#(he def doesn't think he's a good person but at least his morals are clear faslkjdlkajd)

[buckaroundandfindout]

how I know I grew up: civil war edition

When CA:CW first came out, I was def "team tony" bc I liked Tony Stark the most because he was snarky and funny and quippy and sarcastic I hadn't really gotten into the Cap movies (like, I saw them but hadn't really paid as much attention until Civil War).

When I did finally get into the Cap movies and then re-watched CA:CW, I realized I'd lived a lot of life that had taught me a few things the #1 of which being picking a team is pointless and getting "upset" at either Cap or Tony and taking a side is futile (for me, at least) and fully not the point, even from an in-world character perspective.

The TL;DR of it is that Steve is the guy we (probably) aspire to be: very strong moral compass, rock-solid conviction, always seems to know what's right and what he stands for, and fully will go die on that hill. He owns his failures even if they're big fuck up failures, and sees it all through to the end. He has truly incredible, breathtaking resilience. He will always, always, always keep trying. He stays his course and will keep on the path that moral compass shows him, come hell or high water. Not afraid to do the hard thing, especially if it's right. Doesn't really care what others think of him, weirdly, and is unconcerned with people pleasing in the face of doing the right thing. Phenomenally loyal friend who will go to the ends of the earth and war with half the planet for people he cares about, and still not leave those he falls out with hanging. Most people, I think, should want to be Steve Rogers (and by extension, Sam Wilson).

But then I look at the trajectory of my life, and I realize the reality is that I am way more like Tony-- continually going through cycles of making questionable-to-outright-BAD decisions with really good intentions, but that result in bad-to-catastrophic consequences, and then letting the obsessive guilt spiral swing you so hard the opposite direction that the overcompensation ends up usually resulting in such truly shitty collateral damage that makes you wonder if you were better off the first time around. But you can't seem to stop and so you just do your best, looking forward and not back, trying and failing and fucking up and stumbling through the mess of your best attempts to do just one good thing right and have it work out for once without nuking your life and losing most of your friends.

I think that's why it works so well, because in a weird way I think most people are "rooting" for both sides: we root for Cap because we want to BE him, we also empathize and want to see Tony succeed because we kind of are Tony.

The actual issues, the accords, etc., seem like they're just proxies to emphasize the conflict of the dynamic (one side being "standing your ground for your + what is effectively your minority group's personal freedom & autonomy as well as clearing the name of your framed best friend" and the other being "can we be trusted to be left to our own devices to make the 'right' choice when it has such high-stakes consequences? who even knows what is 'right' at all? …and can maybe someone else decide because the guilt around having it be my personal responsibility is starting to wring me out because I can't seem to stop fucking up and its eating me alive")

it's like… maybe not even about one VS the other, but more like you want this guy who is everything you aspire to be to come out on top to re-solidify your conviction in the kind of standards you try to live up to, but who we empathize with more bc it's more realistically as slice of ourselves-- we can't bear to see lose because that hits a little too fucking close.

or something, idk

[sharonisthebettercarter]

lol you coulda just chatted with me in comments but it's clear ya had a lot to say<3 (i feel that honestly) ;)

i would say mm is motivated a lot more by justice than vengeance (two different things, often confused). yeah he's got his faults and his ocd doesn't help him (in a healthy way) with the supes and everything, but he's not even remotely blood thirsty like butcher is lmao (also doesn't take it out on random supes like kimiko or annie and i love that about him<3, he stays hyperfocused on the *main* problem which is *VOUGHT*)

mm's got a lot of *positive* masculinity tho which def gives *main good guy* vibes, but he's also the *honest* counterpart to butcher.

"i'm a motherfucker with a heart. where as you? you're just a motherfucker."

or in other words, butcher *if* he were *actually* a good guy with at least some moral code and genuine interest in what he advertises (justice) instead of revenge. but he's also def got some kratos (older) vibes~<3 which only adds to the heroic aspect of him.

hughie's a bit of a different worm can. people honestly do forget about him or why he's there half the time but it's *butcher* that dragged him in. (literally predatorily sought that poor boi out for recruitment leik--)

legit, he looked this boi up *right after he lost robin*, when he was most distraught and vulnerable and OOOOOH-- (butcher you fuckin' piece of SHIT I WANT TO SCREAM--)

but anyway, while mm claimed that hughie was butcher's 'canary', hughie's more of a... let's call him an insecure protag (lmao). he seems aimless and lost because he's perpetually kept on the line. he doesn't really have *as much* personal drive (he does, but it for sure gets muddled) at stake for the situations they're involved in.

*butcher* is actually the one playing *devil* on his shoulder while *annie* (and mm, kimiko, frenchie sometimes) are the ones acting as counterbalances/*angels* on his shoulder to try and undo the damage butcher does/veer him in the right direction/make it so butcher isn't the *only* voice whispering in hughie's ears.

but hughie's own desires and motives are muddled, squandered, and manipulated by *butcher*. in the first season, it was *annie* and co. that helped hughie come back to himself, but every time him and annie have issues, butcher gets in his head and--...

it makes for an interesting push/pull situation in which our protag is indecisive/a follower instead of a leader (which i would say probably gets missed cause people aren't used to it). but it's kinda like... he's got atreyus vibes/if the story were from the 'growing son's' perspective instead of the 'father who's done everything' deal.

it def hits different but hughie's perspective (and bullshit lol) is def the main focus (but i do like me a story told from a different sort of perspective than the usual, plus i'd say pretty important to the overall lesson being shown<3)

i think in part, he's also supposed to remind viewers/readers that being overtly decisive *before* you have all the info/everything is laid out is kind of a not good thing to do... also that butcher's a fuckin' asshole trying to CORRUPT this poor boi the whole damn time i--

contemplated at shooting annie (which he unnecessarily did)

punched Hughie for stopping him from killing Kimiko’s brother, Kenji, right in front of her. Then said if he got in the way of him reuniting with Becca, he’d kill Hughie too.

Used an infant as a weapon and threatened to kill them

Is a hypocrite himself (obviously)

Killed a whale

Drugged Marvin

He was willing to sell Ryan to Vought knowing that it would likely mean another Homelander. He didn't care, because it meant he would have Becca.

Insulted Ryan, TO BECCA'S FACE (honestly, Becca should've never tried to make Billy like, let alone tolerate Ryan if she knew that Billy has a weak connection with children and is distrustworthy around them. Like she should've just told him to kick rocks and make sure he won't have a hand in raising Ryan either)

He said that Becca could just "have another kid", not understanding that kids aren't replaceable, like objects (jewelry, cars, houses, etc.) That attitude is fucking horrifying if you're a parent, and I'd worry that he would have that attitude towards any kids (whether mere mortal or supe)

He betrayed his team multiple times

Threatened to kill hughie multiple times

doesn’t care who he hurts in the process

Gaslighted ryan

Let's also add the fact that he CHEATED ON BECCA WHEN THEY WERE TOGETHER

Attempts to kidnap Zoe (based on what the trailers implying)

UNALIVES 2 CHARACTERS AT LEAST (ONE MAIN CHARACTER) wouldn't surprise me if it turns out to be Hughie, considering he threated to unalive Hughie numerous of times.

In all honesty, I hope he hallucinates an angry Becca and Becca's ghost haunts him in the next seasons, like Rhonda's ghost haunted Anika in "Empire".

don't forget unnecessarily attempted to blow up teddy stillwell~!

this shit would be why i roll my eyes anytime someone calls billy an 'aNtI-hErO' or 'gOoD', leik Y'ALL--

lol oh no dear gawd you poor bitch, my dear sweet beautiful angel baby child~<3

just wait until we get to the end of the story or even just a *little* bit further along... this ain't even the half of it...

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the ever expanding shit list on butcher can make homie look tame at times, but yeah no~. def not a good guy, def not right in anyway, one of the big main points of the story is proving butcher wrong and showing just how far his own head was up his own ass.

he's a secondary villain to the series, primary being h--VOUGHT (but also since people forget our *actual* hero is HUGHIE, and that the supes themselves are a SYMPTOM not the actual source of the problems *cough*cough*HEY REMEMBER STARLIGHT WHO EXISTS??* OR THIS WHOLE ASS ABUSIVE FUCKIN' COMPANY THAT EXPLOITS CHILDREN AND EXPERIMENTS ON BABIES LIKE NOBODY'S BUSINESS??????) and leik. he is *made* specifically to disappoint and prove the reader/viewer *wrong* about him (apart from prove himself wrong) by being his absolute worst with zero excuses for it at legit every chance he gets. mainly by being a serial killer butt~

he's *designed* to toy with our emotions and the hope that we see some *good* in him or give him the benefit of the doubt, because we are seeing the story mostly from *hughie's* perspective, and that is specifically how *HUGHIE* feels about him. and some are def blind to it (like hughie lmao) but some can see through butcher's bullshit (like *annie*)

like his whole damn niche is *dragging* homelander down to his level and causing chaos beyond his own wildest wet dreams at the *expense* of everyone else, and homie clocked that motherfucker before giving him the promise of that ticking time bomb explosion because butcher ain't the only one pushing him too far--but he is certainly the most devoted.

his *obsession* with homie completely consumes his life and everything he does. homelander *hardly* cares about billy beyond his being a persistent thorn in his side that *occasionally* provides *some* level of interest.

i think an easy gauge at what's really going on is to look no further than annie's perspective. many people are more than willing to overlook butcher's bullshit, but annie describes what's going on probably better than anyone i've seen.

for homie? she specifically says. "there's something *wrong* with homelander", but with butcher she just gets fuckin' mad MAD because HE. KNOWS. BETTER. and does worse.

the framing there isn't a mistake. leik at all.

post gen v, i saw a bunch of people calling for the gen v kids to join the boys or for butcher to 'adopt' them and the only thing i could think was 'dear fuckin' satan, for the love of GAWD, PLEASE NO' because the only thing butcher does and *would* do is~

ABUSE.

USE.

MURDER WHEN THEY ARE NO LONGER OF USE.

LATHER, RINSE, REPEAT.

it is LITERALLY all he does the WHOLE fuckin' time, and it's comin' to a head cause there is only so much bullshit his team will tolerate, and i--.

MM IS BETTER ANYWAY AND IF ANYONE SHOULD BE DOING ANY ADOPTING--

i need butcher... to stay THE FUCK *away* from the gen v kids because *when* he hurts them i will lose my shit--

i don't think hughie will die. given the comic, he's actually one of the few people i would say is actually guaranteed to survive (again, goes back to people forgetting *hughie* is our protagonist, NOT butcher), but he may be the one who ends up killing butcher, def not before billy does a ton of damage to showcase what an irredeemable scumbag he really is (i love him, i really do BUTT JESUS fuckin' CHRIST MAN--)

when it comes to ryan, that's a whole 'nother can o worms, but there's a part of me that honestly feels billy only protected him--not because he actually gives a shit about ryan specifically (let's not forget that moment he was about to beat ryan to death when becca died), but because he actually does care specifically about *keeping his promise to becca* and the leverage that ryan *is* over homelander.

and while i do think it's possible that through that and in his own twisted round about way, he *cares* for ryan in a similar way he cares for hughie (mostly just the connection to becca tho), i also think it's pretty likely there is a part of him that deeply resents ryan *specifically*, i think its SUPER duper fuckin' likely that as soon as billy gets the idea in his head that:

'ryan is a lost cause and can't be saved'?

*and* he's no longer of use to billy?

that poor kid's gonna fall to the 'just another supe freak/only worth somethin' dead' list for billy. :/

and i get it, it is fuckin' infuriating but he is supposed to be infuriating because we're supposed to realize just how full of shit and actually evil he really is under the bravado. he's just another extremist opposite of homelander to the point where even their desires and presentation, inner and outer, ring opposite.

boi is a wannabe frank castle with ZERO fuckin' principles.

but yeah, once you get to the point of trying to BLOW UP A FUCKIN' BABY, i--

[hopegained-a]

💳- What is something that they would never do for any amount of credits?

sw headcanons | accepting | @ichorcrowncd

“Join you and your merry band of soulless friends. I’m not losing sleep if I miss out a job that brings in a stupid amount of credits if it involves killing innocents. Killing people who can’t fight for themselves. People who just wanna live in peace without you trying to take it away from them.”