourself. Let us always remember that Horace, who truly loves us, needs us. I embrace you a thousand times with all my heart, without forgetting Adèle.  Panis to Annette Duplessis June 17 1803

I knew this child, a young pupil of the institution of St. Barbe, directed by M. Lanneau, and I was his master. He was a very amiable and interesting child. I have never heard him spoken of since, and if he be still alive, it is evident that he has not made so much noise in the world as his father. Anonymous note on Horace written by one of his maîtres while at college

Nicknames: little Horace (Madame Philippeaux, Camille, his father and mother-in-law), little lizard (Camille), little wolf (Ricord), baby rabbit (Fréron), my little one, dear child (Lucile)

[estrel]

Heyyy suggestions to write for Jack's birthday: all 3 of his dads try to bake him a cake separatedly (maybe they're bickering about who would make the best cake maybe they just have communication issues as usual and no one knows who was in charge of the cake maybe they just think he deserves all the cakes maybe) and obviously the cakes turn out to be three completely chaotic catastrophes, but Jack loves them anyway😊💞

It started, as most competitions do between Sam and Dean, with a dare.

Because Jack’s last birthday cake had gone...”not the Best,” Dean declared the evening before Jack’s fourth birthday that this year’s cake would be better. Sam had scoffed, lightheartedly claimed he could have Dean beat with his eyes closed, and so the fun began after Dean took the jab a little too seriously. They’d both make a cake, and Jack could decide whose “won” after they were done.

What they didn’t know, however, was that Cas was making one too.

Sam had headed to Eileen’s place (which Dean claimed was cheating, since she would help), and Dean took to the Bunker’s kitchen. Which left Cas with no oven or materials, so he picks up his phone and dials Claire to get assistance.

“Uh...hi?” she asks, “What’s up, something happen?”

“No, I just...wanted to...um. Jody has a kitchen, yes?”

There’s a pause, but then Claire says, “Yeah, like most houses do. Why?”

“Can I come over?” 

He hears Claire mumble a, “Can Cas come visit?” over her shoulder, and then into the speaker, “Jody says yeah, but—”

“Great.” The line disconnects, and then Cas appears outside Jody’s front door, pushing his finger on the pad to ring the doorbell.

Claire still has her phone up to her ear when she lets him in, rolling her eyes to mask her smile. “Jesus. Could’ve at least told me you were gonna do that.”

“I apologize,” Cas says, and then urgently, “Where’s the kitchen?”

Claire points and closes the door behind him. “That way.”

He follows her directions and finds Jody leaning against the counter, arms crossed. Donna sits behind her at the kitchen table, sporting a playful smile.

“Well! Cas, long time no see,” Jody says, coming towards him to envelop him in a hug. “Claire mentioned you visiting, but I didn’t think it’d be so soon.”

Claire brushes past them, muttering, “Neither did I,” before taking a seat at the table next to Donna. 

“Sorry for bursting in on you like this,” Cas says once Jody lets go. “I just need to use your kitchen.”

Jody and Donna exchange a look. 

“Someone in trouble?” Donna asks, suddenly serious, “We have some spell ingredients, but not many. What’s—"

“No, nothing like that,” Cas hurries to say, “It’s Jack’s birthday today. I need to bake him a cake.”

There’s another stretch of silence, and then Claire’s laughter covered up by a hand to her mouth. Donna gently smacks her shoulder.

“Sorry,” she says, “but you? Eldritch terror...baking a cake? Why can’t Sam and Dean do it? Oh god, that thought might actually be funnier.”

Cas sighs as Donna mumbles to reprimand Claire, and takes a seat beside Jody on the island. 

“You’re right, it’s just...Sam and Dean are both competing to make Jack a cake for his birthday today, and I felt I should do the same, but I...I’ve never done this before. I need help.”

Jody smiles, despite Claire’s fading laugh, and rests a hand on his shoulder. “Well, Cas. You came to the right place. Come on.” 

She grabs the keys from a hook next to one of the kitchen cabinets, and swipes her coat from the chair next to Cas. 

“Where are we going?” he asks, standing and following nonetheless. Claire flicks his shoulder as she passes to head for the front door. 

“Grocery store, genius,” she says, and before he knows it, the four of them are cramped in Donna’s much too small car, with Cas wondering how they manage it with Patience and Alex and Kaia as well.

“Where are they, anyway?” he asks once they make it to the store parking lot. 

“Alex is working, Patience is out with friends, and Kaia’s home sleeping,” Claire explains. “What about Jack?”

“With Garth until the cakes are done,” Cas says easily. He’d been their first choice for babysitter, not wanting to bother Jody and Donna when they had all the girls on their hands, but... “Maybe next time, he can hang out with you? I’d like for him to get to know you better,” Cas tries, pushing around the shopping cart as Jody points out ingredients and Donna sets them in the cart, “he really looks up to you.”

Claire scoffs. “He barely knows me. Besides, there’s nothing to look up to. Except height-wise, I guees.”

Cas smiles fondly at her, reminded of Dean telling him something similar plenty of times. “Sure there is, but I won’t push it. You’re welcome at the Bunker always, just...incase you were wondering.”

She grins, but hides it well. “Thanks.”

The trip goes by quickly, after they decide on how Cas wants to decorate the cake, and they all make it back to Jody’s in one piece. 

The actual mixing of ingredients if easy enough (though Claire ends up brushing flour out of Cas’ hair), but the waiting periods are atrocious. Cas spends them by catching up with Claire and Kaia, when she eventually wakes, and it seems like no time at all once the timer beeps. 

They pull it out of the oven, wait impatiently again for it to cool, and by that time Patience is home from visiting friends. The six of them work on the frosting and decorations (although Cas insists on doing the lettering himself), and Alex’s steady hand arrives just in time to slide the cake into a box so that it’s safe and preserved for Jack’s birthday tomorrow. 

By the time it’s all done, Cas is thoroughly enjoying himself, and the company the girls all provided him with. He bids them goodbye, each with a powerful hug that makes him smile, but Claire stops him just before he’s out the door.

“You’re forgetting this,” she says, handing him a yellow envelope. It has ‘Jack’ written across the front in boxy blue lettering that he knows to be Claire’s. Cas takes it, and Claire pushes her hands into the back pockets of her jeans.

“Snagged it while we were at the store...we uh, we all signed it,” she says. “I’m...looking forward to coming over, if the offer still stands.”

Cas nods, a grateful smile spreading across his lips. “Always.” 

Claire rolls her eyes, but nudges Cas’ shoulder in good humor. “Good. Now go win that contest, you goober.”

Of the three, Cas’ cake is the most put together, but that isn’t saying much. Dean’s at least stands up by itself (unlike last year’s), but he’d tried for three different flavors and way too many sprinkles, so it’d tasted a little like mush. Sam’s was decorated beautifully with blue and yellow, but caved in a bit in the middle. He’d tried a “healthy” recipe that unfortunately was flavorless, but Jack ate them both with a toothy grin on his face. 

Cas’ was a labor of love, a product of multiple hands with perhaps too much decoration going on and way too many colors, but it was edible at least, and they end up eating that one more so than the others.

“So who wins?” Dean asks Jack, shoveling Cas’ cake in his mouth with only a slightly annoyed look on his face.

Jack spreads his arms wide and says, “Everyone! I love them all!” before loudly blowing his party popper.

The three of them hug their kid, press kisses to the top of his head and say, “We love you too, buddy.” 

And they all truly do. 

[itsclydebitches]

What are your thoughts on Ted Lasso?

I finished season two tonight so I can finally write this very disorganized, but entirely heartfelt Ted Lasso Review!

Two disclaimers:

Spoilers abound, so if someone hasn't watched the show yet (and they should) you might want to skip this.

I know fuck all about sports. If anyone has criticisms and/or praise for how the sports aspects are handled... I will not know what you're talking about. Sorry lol.

So what’s good about Ted Lasso? The entire show.

/end review.

JK, I’m taking this seriously, I swear. Right, so I went into Ted Lasso knowing only “It’s a comedy,” “It’s about soccer,” and “Literally everyone seems to love it.” So I had a pretty vague, but otherwise firm picture of a sitcom-esque situation that would please the majority of watchers. The opening credits immediately tipped me off that this show was far more than a series of (very well-written) jokes and I couldn’t be happier to have my expectations obliterated. (Side note: I'll have to make a separate post sometime about the credits and how/when they change). I came in hoping for “Football coach tries to teach soccer” silly times and I got that ALONGSIDE “Wonderful commentary on toxic masculinity, the influence of fathers, how harmful the sports industry can be, the importance of giving others support so they can finally grow, and how utterly badass friendships of all sorts can be.”

The development of the entire cast is spot on, whether we’re talking about becoming a better person, or becoming the worst version of yourself. Nothing will ever be funnier to me than Roy pulling a constipated face for a solid 30 seconds before yelling “FUCK” because Jamie has finally grown enough to apologize for something, or respectfully voice his disagreement, and Roy has likewise grown enough to recognize what a big step that is for him, so he can’t just punch him in the face like he wants to, and ugh being a mature adult sucks.

Meanwhile, Nate’s journey (so far) has been so well done and so, so tragic. Rather than overcoming his insecurities thanks to Ted’s support, he latched onto him so fiercely that he sees Ted giving attention to anyone else as “abandonment." Instead of hearing the appropriate confident boost that Rebecca offered him—make yourself feel big and powerful in some private place—he twists that into an act of cruelty—spitting, notably at himself through the mirror—and that quickly spiraled into the belief that cruelty is the only way to gain respect. Nate has been sucked into this cycle of gaining enough self-respect to know he deserves more, turning that into wanting everything, not being able to handle life’s inevitable disappointments, and thus becoming furious and pointing fingers even when he does get what he thinks he wants—like with the team successfully using his strategy. Before the game is even complete, he’s saying that they’ll lose and everyone will blame him for that loss, OR that they’ll win and everyone will give Ted the credit. Nothing can please him, largely because the one person he wants to impress, his father, continues to ignore his success and Nate has reached a point where lashing out at everyone else is easier than sitting with the fact maybe he can’t make his father be a better person simply by achieving more. It’s so disheartening to see Nate turn into a man who would air Ted’s mental health struggles to the press just to make himself look better in comparison, but in a “Goddamn this is well written and I can easily see it happening” way. Nate has become Ted’s foil, especially on the pitch, someone who prioritizes (perceived) success over the love, respect, and mental health of his team. Ted, as established in episode one, cares more about the needs of everyone around him than what most assume is success in this sport: winning instead of losing. And he continues to become a better man by realizing that sometimes winning is what others need, whether that’s for practical reasons like not letting their careers go down in flames, or just because they can win and should be encouraged to reach for that. Ted is finding a balance while Nate plunges deeper into a black and white view that's eating him alive.

So the development is stellar (if I get into every character we'll be here forever lol), but so is the humor. I want to write Ted Lasso fic so badly now, but I know in my heart-of-hearts that I don’t have the skill to pull of this witty, pop-culture laden dialogue. Something in particular I love is how the dialogue doesn’t just sit as, you know, polished TV dialogue. The kind of stuff that’s so amazing you’re always thinking in the back of your head, “Yeah, but no one talks like that in real life.” And sure, Ted Lasso inevitably still produces that feeling, but it’s undercut by how often the characters acknowledge their own, verbal sparring. They frequently compliment each other on a smart turn of phrase, drawing attention to the fact that it is smart and worth taking a moment to admire, rather than the joke just sitting there, not commented on, because all people definitely talk like that, yeah? They also frequently mess up. One person will set the other up for that cool phrase and they miss it. Like Higgins’ “I’m Jimmy” while shaking his paper and Ted doesn’t realize he’s supposed to follow up with “Page.” We’ve got this dynamic where everyone is trying to playfully one-up each other. It takes work and it doesn’t always land. This, combined with how much of the dialogue relies on collaborative thinking (like Beard telling Lasso what he’s aiming for), as well as what are clearly long-established inside jokes, makes the whole thing feel natural even though this kind of writing shouldn't feel natural at all. There’s an extra layer of fun there that I really enjoy.

Okay, I’ve ranted for a page and a half now, but I do want to acknowledge some of the cons here too. Season two, while very strong in many respects:

did have some plotlines that fizzled out, most notably the boycott of the team's sponsor. Things were building for so long only to get resolved through a random text message. Sam asks to pull out of a contract, Rebecca is already dealing with the fallout of that, then the whole team comes out with the tape on their shirts, then Sam ACCUSES THE NIGERIAN GOVERNMENT OF CORRUPTION… and then a few episodes later his dad is like, “They stopped killing the environment! Good job👍‍” Don’t get me wrong, I love the conflict itself, but for a show that’s worked so hard to treat its relevant issues respectfully and realistically, this conclusion came entirely out of left field. I was waiting for the inevitable consequence of the boycott and the impact Sam’s press conference would have on his carrier, but nothing ever came of either decision (with the exception of another Nigerian wanting to snatch him up for that notoriety). “And then the environmental devastation whose wealth funds this sport was fixed off screen, yay!” doesn’t feel like it belongs to the same story where, say, Ted unlearns his prejudice about therapy and finally acknowledges his father’s suicide in a deeply heartfelt, relatable scene.

Side note though: cutting between Ted’s suicide story with Rebecca’s cheating story? Inspired. One of the best scenes of both seasons.

Also, sorry for anyone who’s a fan of it, but I cannot get behind Sam and Rebecca. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not some prude who wants my storytelling to be free of any “problematic” content. It’s just that this feels like such an unnecessary move for two characters who, frankly, already have enough going on. (See: Sam’s activism.) As said, Ted Lasso is a show that’s very self-aware. From Roy’s comment that the nice, boring guy Rebecca was dating is “age appropriate,” to her freaking out and framing her texting Sam as “grooming” him, there’s not doubt the show is aware of how messed up it is for the 40-some owner of a soccer team to date her 21yo player. So when they realized they’d been anonymously chatting with each other this whole time, I was here for it as a funny, but somewhat devastating reveal. Rebecca clearly adored talking to someone as sweet as Sam and Sam, as evidenced by both his, “Three dots!” and calling for his haircut, had high hopes for this woman. The awkward humor of their realization combined with the gut-punch of losing that potential partner is the exact kind of emotional mix that has become Ted Lasso’s brand. It's good in that context.

But then?? They ran with it???

Why, why, why, literally why? There was no reason to do that. I could maybe buy this decision at the start of season one when Rebecca was coming off of her divorce and making bad choices left and right, but she’s come so far since then. Why the backslide? Except—and this is the real kicker for me—the show doesn’t treat it like a backslide. Rebecca freaks out when she first realizes she’s been flirting with Sam. Then she spends days talking herself out of what she knows is a bad decision. Then she convinces Sam to keep it quiet because she (again) knows that this isn’t right. Yet when the relationship is finally revealed… it’s treated as any old dalliance for the girls to gossip over. I was legit cringing through the funeral scene when Keeley, Sassy, and Rebecca’s mother were all acting like her dating a guy 20+ years her junior who she has complete power over is no different from the one-night-stands she was having with the hot dude who never wore clothes in the kitchen. I didn’t like Rebecca making that move in the first place, but I thought the show would at least unpack how questionable this is in terms of the power dynamics. It absolutely didn’t. We’ve left them having broken up only because Rebecca wants to work on herself some more and Sam very much implying that he stayed because of her, with every other character flat out ignoring the problems in this relationship. (Here, Ted's silence is the only one I can accept characterization-wise, just because he's established as a) always looking on the bright side of things and b) not someone who gets involved in other's love lives, like with Beard and Jane. But Keeley should absolutely be calling her out.). The show leaned heavily into the iffy nature of the romance and then swerved hard into classic romance tropes. It’s the one part of the show that really left me shaking my head going, “Nah. Toss that whole arc in the bin and replace it with more environmental activism, please.”

Right, this is getting long, so let me end with the biggest criticism of all: NOT NEARLY ENOUGH TRENT CRIMM. Also, I’m sorry, but where is my Trent/Ted plotline? Is this not the kind of rom com(monism) that Ted Lasso deserves? Hey, tumblr: is it queer to be a hard-ass sports reporter who thinks this coach’s existence here is a “fucking joke” and fully plans to write a piece utterly decimating him to the public, only to unwittingly be charmed over Indian food and then, a year later when he’s only gotten the occasional drive-by interaction, throws away his journalistic credibility and rats himself out to be fired all so that this coach would know who did him dirty and he decides to freely tell him all this while waiting for him outside his job in a super sexy wall lean, so focused on looking cool—“the whole vibe”—that he LOCKS HIS KEYS IN HIS CAR? IS THAT MAYBE A LITTLE GAY?

Trent wants to find something “deeper” yeah okay, season three can get on that 😏

Seriously though, I think a romantic plotline—either reciprocated or one-sided on Trent’s part—could actually be in the works. There’s a lot the show has already hinted at to support that as a future development (Trent’s presumed date with the other mustached man, Ted’s whole journey of improving his mental health and discovering who he is post-divorce, the final interaction of season two that comes across as quite flirty in places, the fact that, again, Trent made a HUGE decision that feels like more than just doing right by an acquaintance he “respects,” or even just using this to get out of a job he no longer loves), but I’ll be the first to admit that it’s easy for us fans to see the potential. That doesn’t mean the show will ever capitalize on it. HOWEVER, Ted Lasso has been so good about tackling representation and toxic masculinity that I can’t imagine they’re not aware of the actual, elephant sized criticism in the room: no queer rep. Outside of that moment where Trent puts his hand on another man’s arm, a fan being creepy with Keeley, and a Grindr joke, this massive ensemble cast doesn’t have a single, confirmed queer character in it. Which is ridiculous considering the focus on soccer and the theme of fathers hurting their children. Someone struggling with their sexual identity in the hyper-masculine world of sports and/or grappling with the fact that they’ve disappointed their father by not loving the "right" person is TAILOR MADE for this show. Which is why I think this is one of the rare cases where the fanbase should wait with high hopes, simply because this show has been too self-aware and that conflict is too relevant for us to go the whole series without it being addressed. We might not get any Ted/Trent, but I believe we'll be getting something soon.

Is it frustrating in 2022 to wait 2+ years for that kind of story? Sure, but the show has been excellent outside of one or two hiccups and a part of that excellence is knowing not to pack too much into one season. Season two was the first time we really delved into Ted. Not the endlessly optimistic version of Ted he sometimes hides behind, but the man still haunted by his father’s suicide and trying to do right by his surrogate kids (something that will undoubtedly come up after Nate’s accusation of Ted “abandoning” him. Bullshit or not, that’s going to eat at him). If the show is going to tackle Ted’s sexuality—or even any of the players’ on his team—I think it’s good that it’s happening later in the show, after the initial conflict of “Will this coach make it?” and “Everyone is backstabbing and learning to trust each other.” Now that we’ve settled into this found family, the characters can start growing in new, less obvious ways. We had to work through the inevitable "Jamie becomes less of a dick" and "Ted proves his worth" storytelling before we could get to the more complex "Nate has left them for Richard's team (right after Rebecca told Keeley never to work for him #yikes)" and, potentially, "Ted gets to explore his sexuality now that he's moved on from his wife and is regaining a strong sense of self-worth." Toss in the tidbit that Trent will have a significant role in season three and it honestly doesn't feel as impossible as it otherwise might. I come from old school fandom where we shipped what we liked without worrying about what was canonical, or even what had "evidence" to support it (all hail the crackship!), so know that when I say I think a relationship is possible, that's not my normal approach. I don't toss out, "Oh yeah, we might and should get the ship the fandom loves in canon" very often.

Seriously though, not to end on a joke, but of course I wound up loving Trent.

Me @ me: Hey, this is a huge cast overflowing with amazing characters you’re already attached to. This time can we please focus on one of them rather than some random side character with little screen time?

Also me: I want that one :D

[reminisce05-20]

Dazai - The Book - Double Black

Dazai couldn't remember being a child, one of elementary age. He had only started to remember when he was around 14, which was when he first met Mori.

Sometimes, he wondered if he should be searching for answers, of who his parents could've been or where he came from, but he had easily moved on. Perhaps too easily, but he had no regrets. After all, the past didn't define him. He could write his own story from the present.

Only after words started to be written on his pale skin did he start to wonder who he really was.

Long sleeves could suffice, but just in case, Dazai wrapped bandages around his arms. Then his torso. Then up to his neck and finally his eye to give the air of an injury. The words hadn't spread quite that much, but it made his stomach crawl whenever he saw the squiggly lines all over his body. It was simply a precaution in case more words suddenly appeared.

Dazai soon met Chuuya, who was loud and angry and short, which made it even funnier when Dazai riled him up. Chuuya insisted that he was still young and growing. For the first time, Dazai wanted to laugh at the words he had seen yesterday on his elbow. Chuuya will never grow.

Although the words brought occasional joy, when he was 18, he saw words on the back of his left arm that said, Sakunosuke Oda will die. Sakunosuke couldn't die. His ability allowed him to see things moments before they actually happened, and Sakunosuke wasn't dumb. He would be fine.

He never had allowed the words on his arms and body to ever affect him. Words, in general, had never affected him since Dazai believed actions could speak much more.

"Be on the side that saves people. If both sides are the same, then choose to become a good person. Save the weak, protect the orphaned. You might not see a great difference between right and wrong, but... saving others is something just a bit wonderful."

For once, he took the words to heart.

Once, long ago when he was still young, not in the Detective Agency nor even the Mafia, Dazai had written something on his arm, something that tattooed itself to his arm for just a second before it burned away with terrible pain.

Dazai experimented. His ability, "No Longer Human", obviously canceled out abilities with no exception. The words were things to happen, things that were happening, and things that had happened. The timing for when the events actually took place differed, from as small as a minute to as long as a year. Dazai couldn't change events that were going to happen or create an entirely new one. It was probably a strange mix of the words and his ability.

Dazai had considered going to the President to inform him of the words. He was fairly sure that everyone else in the agency believed the bandages to be a fashion choice, excluding Ranpo and the President. He walked in front of the office door for a few minutes, pacing, before walking back to his desk. Perhaps the talk could be moved to another time.

The words were often too ugly to be shown to others.

Dazai was good at planning things, which made it entirely his fault that he hadn't prepared ahead for this.

A few days ago words had appeared on his collarbone, ones that said, "Chuuya will unleash Arahabaki once more. Secrets will be revealed." If Chuuya was going to showcase his powers, Dazai would no doubt be sent along unless Chuuya had managed to somehow subdue his powers effectively. Sure enough, he was sent to settle a dispute that would benefit both the Mafia and the Agency. It was always nice, seeing the top of Chuuya's hat, showing that he had indeed not grown a single bit.

He had misinterpreted the "secrets" on his arm. Dazai had expected it to be Chuuya's secrets, of how he stayed so short all the time.

In Arahabaki form, Chuuya had never attacked Dazai, at least not to kill. He had to have some semblance of control to not kill the only person that could bring him back, even if Chuuya hated him. But this time, right after defeating the enemy, Chuuya turned on him in an instant, giving Dazai no time to nullify his ability.

It would have been fine. Dazai only took a few hard hits before he tapped Chuuya on the head, nullifying his ability. They both staggered for a moment before Dazai laughed.

"Well, that was awfully close wasn't it, Chuuya?"

Chuuya huffed, angry but too tired to anything about it.

"Only if you had touched me a little earlier maybe you - hey what's that on your arm?"

Dazai froze before he looked at his left arm, bandages slightly unraveled, revealing the inky text on his arm.

"Some tattoo shit? Or maybe weird scars..."

Chuuya took a step forward while Dazai hurriedly rebandaged his arm with a hopefully winning grin.

"How observant of you."

Chuuya scowled for a second before staring at Dazai.

"Seriously, was it just some weirdo tattoo? Show me what you have written there."

Dazai made a mental note to seriously work out and train with Kunikida. Then again, it probably wouldn't bring him near Chuuya's level for a long time. Even after using Arahabaki, Chuuya stomped forward, grabbing his arm and unwrapping the bandage with unreasonable strength and speed. His control must have actually been getting better. Or maybe they had just defeated the enemy faster today.

"What the - what the heck is this Dazai?"

He didn't have the strength to stand properly, staggering a little bit while unsuccessfully trying to get out of Chuuya's iron grip.

"An occult tattoo I got when I was 14. It says 'fuck off Chuuya'."

"It literally says 'Sakunosuke Oda will die'. I've heard of that name before... who was that again?"

Out of all the sentences Chuuya could have seen, it had to be that one. Why not the one about Atsushi dropping his ice cream, or maybe the one about Chuuya's height? They could have laughed over that.

"This actually happened didn't it Dazai? Like, a few years ago?"

At this point, Dazai simply didn't care enough to wrench his wrist away from Chuuya. He had wanted to tell someone about this for so long. Chuuya and he didn't have the best relationship, but they could certainly trust each other. After all, they had been partners, right?

"It tells me things that are going to happen. Well, at the time of course. This already happened a while ago."

Chuuya simply stared, unsure of what to believe.

"I tried changing history once. It hurt really bad, I think it's got something to do with my goddamn ability, I hate seeing the words every day and having to bandage them - "

"Um... Dazai, calm down."

He hadn't realized he was breathing so heavily. His chest felt like it was burning.

It felt like it was burning just like when he was young - why was it like this when he hadn't written anything down on his skin?

"Dazai, what's going on?"

Dazai turned away from Chuuya before throwing his jacket off, then his vest, then his shirt to reveal the mass of bandages covering every inch of his skin.

"What the fuck Dazai, stop stripping in front of me - "

Dazai for once ignored Chuuya instead of sending back an angry retort. He unwrapped the bandages, not caring if Chuuya saw the words or not since the pain was burning as if he was dying and he wanted it to just stop. Stop stop stop.

The bandages were off to show the mass of writing on his back and arms and stomach and even up to his neck. Chuuya's breathing became softer, more confused and curious.

Chuuya will never grow.

Dazai will trip and fall on the doormat before meeting Akutagawa for the first time.

Sakunosuke Oda will die.

Atsushi will drop the ice cream Dazai bought for him and will be horrified.

More evil will soon come in Yokohama.

Chuuya will unleash Arahabaki once more. Secrets will be revealed.

Chuuya simply stared, dumbfounded, trying to read everything written on Dazai's back. Dazai on the other hand, looked down at the center of his chest to see just a few words.

Yokohama's Page - By Osamu Dazai.

The words were a gleaming gold, burning his skin before suddenly cooling into the familiar black, only a small golden border on the edges of each letter. Chuuya had now walked in front of him, kneeling, reading the words that had just appeared.

"So. You're some special shit."

Dazai let out a flat laugh. Indeed he was.

"It says 'More evil will soon come in Yokohama'. Right, Dazai?"

Dazai nodded blindly. He couldn't remember that one, but maybe it was because it was on his back. It was hard to read from a mirror.

"You should tell your agency this. Have you told them?"

Dazai's silence was the same as a confirmation. Chuuya mumbled something about how he always had to make his life worse, although Dazai knew that it was halfhearted.

After Dazai put on every single one of his bandages, thoroughly covering every inch of skin along with his other clothes, Chuuya and he walked in silence for a little. Usually, they would've been arguing all the way back, making the silence feel even worse.

"Oy. Dazai."

Chuuya growled when Dazai didn't make any move to answer before sighing and backing down. Dazai blinked, seeing that for the first time, Chuuya had backed down from an argument.

"We were partners before. Are we still partners?"

Dazai smiled.

"If we're partners, I'll be annoying you all day! I think that'd be pretty nice ~ "

"Well fuck you too!"

It was nice, feeling the usual annoyance flowing through Chuuya, the same remarks they always passed forth to each other.

"So you're saying we are partners, Dazai."

Dazai's eyes narrowed. What was with Chuuya being overly... nice all of a sudden? Being so calm?

Chuuya, catching Dazai's eyes screeched again before kicking over a trash can.

"I'm saying I can help you with this goddamn book shit! Words! Partners! The fuck is wrong with you?"

Dazai stared as Chuuya knocked over a few more trash cans while screaming about how utterly dumb Dazai could be for someone that was supposed to be so smart, so crafty, and so manipulative.

The familiar tickle of more words caused Dazai to flinch, hand moving toward his neck where the words seemed to be. Chuuya, who was done with his little fit, stopped for a second before walking over, no doubt intrigued. Dazai tugged the bandages down a little bit while Chuuya read the words out loud.

"Fyodor Dostoevsky is looking for another part of the book in Yokohama."

Dazai's eyes widened when he heard the name, and Chuuya no doubt understood that this man was someone dangerous if they could elicit such a reaction from Dazai. They looked at each other, understanding passing through their eyes.

"Well, I guess we're partners again Chuuya!"

"Only because I fucking have to!"

Dazai supposed that he would also have to tell the Agency about this. And as more people knew, the news would inevitably spread to the Mafia too. He only had to make sure that Fyodor didn't receive the information, and that was if Fyodor didn't already know about him.

"Fucking Dazai."

Chuuya grabbed Dazai's hair and pulled, forcing Dazai to yelp while batting Chuuya's hands away.

"We're going to crush this bastard Fyodor."

Dazai laughed at the sheer amount of determination in Chuuya's name, laughing like he never had ever before.

Indeed, Double Black would crush the enemy like they always did.

___________________________

Kind of an abrupt end, but you get the idea :>

[mk-wizard]

Big Hero 6 The Series: It could have been better

Hello, friends. Today, I will be analyzing a TV series based on a movie that I fell in love with for its colourful themes, deep plot, compelling characters, great CGI and memorable messages. Before I get into it, I want to take a moment to say that I have quit doing videos. They are too big of a pain in the petunia to make and I write better than I speak, so I will stick to writing essays, reviews and more. Anyway, onto the analysis.

All I can say about Big Hero 6 the series is that it had a great concept, it presented some great ideas and tried hard to be a cartoon of the times, but it could have and should have been a lot better. The show’s downfall all centers around trying too hard to be kid friendly which makes the shame sting all the more because Big Hero 6 was already kid friendly even with its dark themes, sharp edges and intelligent writing. If anything, even the brightest kid friendly cartoons (Steven Universe, She-Ra, etc.) had those things and actually benefitted from them. By needlessly trying too hard, character development got scrapped, the edges were all smoothed out, storytelling was subpar, the humour was too silly and the executive meddling in the end produced a dismal final season. However, I don’t want this analysis to be one lengthy negative rant about how awful the series was because in its defense, awful is an unfair word. It did have potential and ideas which are worth carrying over to a reboot that I hope will be done someday in the future. Also, we should root for a reboot because Big Hero 6 would not be the first story that needs it before striking gold. Just look at how many times Spider-Man was rebooted in film before MCU found the version that worked. Anyway, I will list all the things in Big Hero 6 that could have been better in my opinion;

1- Go easy on the laughs and be more generous with the action. - I love adding comedy to my own writing because I think a good sense of humour makes everything better, but Big Hero 6 is not a stand up comedy routine. It is a superhero story where we expect action, suspense and life or death situations that are to be taken seriously first. The comedy should be for relief and with the right timing. Also, the chibi cutscenes and having characters act like fools aren’t funny. Ren and Stimpy are the exception not the standard and their way of making you laugh doesn’t fit an action series. In a show as big as Big Hero 6, real life physics and danger matters.

2- Make the villains menacing and gritty. - I admit that after having a movie villain like Yokai who was the stuff of nightmares, it is going to be a challenging act to follow, but it was obvious that the writers were trying especially with some villains who could have easily gone into some dark relatable territory. For example, Mr. Sparkles (the gentleman in the photo above) embodies social media and Internet personalities. Right off the bat, you have a long list of things which embody the dark side of that like scams, fraud, using social media to dox or harass, driving people to suicide, online predators, the Internet personalities being very depressed people in real life, and much more horrifying things. When you stop and look at it, Mr. Sparkles even looks like the Joker which hints how dark and scary he could have been if the stops were removed. The same goes for enemies like Hardlight who embodies online gaming, Liv with cloning, Obake an amoral and insane scientist, and Trina and Noodle Burger Boy (more on him later) being evil robots. Globby especially should have been painted and written in much darker colours rather being played off for laughs because he has many parallels with Clay Face. The only two villains who I can say were supposed to be campy, charming and comical were Baron Von Steamer and Supersonic Sue because they were a satire of the Adam West style villains.

The rest of them needed to be dark and threatening including Mr. Sparkles. In fact, I would love a rebooted version of Mr. Sparkles who gives me the heebie-jeebies. Going back to Noodle Burger Boy, I must confess that I was actually excited when I heard that he was going to be the main villain of the final season because I thought he was going to fulfill his master’s final wish and as a reminder, Noodle Burger Boy was based on a super robot for military purposes.

It would have been fantastic if Noodle Burger Boy was upgraded into a full military war machine with a new threatening look. For that, I think all of the villains deserve to be rebooted and have their full potential unlocked for better or for worse.

3- A show about geniuses merits genius level art quality. - I am usually forgiving towards art styles, but in the case of Big Hero 6, the oversimplified style with minimal details and lack of textures did not suit the show. The characters blend in with the background which makes them look flat and the special effects were extremely dulled down. I also know for a fact that Disney can do a lot better than this because I saw how superbly Tangled the Series was drawn.

You can see and almost feel the difference in quality, the number of layers and level of detail between the two styles. I think there was no excuse Big Hero 6 was not done in the same style and at the same level if not better as Tangled.

3- Don’t dumb down or flanderize amazing characters. - I absolutely detest it when characters are flanderized because it makes them one dimensional and grating. For example, Go Go is tough as nails and extremely calm, but she is not cold or hesitant towards helping her friends. She doesn’t require very special episodes for us to know that. If anything, the movie version of Go Go reminded me a lot of Garnet in how she deconstructed the broody character. She isn’t cold or emotionless. Just calm and mature. Another good example was how Honey Lemon was rewritten to be overly positive to the point of toxicity, naïve and oblivious with a juvenile obsession with stickers. Then you have poor Fred who was rewritten to be an incompetent fool. The spark that makes Big Hero 6 shine is that they are a team of geniuses meaning they are all intelligent. Even Fred is genius in his own way just not a scientific one. He has a vivid imagination, he is resourceful and can get himself out of tight spots. Please, don’t turn characters into dummies especially if their intelligence is a part of them. It doesn’t make them better or funnier. It ruins them.

4- Tadashi needs closure and honour. - I am all for Hiro making peace with the loss of his brother, but Tadashi is to the Big Hero 6 team what Uncle Ben was to Spider-Man. His loss was the catalyst if not the reason. He should never be forgotten. Moreover, there was never any true closure to him especially with the possibility that he may still be alive up in the air. After all, like Callaghan, his body was never found and it turned out that Callaghan was still alive.

With that said, who is to say that Tadashi was not secretly still alive and just hiding or being hidden? This is something that Disney really needed to clear up if not for the fans, then at least as a service to such an important character. Never just forget about them.

5- The format can only be episodic with a deep plots, continuity and character development. - Random episodes with a mere monster of the day is an outdated format which doesn’t fit Big Hero 6′s modern and bright setting. In seasons 1 and 2, when the episodes were plot heavy with character development, the series shined brightest. It also helped move the story along, but with the final season, plot was removed, closure was abandoned or poorly written if any was given, and characters were disallowed from growing. A good example at how plot and character development could have made this series and its characters better was the relationship between Hiro and Megan. Would it have truly survived or would they have broken up?

Would Richardson Mole have eventually lost interest in his obsession with besting and bullying Fred or would his obsession consume him compelling him to become a super villain? I do see quite a few similarities between Mole and Reverse Flash.

Then you have Karmi who is in my opinion, the biggest wild card of the bunch. She was intentionally introduced as an arrogant, prickly and unlikable yet complex character who rivaled Hiro bitterly.

Yet had a huge crush on his alter ego and as time went on, started to grow up and even form a friendship with Hiro. What would have happened further down the road with her? Would she have become a super hero herself? Or maybe even another love interest for Hiro kind of like how Black Cat is for Spider-Man?

Is Obake really gone?

What does the future hold Diana (Liv’s clone), Liv herself or the Sycorax the genetics company?

Is Alistair Krei going to become an ally to Big Hero 6 or an antagonist? There is also the issue at how little we know about the other Big Hero 6 characters other than Fred, Hiro and Baymax. What are Honey Lemon, Wasabi and Go Go’s backstories? These questions matter and while not every mystery can be solved, leaving none of them solved is lazy writing.

6- Executives, kindly stay out of the writing and any other part of the creative process. - I’m sorry, execs, but there is no nice way to say it. History itself proves that every time executives got involved in the creative process of any media, it got worse not better. Leave the writing to the creative team and the execs should only handle the legal stuff. Please. We understand that TV is a business, but writing itself is not. It is an art which you just don’t have a talent for. Let the creative people do their thing with the freedom necessary and you do your thing, deal? Deal.

7- Focus on Hiro and Baymax. - The are the main characters so keep them at the heart of the series no matter what happens around them. That is all I can say.

And that sums up all the things that could have made Big Hero 6 the series better, but this is all just my opinion. What is yours?

PS: I am well aware that the Big Hero 6 series is being retconned because a new series called Baymax is in the works as well as the long awaited sequel to the first movie. I am looking forward to both with an open mind. PPS: I also am aware that some people liked this show the way it was including the art style and I am cool with that. An analysis for art that includes cartoons is never right or wrong. It is solely based on opinion. I may have thought this series could have been better, but there are people who make arguments that it could have been worse.

[lollytea]

What have been your favorite excerpts/parts from the chapters of Undocumented Events that you've written so far? Like the best of Chapters 1, 2, and 3?

OHHH.

Chapter 1:

The first one I thought of was this. I think it’s just me who finds it ridiculously funny

I also really enjoy the whole conversation between Khan and Bagheera after the latter leaves the children upstairs and comes down to talk privately. Like they discuss a lot of topics and I’m proud of how naturally it flows from one subject to the next and how the stressed worrisome personality bounces off against a dry sarcastic one and yet they just click together perfectly. I love how much of their relationship and dynamic and affection for eachother leaks through that whole scene. I like it, I really like it.

Chapter 2:

Big fan of Bagheera being pissed as hell that a little kid kicked his ass at chess. Like he’s such a sore loser but she’s a BABY so he can’t throw a tantrum about it and he has to be a mature adult but he’s clearly having a really hard time holding it together. Meanwhile khan is just like “this is so fucking funny.”

I think Shere Khan seriously engaged in psychological warfare with a thirteen year old is brilliant stuff. It doesn’t get any better than this.

I love the whole jungle cubs in the classroom scene. It turned out really well. But absolutely I adore baby Khans gay as hell internal monologues about baby Bagheera, while he remains completely oblivious to how gay these thoughts sound. My favourite is him being so fucking mad that Bagheera is reading. Just sitting there pure steaming. I like it a lot cuz it showcases that even if Khan cares about Bagheera, he is still a very selfish kid and at this moment cares little for the stuff that actually makes Bagheera happy and just wants everything to revolve around him. Also it’s very fun to write a very emotionally constipated kid feeling things he doesn’t understand and then immediately deciding that it must be anger he’s feeling and then acting out because of it. Love baby khan that little weirdo.

Chapter 3:

The whole closeted college part. Like from start to finish. There was absolutely no reason to put that whole chunk of exposition into the story but I wanted to so here we are. The whole point of this story is jam pack as much of my shere khan hcs into one place as I can and so far I am succeeding. There’s gonna be so much more khan lore in this fic I am obsessed with khan lore. Who is he? Why is he so fucking weird? I have taken on the task of answering my own questions.

Shere Khan failed attempt to prank Kit gets funnier every time I read it

Oh and Shere Khan nonchalantly standing up for Molly and then not understanding why she latches on to him, cuddling into his lap, and Bagheera thinks it’s hysterical.

Bagheeras godawful awkward attempt at making out with Shere Khan to distract him and Khan just being like “my good man what the fuck is wrong with you?” I just love Bagheera, he tries his best.

That’s all I can think of right now. Admittedly I like all of undocumented events. I think the whole fic is turning out really well. But these parts are my faves.