#* not including the live action spider-men rip

[give-grian-rights]

guys there's something thats been driving me crazy that no one in my family can appreciate and that's the fact that THIS

billboard (not my picture) is in my city and all i can think of is. you mean every* spider person in the multiverse verses some fifteen year old kid who doesn't want his dad to die?? is that the "We" who are together that you're talking about?? because TECHNICALLY NO since Miles got away.

[ichorai]

get better ; hobie brown.

track nine of BROKEN MACHINE.

pairing ; hobie brown x spider!cottagecore!reader (gender neutral)

synopsis ; electric guitars and strawberries, leather jackets and quilted skirts, city spiders and cottage spiders. the two of you were perfect for each other.

words ; 5.5k

themes ; fluff, mild angst & action, established relationship (dating)

warnings / includes ; mentions of death, a nightmare/mild panic attack, reader is a mutant on top of being a spider (has the ability to conjure flowers), reader's universe is basically cottagecore universe, pav is there even tho he shouldn't be bcs i wanted to include him, hobie is an amazing bf and affectionately calls reader 'cheeky' :( and a little charles xavier mention bcs <3 the x-men are everything to me

main masterlist.

London was a cold, dreary place. You didn’t belong there, no, sticking out like a sore thumb from the cold, harsh corners of buildings that grazed the clouds and the damp, narrow streets. But you were there anyway, almost as often as you spent time in your own quaint universe, where York was nothing but homey cottages and endless green fields of flowers, strawberries, and farmer’s markets.

You were there for your boyfriend, who cared for the people of the city enough to criticize its leaders—a feat the large portion of the country couldn’t be bothered doing.

Today was a long day of protesting. Inhumane laws were being passed, the government was in shambles, and the PM was a fucking joke. You wanted to be there for him and show him support—it wasn’t your universe, sure, but it was important to you, anyway. Nobody deserved to live in fear of tomorrow.

The two of you made your way back up into Hobie’s dingy little apartment when the sky began to grey with gloomy clouds and cold rain dribbled down dirty rooftops. Hobie slammed the door behind him, the faded Sex Pistols poster loosely tacked on the back warbling with the sudden movement. In turn, you made a bee-line for his bed on the opposite side of the room—really, Hobie’s apartment was just a narrow rectangle, with a cramped bed in one corner, a beaten-up green sofa in another, and the kitchen furthest away from the door. There was another door by the other end that led to the bathroom with cracked mirrors. All the walls were covered with art, posters, random memorabilia, and stickers. 

It was a claustrophobe’s nightmare, but it was home to Hobie, which made it your home, as well.

You moaned with relief when you laid down on his thick comforter, shutting your eyes for a moment. Still leaning against the door, Hobie watched you eagle-spread over his bed with a small, amused smile. 

He could never get over how funny you looked, surrounded by dark colors and ripped clothes and filthy artwork, when you yourself were the exact opposite—all soft hues and gentle nature and sunshine. Hobie loved that about you. How you were unabashedly so lovely no matter where you were, or what you were doing.

“You falling asleep on me, Cheeky?” he asked, voice lilting with the affectionate pet name, languidly striding over to sit onto the mattress beside you. The bed creaked with protest under the additional weight.

“Mhm,” you hummed in reply, turning your head so you could offer him a tired grin. “Rain always gets me sleepy.”

The silver of his piercings glinted with what little light streamed through his window. “Take a nap, then, yeah? I’ll wake you up for dinner.” 

With your final murmur of thanks, Hobie dipped down to sweep the hair away from your face, placing a chaste kiss to your forehead, before standing back up to go fix himself a snack. 

Hours later, when you had only begun to twitch with the beginnings of a nightmare, Hobie had gently shaken you awake, beaming at the way your nose wrinkled and your heavy eyes fluttered open to meet his bright ones. 

“Rise and shine,” he greeted, smoothing out the creases of the shirt you were wearing. “Well, it’s not really shinin’ out there, innit? Rise and gloom.” 

A steaming cup of peppermint tea was pushed into your hands. You didn’t even have to taste it to know that he’d added just the right amount of sugar for you. “Thanks, Hobie,” you mumbled, craning your neck to kiss his cheek.

“Got you somethin’ from the chippie—it’s in the microwave whenever you want it.”

Still groggy, you loosely wound your arms around his neck to tug him into a warm embrace, careful not to spill any of the tea. Half of your body was slung over his legs, the other hanging off the bed. Without hesitation, Hobie’s long arms came around to pull you tighter against him, hugging you close. 

“Argh, you’re just too good to me,” you whispered, clutching him tight. “How much was the food?”

“Ah, ah,” he said, pulling away to click his tongue and shake his head. “Don’t worry about it. My shitty universe, my shitty quid.”

With an affectionate roll of your eyes, you pulled away from him. “Alright, well, next time we’re at my place, I’m treating you.”

“Would expect nothing less, Cheeky.”

The two of you shared the microwaved dinner from the chippie together, the large fries nearly burning your tongue and the fish drenched in far too much vinegar for your taste, but the two of you ate it happily regardless. 

After the food was cleaned out, you curled up into Hobie’s sofa—which smelled just like the mango perfume you had given to him for his birthday—and brandished the sewing kit you had kept here, hidden beneath the cushions. Your boyfriend took a seat beside you, his guitar situated over his lap and a dull pocket knife gripped in his hand. He took to engraving his initials against its side (and planned on engraving yours right next to it), as you pulled his leather vest closer, stitching one of the patches that had come loose back on. 

A comfortable silence stretched over the both of you, like a warm blanket draped over your shoulders. It was only broken by Hobie’s disjointed humming to a song you couldn’t recognize, and the soft pattering of rain outside. 

Once he was done with the ‘B’ of his last name, he peered over your shoulder, leaning down to press a kiss to the base of your neck. “How’s it coming?”

You turned with a sweet smile, one that made Hobie’s chest warm. To him, you were the literal embodiment of sunshine. “All fixed,” you chirped, nudging him slightly. “How’s the guitar?”

“Good as ever. D’you mind if I put your name next to mine?”

Your eyes shone. “Go ahead,” you replied, before reaching down to fish something out of your pocket. “Oh, I totally forgot—I embroidered this for you! Made it from my own synthesized silk ‘n everything.”

It was another patch, about half the size of his palm, depicting a bright red strawberry sitting against an equally vibrant yellow backdrop. A genuine smile flickered over Hobie’s countenance. 

“Oh, this is wicked, Y/N! Looks fuckin’ fab,” he exclaimed, leaning closer to inspect all the tiny details. Somehow, his beam grew wider. Hobie situated the patch over an empty spot on his vest. “Could you sew it here?”

You nodded whilst humming an affirmative. A rush of heat pulsed over your face when Hobie leaned down to kiss your cheek, pulling back with an obnoxious mwah. 

“You’re a talent, you know that? Thank you.”

It was a few minutes later when you showed him his vest—finally ready and decked out with a multitude of both new and fixed patches. In turn, he showed you your name etched right next to his. Overwhelmed by just how much you loved your boyfriend, every single bit of his punk, anarchist self, you threw yourself into his open arms, hugging him tight. A flower appeared behind his ear, and he pinched it between two fingers, pulling it away to inspect its small white petals and smooth green stem. With a hum, Hobie pushed it back onto his ear and returned your embrace.

A week later, you and Hobie were at another underground music concert, filled to the brim with punk rock enthusiasts and anarchists of the very same ilk as him. Seeing as he was the last gig to play, the night ended with an elongated guitar riff, and Hobie’s fist thrusting high up as the final notes crashed against the cheering crowd. It wasn’t long before he was hopping off the rickety stage, immediately greeted with your wide smile and more tiny flowers blooming within the moist cracks of the sidewalk by your feet. 

“You did amazing!” you exclaimed, bouncing on the heels of your feet excitedly. “Argh, I’m so proud of you! When you did that thing—with that guitar—and then you just—AH! I loved it, Hobie!”

Your boyfriend slung an arm over your shoulders, briefly pressing his nose against your hairline. “Thanks, Cheeky.” He glanced at the large box you were holding. “What’s all this now?”

“Merchandise,” you chirped with bright eyes. “Made it all myself back in my universe. Free of charge, of course. Everyone deserves to enjoy art without worrying about its price.”

Hobie swore he fell in love with you just a smidge more right then and there.

With nimble fingers, he plucked a bundle out of the box, unfurling it to reveal a dark black t-shirt with a messy crimson scrawl of ANARCHY! across the chest. To his fond delight, there was a little flower drawn just beneath the large text. A touch of him, and a touch of you.

Not waiting another second, Hobie slipped the shirt over his head, one of his piercings momentarily snagging against the collar. You were quick to shift the box onto one arm so you could help him safely tug the shirt down without ripping his earlobe into two. 

After murmuring his thanks, Hobie cupped his palms over his hands to yell, “Oi, you lot! Come ‘round here for free shirts! Made by the loveliest person I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing!”

The two of you stayed at the venue until all your shirts were given away, and even then there were a few stragglers left, disappointed they hadn’t gotten anything.

“Come to Hobie’s next gig, I’ll bring some more things by then,” you reassured them with a kind smile. 

After another series of goodbyes, Hobie finally pulled you out of the dingy venue, his hand curled over your upper back and your arm wrapped around his hips. 

Hobie was a true artist. Everything he touched, he could turn into something of beauty, something raw and pure and breathtaking. When you had vocalized such thoughts to him, he smirked, loose and humored. 

“Don’t like labels,” he said, gaze fixed on his guitar and the uncapped marker he was using to draw just beneath the strings. “You sure you’re not biased?”

“Not at all,” you hummed in reply, leaning against him. The two of you were in your universe, laying spread over a checkered blanket on a vast field not too far from your little cottage. The grass was greener than what Hobie had back home, and the air was clearer and lighter than anything he’d ever breathed before. Somehow, the breeze that whistled between the two of you smelled of strawberries and peaches—or maybe that was your perfume. Hobie couldn’t get enough of it, either way. Your universe was beautiful—nearly as beautiful as you were. 

Whilst he was concentrating on his scribbled drawings, you were tinkering with one of your web shooters—a series of miniscule gadgets with brown fixings to wrap around your wrist. Once you clicked it back into place, you jutted it out to Hobie, the round capsules hovering only inches beneath his nose.

He laughed, gently pulling your hand away so he wouldn’t go cross-eyed. “You make these yourself?”

“Synthesized them with all natural ingredients. Took a lot of trial-and-error, but I think I’ve finally perfected the colored formula,” you said, pressing down with both your middle and index finger, showing him how the webs shot out so far he couldn’t even see where it disappeared within the swishing blades of grass.

Arching a brow, he echoed, “Colored formula?”

You grinned. “Take a look. I made them green! I think it’s much prettier than plain ol’ white,” you said.

“Green spider webs, huh? You really are something else,” he surmised with a half-chuckle, half-snort, a goofy smile to his lips. Your excitement was beginning to rub off on him, so he took your hands again, admiring your craftsmanship. “These are so fucking cool.”

“I could make you colored webs, too—whatever color you want!” You perked up with the idea, smiling brighter than the golden sun hanging sweetly in the soft pink sky (the skies were pink during the day in your universe, it was trippy as hell). Little flowers bloomed around you, a few appearing in the surrounding grass, some popping into his hair, others materializing on your flowing blouse.

Flustered, you reached over to pluck out the flowers in his hair, murmuring a quiet apology. 

“Nah, it’s cute,” he reassured you, shooting you a curious look. “So—does your universe have others that are also called ‘mutants’ or is it just you?”

“There’s not a lot of us,” you admitted. “It was scary, at first. I was completely… normal until I hit thirteen years old—all of a sudden, flowers started blooming everywhere and I couldn’t stop. I couldn’t control it and it only grew worse the more scared I got. A man named Charles Xavier took me under his wing at his school for gifted students—well, that’s just a code word for mutants—and he helped me train to control it. Obviously… not well enough—flowers still sprout when I feel strong emotions.”

Hobie’s nose wrinkled. “My fault. You like me a bit too much, Cheeky.”

With a playful shove, you huffed out a tinkering laugh. “Anyways, while I was at the school, there was a student with the ability to turn objects radioactive. Highly dangerous, and he could’ve been used as a weapon of war if in the wrong hands. One day, he was just fucking around and… he accidentally turned a spider radioactive. He didn’t tell anyone because he was scared he was going to get in trouble. Lo and behold, it got loose, and the next day, it bit me while I was out on a walk. So not only was I a mutant, I became a Spider, as well. I trained with my newfound powers every day in the Danger Room. I graduated top of nearly all my classes. And not too long after, Miguel came popping out of nowhere—the look on his face when flowers started appearing all over his suit was hilarious.” You chuckled lightly, leaning your head against Hobie’s shoulder. “Your powers are much cooler, though. I wish I had electric abilities.”

The marker in Hobie’s hand was quickly capped, and put to the side so he could raise it to stroke the back of your head. “Flower power is cool as fuck, what are you on about?”

You smiled. Another flower, a fragile pink thing, blossomed onto his lap. Hobie barked out a roguish laugh.

“I love you,” you hummed. 

“Love you back, Cheeky.”

Nueva York was the exact antithesis to your world. Everything was new and modern and cutting-edge, heavy on minimalism and plain white canvases of nothing. It lacked art and humanity and just… life, in general. You didn’t really enjoy coming to this universe—the only reason you did was to help out with anomalies whenever you were needed. Though you didn’t quite agree with Miguel’s canon theory (it was messy and evidently didn’t apply to every Spider), you had to agree that villains running amok in rogue universes was no good for anyone. You had personal experience with the matter when a glitching Mysterio came tumbling through a farmer’s market in your universe, baskets of fruit flying every which way and bouquets trampled beneath his descent. 

Today, however, you were called in because of your boyfriend. His hologram had appeared over your wrist, offering you a loose smile and a two-fingered salute.

“Hey, Hobie,” you greeted, pausing your baking and brushing errant strands of your hair away with flour-covered hands. “What’s going on?”

“I’m at HQ. Heading over to see Miguel. D’you mind coming, if you’re not too busy?”

“Oh, uh, sure,” you said, heading over to the wash basin to rinse off your hands. “Is everything okay?”

The hologram of Hobie hummed, warbling as you rushed to change out of your clothes and into your suit—a white top with beige and green accents, webbing into a spiral around an embroidered collection of flowers on your chest shaped into a spider. Your boyfriend lowered his voice to say, “The original is here.”

“Original?”

“The first anomaly.”

“Oh,” you said, eyes widening a fraction. Oh. 

Hobie pursed his lips. Though he was doing well to hide it, you could see the buried worry behind his dark irises. The both of you were well aware that Miguel wouldn’t take this lightly. “Yeah. You’ll be here?”

“I’ll be there. See you in a minute, yeah?”

“Yeah. I’ll be waiting by the Spider-burger place. Love ya, Cheeky.” With that, he flickered out of view. You blew out a breath, snagged a bag from your room, and pressed a few buttons on your watch. A glowing orange portal opened by your kitchen door. You stepped through, and a tunnel, an elevator, and a hall later, you found yourself at the heart of Spider Society.

Hundreds of Spidermen, Spiderwomen, and Arachnids alike were passing by, chattering aimlessly, or rushing to wrangle their anomalies to the Go-Home Machine. After weaving through the crowd, you made your way to the McSpiders booth, where they sold the most delicious burgers, but you didn’t think you had time for that today. 

Hobie was waiting at one of the tables, Pav glued to his side, and Gwen on the other. 

Your boyfriend waved, shooting you a wink just as Pavitr shot up, dashing forward to envelop you in a tight hug. 

“It’s been so long!” the younger Spider exclaimed. “How’ve you been? How are you?”

“I’m good, Pav,” you warmly replied, patting his back affectionately. Then, you waved to Gwen, who looked a little uncomfortable at the predicament she was in, but tried her best to push it down for a moment to say hello.

You gave her a warm embrace, squeezing tight, a nonverbal confirmation of telling her you were there for her. Knowing that she was technically universeless, both you and Hobie would often let her crash over at your respective places. In fact, she slept in one of your extra rooms so much it was practically hers by now, filled with plenty of her personal belongings. She was one of your closest friends, and seeing her so anxious did nothing but fill you with worry. 

Once you pulled away from your two friends, you gave Hobie a quick hug, kissing his cheek. Pav cooed obnoxiously whilst Gwen lightly joked for the two of you to get a room.

Hobie shoved at the blonde’s shoulder with scoff. “Come off it, we wouldn’t have the time anyway.” 

Finally, you turned your gaze to the last one in the group—Miles Morales. 

It was certainly strange to see him in the flesh, when he was such a popular topic of discussion amongst the verse-traveling Spiders. He was a gangly yet handsome boy, with a head of dark, curly hair, and large brown eyes. 

He offered you a nervous smile. “So, uh, you must be Y/N! I’ve heard a lot about you.”

“I can say the same thing,” you replied, thinking back to all the times Gwen would lounge in your bed and tell you about her time helping Miles with Kingpin. “It’s nice to put a face to your name after all this time.”

“Yeah, yeah, same.” Awkward as ever, Miles let out something akin to a laugh. His eyes darted down when he noticed Hobie’s hand slipping over your midriff. “So! You’re Hobie’s partner, right? I thought he didn’t believe in consistency.”

You grinned when Hobie drummed his fingers along your hip, shrugging in a nonchalant manner. “If I was inconsistent all the time, that’d be me being consistent, no? Keep with the times, mate.”

Confused, Miles’ lips parted to ask another question but you shook your head. “Just don’t question it. God knows how many times I’ve stumped myself trying to figure him out.”

Hobie shot you an amused look. Before anyone could say anything else, Gwen swung onto her feet, shifting her weight in a fidgety manner. “We should probably get a move on, before Miguel gets mad.”

“Oh, yeah, of course. You guys mind filling me in with what happened on the way?”

And so the five of you set off, with Pav and Gwen taking turns on telling you what had transpired in Mumbhattan, with Hobie occasionally chiming in. Miles was far too enamored by all the other Spiders to really pay attention to what they were saying. 

Once you were all informed, you supplied a worried look in Miles’ direction. Stopping a canon event from happening… Miguel definitely wouldn’t be happy about that.

Sensing your eyes on him, Miles met your eyes. “Is there something on my face?�� he asked. 

“Oh, no. Sorry. I was just distracted.” A flower popped on your shoulder, and another appeared in Miles’ hair. He pulled it out with a surprised raise of his brows.

“Huh. That’s new,” he said with a slightly curious smile. “So, you and Hobie! I guess I just didn’t expect him to be with someone so…”

You tilted your head. “So…?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “You guys look, like, complete opposites.”

Pavitr clapped his hands. “Well, opposites do attract!”

With half a smile pulling at one corner of his mouth, Hobie chimed, “We aren’t complete opposites. We both have a crippling hatred for capitalism and greedy billionaire corporations.”

“That we do,” you agreed, beaming warmly at him. Suddenly, you perked up, remembering what you had brought with you. “Oh, I almost forgot! Pav, Gwen—I made you tote bags a while ago and haven’t gotten the chance to give it to you guys. They’re all made from ethically sourced materials, of course. Sorry, Miles, I would’ve made you one if I’d known I was going to meet you today.”

“It’s no problem. There’ll be a next time, right?” he said, watching as you handed the rolled up bags to an excited Pav, bouncing on the balls of his feet with a litany of thank you so much, this is amazing on his tongue, and a hesitant Gwen, smiling despite being so strung-up to face Miguel. 

“Right… A next time…” you echoed, unsure if there’d even be a next time if Miguel had his way with things.

Everything was going wrong. 

Miguel went too far, as he often did in his tunnel-visioned haze for order, and trapped Miles in a laser cage, intending to keep him in Nueva York while his father died back in his home universe. A sick feeling curdled within the pits of your stomach—none of this felt right to you. Peter and Gwen were yelling at Miguel, their words washing over you in a blur, like the crashing and the retreat of a wave against an unsuspecting shore. 

You watched helplessly as Miles turned around, betrayal lacing heavily across his crestfallen features, staring at the people he had once considered his friends. For half a second, Miles caught your gaze. Anxious flowers—various shades of violet and scarlet—blossomed by your feet. To your side, your boyfriend held both his hands up, gaze fixed on Miles.

“Palms,” he silently mouthed. 

Heeding his advice, Miles pressed both his palms against the barrier.

And three beats of a heart later, he had broken free. A blast of energy pushed everybody back a few feet, and you could hear Hobie’s faint laughter echo right beside your ear. You couldn’t help but smile along with him. 

Someone had to look out for the little guy, right?

Apparently, Miguel had other ideas. He wasn’t a rational man. No, he was a perfectionist to the core, needing everything to go according to his plan, his theory, his ideology. When the stakes were this high, who was to say no to him? And now, he had somehow convinced nearly the entire population of the Spider Society to chase after a fifteen year old.

Then what? Lock him up? Force him away from his home and wait out his father’s death?

No. It wasn’t right. None of it was.

As pandemonium broke out during the chase after Miles, Hobie gave you a glance. “Just for the record, I quit,” he announced. It wasn’t directed at you, per se, but it was important to him that you knew of his stance. That he wouldn’t sit around and idly twiddle his thumbs at this bullshit. 

A portal opened behind him, bathing his dark skin in a bright clementine glow. He unclasped his watch and let it fall to the ground. “You coming, Cheeky?”

“I’ll meet you at your place,” you reassured him. An unspoken trust me hung heavy between you. A white little wildflower appeared in his hair, but Hobie didn’t move to pluck it away. Instead, he ducked his head to press a lasting kiss onto your forehead. You shot him a fond grin before leaning forward to peck his cheek in return, and hurriedly rushed off to go help Miles, canary-hued flowers floating behind you with every swing.

It was by pure chance that you happened upon Miles and Peter, the latter begging for him to hold his baby, which he most definitely shouldn’t have brought along to a chase. You hid behind a large metal pipe, waiting for Miles to leave Peter. It wasn’t long before Miles was running away again, believing his mentor had betrayed him once again, and you were quick to follow after him. Green webs shot out from the fixings on your wrist, and you caught up to the younger Spider in no time.

“Miles!” you exclaimed.

“Please, just let me go back home!” he yelled, stress and panic coiled around his words as he rounded around cars and signs.

Guilt settled around your lungs in a constricting manner. You’d lend him your watch to get home, but with a quick glance behind you, noting the several dozens of Spiders hot on your tail, you realized that there was no way that he’d make it there in time without them following after. There had to be another way.

“That’s what I’m trying to do,” you replied, trying your best to convey that you were on his side. “Trust me, I’m with you on this! If not for you becoming Spider-Man, there’d be no Spider Society, and I would’ve never met Hobie. Of course I’d try to help you, Miles! Listen to me—there’s a bullet train that goes to the moon here—if you draw all the Spiders away from HQ, then you can use the Go-Home machine to get back to your universe!”

Miles shot you an initially dubious glance, which soon melded into one of cautious appreciation. “Where?”

“A couple miles that way! You won’t miss it—it’s a huge glass tube going up to space.” You nodded in the direction he was to be headed. “Good luck, Miles. I’m rooting for you!”

With a shout of his gratitude and a slight smile, Miles swung away from you. 

It’s a shame that this was goodbye. Both you and Hobie were really starting to grow on him.

It was raining again, as it almost always was in gloomy London. You were in bed with Hobie, having passed out after letting him know about how you helped Miles, and listening to him tell you about the watch he made for Gwen, knowing she’d most likely need it later down the line if things didn’t work out. He was taking up most of the space on the bed, one arm behind his head on the pillow and the other curved beneath the small of your waist, fingers splayed out over your stomach. Chests rising and falling in synchronized tandem, you were curled up onto your side so that your spine brushed against his side with each breath.

Nightmares weren’t a common thing for you, but when they did slink into your unconscious mind, they were always terrifyingly realistic, and always of the same event. Your canon event. 

Tonight was no different. 

Soft pink skies. Swinging through the trees after something—someone. Prowler. 

The forest gave way to steep mountains. Steep stones and ice and cliffs. The pink above you bled into a menacing shade of purple.

Nets of webbing shooting from your wrists. Desperation. Pleads on your tongue, but you didn’t quite know what you were saying. 

The villain tripped over the webbing, rolling down a mountainside that tapered off into a sheer drop. You darted forward, shooting out a web to catch the Prowler.

But it was too late. 

They tipped over the edge, stray pebbles tumbling down in their wake. If the Prowler screamed, you couldn’t hear it over the thrumming blood in your ears. 

It took over a minute for their body to hit the ground with a sickening thud. 

Horror stained your insides black. You weren’t quick enough. You failed.

You made your way down the mountain, wide eyes fixed on the motionless body. You crept forward, checking for a pulse. Dead. 

Gingerly, you peeled the mask away from their face. The hazy face of your best friend stared back up at you, beaten and bloody. 

Your fault, your fault, your fault—

You woke up with a gut-wrenching sob, jolting up with a broken wail. Hobie had startled from his slumber at the sudden commotion, quick to prop himself up on an elbow, his hand shooting out to properly wrap around you.

Comforting words were murmured into your hair. You only cried harder, gently pushing the blankets away from you, feeling overwhelmingly hot and crowded. It took you another moment to realize that you were hyperventilating, large flowers popping up everywhere around the two of you. 

“Breathe,” you could hear your boyfriend say, tracing slow circles along your lower back. “That’s it, love. You got this.”

After a few minutes, your breaths had slowed down, and the tears stopped flowing. You sniffled quietly, turning to Hobie with an apology on the tip of your tongue.

“Don’t apologize,” he said, seeming to know exactly what was on your mind. “You alright?”

“Nightmare,” you whispered in return, voice hoarse with disuse and thirst. “My canon event. It’s my fault Prowler died. My best friend.”

Another circle along your spine. “You wanna talk about it?”

Your eyes, puffy and red-rimmed, blinked back more cresting tears. You nodded, croaking out the tragic story of you and your best friend—the Spider and the Prowler. Hobie listened intently, humming soothingly into your skin. 

Once you were finished, he adamantly shook his head. “You can’t blame yourself for that. It’s not your fault.”

But it is, you wanted to say. You swallowed the words, deciding instead to remain quiet and simply lean further into his touch. 

“I love you,” he said, voice low and soothing. “You hear me, Cheeky?”

“I hear you. Thank you for… for always being there for me. You’re the punkest punk that’s ever punked.” 

A hum rumbled from his throat. “I’ll always be here for you. I trust you’ll do the same for me. We’re all broken, but… it’s a good thing we Spiders got sticky webs to keep us together, yeah?” A pause before Hobie backtracked, “That didn’t come out the way I intended it to but you get my point.”

You wrinkled your nose in amusement. “Yeah. I’m glad we found each other in all this chaos, Hobbes.”

“Mmh. Nothing better than a bit of chaos, innit?”

The two of you sat in silence for a bit longer, simply soaking in each other’s comforting presence. When you arched your neck to press a lasting kiss along the underside of Hobie’s jaw, you could feel his face shift with a fond smile. Before he could reciprocate the gesture, a tangerine glow shone from outside the window, warbling with the rain, but still a stark juxtaposition to the macabre grey of the city.

Both you and Hobie peered out of the window, limbs still tangled. 

Outside was Gwen, her cowl pulled over her uneven strands of blonde-pink hair, hexagonal portal rings shifting behind her. Her features were solemn and grim as she locked eyes with the both of you. You and Hobie glanced at each other. Small pink flowers started to bloom along the windowsill, much to your chagrin.

With not another second of hesitation, the two of you leapt out of bed, hastily yanking on your suits and swinging out of the window to join Gwen.

To join her in saving Miles Morales, and, ultimately, the multiverse.

[thebibliomancer]

Essential Avengers: Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #1-3

May, 1984

THE WAR BEGINS

Oof, here we go.

Just gotta replicate the pace that let me do the Hawkeye miniseries in one go, three times in a row.

This is probably too much effort considering its Secret Wars (or more accurately Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars) and maybe there’s not going to be a lot of big changes from this in the Avengers book to really justify it.

But we’re getting Jim Shooter writing the Avengers and his non-consecutive runs were a lot better than I had remembered. And it continues the theme he had from the Avengers book.

It just makes sense in a nonsense way to cover this story.

Last relevant time in Avengers! Acting Completely Normal Vision warned the Avengers about some weird, possibly hostile energy surges right in time for an energy surge to surge energetically in Central Park.

When the Avengers went to investigate, they found a weird structure that looked like a techy coliseum maybe. When some of the Avengers wandered into it (apparently the most bankable Avengers? Sucks to be Vision and Wanda, shrug) they vanished.

In the next issue, after several days, these heroes returned, speaking of a secret war they fought. Weird stuff like She-Hulk taking the Thing’s place on the Fantastic Four happened. In other books, Spidey got a cool new suit.

Would you know more?

After being raptured in their various books, the missing superheroes all end up on one of those distinctive structures like the one that appeared in Central Park, except IN SPACE.

Its cool that the Avengers will have some company.

We’ve got a terrific 3/4ths of the Fantastic Four, the X-Men (including Lockheed but not including Kitty Pryde for some reason), the Avengers, Iron Man, Spider-Man, the totally Articulate Hulk, and hilariously Magneto is also here.

Maybe Secret Wars is just setting up the most awkward moment in the universe, as a prank show.

I think I’d enjoy a big event that turned out to be a prank show at the last minute. The fan discontent. Imagine.

Everyone introduces themselves to each other but mostly the audience and Ben Grimm claims his new codename as the Easter Bunny.

Checking, marvel wiki doesn’t have Easter Bunny listed as one of Ben’s known aliases. Cowards.

Looking up into space, Captain America spots another one of the totally cool constructs and Professor X scans that it contains EEEEEEEVIL.

Specifically Amora the Enchantress, Ultron, the Wrecking Crew, the Absorbing Man, the Lizard, VICTOR VON DOOOOOM, Kang the Conqueror, Doctor Octopus, and Molecule Man. Also, hilariously, Galactus is there.

I’m more convinced than ever that this is a prank show.

You know what would be more hilarious? If Punisher ended up on this construct.

The distribution of villains is kind of odd though. Galactus and Doctor Doom map to the FF. Doctor Octopus and the Lizard to Spider-Man. Ultron, Molecule Man, and Kang are Avengers foes. The Absorbing Man and the Wrecking Crew can go a couple ways but started off as Thor villains. And Amora is usually a Thor villain but supposedly has chilled out around this time or at least is less of a pain than her horny sister.

No X-Men villains. Because Magneto is chilling with them in the generally heroic pod.

Also, all the heroes were raptured from Earth while the villains were grabbed from Earth, from space, from Asgard, resurrected just to be here, or from the FUTURE.

I know marketing is wagging the dog but be consistent, secret organizer who we don’t know yet.

The Thing points out that Magnet is off-sides, re: being in the hero construct, and Magneto is like ‘hey, chill out dudes’ and denies specifically doing murders.

Magneto: “I know not what power transported me here from my secret lair, nor why I was placed among you -- but I find it more appropriate to ask why such as you were judged fit to be placed in my presence!”

Oof.

Burn.

Then the conversation is put on halt on account of the wildest shit any of them have ever seen.

An entire galaxy vanishes but probably not due to a wave of anti-matter.

Thor: “It’s gone! Gone -- ! Swept away like dust before some unseen, giant hand!”

And then around that last star left unswept, various chunks merge together to form some sort of world, perhaps for battle.

A nice touch for later is that you can definitely see that one of the chunks is a stray chunk of city.

Some of the villains start squabbling because close quarters, ego, etc.

But Ultron goes hey we’re allowed to fight? I’m the best at that.

Ultron: “I am Ultron! I do not understand the events transpiring! I do not understand how I came to be resurrected... nor how I came to be here! Nothing computes... Insignificant! I am Ultron! My purpose is to slay that which lives. You are all living things, ergo -- Ultron must destroy you!”

With the benefit of having read all the Avengers up to now, I feel that Ultron got up on the wrong side of the resurrection a little.

He’s not not like this but he’s not usually this turned on?

(Then again, maybe he just came back cranky)

DOOM grabs and shakes Molecule Man to do something about this because given enough time even the mighty DOOM might fall before Ultron.

Ultron is famously annoying to defeat, what with that adamantium.

But Molecule Man is in therapy after the Avengers kicked his shit and Tigra yelled at him for being a punk. He doesn’t want to hurt anyone.

So Doom with all his brilliant genius tells MM a cool way to help out that won’t hurt anyone. Directly.

Using his Molecule Man power over molecules to lightly toss Ultron into Galactus.

So that Galactus goes ‘who the fuck scuffed my boots’ and rips out all the energy in Ultron’s Ultron.

He can do that.

Why wouldn’t he? If he can do that to a planet, he can do it to a pissbaby robot. Even one apparently containing more power than an atom bomb.

Then, because this is one of those plots where things are always thenning, a rift opens in the nothingness of space and a heavenly esque light shines out. A warbly voice commands the action figures beat each other up.

I mean. Its more like

The Beyonder: “I am from beyond! Slay your enemies and all you desire shall be yours! Nothing you dream of is impossible for me to accomplish!”

But you have to admire that this toy commercial of a comic book is being honest and upfront about being a story where action figures bonk off of each other.

Galactus just hears ‘i can finally shake off these persistent forever munchies’ and flies off to demand prepayment for action figure bonking, with DOOM following behind him.

The Beyonder speaks up warning Galactus that hey, personal space. And that a guy that can effortlessly wipe out a galaxy is gonna have a sweet barrier but Galactus wants the hunger pangs gone and does not listen.

DOOM recognizes a bad idea when he sees one once in a while and hangs back but still gets blown out of space by the force of Galactus bonking off the Beyonder’s barriers.

Captain America: “They were swatted back like flies!”

Professor X: “To the Beyonder, even Galactus is less than a fly, Captain!”

Interruption dealt with, the Beyonder gets the show on the road and sends the two constructs to different parts of the patchwork planet.

The Marvel Super Heroes And Magneto land on some hill and quickly make sure that there are no villains excepting Magneto around.

With Magneto around, the non-X-Men raise an objection to Magneto being around.

He sank a Russian submarine with all hands back in X-Men #150 but he insists that it was self-defense and also they started it.

The X-Men’s position is ‘hey he’s a jerk but he’s our jerk plus we could use his help? The bad guys get GALACTUS, how is that fair?’

Well, they don’t say it but they’re probably thinking it.

And Hawkeye decides to be a little racist today.

Hawkeye: “You mutants stick together, huh? Well, sticking to a blood-soaked maniac like him doesn’t speak well of you, pal!”

Dude, Clint. Your dear old friend is Wanda.

Wait, why ISN’T Wanda here? Did the toy people really not want her? Fools. Her husband is toyetic as all get out.

Also, point of order, Wolverine? If anyone qualifies as ‘hey he’s a jerk but he’s our jerk!’ here its you.

Johnny “good life choices” Storm decides he’ll just kick Magneto’s ass and end the debate but yeah. Yeah, no. Magneto makes a fool of him.

And then Magneto decides eff this noise and flies off.

With Magneto alienated (good job, guys), Professor X decides this group needs some dang leadership and throws a nomination to Reed Richards. Reed defers since he’s thinking of Sue, left at home and not able to participate in the event.

Wasp, the cool leader of the Avengers, nominates instead Captain America.

Wasp: “We’re off in a strange land, up to our ears in a little secret war that may decide the fate of the universe! Some people don’t know me well! They might have doubts... and there’s no room for that!”

I’m baffled that there’s people here who don’t know Wasp who has been heroing since the 60s but sure. Cap(tain America) probably gets more crossovers and whatever.

I mean, heck, we’re talking a group of heroes consisting of the Avengers (who she already leads), the Fantastic Three (who she’s well acquainted with), and the X-Men (who I’m sure she’s met, although awkwardly its going to later be revealed that Wasp is in the Hellfire Club, but only the sex parts).

And I guess Wolverine’s extensive backstory with Cap doesn’t exist yet because Wolverine isn’t keen on him being the leader, describing him as the least of the assembled heroes. When Hawkeye is right there!

I kid because I love.

Meanwhile, DOOM wakes up adjacent to Galactus ankle and heads to a nearby fortress which he correctly assumes is where the villains have ended up.

Wait, the heroes get beamed down to a random hill while the villains get sent to an advanced fortress with weaponry and we later learn vehicles sold separately?

Kinda stacking the deck, the Beyonder.

You gave the villains GALACTUS and A FORTRESS PLAYSET right out of the gate.

The other villains tell Doom that they’ve (mostly) decided that he should be their leader. But Doom has bigger fish to fry than the prizes that the Beyonder is offering.

In typical Doomesque fashion, he wants the whole kettle. But the other villains what with their petty concerns think he’s too afraid to fight.

So he ditches.

He goes to steal-borrow a spaceship and even though he hates the thought, takes off to go talk to Richards. And then Kang shoots him out of the sky with a GIANT GUN THAT THE VILLAIN FORTRESS ALSO HAS? to stop him from allying with the heroes.

Said (marvel super) heroes see the distant explosion and fly as a group in the most hilarious way possible to check it out.

God, I have always loved this image. Its squished down into the bottom third of the page but its a delight.

They find Doom sprawled in the crash site, rambling that he’ll only speak to RICHARRRRRDS and about the Beyonder’s power. But Cap offends Doom mightily but offering him a hand up and because Doom sees pity in Cap and RICHARRRRRRDS eyes.

So he blasts the heroes and fucks off.

How very Bakugou of him.

And right as the heroes recover from that, a bunch of villains arrive to get this secret war started.

I have a fondness for this particular issue. For a long while, issue 1 was the only issue of Secret Wars I could find. So I just had the start of this story with all these non-Spider-Man non-X-Men heroes I barely knew cliffhangering into an attack by villains I really didn’t recognize except for Doc Ock and the Lizard.

It was a window into another side of the Marvel Universe. And for child me, this first issue worked perfectly to intrigue me. All these characters, the very straightforward conflict, all the complications that immediately pop up like Magneto, Galactus, and Doom. Alas, small child resources.

June, 1984

PRISONERS of War!

The heroes react slowly to the sudden villain attack but thankfully, the villains aren’t working together well. Unthankfully, half of the heroes were already knocked out by the first attack.

Meanwhile, over at Doctor Doom’s side of the plot, he flies back over to where Galactus just in time to see him finally rouse from being slapped down by the Beyonder.

Galactus floats to his feet and wanders off.

Doom: “He ignored me! As though I were a gnat buzzing at his feet! And so I am... Just as all of us, even Galactus himself, are but insects to the all-powerful Beyonder! Thus, the others have chosen to play the Beyonder’s simple game -- thereby, in effect, paying homage to him. Should I, too, pay homage? Should I worship at the feet of this god-like being -- or chose another path... one only Doom would dare!”

I think anyone that knows Doom knows which option he’s gonna choose.

He heads back to the villain fortress and finds Ultron’s deactivated body and decides Doom can use this.

Meanwhile, back at the first secret battle of the secret war, the heroes rally and start fighting back under Cap(tain America)’s leadership.

She-Hulk even gets a designated girl fight with the only female villain on the villain team.

I’d complain, I would. But at least She-Hulk isn’t the only heroine on the hero side.

She-Hulk: “Hiya! I’m the She-Hulk! You must be the Enchantress! Gee, I’ve heard so much about you -- ! You’re a not-nice lady!”

Enchantress: “A green woman? Is there no end to the varieties of mortals?”

The Enchantress magic slaps She-Hulk away and comments that she could crush She-Hulk physically but its beneath her.

Yeah, all Asgardians have some level of super strength, that’s right. Even the squishy wizards.

But all She-Hulk heard was, ‘someone I can really punch!’

She-Hulk: “I don’t often duke it out with someone solid enough to really unload on -- and slow enough to let me! Oh, wow! That was, like tubular, you know -- to the max!”

Uh. Jen, are you okay? Did you have a stroke? You don’t usually talk so much in Mario World secret world levels.

I think maybe Jim Shooter didn’t have a good grasp on her. I don’t think he’s ever written for her. And the other heroes mostly don’t vary too much from generic hero speaking patterns. Add some smart for smart characters, add some rude to Wolverine, and so on.

The battle wraps up with Kang, the Enchantress, and the Wrecking Crew captured and the rest of the villains fleeing when the battle didn’t go their way.

Cap sends Storm off to scout for a cool playset that they can use as shelter and she does so, noting that the winds on Battleworld are super easy to control. Like Battleworld was created to create ideal fighting conditions for everyone. Pretty neat, the Beyonder.

Storm finds a particularly rad fortress (”Bigger than fifty-four and a half Pentagons, I’d estimate!” Wow!) and the heroes move in.

I unironically enjoy how toyetic this story is with the fortresses and the vehicles and the weapons. Because I’m almost positive that Mattel barely capitalized on it.

There were only two playsets. Pitiful.

Over in their new headquarters, Reed stashes the captured villains in some form of psychostasis which “works by controlling aggression through brainwave modulation!”

He also sticks Enchantress in a healing pod to address that nasty case of being She-Hulked right in the face. Nothing will salve her ego though.

Captain America: “It’s no wonder that the name Mister Fantastic is renowned for compassion as well as courage! You give added meaning to the word hero, Richards!”

Whenever someone loudly announces that Reed is super compassionate, it makes me feel like they’re overcompensating.

Nobody ever makes note of, say, Captain America’s compassion.

With the prisoners (of war? Is that the whole reason for the title?) accommodated, Cap calls everyone for a meeting in a cool meeting dome he found which has a small waterfall for aesthetic and so everyone has to yell to be heard.

Wolverine yells that they should mop up the rest of the villains and get this over with.

Not mentioning that in order to “win it” they’d have to kill the villains, which none of the heroes have shown any interest in doing so far.

Cap(tain America) replies that A) planet big and they have no idea where the villains got to. And B) the remaining villains slash antagonists are Galactus, Doctor Doom, Molecule Man, Doctor Octopus, the Wrecker, the Absorbing Man, and Magneto. Not really people you mop up.

In a fun logistics bit, Cap sends out a patrol to make sure the area is secure but he also sends out two additional groups to find  if there are any places in this fortress they can sleep and whether there's any... food.

Makes me imagine a Secret Survival War where the sides have to wrestle over limited resources.

Hours later, the villains that escaped the fracas arrive back at their fortress.

I’m sort of confused here.

Maybe it took so long because they had to make sure they weren’t followed. Or maybe because they didn’t have the sweet tripod vehicle anymore. But think about the flow of events of: everyone beamed down to Battleworld > Doom ditches the villains and gets shot down > heroes investigate and Doom ditches > villains show up for cliffhanger fight.

The villain fortress should be pretty close to where that fight took place. And then the heroes find a nearby fortress of their own so their fortress should be pretty close to the villain fortress. Maybe not in the same neighborhood but surely the same zip code.

Anyway, they find that while they were gone, Doom swanned in and renamed the place the Doombase.

If they have problems with it, they can talk to his Ultron.

Which I’m surprised he didn’t rename Doomtron.

Doom also tells them that he’s in charge now.

Absorbing Man: “Aw! Who gives a hoot! I need a meal an’ sleep! You wanna be in charge, Doom? Okay by me!”

If you think about it, this is just some steps added what the villains wanted all along.

They wanted Doom to be their leader but he told them he had bigger fish to fry and fucked off. Now he’s fucked back on and told them all that he’s their leader. They initially object before reconsidering due to Doomtron but, yeah, its all gone full circle.

Doom is a lot more cordial to Molecule Man though.

Doom: “Molecule Man... uh, Mr. Reece, I believe it is? I trust you were not inconvenienced.”

Molecule Man: “Well, being absolute master of molecules I can just assimilate molecules when I want, so I never have to be hungry, and I can just shoo away dirt molecules, so I’m always nice and clean -- but I am tired!”

Doom: “I have prepared a special chamber for you! I hope you like it!”

Molecule Man: “If not, I can always reconstruct the molecules -- !”

Heh.

Nice to see Jim Shooter able to follow up on the trajectory he sent Molecule Man on.

The rest of the villains head off but Doctor Octopus, the only other brain cell in this group, hangs back to talk to DOOM.

He wants to know what he plans to do about Galactus and then shows Doom on the biggest screen TV that Galactus is standing on a mountain glowing with an awesome power.

Doom just retorts that his plans are for his forces to triumph.

Doctor Octopus: Something tells me he’s got ambitions that dwarf merely triumphing in the Beyonder’s little contest! The question is whether he will destroy us in trying to achieve them -- or immediately after fulfilling them?!

Like I said, the only other brain cell in this group.

Meanwhile, while Magneto secretly sneaks into the hero fortress for Reasons, the heroes have a quiet moment that lets this Secret Wars biz really sink in.

Wasp: “I’d be having tea in my studio now, Jenny... And lunch on my patio tomorrow... This... um... situation we’re in... is kind of... much, you know? I feel there’s just a little thin wall inside me holding back a flood of despair!”

Its a nice touch, if intentional, that Wasp only admits this kind of thing now that she’s passed off the leadership responsibilities to Captain America. Its been a recurring character beat that she’s been keeping these sorts of worries to herself as chairwoman.

Over in another part of the fortress, Cyclops complains that he was right in the middle of his dang honeymoon when he was yanked into this event.

Cyclops: “I don’t know about you, Richards, but more than angry or afraid, I feel cheated! I -- I was on the verge of real happiness...”

Oof. This really sets the tone for his marriage with Madelyne Pryor.

Spider-Man and the Human Torch even have a little conversation.

Spider-Man: “You mean it doesn’t shake you, Torch, being here? What if we don’t get home?”

Human Torch: “The Fantastic Four have been off on space missions a couple of times, Spider-Man! We’ll get back! Believe me!”

I like when they’re friends.

So, I’m not sure what Magneto’s plan actually was. He was going to sabotage the fortress’ fusion generator as a distraction but Spider-Man’s Spider-Sense Spider-Alerts him to shenanigans afoot and he runs off to the power plant while Johnny Storm goes to get the other heroes.

Magneto decides to abandon whatever his plan was and captures Wasp as a consolation prize.

Gasp, another prisoner of war!

The Thing tries to give chase but inexplicably turns back to normal, smooth skinned Ben Grimm.

Also, Magneto escapes with the Wasp.

It’s like the aardvark says, you can get what you want and still not be happy.

Captain Marvel is holding the randomly anti-mutant ball for Hawkeye here and comments that none of the X-Men showed up to help stop Magneto.

Cap(tain America) tells her to belay that.

Captain America: “Let’s keep our minds on solving problems, not creating more!”

And they can’t even go after Magneto or rescue the Wasp right now because they have bigger problems: Galactus glowing with an awesome power and a massive storm that’s forming on Battleworld.

July, 1984

TEMPEST WITHOUT, CRISIS WITHIN!

The Beyonder has thrown in a nice stage hazard to keep things fresh in the form of a massive storm raging on Battleworld, with lighting that shatters mountains and winds that could tear someone’s limbs clean off.

Or perhaps its the unintentional result of just slapping a planet together out of random stuff you have lying around. The climate must be shot to shit.

I like it either way. Secret Wars has a lot of very toyetic collisions between groups of characters so its nice when Battleworld itself manages to be an obstacle.

Over in his giant U-shaped fortress, Magneto finally unwraps Wasp from the ball of random metal crap he has her in.

He lets her wander around until she finds him so that he can be all casual and eating a space scone.

Magneto: “Do not bother trying to attack me, my dear! My person is magnetically shielded!”

Wasp: “Well, la-de-da!”

Wasp: -blows up his space scone- “You think I have to strike at you directly to hurt you, monster?”

Hilarious spite, thy name is Janet van Dyne.

She also makes the point that magnetic shielding or no, she could bring this whole room down. Her being able to knock over a small house with her pew pew hasn’t stopped being true.

Magneto hastens to ask her not to do that because neither of them want to be out in the storm outside.

Besides, he just wants to talk! And flirt!

Magneto: “You are obviously a woman of intelligence and understanding as well as great beauty -- and I am not the monster you believe I am -- which is precisely what I wish to discuss!”

Wasp: “Oh? My intelligence, understanding and beauty or your non-monsterhood?”

Magneto: “Why... both!”

Back at the hero base (which is apparently ROUGHLY THE SIZE OF CHICAGO?? I want that playset), the storm has almost completely flooded the area, leaving just the top dome and such poking above the water.

The storm keeps dropping chunks of mountain at the base but Thor is standing on top, protecting it while grinning like a loon.

Captain Marvel even speculates that Thor could calm the storm but is whipping it up into a greater frenzy instead. Those storm gods, amirite?

Hawkeye is also standing by, with his explosive arrow, thinking to himself that if Thor fails, Hawkeye will totally save the day.

I don’t know whether that’s sad or endearing.

Mostly though he’s trying to distract himself from thinking about the new wife he left behind.

Cap, Reed, and Hulk are watching the villain base because apparently they do know where it is. The storm is keeping the villains in too but Cap figures they’ll pull one desperate attack as soon as the storm breaks.

They’ve already lost four of their dudes. Plus, Galactus isn’t a team player.

Spider-Man is just swinging around, enjoying how good for swinging the random technological pipes and tubes and whatsits are when he stumbles upon the X-Men having a secret meeting.

Professor X has decided, possibly on the basis of two (2) rude comments from Hawkeye and Captain Marvel, that the X-Men just don’t belong here and that they’d be better off going and teaming up with Magneto.

This... sure is a take.

Rogue comments that the Avengers don’t trust her because of that time she kicked their asses collectively. Which, hey, very possibly. They haven’t really had a thing to say about you though. They’ve mostly been grouchy about Magneto.

Which is kinda born out by the way he tried to blow up their base and definitely kidnapped the Wasp?? And is even now aggressively eating scones at her?

That’s the Magneto you guys want to go join because he’s more your people than the Fantastic Avengers and friends are?

You know, there’s a pattern I sometimes see with the X-Men where they loudly insist that the other superheroes don’t help them and don’t care about mutant stuff while at the same time doing shit like this.

“Should we get Reed Richards, smartest dick in the world to help with the legacy virus or the techno-organic virus Stryfe shot into Xavier? NAHHHH Beast can handle it.”

“Should we stick with the other superheroes or go hang with Magneto instead in a cool mutants only U-shaped fortress? Well, U is the coolest letter that isn’t X...”

If you squint, you can definitely see Krakoa all the way in the future.

Anyway, Spider-Man overheard all of this and goes ‘I’M TELLING!’

Wolverine tries to tell him that snitches get stitches but the thing is?

Spider-Man is ridiculous. He’s a ridiculously good combination of skills and powers which lets him make chumps out of entire groups at a time.

He’s embarrassed the Fantastic Four, the Avengers, and now he’s about to embarrass the X-Men.

After making them all feel foolish, Spider-Man gets away and goes to tell Reed what that doody-head Xavier said when Xavier uses his psychic powers to just wipe the entire encounter out of Spider-Man’s memory.

Yeah, it’s to cover their imminent blowing off but also? I don’t think he wants anyone else to find out how badly his X-Men just got stomped.

Psychics are too OP, I tell you what.

In fairness IN FAIRNESS, the X-Men kind of have the right to fuck right off if they wish. I don’t even know what it had to be in secret. In fact, doing it in secret is a massive dick move of its own for reasons.

What would the Fantastic Avengers have done if the X-Men had just said ‘hey we’re heading out’? Would they have put them in stasis tube jail? I doubt it.

Professor X made the decision to handle this the stupidest way for whatever reason. That scamp.

Speaking of Magneto, he’s over at the U-Lair turning down a partnership offer from DOOM. So, hey, he has standards.

Wasp has become less ‘i’ll blow up this room and your breakfast’ about him over the course of whatever the hell they discussed in their offscreen chat.

Magneto even starts to make out with her and Wasp is like ehhhhhhhhhh what the fuck why not.

Why is this happening?

I guess he has a...................... magnetic personality?

Eh? Eh??

No, but seriously, I do have a theory that I heard someplace but it’ll have to wait.

What’s weird is that there’s a Marvel What If about some spinoff babies that come about if the heroes and villains got stuck on Battleworld and never managed to leave.

Wasp has a son with Human Torch. Which is pretty weird and comes from nowhere. I guess a lot can happen during a massive time skip. My point being though, its weird that they didn’t have a Wasp/Magneto baby instead given the weird chemistry they have here.

Meanwhile, over at DOOMBASE, DOOM has some women in giant tubes.

That’s So Doom.

Doctor Doom: “All is ready -- ! This alien technology, so rich, so subtle... so easily harnessed to serve my purpose... Energy, tapped from the raging tempest... And two mortal subjects who dare to gamble for power -- knowing that to lose is death, for truly, here I shall test the limits of power a human body can contain! With the throwing of a switch... so -- the die is cast! Hear me -- ! Power must be seized -- ! Crave it! Welcome it! Drink it in, despite the pain... or it will destroy you.”

And thus are Volcana and Titania created!

Talk about lasting effects of Secret Wars! Titania is going to be around forever! Mostly annoying She-Hulk!

Where did Doom find two random women to give superpowers?

Denver, Colorado.

No, seriously.

That city chunk we saw as Battleworld formed? That’s Denver, Colorado, USA, EARTH.

Why isn’t there a miniseries or one-shot about a normal ass civilian from Denver having to deal with OH MY GOD WHERE DID EARTH GO?

I actually read an interesting thing re: this scene. It exists because Mattel asked Marvel to introduce some new female characters so Shooter wrote in these two and a third who I’ll get to when I do.

Mattel then promptly used none of these characters for the associated toyline.

The toyline, in fact, used none female characters at all. It made toys of characters who weren’t in the story but did not have a single female character.

So its very weird that they asked Marvel to introduce some but I’m not going to knock the results.

Doom introduces these two new characters to the other villains.

Hilariously, Absorbing Man guesses that Doctor Doom just made women from scratch. Because doesn’t it sound like something he could do?

Volcana and Molecule Man immediately hit it off, her being attracted to his sensitivity and him being attracted to... positive attention at all, I guess?

He muses that he could easily stop the storm outside, because molecules, but his therapist told him to let nature take its course. “Unless Doom asks me to!”

And Titania and Absorbing Man. They don’t hit it off. She either wants to hit him or hit that and its not clear and it might be both.

(Spoilers: Its both)

Titania: “You! Absorbing Man! You look like the toughest man here! Get up!”

Absorbing Man: “Whatcha got in mind?”

Titania: “I’m going to do anything I want to you! Everything I always wanted to do to everybody who used to be bigger and stronger than me! Maybe I’ll just play with you... or maybe I’ll make you eat dirt... or maybe...”

Absorbing Man: “Woman, if you got somethin’ to prove, prove it tomorrow against the guys we’re fightin’!”

Titania: “You’re backing down?”

Absorbing Man: “Nope! I just ain’t getting up! I got nothin’ to prove... to a dame!”

Would you believe that they become one of the healthiest and most stable romantic relationships in Marvel?

Speaking of weird relationships, back over at hero base, Thor goes and pops the lid on Enchanteress’ healing tube because he’s bored and wants to talk to a peer. A god peer.

Enchantress is at first more characteristically worried about what her face looks like after being She-Hulked.

But she then creates a portal so she and Thor can go have a chat.

Later, it’s morning and Hulk has been too busy stressing over losing his Banner smarts to actually keep watch or wake up Cap for watch like he was supposed to.

So when the villains ram an airship into the hero base, the heroes are not at all prepared.

Titania hurls a giant slab of wall through the room the Terrific Three are sharing, breaking Johnny Torch’s arm and ribs and knocking out the other two. He manages to get himself and co out of danger by melting through the floor.

Meanwhile, She-Hulk is carrying a big heavy as she’s been doing since the previous night and is caught unaware by Volcana who blasts her off her feet and then collapses the room on top of her.

Doctor Octopus knocks out Captain Marvel who is in the hot springs dome but gets chased away by Hawkeye, claiming that long-range firepower is his weakness.

I’m stunned at the implication that Doc Ock is one of Spider-Man’s most dangerous foes but could be scared off by Hawkeye while Spider-Man could pretty easily drop Clint’s ass. There’s some rock-paper-scissors nonsense at play here.

Spider-Man and Iron Man are also taken unawares by Ultron but manage to hide under some rubble.

Hulk leaps into the fray at Molecule Man and Doom but Cap convinces him to fall back to a defensible position.

The villains reconvene with all the captured villains freed except Enchantress (since she fucked off to have a chat with Thor) and the heroes scattered and buried under various rubbles. How the fortunes of Secret War turn.

Sure would have been nice if the X-Men had been around to help or if they mentioned they wouldn’t be. Sure would have been.

Doom: “We have accomplished much here today! And to finish it, we shall level this place so that no stone remains on stone!”

No wonder Mattel didn’t make a playset of this base! Dammit Doom, you’re ruining the merchandising!

Follow @essential-avengers​ for more of Secret Wars! At this same pace! Its sustainable! This is fine! Like and reblog too!

[timtimmersdrake]

Stray Bullet - Tim Drake x Reader

Well, look at this, I’m writing another one. Like I said in my last, this isn’t a regular thing. This is only my second imagine, but you guys seemed to really enjoy the last one so *shrugs* here we go?

Summary: You’ve been struck by a stray bullet as a civilian, and you decide instead of being the damsel, you hide it from Tim. I’m thinking this is set after the Red Robin comics, everyone is alive and Tim is starting to relax after being a tense hero for so long. (Pre-52) Warning for a little blood, not very graphic though.

In retrospect, you should have known it was going to happen eventually. You live in Gotham City after all. You just didn’t expect for it to catch you off guard like this.

You expected immediate medical attention. Maybe a vigilante or two already on the scene.

Not this chaotic.

But when has Gotham ever conformed to the norm? She liked to rear her ugly, unexpected head when it inconvenienced you the most.

And now you’ve been shot.

Stupid Penguin. Stupid underground gun market I’m not even supposed to know about. Stupid me.

Hissing, you leaned up against the brick wall, not daring to look down at the bullet wound. A stray gunshot in the sudden gang fight that had broken out on the street you had been walking on to get to the nearest crossing to summon a taxi home.

Around you everyone was screaming, guns were still firing rounds and you were trying you’re best not to let the panic rise.

Your boyfriend was a vigilante, but dammit, you were not going to be a damsel in distress.

Closing your eyes, you focused on breathing in through your mouth and out through your nose. This proved to be two mistakes, the first being that deep breaths hurt and the second is now your eyes knew the world was spinning and didn’t want to open again.

Do. Not. Panic.

Tim would be here soon, or someone from his family. You just had to be patient…and not lose too much blood while waiting. You would not let them see you as the civilian you were. Tim worried enough as it was, and if he saw you panic he would go berserk. Leaving the apartment the two of you shared alone would never happen again.

Digging into your bag you pulled out your keychain, one that had many gadgets Tim insisted you carried on your person at all times. Fumbling through a flashlight, a portable charger, pepper spray, and the keys you finally grabbed the pocket knife.

I liked this shirt too.

Gritting teeth, you ripped the edge of your camisole, the undershirt tearing with a few tugs; you had a makeshift bandage.

Bullet just grazed my hip, but damn it took a chunk of me with it.

Tying the fabric around your waist as tight as you could stand to keep pressure on it, dizziness took over.

Hands bloody, you reached back into the bag and pulled out your next trick; a bottle of Tylenol. Something to help until Tim could give you something better. Just to hold you till whichever bat would show up.

A bat would show up, right?

The cell phone that had been in your hand when the incident had occurred lay innocently on the ground. Maybe you shouldn’t call him.

Don’t be stupid, he’d want you too.

But you were a big girl, you lived in Gotham. You were dating Tim Drake-Wayne, one of the richest men in the city and also on the top ten most wanted for criminals bartering tool.

It was in the middle of the day, and there wasn’t a cape in sight.

Sucking in the deepest breath you could manage, you resigned yourself to the inevitable solo trip to the hospital. Walking down the alleyway you had slipped down to the next street over, pulling your coat closer so no one could see the blood soaking though, you hailed a cab.

“Where too, miss?”

The driver didn’t even bother to look at you, simply chewed on a toothpick and kept messing with his radio.

Opening your mouth you almost spat out the name of the closest hospital before realizing if your plan was to not call Tim, he would be angrier if you went to the hospital without telling him either.

“Leslie Thompkins Medical Practice, please, the one near crime alley.”

You had only met the woman a handful of times, all of them when Tim had been hurt on his night job and you were visiting. She had been a formidable role-model, caring and loyal. She would have you good as new, and hopefully, if you played your cards right, a certain pretty boy in your life would never know you were there.

~

Learning long ago that trying to cook dinner for Tim was an unwinnable battle, his schedule too unpredictable, you settled on leaving the take-out menus on the table for when he got home.

You had stolen Tim’s biggest sweater, hiding your frame to the best of your ability, and hopefully the bandage. Tim would find out eventually, but you were aiming to play your cards right enough that it wouldn’t be till long after it had healed to where it didn’t look as bad as it did.

Leslie promised not to say anything; oh how the glorious patient confidentiality had been to your advantage.

The door opened, jerking you from your thoughts as Tim’s voice echoed down the hall.

“Y/N, dear, I’m back!”

Smiling, you inwardly chuckled at the pet name. Tim had liked to use it when he was being sarcastic with you, but eventually, it became a habit.

“You’re back early, what time is it? 10:30?”

Tim entered the living room of your renovated theater apartment, grinning at the sight of you.

“Scandalous,” he commented, coming over to gently tilt your chin up and place a kiss before turning his attention to the scattered menus. “I’m starving, what are you in the mood for?”

Relieved that Tim was adequately distracted from you, you took advantage of the situation.

“You choose,” You smiled. Had it not been for the anesthetic, adrenaline, and pain, you might have been able to give more to the conversation, but you were exhausted.

“Something quick,” Tim stated, rifling through restaurant choices. “Told Dick I’d help him with a lead on a gang turf war going on.”

Spine stiffening, you played it cool.

“Oh? The one involving Penguin’s underground illegal arms trading with Bludhaven?”

Tim nodded, a suddenly serious expression crossing his face.

“I don’t like how close they got to where you work today. Promise me you’ll be careful.”

Ah, there it was. Every person you had ever met that dated a vigilante like you all had the same inevitable experience. The ‘be safe, I’m protecting you I promise’ speech. You hated the fact that Tim meant it so earnestly too, about wanting you to be safe. It made you feel like a helpless damsel in distress all the time.

If I make a fuss, he’ll get suspicious. You reminded yourself.

Instead of grumbling, you opted to nod.

“Of course, you taught me everything I know after all. Pepper spray in hand, phone in other.”

“That reminds me, I need to give you Jason’s new number.”

“Oh? Are we talking to him as part of the family again?” You ask, taking the menu of a small burger joint down the road from his outstretched hand.

Your boyfriend rolled his eyes.

“We’ll see how long it lasts. You know how it is. Jason’s morals have always been questionable and his decisions switch faster than whiplash.”

Humming, you took a seat next to him as he pulled out his laptop. Thankfully, the action made it so he missed the wince of pain you habited.

“Says the guy who broke him out of prison, once.”

Tim didn’t seem to want to get into it.

“You order? I got some W. E. work to jump on while I can.”

Far too used to this routine, you only nod once more.

It was almost too easy to pull your secret under his nose.

He’ll find out eventually, but not tonight.

~

You managed a week. It wasn’t long, but when you were hiding it from arguably the world’s greatest detective, a week should have earned you a gold medal. Or some more recognition than you were probably going to get.

You just wish it wasn’t the tiny stupid mistake that it was that gave you away.

“Y/N, can I borrow your portable charger?”

“What happened to yours?” You asked, idly scrolling through your phone. “Take it apart again?”

“Damaged in a fight actually,” He smiled sheepishly.

“It’s in my bag,” You answered with a humble roll of your eyes.

He left the living room for a moment, the peaceful calm of Saturday morning blissful once more. You hadn’t even thought twice about letting Tim rummage through your bag when he was marching back into the room dropping it on the coffee table in front of you.

“What the h- “

“Why is there dried blood on your stuff?”

Silence.

Tim had a habit of wiggling his nose when he was upset, something you thought was adorable until you saw the furious eyes behind them. His nose may have been cute, but his eyes were well trained to be terrifying when riled up.

“I didn’t kill someone,” You blurt out in a panic.

Granted that wasn’t your best moment. Of course, Tim didn’t think you murdered someone. Did he?

“Then it’s good that wasn’t my conclusion,” He answered, holding up an orange bottle in his hand instead.

He had found the pain killers. No denying them, your name was printed very clearly.

“What. Happened.”

Shame on anyone who thought Tim couldn’t be intimidating. The boy had been trained around the world by the best, including Lady Shiva. He had picked up tips from the League of Assassins, studied the Council of Spiders. Tim Drake maintained a cool demeanor, but he knew just as well how to be scary without raising his voice.

“It was an accident.”

He didn’t interrupt, but his brows furrowed just a tad more.

“I got shot?”

He gripped the back of the couch, looking away from you for a moment before taking a breath.

“When?”

“Last Friday, on my way home from work.”

You could see the wheels working in his head, running through all the scenarios. Which was more likely, where it had happened, who the culprit could be. It took him only a few seconds before…

“The gang fight, Penguins’ men.”

It wasn’t a question.

You nodded, accepting defeat.

“Stray bullet,” you admitted.

“Did you- “His voice sounded strained. “Did you at least go to the hospital?”

“I went to Leslie,” You sighed, gently prying the pill bottle from his hand. Placing it on the table you watched his face give nothing away to how he was feeling.

“So, you were trying to hide it from me?”

Did you mention your boyfriend wasn’t an idiot?

“I didn’t want to worry you,” You mumbled, playing with the strings of a Gotham University hoodie you had stolen from him a year ago and never given back.

“This is so much worse, where? Where did it get you?”

Finally, he was looking at you again. His face twisted in a mixture of worry and frustration, maybe even a bit of anger still.

Gently, you pulled up the side of your shirt, revealing the angry red stitching that was still in the process of healing. The bandages had been removed a while ago, but you almost wished you still had them on to hide how bad the stitches made the wound look.

“It was just a graze,” You tried to appease him. “I handled it just fine. Leslie said I was lucky. If I take care of it well, the scar won’t even be that bad.”

His thumb gently rubbed over it, analyzing. You wished you were privy to what he was thinking, but he kept them carefully concealed.

“This could have hit a major organ,” He finally breathed.

“It didn’t.”

He frowned.

“Y/N, why didn’t you call me?”

“Because I was fine!” You snapped, picking at your shirt more aggressively, avoiding eye contact. “I didn’t panic. I stayed completely calm; I immediately used my shirt to tie over it. I put pressure on it like you showed me. Then I went to Leslie. There wasn’t anything you could do.”

“Wasn’t anything-There was a million things I could have done! I could have helped. I could have been there! Isn’t that my job?”

Don’t turn this into a fight. Do not turn this into a fight.

“I didn’t want to be the damsel in distress,” You admitted calmly. “For once, I didn’t want to be the girl completely reliant on a superhero swinging in to save her. Do you know how embarrassing that is? Barbara doesn’t need Dick to save her, Stephanie doesn’t need anyone to save her. Neither does Cass, Helena or Kate! I’m the only girl in the family that doesn’t wear spandex.”

Tim was staring at you, apparently surprised.

“But I like the fact you’re not a vigilante.”

You bristled.

“What? You like me being feeble and meek?”

“No!” Tim quickly backtracked. “No, you know that’s not what I mean. It’s just not who you are. That doesn’t mean your anything less. I live with a bunch of them, trust me, dating outside of the job is refreshing. I’m sorry you had the impression that you needed to be. But Y/N, not even we try to tough out a bullet. You should hear Dick, he swears like a sailor for days when he’s been shot.”

You look at him skeptically.

“You guys get shot all the time, but you still don’t baby each other. I want the same treatment.”

“You don’t get shot regularly,” Tim argued. “Allow me to be a little worried. It was your first time, and please, for the sake of my sanity, let it be the last time.”

You look at him.

“What sanity?” You ask innocently.

He blinked, then rolled his eyes.

“Haha,” He came around the couch, wrapping his arms around your waist, far gentler than it had been the past few days. His chin rested on your head.

“You owe me for all the sanity you keep taking when you do things like this. The Office marathon? It’s a tradition whenever one of us gets seriously injured.”

“I’m not seriously-“

He poked your side that wasn’t hurt. You let out a laugh, pulling free.

“Fine! But you have to make popcorn with extra butter.”

“Deal.”

[shlabam]

TOP TEN COMICS BOOK VILLAINS WE PROBABLY WON’T SEE IN THE MOVIES

Superhero media is the hottest thing going right now. It was true ten years ago when the MCU was in its adolescence, and it’s even truer now. Even with film production on lockdown, Marvel and DC are still planning on literally dozens of their characters entering their respective cinematic universes. However, for the fans of the source material, things can be contentious. For every memorable Tony Stark quip, there’s Superman destroying an entire city because he’s, frankly, kind of dumb now. A major point of contention is how the various popular villains are utilized. Making an intimidating and potent villain in a comic book is very different than in a film. In comics, you have months to establish motive, powers, and backstory before the villain even makes their first move. In films, that all has to be compressed and spilled out in the scarce few minutes when Captain America and Bucky aren’t making bambi eyes at each other. To be concise, some villains adapt perfectly, and some, no matter how good they are in the comics, just don’t. And to be clear, this list is of popular villains who have the possibility of appearing in a big-budget film, so no, you won’t be seeing Ten Eyed Man or Big Wheel in there. Their powers are, respectively, having ten eyes, and being very good in business. (That’s a lie, he’s just a huge wheel who chases Spider-Man.)

10: Mr. Mxyzptlk:

Cool, let’s get this one out of the way. Despite being one of Superman’s oldest, longest-lasting, and most popular enemies from all the way back in the Golden Age, there’s no way in hell he will be in a movie. For the uninformed. Mr. Mxyzptlk is a 5th dimensional wizard-genie who appears every ninety days to torment Superman with his reality-altering antics, and can only be sent back to his home dimension if Superman tricks him into saying his own name backwards. Yes, it would be very dazzling, as Mr. Mxyzptlk’s powers in a movie would basically look like if Christopher Nolan directed Who Framed Roger Rabbit, but he’s a little too silly to fit in with the current “everything is gloomy and also a bummer” tone of the Superman films. This silly tone has lent itself perfectly to the Supergirl series, where he’s made a handful of appearances. Besides, if we get Mxyzptlk in a Superman movie before Brainiac, I’ll lose my entire freaking mind.

9: Hobgoblin:

There have been eight Spider-Man movies so far, and of those eight, four of them have, in some capacity, featured the Green Goblin. And that makes sense, right? The Green Goblin is easily Spider-Man’s most memorable and reoccurring nemesis, with Doctor Octopus and Venom close behind, and Peter Parker’s link with Norman and Harry Osbourn makes their tragic story perfect for film adaptation. On the other hand, we have the Hobgoblin, who is essentially Green Goblin with all the gimmicks, none of the Parker-adjacent backstory, and an orange and blue color scheme, likely tying him to the Denver Broncos [citation needed]. Still, in those four cinematic attempts at tackling the Goblin, none of them have quite gotten him right, and I can’t imagine this character, who is, even in canon, an intentional Green Goblin rip-off, would fare any better.

8: Starro:

Brave and the Bold #28 from 1960 featured the first story with the Justice League, and this story put them up against a very unique new villain: Starro the Conqueror, a giant telepathic starfish who can release tiny versions of himself. If these tiny starfish latch onto your head, you’re under his control and obey his commands. The Justice League have battled him fairly regularly over the last fifty years, and he’s a distinct and powerful enemy that the fans generally appreciate, leading to him being referenced occasionally in Smallville, Arrow, and Flash. Why won’t he ever be in a movie? Because if you’re a Hollywood producer, you stopped paying attention at “giant telepathic starfish”. Sorry. Maybe Shuma-Gorath will pop up in the next Doctor Strange movie, and he’ll set off a Twilight-esque wave of starfish monster movies! Then again, almost absolutely not.

7: Puppet Master:

Speaking of mind control, what’s scarier than that? For my money, nothing. Having your body and will taken away from you by an unseen force is a terror greater than death. How could you possibly make a villain based around such a chilling concept and have him not be scary? Well, maybe if it’s an old bald man in an apron playing with dolls. The Puppet Master is an ongoing threat for the Fantastic Four who is just that: he makes models of his foes out of radioactive clay, and makes them punch themselves and dance around and kiss each other, because he’s, y’know, a weird old man. Why is he such a consistent threat who hasn’t fallen into obscurity like other dumb gimmick-based villains? His stepdaughter, Alicia Masters, is the Thing’s longtime girlfriend. As long as she keeps appearing in movies (including being played by… Kerry Washington? That can’t be right), there’s always a chance he’ll pop up, but I don’t think any movie studio is that stupid, despite the quality of every Fantastic Four movie blatantly defying that prediction.

6: Bizarro:

Superman has always suffered in the villains department. When you’re essentially a god, what can they throw at you? As it turns out, Lex Luthor, almost always. But why not another Superman? Bizarro is essentially that, an imperfect clone of Superman who speaks in opposite speak - “Bizarro am good! Me not punch you until you live!” - and features the same abilities as the Man of Steel. Sounds great, right? Putting a hero against a villain with their same powers has worked for nearly every Marvel movie (shots fired). So why won’t we see him grace our silver screens any time soon? Because they’ve never really figured him out. Is he funny? Is he lethal? Does Kryptonite work on him? If he does everything the opposite of Superman, why does he wear clothes? Isn’t being naked the opposite of being clothed? Bizarro is a major Superman side-character and has made appearances in Smallville and Supergirl, but the idea of him being the Big Bad going toe-to-toe with Henry Cavill doesn’t sound like it would generate a lot of views.

5: Impossible Man:

You remember what I said about Mr. Mxyzptlk? Remember? So take that bit, but everywhere I say Superman, have it say Fantastic Four instead… yeah, that should do it.

4: The Wrecking Crew:

Thor has a unique quirk of having a very cinematic rogues gallery. Sure, most of the movies have pitted him against Loki, but if they were to run him up against the Enchantress, or the Absorbing Man, or Ulik the Troll, or Kurse, or even the Stone Men from Saturn, that’s not a bad movie! However, in one of the attempts to give Thor more of a mortal nemesis, they put him up against the Wrecker, who has an… enchanted… indestructible… crowbar. Yeah. Incredibly, the Wrecker and his Wrecking Crew have become very present characters throughout the Marvel Universe, essentially serving as “jobbers”, being rolled out to get beaten up by the new top hero or villain, but that may not work in a movie, where villains have to be seen as having some level of potency before being struck down. That means we’d need at least a short scene where it seems like Thor might lose to a guy whose power is “crowbar”, and that’s about as likely as an Edward Norton cameo in the next Avengers. Ho boy, they did NOT part on good terms!

3: Clayface:

When the movie-going public goes to see a Batman movie, they generally want something a bit more grounded than your typical superhero fare. After all, Batman has no powers, and therefore the most supernatural thing that should happen in these movies is a gas that makes you smile, or a different gas that makes you think your dead parents are back and disappointed in you. Might wanna put a mouth covering on that mask, Bruce! The one and only they’ve made a movie where Batman fights people with real, off-the-wall super powers (Batman and Robin), it did not go great. And those guys pale in comparison to Clayface, who is, yes, made of clay. In the comics and cartoons, Clayface looks awesome, turning his limbs into weapons and being very challenging to incapacitate, but in a live-action, realistic Batman adventure, we wouldn’t want to see the Dark Knight fight a poop-colored version of the T-1000, especially if it’s got the same chemical composition of a little dreidel that I made.

2: Red Hood:

A relative newcomer to the Batman universe, Red Hood is the revived body of Jason Todd, the second Robin, who was brutally killed by the Joker in one of the most controversial storylines DC Comics ever produced. Literally, fans called a 900 number to tell the writers to kill him off. A 900 number. That’s how much they hated the little turd. Anyway, Jason Todd, whom Batman and the rest of the world believed was dead, was revived by Ra’s al Ghul and became a ruthless villain. Since then, he’s gravitated more to the side of the hero, though one a bit more willing to spill blood than his mentors. Why won’t we see him in the darker, edgier Batman films? Because… that’s Bucky. It’s the same thing that happened in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Teen sidekick killed in controversial manner, revived by super villain to be a thorn in said hero’s side, later changes his mind and becomes a good guy again, though with enough PTSD to fill a PTSD super store. The two storylines even occurred in the comics in the same year, 2005, to much fanfare and across-the-board declarations of one company ripping off the other, reminding the world of the great Aquaman-Namor debates of the 1940s. Considering that DC’s films have criminally underperformed compared to Marvel’s, the last thing they want to do is be accused of lazy plagiarism, so Jason Todd will likely remain a permanent fixture in the afterlife, hanging out with Batman’s parents and, at the rate that people are coming back from the dead, literally no one else. (Plus, if they can’t even get Robin right, how are they gonna do this?)

1: Mister Sinister:

Yes, he was teased at the end of X-Men Apocalypse, but ignoring that the film underperformed both critically and commercially, Mister Sinister is never going to be in a movie. It would make sense for him to appear, though, right? He’s one of the most present and potent X-Men villains, he’s played crucial roles in many memorable storylines, he’s got a sick cape, but… something a lot of comic book fans tend to overlook is his murky backstory, powers, and motivations. He was a biologist in Victorian London who did genetic experiments on homeless people in the hopes of finding clues about the oncoming threat of mutants. In this time, he unearthed the long-dormant En Sabah Nur, whom you plebeians may know as Apocalypse, and Apocalypse gifted him with great abilities. What abilities you ask? HA HA, good question! At various times, Sinister has displayed: telepathy, telekinesis, energy projection, shape-shifting, regeneration, and teleportation, but these powers will mysteriously disappear whenever they want him to get sliced up real good by Wolverine. Additionally, it has never been made very clear what Sinister wants. Does he seek perfect mastery of the human genome? Does he live to torment Cyclops? Is he a blind follower of Apocalypse? Is he just running through all the different kinds of goatee? Of course, in adaptation, the writers would pick and choose the aspects they’d want to use, but I doubt they’d want to untangle the Christmas lights mess that is Mister Sinister, especially when they’ve got a perfectly good villain whose power is just “magnets”.

[recentanimenews]

Licensing of the Monsters: How Pokémon Ignited An Anime Arms Race

  "Hey, what do ya' got there? A rabbit?" Batman asks his mentor, staring at a video of Pikachu on a massive underground computer screen.

  "It's a Pokémon," Bruce Wayne replies.

  Five seconds later, Batman is shocked so hard by the tiny yellow creature that he ends up flying headfirst through another computer monitor (Using a clip from the "Blackout" episode of Batman Beyond, an episode that would've aired for the first time just days earlier.) It doesn't make much physical sense, but this bizarre 1999 crossover promo did establish two things: 1) Pokémon was coming to Kids' WB, and 2) Pokémon was important. So important that Batman actually took time away from obsessing over crime and vengeance to care about it.

  Echoing a 1997 promo where the comedic Bugs Bunny let us in on the "secret" that the serious, dark Batman was coming to Kids' WB, it almost seems like a passing of the torch. Kids' WB, up until then, was a programming service chock full of classic Warner Bros. cartoon properties like Bugs, Daffy, Pinky, Brain, and various members of the Justice League — all animated Americana. 

Pokémon wasn't a huge risk as the 4Kids Entertainment dub of the show had done well in broadcast syndication, they had plenty of episodes to work with (sometimes airing three in a row), and it was based on a game series that was already a worldwide smash hit.

  But the show was ... different.

  And it would end up changing cartoons as we knew them.

  Part 1: Batman Jumps Ship

  It's hard to think of a better scenario when it comes to appealing to kids than the one Fox Kids had with Batman: The Animated Series. Debuting in September 1992 and airing on weekdays just after school let out, it received immediate acclaim due to its moody, beautiful animation and storytelling that didn't talk down to anyone. Little kids could get into Batman throwing crooks around and adults could marvel at plots like the one where a former child actress with a medical condition that keeps her from aging takes her former co-stars hostage and ends up holding a gun, hallucinating, and sobbing into Batman's arms.

  It did so well that Fox tried to air it on prime-time Sundays and though this was short-lived — turns out, Batman was no match for Ed Bradley on CBS's 60 Minutes — it solidified the show as "cool." This was a show that could hang with the big boys. You couldn't say the same of something like Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends.

  And then, in 1997, it was gone. A five-year contract ran out and Batman leapt completely to Kids' WB, where a continuation of the show (the often even grimmer The New Batman Adventures) aired later that year. There, it joined Superman: The Animated Series in a one-two punch of programming called The New Batman/Superman Adventures. When it came to Kids' WB, competitors not only had to deal with the Merry Melodies crowd, they now had to face the World's Finest Heroes.

  This, along with a departing Animaniacs, left Fox Kids with a gap in flagship programming. Sure it had various incarnations of the Power Rangers (which was still holding strong) and Spider-Man, but if you look back on 1998 programming, little of it would survive the year. Silver Surfer? Gone by May. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation? Out by December. Casper? Dead in October. By May of 1999, Warner Media would announce record ratings thanks to Pokémon, while its competitors, including the Disney-led ABC, Fox, and even Nickelodeon, would suffer losses in the Saturday morning area. Pokemon would have the best ever series premiere numbers for Kids' WB at the time.

    A chunk of that has to do with 4Kids Entertainment's (or to be more specific, 4Kids Productions) handling of the show. Again, Pokémon was a proven concept. If you love monsters, adventure, and collecting things, you'll probably find something to enjoy in the franchise. But the dub was particularly strong. For years, dubbing was seen as an inherently laughable thing in America, full of exasperated voice actors trying desperately to convince you that they weren't portraying three different characters, and lips that didn't match the dialogue. Entire Japanese series were reduced to laughing stocks in the U.S. because why focus on the lovingly created miniatures and top-notch tokusatsu action in Godzilla if one of the actors sounds weird?

  But while Pokémon wasn't the first great dub, it was a remarkably underrated one. Veronica Taylor's work as Ash Ketchum was relatable, funny, and consistent. And Racheal Lillis, Eric Stuart, and Maddie Blaustein's turns as Team Rocket's Jessie, James, and Meowth gave us villains that could've easily been the most repetitive parts of the show  — you can only try to capture Pikachu so many times before you should logically find a second hobby — but instead were one of the most entertaining aspects.

  Aside from some easily meme-able bits — Brock's drying pan and jelly donuts, for example — Pokemon became a seamless addition to the Kids' WB lineup and would end up giving many fans a lifelong love of anime. And it was great for 4Kids, too, as in 2000, they would be number one on Fortune's 100 Fastest-Growing Companies.

  Fox Kids wanted an answer to this. And it would soon find one.

  Well, two.

  Part 2: Monsters Rule

  Saban Entertainment was no stranger to Fox Kids. They'd been the one to adapt Toei's Super Sentai into The Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers for American and international audiences, creating an unexpected sensation that combined monsters and martial arts. And in 1999, they nabbed Digimon Adventure, a series about kids that gain "digital" monster partners when transported to a "digital world," which had begun airing earlier that year in Japan. Based on a fighting virtual pet that had already been around for a few years, Digimon was a natural fit for an anime series and also a natural fit for a climate that was desperately trying to find the next Pokémon.

  Renamed Digimon: Digital Monsters, it premiered in August of 1999. Of course, accusations followed that it was a Pokémon rip-off, considering that they were both about befriending terrifying laser critters, but they offered fairly different things. While Pokémon was more episodic, Digimon gave viewers a more Dragon Ball Z-esque experience (they were both Toei productions, too) with the titular monsters evolving and gaining "power-ups" due to fighting increasingly powerful villains.

  Almost two months later, Monster Rancher would join the Fox Kids lineup, airing on Saturdays at 8:30 AM after Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century (a Fox Kids lost relic if there ever was one). Together, Monster Rancher and Digimon would cover the programming block with monster action, sometimes airing twice each. Meanwhile, Pokémon would do the same for Kids' WB, and if you look at their Saturday morning schedules from 1999 and 2000, it appears they just shoved Pikachu in whenever possible.

  Looking back on Monster Rancher is always odd, though, because it's so specifically trapped in the time period where it originated. The video games used metadata from readable discs to create new monsters for the player, meaning that as soon as people gained the ability to download or stream media online without having to travel to their local Circuit City, the game would look absolutely archaic in comparison to its peers.

  Monster Rancher is a very fun show based on some very fun games, and the dynamic array of personalities and their particular squabbles in the core group actually reminds me a lot of One Piece. But even the show itself deals with reviving monsters on giant stone discs — a prehistoric-looking adaptation of a video game gimmick that would, a decade later, appear prehistoric itself.

  The Monster War was waged across 2000 and 2001. And though it appears Pokémon was the clear winner — in 2020, it's the most popular franchise with the widest reach, even if Digimon does produce some stellar shows and movies — the ratings tell a different story. In the May sweeps of 2000, Pokémon (and Kids' WB) took the prize among kids 6-11, but in the end, Fox Kids would score a victory of a 3.1 rating to Kids' WB's 3.0 (the first sweeps win since 1997, the year that Batman left.)

    Early the following year, Fox Kids would score again, narrowly beating Pokémon on Saturday morning in the same timeslot and even coming ahead of properties like X-Men. And what would propel this February 10th victory? The first appearance of BlackWarGreymon, the Shadow the Hedgehog to WarGreymon's Sonic.

  However, Pokémon would still help create ratings records for Kids' WB, even though late 2000/early 2001 saw a slide that would often cede dominance to Nickelodeon. Jed Patrick, who was president of The WB at the time said: "I didn't think Pokémon would fall off as much as it did ... every fire cools down a little, but that doesn't mean it doesn't stay hot."

  Even though, in retrospect, claims that "Pokemania" had died seem a little ridiculous — the latest games, Pokémon Sword and Shield, just became the highest-selling entries in seventeen years — big changes were ahead.

  Part 3: It's Time To Duel ... Or Not

  In early 2001, Joel Andryc, executive VP of kids' programming and development for Fox Kids, was looking for a "Digimon companion series to create an hour-long anime block." He felt they were too reliant on Digimon, as they were airing it three times in a single morning. Likely not coincidentally, that summer Fox Kids Fridays were dubbed "anime invasion," advertising Flint The Time Detective, Dinozaurs, Escaflowne, and Digimon. In one commercial, a single quote zips across the bottom of the screen: "Anime Rocks!" Nicole, TX

  That it does, Nicole from Texas.

  Meanwhile, 4Kids Entertainment would provide Kids' WB with another monster show: Yu-Gi-Oh! Known as Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters in Japan, this anime adaptation absconded from retelling the stories found in the early chapters of the manga — which were mostly devoted to Yugi running into jerks, only to have his Egyptian spirit "alter ego" deal karmic retribution on them — and instead focused on the parts that involved the cool monster fights. So basically the parts that were the most like Pokémon.

  But how would this be received? In 2000, Canadian studio Nelvana had licensed the anime Cardcaptor Sakura and turned it simply into Cardcaptors — an extremely edited version that removed many important relationships and plotlines and tried to streamline the show into a pseudo-Pokémon story. It's gone down in history as one of the most questionable dubs ever, and never really made a splash on Kids' WB. So they wouldn't want a repeat of that.

  But would kids be into a card game? The cards did summon monsters, but in Pokémon and Digimon, the monsters are just there, moving around and not relegated to a glorified checkers board arena. It turned out, yes, kids would be REALLY into that. Yu-Gi-Oh! debuted at number one in multiple demographics in September 2001, and would remain a steady part of its lineup for years to come.

    And how did Fox Kids respond? Did the "anime invasion" work out? Well, sort of, but not in the way they were hoping.

  In 2001, due to diminishing ratings and audiences, Fox Kids Worldwide (along with Fox Family Worldwide) were sold to The Walt Disney Company. By November 7th, they'd canceled their weekly afternoon blocks, and the next year, they'd end up selling their entire Saturday morning block to a company that had provided their rivals with the very same TV shows that aided in sinking them: 4Kids Entertainment. The final show to premiere on the original Fox Kids was Galidor: Defenders of the Outer Dimension, a live action series that stood beside Alienators: Evolution Continues (a cartoon sequel to the mediocre 2001 comedy Evolution) and the underrated Medabots as the block's last gasp. 

  Renamed FoxBox in late 2002 (and later 4KidsTV in 2005), the 4Kids run schedule would, over the years, include anime like Kirby! Right Back At Ya!, Ultimate Muscle, Fighting Foodons, Sonic X, Shaman King, and eventually, in 2004, the infamous One Piece dub. The first Saturday of the new FoxBox lineup would also outdo the previous Saturday's Fox Kids lineup. Disney would acquire the rights to Digimon and it showed up on ABC Family in late 2001 (eighteen years later, a reboot of the original series would air, which can be watched on Crunchyroll).

  Eventually, in 2007, the Monster War would come full circle. 4Kids Entertainment announced they would be taking over the Kids' WB Saturday morning block entirely, renaming it the "CW4KIDS," as The CW had been born after UPN and The WB had ceased to be. Pokémon was long gone by this point, having been dropped by Kids' WB in 2006, and was now overseen by The Pokémon Company International on Cartoon Network.

  "We wish Pokémon USA much success going forward," the CEO of 4Kids Entertainment said. Later sued over "illegal agreements" regarding the Yu-Gi-Oh! franchise, the company would eventually file for bankruptcy in 2016. Pokémon Journeys, the latest installment in the franchise, launches on Netflix on June 12th. 

      Daniel Dockery is a Senior Staff Writer for Crunchyroll. Follow him on Twitter!

  Do you love writing? Do you love anime? If you have an idea for a features story, pitch it to Crunchyroll Features!

By: news+feed@crunchyroll.com

[mrsspidermanmaryjanewatsonparker]

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

Previous thoughts here.

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

So did it go out on a high note.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Let’s talk positives though.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

However precedence alone is not necessarily justification.

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

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

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

The second biggest problem with this arc is with Annie.

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

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

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

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

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

It just breaks the narrative.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

It’s such a weird creative choice.

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

Other smaller problems with the arc include:

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

-          The art was a bit sketchy and felt unfinished

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

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

Hopefully Spider-Girls will be an improvement

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

[celtics534]

Natural Chapter 12

Natural Chapter 12 is ready for y’all to enjoy! I have two things to say about this chapter. First: @gryffindormischief helped with Ginny’s killer comeback. Second: sorry for the ending.... 

Read on: FF.net, AO3, or down below!

"Come on!" Ron looked like a child going into the local sweet shop. He refrained from dragging Harry by the arm, but only just. Harry, for his part, was too amused to say anything. When he had offered to take his future brother-in-law to the pub, he hadn't expected the full-grown adult to become a toddler.

The Cannons frequented a small pub only a few miles from their stadium. With such a limited fan base, the pub rarely filled after games. Harry and Ron had no issue entering the place, let alone finding the team.

"Holy Merlin's balls," Ron breathed as he stopped dead by the front door, rather reminiscent of a teenage witch seeing her favorite member of the Weird Sisters.

"Hey, Potter!" Lance Goone waved them over with a smile

"Ron?" Harry had made it halfway to the table before he noticed Ron was still at the door. His mouth was wide open, welcoming any sort of insect to fly in. "You coming?"

It took a solid five seconds for Ron's feet to start moving, though still at a sloth's pace.

Merlin! At the rate Ron was moving, Harry could drink four beers and down three shots before he made it to the table.

Harry moved back a few steps to gently push Ron forward. The tall man stumbled slightly, but picked up his pace.

"Hey, Goone!" Harry greeted the Cannons' beater while nodding at the rest of the team. "How was the game today?"

"Not too bad." Goone snapped his thumb and forefinger together, and got the attention of the barman. "Another two drinks, please!" He turned back to Harry. "We only lost by a hundred."

"Who were you playing?" Harry asked while the grumpy barman placed down two bottles in front of him and Ron- the latter of whom instantly took a slip of his liquid courage.

"The Wigtown Wanderers."

Harry could feel his brow rise. "Really? Not bad, Goone."

Goone pretended to shine his fingernails on his shirt sleeve. "They weren't expecting me and Snyder to focus on their keeper every time we were about to take a shot." He waved his hand dismissively. "But, anyways what are you doing here? And who's your mate?"

Harry could hear Ron's breath catch. Such a teenage witch!

"This is my fiancée's brother, Ron. He's been a fan of the Cannons forever and I promised to show him your preferred spot."

Goone looked shocked for a moment. Most likely never met a fan before, Harry thought sarcastically.

"Nice to meet you, Ron." Goone stuck out his hand. Ron remained as stiff as a board, just staring at the proffered hand.

"I'm glad this moment happened before Ginny showed up." Harry laughed lightly. "She would never stop taking the mickey."

"Oh, your girl is coming here?" Goone turned his attention back to Harry, letting his hand drop back to his side. Ron was still sitting ramrod straight. "I've never met her before."

"Yeah, she had a late training session with the Harpies, but after that she wanted to come- and this is a quote from her-'watch Ron make a fool of himself'."

Goone snorted, but gave Ron a kind smile. "Well, I look forward to meeting her. Remind me again, what does she look like?"

Harry could feel his lips curl in a stupid grin. It always happened when he talked about Ginny. "She's got semi-short red hair, brown eyes -"

"Athletic build?" Goone interrupted.

Harry nodded slowly. "Yeah."

"Does she tend to order a firewhiskey?"

"How do you -"

Harry turned in his seat and saw Ginny at the bar, a glass of whiskey in one hand and an annoyed scowl on her beautiful face. It didn't take long for Harry to see why she looked irked. Alfie Malcolm, the Cannons' seeker, leaned against the bar, clearly flirting with her.

A creature within Harry's chest started to growl. The way Malcolm was leaning over Ginny… It wasn't as if Harry didn't trust Ginny. Fuck no! He trusted her more than anyone else, but that didn't mean he liked other men hovering over her like she was a piece of meat.

Harry snorted in glee as Ginny's expression shifted. He knew that look. That sickly-sweet batting of eyelashes that meant she was about to crush some dreams - and likely a few toes.

Sure enough, Ginny patted the seeker on the cheek not-too-gently with her left hand and gave him a smile that could make a tough man whimper in fear. Malcolm's eyes darted towards the ring on her finger. Harry had never been good at reading lips, but he could see Ginny's mouth form the word engaged. Then she stepped on his toes as she walked past the seeker, making the man flinch.

"Hello, love." Ginny placed glass her next to Harry's, giving him a quick kiss in the process. She pulled an empty chair from another table and sat down next to Harry. "Ron." She nodded at her still star-struck brother. "And you must be Lance. Harry told me you're a decent bloke, unlike that prick." She gestured back towards the bar where Malcolm was still standing stunned.

"I've always heard redheads are feisty, and you seem to be the epitome." Goone laughed as he looked over at his teammate. "Alfie needs to learn to look for rings before chatting up a bird."

"He should also learn to how to chat someone up properly." Ginny sipped her whiskey. "I mean, his lines are pathetic." She deepened her voice. "I'm a seeker and let me tell you, I think I already have you in the palm of my hand."

Harry and Goone both snorted into their beers. "Seriously?" Goone asked.

Ginny nodded. "Yeah, and I told him I bet a cactus got more action than him." Ginny grinned mischievously. "Self-attention not included."

"Oh," Goone choked, as his body shook with laughter. He rested his forehead on the table. "That's good!"

Harry couldn't agree more. The creature in his chest purred as Ginny leaned into him. He pressed a kiss to the side of her head.

"So what have you lads been talking about?" Ginny changed topic as she looked over at her brother. "Did I miss something good?"

"He's been like this since before we sat down," Harry confided. "I think he's broken."

Ginny dismissed Harry's concern with a careless gesture. "Oh, I know how to fix that." She turned to look at Goone, who had only just composed himself. "Wanna hear the story of how Ron got knocked out?"

To Harry's surprise, Ron came back to attention. He glowered at his sister. "You don't tell it right!"

"Well then, dear brother." Ginny smiled wickedly (something Harry found way too attractive). "How do you explain the time you ran into a door frame while fleeing from a three centimeter spider?"

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"I like this color blue." Ginny admired the fresh coat of paint on the sitting room walls. "It's simple and keeps the room feeling light."

"I see what you mean," Harry rested his back against the base of the sofa. He and Ginny had moved all the furniture to the center of the room so the paint that had been casted up on the wall could dry without an issue. With all their different spells and enchantments to make things simpler for themself, Harry was shocked there wasn't a paint drying spell. Sure, they were able to make the mid-grade blue color stick the walls no problem, but they still had to wait for it to dry. Wizards were odd.

Ginny grabbed another piece of pizza from the box that sat between them. Harry had decided that a picnic in the sitting room was perfect for their Saturday night. Neither of them had practice (both coaches decided their team needed a night off with it being a quarter of the way into the season) and a quiet evening sounded pretty amazing.

They had been living in their cottage for a few months, but hadn't gotten around to improving anything. When Harry had started working on the place he knew there would be things Ginny would have opinions on, such as paint colors. Today alone, they had changed the colors of all the rooms and reorganized the furniture.

"So, Mum's been getting on my case again," Ginny started nonchalantly. She placed her half- eaten slice down on her paper plate. "She has wedding fever."

"Better than baby fever," Harry joked, trying to lighten the mood.

Ginny frantically shook her head. "Don't give her any ideas. I bet the minute we're married she gonna start knitting booties."

"But she has Bill and Percy to help with her grandkid craze, right?"

"You'd think that'd be enough." Ginny sighed and scooted her body closer to his, letting her head fall onto his shoulder. "But no, she can't wait for her only daughter to have a baby."

She suddenly jerked her head up. "Oh! I forgot to tell you! Fleur's pregnant!"

"Really? That's great." Harry was happy for the older couple. They would make great parents. "I didn't know they were trying."

"For over a year. They were really starting to get stressed about it. Fleur told me she thought it was a sign they weren't meant to have children." Ginny's smile somehow widened. "But here they are, three months along. She's even showing a little."

"Wow! They waited a bit to tell you, didn't they?"

Ginny shrugged. "Fleur wanted to wait until their chance of miscarriage was lower."

"Ah." Harry understood that. He couldn't imagine telling everyone the good news, only to have it ripped away from you.

"Anyway, Fleur wants to give baby a French name." Ginny took a bite of her dinner. "They don't have a boy's name yet, but they are saying Victoire for a girl. It's close to victory in French. She says getting pregnant is a victory to them."

"Well, that's..." Harry wasn't quite sure of the word he wanted to use.

"One way to look at getting knocked up," Ginny supplied with a sly smirk.

Harry laughed. He tilted her chin, intending to give her a light kiss, but Ginny seemed to have other intentions. She pressed her mouth hard to his, her fingers tangling into his hair.

"You know," Ginny murmured against his lips, "we could celebrate their victory… We haven't shagged in this room while the walls are blue, yet."

Harry pulled back slightly, adjusting their bodies so he hovered over her. With a wave of his wand (that had been sitting beside him) he lit the fireplace, filling the room with the happy sounds of crackling logs. "We wouldn't want break our streak, now would we?"

He moved his mouth down from her lips to her throat, then to her sternum. Ginny let out a sound of approval as he slid his hands to the hem of her shirt, letting his fingers play with the the little bit of exposed skin.

"You know, they rightly named this carpet." Ginny's voice was husky as she untangled her hands from his hair. She guided her fingers to the top button on his shirt. She made quick work of the first three. "It is perfect for shagging."

Harry stopped his ministrations and connected his eyes to hers. They gleamed with delight at her own joke. "Really?"

"Do you disagree?"

"Oh no! I couldn't agree more."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Have I ever told you how much I hate wedding planning?" Ginny moaned as she flopped down onto the sofa beside Harry. Deciding he would find out who murdered the young woman in his novel later, Harry placed a bookmark into the folds. His fiancée need his attention more.

"You have, but it is the groom's job to listen to his ranting bride. So please, keep me up to date. What happened?"

Ginny glared at him for his sarcasm, but clearly decided her tirade was more vital than reprimanding him for his satire. "My mother spent three hours on flowers. Just flowers!" Her face contorted in pain. "Do you know how little I care about flowers?"

"Probably as much as I care about tablecloths." Harry twisted his body so his back was against the armrest. He helped Ginny position herself with her back to his chest, their legs spread out in front of them on the cushions.

"Remind me again why we can't just elope?" Ginny whined, as Harry rubbed small circles into her thigh.

"Because we want to live to see thirty."

"Right, our mothers would become murderers."

"And I don't think our fathers would forgive us for making that happen." Harry pressed a kiss to the top of Ginny's head. "I get why they are pushing us more."

"Oh, don't bring logic into this!" Ginny complained, her hands coming up to cover her face. Her voice was muffled, but Harry had become completely fluent in the ways of Ginny Weasley allowing him to understand her through the barricade. "Two months is plenty of time."

"How many weddings have you planned?"

Ginny turned her neck to look at him, her hands dropping. "Huh?"

"You say two months is plenty of time, but I can say that I have no idea how hard it is to plan a wedding. But I have heard it takes quite a bit of time, maybe more than two months."

"Stop with your logic, Potter. Can't you just agree with me?"

"Sorry, darling. You know I love playing the devil's advocate."

Ginny let out a deep breath. "You're right."

"Can I get that in writing?"

"No. I guess I should go back and work with my mum, huh."

"I mean." Harry leaned around to kiss her cheek. "I could come with you. I picked white tablecloths so I can help to make sure the flower's color works with the tables."

Ginny turned her entire body around, her eyes locked on his. "You'd do that?"

"For you, I'd suffer through the seating chart rearrangement for the twentieth time."

"Well if that isn't love..." Though her tone oozed with sarcasm, the way she kissed him told Harry he had done the right thing.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Weasley has been unstoppable today!" Mothers told the listeners. "She hasn't missed a shot. It's as if the Magpies haven't had a keeper at all."

"Fifteen shots and fifteen goals." Gregory clapped his hands together. "We don't tend to see such a one-sided game this close to the finals."

"Make it three-hundred and ten to one-hundred and twenty. Harpies still in the lead."

"I wish we could bottle whatever is driving Weasley today so we can have more games like this," Gregory mused as he watched the red-head speed pass him. "What do you think is her inspiration today?"

"I have no idea, Dan," Mothers admitted. "We did speak with her fiancé, Harry Potter, before his match today. When we brought up Weasley, he claimed she was ready for today's match, and clearly, he wasn't lying."

"Have the happy couple set a date yet?" Dan asked, more for himself than the listeners at this point.

"Actually, I did ask Potter." Mothers smiled at his partner. "He didn't say the exact date, but he hinted it was less than a month."

"Amazing! I can't explain how much I love the -"

Gregory gasped as Ginny Weasley started to fall fast. Her body was like a rag doll, moving through the air limply.

"Weasley has been taken down by a bludger to the head!" Mothers informed the crowd. "There is no one near her! She's gonna hit the ground!"

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Mr Potter, I need you to remain calm."

"Oh, I'm plenty calm. I'm calm enough to hex you from here to Timbuktu."

"Harry, dear, how about you and Ron go get a cup of coffee down in the canteen."

Ginny couldn't move. She recognized her mother's soothing tone and Harry… a very distressed Harry. What would cause him to be so upset? She tried to open her eyes, but it was as if her lids had been stuck together with a permanent charm.

"Ergh." She tried to call Harry. She wanted to comfort him, but instead of saying his name loud and clear (like she had planned) the only noise that came out was an odd grunt.

"Ginny!?" Harry's voice had moved closer. "Gin, are you awake? Open your eyes, love."

Ginny tried to follow his instructions, but she just couldn't. The more she tried the more her head pounded.

"What's going on? Why can't she open her eyes?" Molly Weasley's voice accused fast and sharp. It was the tone she used when interrogating a trouble-maker.

"If she opens her eyes, her brain will face a sensory overload. I have made it so her eyes will remain shut until her brain has had more time to heal." Ginny didn't recognize the man's voice, but based on context clues she had to assume he was a healer of some sort.

"Why didn't you say so earlier?" Harry's tone made her want to laugh. He sounded ready to rip the head off the assumed healer. "Gin, can you hear me?"

"Ye-" Ginny tried to say yes, but she seemed unable to complete her task.

A hand she knew was Harry's lightly traced her cheek. "Good, love. Just relax then."

Ginny was more than happy to comply.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Multiple contusions, brain swelling, shattered bones in the hands, a broken leg and broken arm," Healer Rhodes explained, his elbows resting on the desk in his office "Miss Weasley is going to have quite a recovery process."

"Why did it take a week for her to wake up?" Harry asked for the fifth time. He, Molly, and Arthur sat together on the opposing side of the healer's desk.

"We believe she was in a comatose state." Rhodes laced his fingers together. "Her brain tissue swelled. Her body decided to shut down in order to focus on the trauma. It takes time for the body and mind to recover from such a serious injury. Our concern now is to test for any side effects from the swelling."

"Like what?" Arthur asked, his hand squeezing Molly's.

"Memory loss, speech functionality, motor functions, change in personality, things like that."

Harry didn't like it at all. "She might not remember things?"

"It's a possibility." Rhodes turned to Harry. "Though based on the response to you earlier I will hypothesize she knows you, Mr Potter."

"How do you check for…"

Rhodes gave Harry an understanding expression. "Slowly but surely. First we get her to a state where she can use her eyes comfortably. Then we see how well her brain responds. I would like to start healing some of the more serious injuries as soon as we can confirm she is mentally responsive."

"I'm going to go tell the boys to head home." Molly wiped away some stray tears. "It sounds like she doesn't need the whole family here right now."

"I have to agree with that, Mrs Weasley." Rhodes pulled out some charts from a drawer in his desk. "I'm going to wake her in about an hour and we are going to try and test response time. Mr Potter, I would like you to be there. It's always better if we have someone the patient is comfortable with."

"I had no intention of leaving," Harry told the healer. He knew he must sound rude, but at this moment he didn't give a shit about being charming and nice. If the healer had told him to leave, Harry had been more than prepared to fight the man.

"Good. Like I said it's going to be a hard recovery." Rhodes leaned in closer. "I want you to be prepared, Mr Potter. Miss Weasley is going to need you more than ever."

"Won't be a problem." Harry had never been more sure of anything in his life.

"I thought so." Rhodes stood, grabbing the charts with one hand and offered the other. "I'm going to check on a few other patients. Feel free to wait in your fiancée's room. I'll be there within the hour."

[hellzyeahthewebwieldingavenger]

My Thoughts on Venom 2018 Part 3: The 90s live again!

We’ve spoken about the different takes upon Venom and which one the movie leans on, but does that take really work for the movie?

Which version of Venom SHOULD this movie be portraying?

And again that answer will depend upon whether you are talking to a Spider-Man or a Venom fan.

You ask me Eddie Brock was never a more compelling character than when he was a Spider-Man villain and 1990s solo anti-hero Venom is just a laughably broken character. This is mostly because the transition for Brock/Venom into a sympathetic anti-hero made little sense given his background and early appearances where he was a homicidal maniac. It was akin to playing the Joker as sympathetic.

However in the context of a film project where Venom is a solo star and where Spider-Man can’t be in it, it’s only logical to base the film upon that rendition of the character.

The advantage the film holds over the comics is that their version of Eddie Brock is being built from the ground up and so consequently selling the audience on the idea of him as a sympathetic anti-hero is a lot easier when you don’t know he has a history of murder prior to that. He is more sympathetic albeit like his comic book version also rather a jerk, just not immensely unethical.

In this sense the movie could’ve worked as a movie unto itself. But it doesn’t which is largely owed to the facts that...

This movie is a product of the 1990s

As I mentioned above to my knowledge a lot or most of the script for this movie was specifically based upon a repurposed 1990s Venom script and the comic book source material for the movie was 1990s Venom mini-series. Specifically Lethal Protector and Planet of the Symbiotes, with stuff like She-Venom  and other references thrown in too.

More than this there are even nuggets from the 1990s Spider-Man cartoon which played a HUGE role in bringing Venom to a wider audience and redefining the character. In fact that show and the 1990s X-Men cartoon were incredibly important to the late 1990s/early 2000s Marvel movies.

The X-Men movies even to this day borrow an awful lot from those cartoons at least in spirit if not in explicit elements (although X-Men: Apocalypse contains a direct quote from the cartoons). Various elements of the 1994 Spidey cartoon made their way into Sam Raimi’s trilogy, including the name Oscorp, Norman Osborn conversing with himself in a mirror and the entire central premise of the alien costume in Spider-Man 3.

In fact the cartoon was an influence upon the original Blade and Daredevil films. Remember how in Daredevil 2003 a young Matt Murdock saw his father acting as a criminal before he was blinded? Or how about Blade’s mentor Whistler who appeared across all 3 Wesley Snipes movies? Both of those things originate from the 1994 Spidey show.

Similarly elements from the show found their way into the Venom film. The symbiote(s) are brought to Earth by a shuttle piloted by John Jameson who crash lands it on Earth. Venom is essentially pursued by Spider Seekers, highly explosive drones made to locate and engage Spider-Man in battle. I’m sure there are other things I missed.

The inclusion of these elements in the movie serves to further highlight how the film was obviously originally conceived in the 1990s and spruced up to serve as a quick script for a modern movie.

This is the reason why so many professional critics are drawing 1990s comparisons to the film. Of particular note was the immeasurably over the top and bombastic car chase sequence that threatened to be something out of the Blues Brothers. Also the shape shifting qualities of Venom and Riot (who turns his arms into liquid blades) which is again straight out of Terminator 2, one of the most defining action movies of the early 1990s.

But of course the biggest 1990s influences are the fact that everything (and I do mean everything) in this movie is ripped from 1990s Venom stories. There isn’t a hint of more modern Venom stories from the 2000s or 2010s. There is at best a vague reference to Venom’s 1980s origin as a disgraced reporter. Really this movie’s heart and soul lies in 1990s source material because it’s script was obviously vaguely updated from something made 20 years ago.

And by God....you can tell.

I am someone who defends 1990s comic book stories on the grounds that the popular perception of them as essentially universally bad is a lazy oversimplification since there was plenty of quality material in the decade.

This does not however mean I am blind to the failings of certain 1990s stories and tropes.

1990s Venom solo stories are unfortunately quintessential examples of those failings.

I do not pretend that I have read EVERY 1990s Venom solo story ever.

But I will tell you that I’ve read a few and of those few I have read...none of them have been good.

This is true unfortunately of the two stories that this movie is based upon. I respect David Michelinie very much and feel his is often grossly over criticised as a Spider-Man writer.

But I must be honest. Lethal Protector and Planet of the Symbiotes are simply bad stories.

And the fact that they are bad stories is what critically hurts the movie.

This didn’t need to inherently be a problem though.

Captain America: Civil War and Marvel’s Spider-Man for Playstation 4 were both based upon shoddy source material and were nevertheless able to elevate said material and deliver compelling stories.

Venom 2018 however instead of recognizing the weaknesses in its source material and borrowing the best ideas to build a better story was weirdly reverential to the spirit of those 1990s stories.

The massive logical fallacies, the goofiness, the bland and overly similar to Venom looking villain, the macabre and rather out of place dark humour and violence along with just being over the top and caring little for true character development or organic plot progression, these are all faults of 1990s Venom stories, including Lethal Protector and Planet of the Symbiotes.

I typically advocate that an adaptation of comic books should respect the spirit of the source but in this case this was a bad idea because the source material itself is rotten.

And yet...

This movie was incredibly entertaining!

[kerlonia]

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The Amazing Life Of Stan Lee (2018)

The Amazing Life Of Stan Lee (2018)

In 1961 Lee and artist Jack Kirby created The Fantastic Four, Spider Man Stan Lee Shirt about four astronauts who gain superpowers after a cosmic incident. Freddie Mercury We Are The Champions Shirt made him and Atlas—now known as Marvel—major forces in the comics world. One year later Lee and artist Steve Ditko created Spider-Man. Lee, Kirby, and Ditko adopted a collaborative workflow that came to be known as “the Marvel method.” The technique gave artists significantly more input on story plotting, and it allowed Marvel to produce new content at a dizzying rate. The books joined a roster of increasingly successful series that also included The Incredible Hulk. Lee and Kirby added another winner to the group when they created The X-Men in 1963. A distinctive feature of Lee’s comic-book heroes is that they combine superhuman powers with human insecurities and emotions. 7 billion in box office receipts. But offshoot series, such as the X-Men, have also been huge money spinners. RIP Stan. Thanks for everything. Guardians of the Galaxy star Chris Pratt, too, shared a picture on Twitter and wrote, “Thanks for everything Stan Lee! What a life, so well lived. Thanks for everything Stan Lee! What a life, so well lived. I consider myself extraordinarily lucky to have gotten to meet you and to have played in the world you created. Tom Holland, one of the most recent entrants into the Marvel world, posted a picture on Instagram with the message, “How many millions of us are indebted to this guy, none more so than me. The Marvel Comics icon was inducted into the Signal Corps Regimental Association in March 2017 — a moment he says trumps some of his top accomplishments. ] if you’re looking, this is one of my proudest moments. ” Lee said when he received a certificate of his lifetime membership and coin from the battalion. Lee previously said his comic book characters were influenced by some of his life experiences. As the top writer at Marvel Comics and later as its publisher, Lee was widely considered the architect of the contemporary comic book. He revived the industry in the 1960s by offering the costumes and action craved by younger readers while insisting on sophisticated plots, college-level dialogue, satire, science fiction, even philosophy.

Lee began his long and esteemed career in the world of comic books in 1939, running errands for Marvel precursor Timely Comics before eventually being named editor after his war service. He remained editor as Timely was officially rebranded as Marvel in 1961, at which point he teamed with longtime collaborator Jack Kirby to create some of Marvel’s most iconic and enduring characters. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Lee set his sights on Hollywood, and television shows based on Marvel characters began to populate the airwaves. Animated series and, of course, blockbuster films woud follow in the ensuing decades, and Marvel grew to become a multimedia giant, with Lee as its fearless, beloved leader. His writing career began with obituaries. Many of them were about famous people, and he was required to prepare them in advance so newspapers could rush them to print when the celebrity died. “I got depressed writing about living people in the past tense,” Lee told me. He didn’t want to write about death. He wanted to write about things that were larger than life. Lee’s big break came when his cousin-in-law, Martin Goodman, hired him to work at Timely, penning Westerns, love stories, and comedy cartoons. “When I got into comics, nobody, nobody had any respect for them,” he told me. “Even most of the people in the field were embarrassed. That’s why he created a pen name by cutting his first name in half. Decades later, he described it as his biggest regret.

Lee was taken to Cedars Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles on Monday after suffering a medical emergency, and was declared dead shortly afterwards. The titles Lee authored included those featuring Spider-Man (with artist Steve Ditko), the Hulk, X-Men, Iron Man, Thor, Daredevil, Captain America, and the Avengers — all of which have been turned into major features. Lee himself left Marvel — after one of several management changes — in 1972, but he retained the title chairman emeritus throughout his life. Although no longer directly involved with the company, Lee received producing credits — and appeared in cameos that invariably triggered knowing laughs from aficionados — in Marvel’s live-action efforts. He filmed cameos in movies including “Deadpool 2” and “Guardians of the Galaxy 2” far in advance of their release, in case he was indisposed. A gifted salesman, Lee also became a premiere ambassador for the comic book industry, reaching out to college campuses through personal appearances and interviews. With his outsized personality, Lee remained much in demand and creatively active into his 90s, creating new concepts for animation and TV. Born Stanley Lieber (and choosing his professional name by splitting his first name in half), Lee was raised by Jewish immigrant parents in New York City. His younger brother, Larry Lieber, became a comic book artist. Through his uncle, the brother-in-law of comic book publisher Martin Goodman, Lee became an assistant at what was then known as Timely Comics, which eventually became Marvel. By the time Marvel passed DC Comics in 1972 to become the top-selling comic book publisher, a new generation of fans-turned-pros stepped in to play in the sandbox Lee had helped build and continued to popularize. Few seemed to worry that the innovation on the company's core titles had drastically slowed. Characters whose actions were once hard to predict settled into recognizable patterns; narratives became cyclical. This, too, would eventually play into Lee's legacy, effectively incubating the company's stable of characters for decades so that their eventual film and television stewards could cherry-pick the most viable creative projects from thousands of pages of similar material. The backlash against Marvel's impresario came faster. Lee was cast as an industry villain twice in his career. The first time was for betraying his status as co-creator on so many of the previous decade's Marvel comics. The father of Marvel has made so many people so incredibly happy. What a life and what a thing to have achieved. Rest in peace Stan.” Holland plays Spider-Man in the movies, perhaps Lee’s most famous creation as a comic book writer. How many millions of us are indebted to this guy, none more so than me. The father of Marvel has made so many people so incredibly happy. What a life and what a thing to have achieved. Hawkeye star Jeremy Renner also posted a picture on Instagram, calling Lee a ‘legend’. The picture shows the two of them posing together. RIP Stan Lee ! Stan Lee and Dr. Seuss and Ray Bradbury.

Evans, who has played Steve Rogers in the Marvel Cinematic Universe since 2011’s Captain America: The First Avenger, wrote on Twitter, “There will never be another Stan Lee. For decades he provided both young and old with adventure, escape, comfort, confidence, inspiration, strength, friendship and joy. He exuded love and kindness and will leave an indelible mark on so, so, so many lives. There will never be another Stan Lee. For decades he provided both young and old with adventure, escape, comfort, confidence, inspiration, strength, friendship and joy. He exuded love and kindness and will leave an indelible mark on so, so, so many lives. Sad, sad day. Rest In Power, Uncle Stan.

[geek-gem]

Describing Doom 2016 Characters In A Nutshell

Mainly based upon this meme describing characters. Also just took out Silly Ways to Funny Ways yet the first one seemed childish just A Nutshell makes a bit more sense. Anyway please understand what I meant when I make this. Including spoilers for Doom 2016.

Doomslayer.

1: Evil's worst nightmare.

2: He's just fucking done now. With all this demonic shit.

3: Give him any weapon or even let him use his God damn bare hands. He'll be able to kill 10 demons in a row with that same method or a mix of everything. Including the demon body count rises.

4: RIP AND TEAR TILL IT'S FUCKING DONE!

5: Seriously fought the demons of Hell for eons.

6: So hardcore that some sort of angel was so shocked they gifted him what the demons call terrible power and speed so he can wreck shit up even more. Including due to his actual incorruptible soul.

6: He fought a huge ass demon that the demons called their champion named the Titan and HE FUCKING WON. How the Hell did he do that.(Maybe the idea I thought did he go to it's heart and killed it or just fought it regularly) Yet holy fucking shit it's skull was huge.

7: Including after killing the Titan a actual demon named the Wretch who the demons called actually betrayed her kind and gave him a suit(the one you wear in the game) and even a sword and shield, but the suit takes the life out of demons basically making him unstoppable.

7: The demons couldn't fucking kill him that they had to trap him and put him in some cursed sleep. Even afterwards they worshipped him like a fucking God. To the point of making testaments about him.

8: Including the demons shit themselves and worked together when the UAC were close to him because they didn't want him awaked but he's up now.

9: But other then that despite his brutal nature. The guy hates seeing innocent people die, and wants to make sure Hell stops invading. Including just wants to kill all demons. Probably has a heart of gold.

10: A extra thing he likes rabbits.

Samuel Hayden.

1: A tall ass cyborg of a man who can't die now basically.

2: Has a powerful voice because the sound of it is like wow.

3: Seriously fucking thinks using enegry from Hell is a okay to live.

4: Including he's fucking delusional that seriously thinking people's lives are worth the risk.

5: He's gonna betray because you broke his shit and he's tired of your shit. Seriously he planned this from the start yet probably got more pissed because the way Doomslayer was acting.

6: He could have prevented all of this madness by taking care of Olivia. Yet he let 61337 die and he knew it was gonna happen.

7: Yet he still spews shit that all of this is for the betterment of mankind and worth the risk. Despite the loss of many men, women, and children (I need to know if any children we're on the Mars base). Including the demons of Hell would basically take advantage of this too to invade.

8: Even if he's helping you, you just wanna kick his ass hoping for that in the next game. Including the fact he seriously says he's not the villain of this story. Or that's his personal thoughts.

Olivia Pierce.

1: An older women one of Samuel's former protege now helper of demons.

2: Is tricked and believes in the ideal of a future with demons. Oh yeah like that would go well.

3: While not innocent at all. This idea that Samuel calls her weak at certain points. Including Samuel could have prevented this by taking action yet fucking assumed assumed she might overcome or just knew she would never overcome it.

To be serious it's this idea the way Samuel addresses that. Including the idea he could of made sure none of this could have gotten worse. Basically Samuel is worse while Olivia was tricked and sided with the demons. While Olivia's not a victim I'm sorry of me getting serious.

Vega.

1: An AI so fucking advanced that he runs most or all of the Mars UAC facility.

2: Just a AI helping, no personal goals maybe, and no siding with anyone. Basically just programmed to help give details.

3: Very polite and helpful you'll like him more the Samuel. Including doesn't spew bullshit of using Hell's enegry to help mankind.

4: Is given an actual age 50 years actually I'm surprised honestly.

5: Actually had regrets of some things he's done. Probably meaning by helping Samuel out and I forgot about that part or just didn't think of it much. Also allows and helps by opening a portal to help by scarificing himself.

6: Yet what amazes me that Doomslayer actually considers him a innocent life worth saving that he makes a back up of Vega and keeps it. Preventing Vega from basically being dying. Was gonna mention this for Doomslayer but decided not to a bit much yet says a bit about the Doomslayer as a character.

UAC Spokesperson.

1: Not a character or maybe whatever but basically in a nutshell what's wrong with normalizing working with Hell and shit. The fact when watching Markiplier it made me think now the way he reacted.

The Demons.

1: All Hail Satan.

2: Look at all these gruesome and narly mother fuckers. We have Imps, Hell Knights, Pinky's, Cacodemons, Revenants, Baron's Of Hell, the Cyberdemon, the Hell Guards, and the Spider Mastermind, and so much more. To strike fear into everyone.

3: But once the Doomslayer appears, they became fucking pussies mainly in their mindset, yet fucking try and some of them thinking they could even take him on when really it's suicidal at this point.

4: A funny idea I've had imagine if a lot of the demons are new demons that weren't around when the Doomslayer was killing demons. They seriously fucking think they can take him on and don't believe or care for the stories.

But it all goes to shit when they realize how fucked they are. That you almost pity them but laugh at them as well.

Well that was a bit long or it was supposed to be long. But was supposed to be more funnier. Including I went to this video and just wanted to see this part with the death count. Okay didn't need to scroll down but yeah the 2nd level. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=t862gFWANVo

Including checking out Olivia and Vega on the Doom wiki for anything else. Got tags done but forgot to put the bosses when I was in the tags so put those there before started typing here. Hoped you enjoyed t.....my bro came in here singing what a man and just....he said dang I did it again after signing it more just anyway hoped to enjoyed this

[aion-rsa]

Upcoming Must-See Movies in 2021

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It’s 2021. Finally. If you’re reading this, it means you’ve hopefully gotten through the wreckage of last year unscathed and are ready for a brighter future. And if you’re also a movie lover, this certainly includes a trip (or 20) back to the cinemas. Although a month into the new year, and our hope for a better tomorrow has faded a bit–especially with new COVID variants spreading. Yet there is reason to remain warily optimistic. Yes, including about theaters

For nearly a year now cinemas have remained largely dormant, and given the already shuffling 2021 film calendar, that will continue for the foreseeable future. However, studios (with one notable exception) remain mostly committed to getting new films to the theater this year, and the current 2021 film slate gives reasons to be hopeful.

Indeed, 2021 promises many of the most anticipated films from last year, plus new surprises. From the superhero variety like Black Widow to the art house with Wes Anderson’s The French Dispatch, 2021 could be a much needed respite. So below is just a sampling of what to expect from the year to come…

Judas and the Black Messiah

February 12

It’s kind of hard to wrap one’s head around the annual “Oscar race” in a year when little trophies don’t seem so damn important, but Warner Bros. feels strongly enough about this movie that it’s getting it into theaters and on HBO Max right in the thick of the pandemic-delayed awards season. And judging by the marketing, it’s bringing heat with it.

Shaka King directs and co-writes the story of Fred Hampton (Daniel Kaluuya), who became the chairman of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party in the late 1960s and was murdered in cold blood by police in 1969. LaKeith Stanfield plays William O’Neal, a petty criminal who agreed to help the FBI take Hampton down. This promises to be incendiary, relevant material — and it’s almost here.

Minari

February 12

Lee Isaac Chung directs Steven Yeun–now fully shaking off his years as Glenn on The Walking Dead–in this semi-autobiographical film about a South Korean family struggling to settle down in rural America in the 1980s. Premiering nearly a year ago at the Sundance Film Festival, where it won both the U.S. Dramatic Grand Jury Prize and the U.S. Dramatic Audience Award, Minari had a quick one-week virtual release in December, with a number of critics placing it on their Top 10 lists for 2020.

Its story of immigration and assimilation currently has a perfect 100 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes, with critics lauding its heart, grace, and sensitivity. A few of ours also considered it among 2020’s best.

Nomadland

February 19

Utilizing both actors and real people, director Chloé Zhao (The Rider, Marvel’s upcoming Eternals) chronicles the lives of America’s “forgotten people” as they travel the West searching for work, companionship and community. A brilliant Frances McDormand stars as Fern, a woman in her mid-60s who lost her husband, her house, and her entire previous existence when her town literally vanished following the closure of its sole factory.

Zhao’s film quietly flows from despair to optimism and back to despair again, the hardscrabble lives of its itinerant cast (many of them actual nomads) foregrounded against often stunning–if lonely–vistas of the vast, empty American countryside.

I Care a Lot

February 19

A solid cast, led by Rosamund Pike, Peter Dinklage, Chris Messina, and Dianne Wiest, star in this satirical crime drama from director J. Blakeson (The Disappearance of Alice Creed). Pike plays Marla, a con artist whose scam is getting herself named legal guardian of her elderly marks and then draining their assets while sticking them in nursing homes. She’s ruthless and efficient at it, until she meets a woman (Wiest) whose ties to a crime boss (Dinklage) may prove too much of a challenge for the wily Marla. It was one of our favorites out of Toronto last year.

The Father

February 26

Anthony Hopkins gives a mesmerizing, and deeply tragic, performance as Anthony, an elderly British man whose descent into dementia is reflected by the film itself, which plays with time, setting, and continuity until both Anthony and the viewer can no longer tell what is real and what is not. Olivia Colman is equally moving as his daughter, who wants to get on with her own life even as she watches her father’s disintegrate in front of her.

We saw The Father last year at the AFI Fest and it ended up being a favorite of 2020; Hopkins is unforgettable in this bracing, heartbreaking work, which is stunningly adapted by first-time director Florian Zeller from his own award-winning play.

Chaos Walking

March 5

This constantly postponed sci-fi project has become one of those “we’ll believe it when we see it” films until it actually comes out. Shot nearly three and a half years ago by director Doug Liman, Chaos Walking has undergone extensive reshoots and was at one point reportedly deemed unreleasable.

Based on the book The Knife of Letting Go, it places Tom Holland (Spider-Man: Far From Home) and Daisy Ridley (The Rise of Skywalker) on a distant planet where Ridley, the only woman, can hear the thoughts of all the men due to a mysterious force called the Noise.

Raya and the Last Dragon

March 5

Longtime Walt Disney Animation Studios head of story, Paul Briggs (Frozen), will make his directorial debut on this original Disney animated fantasy, which draws upon Eastern traditions to tell the tale of a young warrior who goes searching for the world’s last dragon in the mysterious land of Kumandra. Cassie Steele will voice Raya while Awkwafina (The Farewell) will portray Sisu the dragon.

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Disney Animation has been nearly invincible in recent years with other hits like Moana and Zootopia, so watch for this one to be another major hit for the Mouse.

Coming 2 America

March 5

The notion of whether nostalgia-based properties are still viable has cropped up repeatedly in the last few years. However, streaming, which is where Coming 2 America finds itself headed post-COVID, makes golden oldies much safer. This sequel—based on a 32-year-old comedy that was one of Eddie Murphy’s most financially successful hits—sees Murphy back as Prince Akeem, of course, along with Arsenio Hall returning as his loyal friend Semmi.

The plot revolves around Akeem’s discovery, just as he is about to be crowned king, that he has a long-lost son living in the States (we’re not sure how that happened, but let’s just go with it). That, of course, necessitates another visit to our shores—that is, if Akeem and Semmi presumably don’t get stopped at the border. The film reunites Murphy with Dolemite is My Name director Craig Brewer, so perhaps they can make some cutting-edge social comedy out of this?

Godzilla vs. Kong

March 26

Here we are, at last at the big punch up between Godzilla and King Kong. They both wear a crown, but in the film that Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures have been building toward since 2014, only one can walk away with the title of the king of all the monsters.

Admittedly, not everyone loved the last American Godzilla movie, Godzilla: King of the Monsters, but we sure did. Still, Godzilla vs. Kong should be a different animal with Adam Wingard (You’re Next, The Guest) taking over directorial duties. It also has a stacked cast with some familiar faces (Kyle Chandler, Millie Bobby Brown, and Ziyi Zhang) and plenty of new ones (Alexander Skarsgård, Eiza González, Danai Gurira, Lance Reddick, and more).

It’ll probably be better than the original, right? And hey with its HBO Max rollout, questions of a poor box office run sure are conveniently mooted!

Mortal Kombat

April 16

Not to be deterred by the relative failure of Sony’s Monster Hunter in theaters at the tail end of 2020, Warner Bros. is giving this venerable video game franchise another shot at live-action cinematic glory after two previous tries in the 1990s. Director Simon McQuoid makes his feature debut while the script comes from Dave Callaham (Wonder Woman 1984, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings) and the cast includes a number of actors you’ve seen in other films but can’t quite place.

The plot? Who knows! But we’re guessing it will feature gods, demons, and warriors battling for control of the 18 realms in various fighting tournaments. What else do you want?

Black Widow

May 7

Some would charitably say it arrives a decade late, but Black Widow is finally getting her own movie. This is fairly remarkable considering she became street pizza in Avengers: Endgame, but this movie fits snugly between the events of Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: Infinity War. It also promises to be the most pared down Marvel Studios movie since 2014’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and that’s a good thing.

In the film, Scarlett Johansson’s Natasha Romanoff is on the run after burning her bridges with the U.S. government and UN. This brings her back to the spy games she thought she’d escaped from her youth, and back in the orbit of her “sister” Yelena (Florence Pugh). Old wounds are ripped open, old Soviet foes, including David Harbour as the Red Guardian and Rachel Weisz as Nat and Yelena’s girlhood instructor, are revealed, and many a fight sequence with minimal CGI will be executed.

How’s that for a real start to Phase 4? Of course that’s still assuming this comes out before The Eternals after it was delayed, again, due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Those Who Wish Me Dead

May 14

Taylor Sheridan is among the best writers in moviemaking right now. Having all but cornered the niche around modern Westerns, he’s responsible for the scripts for Hell or High Water, both Sicarios, and Wind River, the latter of which he also directed. He’s back in the director’s chair again for Those Who Wish Me Dead, which has been described as a “female-driven neo-Western” set in the Montana wilderness. It is there a teenager witnesses a murder, and he finds himself on the run from twin assassins, and in need of protection from a likely paranoid survivalist. The film stars Angelina Jolie, Jon Bernthal, Nicholas Hoult, Tyler Perry, Aidan Gillen, Jake Weber, and Finn Little.

Spiral

May 21

Chris Rock has co-written the story for a new take on the Saw franchise. Never thought we’d write those words! The fact that it also stars Rock, as well as Samuel L. Jackson, is likewise head-turning. It looks like they’re going for legitimate horror with Darren Lynn Bousman attached to direct after helming three of the Saw sequels, and its grisly pre-COVID trailer from last year.

Hopefully this will be better than most of the franchise that came before, and given the heavily David Fincher-influenced tone of the first trailer, we’re willing to cross our fingers and play this game.

Free Guy

May 21

What would you do if you discovered that you were just a background character in an open world video game—and that the game was soon about to go offline? That’s the premise of this existential sci-fi comedy from director Shawn Levy, best known for the Night at the Museum series and as an executive producer and director on Stranger Things. Ryan Reynolds stars as Guy, a bank teller who discovers that his life is not what he thought it was, and in fact isn’t even real—or is it? We’ve seen a preview of footage, so we’d suggest you think Truman Show, if Truman was trapped in Grand Theft Auto.

F9

May 28

Just when you thought this never-say-die franchise had shown us everything it could possibly dream up, it ups the stakes one more time: the ninth entry in the Fast and Furious saga (excluding 2019’s Hobbs and Shaw) will reportedly take Dom Toretto (Vin Diesel) and his cohorts into space as they battle Dom’s long-lost brother Jakob (John Cena, making a long-overdue debut in this series). Michelle Rodriguez, Tyrese Gibson, Chris “Ludacris” Bridges, Jordana Brewster, Helen Mirren, and Charlize Theron all also return, as does director Justin Lin, who took a two-film break from his signature series. Expect to see the required physics-defying stunts, logic-defying action and even more talk about “family” than usual.

Cruella

May 28

Since Disney has already made an animated 101 Dalmatians in 1961 and a live-action remake in 1996, it is apparently time to tell the story again Maleficent-style. Hence we now focus on the viewpoint of iconic villainess Cruella de Vil, played this time by Emma Stone. She’s joined in the movie by Emma Thompson, Paul Walter Hauser, and Mark Strong, with direction handled by Craig Gillespie (sort of a step down from 2017’s I, Tonya, if you ask us).

The story has been updated to the 1970s, but Cruella–now a fashion designer–still covets the fur of dogs for her creations. This is a Mouse House joint, so don’t expect it to get too dark, and don’t be completely surprised if it ends up as a premium on Disney+ in lieu of its already delayed theatrical release.

Infinite

May 28

This sci-fi yarn from director Antoine Fuqua (The Equalizer) stars Mark Wahlberg as a man experiencing what he thinks are hallucinations, but which turn out to be memories from past lives. He soon learns that there is a secret society of people just like him, except that they have total recall of their past identities and have acted to change the course of history throughout the centuries.

Based on the novel The Reincarnationist Papers by D. Eric Maikranz, this was originally a post-Marvel vehicle for Chris Evans. He dropped out, and the combination of Fuqua and Wahlberg hints at something more action-oriented than the rather cerebral premise suggests. The film also stars Sophie Cookson, Chiwetel Ejiofor, and Dylan O’Brien.

The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It

June 4

James Wan is already directing a new horror film this year so he’s stepping away from the directorial duties on the third film based on the paranormal investigations of Ed and Lorraine Warren (Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga). That task has fallen to Michael Chaves (The Curse of La Llorona), so expect plenty of the same Wan Universe touches: heavy atmosphere, superb use of sound, and shocking, eerie visuals.

Details are scarce, but the plot—like the other two Conjuring films—is taken from the true-life case of a man who went on trial for murder and said as his defense that he was possessed by a demon when he committed his crimes. That’s all we know for now, except that, intriguingly, Mitchell Hoog and Megan Ashley Brown have been cast as younger versions of the Warrens.

In the Heights

June 18

Lin-Manuel Miranda’s first Broadway hit musical gets the big screen treatment (by way of HBO Max) from director Jon M. Chu (Crazy Rich Asians). Set in Washington Heights over the course of a three-day heat wave, the plot and ensemble cast carry echoes of both Rent and Do the Right Thing. While a success on the stage—if not quite the cultural phenomenon that Miranda’s next show, Hamilton—it remains to be seen whether In the Heights can strike a chord with streaming audiences.

Luca

June 18

Continuing its current run of all-new, non-sequel original films started in 2020 with Onward and Soul, Pixar will unveil Luca this summer. Directed by Enrico Casarosa–making his feature debut after 18 years with the animation powerhouse–the film tells the story of a friendship between a human being and a sea monster (disguised as another human child) on the Italian Riviera. That’s about all we have on it for now, except that the cast includes Drake Bell and John Ratzenberger.

Pixar’s recent track record has included masterpieces like Inside Out, solid sequels like Toy Story 4, and shakier propositions like The Incredibles 2, but we don’t have any indication yet of what to expect from Luca.

Venom: Let There Be Carnage

June 25

Can anyone honestly say that 2018’s Venom was a “good” movie? A batshit insane movie, yes, and perhaps even an entertaining one in its own nutty way, but good or not, it made nearly a billion bucks at the box office so here we are.

Tom Hardy will return to peel more scenery down with his teeth as both Eddie Brock and his fanged, towering alien symbiote while Woody Harrelson will fulfill his destiny and play Cletus Kasady, aka Carnage, the perfected hybrid of psychopathic serial killer and red pile of vicious alien goo. Let the carnage begin!

Top Gun: Maverick

July 2

It’s been 34 years since Tom Cruise first soared through the skies as hotshot pilot Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, and he’ll take to the air once more in a sequel that also features Val Kilmer, Jennifer Connelly, Miles Teller, Jon Hamm, and more. The flying and action sequences from director Joseph Kosinski (who worked with Cruise on Oblivion) will undoubtedly be first-rate, but the studio (Paramount) has to be nervous after seeing one nostalgia-based franchise after another (Blade Runner, Charlie’s Angels, Terminator, The Shining) crash and burn recently.

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings

July 10

With Shang-Chi, Marvel Studios hopes to do for Asian culture what the company did with the groundbreaking Black Panther nearly three years ago: create another superhero epic with a non-white lead and a mythology steeped in a non-Western culture. Simu Liu stars in the title role as the “master of kung fu,” who must do battle with the nefarious Ten Rings organization and its leader, the Mandarin (the “real” one, not the imposter from Iron Man 3, played here by the legendary Tony Leung). Director Destin Daniel Cretton (Just Mercy) will open up a whole new corner of the Marvel Cinematic Universe with this story and character, whose origins stretch back to 1973.

The Forever Purge

July 9

One day nearly eight years ago, you went to see a low-budget dystopian sci-fi/horror flick called The Purge, and the next thing you know, it’s 2021 and you’re getting ready to see the fifth and allegedly final entry in the series (which has also spawned a TV show). Written by creator James DeMonaco and directed by Everardo Gout, the film will once again focus on the title event, an annual 12-hour national bacchanal in which all crime, even murder, is legal. How this ends the story, and where and when it falls into the context of the rest of the films, remains a secret for now. Filming was completed back in February 2020, with the film’s release delayed from last summer by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Space Jam: A New Legacy

July 16

There are two types of folks when it comes to the original Space Jam of 1996: those who were between the ages of three and 11 when it came out, and everyone else. In one camp it is an unsightly relic of ‘90s cross-promotional cheese; in the other, it’s a sports movie classic. Luckily for kids today, NBA star LeBron James was 11 for most of ’96, and he’s bringing back the hoops and the Looney Tunes in Space Jam: A New Legacy.

The film will be among the many Warner Bros. pics premieres on HBO Max and in theaters this year, and it will see King James share above-the-title credits with Bugs Bunny. All is as it should be.

The Tomorrow War

July 23

An original IP attempting to be a summer blockbuster? As we live and breathe. The Tomorrow War marks director Chris McKay’s first foray into live-action after helming The Lego Batman Movie. The film stars Chris Pratt as a soldier from the past who’s been “drafted by scientists” to the present in order to fight off an alien invasion overwhelming our future’s military. One might ask why said scientists didn’t use their fancy-schmancy time traveling shenanigans to warn about the impending aliens, but here we are.

Jungle Cruise

July 30

Disney dips into its theme park rides again as a source for a movie, hoping that the Pirates of the Caribbean lightning will strike once more. This time it’s the famous Adventureland riverboat ride, which is free enough of a real narrative that one has to wonder why some five screenwriters (at least) worked on the movie’s script.

Jaume Collet-Serra (The Shallows) directs stars Dwayne Johnson and Emily Blunt down this particular river, as they battle wild animals and a competing expedition in their search for a tree with miraculous healing powers. The comic chemistry between Johnson and Blunt is key here, especially if they really can mimic Bogie and Hepburn in the similarly plotted The African Queen. If they can sell that, Disney might just have a new water-based franchise to replace their sinking Pirates ship.

The Green Knight

July 30

David Lowery, the singular director behind A Ghost Story and The Old Man & the Gun, helmed a fantasy adaptation of the Arthurian legend of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. And his take on the material was apparently strong enough to entice A24 to produce it. Not much else is yet known about the film other than its cast, which includes Dev Patel, Alicia Vikander, Ralph Ineson, and Kate Dickie–and that it’s another casualty of COVID, with its 2020 release date being delayed last year. So this is one we’re definitely going to keep an eye on.

The Suicide Squad

August 6

Arguably the most high-profile of the WB films being transitioned to HBO Max, The Suicide Squad is James Gunn’s soft-reboot of the previous one-film franchise. It’s kind of funny WB went in that direction when the first movie generated more than $740 million, but when the reviews and word of mouth were that toxic… well, you get the guy who did Guardians of the Galaxy to fix things.

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Elements from the original movie are still here, most notably Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn and Viola Davis’ Amanda Waller, but the film promises to be weirder, meaner, and also sillier. The first points are proven by its expected R-rating, and the latter is underscored by its giant talking Great White Shark. Okay, we’ll bite.

Deep Water

August 13

Seedy erotic thrillers and neo noirs bathed in shadows and sex are largely considered a thing of the past—specifically 1980s and ‘90s Hollywood cinema. Maybe that’s why Deep Water hooked Adrian Lyne (Fatal Attraction, Indecent Proposal) to direct. The throwback is based on a 1957 novel by the legendary Patricia Highsmith (The Talented Mr. Ripley), and it pits a disenchanted married couple against each other, with the bored pair playing mind games that leave friends and acquaintances dead. That the couple in question is played by Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas, who’ve since become a real life item, will probably get plenty of attention close to release.

Respect

August 13

Respect is the long-awaited biopic of the legendary Aretha Franklin, with the Queen of Soul herself involved in its development for years until her death in August 2018. Authorized biopics always make one wonder how accurate the film will be, but then again, Aretha had nothing to be ashamed of. Hers was a life well-lived, her voice almost beyond human comprehension, and the only thing now is to see whether star Jennifer Hudson (Franklin’s personal choice) and director Liesl Tommy (making her feature debut) can do the Queen justice.

The King’s Man

August 20

This might be a weird thing to say: but has World War I ever seemed so stylish? It is with Matthew Vaughn at the helm.

An origin story of sorts for the organization that gave us Colin Firth and the umbrella, The King’s Man is a father and son yarn where Ralph Fiennes’ Duke of Oxford is reluctant about his son Conrad (Harris Dickinson) joining the war effort. But they’ll both be up to it as the Duke launches an intelligence gathering agency independent from any government. It also includes Gemma Arterton, Matthew Goode, and Aaron Taylor-Johnson as charter members.

Oh, and did we mention they fight Rasputin?

Candyman

August 27

In some ways it’s surprising that it’s taken this long—28 years, notwithstanding a couple of sequels—to seriously revisit the original Candyman. Director Bernard Rose’s original adaptation of the Clive Baker story, “The Forbidden,” is still relevant and effective today. Back then, the film touched on urban legends, poverty, and segregation: themes that are still ripe for exploration through a genre touchstone today.

After her breathtaking feature directorial debut, Little Woods, Nia DaCosta helmed this bloody reboot while working from a screenplay co-written by Jordan Peele (Get Out). That’s a powerful combination, even before news came down DaCosta was helming Captain Marvel 2. And with an actor on-the-cusp of mega-stardom, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, picking up Tony Todd’s gnarly hook, this is one to watch out for.

The Beatles: Get Back

August 27

Peter Jackson seems to enjoy making films about what inspired him in his youth: The Lord of the Rings, King Kong, his grandfather’s World War I service informing They Shall Not Grow Old. So perhaps it was inevitable he’d make a film about the greatest youth icon of his generation, the Beatles. In truth, The Beatles: Get Back is a challenge to a previous documentary named Let It Be, and the general pop culture image it painted.

That 1970 doc by Michael Lindsay-Hogg zeroed in on the band’s final released album, Let It Be (although it was recorded before Abbey Road). Now, using previously unseen footage, Jackson seeks to challenge the narrative that the album was created entirely from a place of animosity among the bandmates, or that the Beatles had long lost their camaraderie by the end of road. Embracing the original title of the album, “Get Back,” Jackson wants to get back to where he thinks the band’s image once belonged.

Resident Evil

September 3

Let’s try that again. As one of the most popular video game franchises of all-time, the original handful of Resident Evil games appeared ready made for adaptation. Visibly inspired by cult classic zombie movies from George Romero, Resident Evil once even had Romero attached. Instead we got the deafeningly dull Paul W.S. Anderson franchise starring Milla Jovovich. And those decade-spanning monstrosities lacked something any self-respecting zombie film needs: brains.

Now Resident Evil is back in a reboot helmed by writer-director Johannes Roberts. And he’s off to a promising start by apparently focusing on the plots of the first several video games in the series. The cast includes Hannah John-Kamen as Jill Valentine, Robbie Amell as Chris Redfield, Kaya Scodelario as Claire Redfield, Avan Jogia as Leon S. Kennedy, and Tom Hopper as Albert Wesker. So far so good. Fingers crossed.

A Quiet Place Part II

September 17

The sequel to one of 2018’s biggest surprises, A Quiet Place Part II comes with major expectations. And few may hold it to a higher standard than writer-director John Krasinski. Despite (spoiler) the death of his character in the first film, Krasinski returns behind the camera for the sequel after saying he wouldn’t. The story he came up with apparently was too good to pass up.

The film again stars Emily Blunt as the often silenced mother of a vulnerable family, which includes son Marcus (Noah Jupe) and deaf daughter Regan (Millicent Simmonds). However, now that they know how to kill the eagle-eared alien monsters who’ve taken over their planet, the cast has grown to include Cillian Murphy and Djimon Hounsou. While the film has been delayed due to the coronavirus outbreak, trust us that it’ll be worth the wait. Is it finally time for… resistance?

Death on the Nile

September 17

Murder on the Orient Express (2017) became a surprise hit for director and star Kenneth Branagh. Who knew that audiences would still be interested in an 83-year-old mystery novel about an eccentric Belgian detective with one hell of a mustache? Luckily, Agatha Christie featured Poirot in some 32 other novels, of which Death on the Nile is one of the most famous, so here we are.

Branagh once again directs and stars as Poirot, this time investigating a murder aboard a steamer sailing down Egypt’s famous river. The cast includes Gal Gadot, Armie Hammer, Letitia Wright, Tom Bateman, Ali Fazal, Annette Bening, Rose Leslie, and Russell Brand. Expect more lavish locales, scandalous revelations, the firing of a pistol or two, and, yes, more shots of that stunning Poirot facial hair.

The Many Saints of Newark

September 24

The idea of a prequel to anything always fills us with trepidation, and re-opening a nearly perfect property like The Sopranos makes the prospect even less appetizing. But Sopranos creator David Chase has apparently wanted to explore the back history of his iconic crime family for some time, and there certainly seems to be a rich tapestry of characters and events that have only been hinted at in the series.

Directed by series veteran Alan Taylor (Thor: The Dark World), The Many Saints of Newark stars Alessandro Nivola as Dickie Moltisanti (Christopher’s father), along with Jon Bernthal, Vera Farmiga, Corey Stoll, Ray Liotta, and others. But the most fascinating casting is that of Michael Gandolfini—James’ son—as the younger version of the character with which his late dad made pop culture history. For that alone, we’ll be there on opening night… even if that just means HBO Max!

Dune

October 1

Could third time be the charm for Frank Herbert’s complex novel of the far future, long acknowledged as one of the greatest—if most difficult to read—milestones in all of science fiction? David Lynch’s 1984 version was, to be charitable, an honorable mess, while the 2000 Sci-Fi Channel miniseries was decent and faithful, but limited in scope. Now director Denis Villeneuve (Blade Runner 2049, Arrival) is pulling out all the stops—even breaking the story into two movies to give the proper space.

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On the surface, the plot is simple: as galactic powers vie for control of the only planet that produces a substance capable of allowing interstellar flight, a young messiah emerges to lead that planet’s people to freedom. But this tale is dense with multiple layers of politics, metaphysics, mysticism, and hard science.

Villeneuve has assembled a jaw-dropping cast, including Timothée Chalamet, Rebecca Ferguson, Oscar Isaac, Josh Brolin, Stellan Skarsgård, Dave Bautista, Zendaya, Charlotte Rampling, Jason Momoa, and Javier Bardem, and if he pulls this off, just hand him every sci-fi novel ever written. Particularly, if relations between the director and WB remain strained…

No Time to Die

October 8

Nothing lasts forever, and the Daniel Craig era of James Bond is coming to an end… hopefully in 2021. In fact, delays notwithstanding, it’s a bit of a surprise Craig is getting an official swan song with this movie after the star said he’d rather “slash his wrists” before doing another one. Well, we’re glad he didn’t, just as we’re hopeful for his final installment in the tuxedo.

Director Cary Joji Fukunaga is a newcomer to the franchise, but that might be a good thing after how tired Spectre felt, and Fukunaga has done sterling work in the past on True Detective and Maniac. He also looks to bring the curtain down on the whole Craig oeuvre by picking up on the last movie’s lingering threads, such as 007 driving off into the sunset with Léa Seydoux’s Madeleine Swann, while introducing new ones that include Rami Malek as Bond villain Safin and Ana de Armas as new Bond girl Paloma. Yay for the Knives Out reunion!

Halloween Kills

October 15

2018’s outstanding reboot of the long-running horror franchise—which saw David Gordon Green (Stronger) direct Jamie Lee Curtis in a reprise of her most famous role—was a tremendous hit. So in classic Halloween fashion, two more sequels were put into production (the second, Halloween Ends, will be out in 2022… hopefully).

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Curtis is back as Laurie Strode, along with Judy Greer as her daughter, Andi Matichak as her granddaughter, and Nick Castle sharing Michael Myers duties with James Jude Courtney. Kyle Richards and Charles Cyphers, meanwhile, will reprise their roles as Lindsey Wallace and former sheriff Leigh Brackett from the original 1978 Halloween (Anthony Michael Hall will play the adult version of Tommy Doyle). The plot remains a mystery, but we’re pretty sure it will involve yet another confrontation between Laurie and a rampaging Myers.

The Last Duel

October 15

What was once among the most anticipated films of 2020, The Last Duel is the historical epic prestige project marked by reunions: Ridley Scott returns to his passion for period drama and violence; Matt Damon and Ben Affleck work together for the first time in ages as both actors and writers; and the film also unites each with themes that were just as potent in the medieval world as today: One knight (Damon) in King Charles VI’s court accuses another who’s his best friend (Adam Driver) of raping his wife (Jodie Comer). Oh, and Affleck plays the King of France.

With obviously harrowing—and uncomfortable—themes that resonate today, The Last Duel is based on an actual trial by combat from the 14th century, and is a film Affleck and Damon co-wrote with Nicole Holofcener (Can You Ever Forgive Me?). It’s strong material, and could prove to be one of the year’s most riveting or misjudged films. Until then, it has our full attention.

Last Night in Soho

October 22

Fresh off the success of 2017’s Baby Driver (his biggest commercial hit to date), iconoclastic British director Edgar Wright returns with what is described as a psychological and possibly time-bending horror thriller set in London. Whether this features Wright’s trademark self-aware humor remains to be seen, but since the film is said to be inspired by dread-inducing genre classics like Repulsion and Don’t Look Now, he might be going for a different effect this time.

The cast, of course, is outstanding: upstarts Anya Taylor-Joy (Queen’s Gambit) and Thomasin McKenzie (Jojo Rabbit) will face off with Matt Smith (Doctor Who), and British legends Diana Rigg and Terence Stamp. And the truth is we’re never going to miss one of Wright’s movies. Taylor-Joy talked to us here about finding her 1960s lounge singer voice for the film.

Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins

October 22

While the idea of a Hasbro Movie Universe seems to be kind of idling at the moment, corners of that hypothetical cinematic empire remain active. One such brand is G.I. Joe, which will launch its first spin-off in this origin story of one of the team’s most popular characters. Much of his early background remains mysterious, so there’s room to create a fairly original story while incorporating lore and characters already established in the G.I. Joe mythos.

Neither of the previous G.I. Joe features (The Rise of Cobra and Retaliation) have been much good, so we can probably expect the same level of quality from this one. Director Robert Schwentke (the last two Divergent movies) doesn’t inspire much excitement either. On the other hand, Henry Golding (Crazy Rich Asians) will star in the title role, and having Iko Uwais (The Raid) and Samara Weaving (Ready or Not) on board isn’t too bad either.

Antlers

October 29

Dramatic director Scott Cooper (Crazy Heart, Hostiles) is doing a horror movie. As we live and breathe. And he’s doing it with a huge boost of confidence from Guillermo del Toro, who has opted to produce the movie. Antlers is the tale of two adult brothers, one a teacher and the other a sheriff, getting wrapped up in a supernatural quagmire that involves a young student and a “dangerous secret.” And with a cast that includes Jesse Plemons, Keri Russell, and Graham Greene, we are very intrigued… even if we must wait once again due to a coronavirus delay.

Eternals

November 5

Based on a Marvel Comics series by the legendary Jack Kirby, the now long-forthcoming Eternals centers around an ancient race of powerful beings who must protect the Earth against their destructive counterparts (and genetic cousins), the Deviants. Director Chloe Zhao (fresh off the awards season buzzy Nomadland) takes her first swing at epic studio filmmaking, working with a cast that includes Angelina Jolie, Gemma Chan, Kit Harington, Salma Hayek, Richard Madden, Brian Tyree Henry, and more.

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The Incredible Hulk’s Diminished Legacy in the Marvel Cinematic Universe

By Gavin Jasper

In many ways, Eternals represents another huge creative risk for Marvel Studios: It’s a big, cosmic ensemble film introducing an ensemble that the vast majority of the public has never heard of. But then, it’s sort of in the same position as Guardians of the Galaxy from way back in 2014, and we all know what happened there.

Ghostbusters: Afterlife

November 11

With the 2016 Ghostbusters reboot criticized (fairly) for its lack of imagination and castigated (unfairly as hell) for its all-female ghost-hunting crew, director Jason Reitman–finally cashing in on the family name by returning to the brand his dad Ivan directed to glory in 1984–has crafted a direct sequel to the original films.

Set 30 years later, Afterlife follows a family who move to a small town only to discover that they have a long-secret connection to the OG Ghostbusters. Carrie Coon (The Leftovers), Finn Wolfhard (Stranger Things) and Paul Rudd (Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania) star alongside charter cast members Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson, Sigourney Weaver, Annie Potts, and, yes, Bill Murray.

King Richard

November 19

Will Smith’s King Richard promises to be a different kind of biographical film coming down the pipe. Rather than being told from the vantage of professional tennis playing stars Venus and Serena Williams, King Richard centers on their father and coach, Richard Williams. It’s an interesting choice to focus on the male father instead of the game-changing Black daughters, but we’ll see if there’s a strong creative reason for the approach soon enough. The film is directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green (Monsters and Men, Joe Bell).

Mission: Impossible 7

November 19

Once upon a time, the appeal of the Mission: Impossible movies was to see different directors offer their own take on Tom Cruise running through death-defying stunts. But then Christopher McQuarrie had to come along and make the best one in franchise history (twice). First there was Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation and then Mission: Impossible – Fallout. Now McQuarrie and company have set up their own separate quartet of films with recurring original characters like new franchise MVP Ilsa Faust (Rebecca Ferguson) across four films.

Read more

Movies

Audio Surfaces of Tom Cruise Raging on the Set of Mission: Impossible 7

By Kirsten Howard

Movies

Mission: Impossible 7 – What’s Next for the Franchise?

By David Crow

Thus enters M:I7, the third McQuarrie joint in the series and first half of a pair of incoming sequels filmed together. The first-half of this two-parter sees the whole crew back together, including Cruise’s Ethan Hunt, Ilsa, Benji (Simon Pegg), Luther (Ving Rhames), and CIA Director Erika Sloane (Angela Bassett). They’re also being joined by Hayley Atwell and Pom Klementieff, but really we’re all just eager to see what kind of insane stunts they can do to top the HALO jump in the last one.

Nightmare Alley

December 3

Director Guillermo del Toro is finally back with a film which was originally intended for release in 2020. But like so many others, Nightmare Alley saw its production frozen due to the coronavirus. Del Toro’s first film since winning the Best Picture Oscar for The Shape of Water, Nightmare adapts William Lindsay Gresham’s novel of the same name. With a script by Kim Morgan and del Toro, it tracks a mid-20th century carny played by Bradley Cooper who is also a silver-tongued grifter. But his con meets its match (and is then outclassed) by his chance encounter with a psychiatrist (Cate Blanchett). They’ll make a hell of a team.

West Side Story

December 10

Steven Spielberg has just two remakes on his directorial resume: Always (1989) and War of the Worlds (2005). While the former is mostly forgotten and the latter was an adaptation of a story that has been filmed many times, his upcoming reimagining of West Side Story will undoubtedly be directly compared to Robert Wise’s iconic 1961 screen version of this classic musical.

A few numbers in previous films aside, Spielberg has never directed a full-blown musical before, let alone one associated with such powerhouse songs and dance numbers. His version, with a script by Tony Kushner, is said to stay closer to the original Broadway show than the 1961 film—but with its themes of love struggling to cross divides created by hate and bigotry, don’t be surprised if it’s just as hard-hitting in 2021. Certainly would’ve devastated last year….

Spider-Man 3

December 17

Sony has finally gotten to a “Spider-Man 3” again in their oft-rebooted franchise crown jewel (technically though this film is still untitled). That proved to be a stumbling block the first time it occurred with Tobey Maguire in the red and blues, but the company seems undaunted since Tom Holland’s third outing is expected to bring Maguire back—him and just about everyone else too.

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Movies

Spider-Man 3: Charlie Cox Daredevil Return Would Redeem the Marvel Netflix Universe

By Joseph Baxter

Movies

Spider-Man 3 Adds Benedict Cumberbatch’s Doctor Strange

By Joseph Baxter

With a multiverse plot ripped straight from the arguably best Spidey movie ever, 2018’s Into the Spider-Verse, Holland’s third outing is bringing back Maguire, Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man, Alfred Molina as Doc Ock, Jamie Foxx as Electro (eh), and probably more. It’s a Spidey crossover extravaganza that’s only missing a Spider-Ham. But just you wait…

The Matrix 4

December 22

Rebooting or continuing The Matrix series has always been a tough proposition. While the original Matrix film is one of the landmark achievements in science fiction and early digital effects filmmaking in the 1990s, its sequels were… less celebrated. In fact, directors Lily and Lana Wachowski were publicly wary about the idea of ever going back to the series. And yet, here we are with Lana (alone) helming a project that’s been a longtime priority for Warner Bros.

Read more

Movies

The Matrix 4: Laurence Fishburne “Wasn’t Invited” to Reprise Morpheus Role

By John Saavedra

Movies

The Matrix 4 Already Happened: Revisiting The Matrix Online

By John Saavedra

The Matrix 4 also brings back Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, and Jada Pinkett Smith. This is curious since Reeves and Moss’ characters died at the end of the Matrix trilogy—and also because Laurence Fishburne’s Morpheus did not, yet he wasn’t asked back. We cannot say we’re thrilled about the prospect of more adventures in Zion after the disappointment of the first two sequels, but we’d be lying if we didn’t admit we’re still curious to see the story that brought Lana back to this future.

The French Dispatch

TBA

Wes Anderson has a new film coming out. Better still, it is another live-action film. While Anderson’s use of animation is singular, it’s been seven years since The Grand Budapest Hotel, which we maintain is one of the best movies of the last decade. Anderson  is working with Timothée Chalamet and Cristoph Waltz for the first time with this film, as well as several familiar faces including Saoirse Ronan, Willem Dafoe, Tilda Swinton, Léa Seydoux, Adrien Brody, Owen Wilson, Jason Schwartzman, and, of course, Bill Murray.

The French Dispatch is set deep in the 20th century during the peak of modern journalism, it brings to life a series of fictional stories in a fictional magazine, published in a fictional French city. We suspect though, if Anderson’s last two live-action movies are any indication, it’ll have more than fiction on its mind–especially since it’s inspired by actual New Yorker stories, and the journalists who wrote them! We missed it in 2020, so here’s hoping it really does go to print in 2021!

Other interesting movies that may come out in 2021 but do not yet have release dates: Next Goal Wins, Don’t Worry Darling, Blonde, The Northman, Resident Evil, Red Notice, Army of the Dead.

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The post Upcoming Must-See Movies in 2021 appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[the-master-cylinder]

SUMMARY In the kingdom of Aruk, the high priest Maax is given a prophecy by his witches that he would die facing the son of King Zed. So he sends one of his witches to kidnap and kill the child, but before she can kill him, a villager rescues the child and raises him as his own son. Named Dar while raised in the village of Emur, the child learns how to fight, and has the ability to telepathically communicate with animals. Years later, a fully grown Dar witnesses his people being slaughtered by the Juns, a horde of fanatic barbarians allied with Maax. Dar, the only survivor of the attack, journeys to Aruk to avenge his people. In time, Dar is joined by a golden eagle he names Sharak, a pair of thieving ferrets he names Kodo and Podo, and a panther he names Ruh.

Eventually, Dar meets a redheaded slave girl called Kiri before getting himself lost and ending up surrounded by an eerie half-bird, half-human race who dissolve their prey for nourishment. As the bird men worship eagles, they spare Dar when he summons Sharak and give him an amulet should he need their aid. Dar soon arrives at Aruk where Maax had assumed total control with the Juns’ support. Maax has taken the children of the townspeople, and is sacrificing them to his god Ar. After having Sharak save the child of a townsman named Sacco, Dar learns that Kiri is to be sacrificed. On his way to save her, Dar is joined by Zed’s younger son Tal and his bodyguard Seth, learning that Kiri is Zed’s niece as the three work to save her. While Seth goes to gather their forces, Dar helps Kiri and Tal infiltrate the temple and rescue King Zed.

Zed leads his forces to attack the city, but they’re captured. Dar returns to save them from being sacrificed. In the conflict that follows, Maax reveals Dar’s relationship to Zed before slitting Zed’s throat and facing the Beastmaster. Despite being stabbed, revived by his remaining witch before she was killed, Maax is about to kill Dar when Kodo sacrifices himself to cause the high priest to fall into the sacrificial flames. But the victory is short-lived as the Jun horde is approaching Aruk, arriving by nightfall to face the trap Dar and the people set for them. Tal is wounded as Dar succeeds in burning most of the Juns alive while defeating their chieftain before the bird-men arrive to consume those remaining. The following day, Seth invites Dar to be the new king, but Dar explains that Tal would make a better king, and he leaves Aruk. Dar sets off into the wild with Kiri, Ruh, Sharak and Podo (who has given birth to two baby ferrets) on the path to new adventures.

DEVELOPMENT/PRE-PRODUCTION Beastmaster found a home under the protective wing of Sylvio Tabet’s own production/financing company, Leisure Investments. This arrangement allowed the production company more artistic freedom than studio financing would have permitted. Tabet then proceeded to seed the production staff with the finest artisans and craftspeople he could find.

“We have a very good team, it’s very professional,” Tabet comments. “John Alcott, the cinematographer, made The Shining and Barry Lyndon. He’s an Academy Award winner! He’s giving a tremendous look to this picture. He’s painting the film in a kind of goldish, rust color which gives us the feeling that this picture is of another time. He had a way to light interiors with only torches and candles, using practically no light at all. Again, I think this film has been very challenging for everybody, but the results on screen are incredible—it’s working incredibly well.”

“We spent two years researching Beastmaster. You need it! We studied each movement of the actors because there is a lot of sword fighting in the picture, and you have to choreograph the movements on paper before you can bring it to the screen. We’re also working with a lot of special effects, miniatures and animals. I’ve had to create a whole new world for this film. Or at least, I’m trying.

“It’s very challenging. Sometimes I don’t sleep at night….” Tabet pauses. “But I must say, I’m very pleased with the results. On the screen, the film has a totally different look, much imagination.” And for Tabet, the end result on the screen is his reward for the hard work and lost sleep.

The shoot itself was a demanding one. Bad weather and difficult night shoots plagued the production. Everything in the film had to be built from scratch, and built to last. Film Builders Productions in North Hollywood provided villages, sets and a 70-foot sacrificial pyramid that had to endure five months of location shooting. But Tabet, director Don Coscarelli and producer Paul Pepperman assembled a cast of special effects artisans who had the vision and the ability to meet the demands of budget.

FX Lineup Mike Minor provided the Art Direction for the Special Effects Unit. Under his direction, Will Guest built the miniatures which were photographed by Bill Cruse. Makeup artist Bill Munns created the fantasy makeups, and pyrotechnic wizard Roger George marshalled the explosions.

The fantastic creatures which populate Beastmaster were a pioneering effort in Tabet’s eyes. “There are many new SPFX concepts we are testing,” he explains. “The bird warriors in the picture are one of a kind. They are men who are like bat creatures. We had to create winged clothes on the actors (which were articulated), to close around the enemy. The enemy starts to disintegrate, and you can see the disintegration through the wings.”

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Witch women cling like spiders to the ceilings and fly through rooms, weaving evil spells at the bidding of Maax, their high priest. Jun warriors devastate villages. Zombie death guards sacrifice innocent children. Giants smash cities into ruin. Beastmaster promises a feast of visual effects for its viewers.

“All kinds of special effects!” Tabet chuckles. “It’s a fantasy with a lot of action, a lot of dreams. This kind of film you’ll never see on television. It has a large scope. It is a very ambitious project.”

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“It took me a year to put together,” he says. “I believe in the talent of Don Coscarelli. He sees everything fresh, new ideas.”

“We did a lot of storyboarding,” says Coscarelli, “but it all turned out to be pretty useless once we got to the set. A lot of things changed.” Some of those changes may have had something to do with the special considerations of cinematographer John Alcott (The Shining, Terror Train) and special effects man Roger George (Phantasm), since perhaps 90 percent of the picture was shot in natural illumination and torch or firelight of some kind. “Roger George was in charge of all the pyrotechnics,” says Coscarelli, “and we worked out some incredible things; explosions, and a 200 foot long wall of fire 25 feet high. We shot that same scene for three weeks.” Says Coscarelli of John Alcott, “it was a different experience having another person doing the cinematography, but John Alcott is terrific. He was easy to work with just a real nice guy-and he was very responsive to my wishes.”

The Beast Master by Andre Norton

The Beast Master tells of Hosteen Storm, a Navajo and former soldier who has empathic and telepathic connections with a group of genetically altered animals. The team emigrates from Earth to the distant planet Arzor where it is hired to herd livestock. Storm still harbors anger at his former enemies the Xik, and has sworn revenge on a man named Quade for his father’s murder. According to Kirkus he finds “life and hope” instead.

The animals in Coscarelli’s film are possibly the most unique aspect of it, and were, perhaps, the most difficult. It takes time to film animal scenes, especially if the animal must perform some bit of business that is vital to the plot. Boone Narr, of Gentle Jungle in Burbank, California, supplied the beasts, including some 20 ferrets, each trained to do a different task (so that it would appear that the two ferrets in the story were doing everything), and Kipling, an extremely large Bengal tiger that was colored black for his role as Dar’s pet. “Kipling,” chuckles Coscarelli, “had absolute casting approval.” Had the big cat been less amicable, Marc Singer (Dar) might have wound up as leading meal, rather than leading male. There were only a couple of instances when the tigers (there were three-as stand ins for one another) appeared to get out of hand. One cat got loose in the dark warehouse that was being used for the interior sets. “A black tiger in a dark warehouse!” laughs Coscarelli, “We didn’t hang around to see how they were going to catch him.” The cat was caught, quickly, however, and without incident-credit the animal handlers from Gentle Jungle.

“The animals are really difficult –it’s a matter of sitting around with 80 people, spending a fortune, until you have what you want. Then, when it does happen, it’s like magic; no one can figure how we get them to do it. The ferrets are very workable-we have about 20 of them, to represent the two in the movie. Some are jumpers, some are quick ones, some are trained to carry beads; they’re all trained to do different things, all of them in marked cages waiting for their set call.”

As talented as the animal cast may be, finding the right human cast was one of the most arduous preproduction tasks. Certainly the best-known cast member is Rip Torn, one of New York’s most respected stage actors, reputed to be a very interesting’ person to have in any cast. Pepperman confirms that there were few dull moments while Torn was on the set. “We only had him for a while, and we’ve really missed the action since he left,” says the producer.

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For the part of Lara the slave girl, Tanya Roberts-a former Charlie’s Angel who is exceptional in appearing to be both beautiful and bright-was selected after a lengthy period of open casting calls and dozens of readings. “When she came in, we all agreed that she had the look and the feel that we had in mind for that character, and she’s been wonderful. She does a lot of very athletic things in the film; just two nights ago we were out on top of this 80-foot cliff, with Tanya and a stuntman in the outfit of Maax’s Deathguard, who was to take a high-fall off of it, and the role required her to stand at the very edge looking down. She was letting out a little scream every once in awhile-but she was out there doing it.”

Pepperman seems most grateful for having Marc Singer on board. “We literally saw hundreds and hundreds of people for that lead role, through the two casting directors that were with us through preproduction. “Name” people, unknowns, all kinds of people. We were looking for a guy in really good shape-not an overdeveloped bodybuilder type, but somebody normal-looking who was in really good shape. We were looking and looking, and Marc’s name came up twice-once on a list that mentioned him as part of a San Francisco repertory production of Taming of the Shrew. Our casting director at the time said no, that won’t work. Then his name came up again a couple of months later on a list of ‘name’ people to be considered; his credits included a TV movie called The Contender, in which he played a boxer, and another called For Ladies Only, where he played a male stripper. We knew from those roles that he had to have a body, and we knew that if he could handle The Taming of the Shrew he had to be able to act, so we had him in. We found that he had the body, he had the look, and he could act, so he was in. As another plus, we never asked whether he was able to handle a sword-but it turned out that he is a more than adequate fencer, and he does a heck of a lot of his own stunts, too. I imagine that without Marc, we would have been maybe three weeks behind schedule.”

Principal filming will be finished as you read this, and plans call for the edited film to be delivered in early July. “For us that’s working very fast,” says Pepperman, “but then, again, this is the first time that Don has not done the editing entirely on his own.”

During lensing of the sword-and-sorcery adventure, Marc Singer notes he got along well with director Don (Phantasm) Coscarelli. “I’m really happy we turned out such a great movie. I received excellent directorial advice on my character from the man who was sort of ‘helping’ in the direction of Beastmaster, Chuck (Gumball Rally) Bail. He was on set as a ghost entity to help with the production and he gave me clues for Dar’s character. Chuck did so much on that film that I hesitate to say how much he truly did. In my opinion, he was the backbone of the project.”

 Playing a warrior who can telepathically bond with animals, Singer found himself in close contact with hawks, tigers and bears– not to mention ferrets. “It was very demanding, working with the animals, but it was also exhilarating,” he says happily. “I would have to say it was more inspiring than it was hard, except for the bear, which had a tendency to want to eat people. That was the only animal you had to stay away from.

 Singer to work closely with some beastly co-stars: tigers, eagles and ferrets. The actor remembers the experience with mixed feelings; “At first, I had to work with five different tigers to find the tiger with which I had the best relationship. At one point, one turned around and grabbed me by the leg. Everyone froze for a minute, then the cat let me go.

 “I had a very good relationship with my tiger. In fact, I miss it and think of it often. It was like a religious experience everytime I was near this animal, and I developed a great and abiding love for it. I think the reason the tiger accepted me, and was good to me, is that whenever I was on screen with it, I felt it was an enormous privilege. I always let the tiger be the boss. The film may have been titled The Beastmaster, but whenever I was on screen with that tiger, I said to it, ‘This is your forum to tell us of the beauty and majesty of the natural world and why we should take care of it and have a responsibility towards you.’”

 The eagle, on the other hand, proved less amenable. According to Singer, the only person it tolerated was its trainer. In one scene, the bird flew directly at Singer, scoring his back with its talons. “It really was a question of the eagle’s maternal instinct fixating itself on its handler. To the eagle, anyone else was an intrusion and a threat,” Singer explains. “Obviously, we had to reshoot the scene.”

 Another animalistic incident involved a Japanese grizzly bear. “This was the very first shot of the film,” Singer recalls. “And the handlers said to us, ‘Gentlemen, if you’ll all stand back now, we’re going to bring out the bear and use him in this shot. Please be very quiet and anybody not needed on the set, please go away. Everything will be just fine.’

 “They turned around and unlocked the cage. This bear-it’s about eight or nine feet tall jumped right out and began mauling one of the handlers. Just tore him to pieces. They had six guys trying to get it off the trainer and back into the cage.”

SPECIAL EFFECTS Though Phantasm had a goodly number of makeup effects, the size and scope of The Beastmaster required Coscarelli, for the first time, to engage in the creation of a makeup effects unit. It wasn’t easy.

“Our problems in the makeup department,” Coscarelli says, “were chiefly problems of organization. We shopped around for a time, while we were in preproduction. We had something on the order of 50 different things that had to be accomplished. One very well-known outfit priced the job at $300,000, and another group that had just completed a successful sword and sorcery picture figured it at $100,000. For a while, we employed a fellow who had done some work for New World Pictures; he came in, and was very pleasant, and he gave the impression that he could handle everything that we needed. But apparently we made a mistake by not checking more thoroughly into his background-I recall one time that he explained that something we needed wasn’t ready because he had used the wrong fixative on his plastics, and that he’d passed out in his lab for three hours!”

If only for his own safety, it was thought best to let that individual go, and the search resumed for the right effects man. With the schedule grow among his recent credits, has proven to be a valuable addition to the crew. In other areas, however, it has proven, for Pepperman at least, to be a shade less satisfying.

“There’s not as much of our being able to get in there and say, ‘OK, this here’s the way we want it, the way it should be done,’ showing people exactly what you mean. This has been a long, hard haul, and day after day ! promise myself that the next one will be a nice, small movie. This way, there are so many departments, and so many people in each department … it becomes a problem to have little things changed. The prop department needs something, it gets drawn up, then it gets fabricated, and by the time you see it, if something is not quite right, it’s a big process to send it back to have it changed. And it’s necessary sometimes, though we do have a lot of topnotch people.

‘On special effects, there were a lot of things that, on Phantasm, we had to figure out how to do-now we’ve got people who tell us right off the bat what we’re going to do, with mechanical and pyrotechnical effects.”

In addition to the expanded scope of the production, further complications were introduced to the project in the film’s extensive use of prosthetics: witch women-beautiful bodies topped by hideous faces; bird warriors-extra tall, lean actors dressed in elaborate costumes; and various other worldly beasts are all dependent on realistic prosthetics for their convincing portrayal. Add to that the task of shooting many scenes with trained animals, and you may begin to conceive the types of problem is faced and solved by the young filmmakers.

Enter Bill Munns, Munns is the subject of some controversy in special effects circles; his work in The Boogens and Swamp Thing has received some sharp criticism and yet both of these films were made on budgets that require Munns to practically pull his monsters out of a hat. What Munns lacks in terms of a glamor reputation is amply compensated by his growing reputation as an fx man who respects the movie makers’ budgets and schedules. By the time Munns joined Beastmaster, the schedule had been cut desperately short by the previous fx dead ends. “When I saw the things that Bill had done for us,” recalls the director, “I wasn’t immediately pleased with all of them; but everything Bill did was done on time and on schedule. And by taking extra care with the lighting, everything looks good on screen, so, in general, our experience with Bill was a good one.”

The original makeup designer (Michael McCracken, Jr.) did not put any mouth or nostrils on these masks, and the people wearing them couldn’t breathe. I had no time to resculpt and remake the masks, so I just cut discreet holes in the masks and put straws up into the masks and into the actors’ mouths. Then, right before each scene was filmed, I took scissors and clipped the straws off right at the mask surface so they wouldn’t show, but so the actors could still breathe. These photos were my own on-set photos between takes, which is why the straws stick out so obviously. I was just taking reference photos of the suits. Another curious thing about these suits is they have no backs, because there wasn’t enough money left for me to make back-torso sections.

The work I am most proud of on this movie is at the upper right top, the “eye ring”. This curious thing was supposed to be a living eye magically infused into a ring, worn by an unsuspecting person, so the ring could spy on people and report visually back to its magical owner. There were six rings total, three just regular with eye closed (the left ring) and one with the eye open, plus the “Hero” ring with animation built in so the eyelid could open and the eye could look side to side, and finally a ring with a gelatin eye that could be burned and melted with a flaming stick. The “Hero” eye ring was one of my more ingenious feats of engineering, because it was still a practical ring the actor could wear.

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The beginning of the film, where a witch steals the queen’s unborn child from her womb. They wanted to see the unborn baby struggling against the woman’s stomach skin as it was magically being extracted. So I had to build a cable-controlled baby head and hands that could push against the foam latex stomach skin and also build a large air bladder so the belly could be expanded and contracted with air pumped rapidly in and out. At left, the green and black hoses are the air hoses for inflating and deflating the bladder. At the bottom, you can see the baby animation device and the cables controlling them. Bottom right is the foamed latex skin that covers the effects devices.

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SCORE/SOUNDTRACK The Beastmaster (1982) Lee Holdridge

The score was composed and conducted by Lee Holdridge; it was recorded in Rome with members of The Orchestra of the Academy of Santa Cecilia of Rome and the Radio Symphony Orchestra of Rome. The soundtrack album was originally issued by Varèse Sarabande, and subsequently by C.A.M. In 2013 Quartet Records released a 1200-copy limited edition featuring the original album (tracks 1–13, disc 1) and most of the film’s score (Holdridge wrote eighty minutes of music for the film; a few cues could not be found, but the album includes music that was not heard in the finished product).

  CAST/CREW Directed Don Coscarelli

Produced Paul Pepperman Donald P. Borchers Sylvio Tabet

Written Don Coscarelli Paul Pepperman

Based on The Beast Master by Andre Norton

Marc Singer as Dar Billy Jacoby as young Dar Tanya Roberts as Kiri Rip Torn as Maax Donald Battee Don Battee as Chameleon John Amos as Seth Josh Milrad as Tal Rod Loomis as King Zed Vanna Bonta as Zed’s Wife Ben Hammer as Dar’s father Ralph Strait as Sacco Tony Epper as Jun Leader

Tara Candoli … makeup artist Ailen Derderian  … makeup effects assistant Katrin Derderian … makeup effects assistant Karen Kubeck … assistant makeup artist Louis Lazzara    … makeup artist: second unit David B. Miller  … makeup effects artist Michael Mills    … prosthetic makeup artist Jaklin Munns … makeup effects assistant William Munns    … special makeup effects designer Peter Tothpal    … hair dresser Michelle Triscario   … makeup effects assistant Mark Shostrom    … special makeup effects artist (uncredited)

CREDITS/REFERENCES/SOURCES/BIBLIOGRAPHY Starlog#63 Starlog#84 Starlog#271 Fangoria#18 Fangoria#22

The Beastmaster (1982) Retrospective SUMMARY In the kingdom of Aruk, the high priest Maax is given a prophecy by his witches that he would die facing the son of King Zed.

[millennialslayer]

I agree. Anya's first episode on BtVS she does a wish that gets FIVE members of the group murdered including the one cojoled into making the wish, turns Willow & Xander into soulless demons (his worst nightmare), lets loose The Master, Angel was chained & tortured every week (likely raped "people in chains and we can ride them like ponies"), and such a high death rate in Sunnydale there's a city wide sunset curfew.

Anya cursed a domestic abuser by turning him into a sluggoth demon and he ate his victim's dog and tried to eat her too.

When Anya conjured a massive spider to murder 11 men she went home afterwards. The girl who wished figuratively "they'd know what it felt like to have their hearts ripped out" was trapped alone and crying in a closet with the mass murdering spider right outside then it left campus and ripped out the heart of another man not connected to any of what was happening.

Vengeance demons chose easy marks when they should save children locked in cages by parents, women forced into prostitution by male traffickers, etc. Tara was gaslit by the men in her family into believing she was a demon and had to be their servant or she'd fully succumb to evil. Amy had to live for months inside her abusive mother's body. Xander & Faith had alcohol parents. Connor was raised in a demon dimension. Wesley was traumatized by his father. That little league coach who beat an 11 year old into a coma wasn't worth punishing?

Halfrek punishes Buffy on her 21st birthday (judging her actions when a 20 year old) in her first 3 months after being raised from the dead because she worked 2 jobs (80-90 hours a week, DMP + unpaid patrol + training + researching) and couldn't spend enough time with Dawn who is only 5 years younger. She thought it required vengeance instead of helping Buffy, who is not that far from teen herself. Where was Halfrek when Buffy was 15 battling demons?

Does anyone else think the Halfrek scene shitting on Buffy in s6's Older & Far Away is nearly as hard to watch as the mutiny scene shitting on Buffy in s7's Empty Places?

[traincat]

I love the gifset you reblogged with Pete and Gwen! I was just wondering what was wrong(?) with the Homecoming review you mentioned in your tags? What are your thoughts on Homecoming? :) Anyways love your blog and your writing! Have a great day!

Thank you! So I have somewhat unsuccessfully attempted not to be Really Negative about Homecoming, except on twitter where I’ve clearly given up altogether, but heads up: I’m about to be pretty negative because I care way too much about Peter Parker. My opinions are my own, etc. Right off the bat: I actually do think Spider-Man: Homecoming is going to be a fun summer movie. It’s probably well-written and engaging! It looks like a good movie about a teenage superhero coming into his own and I’m excited about the diverse cast. 

It also, in my own opinion, looks like a terrible movie about Peter Parker.

There was nothing wrong with the review (it was in USA Today) so much as that literally everything it described made me, a person who loves Peter Parker, cringe. Full disclaimer that I haven’t seen Homecoming yet and it’s plausible I might like it in the end! I won’t, but it’s plausible! So everything I’m talking about is based on interviews with the cast and creators/trailers and released scenes/etc. 

But I’ve got so much beef with this movie I practically own a cattle ranch. 

I’m just going to try to hit my main complaints: Ned Leeds, or, This Should Have Been a Miles Morales Movie, Peter as a New Yorker, Peter Parker vs Spider-Man: A Fake Argument, and Why We Actually Do Need To Know How Ben Died, Thanks. “Traincat, how much have you thought about this?” I don’t want to talk about it! Except I do, under the cut:

1) Ned Leeds. This has been pointed out before, but it bears repeating until all my metaphorical cows come home: Homecoming’s “Ned Leeds” is literally Ganke Lee, Miles Morales’ best friend. Look at Ganke. Now look at 616 Ned. Back to Ganke. Yeah. He looks like him, and he appears to act like him from the little we’ve seen. “Ned” knows Peter is Spider-Man, the way Ganke knows Miles is Spider-Man. Ned is enthusiastic about Peter being Spider-Man, the way Ganke is. Ned’s playing with Legos in a Homecoming trailer, Ganke loves Legos, etc. They didn’t even try to hide the fact that they stole a major Miles Morales character for the benefit of a Peter Parker movie. 

It’s possible Ned Leeds will resemble Ned Leeds more closely when the movie comes out, in which case I look forward to Spider-Man 3: Still At Home, where Peter passionately makes out with Ned’s wife and then Ned dies in Germany. But I have my doubts about that.

One of my problems is that I, personally, am not particularly interested in Peter Parker in high school. (WHERE is the movie where he is 30, teaching high school, and played by Alfie Enoch? I want it. You want it. We all want it. Look at him. He’s perfect.) If we’re going to do a teenage Spider-Man, why NOT Miles Morales, who IS the Spider-Man currently in high school, and who HAS been a kid since his introduction several years ago. Peter graduated high school in Amazing Spider-Man #28. There are over 700+ issues of Amazing Spider-Man alone. It’s time to leave the idea of Peter Parker as a character perpetually in high school behind.

BUT, if we were going to make a Teen Peter Parker movie, make it actually about Peter, because the way this is marketed (the gaming laptop commercial? The Audi one where he’s taking a driver’s test? The banking quiz? I cannot think of anything that screams Spider-Man less than German automobiles) sure looks like this is a movie about Relatable Teen Hero Boy-Man, who may be a good kid but he’s not Peter Parker, and who is here to sell you, the viewer, some stuff.

(I cannot believe consumerism giveth the Spider-Mobile, and consumerism taketh it away.)

2) New York! Where I am typing this post from, actually! True story: I never would have even read this review, but my mom read it and to quote: “There’s going to be a problem. Aunt May drives him around.” NAH. N A H. Listen, I know people in New York have cars. I know people in Queens have cars. I know this so well that I have my aunt’s car, which before me sat in a parking lot in Queens 360 days out of the year. Almost any scene you could tell in a regular car, you could tell in a subway car. Also, you can see Washington DC in the trailer, which means that at some point the movie is going to take Peter out of New York, a move I cannot possibly see the point to. I’m going to be an Obnoxious New Yorker for a hot second: Other superheroes might live in New York, but Peter Parker is New York. He has to have a relationship with the city itself. This is one of the things I think The Amazing Spider-Man movies did wonderfully: looking at New York actually felt like looking at New York. The scene with the crane operators, the webbed I LOVE YOU, Gwen’s fire escape, or when he jaywalks through traffic in Union Square. The big fight in Times Square. Homecoming already didn’t FEEL like New York from the trailers and now a chunk of the movie isn’t even taking place in it? Aunt May’s going to drive her nephew around? What’s the point? Why would you strip the New Yorker (”fuck you” means “have a nice day”) from a superhero defined by it? 

(PS it’s because Peter is a heavily Jewish-coded character and taking the New Yorker out of him makes him less so. See also, down below, the removal of his guilt/responsibility complex.)

3) He’s Just Always Spider-Man, Guys. The USA Today review also includes a quote from Tom Holland about how “Spider-Man is not Peter Parker” and they’ve “made quite a clear divide between the two” and not to be shady but I think the biggest mistake people make when writing Peter Parker is thinking that there’s ANY difference between Peter and Spider-Man, except that sometimes he has to pretend like lifting the couch takes any effort. He’s always Spider-Man. The kind of confidence you get from being able to throw a Jeep, or crush steel pipes with your bare hands? That doesn’t go away just because you take off a mask. It’s a shallow take. Peter, as a character, isn’t a very reliable narrator of his own personality – you have to look at his actions. Don’t get distracted by his jokes. There’s no divide.

This ties into my problems with the apparently heavy presence of Iron Man – the review calls him a “reluctant father figure” to Peter – beyond my disbelief over not trusting Spider-Man of all characters to carry his own movie. I understand that the MCU is as built over RDJ’s portrayal of Tony Stark as the 616 Universe is built on the legacy of the Fantastic Four, but one of the things I keep in mind when writing Peter is that he doesn’t truly respect anyone else’s authority but his own. As soon as that spider bit him, that was it, he was his own ultimate authority. And now he’s the “Kid Avenger” and Iron Man is making all his tech? Why, when Captain America: Civil War went out of its way to highlight that he’s a tech genius? Why the effort to make Peter Parker less than he is? Oh, right, Relatable Teen Hero Boy-Man. As an advertiser’s daughter, I don’t like being so OBVIOUSLY sold “Spider-Man! He’s just like you! Buy an Audi.” 

4) Ben Parker Must Die. Uncle Ben’s death won’t be shown in the movie, they said! HUZZAH, a million voices cried out, drowning out my own cries of, BUT HOW DO I KNOW WHO PETER PARKER IS IF I DON’T KNOW THE EXACT CIRCUMSTANCES OF BEN PARKER’S DEATH.

But this is fine, I said. This is okay. You don’t need to show Ben Parker’s death to feel the impact of it, of course! A skillful storyteller can get around that easily! 

Yeah uh so Ben’s death isn’t going to have a large impact on Peter in the movie at all, apparently, which is AN ISSUE when this is THE defining moment. 

From this article: 

As for why Ben was left out, Watts says he wanted to go all out on focusing on how awesome it would be to become Spider-Man, going from a geeky teen to possessing superhuman powers. Dealing with the fact that Peter is partially guilty for a loved one’s death would have put the dampers on that. 

Cool cool cool so you wanted the power and you didn’t want the responsibility. To quote tumblr user myvisagewasted: “Literally the thematic point of Spider-Man is that if you can shatter someone’s face, you GOTTA put a damper on that” and I 10000% agree. Peter, in 616, was initially selfish with his powers. He was an angry teenager who declared he’d only take care of his aunt and his uncle, and that “the rest of the world can go hang.” The Uncle Ben dies, and Peter starts to change. Putting “dampers” on the awesomeness of suddenly being as strong as forty men is called character development, and stripping the guilt complex from Peter is, whether intentional or not, further attempts to hide the character’s Jewish coding. You don’t have to dwell on how much of an impact Ben Parker’s death made on Peter, but I do strongly believe you cannot brush it off because it wouldn’t be fun. 

(Ask me about murder lovebirds Spideytorch, or, What If? Uncle Ben’s Death Didn’t Change Peter.)

How Ben dies also matters with regards to who Peter is – for example, in Spider-Man Noir, Ben dies before Peter becomes Spider-Man, and he isn’t shot but rather ripped to shreds and partially eaten by the Vulture. As a result, Noir!Peter is PRETTY COOL with guns and shooting people, whereas 616 Peter has an extreme aversion. If there’s no specifics about Ben’s death, how do we know who Peter is?

Anyway I also believe Peter isn’t his fully formed self until he feels partially responsible for the deaths of three loved ones, so. There’s that. (George Stacy Or Appropriate George Stacy Stand-In Also Must Die.)

Anyway, this has been Traincat’s Unpopular Spider-Man Opinions, the Homecoming edition, thank you for reading, I’m still gonna see the movie because I love Liz Allan and I am Doing It For Her. And also to see if I was right about 10 different theories. Send in the clones.