#I liked the magneto stuff but I had a REALLY hard time giving a shit about storm and the other guy

[killlerfang1]

Pacing really is the make or break of tv shows because X-Men 97 could have EASILY been a 10/10 for me if it weren’t for the fact the plot and relationships were going at 1000 mph

[angelicspaceprince]

NSFW Alphabet Heisenberg Headcanons

For obvious reasons, this contains smut and is for 18+ only readers. Again, I’m posting only my headcanons onto tumblr, both can be found on my AO3

A = Aftercare (What they’re like after sex)

Very grabby, has a tendency to be a little softer. Loves a good cuddle after sex, definitely praises you constantly. He loves to wash you down with a cloth, wiping away all of the cum, the sweat, the blood, the tears, as he murmurs soft words of praise and encouragement, pressing a small kiss here and there as he does so.

B = Body part (Their favourite body part of theirs and also their partner’s)

I’m not entirely sure if Heisenberg would like any part of his body - it's just a vessel to him I believe. I think his favourite part of himself would be his discount magneto powers because that gives him the ability to create so many new tools to play with when it comes to having sex with you, some even on the spot.

For you, he loves your hands. He sees them as soft and gentle and he loves the feel of them in his work-worn, rough hands as he pushes you down into the bed, or them cupping his face as you pepper his face with kisses, telling him what a good boy he’s being for you, or when their wrapped around his dick as you jerk him off in a way that has him melting against your back and rolling his hips up into your palm.

C = Cum (Anything to do with cum basically… I’m a disgusting person)

He loves cumming inside or on you, there is no way in hell he’d ever wear a condom. It’s a marking thing, he needs to make sure you know that you’re his. He doesn’t have a preference for where he cums, just as long as it’s somewhere on you. If you spit and not swallow, he thinks it’s a waste of his seed and gets huffy about it - he’d much rather see it across your face than down the sink.

He cums a lot and it’s ungodly thick as well.

D = Dirty Secret (Pretty self explanatory, a dirty secret of theirs)

He’s fucked a lycan, been fucked by a lycan, and he fucking loved it. Was tempted to fuck a soldat but that was a little too much for him.

E = Experience (How experienced are they? Do they know what they’re doing? )

I’d say pretty experience, if anything, he fucks the girls at the village mostly to spite and in an attempt piss off Miranda. He’d mellowed out about a decade before you met him, but definitely he’s had the time to gain quite a lot of experience.

F = Favourite Position (This goes without saying. Will probably include a visual)

Lotus, or any position where you’re on top of him. He enjoys grinding up into you and watching you come undone on top of him, but also means it's easier for him to grab at different parts of you - this goes for eating out too, he loves it when you sit on his face and ride him to completion. Loves mating press too, when he’s feeling particularly primal.

G = Goofy (Are they more serious in the moment, or are they humorous, etc)

By ‘goofy’ for H, I more think of sadomasochism or teasing you when you cum so hard you can’t see straight. I think he’d crack a few jokes here and there to make you laugh and you’d definitely have fun but for the most part, I think he’s more all about getting you riled up until you’re a trembling, begging mess.

H = Hair (How well groomed are they, does the carpet match the drapes, etc.)

He is a hairy, hairy man who doesn’t give a shit about his grooming - he would have a thick and large amount of pubes that are wiry just like his beard. If you asked, he’d probably tame it down a little, but if you don’t care, it wouldn’t even cross his mind.

I = Intimacy (How are they during the moment, romantic aspect…)

Only after leaving the village will he 100% let his guard down to be intimate during sex I think. There would be a lot of praise and stuff whilst you’re at the village, but it doesn’t really become too intimate until after everything has washed over. I fully believe the first time he says ‘I love you’ was in German and whilst you two were having possibly the most intimate round of sex you’d ever had in your life the first night after your escape from the village. After sex is usually where he’s the most intimate - where he will murmur softly against your skin about how good you are to him and how he adores you and can’t believe that you’re in his life.

J = Jack Off (Masturbation headcanon)

I feel like he’d jack off quite frequently before you were around and even then, it probably doesn’t change much once you’re there. If he has no time for sex with you and it’s literally just an urge to deal with so he can concentrate on his work? Then yeah, he’ll pull out his dick and stroke himself off as he continues to work without a care in the world. It’s just to clear his mind so he can focus on the task at hand, to him it's no different than eating or sleeping. Just something he has to do to get by.

K = Kink (One or more of their kinks)

It’d be a lot easier to list the kinks he doesn’t have - shit, vomit and death. Beyond that, anything else is on the tables. His favourites would definitely include pred/prey, bondage, overstim, bloodplay, watersports, knife play, choking, cumplay/breeding kink, cockwarming, exhibitionism/voyeurism and marking/biting. He does have a preference for an active and willing partner, that being said CNC is also something he would enjoy as long as it was clear that both parties wanted it prior to the scene being played out.

L = Location (Favourite places to do the do)

Loves fucking at his desk - cockwarming especially. Loves cockwarming during inappropriate times too, like during family meetings. Or fucking you at Lady D’s house, edging you on and reminding you not to make a sound whilst making it impossible for you not to moan or scream his name. Anywhere and everywhere is an option for Heisenberg, but the riskier it is, the more he seems to love it.

M = Motivation (What turns them on, gets them going)

Literally, anything and everything. A breeze hitting him the right way will get him horny. You could be walking past in sweatpants and a baggy jumper and he will want you bent over the bench with his dick railing into you. It doesn’t take much, the man ain’t fussy.

N = NO (Something they wouldn’t do, turn offs)

Killing someone during sex would be a big turn off. Involving any talk of Miranda or Lady D would also be off limits.

O = Oral (Preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc)

Doesn’t really have a preference. Is a master at getting you off with his mouth and will gladly spend hours dedicated to mapping you out and causing you to cum again and again with his just tongue. By the time he’s finished with you, you won’t be able to walk and you definitely will have a number of bruises and bite marks against your thighs as well as a pretty decent beard burn going on. His favourite thing to do once he’s pulled away is to put his cold hands against your thighs specifically where his beard burn is, just to feel you squirm and attempt to kick him away.

Receiving - he loves throat fucking you, or having you kneel under his workbench, tied up nice and tight, with his dick resting heavy on your tongue as he works, occasionally reaching down to stroke your hair, scratch at your scalp or fucking his hips up into you so you don’t get too cozy down there. Your jaw and throat always aches afterwards and he loves hearing how hoarse he’s made your voice - he will always have a drink waiting for you afterwards, but first he needs to hear how well he’s fucked your voice out.

P = Pace (Are they fast and rough? Slow and sensual? etc.)

It’ll depend on the mood - definitely after leaving the village there is more of an opportunity for Heisenberg to reach a more romantic, slow and sensual pace (although it definitely happened whilst in the village, it was just rare as often Heisenberg used sex as a stress release as well as a way to feel like he’s achieved something or made someone proud), but his more natural pace will always be fast, deep and on the rougher side.

Q = Quickie (Their opinions on quickies rather than proper sex, how often, etc.)

Good way to scratch an itch and was, for a good portion at the beginning of your relationship, the only way you’d have sex as the only reason you were having sex was to scratch an itch or for stress relief. As time went on, things changed and although ‘proper’ sex and longer sessions became the norm (especially because he loved to dedicate the time to map out every inch of your body and see exactly what makes you tick), he still loves a good quickie during the day.

R = Risk (Are they game to experiment, do they take risks, etc.)

He will try anything once, after all it’s how you figure out if you like something or not! In terms of risks, if it's a risk of getting caught, he is more than happy to take it. If it's a risk to your safety? Not on his life.

S = Stamina (How many rounds can they go for, how long do they last…)

It doesn’t take long for Heisenberg to recover - unless you’re having a quickie, you best be ready for multiple rounds. Even if he can’t get it up, he will plaster his mouth between your thighs until your voice is hoarse and you’re squirming and weakly tugging at his hair in a vain attempt to pull him away. He loves feeling your strength pull away with each orgasm, seeing how weak and tired you become because of him. He’d never go too fair without prior warning, and if you safe-word out he will pull away instantly and be straight into aftercare mode. As for how long he lasts…..it really does depend on the situation, but if you have enough time and are in an environment where he feels safe, who knows how long he’d last. You have sat in his lap, cock buried deep inside of you for the entirety of many a family meeting, having to hide the fact that he was hard and throbbing inside of you. So, you know for a fact, he can last that long under stressful situations.

T = Toy (Do they own toys? Do they use them? On a partner or themselves?)

He’d make his own and have a little collection. He’d definitely think of something whilst working on his metal army, make it and instantly turn to find you to test them out. If it’s something a bit more intense, he’ll test it on himself first before seeking you out.

U = Unfair (how much they like to tease)

He loves to tease you and keep you on edge of your first orgasm, making it out that he’s close to making you scream only to pull back and watch you pout, beg or even scream in frustration. His favourite place to tease you, though, is in a place where you can’t protest or beg, where you need to be silent or keep whatever you’re doing a secret. That’s definitely when the worst of his teasing will come out.

V = Volume (How loud they are, what sounds they make)

It will depend on the situation (see wild card for submissive!H), but usually? He wants to drink in the sounds he has you make - he’s all short grunt and growls and soft murmurs of praise against your skin and dark promises that merge seamlessly with general dirty talk with small groans and moans peppered throughout. If he’s had an awful day, however? He’s much louder, much more aggressive. He needs to fuck his emotions out - and this is definately when his pred/prey kink comes into full swing. He will chase you throughout the village, throughout his factory, wherever he can, and is nothing but growls and snarls, every sound coming from his throat animalistic. He also bites a lot more too, claiming you as his, and it’s the only time that his sounds are muffled slightly.

W = Wild Card (Get a random headcanon for the character of your choice)

If you get him worked up enough if you get the chance to dom him (he will sub for a selected few), he will always end up babbling out his begs in German. If you ask nice enough, he may order you around in German or Romanian, but the only time it naturally comes out is when he’s so far gone into subspace, so needy and desperate, that it’s just natural for him to speak his first language. In general, if you get him to sub for you, he will not shut the fuck up - all moans and whimpers and broken groans, small promises to be good for you if you would just touch him already . Bratty sub for sure, definitely into pet play. Will only ever be able to handle a gentle dom for obvious reasons, and has a major, major, major praise kink, both giving and receiving but get this boy into subspace and praise him and just watch him whine and squirm and ask for more. If he’s misbehaving at home and you jokingly say ��behave pup’, he will get flustered so quickly.

X = X-Ray (Let’s see what’s going on in those pants, picture or words)

Body wise, he is quite muscular but has a nice layer of fat to soften things out - it actually surprises you how strong he is from brute strength alone because he definitely doesn’t look it at first glance.

Cock wise - he’s more thick than he is long, average length but with a good amount of girth that has you feeling that stretch for hours afterwards.

Y = Yearning (How high is their sex drive?)

I’d say pretty high, but he is also good at distracting himself from it? During his tenure at the village, he’s so focused on escaping that it looks like his sex drive is low to normal. But the moment you get out of the village? Have your own place where it’s safe and no one is there to stop you? All bets are off, he cannot keep his hands off of you. Half of it is catching up for lost time, half of it is just the fact that the man is permanently horny.

Z = ZZZ (… how quickly they fall asleep afterwards)

When domming: He doesn’t fall asleep often, but he will doze or rest his eyes for a second and enjoy the afterglow. He won’t leave to go back to work until you’ve fully conked out though, unless something desperately pressing comes up and he has to go. He’d rather spend this small amount of quality time with you and making sure you’re okay before leaving you alone and even when he does leave when you’re asleep, he has his eyes on his monitor with a live feed of you sleeping, just in case something goes wrong and you need him.

After subbing: He usually passes out pretty quickly. Subbing takes a lot more energy out of him than domming does, so once he’s cleaned up and has received his dose of praise and love, he usually falls asleep with his head in your lap, on your tummy or on your chest. He can’t wake up alone after a sub scene, even the very idea of it freaks him out, so you better make sure you have something to do as he naps because once he’s out, he’s asleep for hours.

[moonbaby26]

Title: Telling the Truth

Pairing: Peter Maximoff x Reader, but also Magneto and Peter father/son interaction!

Summary: Continuation from previous chapter. Set during X-Men: Age of Apocalypse, you and the others finally defeat Apocalypse, just to end up stranded together until a way home can be devised. During the wait, you get to clear up some things with Peter on your feelings for him. Yet all goes sideways when Peter finally works up the courage to tell Magneto the truth about being his son.

Notes: For those that know the movies by heart, I made some more changes closer to the comics obviously. You’ll see.

Warnings: Some cursing, especially during the impromptu therapy session of Magneto and Peter unleashing their emotional baggage.

Chapters: Previous Chapter | Next Chapter

Taglist: @drikawinchester , @n0obmaster69 , @alexloveskili , @what-a-silver-lining , @bluesprings18 , @weakmoony-stuff , @slytherinsi-mp , @wintwrsoldiwr , @tommy-braccoli , @amourtentiaa

Peter Maximoff x Reader Masterlist

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You didn’t know what you felt anymore. In a way it was like being outside of yourself. Just watching from somewhere far away even as you were pouring every ounce of strength you had left into your hands, blasting Apocalypse’s shield over and over.

You were trying to cause even the slightest, tangible bit of damage to him, just as Magneto was, just as Scott was. And yet, even with the three of you giving all you had, the monster had already gathered himself up again. With just the movement of one hand, he’d thrown Hank violently to the side when Beast had gotten too close while trying to help you all.

And only moments after Hank’s unconscious body had come to rest, Scott had faltered as well. In exhaustion, he’d finally had to close his eyes, pulling his glasses back down as he’d staggered backward. Then with another flick of the wrist, Apocalypse had all too easily slammed the boy into a building, the wall he hit then swelling out to cover and encase him like some living horror.

You could still hear Scott screaming even as you realized Apocalypse had now turned his attention towards you. With his every step closer, that numbness grew within you. You were too weak to fly away now, after all the energy you’d thrown at him, you were barely still standing.

But you could see the irritation in his expression. It was obvious that he couldn’t understand your loyalty to one another. Why any of you would be fighting this hard, just to die.

He kept reusing the same tricks, but they were effective. As the earth shot up around you like tendrils on a vine, you couldn’t break free. As quick and flexible as it was, it only felt like concrete wrapping all around you. It pinned your arms to your sides and wrapped around your legs, chest, and throat.

With a clenching of Apocalypse’s fist, it all drew tighter. And when your energy field finally gave out, the last of your shielding went away with it. As that light faded, the pain of being slowly crushed exploded through you. But you couldn’t scream when you couldn’t even breathe.

Apocalypse would have Xavier. That was all he wanted, then outright ignoring the straining of Magneto in the sky above him, Erik desperately trying to still do anything on his own now.

But as your sight blurred and your senses faded, it was the most surreal thing, you could still recognize Jean’s silhouette as she also moved out into midair.

Yet it wasn’t her, at least not as you knew her. Somehow that thought had still floated through your dying mind, before the world exploded all over again.

Even without being powered up, you could feel that surge. Like a pressure wave of pure, raw force. It seared across everything, hot and burning. But like a warm fire, for those far enough from the center, it only revitalized them. Hank was awakened suddenly, soon enough breaking the pieces that held you and giving you a chance to breathe again before he ran on all fours to also free Scott.

And yet for Apocalypse, someone far too close to that center, and the real target of Jean’s fury, the only option was to burn.

You were on your knees as you still tried to catch your breath, but you all knew opportunity when you saw it. She’d broken through his shield, torn through his armor. But even as his flesh seared away, it was still trying to heal back just as quickly.

Magneto had impaled him to the spot with multiple steel bars as soon as his shield had fallen, but Apocalypse was a coward. As soon as that tide had started to turn, he tried to flee.

Hank called out, “He’s getting away!” As Apocalypse tried to teleport, an energy shield rebuilding to close around him.

Even digging as deep as you possibly could, you only had enough left to make a large orb from one palm. That white light encasing just one of your hands rather than your whole body as you realized you had to make this last shot count.

And just as you thought you were not going to have another opening to get past his shield, lightning began striking down right on top of him. A hole broke in his field with the force, the white haired girl from before surprising you all with a sudden change of allegiance.

You threw your orb at once then, controlling it to come right through the opening she had made. It exploded directly against Apocalypse’s head and neck, further blasting away muscle and bone that no longer had time to heal under all the combined attacks.

But it was still Jean who dealt the killing blow. With one final powerful surge of her energy, screaming, she erased the last of him. His body broke into only ash under her red aura. It spread into the sky all around her, like wings of flame before extinguishing at last.

You were still waiting for some final confirmation that it was really over though, that you’d won. After a few moments of only the sound of the receding wind, and the sand lightly blowing past with it, it was like a collective acceptance at last.

You fell back with a large exhale, exhausted as you laid onto your back in the dirt. In the sky, you could see Magneto and Jean hover back to where Xavier was, no doubt to check on him now. You could only imagine if Magneto would soon be apologizing to his old friend, or not, for his part in all this.

But you didn’t rest in your silence for long. As you heard footsteps, you turned your head enough to see Hank’s clawed feet approaching. But he wasn’t alone. He had Raven on one side and Peter on the other, Peter more so the one he was propping up with that broken leg.

“Raven wants to go see Charles,” Hank said by way of some explanation, awkwardly helping Peter sit back down beside you as the other winced in pain. “I need you two to stay here while we see if there’s any medical supplies intact nearby, and while we try to figure out how on earth we’re going to get home now.”

While Hank spoke, you thought Raven might have still been giving you a kind of odd look. As if she was trying to make sense of something. You could assume what, after the abrupt display between you and Peter before. But you were just too tired to feel anything other than relief right now that everyone was still here at all.

“Okay,” You said, maybe just to check that you could talk, as much as your throat still hurt from being squeezed earlier. But the two older mutants were then gone just as quickly. Hank had picked up Raven, jumping over to the exposed second floor of the building where the Professor and the others were.

Peter was unnaturally quiet afterward. At least for a while before he finally looked down at you. “So holy shit, right?”

You glanced up. That phrase really could reference about anything that had happened today. You smirked tiredly. “Could you be a little more specific please?”

“I mean, your friend just vaporized that dude.” Peter answered, waving one hand. He couldn’t stop from being animated even if he tried it seemed, even when injured. “Did you know she could do that? Like damn, we could have been done an hour ago.”

You tried not to laugh. It’d hurt your ribs too much if you did. “No. I’d say she didn’t even know she could do that.”

“Well, I know who not to piss off,” He said, before going quiet for a bit again.

You still hadn’t been around him all that long in actual length of hours. But for all you’d now been through since first meeting at the mansion, it seemed like this morning was lifetimes ago. And you could sense that his mind was churning with something else he actually wanted to say.

You looked up to him again after a while. “You okay?” You asked. Which probably was still a bit ironic for you to question, as even though he had the broken leg, you were also the one laying in the dirt, too tired and hurting to properly sit up.

It still took him some time to respond though. Which told you he actually was trying to weigh his words somewhat before speaking. But when they did finally start to come out, he was still pausing and hesitating. “I’m, um, first of all, sorry about the whole surprise kiss there. I figured you’d just slap the crap out of me or something. But I thought we were going to die too, and I...I just-”

He was looking at the ground now, like there would be some answer there that would help him verbalize what he was trying to say. “I know I screw up a lot and let things go that I shouldn’t let go I guess. I already flaked out with the whole reason I came up to your house this morning, the whole Magneto thing. And I didn’t want to do that twice, not telling someone the truth again all in one day just because I was being chicken shit. You’re just really cool, and you know...I just wanted you to know that.” He looked back at you at last, as if trying to judge if any of this was making sense at all.

It did and it didn’t of course. You didn’t understand at all what he meant about why he came up to the house in the first place, or anything about Magneto. But you didn’t want to question on that when he was already making himself vulnerable with the main point you thought he was trying to make to you at least.

“Peter, I kissed you back remember? I mean yes, there was a lot of stress involved. But it doesn’t make it a mistake.” Now you were the one perhaps putting too much optimism in your thoughts here, and taking a risk. “Maybe it just made it happen a lot sooner than it naturally would have. But it doesn’t mean I didn’t want that, you know, eventually.”

Again, you’d only known each other for a day in real terms. Of course it was too much. But everybody had to start somewhere, right? You had no idea what a serious relationship could be like though, you’d never had one. Just awkward first dates that never became second dates because it was always just weird. You didn’t feel anything that way for those people and it was always evident so quickly.

And yet here came this guy, dropped into your life like a bomb in a time of utter chaos and danger, and you thought you were now finally understanding why your friends seemed to go so crazy when they told you about their “crushes” at school. It was just something that clicked. You couldn’t put rational thought to emotions like this.

“So you wanted to kiss me?” Peter finally asked in a way that was somewhat silly to you, because of course you wouldn’t have done anything like that if you didn’t actually want to. And yet you couldn’t make any dry reply to that effect when you saw the honest expression on his face as he’d asked.

Was it really so hard for him to believe that he would be wanted? You were surprised, genuinely. Of course he was quirky and odd, well maybe a great deal odd. But for all the flashy appearance and smugness you knew he could radiate, did he not actually see his own worth?

You touched his hand lightly, as you sat up at last. It hurt, but he needed to see your eyes to believe you now. You knew this was important. “You’ve had me flustered since you first introduced yourself this morning. I’m not used to that, at all, so it’s really new. I don’t really know how it’s all supposed to work, or what I’m supposed to do next. But I can at least speak to how I feel. I want to be around you more, I want to be close.”

The physical and the emotional went hand in hand really. But, you’d both have to figure out your own comfort level on that. You continued, trying to put that into words. He didn’t owe anything to you. “You need to remember it depends what you want too though. I can like you with or without kissing again. If you just want a friend, that’s okay too.”

He chuckled, seeming kind of taken aback. “Hell...” He looked away a moment, running his hand through his hair. It was obviously a nervous gesture, as it only made it look messier. “I’d really be a pathetic boyfriend you know. Like, epically bad.”

“You think so?” You asked, trying not to press too hard, but also not wanting him to keep seeming like he didn’t deserve any of this kind of attention.

“I’ll annoy you eventually, you’ll regret it.” He kept on, a little bit quieter then.

“How do you know I’m not annoying?” You countered. Of course you hoped you weren’t, you seemed to get along well with the other students, and they ran the gamut of so many kinds of personalities. But really, how was it fair for him to assume any fault would only be his?

“Pfft.” He looked back to you. “You literally glow. It’s not even metaphorical. You’re like perfect, and-“

Did Apocalypse ding him in the head too? You were having none of that. “I’m nothing of the sort. And neither are you.” But you smiled before he could take that negatively. “And I’m totally good with that.”

He quieted again, just watching you for an awkward while, before finally responding. “I guess we can try. I mean as long as you’re admitting now that your taste in guys is really this bad and you won’t get mad at me later for saying I told you so.”

It didn’t seem proper to laugh, but he made you want to. “I’ll overlook you insulting the both of us. But yes, if you want to try, then so do I.”

“Okay.” He answered. Then seemed to realize the depth of this a little more. “Shit...didn’t expect to get mutant-napped by the government, fight a god, break my leg, and become a boyfriend all in the same day.”

“And rescue a whole mutant school,” You added.

He shrugged purposefully for effect. “That’s what heroes do, babe.”

The pivot from so self conscious that he could barely accept your attraction to him, to now wanting to brag again really was something to behold. You started to quip something back, but stopped when you saw his face go serious. He was now looking at something abruptly in the distance, so you turned your head to follow his gaze.

It was Magneto.

You straightened up as well, now fully sitting up before Erik landed in front of you both.

He was direct, speaking immediately. “It will still be some time before Charles’ little CIA friend can get her cohorts to arrange your transport out of here.”

You didn’t know if the distaste in his tone was more about Moira being a government agent, or just dislike to her presence here entirely, but he only continued. “And given that Hank has no idea how to field dress wounds without access to his full laboratory, I get that responsibility.”

Peter shifted, abruptly realizing the meaning then. “I’m fine,” He lied.

Of course he absolutely wasn’t fine. But clearly distrusting about whatever Magneto now had planned and the inevitable pain it could mean for him. Peter hadn’t moved his leg at all in the entire time you’d been sitting here together.

Erik only answered him sharply, “You need a splint before you do even more damage to yourself.”

As he then raised his hands, metal rebar started to drag itself out from the broken buildings all around you, leaving no question that this was no longer a choice for Peter.

It was hard not to think that just a short time ago, Magneto had been using that same kind of power to impale Apocalypse over and over again. And yet now he showed how controlled he could be, breaking the thin rebar into lengths that could run all the way from Peter’s thigh to just above his ankle, and even bending them slightly to match the natural curvature of the knee.

“Lift his leg.” Erik spoke.

You’d been so distracted with watching him work the metal, that it took you a moment to realize the command was for you. You looked briefly to him, then to Peter. You and Peter both shared the same nervous expression.

If you just used your hands, you felt like you would only hurt him, not being able to support his whole leg in a way that wouldn’t put more pressure on the break. But you also didn’t know if you’d rested long enough sitting here to use your powers at all either.

Someone as intimidating as Magneto standing over you both impatiently certainly didn’t help.

But if it meant less discomfort for Peter, you’d at least try. You lifted both your hands, facing your palms towards Peter’s leg while focusing as best you could. Normally what would have been fairly simple now took a good deal of effort in your still drained state. But a faint white glow did start to move across his leg, eventually covering it from his hip all the way to the end of his foot.

Once enveloped, you raised just your fingertips, lifting his entire leg gently, just high enough that Magneto could place the metal bracing around it.

You heard Peter make a small sound of pain as Erik had circled other metal strips around the longer ones that ran parallel with his leg, snugging it all into place. But beyond that, the unconventional first aid seemed to be successful. His leg was effectively now immobilized as you let it back down softly, the light fading away as you let go.

“I look like a Mad Max reject,” Peter commented absently, breaking the silence after a moment as he poked at the new metal contraption.

“You’ll be running and finding trouble again soon enough I’m sure. We still heal faster than the lesser species.” Magneto responded, but not all that surprising to you really that he would still find ways to throw jabs at non mutants even in an unrelated conversation.

What did surprise you was that when Erik had started to turn to no doubt leave again now that his task was done, it was Peter that stopped him.

“Hey, wait a second.”

You didn’t think you were imagining a new anxious sound in Peter’s voice either, and it bloomed all new nerves in you as well. What was it between the two of them? There had been confusing hints of something ever since you’d gotten to Egypt, but Peter had never elaborated to you. Not that he’d really had much chance either though.

But just because of who Magneto was, it was easy to imagine things taking a dangerous turn if the wrong thing was said or done, but you had no idea how to help when you didn’t even know what had Peter so focused on him.

You felt him touch your hand, like a physical desire for support, as he asked Erik in the most serious voice you’d ever heard from him. “Do you remember a woman named Magda Eisenhardt?”

Magneto went rigid, and you froze as well. Very suddenly you were wondering if the others could still see you from here. If they were paying you any mind at all right now. But the only person here fast enough to actually get away from Erik, was here beside you with one wing clipped essentially. There’d be no escape.

“How do you know that name?” He’d turned fully back to face you both, eyes locked on Peter.

By the way Peter had seemed to pause his breathing, he wasn’t immune to the sense of threat either, but he still answered. “Well she goes by Maximoff now. She’s my mother.”

You felt like a helpless bystander watching some kind of disaster unfolding in slow motion. The frightening look in Magneto’s eyes versus the way Peter was now almost squeezing your hand painfully. The mental gymnastics your mind was now going through were chaotic. Did Magneto do something to Peter’s mother? Were they enemies? Was this some vengeance quest?

But if any of that were true, why on earth would Peter confront him now? With both of you already injured with not a chance to survive or defend against someone of Magneto’s power?

Whatever frightful things were burning through Erik’s mind as well still silenced him long enough for Peter to speak again though. And it all came out then.

“I was too afraid to tell you earlier, but I guess I’m just ripping the damn band aid off everything now. She told me about you. How she left because she was afraid of you too. But she didn’t tell you about being pregnant. She went to the states, changed her last name and had me. Me and my sister Wanda. Twins. But I didn’t know any of that about you when I busted you out of the Pentagon those years back. I didn’t know who you really were. That you were the guy I thought had just run off, or maybe you were dead. I didn’t know my father was in a damned plastic cell less than ten fucking miles away all those years when we had nothing!”

A chill went through you. The anger in Peter’s voice towards the end only added to the shock as you were forced to process everything at once. This was why. God. Just...shit.

You were all silent after that. For an unbearable amount of time there was silence.

When Erik finally did speak, you heard the anger in him too, but it was different. There was a raw pain in that, something so extremely deep coming out of him now. His fist was clenching. “She was right, boy. If it’s all true, then Magda was goddamn right to do everything in her power to hide you from me and to try to put an ocean between us back then.”

With a little horror, you could see the smallest fragments of metallic debris starting to quiver along the ground. His emotion carrying over into the environment now.

“I did remarry after I escaped Washington and went back to Europe. We even had a little girl. Anya.” There was the slightest sheen of wetness in his eyes, even though sheer anger was the only look still coming from them. “They killed them. My wife. My daughter. The humans killed them because of who I was!”

He gritted his teeth, and you could plainly see a couple tears escape his eyes then before disappearing back behind the sides of his helmet.

“They would have done the same to you and your sister eventually. To Magda too. She knew she’d be caught in the crossfire even when I didn’t. She knew what I really was.”

“It doesn’t make it right!” Peter’s voice surprised you as it broke, uneven and just as emotional as he yelled back at Erik. But he looked down again afterward, his hand trembling against yours. “I’m sorry what they did, that was our little sister too then. But you can’t just lie to someone their whole life. My mom shouldn’t have waited so long to tell me! I could have helped you...maybe it could have been different. Maybe we-”

“It would have been the same result.” Erik said coldly. “Because I would have been the same.”

With that he flew off abruptly, completely out of sight before Peter cursed under his breath, looking defeated. “Goddamnit. He really is an asshole...”

You opened your mouth to respond, maybe to try and comfort him, but then hesitated. There was so much to digest on both sides here. “I think he might just need time to cool off...” You finally said, as delicately as you could.

“Correct.” The Professor’s voice popped into both your heads then, leading you both to glance towards the broken building where the others had been, to now see they were all standing on the edge looking towards you.

“Apologies for eavesdropping,” Xavier continued. “But you were getting quite loud, both verbally and mentally, and I wanted to make sure you were safe as I had instructed the others not to interfere.”

Peter sighed, maybe a bit embarrassed at the audience, but also still clearly unused to having anyone in his head as he replied aloud. “That’s so damn weird. Guess you’re good now then?”

“Getting there, thanks to all of you.” Xavier answered with a slight amount of humor, “But helmet or no helmet, I don’t need to read Erik to tell you that he’ll be back. His anger is only towards himself, not to you. You did the right thing by letting him know the truth. He’ll come around.”

There was another odd feeling of amusement from the Professor after a moment though. “In fact, knowing how possessive Erik can be, I dare say you may get more than you bargained for, Peter, in parental attention. Good luck to you too, (Y/N). Though I’d think he’ll approve of you once he realizes how much you genuinely care about his son.”

You stared, knowing Xavier couldn’t see your ‘are you for real/horrified’ expression from this distance but that he’d definitely feel it.

You saw Raven make an exaggerated gesture of a thumbs up from way over there and Peter laughed tiredly. “We’re totally screwed aren’t we?” You sighed and he just leaned into you, teasing. “See? Too early to say it yet? Nope, it’s not. Told ya so. Told ya so. Terrible choice of a boyfriend, babe!”

You put your head on your knees as he rubbed one of your shoulders. You mumbled numbly. “I just want to sleep for sixteen hours.”

—————————

(Continued in next chapter here)

[legionofpotatoes]

we decided to watch all story cutscenes from the new resident evil village videogame on a whim, since it’s not really our cup of tea gameplay-wise but seems to be this massive zeitgeist moment that made us morbidly curious. And I know how much everyone cares about my thoughts on things I know very little about, so. let’s get into it huh gamers. and yeah spoilers?

for context, I’ve only played resident evil 4 and a small portion of 5. I also read the wikipedia entry for 7’s plot recently. all this to say I was only vaguely aware of how tonally wacky the series was going in

I also completely gave up following the plot of the mutagens’ soap opera, so that paid off in spades here as you might imagine

anyway so that baby in the intro. that baby’s head is just massive. humongous toddlerdome. when ethan finds the baby’s head in a jar later on. there is no way that head would fit into that jar. bad game design. no not even game design. basic stuff. one hundred years in prison for jar modeler

if I see a single functional hetero marriage in video games I will cry tears of joy. I understand their misery is kind of The Point irt them badly working through the hillbilly romp trauma but like. sheesh. at least set that up as an emotional story goal the plot will help resolve. but nope they start off miserable and it goes nowhere

I know I know the mia thing has a huge wrinkle in it but like. not really in terms of dramatic function?? set up a happy end to the re7 nightmare (miranda can keep up appearances for all she cares) and then take that all away from angry griffin mcelroy for manpain. it will still absolutely work to set up the dramatic forward momentum. why throw in this cliche Hollywood Tension in their marriage if you’re not going to address it oh maybe because it’s normalized as automatically interesting because nuclear families are a self-propagating pit of a very narrow chance at emotional happiness relying on social stigma to preserve their empty function oops my baggage slipped in yikes abort mission

I called him griffin mcelroy because I saw his face on twitter and. yeah. I will continue to do this occasionally. my house my rules

... fuck the reason I’m hung up on this is specifically because the rest of the game is so tonally dexterous (which is a shining point to me! more on that later!), and yet they felt weirdly compelled to create the aesthetic trapping of a family-at-odds trope without following it through too well. a sign of both the good and the bad stuff to come

but listen the real reason why I wanted to talk about any of this is to nitpick the fascinating backwards-engineered nucleus of the entire thing; in that this game essentially creates a melting pot of just SO many disparate horror tropes and then makes a no-holds-barred unhinged effort at weaving thick lore to piece them all together. it is truly a sight to behold. like straight up you got your backwoods fright night situation, your gothic castle vampires, your rural-industrial werewolves, and don’t forget your bloated swamp monsters over there, with then a hard left turn into robotic body horror, and the entire ass subgenre of Creepy Doll writ large, and the bloodborne tentacle monsters, and a hellboy angel bossfight, which rides on the coattails of a mech-on-mech pacific rim bonanza, and just jesus henry christ slow down

almost all of these are textural hijack jobs that don’t really get into the metaphor plain of any of those settings but the game sort-of makes an argument that the texture IS the point and revels in it. It is kind of admirable almost. The same reason why the intro felt boxed in and unmotivated is also why the rest of the game just blasts off of its hinges to the point of complete and self-indulgent tonal abandon. I kinda loved that about it. lady dimitrescu made sure to hold her hat down as she bent forward in mahogany doorways and then suddenly she’s a giant gore dragon and you settle in your temp role as dark souls man with Gun to take her ass down. Excellent??

this rhino rampage impulse to gobble up every horror aesthetic known to man comes to head when the game wrestles with its FPS trappings in what is the most hilarious solution in creating visceral player damage moments. Since most cinematics and the entire game is in first person, that leaves precious little real estate for the devs to work with if they really want to sell griffin’s physical crucible. To wit. This dude’s forearms. Specifically just the forearms. They are MASSACRED throughout the story. The poor man lives out the silent hill dimension of a hand model. by the end cutscene he looks like a neatly dressed desk clerk who had decided to stick both his grabbers into garbage disposal grinders just a few hours prior. like in addition to everything else it manages to rope in that tinge of slapstick violence into its general grievous genre collection except this time it IS for a lack of trying! truly incredible

but wait his miracle clawbacks from everything his poor paws go through are retroactively explained away, yes, but far too vaguely and far too late to console me as I sat and watched everyone’s favorite baby brother reattach an entirely severed hand to his wrist stump by just. placing it on there. and giving it a lil twist ‘n pop terminator-style. and then willing his fingers back into motion right in front of my bulging eyes. this game just does not care. it does not give a shit. and boy howdy will it work to make that into one of its strongest suits

cause generally speaking resident evil was THE premiere vanilla zombie content destinaysh for like a decade, right? and as the rest of the world and mainstream media started encroaching and bloodying its blue ocean it went and just exploded in every single conceivable horror trope direction like a smilodon on catnip. truly, genuinely fascinating franchise moves

yeah the big vampire milf is hot. other news; grass... green. although I do love the implication that her closet is just identical white dresses on a rack. cartoon network-level queen shit

apropos of nothing I’ve said there’s also this hobo dante-devimaycry-magneto man, and I can’t believe this sentence makes sense. anyway he made that “boulder-punching asshole” joke referring to chris redfield and it was probably the only easter egg that really landed for me and boy did it land hard. I have not seen him punch the boulder in re5, mind. I had only heard about how funny it is from friends. and here this dude was, probably in the same exact mindset as me, trying to grapple with that insane mental image. with you on that ian mckellen, loud and clear

I advocate vehemently against the shallow pursuit of hyper photorealism in art direction but I gotta admit it works really in favor of immersive horror like this. the european village shacks especially gave me super unchill flashbacks to my rural countryside retreat in western georgia. I could smell the linoleum dude. not cool

faces are weird in this game. can’t place it. nice textures, good animation, but the modeling template is... uuh strange? and the hair. it has that clustered-flat-clumpy look that harkens to something very specific and unpleasant but I just don’t know what. sue me

griffin’s mental aptitude to take all this shit in stride and end every seemingly traumatizing bossfight involving some fucking eldritch being yet unseen through mortal eyes by essentially throwing out an MCU quip is just. What the fuck dude? I mean that was funny how you casually yelled the f-word at a god damn werewolf that you considered a fairy tale an hour ago but are you like, all right?? it was swinging a sledgehammer the size of a bus at you, ethan

oh oh the vampires are afraid of cold and your last name is winters. I get it haha

Pro Gamer Nitpick: boss fights seemed a bit unnecessarily long?? idk why the youtuber we picked decided the ENTIRE propeller man fight counted towards the vital story scenes he was stitching together, but man mr big daddy lite there really had some get up and go huh??

why are they saying dimitrescu.. like that. is it really how you say that word or is the english language relapsing into its fetish for ending every single word with a consonant at all costs

I’m not saying it’s a dramatic miss of a twist in context of all that’s going on, but the “you died in the last game actually and have been DC’s clayface ever since” revelation is low-key. it’s. it’s just funny to me, I dont know what to say. century-old god-witch fails her evil plan after she mistakenly removes heart from what was definitely NOT just some white guy with eight fingers after all

chris realizing he’s about to become the player character and immediately swapping out his tsundere trenchcoat for the muscletight sex haver sweater

the little bluetooth speaker-sized pipe bomb he taped to his knife was nuclear?? really??? I must have missed something because that is just too good. I buy it though I totally buy it. chris just got them fun-sized nukes in his car trunk for, you guessed it, Situations

anyway this is all for now just wanted to briefly touch on how unexpectedly funny and tonally irreverent this seemingly serious game turned out to be. did not articulate any cathartic story beats whatsoever but my god it had fun connecting those plot points. he just fucking put his severed hand back on his stump and it Just Worked todd howard get in here

[scarletwitching]

just curious, why aren’t u reading comics anymore? Is it cause wandas not in anything?

So, Ike Perlmutter... is bad.

This is hard to explain, not because I don’t know why I quit but because I cannot recall why I didn’t quit earlier. I guess it was the Spiegelman thing that did it, though that’s confusing because I remember quitting in July, not August. (2019 was 87 years ago, so who knows.) Sina Grace’s post had gone up that same summer. There was other stuff too. Things built on each other until I felt like I couldn’t justify it anymore.

It was probably inevitable. Or at least, it feels inevitable now. I considered it after the Northrop Grumman incident, but that was cancelled so fast that I didn’t even have time to process it. Things like that kept happening. I’d get mad about something, then it would whoosh by. But it was all chipping away at me. And it chipped and it chipped until one day, I was done. What’s that quote? Liking falling asleep, slowly and then all at once.

A couple of months after I quit, there was some internal role shifting that I don’t understand fully to this day, but was treated as “Feige is in charge of the comics now.” There was a lot of relief in the fandom at the time, and I remember thinking this should make me want to reconsider, it should make me want to at least wait and see if things changed. But I never seriously entertained the idea. Well over a year later, I couldn’t tell you what, if anything, changed.

Regardless, some things aren’t going to change. Did you see that photo of the guy storming the US Capitol holding zip ties? He had a Punisher logo on his chest. I’m not gonna argue about the political implications of that character or how much Marvel could actually do to put the genie back in the bottle. I’m more thinking about how, as superheroes have come to dominate pop culture, conservatives and liberals have both started adopting their iconography more and more. Remember that Dan Crenshaw ad? And the ICE tweet? I hate that shit.

The thing people love to do in this situation is insist everyone who disagrees with them is “misinterpreting” the characters and stories, but I don’t know how tenable that position is. I won’t pretend I don’t know why fascist insurrectionists love these characters. On the flip side, I can’t imagine an argument for why the person I saw call Amy McGrath “the real life Captain Marvel” is missing the point. I’d say they’re bang on the money, and I don’t mean that as a compliment. The white nationalists who think they’re vigilantes are obviously the worst (by several magnitudes). I’m not saying the cheesy liberal shit is the same as fashy right wing shit, just that I’ve grown exhausted with the way that society at large engages with these characters.

Is that the reason I quit reading Marvel comics? No, but it is a reason I haven’t started again. This stuff has become so obnoxious and omnipresent that it has tainted my feelings about the source material. Maybe part of my annoyance is that I know so much about the history of this meaningless nonsense that when I see people oversimplify it in order to slot them neatly into their own political views, I know it’s bullshit. Because it’s never as clear-cut as people make it out to be. No, Magneto was not based on Malcolm X, but yes, the Avengers kind of are ICE. But only that one time. (Fucking Hickman.)

It’s not just the general audience either. People in the supposedly enlightened part of this fandom downplay and excuse (and make snide jokes about) actual, non-fictional US war crimes under the guise of defending a fictional character. Do some people around here have any self-awareness about how embarrassing they are? It is vile the shit some of y’all will say with your whole chest, as if it’s completely divorced from the real world. The level of historical revisionism, the literal neocon talking points I have seen trotted out and presented as antiracism. I am begging certain people to PLEASE talk to an Iraqi. One (1) Iraqi. Any Iraqi. (Okay, maybe not any Iraqi.)

Actually, forget that. I don’t want to burden a single victim of US imperialism with some of y’uns, especially since you have proven time and again you cannot be reasoned with. Does that stuff affect my willingness to to buy Marvel comics? Yeah, it does. The fans may not be the company’s fault, but this attitude that real people’s suffering is just an exotic backdrop that doesn’t need to be seriously engaged with came straight from them.

More than anything, I’ve been thinking a lot about Capitalism (lol, of course, I have) and how I engage with this awful system I am forced to live in. Disney sucks. We all know it. The comic industry is exploitative. We all know it. How much do I really want to support them instead of giving my money directly to independent creators? How much more watered down, neoliberal, “more female drone operators” art do I need to experience in my life?

I’m not calling for a boycott or whatever. I don’t pretend to know how other people should live their lives. I’m not even sure how I should live my life. I just know that it’s been good for me to step back and evaluate what I spend my money on and how I feel about art that doesn’t live up to my values. Will I come back into the fold with a healthier attitude and more insight than I had before? Dunno. Will I eventually want to catch up on Immortal Hulk? Probably, but I’m guessing I’ll get it from the library when I do.

[flying-elliska]

Shadow and Bone Season 1 Review

Ok so I got distracted by a need to watch all of Ben Barnes' filmography (lmao) but here is my review : It was really fun to watch and it was clearly made with love which is already the main thing with YA fantasy, which is often turned into a soulless moneygrab when put on screen. The actors were GREAT. I did think that the Crows suffered from being mashed up with the Shadow and Bone story, but they were still a highlight. I also think it was a bit rushed, esp. when it came to Alina's training. The costumes were beautiful, I want a kefta now. Plus the crossover fanfic interactions btw the SaB characters and the Crows were just pure joy. Also Milo, obviously <3 I'm in hyperfixation mode so here, have an essay :

The "Shadow and Bone" Characters :

- Jessie Mei Li !!!!!! She really made me like Alina so much more than in the books, she absolutely is the 'human embodiment of literal sunshine' and she was a joy to watch. Her character's arc is cliché but her acting is so expressive and endearing, I really felt for her all the way through. (maybe I'm biased bc Jessie talking about her ADHD and seeing her thrive at the same time is like!!! i love them they deserve all the best.) I like that they made Alina more proactive - even though she does make some stupid decisions... but I just don't understand people who put that down as bad writing, like ??? have you ever met a real person who only makes wise, good decisions ?? a character like that would either be at the end of their story or just in the background because that makes them static. The things with the maps in the beginning does a good job of illustrating how she is just this one girl making rash, erratic decisions out of fear and loyalty and doesn't have a sense of the bigger picture, caught in the tide of bigger events. It works for her character. When it comes to the choice of making her half-Shu, I do think it really makes sense re: her character feeling like an outsider but I do understand the criticisms that the microaggressions felt too relentless and one-note. I am really looking forward to them introducing Tamar and Tolya and hopefully connecting to them over her heritage in a more positive way.

- Mal in the books was one of the most annoying YA characters I've ever come across, so I really liked that they made him much more of a loyal, devoted friend. I found his relationship with Alina cute, it really gives us the sense that these are two orphans who found a home in each other, childhood best friends (and potential sweethearts) separated by war, two army grunts and ordinary people caught up in the wheels of power and war that usually crushes people like them, it's a great way to introduce the dynamics of their world and it's a trope that always makes me emo. It felt a bit too one note to me, though, and too heavily on the nose, like Mal's only personality was his attachment to Alina (and his resentment towards the Grisha) and too much of her emotional arc also relied on him. Them hitting us over the head with the meadow scenes felt like pure telling instead of showing and it ended up being super repetitive and kind of annoying. I am willing to like this pairing, but I wanted more scenes of them just having conversations about things and really understanding why they like each other beyond the whole childhood friends bond that we're asked to accept exists at the beginning. So I hope there's more depth there in next seasons.

- Ben Barnes!!!! Just jksdfhgkdjghdf. I'm not a big villain stan usually and I hated the Darkling in the books but DAMN his performance is just amazing. They managed to make him more sympathetic and human while at the same time making clear the stuff he does is deeply horrible. There's the Magneto-aspect of 'well clearly his methods are fucked up but he's addressing a terrible injustice nobody is doing anything about' that makes it very tempting to root for him ; and again, well, like, Ben Barnes is so hot and charismatic it feels uncomfortable (which I guess is part of the point lol). His loss of humanity is, up to a point, understandable, brought about by despair, loneliness, grief and a sense of powerlessness - living so long he starts to see other people as disposable, losing so many people he stops caring, seeing over and over how hate never seems to stop, etc. It's a logical explanation for going insane.

But the hunger for power is also very much present as a motivation and this ambiguity is there constantly. Does he maybe come to genuinely care for Alina or is it totally bullshit ? I think he does, he's just so fucked up that it comes out as possessiveness and a need to control her. He wants Alina to be his equal but he's incapable of treating her that way. It's tragic, in a sense, but the show doesn't excuse his actions either. Like his monstrosity is a product of this world full of injustice, yes, and that warrants some compassion, monsters are always a symptom of their environment in some ways and dehumanizing them completely is an excuse ; but at the same time, he sabotaged his own cause anyway the moment he started to treat other people like things, as he does with Alina, because that just perpetuates the cycle of violence and hate. At some point he started feeling like he was the only solution and he was owed power for his sacrifices, and he's using his cause as an excuse. When Alina came to him, there was a possibility for redemption, taking down the Fold, and it's a test because there is finally someone on his level of power. But instead of seeking to remedy the power imbalance between them, he made it worse, by lying to her, manipulating her, etc, and the antler collar is the ultimate sign of this.

I love those scenes towards the end (the antler-based body horror has big Hannibal vibes, so messed up). I like Alina telling him they could have had this, that she had compassion for him and his cause, that they could have worked together, and he's the one responsible for screwing it up and this time his claim that he's the misunderstood victim ("Make me your villain") appears delusional and self-serving instead of somewhat justified. The almost-lovers to enemies vibes, the sense of lost potential, and the angst of the whole 'oh you could finally have been loved by people, too bad you fucked it up !', very juicy. There is this fundamental idea that power/respect/love is not something you are owed no matter how good your intentions are or because you're strong or you have suffered or you're willing to commit horrible drastic actions, you have to keep proving you deserve it, and trying to claim power without responsibility of care turns you into a monster. The thing with the stag was an excellent metaphor of the fact that there's things you can't take, they have to be given to you, and the wonderful power there is in understanding that is what allows Alina to harness the stag amplifier's power. This is really when she escapes his grim utilitarian outlook and a different way forward and owns her own power fully on her own terms.

Anyway I hope Alina gets to beat the shit out of him at some point that would be very sexy but I'm also looking forward to see how their arcs parallel and diverge from each other as Alina starts to grapple more with the implications of her power and the harsh dilemmas of war and her own dark side. I want to see him become scared of her, and I feel it will be more visible than in the books where he just has this cold aggressive facade all the time. This one feels a lot more openly emotional which is just a lot more interesting.

- As for the other characters ; Zoya mostly made me sad. The actress has the perfect vibes but I'm not sure I love their take on her character so far, it does make sense in terms of the later books - that she has internalized prejudice regarding her mixed-race heritage, that she is jealous of Alina because of how hard she's fought to get where she is and Alina kind of takes it away from her, etc. But I would have liked to see a bit more of her being badass and sharp-tongued in a clever (even if mean) way instead of spending most of her time being rejected by men and being racist towards Alina. I did like the ending though, of her actually seeing the monstrosity of the Darkling in action and the mention of her aunt. And her brief bonding with Inej was great, just because it was badass but also maybe because it could be a part of Zoya learning to accept her Suli heritage in turn, maybe not right away but in time, when thinking of that part of herself, she won't only think of her parents' ruined marriage and all the pain it caused, but also of that badass and brave acrobat girl who went toe to toe with these really scary monsters without even having any powers and !!!!!

- Also Leigh's cameo was so cute and as an aspiring writer this is just such wish fulfillment

- I honestly think that having the Crows there actually made the S&B story better ? Not only in terms of the much needed levity breaks but also in terms of themes. For instance, Matthias and Nina's story gave us a really raw and visceral view of how the Grisha are hunted. And Inej's relationship to Alina really gave us a sense of what Alina actually means to people who believe in the Saints in a way that doesn't feel just like 'ugh those superstitious people' because we know that Inej's faith is part of what makes her who she is and a person with morals, and something that saw her through the worst moments of her life. It feels so special that she got to meet Alina and given a sign that maybe the world is not completely shitty. And Alina's kindness towards Inej really gives you a sense that she might be, or become worthy of that belief in time, or at least that she wants to, that she's figuring out her power to really touch people's lives might be a good thing, and that she's starting to accept this responsibility more fully. And her arming Inej is a nice parallel to that. I'm very emotional about this scene, because one of the first things we see of young Alina is her taking out a knife to defend Mal from the bullies, because she's protective and brave, but she's also aware the world is a shitty place, and so her giving that knife to Inej is a sort of spiritual transmission and recognition of sorts, that she trusts Inej with that fighting power, that she'll use this knife to defend herself and her loved ones and not abuse it. It's so interesting. And a counter point to the Darkling's fucked up relationship to power that Alina might at some point get afraid she'll replicate. That you could see Alina trying to gather followers and using people's admiration for her like he did but instead she sets them free and empowers them. It's great. And I feel that when Inej takes to the seas, she'll think about Alina. (I do hope somebody tells her Alina's not dead at some point though god). Girls giving each other knives is my spirituality, honestly.

- And I also noticed an interesting parallel between Kaz and the Darkling in terms of being two emo dudes who like to wear black, are prone to violence and have a thing for two very powerful women they think are special and want to have at their side, but of course, they go about it in very different ways. The Darkling comes at it from a place of power while Kaz comes from a place of utter powerlessness, first of all, and he understands why it's important to set Inej free. Him spending the entire season trying to earn enough money to pay off Inej's indenture is the opposite to the Darkling putting that collar on Alina and while I do have issues with how the show portrays him, I do love that. Love is about setting the person you love free !!!! And that confrontation scene was so powerful, when Kaz tells the Darkling Alina was tired of being a captive ! Drag him !

- As for Genya, I liked the actress and her chemistry with Alina, but I'm not sure they did a great job of making her arc very clear, for instance what it means for her to get that red kefta, her relationship with the other Grisha, etc. Her and David are already very cute though. Also very much looking forward to see where that goes.

So yeah I think they did a great job with this bit actually, I enjoyed a lot more than I think I would and even though it is a very tropey story, there's plenty of depth there too.

The Crows :

- I'm a bit more nitpicky about this because I care about these characters so much. I think overall the problem is that the SaB story in the books happens on this massive scale with enormous stakes, and that next to that the Crows' issues feel less important ; it's like their impact is distorted by the gravity of the much larger story. Like for instance, Kaz in the books is very much at the center of everything, this larger than life trickster figure who knows and controls almost everything by sheer cleverness, and he has this sense of allure and mystique that can't happen here, and so his aura just shrinks. On top of that they're not on their home turf. Being introduced to these characters before they've reached their full levels of badass is weird - there is a reason why prequels generally happen after the main stuff, because they count on the love you have for these characters at their full potential to make you interested in their story when they were less badass and interesting. So I had several moments where I was like 'oh this feels wrong'. Tbh the idea that they would even volunteer to kidnap Alina in the first place, what with Inej's backstory, feels kind of wrong, esp since they had no idea of what would happen to her if they succeeded.

- But I still enjoyed a lot of it though, especially the fact that they were this force of chaos in the midst of this bigger narrative that's a lot more self-serious. The bits with the train, or the circus acts were very clever. A lot of the best moments in the show happen when they come to disturb the other plot in unexpected ways. I'm still dead over the whole 'Alina jumps into their carriage' scene, that was fucking gold. The team up at the end !!!! Alina and Kaz making a deal ! Inej stabbing the Darkling !!!! Them stealing the Darkling's carriage !!! They don't give a shit that the story is supposed to be super dramatic it's great.

- Jesper is the one character they completely nailed from start to finish and he's probably my favorite part of the whole show. He's very funny without being reduced to the role of comic relief ; he's just so! damn! cool!!!!!!! I honestly feel this is a thing they actually did even better than in the books, or at least Six of Crows where I felt Jasper kind of disappeared behind Kaz and they insist a lot on his flaws and issues. So before we dig more into those problems I love that they gave him time to be this ultra badass who saves the day several times ; while at the same time, hinting at further developments like his powers or his gambling issues. Kit Young is just perfect, confident without being arrogant, a bit cold when it comes to crime while at the same time being so obviously caring with Inej - I loved their friendship, that was so sweet. My main criticism is that they should have made it clearer he was bi because there are already people calling him gay and that's very annoying. I know some people had a problem with his hookup and like...I can see it's a bit of a cliché...the charming badass bisexual adventurer....it's a trope I kind of love though lmao and the scene itself felt kind of cute and fun. He's not the only person who is shown to have an active sexuality and he's also not the only queer person around and we know he's going to have a more substantial romantic arc later so eh. On a larger note I loved the little casual hints of completely normalized queerness - Nadia thirsting over Zoya, Fedyor and Ivan, Poppy, etc. Having grown up with fantasy where queerness was either completely erased or very tormented and problematic, this was refreshing as hell.

- Inej and Kaz...my faves... They have a kind of relationship which feels so rare and unique in terms of what exists on TV and while I don't feel they entirely replicated it, the core is still there - the mutual respect and building of trust, the longing, the repression, the trauma, etc. One thing I really like is their arc around faith - in the books, Kaz is dismissive of Inej's faith in ways that often feel really shitty and I like that he learns to be more respectful of it. It's very much linked to hope/survival ; Inej keeps this token from her parents and she hopes to find them again ; Kaz tells her it's no use and she'll survive better if she gives up. He believes Alina is a fake, while Inej wants to believe that myths can come true and there is hope for good things in the world. Kaz comes to accept that Alina is the real deal and, out of respect for Inej's faith, to stop pursuing her. I loved the bit about Inej struggling to kill as well - it's the dilemma of what her survival and that of the people she really cares about are worth in such a shitty world - her compassion is a good part of her but so is her survival instinct, and that's the part Kaz represents - that even after she's been through hell, broken in unfathomable ways, even if she gave up all hope and faith in the world, even she becomes dangerous and ruthless to survive, she will still deserve dignity, and to be treated better. And meanwhile she is willing to break her principles, which she holds so dearly, to save him, when he's never had anyone who cared for him like that - enough to keep him alive. That bit in the church !!!!! God !!!!!! Bye !!!!!!! And then him basically calling her his own version of a Saint, that he doesn't believe in miracles but he does believe in her !!! It's very emblematic of their whole arc ; he empowers her to survive in a ruthless world and loves her at her most dangerous ; but he loves her laugh too, he finds her a ship and her parents, he honors her capacity for love and hope even when he can't share it. And she sees that he's capable of doing better, that he's worth caring for. This whole thing kills me honestly and I can't wait to see where they take this next. I'm not mad they're a bit more soft and obvious than in the books, Kaz would just have come across as an an asshole otherwise.

- That said, there are bits of how they introduced their backstories I don't like. I get that making it so Inej was still tied to the Menagerie gave them a very powerful reason to want to kidnap Alina beyond greed so that they wouldn't look like very shitty people. But in the books Inej is terrified by the idea of simply seeing Heleen or the Menagerie and the way they have her interact with her feels weirdly casual and dismissive of her trauma. Also, in the books, the fact that Kaz had to convince Per Haskell to buy Inej's contract through a lot of effort, that he wasn't the one holding that above her head either, made the power dynamics more palatable. I especially disliked the scene where Kaz says he won't free other girls because just Inej is special, it makes him look like he has the power but he's just too much of a callous asshole to do it, and that he just freed Inej because he liked her which is absolutely not what their relationship is about at the start, it's a lot more about seeing Inej's dangerous side behind a facade of powerlessness and relating to her, in a sense, and this scene made it all feel cheap.

- Also, what was that about Inej having a brother ? Not a fan of that either. I'm afraid they're going to make her story all about finding what happened to him, and that's 1) too on the nose similar to Kaz's story and 2) it kind of cheapens her own arc, a female character realizing that what was done to her was wrong, reclaiming her own power and dignity and then making sure it doesn't happen to anybody else, harnessing her personal experience to save strangers, that's so powerful - making it about a family member at first, especially if it's about revenge, it's so much more simplistic and unoriginal and the perspective really annoys me.

- Also not a fan of Per Haskell not being there because he's a very important part of Kaz's evolution, so I hope he shows up eventually - and the way they introduced Pekka Rollins was kind of like...weird and out of place. I just found the Crows' introduction scenes stilted and not as cool as they should have been - well, Jesper and Inej were very cool, but we needed to see Kaz in action first, we needed to see why he's such a menace before we see him flounder later, and I just...I don't know exactly but it didn't work for me. Also this is a very petty thing but I wasn't crazy about the Ketterdam sets, I know this is probably a budget thing but in my head it looked like this incredible mix of Amsterdam and Venice - specific locations in the book directly remind me of parts of Amsterdam I know very well - and instead what we got felt like this very generic London-ish fantasy setting....so boring. Also a lot of scenes that felt to exposition-y. I don't mind that Kaz was a bit softer than in the books, like many people have said some things work in books and don't work on a screen, and you need to make the character's inner dynamics more explicit. But I do agree that, at the same time, he should have been more ruthless towards people outside of his group. Loved that scene where he faces the Inferni though, and how well they illustrated his disability and aversion to touch.

- I don't have that much to say about Nina and Matthias ; I'm still not super sold on the whole 'haha misogyny!' thing and I dislike that so much of Matthias' change of heart relies on the fact that he finds Nina hot. But I did think that the actors had enough chemistry to make their scenes together interesting and cute ; I loved the waffle scene. Even though it's disappointing that they didn't find an actress who was more clearly plus size for Nina, I still think Danielle does a good job bringing her bold, unapologetic energy. I'm really looking forward to seeing the Crows as a whole team.

So yeah, even though the season didn't feel like a perfect, coherent whole, it was just a lot of fun and I really hope they get renewed. In particular I feel like tying the first trilogy to the Crows' story could create such interesting parallels in terms of themes, about power, the cost of survival, hope, trauma, etc etc

[pomegranate-belle]

V-day ask meme 5 with mattfoggy?

5. Character spends all day trying to give a valentine to their crush, only to be foiled in increasingly ridiculous ways

So this became... 3k words. I feel like this trope is very high-school oriented, but somehow the fic ended up being comicsverse so idk. It’s set... Somewhere in a post-whatever-run-we’re-on-now future where Kirsten is back and Matt’s not stupidly sleeping with mob boss wives. Also, massive apologies to any X-Men fans; I do not know shit or fuck about characterizing Magneto and Professor X, I just wanted Sir Ian and Patrick Stewart to cameo in this fic—

—

Despite all the commercialism and the overwhelming scent of flowers and processed candy, there’s just something about the aura of Valentine’s Day that Matt likes. People young and old get excited for it — whether for romantic purposes or just because chocolate will soon be on sale — and their feelings infuse the air in a way Matt can’t quite pin down to one or another of his senses. The Valentine Vibe, Kirsten had called it when he tried to explain the sensation to her.

He’s... Ecstatic, to have her back in his life, there’s really no other word for it. They’re not quite what they once were — in fact, Matt has no idea what they are except she’s there and they love each other but they’re not the kind of people who kiss each other anymore. Still, after climbing out of his latest spiral to find her waiting at the top? He can’t think of a better dynamic to have with an ex. She’s still Kirsten, after all. She’s still intelligent and funny and brave and doesn’t take his shit.

She’s also begun to take a particularly pointed interest in his relationship with Foggy that he thinks he should maybe be a little frightened about. Her intention is that Matt, so she says, ‘stop pining and seduce him already’ — which is easy enough for her to say, but just because he and Kirsten followed an absolutely fantastic trail of sexual tension to an even more fantastic relationship does not mean the same thing will work with Foggy.

You don’t seduce Foggy Nelson, and Matt would know. He’s been trying unsuccessfully for fifteen years and he is not subtle. Matt knows he looks good even if he can’t see it himself; the empirical evidence is pretty, uh, evident. But whenever Foggy sees him shirtless his only reaction is to toss a shirt at him and tell him to cover his shame with a warm fondness that’s simultaneously disappointing and heartwarming. Matt’s not even on the menu to Foggy, he’s concluded. But, well. Matt’s always been a champion of lost causes, and all that.

Besides, best friends give each other stuff on Valentine’s Day all the time. Foggy loves chocolate, and he’ll probably brush off what the ‘oh my god Matt you big softie this is totally the sappiest one in the store’ card Kirsten helped Matt pick out says as being a joke, so it’s not like there’ll be any negative repercussions. Matt’s resolved. He’s gonna do it.

Unfortunately, Foggy’s in a meeting with a client when Matt shows up to probably-unsuccessfully sweep him off his feet. The secretary says it’s set to go on another two hours. Matt doesn’t have that kind of time to bandy around now that he’s trying to be responsible with his work-life balance, so he makes a tactical retreat.

Fine. He’ll just take Foggy out to lunch and give him his valentine then. No problem.

—

They actually do make it to lunch, which gives Matt a false sense of security. He decides to save the valentine for the end — like dessert. It’ll be sweet, he’s certain, and he’ll be able to savor Foggy’s happiness the entire time he walks him back to his office.

Matt is just about to pull out his gift and offer it to Foggy when his phone starts announcing Jessica Jones’s name. He spends about three seconds too long debating whether to answer or not.

“If you ghost her she’ll beat the crap out of you,” Foggy points out, standing with a metallic rasp of chair legs against the floor. “I’ll head out and let you take that.”

Foggy sounds content, smells like deli ham and honey mustard and potato chips — a not-super-healthy sandwich lunch masquerading as something more so by way of a thin layer of lettuce — and gives off the same soothing body heat he always has, excepting his bout with cancer that Matt tries not to think about. To make a long story short, he feels like home to every one of Matt’s senses, and it’s a struggle not to ask him to stay. Still, the insistence of Matt’s phone prevails, because he knows what Jess is calling about. He’d asked her to help keep an eye on Mike and let him know if he was up to anything — if she has something to report, it’s bound to be important. So, Matt offers Foggy a nod and then pulls out his cell to answer her.

—

Of course, both he and Foggy are busy all afternoon, but Matt knows that Foggy usually knocks off early on Fridays, so he wraps up his own business — meeting with Jess to discuss strategy, any work that can’t be pushed to later — as efficiently as possible and follows suit. His plan is to meet Foggy right as he’s stepping onto the sidewalk — waylay him and present him with the valentine before anything else can interfere. Except that as he’s strolling along down the street, Matt happens to hear a mugging going on down an alley that he’s passing. Breaking that up takes more time than he’s willing to admit — god, he’s getting old — and even vaulting over a few rooftops doesn’t make up the delay. Foggy’s gone when Matt reaches his destination. He lets his head fall back against the brick wall behind him, breathing heavily, and then reaches for his phone.

“Matt?” Foggy’s voice is tinny and confused and perfect over the phone line. “What’s up?”

“Dinner?” Matt asks. “I was thinking Italian tonight, want to meet me at Maria’s at five-thirty?”

There’s a long, long pause.

“Yeah, sure thing, Matty. I figured you’d already have plans...?”

“Nah, nothing. See you then.”

—

Fourth time’s the charm, that’s what they say, right? Maria’s is quaint and quiet and always smells like good bread and cheese. He and Foggy aren’t the only ones there — a few couples seem to be scattered around the room, including a pair of teenage girls that are probably on a first date based on the way they fumble their words and their silverware. There’s also two elderly men, one in a wheelchair, who sound like they might be playing chess on a travel board while they wait for their food. They all add to the atmosphere instead of disturbing it, though, which is nice. Across the table, Foggy clears his throat, scraping the tines of his fork through his food.

“So. Lunch and dinner? I feel like you’re buttering me up for something,” he says. “We don’t have to move back to California, do we? Because I will, but I only just unpacked my last box a few weeks ago and it’s going to be a pain to pack it all up again.”

“No! No, nothing like that, Foggy,” insists Matt. “Seriously. I just want to spend time with you. Is that really so out of character?”

“On Valentine’s Day?” Foggy points out, and his silverware clinks against his plate. “I mean, kind of.”

The implication isn’t lost on Matt — don’t you usually have a date? — but he doesn’t address it. Foggy is his date, but couching it like that out loud is a little too presumptive, even for him.

“Well, not this year.”

Matt smiles his most charming smile, and it nets him a fond sigh, the kind that’s normally paired with Foggy ruffling his hair.

—

Again, Matt waits until the end of the meal. This time, they get to dessert, and the moment is perfect. They’re comfortably full, happy, and relaxed. It doesn’t matter if Foggy sees the gesture as romantic or not, because at least Matt can be satisfied that it was done as romantically as possible. His sense of aesthetics, such as it is, will be appeased.

Which is, of course, the moment the door of the restaurant bursts open.

“Magneto!” shouts a man, storming into the restaurant with heavy, clomping bootsteps and shattering the moment to pieces. “I’ll kill you!!”

Matt is going to kick this guy’s ass.

What is he even yelling about? Magneto? Magneto’s not—

And then one of the old men stands. Every spoon in the restaurant rattles towards him when he pushes back his chair, prompting a sigh from his dinner companion. And so it turns out that maybe the guy bursting through the door isn’t as off-base as Matt assumed. That old guy really is Magneto. It actually takes Matt a minute to realize that the man in the wheelchair across the table must be Charles Xavier. Xavier just isn’t someone Matt hangs around a lot, he tends to steer clear of both him and his academy when possible. It’s not mutants Matt has a problem with, though — it’s telepaths. The idea of someone poking around in his brain pan without so much as a by-your-leave gives him goosebumps. And not the fun kind.

As Matt considers all this, the scene continues — he notices distantly that the teenagers are being ushered towards the kitchen and away from the action. There’s a few whiffs of air as punches are thrown by the unknown assailant, and an unpleasant burning smell. Matt’s torn between shuffling Foggy away from danger and joining the fray himself, but when Foggy reaches out and grabs his hand for comfort he finds he can do neither.

“Let me very firmly impress upon you the enormity of your rudeness,” says Magneto, his voice crisp and cold.

Matt can’t even tell what he’s doing — something about Magneto’s powers is messing with his radar sense in the most disorienting way — but it sounds painful. Matt debates with himself the pros and cons of shaking off Foggy’s grip and intervening.

“Erik,” Xavier says warningly, though there’s still something quietly warm suffusing his tone.

“Oh, very well.”

The would-be assassin hits the floor with a thud that rattles the dishes on Matt and Foggy’s table. He’s breathing, a little bit labored, but still alive. And unconscious. Also possibly bleeding a little bit, but it’s hard to tell with the scent of all the metal in the air.

And that, he supposes, is why you don’t mess up Magneto’s dinner plans.

Magneto and Professor X make their leisurely escape, leaving Matt’s romantic moment with Foggy thoroughly in ruins. He lets it go, sighing into the last bite of his tiramisu and gives the plan up as a bad job. Maybe next year, he thinks wryly as he and Foggy get up together to examine the man left on the floor.

“He’s wrapped up in a chain of spoons,” Foggy narrates quietly, nudging the guy with his toe. “Wasn’t sure if you could tell that, you looked confused. He must have some sort of acid powers though because he managed to melt a few on their way in. I think maybe he just fainted when the chain tightened. Are you able to sense any really bad injuries?”

Matt tilts his head and concentrates.

“No,” he determines at last. “No, nothing.”

That settled, they split the check and book it before they can get caught up in a police investigation or a mutant hunt.

Their apartments are in opposite directions, so there’s not even an excuse to give Foggy the valentine on the way home. And anyway, Matt’s feeling so discouraged that he’s not sure he even wants to go through with it anymore. He turns for home, planning to crumple up the card and maybe eat the chocolates himself.

“Matt.”

There’s a tug as Foggy grabs his sleeve. He turns towards the warmth of Foggy’s body, the sounds of his heart and his breath, and tries to offer a smile.

“What?”

Foggy gives him a quiet huff in return.

“Come on, Matt, give me a little credit. You’ve kept coming up with excuses to meet me all day. There’s something you wanted to say, and you still haven’t said it,” he explains. “I can tell. So let’s head back to mine and you can finally get it off your chest.”

Matt feels, suddenly, seen. It’s an unsettling and vulnerable feeling, but he knows beyond all doubt that he’s safe with Foggy. That it’s silly of him to be surprised at somebody knowing him so well when that somebody is Foggy. There’s not much the two of them can hide from each other after being best friends for so long. Mood improved a little, Matt manages a more genuine smile, and they walk on together.

—

“So, what exactly is your problem, Matt?” Foggy asks once they’re safely inside.

And it’s not as if he says it in a rude way, he actually sounds very earnest and concerned, but that just impresses on Matt all the more how stupid this entire situation is. He’s twisted himself in knots all day over one dumb little gift for one dumb little holiday. Annoyed with himself, Matt divests himself of his glasses, cane, and suit jacket, opens up his briefcase, plops the valentine and accompanying small box of chocolates inside down on Foggy’s coffee table, then flops onto the couch on his back.

“That,” he says, gesturing towards it. “That’s my problem, ok?”

Foggy laughs.

“That’s what all this was about? A valentine? You had me worried you were getting ready to pull some crazy stunt or another.” He pauses, likely studying the items set on the coffee table. “Chocolate and a card, huh? For Kirsten, I’m guessing? I had a feeling the two of you would be getting back t—”

Matt is extremely tired of Foggy’s assumptions.

“No, it’s for you! I’ve been trying to give it to you all day!” he complains, throwing an arm over his face — he might be a grown man but after the day he’s had he’s allowed to be a little dramatic, ok?

“Me?”

Foggy sounds surprised and pleased, but not like he’s having any sort of revelation about Matt’s feelings for him. Which is fine. That’s what Matt had expected, after all.

“Yup.”

“Well, if it is for me, then I guess I don’t have to feel guilty about wanting to eat these,” Foggy says, and there’s some rustling of cardboard and plastic as he opens the box of sweets and chooses one.

Raspberry-filled, Matt’s nose tells him as soon as it’s bitten into. With a pleased hum at the taste, Foggy picks up the card and opens the envelope. There’s further quiet, inarticulate sounds after that — noises Matt remembers from studying near Foggy, the sound of him not-quite-reading-aloud.

There’s a pause.

Foggy’s heart does a funny kind of stutter in his chest, then speeds up considerably. He swallows the chocolate in his mouth with a gulp that sounds distinctly nervous.

“Um. Matty...”

And now Matt’s nervous too. He sits up, clenches his fingers in the fabric of his slacks to keep from reaching for his glasses.

“What? What is it?” he demands.

“Did you, uh... Did you know Kirsten wrote in this?”

Oh no.

“What did she write?”

“Well, there’s a pretty long spiel about what she’ll do to us if we hurt each other,” Foggy says, with a jovial tone that rings very hollow. “But she also says I need to get over myself and kiss you because you’re an emotionally stunted duckling and won’t make the first move.”

“... Ah.”

Matt’s still trying to calculate the relative distance to the ground if he flings himself out the window when Foggy’s hand lands on his shoulder.

“Is she right?” he asks Matt.

“About what?”

Though he tries for a devil-may-care grin, Matt thinks it probably comes out a little anemic.

“About you wanting to kiss me, Matthew,” Foggy says drily. “we both already know you’re emotionally stunted.”

Matt shrugs.

“I do. But you don’t, and that’s fine, I’m... I don’t need...”

“I don’t?” asks Foggy, sounding incredulous. “Matty, come on. There’s pretty much nobody on Earth who’d turn you down and you really think I would?”

“But...? You never said...”

Foggy sighs and steps back. Matt gets the feeling he’s probably shaking his head in despair at Matt’s apparent idiocy.

“And why would I, Matt? I mean. You know what I mean! I’m just not the kind of person you would... They have leagues for a reason, buddy.”

That self-depreciation, light but tinged with a very deep melancholy that Matt knows is drilled right through to Foggy’s core, drives him to his feet in agitation.

“Objection!” he snaps, and doesn’t care how ridiculous it sounds. “I’ve flirted with you before! How could you think...”

“You flirt with everything that moves, Matt, I knew you didn’t mean it. That’s just who you are,” Foggy explains patiently.

“Well...” He can’t exactly deny it. “Yeah, but I did want to kiss you. Do want to kiss you. All the time. Except after you eat something gross and unfit for human consumption.”

Foggy offers up a quiet laugh, then, and it smooths some of Matt’s ruffled feathers when he can’t detect any bitterness in the sound.

“Real smooth, Casanova,” Foggy says. “That was sarcasm by the way. I’m rolling my eyes at you.”

“But you still want to kiss me too,” Matt replies, because he’s beginning to think it’s true and he knows Foggy finds it both irritating and endearing, but more the latter, when he’s smug about things.

“You really are unbearable. What do I see in you, I ask myself,” laments Foggy, even as he steps forward and cups Matt’s cheek in his hand.

Matt can hardly stop grinning long enough to swoop in and kiss him first.

[sebastianshaw]

(Part 1) I was wondering if Krakoa is truly beneficial from Shaw's perspective. If we assume Shaw still had his 80s level of power, he would have to stop manufacturing sentinels and every political ally would know he's a mutant (altering his public image). That's a lot of global power going down the drain in exchange for his involvement in the drug trading for Krakoa. It may give him money, but the extent to which he can do is limited by the council. His role on the council is pointless, he …

(Part 2) … gets told to shut up and is ignored/sidelined in council meetings, might as well be a brick wall. He definitely doesn’t have enough control in the HTC with Emma and Kitty totally against him. His amoral ways of killing to get what he wants is against the official law, ofc he can be discreet but we know he will get caught for killing Kitty. Onto resurrection, he may be satisfied with immortality however he will always have to act in accordance to Krakoa … (Part 3) … and can’t exploit people. He only brought back Shinobi as a pawn to have on his side, because he can’t control the way the HTC works and Charles is more willing to accept Emma’s point of view. It seems like a possible solution would be if he just leaves the HTC and still remain on Krakoa so he can focus on his company and enjoy the benefits of the portals and immortality. If he stays on with the HTC, it’s partly incompatible with his libertarian views … (Part 4) … so it’s either freedom or more power under a governed rule. But I don’t think Charles can allow that, from what he said to Mystique about everyone having a responsibility on Krakoa and there isn’t a substitute for Shaw. On the other hand, rejecting Krakoa has a big opportunity cost and he would have to stop manufacturing sentinels anyway if every mutant would be on the island. The alternatives aren’t any better but for now I’m just … (Part 5) … focusing on the cons of Krakoa for him. Unlike every other evil mutant who seems satisfied (Selene may be an anomaly), Shaw doesn’t fit in. Overall, Krakoa seems more restricting to him than his situation before and I don’t know why a fictional character has taken up so much of my thinking time. Thanks for reading this and I want to know what’s your opinion on how much Krakoa is worth for Shaw all things considered. Fictional characters take up ALL my thinking time! I think it’s great you think this much about your fave and what makes sense for them, in particular since he’s a fave that I share and it’s not like I find many other people who do. I certainly wish even ONE writer thought this much about his personality, philosophy, and motivations! I don’t really have any lengthy thoughts to add, I just basically agree with you. I’ve kinda had the same thought for awhile, that Shaw is risking/sacrificing a whole lot in order to be part of Krakoa, for what’s really not much gain in return at all, and I’m not sure how likely that really is for someone like him. My in-universe explanation is that, much like he only brought Shinobi back as a pawn, he himself was only brought back by Xavier and Magneto because they needed him for his black market connections. So it behooves him to obey and play that part for them, because if he refuses, they have NO REASON to bring him back once more should he get killed again...and given that Emma, who killed him in the first place, would probably be happy to do it again and could very likely get away with it, then yeah, he might see this as a survival thing, and is just going to make the best of it (and get Emma out of the way so she’s no longer a threat). Like, yeah, okay, I *HAVE* to do it, but in typical Shaw fashion I’m going to damn well make the most of it. I imagine his selection for being on the Council was his economic know-how. I mean, he immediately brings up very practical concerns like currency, taxes, property...and immediately gets shut down, as you said, and never participates in anything again as of yet...but everything he said *was* stuff that people should actually be thinking about if they’re going to have a country, and also not stuff I think anyone else on the Council would have considered, since everyone else there was always all about ideals more than anything (except Emma, but she’s in the “ideals” camp now for sure) They’re all people who are thinking about the Utopian vision, Shaw’s thinking about practical and necessary shit, and I think that’s why he’s there, even if they all dump on him for it. That said, that’s all just my theories for in-universe, that’s just ME trying to find a way to make it all fit despite the VERY good points you make (which I agree with). On a meta level...on a meta level I don’t think Hickman or anyone else thought that hard. I think he’s there for the same reason that, say, Exodus is there---Hickman thought it would be cool if a bunch of prominent or semi-prominent former villains made up like half the Council, and Shaw made the cut as a former Big Bad. Beyond that, he is (also much like Exodus) basically window dressing who might as well not be there at all. He’s not there because it’s in-character, he’s there because Hickman wants him there. Likewise, he’s not part of the HTC for any greater reason than Duggan wants him there. If Shaw actually did what was most sensible and likely for him, he’d just drop out of the story because he wouldn’t be involved with any of the storyline stuff, and since the writers want him in it---even just as a background image at Council Meetings---he’s not going to do that. I just kind of accept it, and instead focus on if he’s at least being written in a way that I enjoy and find accurate, rather than questioning “why is he even here, why is he even doing this???” since, like you, I just find myself bogged down with reasons why he WOULDN’T be. Which, by the way, you did a really beautiful job going through and laying out, and I enjoyed reading it! It was like you took bits of what I’d been kind of feeling and then you fleshed them out really articulately. My reading comprehension is admittedly not the greatest right now (sads gives me a fuzzy brain) but everything you said reads correctly to me, and ultimately the only thing I can really say is that “yeah, you right tho” So like I’ve got my answers that I use it to make sense for me in-universe, but you are correct and I’ve actually been hoping he would say SOMETHING to this effect at one point or another, like give some IC reason he personally finds this to be worthwhile or worth the risk, or why he doesn’t just wash his hands of all this and go back to doing the shit that actually made him money WHICH IS WHAT HE CARES ABOUT, what is stopping him, etc. But he doesn’t, so I just kinda accept it and hope he at least doesn’t get written terribly in whatever latest thing he’s in. I hope my answer made sense and that I understood your points right! Again, I feel the same way, you just did a MUCH better job of writing it out and I enjoyed the read, I’m just also not at my sharpest right now <3 But I also love your thoughts!

[davidmann95]

Velvet's battle is a great choice, though I'll always have a special place in my heart for the fight against the Grimm Deathstalker and the Nevermore in Episode 8. That said, what do you think of the individual members of Team RWBY?

I decided to wait on this until I caught up on the series thus far, which I just finished doing the night before last in pretty much the only time in my life I’ve ever really properly binged anything other than comics, and…wow. I knew RWBY was a thing just as a matter of course from being on this site and Youtube, and from watching Death Battle, so I picked up some major beats by osmosis. But my main impression was that it was a charming pseudo-anime online thing of decent quality that unsurprisingly got heavier as it went along as such things tend to do, with extremely rad fights and music along the way; figured it’d be more than serviceable to watch while I was on the treadmill as a disposable distraction from the agony of propelling my wheezing, sweating, loathsome meat-scaffolding forward.

I did *not* expect it to eventually end up after growing pains a - while far from flawless - intensely engrossing story of all-consuming personal and generational pain and people who choose to love and do the right thing in defiance of that trauma and loss and hopelessness, where also occasionally a corgi gets fastball specialed at mechas. Though once it became clear that’s what it is, it pretty clearly sat at an intersection of a hell of a lot of my favorite things, especially when characters copped in-universe in both the main series and spinoff material that this is basically a superhero thing. My initial impressions re: the fights and music were on-point though.

I actually have quite a few thoughts on pretty much all the protagonists of note at this point (other than I suppose Oscar and Maria. Like them both though, and I do hope that nice boy’s brain somehow doesn’t dissolve into the blender of Ozpin’s subconscious), but I’ll just stick with the core four here as requested for now unless someone asks otherwise. Weiss is the simplest to get at the core of, I’d say: her arc is learning that fuck rich people, actually. She’s a seriously difficult character to get onboard for at first - especially if you’re watching those first episodes for the first time in 2019 - as the mean unconsciously racist rich girl who learns to be less mean and racist but still kinda mean. But after you’ve extensively seen the hideously toxic environment she grew up in, and fully understand her efforts to grow past the empty values it inculcated in her in favor of everything she was raised to think of herself as above, she becomes a hell of a figure to root for. Assuming RWBY is gonna go, say, a respectable 10 seasons given it was just renewed through 9, I could easily see the upcoming 7th be the climax of her arc with her return to Atlas and likely further reckoning with the consequences of her families’ actions beyond how they’ve hurt her personally.

Yang is also, in a certain abstract narrative sense, simple, in that she’s built around the very oldest trick in the book for characters whose main deal is ‘can punch better than absolutely anyone’: give them problems that cannot be solved by punching. Except in her case it’s less a material “well, this person is invulnerable to punching!” or “well, actually this other person can punch most best of all” issue blocking her path than “punching cannot solve depression, abandonment issues, questioning whether what she considers her purpose in life is one she’s truly pursuing for noble reasons or if she even has the resolve for it anymore after what’s happened to her, or PTSD”. Yet, while it may not be the kind that manifests in the form of punching people with a smirk and a bad pun anymore (much as she still definitely does that all the time) what ultimately drives her and defines her is still her strength: to move forward, to forgive, to let go, to do the right thing in spite of the risks. Which could easily come off as some unpleasant “you just have to get over your moping!” dismissal - there’s a bit with her dad that means it saddles riiiiight up to the edge of that - but there’s a weight to how her traumas remain a consistent factor in her life and have shaped her outlook even as her circumstances and day-to-day disposition improve that makes it feel thematically like it’s coming from a place of acknowledgment and endurance rather than denial, even if it’s not handled perfectly. Great to see her apparently recapturing some more of her joie de vivre based on the trailer for Volume 7, and how that’ll interact with how she’s grown should be interesting.

Blake is…tough, because you fundamentally cannot talk about Blake without getting into the Faunus, which is maybe the biggest aspect of RWBY that leaves it in the realm of Problematic Fave. It really, really wants to have something substantial to say about the proper response to racism, and every now and then it pumps out a “capitalism greases the wheels of systemic oppression and vice-versa” or “it’s perfectly reasonable for the oppressed to seek to fight back directly against their oppressors, and even the pacifist in the room can recognize that’s a defensible approach that deserves its place”. But then Abusive Boyfriend Magneto literally murders nuance in Vol. 5 episode 2, and it descends into some borderline “but what about black on black violence” respectability politics shit. It’s the classic X-Men setup - this persecuted race of often superpowered folks torn between pacifism and efforts to prove themselves to their oppressors, and those who think they should rise up and annihilate the flatscans - with most of the same pitfalls, but also we haven’t had over 50 years to get used to that just being how it works here, and it doesn’t have the excuse of having to expand as best it can on a metaphor that was originally devised before most of the people currently handling it were born. All of which would be rough enough, but given I watched this right as Jonathan Hickman’s been completely refining the entire X-Men paradigm outside that outdated binary, it especially grates. I’d love to be directed to any solid counterarguments - I’ve heard it might actually be an analogue, and a well-done one, for The Troubles, which I am one million percent unqualified to evaluate - especially since apparently one of the writers grew up in a mixed-race household, and at the end of the day I’m a white guy who may well be talking completely out his ass. But it sure comes off at a glance as some well-intentioned dudes stumbling through stuff that’s not their business, and that’s inextricable from Blake’s character when so much of her story is her navigating through that metaphor. Hopefully with new writers coming onboard this is something that can be navigated more insightfully in the future.

On a purely personal basis however, Blake’s a standout in terms of relatability when her story comes down to a pretty universal shared horror: how to climb back from having fucked up. She tried really hard to do the right thing, was taken advantage of and led into doing things she eventually realized were wrong, was so shaken that she couldn’t tell who to trust, and then the situation spiraled out of control on every possible front just as things finally seemed to be stabilizing. The way a single mistake - enabled and exacerbated by an abusive past relationship in her case - expands into a self-loathing far beyond the bounds of anything she could possibly be responsible for is brutal and completely understandable, and seeing her start put her self-esteem back together with the help of those closest to her and the power of her original convictions is arguably the single strongest, most clearly conveyed individual character arc in the series. I’m very curious where it goes from here: Adam’s finish represents a logical climax and the setup for a happily-ever-after with Yang (or Sun if they end up going that way after all) for her to coast through the remainder of the series on, but the way emotional consequences have played out in the series thus far I doubt her demons are going to be put to bed that simply.

Finally there’s Ruby, and I am contractually obligated to note up front: she is clearly not a Superman analogue. There is precisely zero percent chance that she was conceived as such or was ever deliberately executed in such a way that mirroring him was kept in mind. Though she IS a super-powered idealist raised in the middle of nowhere with a significant deceased parent who wears a red cape, flies, gives inspiring rallying speeches, has black-ish but primary color-tinted hair, and has a mysterious birthright that involves being able to shoot lasers from her eyes, plus she has a dog who also essentially has superpowers, plus she tells someone they’re stronger than they think they are, plus Yang basically quotes a bit from Kingdom Come regarding her in Rest and Resolutions. But it probably goes a ways in explaining why she works so well for me.

There’s more to it than that of course, though it does bring up the closest way in which she relates to the superhero paradigm: she doesn’t go through an arc in quite the same way as the others, instead being an already solidly-defined character who is simply illustrated by how she interacts with the people and situations around her. She learns and grows and matures, but her most basic motivations and goals and outlook haven’t really changed since the day she enrolled at Beacon. She’s a good, caring person, a leader archetype who still has more than enough personality to spare to keep from falling into the genericism that can often plague that role. A big part of the key I believe is that she’s the audience surrogate in a profound way beyond the obvious touchstones of her frequent awkwardness and self-doubt: the reason she does this is because she was inspired by stories. She’s a fan, ultimately, but one who learned all the right lessons, whether recognizing from day one the way reality falls short of the tales she was raised on but still believing in the ideals they represent, or openly holding up Qrow as a role model while being willing to call him on his shit when push comes to shove. It’s a romantic, hopeful perspective that stands out sharply from even our other heroes even as it mirrors their struggles, but as of yet there’s little to suggest it comes from a place of naivete so much as a belief that it’s the only way to bear the pain of the world and continue to believe in it. Bit by bit it’s clear she’s heading for a breaking point, but all signs point to that being a matter of her ability to withstand what she’s been through, rather than any doubt that it’s necessary, and should that time come she’s inspired plenty who’ll be able to help her back onto her feet the way she has for so many others. So while I understand her speeches apparently grate on some, as far as I’m concerned keep them coming, they’re the beating caring heart of the series and often the sole respite in the eye in the storm.

[stardustloki]

Fanfic ask game

I was tagged by the lovely @mercialachesis Thank you so much!! I really enjoyed doing this.

Side note that isn’t part of the ask game because I don’t think enough people have read their work:

My favourite stuff of theirs is a really well written civil war AU that doesn’t have nearly enough views or anything! Steve is so incredibly well written in this and everyone else is amazing as well.

I also really like the one in which kid Loki (who has his mouth sewn shut :(  ) ends up on earth and meets 1940s kid Steve because aaah that’s so well done toooo. I really feel like I’m there when I’m reading it.

At what age did you start writing fanfiction? I’ve been writing it since I was six years old, maybe earlier. The first I can remember (and have a typed record of) is my friends and I meeting the doctor, sarah jane etc. Please enjoy the absolutely gripping beginning lmao ‘There was a banging noise outside Holly’s, Chloe’s and Deborah’s door. It was a monster called the Dark Knight. It took them to a foreign planet. It took them took to a jail and locked the door. Sarah Jane, Rose and K.9. were also locked up.‘ 

6 year old me was not a literary genius by a long shot.

Who is your favorite author?

This is a hard hard hard question. I have sooooooo many. I have had a long think and I’m going to go with Snorri Sturluson. Snorri, you may be long dead and gone however I thank you greatly for writing the prose Edda so that now, hundreds upon hundreds of years down the line, we have Thor in the MCU and Mythological material to bastardise in our fanfictions. 

Edit: Does this mean fanfic author. It probably does. In which case it’s @gold-from-straw because her work = impeccable.

Favorite type of scene to write?

This probably won’t come as a surprise to anyone who has ever read my work but I thrive off angst and whump and angsty conversations/introspection.

What is your favorite fanfic?

Against the Moon by StoplightDelight. Absolutely the best Marauder’s Era fic there is out there. Every single character is handled so goddamn well. 

What tags do you avoid like the plague?

Th*rki (they are brothers!), St*rker (Peter is a child and they have a mentor mentee father son relationship goddamnit), L*ki/reader (I am one of the seemingly rare people who love Loki but are not lusting after him so just. No thank you. I’m a lesbian.) - stars added to names so people who do like reading these don’t have to see my answers when they search for content

What AU do you wish to write but feel like you won’t manage?

I am mind blanking here, sorry. Actually, I’ve just thought of one! One in which the X-men go back in time and save Erik (Magneto) and his mother etc. from before the concentration camp and maybe he grows up with kid Charles. I know I love angst but I want people to heal from it and Erik did not deserve the shit he went through.

What has been your favorite story to write so far? 

The Monster Under the Bed, easily. I just, love all the characters in it so much! (Apart from Odin, who is evil af in it - I did love writing him tho) And the story went to so many places I wasn’t expecting and it was just an utter joy to write.

Do you prefer to write one-shots or multi-chapters? Why?

Multi-chapters. I just like how you can explore multiple characters and take them on a journey get to know your reviewers/commenters a bit along the way.

What is your favorite kind of comment?

Do I have one? I love ones that are just like: well thanks I’ve stayed up basically all night reading this so I’m getting nowhere enough sleep because of you. I like people saying they liked general things (aka I like reassurance that the chapter wasn’t crap) or details. I like seeing what people felt, whether through keysmashes or more eloquent means. For the Monster Under the Bed one reviewer just said ‘LOVED IT!’ every chapter and you know what, that was magnificent because I knew they read the chapter and got to the end of it and liked it and it was very reassuring (because after someone’s left kudos for the first time, or followed, there’s actually no way to know if they like the next chapters if they don’t comment/review).

NGL sometimes I do love flames. This one time a commenter compared Thor to Hitler and I still Lose My Shit laughing every time I think about that. This other time I was presented with an 800 word essay of everything wrong with what I was writing. Once this person stopped reading because they didn’t like a chapter title.

Don’t leave flames. Flames aren’t nice. But sometimes they just illustrate how stupid people are and you have to laugh.

TLDR: I love comments. I sell my soul for comments. Give me comments please.

Why did you start writing fanfiction? Why are you still writing it?

I saw possibilities. I like writing. I want practice for becoming a professional author. The reasons haven’t changed in the last 14 or so years haha

I tag: @legolokili @gold-from-straw @readeption @lalaurelia @crissiti @enkelimagnus and legit anyone else who wants to do this as I am super aware that I have probably forgotten loads of people who write!

[awkward-snake-girl]

Vindication

A short fic based on a conversation I had with @littlemeangreen and a small dose of inter-dimensional shenanigans.

Mattie lived in a world where a lot of weird stuff happened. She’d accepted it a long, long time ago. Time travel, aliens, mutants, a whole mess of paranormal stuff, and most recently a younger version of herself from another universe. So...yeah...pretty weird week so far...definitely a new one for her anyway. But it wasn’t she couldn’t help her, she remembered what she was like at her age. Sweet, innocent, naive...a little stupid. It would be like throwing a baby deer to a pack of wolves, especially how much safer her universe was compared to her own...

So, she’d arranged to have her stay at the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning, and while she’s had her own personal issues with some of the X-Men, there were still a lot of people there who were competent enough to help the kid out. However while talking to them, she’d learned about a rather messy incident involving Husk, Toad, and the Hellfire Club which was going to royally screw over Mortimer even though he’d helped save the students and snapped Paige back to reality.

Mattie had always felt for the guy, especially after learning about how Magneto treated him and after he’d started to try and get his life together, she’d started chatting with him from time to time, eventually considering him as a friend. He was a sweet guy if not a little clingy, and was trying hard to get over his issues and past with the Brotherhood. Honestly she didn’t expect the X-Men to accept him with open arms at first, but she thought they would at least make an attempt to treat him properly, to trust him, you know...help him? Like their whole philosophy was about helping out mutants, and they treated him like shit... Oh yeah, because no one at that school had a less than perfect past. Please.

As she drove...well...herself...to the school, listening to the other her talk about her school, how she was friends with that universe’s version of the Brotherhood, and was even dating someone in that group named Todd...or was it Lance? She honestly kind of zoned out when she started gushing about her beau, but she was glad she seemed happy with whoever they were. God knows her own dating experience in high school was hell... Just when she was pulling up to the school, hearing Mattie two talk about her sewing projects, (Huh...she hasn’t picked up sewing needle in years...) She saw the staff in the courtyard with Toad, no doubt telling the poor man off, when she had an idea. Turning to face the other her, she gave a playful grin as a plan started to form in her head. “Hey kid, wanna help me stop the X-Men from screwing another mutant over?”

Mortimer had seen this coming, he knew the risks following Paige to that school, but she’d been so kind to him, and he loved her so, so, much. Although now, he was pretty sure that relationship was going to be ending since she was much more sane now... Just as they finished speaking he heard a different voice speak up. “Hey! You can’t just fire him! He saved those students, and stopped his girlfriend from attacking everyone! And wasn’t she the one who brought him to that other evil-villain-school-thing in the first place? How come she isn’t getting in trouble!” The staff looked surprised to say the least, Toad looked down right shocked as Logan looked at the kid strangely.

“Do you even go here?”

“No I do not!”

“She makes some good points though.” Mattie said, stepping out of the car and earning an annoyed look from Logan and a few of the other staff members. “Explain, Granger.”

Mattie chuckled. “She’s the one I was telling you about.” She said, looking at the younger her as she looked around the grounds excitedly. It was so much bigger than the Xavier school in her world! And that place was already pretty big.

“Ah. And I’m guessing that little outburst was your idea?” Asked Logan. Mattie shrugged. “Yeah, she cleaned up the language though. But seriously, after all the shit he’s gone through here you’re not firing him. Honestly he probably has grounds to sue this place and I can get Jen or Matt on the phone like that.” She said snapping her fingers and lowering her voice slightly to not alarm the other Mattie. “You can’t go on and say you gave him a chance when you never really did in the first place.” Mattie said darkly. “Give him a better job, or at least some help for him. I’m honestly impressed that he was able to keep this place looking nice considering he was the only janitor.”

“Well...when you put it like that...fine. Frogger can stay. But he’s on thin fuckin’ ice.” He grumbled. “Good. Now that’s taken care of, why don’t you have someone show other me around.” And with that, Mattie said good bye to her other self as she was whisked away to see the school, leaving her and Mort alone.

“Um...thanks...that was...that was very kind of you.” Mortimer said quietly. “Hey, what are friends for, right?” She said, pulling the shorter man into a hug, much to his embarrassment, letting go with a small smirk when she saw how red in the face he was. “Now, you should go see if you can work things out with Paige. I’m sure she’ll be happy to hear you’re staying. She’s a lucky girl to have someone like you watching out for her.” She says, actually smiling sincerely. “See you around, Toad.”

She said turning to leave. Maybe when she got home she’d get out her old sewing stuff. Maybe, just maybe it wasn’t the worst idea to embrace her softer side once in a while.

[praphit]

The X-People: DP Degrees of BS

Frickin Phoenix!

(What does that even mean? “Every hero has a DARK side?” She kills people! Are all of our heroes murderers? - but I’ll get to that later.)

I'm mad! That's right, people! I'm mad at MYSELF! Why? Well, I could have taken the kids to go see "The Secret Life of Pets 2", so we could laugh our asses off (Idk what kids I'm talkin about - just randomly picking kids up off the streets and taking them to see movies... prob best I didn't do that). 

I could have seen something cultured like "Late Night" or "THE LAST BLACK MAN IN SAN FRANSISCO"; which I admit is a stupid title, but it seems like it's a good movie. But, no, people! My comic book geekiness would not allow it!

Instead I went to see this bullshit right here - “X-Men: Dark Phoenix”. 

Don't look at me that way, Sansa! You know dag gon well this movie is some ol' bullshit!

You know! The rest of your acting squad knows, the director knows, the writers know - I knew from the first trailer! I knew from the first time they announced that they were taking another crack at a cinematic Phoenix story. Why?? Cuz we've done this before! Yep! 

There it is! - and it was terrible! 

What’s going on with that poster? Apparently, they didn’t have any confidence in that movie either. Why is Wolverine running at me like Sonic the Hedgehog?

I tried to find a better poster, but...

Here they look like they’re posing in some 80′s rock video. TAKE THAT STAND:)

I was mad back then with the first trailer, because I knew that this moment would come. And I actually really liked the first two movies of these particular X-Men. It was Apocalypse that ruined everything. 

People thought that movie was so bad, that it erased all the good that this franchised has done (even going back to the older X-Men):

The ground-breaking 1st movie (tho it prob doesn't hold up),

(Creepy old Magneto is coming for dat ass!)

Wolverine 

(it's hard to imagine anyone playing him better than Hugh Jackman. And he should have won an award for how cut he got... and he was so modest. If I ever  end up looking like that, WHEW! - ladies look out:),  

I loved Patrick Stewart as Prof. X, James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender's intense hot & frigid bromance (though we never got our make-out seen:), Quicksilver (man, I wish we could get more of him), "Logan" (excellent comic book movie), and I'm not sure if we'd have Deadpool without them ruining that first Wolverine movie. Not to mention that they marketed the hell out of this movie franchise and made so much money! But, then this guy showed up and effed it all to hell!

("Everything they built will FALL... ")

- you ain't lyin, jack!

And while that movie was terrible, it wasn't as bad as everyone said. Bullshit sure, but... there are different degrees of bullshit. Apocalypse was forgettable BS, sometimes there's BS that makes us laugh, or think, or cry - what type of bullshit will Dark Phoenix be? -  Let's take a look:

This movie kicks off with the X-Men in space. Yep! SPACE! Since when are the X-Men astronauts? Which movie did they get training for any of that? How did they build an X-Jet for space travel? Did they learn it on YouTube? And even if that were the case, how's the government allowing this? If a group of talented minorities built a functional space craft, do you think President Trump would allow them to come and go as they please? Shiiiiiii In the movie they don't even test it first. Xavier just says that they'll be fine, and sends the kids off.

I think that there needs to be an investigation. Prof. X is trying to kill these kids. He keeps sending them on missions that they shouldn't come back from:

X-Men: "But, professor, we don't know how to disarm a bomb!"

Xavier: "You'll be fine."

X-Men: "But, professor, the X Jet isn't built for deep sea exploration, we don't even know where we're going!"

Xavier: "Y'all will figure it out."

Then, as they come back, he's counting to see if they all made it - "Ten kids left, and coming back, I count... ten DAMMIT! But, wait, one is injured... doesn't look like he'll pull through. YES! (as he drinks some bourbon - which he does at an alarming rate in this movie... prob to block out all the kids he has killed).

While we're on the topic of him - did the movie "Split" ruin James McAvoy's take on Prof X for anybody else? This is all I kept seeing when he was on camera.

But, as you know, cuz they did this exact plot in "X-Men: Last Stand" Jean Grey gets possessed by some space entity while they're up there, and becomes Phoenix.

Jean (played by Sophie Turner, who actually does a good job) is found to have done something horrible. Xavier (and this is no spoiler, cuz again X-Men: Last Stand") blocks out the bad stuff she has done to try to protect her, this eventually wears off, and now we get DARK 

...wait, sorry.

Now we get DARK PHOENIX! 

There we go!

(”Where’s my money?!”)

Now, Jessica Chastain is in this as well seen here, experimenting with bleach,

 who's leading a group of aliens to manipulate Jean (I'll get to them later). But, if JC is in the house, you can be sure that a women's rights message will be in there somewhere (#drinkinggame) And BOOM, there it was - "Don't let some MAN in a chair tell you what you are? - what you can and can not be! Don't let him controoool you!" 

I'm all for girl power, buuuuuut she HAS been on a bit of a carnage streak, and she has been killing people, annnnnnd isn't Jessica Chastain also trying to control her? But, imma let all that go... what do I know?? :)

I gotta be honest, I was digging the first half of this movie. They were capturing everything I love about the X-Men: social issues, political issues, teen struggles. They have lots of real drama going on amongst themselves. There are times when you'll cheer the X-Men on and times when you'll agree with some of the humans that THEY GOTZ TO GO! I love the flaws of the X-Men; it makes them relatable. I even love the struggle with having so much power, and yet having to try to walk a line of morality - which they suck at btw.

The professor sucks at it the most, which made me kinda sad, actually. BUT, to be fair, he has the power to control people's minds... would any of us with that power be able to consistently resist certain temptations?? Def not giving him a pass though. He does a lot of messed up stuff (some things they draw attention to, and others that they don't). Some things that made me cringe, even though MOST of what he was doing was out of love. I can't depend on none of my fave leaders anymore - not even the fictional ones.

We were getting into some deep stuff! BUT, then it was as if some big shot walked on the set and reminded them that they have a "Blow shit up" quota to meet, and that the plot points were slowing them down. Soooooooo, they burn the script and start blowing things up. Some people might say "Praphit, this is a comic book movie, how much script can you expect?" If this were 20 years ago, I'd agree.

Plus, it's more the fact that nothing makes any sense at this point.

Magneto (who's always the voice of reality in these movies, in my opinion) wants to kill Jean (for very good reasons), but he knows that he can't take Phoenix by himself, so why is he trying? He's a smart dude; why not come up with a better plan? Prof X wants to talk to Jean, to reason with her... the problem with that is that they just tried that a few days ago, and that couldn't have gone any more terribly than it did. The aliens in this movie (which lack all personality btw), who's objective is to control Jean, also know that they can't really do that or take her out (which was plan B), so... what the hell are we doing? The aliens are supposed to be the smart ones!

Prof X should have just controlled everyone's minds, and played a big game of immoral chess to take Jean out - that would have been a cool movie. But, this (though the effects are VERY COOL:) simply became a shoot-out! Not to mention, that right before all of this awesome, but confusing damage takes place, they have a big speech about restraint and not doing harm. Literally, a minute later, the X-Men are blowing buses up!

But, all of that is not even what makes this movie bullshit (grade: D+ btw). What makes this movie bullshit is the fact that it's the last one before Disney takes over.

You'd think that they would have given it their best, so that they can go out making us miss them! But, it felt like half way through the movie the team was told that this is all over, and that Mickey Mouse is coming to collect, but instead of going out with their best, they said to themselves "bleep it" and mailed-it-in.

The way that the final battle scene ends doesn't make any sense. It's one of those scenarios where "If you could do that... why didn't you do that earlier and save more destruction?" and a lil bit of "Well, if you had THAT much power, then none of these other altercations should have even been close."

The way it ends after that too! Man! It's like they just fast forwarded through the parts they didn't feel like acting out. This is the last one, people! Just lazy!

Yeah you!

I've got a spoiler, sooooo if you don't want it, skip through the text after Patrick Stewart - and start reading again when you see his handsome face again:)

(this is back when I learned to love this man)

So, Jean is... gone (possibly dead), and the X-Men name the school after her "Institute of Jean Grey" or something like that. Also, Prof X steps down (maybe due to guilt of his misatkes with Jean, who knows for sure, cuz they didn't act it out), and leaves Beast in charge in with the other teen X-Men to instruct the 'young kids at the school. "Other TEEN X-Men" Did they just make these kids professors? And what qualifies Beast (at this stage in his life) to run the school? Plus, Jean Grey was kind of a murderer wasn't she (and this wasn't a secret from the rest of the world)? Come on,kids, let me sign you up for "Ted Bundy's School for gifted youngsters" Would you be onboard for that? Hell no!

(Here’s PS fresh off a bender. “I promise, Timmy, I’ll try to think about never touching the sauce again, but this hair says that I will.”)

So... I'd say, entertaining bullshit. The effects (especially) at the end are great! But, the rest... and to go out like this... ugh.

There's a cool quote in here from Mystique (played by J.Law) who clearly didn't want to be there. It was a quote about how the women in the X-Men seem to be sticking their necks out and saving the day way more than the men, and that  maybe Xavier should change their name to “The X-Women”. I thought that was not only funny, but a damned good point. I say do it!

I'd love it if you had a a big strong manly man of the team go ahead of the action and stand up to the enemy, and when asked "Who are you?" he replies

"We're the X-Women."

[kimnamjooonz]

Blank Space - Episode 5

Don’t Hurt Yourself

Introducing In This Episode: 

This little shit you may or may not know:

(I heard his name’s Chris Evans, I’m not so sure)

Joe Alwyn, you may know him as the king of Taylor Swift’s heart: 

General awesome human being Emily Blunt:

Magneto aka Michael Fassbender:

Todrick Hall as Lucas Williams:

And Chace Crawford aka Nate from GG:

Songs that inspired this episode:

Don’t hurt yourself - Beyonce 

''When you hurt me, you hurt yourself. Don't hurt yourself. When you diss me, you diss yourself. Don't hurt yourself.''

Finally, the big day had come. She was finally meeting her cast-mates and she couldn't wait. The mystery will finally be over. ''Are you ready?'' Taylor asked and Morgan nodded. ''Okay, be nice, don't be arrogant but also don't be intimidated by them. Just be normal. Remember that when you get back you'll have to chose an assistant.'' Taylor had sort of improvised a 'casting' to be Morgan's new assistant and the call had got hundreds of applicants. Taylor had chosen only twenty to be interviewed by Morgan herself. ''I'll be here around two. The read through starts at eleven. I doubt they kept us there for more than two hours. We're busy people with tight agendas.'' ''If you're late I'll entertain them, okay?'' Morgan just nodded and left. Twenty minutes later she was arriving at the studio. After getting the indications from the security guard outside she knew exactly where to find Damien and the rest of the cast. When she got to the room she just saw one more person: a tall blond guy that Morgan recognised as Joe Alwyn, of Billy Lynn's fame and known by the locals as the inspiration for many songs in Taylor Swift's latest album, something that Morgan was never in a million years going to mention in front of him. But she was confused. As long as she knew Joe wasn't shortlisted to be her co-star. Or maybe he had got another role. ''Hi!'' he greeted her with a big smile. ''You're Morgan Llewellyn, for two weeks I was looking forward meeting you.'' he shook her hand. ''I had no idea I was meeting you but I'm glad I'm doing it. You were brilliant in Billy Lynn's.'' ''And you in Macbeth.'' Morgan looked at him with a questioning look. ''Yes, I saw the play two years ago. I had no idea you were Lady Macbeth until I saw it in your IMDB profile and then I remembered that I had seen you before.'' ''I'm glad you liked it. I enjoyed being in there, that's for sure.'' she stopped talking and looked at him. ''Do you know the rest of the cast?'' He shook his head. ''I just knew that you were in it. By the way, I'm not your love interest, I'm your brother.'' She found that awesome. Snogging Taylor bloody Swift's boyfriend in front of the camera for everyone to see wasn't something she was looking forward. ''So, you're Simon Hathaway.'' she grabbed the iPad from her bag and skimmed some of the script. She had read it all, that was why she knew she had a fair share of kissing scenes with whoever that was her co-star. ''Indeed. I auditioned for the lead role but apparently Timothee Chalamet was better.'' Morgan's interest sparkled even more if that was possible. ''So is it finally Timothee?'' ''That's what everyone's saying. But you never know. Expect the unexpected. At the end of the day even Ryan Gosling can show up.'' ''Bloody hell'' she squealed. ''Or Reynolds'' ''I met Ryan Reynolds once and I stared at him for half an hour...'' he laughed. They were giggling for a whole minute until the door opened again and both of them almost broke their necks because of turning so fast towards the door. Morgan almost had an stroke when she saw Michael Fassbender walking in. But she dissimulated her reaction under a face of simply curiosity. Joe mumbled 'Magneto'. Luckily Michael didn't hear that. He simply smiled at them both. ''So, Joe Alwyn and Morgan Llewellyn, this is getting interesting. I knew that Damien was not going to disappoint me.'' He shook their hands. Morgan was in cloud nine, she couldn't believe she was shaking hands with THE Michael Fassbender. ''Nice to meet you'' Morgan and Joe said at the same time, laughing about it then. ''So...'' he looked at Joe. ''Are you Morgan's mysterious co-star?'' ''No. I'm just her brother.'' ''So you aren't either'' said Morgan looking at Michael. ''No. I'm your mentor. Phillip Monaghan, at your service.'' Morgan was even more curious about her co-star. Who the hell was he? Joe told her to expect the unexpected. Well, maybe she was getting Tom Hiddleston or Chris Evans. Morgan stopped thinking before she hyperventilated. ''So, we still have to find who is Elena Fitzgerald, the good girl that everyone is going to hate and Alexander, my co-star. Do you know who may that be?'' she asked Michael. ''No idea. I heard that Spiderman was playing Alexander. He looks fifteen, I don't see him as your love interest. I was betting all my money for Stan but then I heard that he was filming in Greece.'' That took Morgan by surprise. She hadn't heard about Sebastian in weeks, since that drama night. And then she had landed the lead role in a movie so she had started to see him in a different way: as a potential co-star not as a celebrity crush. But she had no idea that he had been filming in Greece, like the Greek God he was. ''He finished with that'' said Joe out of nowhere. ''A couple of days ago, I saw it on his Instagram.'' Now Morgan was more confused than ever. Could someone tell her once and for all who the hell was the guy she'll have to snog several times during the next two months? Suddenly the door opened again. ''Am I late?'' a woman asked. Morgan looked at the door only to find Emily Freaking Blunt right there. It was hard for her not to fangirl. ''No. You're one minute early'' said Morgan with a big smile. ''Hi, I'm Morgan Llewellyn.'' ''I'm Emily Blunt. I really wanted to meet you. Apparently everyone is talking about you these days.'' Morgan did her best to look humble and not proud of herself. ''I'm still not used to'' she shrugged her shoulders in a very convincing way. At exactly eleven o'clock Damien Chazelle turned up. Everyone was very attentive. ''I think I have...'' he looked at the room. ''...almost everyone. Where the hell is my Alexander?'' ''Late.'' said Morgan rolling her eyes. ''But maybe for a couple of minutes.'' Damien seemed to agree with her and relaxed. They remained in silence for the longest ten minutes of Morgan's life. No one dared to say a thing. Damien looked ready to snap. ''I'm going to call this idiot'' he stood up and left. ''Do you think something happened to him?'' asked a worried Emily. ''Whoever we're talking about.'' All of them shrugged their shoulders. Joe was scrolling through Instagram to see if it was any sort of information about anything. And he found it. ''Guys... we can discard Timothee. He just posted a picture of himself relaxing at Central Park with his dog. No one would be this calm if he's running late to a read through.'' Everyone agreed with Joe. ''I know Tom.'' said Emily. ''He may look silly but he's really serious and responsible. It's been twenty minutes already.'' After a while Damien was back, looking tense. ''He's not answering or reading his texts. I'm starting to worry.'' ''It's been just half an hour.'' said Joe. ''Maybe he's stuck in a traffic jam. You know, we're in New York. This kind of stuff happens.'' ''Or he's stuck inside an elevator'' Morgan was using all the logic she had. ''It's also possible.'' ''Or locked inside the bathroom at Starbucks'' Michael said. ''Or maybe he's not back from Greece yet'' said Emily, clearly believing that Sebastian Stan was their cast mate. Apparently everyone but Morgan knew about Sebastian filming in Greece. Which was weird because she was the only person in that room who had been his avid fan. ''Maybe he got lost into the Minotaur's Labyrinth'' Joe was clearly joking with that one, mentioning mythology and everything. ''That's in Crete not in Athens'' Morgan thought out loud. ''Maybe he tried to climb Mount Olympus and Zeus stroke him down with a lightning.'' Emily and Michael glanced at each other. There was no way that Morgan and Joe were being serious. After all, they were just kids. God forbid that Tom Holland had got the lead role because the immaturity was not going to be contained. And Sebastian Stan was no better. He may be 36 but he didn't act his age and was as silly as Joe and Morgan, if not more. When Damien got back in the room Morgan and Joe immediately stopped giggling. ''Okay, he left me on read, can you believe it?'' he looked really pissed. ''So, he ghosted you!'' yelled Morgan, very spontaneously. ''Exactly!'' he looked at the four of them as if they were the only people with common sense left in this world. He left again, muttering some bitter thoughts. Morgan completely understood him. She may have been joking with Joe for the last ten minutes but she was starting to get really pissed. Who was this disrespectful piece of trash that apparently didn't care at all about his co-stars and their timetables? And ghosting the director was just stupid at its best. What the hell was wrong with him? ''At least we know he's not dead.'' said Morgan. ''He had enough energy to leave Damien on read. A person who's lying dead at the side of a desert road can't do that.'' Everyone agreed with her. But also all of them wanted to kill him and leave his body on an empty road. ''It's been an hour'' said Emily, getting impatient. ''This is not proper either from Tom or Sebastian. I don't know Sebastian personally but both Margot Robbie and Alison Janney told me that he was just the most professional and nicest guy you could ever meet. Trustworthy to the core.'' That was what Morgan knew. She had been a fan of his not only for his looks but because he seemed to be a genuinely nice person, always attentive with his fans, giving good advice and being a sunshine. He was a really special celebrity, one that cherished every single good thing that happened to him an never took anything for granted. It was unlike him to make his colleagues wait for more than an hour and ignore the director. ''Maybe he's going through a rough time for some reason'' Michael guessed. ''Or maybe it's not Sebastian'' said a thoughtful Morgan. ''We're probably getting his name into this and he probably has no idea.'' It seemed a reasonable explanation and everyone seemed to agree with it. ''Do someone has any kind of embarrassing anecdote to tell so we can pass the time?'' asked Michael after a pause of ten minutes. It was clear that the question was directed at Morgan and Joe, who were the younger ones, and the chances of them going through embarrassing stuff was high. ''I auditioned for Spiderman'' blurted out Joe. ''What?!'' Morgan was really surprised. She had heard of many people that had auditioned for that movie, even some famous and insufferable Youtubers. But she had never heard about Joe Alwyn. ''I don't need to say that I didn't get the role. Anyway, Tom Holland's flawless in it. 'I don't wanna go Mr. Stark...' ugh, it got me in my feelings.'' Morgan didn't say anything but she agreed with him. She had cried with that goddamned scene in Infinity War. ''That was not embarrassing but  it counts'' said Michael, who was apparently the judge. ''And you Morgan?'' As if running a Sebastian Stan thirst account wasn't embarrassing enough, thought Morgan. And it was even worse to spend a whole night listening to Beyonce songs and planning revenge after learning that he had a girlfriend. No, that wasn't embarrassing. That was absolutely pathetic. And there was no way in hell that Joe Alwyn, Michael Fassbender and Emily Blunt were going to know about it. ''Well... I auditioned for Game of Thrones.'' she follow on Joe's example and shared an story about a failed audition. ''Really?'' three different voices asked. ''Yeah. I auditioned for Arya and Sansa. I was sixteen when I auditioned and even though they liked my acting I got rejected because I didn't look like the characters. I was too tall to be Arya and they needed someone more naive looking to be Sansa. I was told that I was too 'husky'. ''Husky?'' asked Emily, a bit lost. ''Yeah, I was compared to a dog. But they were right The expression I had on my eyes was really violent. After that I spent more than a month walking around my house with a mask trying different expressions only with the eyes. I drove my mum crazy but I mastered the technique.'' And it was true. Everyone in the media was mentioning Morgan Llewellyn's big, dark blue and expressive eyes. ''Woah, it's true that if someone look at your eyes at a certain angle and with the right lights, they look kinda purplish.'' said Michael. They were five minutes examining Morgan's eyes from different perspectives. And the asshole of their co-star was still missing. When they were waiting for an hour and twenty minutes they were starting to freak out. Michael was the only one who was trying to control de situation. ''We are actors. We know everything about techniques to relax.'' And they genuinely tried. At least for five minutes. ''To hell with this.'' said Joe, standing up. ''I can't relax. I'm going to Starbucks and drown with caffeine. Someone wants anything from there?'' ''No. But I'll go with you.'' Morgan really wanted some fresh air to cool down her head and not thinking about killing her co-star in cold blood. ''This idiot ruined everything'' complained Joe when they were on the way to Starbucks. ''I had my day planned. I had promised my girlfriend to spend the day with her. She's never at home as she is in a World Tour. We had one free day to be together but... this unnamed idiot ruined it.'' Morgan nodded after Joe's little rant. ''And I had to choose a personal assistant and now I'll certainly be late. I swear, that if he appears, he's getting a piece of my mind.'' Of that Morgan was sure. She was going to give a reality check to her co-star, no matter if he was Sebastian Stan, Tom Holland or anyone else. ''I'm not confrontational...'' Joe admitted. ''...but I'll stand by you, nodding. Is that okay?'' ''Yeah, I can take that''. They didn't waste my time choosing beverages. Michael and Emily had asked them to bring just capuccinos. Joe left with a pink frapuccino. And Morgan with three cups. ''Why do you need so much coffee?'' Joe asked her, a bit impressed and wondering if she was not going to blow up between the caffeine and the anger she had. ''I'm drinking only this two'' she pointed at two simple lattes. ''This is for out co-star.'' Joe grabbed the drink from Morgan's hands. ''Pumpkin Spiced Latte with two pumps of caramel...Gosh, you want to kill him, this is disgusting.'' ''Well, some people drink this thing for real.'' When they got back to the room Emily and Michael were still there, looking grim. Of course there was no sign of that idiot. An hour and a half late. He should be fired from the production. ''Nothing?'' asked Joe, giving Emily and Michael the capuccinos. ''Only Damien looking like crazy. And I don't blame him, poor thing. It's not his fault.'' said Emily. Michael was glancing at Morgan's extra drink. ''Llewellyn, if you bought that disgusting thing for our co-star, let me tell you that you are brilliant.'' Morgan didn't say anything and just smiled. And time went on and on. They had all finish their drinks (Morgan the two of cups) and the idiot was still missing. They were starting to wonder if he was going to show up at all. ''I just, cannot take it anymore.'' Morgan stood up from the chair and started pacing the room. The caffeine was making its effect and she was ready to blow up. ''I cannot believe it. An hour and forty five minutes. I'm talking to Damien right now and he's telling me the name of that disgraceful piece of shit. And I swear that if I have to run through the whole of New York searching for him, I'll do it and then I'll bring him by the hair if I have to.'' Morgan was in the middle of her rant when the door opened again. She had always thought that her first encounter with Sebastian Stan would be something straight out of a fairytale or a romance movie. But in real life things worked quite different than in her wild fantasies. When she saw Sebastian Stan walking through that door she just wanted to punch him in the face for making them wait for an hour and forty five minutes. They looked at each other's eyes for five seconds before Sebastian looked somewhere else. Looking at Morgan Llewellyn's dark blue eyes had the same effect as looking at a Basilisk. He just wanted to run as far from this woman as possible. In ten seconds she had scared the hell out of him. ''Where the hell were you?'' she hissed. Sebastian looked at his cast mates. All of them had hostile expressions but not as angry as Morgan. Morgan was trying to calm down a bit. Maybe he had had a problem and couldn't make it on time. He was human, those things happened. But if that was the case he'd had told Damien about it instead of ignoring him. Damn, her fangirl feelings were getting the best of her and she was trying to justify Sebastian when he probably had no justification. She was wishing for everyone's sakes that he had some decent excuse. Sebastian knew it was his fault but Morgan Llewellyn's demanding tone wasn't making things easier. He wondered if she was that irritating on a daily basis or if it was just because she was pissed. ''Sorry, sorry'' he lifted his hands on the air. ''I just couldn't make it on time. I'm so sorry.'' he looked at all his cast mates. By the way they were looking at him, they were demanding an explanation. ''I was on a date an I ran late'' he lied and immediately regretted it. But the damage was done. Emily's face was stony, Michael looked ready to snap, Joe had a really brooding expression but it was Morgan the one that looked absolutely livid. So, there was the explanation. And it made Morgan the angriest she had felt in weeks, maybe since that drama night and now she had the chance of set the record straight. ''That was the excuse of the century'' she said with sarcasm, without a hint of intimidation. ''So, your date was more important than being respectful to four people, without counting Damien, who you ignored. But, of course, your date was more important and we had to just suck it and wait. Emily has kids, Joe has a girlfriend who's in town only for a day, Michael and I have pretty tight agendas.'' Sebastian wanted to say something but she didn't let him. ''We've been nice enough to get you coffee! It's still there but it's probably cold.'' she hissed the last words and then she calmly sat down again. Joe had been nodding the whole time, Emily was looking at Morgan with admiration and Michael seemed to be a bit entertained. ''Pumpkin Spice Latte?'' even though Sebastian wanted to send Morgan Llewellyn to Pluto at that moment, he had to admire her wicked sense of humour. Everyone knew that only basic people liked that drink. ''Are you allergic?'' she asked with no emotion in her voice. ''No.'' he didn't know what to say. Morgan had left him completely numb. In their battle of power Morgan was not only winning but she was toying with him. ''So you drink it'' she hissed. Sebastian could notice a venomous spark in her eyes. Michael couldn't keep it together anymore. So, Morgan had made sure that Sebastian was not going to die with the beverage and then had made him drink it. A million of thoughts were running through his head, all of them concerning his co-star. He had no absolute idea how he was going to do to work with her for the next three months. He had to act as her freaking love interest, pretending to be in love with her. He'll need his best acting abilities to make that believable and for what he could see, Morgan too. Someone give them an Oscar already. ''Finally, you're here'' Damien looked at Sebastian with a hard expression, but he shook it off in a moment. ''At least you're alive. And I have my Alexander and my Meredith. You look perfect together, you'll set the screen on fire.'' It was undeniable that Sebastian and Morgan were incredibly attractive people. But by their faces, 'Alexander' and 'Meredith' were whatever but couple goals. Sebastian could swear that he could feel the negative vibes towards him that she was producing. The other three had apparently stopped being hostile towards him because they were having so much fun with his and Morgan's silent show. This next months were going to be a war. It was the most awkward read-through any of them had ever had. Everyone was exhausted and irritable, especially Morgan and Sebastian. In Morgan's opinion, he had absolutely nothing to complain. This situation had been his fault. Damien insisted for more than an hour before giving up and letting them go. ''Before we start shooting, there's a couple of scenes I want to rehearse. We're doing this tomorrow. And if you...'' he pointed at Sebastian. ''...do something like what you did today one more time, you're out and I'm bringing Ryan Gosling. Understood?'' ''Yes.'' Morgan didn't say anything but Sebastian could see a contented look in her eyes. Before he could even notice, Morgan had said goodbye to everybody (except him, of course) and was running towards the exit. He wondered how could someone run that fast with heels that high. Emily and Joe said goodbye to him in a cold tone before leaving. Only Michael seemed to have enough pity for him. ''Why did she react like this?'' Sebastian asked him. They both knew who he was talking about. Honestly, Michael had no idea. But he knew that Morgan liked drama and exaggerating stories. ''She had an audition'' he blatantly lied. ''I think she missed it. That's why she was so upset, you can't blame her.'' Sebastian felt a bit guilty. Only his wounded pride didn't let him feel as sad for her as he would normally feel. After saying goodbye to Michael he texted his friend Chace to meet. After the hellish day he was having he needed to talk to someone.

Morgan got back to her apartment half an hour later with a somber mood. Taylor didn't ask what had happened and why she was late because they had other things to worry about: there were twenty people there waiting to be interviewed by her and become her new personal assistant. She wanted to get over it really quickly so she tried to keep the interviews short because her patience was running really low. She blamed Sebastian Stan for this. After 19 applicants, none of them convinced her. She had dismissed them all with a nice smile and an 'We'll call you back if there's any news'. ''You only have one more to go. If you don't like him, I'll call new applicants tomorrow.'' Taylor softly said, knowing that Morgan's mood wasn't the best. Taylor called the latest applicant, a young man, who looked really shy. He reminded her of Todrick Hall, that amazing Broadway performer Morgan loved.   ''Hi!'' she greeted him with a smile. She didn't know why but he had improved her mood a little. At least she had smiled for the first time in hours. ''Hello, Miss Llewellyn, I'm Lucas.'' he said, nervously. He felt as if he was doing an audition for America's Got Talent. But Morgan seemed nicer than Simon Cowell. ''So... Lucas...'' she followed the process she had had with the other 19 applicants. ''Tell me a little bit about yourself. Where are you from... How old are you... anything you want to tell me.'' He was more nervous than ever. He had never had job interviews to be the personal assistant of a celebrity. ''I'm Lucas  I'm 21, from Harlem. I want to be a filmmaker, I got in the NYU and I work at McDonalds and Taco Bell so I can pay it. And... that's my story.'' Interesting. So, he was someone with big dreams an ambitions, the kind of people Morgan valued. ''So, you'll be a filmmaker. That's great.'' ''I wish I can dedicate myself totally to this, because I love it. But... I'll just need more hours in the day'' he shyly smiled. He knew that it by some miracle he got the job with Morgan he'd be as busy as before but much better paid and he'll have a better boss than those exploiters from the food chains. ''I understand. Before landing this role I was more or less in your situation, without actually getting into a drama school yet''. It was weird for her to talk about this. All those experiences were like a past life for her. ''You really want this job, don't you? Morgan wasn't asking, she was making an statement. ''I think it's a much better option than McDonalds or Taco Bell. To be honest, Miss Llewellyn, I have nothing to lose and a lot to win. I don't have experience at being an assistant but I learn fast and for sure, I'll give my all to this job.'' Morgan didn't need much persuasion. She knew perfectly well that it was Lucas the one she wanted as her assistant as she had connected with him. More than an assistant she wanted someone she could be friends with. ''Okay,'' when Morgan started speaking Lucas was sure that she was going to dismiss him and he'll never hear from her again. ''...what you'll have to do as soon as possible is send McDonalds and Taco Bell to hell. You're probably underpaid and miserable there and you deserve better. You start tomorrow at eight as we'll have to be at the studio at nine.'' Lucas couldn't believe his own ears. He thought he was just confused or he had misunderstood Morgan's words. ''I'm sorry, Miss Llewellyn, but I don't understand.'' ''Oh, sorry. I wanted to say this all day... Lucas Williams, you're hired.'' He wanted to do a celebratory dance. Never in a million years he could have imagined getting this job. It was a dream. He was going to work with Morgan Llewellyn, the newcomer that everyone was talking about and for sure she was quickly becoming an A-List celebrity. If she wasn't already. He couldn't wait for getting home and telling his parents and siblings about this. ''Thank you so much, Miss Llewellyn. This means a lot to me. I'm not going to disappoint you, I swear. I'll give my everything.'' ''First of all, call me Morgan. Apart from that, I won't be your boss. We'll work together, as a team. I have a feeling that it'd be great. You have to promise me that in the in the future you'd cast me in your films.'' ''That's be a honour'' Lucas still couldn't believe that this was happening to him. ''Lucas, if you need help with any NYU project, just ask me. You know that I work with Damien Chazelle, Michael Fassbender, Joe Alwyn and Emily Blunt...'' she purposely eliminated Sebastian from the list. ''...and I'm sure that if you need advice of any kind, they'll be helpful.'' Lucas was in shock. The fact that he was going to meet an Oscar winner director was about to make him cry. ''I... Morgan, I'm really thankful for this opportunity.'' he had the brightest smile on his face. ''By the way, what are your favourite types of coffee?'' ''Cold Brew when it's hot...'' Lucas was typing all of this in his phone. ''...and Latte when it's cold. A simple one. Under no circumstances Pumpkin Spice.''

''So, Damien Chazelle called you out?'' was the first thing Chace asked Sebastian once had finished with the tale of his long day. He had avoided to mention Morgan Llewellyn. He refused to do that. He had had enough of that irritable woman only with the hour they had spent together and he didn't want to think in the three months with her company that lay ahead of him. And he knew that it was a matter of time before Chace mentioned her. ''And it wasn't the worst part of the day.'' They were both sitting in table near a window in a random Starbucks. It was a miracle that any of them had been recognized by eager fans yet. Although, it'd be a relief for Sebastian to meet one of his fans after his experience with Morgan. ''Yeah, your cast mates probably wanted to exterminate you.'' by some reason Chace was finding this situation funny. ''Honestly, man, I don't know why you lied. If you'd told them that you were going through a mental breakdown, they would have understood and no one would have called you out, not even Damien. Talking about cast mates, did you finally meet Morgan Llewellyn?'' And there was the question Sebastian didn't want to answer. ''I did and she's... a nightmare. She shouted at me for quite a while and I'm pretty sure she hates me now.'' This time Chace laughed in front of his face. ''I can't imagine why'' he said with sarcasm. As much as he loved his friend, Chace was of the opinion that Sebastian had got into this mess by himself. ''But she probably doesn't hate you, she was just mad at you for being an irresponsible liar. And yesterday she wasn't a nightmare when you were drooling over her Instagram pictures and you said you couldn't wait to work with her. And you have a girlfriend, that's wild.'' ''That was before meeting her in person'' Sebastian cheeks were a bit red. ''She's drawn all of my energy.'' Chase looked at him with a side smile. Yeah, maybe Sebastian's pride was a bit wounded but there was another reason why she had drawn his energy and probably Morgan was unaware of it. ''Tell me one thing and be honest. Is she as pretty as in the pictures?'' ''Pictures don't do her justice. She's absolutely stunning, even when she was shouting at me. She's a real daydream but her personality is just... explosive.'' ''A nightmare dressed like a daydream'' Chace mumbled with dreamy tone. ''Are you quoting Taylor Swift now? Please, Chase shut up.'' but it was Sebastian turn to talk. And once he started with the Morgan topic he was not going to stop. ''But, who is she? She showed up out of nowhere. Two weeks ago no one knew who she was and now she's everywhere. How did she do it?'' ''Have you checked her IMBD profile?'' Sebastian just shook his head. ''Let me do it...'' Chace just spent a couple of seconds typing something on his laptop. ''Here we have her. Name: Morgan Llewellyn. Birth Name: Not Specified... well, that's weird. She goes by her stage name but we can't know her real name.'' Sebastian was starting to imagine that Morgan was some alien sent from Saturn on the body of a beautiful woman. Or maybe everyone in Saturn were as beautiful as Morgan. ''Date of birth: 13 of December, 1992...Born in Caernarfon, Wales...  blah, blah, blah... she's mostly an stage actress. Shakespearean. Worked with Ian McKellen, member of the Royal Shakespeare Society, started studying drama at age 12 at the Royal Cardiff College of Music and Drama, starred in many plays at the Globe Theatre since she was 16. That's pretty much her.'' ''I went to the Globe Theatre too.'' he mumbled. ''Yeah, when you were at college'' Chace corrected him. ''Morgan was there at sixteen, when she was probably still in high school.'' ''I have more than forty acting credits.'' he defended himself, as if this was some sort of competition between him and Morgan. ''Yeah, but Morgan is ten years younger than you and she has booked her first lead role in an important production. When she eventually reaches your age, she'll double your credits.'' ''Whose side are you on?'' Sebastian angrily asked. Apparently Chace was the latest one to jump on the Morgan Llewellyn Support Group. ''I'm just stating facts. By the way, what were you doing at her age? The Covenant?'' ''We were doing The Covenant. Both of us. It wasn't just me who was into that mess.'' no matter how many years passed he was always going to be reminded of doing that movie. He wished that Morgan never learned about that. ''Okay, you won this round. But it's fun to roast you.'' He didn't say anything because he was too busy Googling Caernarfon in Wales. The place Morgan was born. Or created. Maybe she was a scientific experiment created to make his life miserable. Or she was brought out of a cauldron by some witches. She had, for sure, a witch name. ''What a pretty place'' he was looking at the pictures of the town. A cute coastal village with a mediaeval castle. ''I can't believe that this fairytale town produced the spawn of the devil.'' Chace knew why Sebastian was bothered by this situation and it wasn't Morgan's fault at all. He knew Sebastian too well not to notice that he fancied her. And Morgan had called him out and shouted at him. And he had a girlfriend. No wonder he had had a mental breakdown that very same morning. And that was before meeting her in person and realising she wasn't the nice and gentle woman he was expecting but a hard headed explosive nightmare. And he still had more than three months in her company. Poor Sebastian. ''Don't look at me like that, Chase.'' Sebastian was a bit bothered of Chase's judging expression. ''You know that my relationship history is basically trash. And you don't have to worry, I don't fancy Morgan anymore. Happy?'' Of course that Chase didn't believe him. ''I thought that finally you had met a nice girl, who's not an actress, and you were pretty excited of getting to know her better. But now, apparently, you want to go back to your old habits but this time not with a B-list actress from a TV show but with Morgan Llewellyn, who's everywhere, has a brilliant career ahead of her, she'll be covering Vogue in the next months and she'll be the Taylor Swift of the acting industry. You're dead.'' Sebastian thought that Chase was just overreacting. Yes, he had thought that Morgan was attractive but nothing else apart from that. Now, he didn't know if he even liked her. ''I'm not dead.'' he confessed. ''I'm pretty much alive. Believe me when I tell you that I want nothing to do with Morgan apart from acting with her.'' Chase knew this wasn't his business but he just hoped that he meant what he had just said. ''Are her eyes really purple?'' he asked, a couple of minutes later when he was reading a Vogue article he had just found that talked about Morgan Llewellyn's 'impressive purple eyes.' ''No. They're just really dark blue.'' he remembered the sensation of looking at those eyes. It was like looking at Medusa, who turned you to stone when you looked at her eyes. ''But it'd make sense if she had purple eyes. That'd confirm my theory that she's the reincarnation of Thanos.'' Both of them laughed with that.

[mrsspidermanmaryjanewatsonparker]

Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows Vol 2 #6-7 Thoughts

Previous thoughts here.

Okay I’ve finally caught up to where I left off with RYV in 2017 so these are my thoughts on the X-Men arc.

I have very mixed feeling about this arc depending upon what POV I look at it from.

As a general story unto itself and an instalment in this series it was pretty great.

However in the context of an AU series with a limited shelf-life as is and in a context when Spider-Man had so often been sharing the spotlight (and the Spider-Marriage hadn’t been seen) making what amounted to a standard paint by numbers X-Men story just from the Parker’s POV was very questionable even if I like the X-Men.

Finally from the POV of a guy who likes the X-Men but isn’t hardcore but is very much in love with 90s X-Men (which this version is based upon) my feelings are very mixed.

And that boils down to what I love about the X-Men and that era of the X-Men vs. how Conway apparently feels about them.

But let’s get general perennial opinions out the way. I’ve grown to begrudgingly accept the conceit of this series as a Spider Family book and a book where we are just going to ignore the child endangerment issues at play. But i’ve spoken about that before in my older coverage of issues #1-5. Similarly in those issues and it still holds true for this arc, Stegman is the goddam man when it comes to the artwork.

Whilst there was one panel in which he tried to draw MJ shocked and upset and it came off just goofy, over all the artwork in this arc was stunning and I genuinely said ‘wow’ out loud when I got to the splash page of Spider-Man and Wolverine.

Keeping on the visuals for a moment, I goddam love the costumes chosen for the characters here. Yes even the reimagined looks for Toad, Crucible and Mist Mistress.

Obviously I don’t talk X-Men here much but I adore the 1990s X-Men costumes from the 1992 cartoon, which originated under Jim Lee. And honestly they genuinely are among the most iconic and visually dynamic looks for the characters so it’s not purely personal preference. This is especially resonant for me with Wolverine. Spider-Man is my favourite (American comic book) character and following him are various Spider-Verse characters like MJ, Norman Osborn, Ben Reilly, Mayday, etc.

But outside of those Spider-Verse characters, Wolverine is my absolute fav Marvel character and it’s always annoyed me that Marvel were like embarrassed to put him in his classic Giant-Sized X-Men uniform once Whedon began writing X-Men.

That is THE iconic Wolverine look and in this story Stegman brought it back baby!

Similarly I appreciated that the Magneto of this story both looked and acted like classic Magneto. Not the aweful black and silver shit he was wearing around this time in the comics and I’ve never been fond of him as a good guy member of the X-Men.

Honestly, whilst I get it was well executed character development, Magneto is inherently more interesting as a morally grey antagonist for the X-Men than among their ranks. So much of the core premise of X-Men is built around the fundamental philosophical conflict between Magneto’s beliefs and Xaviers that you lose a not insignificant chunk of the essence of X-Men when you put them on the same side. Not to mention in a superhero story you want strong characters as antagonists and Magneto is arguably the best X-Men villain, scratch that best comic book villain, ever.

Okay now let’s chat story.

I wasn’t pleased with  the deaths in this. Banshee might be few people’s fav  but Beast was and in both cases their quick shock deaths were unearned and unworthy. Kind of overly dark to be honest with you given the nature of the RYV book and it gave the impression that Conway isn’t fond of either character.

But that sentiment shines through far more poignantly with Jubilee and Cyclops. Whilst Cyclops gets screwed over slightly less badly than he did in the X-Men movies, the same problems occur. He gets undermined in favour of Wolverine and so Logan and Jean can be shipped together. Which is only a different flavour of frustrating if you LIKE the Cyclops/Jean relationship as I do, than when Jean got screwed over so Scott and Emma could hook up. I still despise that.*

But at least this was kind of believable, at least to me. No X-Men expert so maybe their break up was OOC, but the idea that Cyclops and Jean broke up because Jean didn’t have faith in controlling her Godlike powers whilst Cyclops did is an interesting piece of relationship drama. And at least the characters in RYV didn’t get fucked as hard as they did in the 2000s.

Still you can kind of tell Conway isn’t a big fan of Cyclops (understandable he has his haters, I hate 2000s-2010s Cyclops) but you can equally tell he really doesn’t like Jubilee.

Again, not an X-Men expert here but I’m pretty sure Jubilee being a traitor to the X-Men and being disillusioned by Xavier’s methods is immensely OOC for her character.

Now that isn’t that big of a deal because this is an AU at the end of the day. But if you like Jubilee or just know her character then it will probably annoy you. Unfortunately for one reason or another Jubilee in my observations seems to get a lot of hate that Kitty Pryde and X-23 don’t and I do not understand why.

In the cases of both characters I could tell instantly that Conway was setting one of them up to be the traitor and honestly if you are doing an AU book, Cyclops is kind of the more interesting choice although I grant you maybe not in the context of 2010s Cyclops who already murdered Xavier in AvX and has been a douchebag for a long time. But in the context of this story and 1990s X-Men which this story is trading off of, it’s the more interesting choice. I will give it to Conway though for at least bothering to give us 2 suspects. These days most writers wouldn’t even bother with that and just think they were being subtle when they have Jubilee say shit like “Maybe your human friend wouldn’t like you if she knew you were a mutant!”

On some final notes about the X-Men themselves I feel like there was maybe something more interesting you could’ve done with Jean and Wolverine’s child than what we got with Shine. In her personality and powers she could be any one of the army of Summers/Grey children or any given generic mutant. There is no Wolverine in her to be seen.

That’s not me inherently hating her. She’s just more of a missed opportunity. She was adorable unto herself and even moreso in her relationship with Annie and I hope that gets revisited in consequent issues.

My final little note regarding the X-Men themselves was that I didn’t care for Magneto being mind controlled at the end or his over all plan.

Okay, it’s more like I felt his plan was underdeveloped. Because it’s not that it didn’t make sense because it was literally the same plan from X2: X-Men United. But Conway basically expected you to have just known  that because of the visuals and results of the plan. And for comic book and comic book movie fans like me, sure I know the shorthand but it’s not good storytelling. Similarly Emma Frost shows up at the end, barely talks but just kind of takes over as the main villain when Magneto had been the guy built up in the story and...he, he’s Magneto dude. That’s like having Puppet Master show up towards the end of a story where Doom’s been the main villain and take over.

Also doesn’t his helmet shield him from psychic control? I mean again it’s an AU and I feel like that wasn’t established until way later about Magneto but still.

I also wanna talk about how this arc more than anything else just blows up the continuity between RYV volume 1 and volume 2.

In RYV vol 1 #1 it was a big deal that the X-Men got wiped out by Regent and the implication was that the universe diverged in the early-mid 1990s.

In this arc though it’s made crystal clear that obviously the X-Men are fine and that in this universe (the dumpster fire clusterfuck that was) Civil War 2006 was avoided.

Which is again an example of Conway subtly saying screw you to stuff he doesn’t like but I don’t mind that because yeah screw Civil War it was hot trash. But it does make RYV volume 1 way more confusing in terms of continuity, especially since literally no other post-Secret Wars ongoing series (including X-Men ’92) seemed to radically alter their universe after the event like RYV did.

Honestly I think the only way to have it make sense is to just say RYV volume 2 is an alternate version of the RYV volume 1 characters and that prior to volume 2 a guy called the Regent showed up, stole some people’s powers then Spider-Man and his family stopped him. He didn’t kill anyone, he didn’t take over the world, he wasn’t trying to kill God Emperor Doom or whatever and the world didn’t know who Spider-Man was by the end of it.

This actually jives way better with what Houser would later establish in her run on RYV that Annie isn’t a daughter Peter and MJ had INSTEAD of Mayday, but in fact the daughter they would’ve had if OMD hadn’t fucked everything up. I guess in the RYV universe though Spider-Man never joined the Avengers and fashion was stuck in the 1990s even in the 2000s.

I’m not complaining I’m just trying to get all this stuff straight.

Okay let’s move onto the Parker family.

I loved the payoff to issue #2 with MJ planning a party and it turning out to be for Peter’s birthday. That was the best scene in the whole story. Normal life drama with supporting characters we know and love. This is the heart of Spider-Man! And it came with adorable scenes like Annie confronting the horror of gluten free desserts and acknowledgments of Aunt May and Aunt Anna’s deaths.

The heart of the story was the stuff related to whether Peter and MJ should make Annie stay at the Xavier school or not and the scenes exploring this were really good.

Spider-Man deal with relatively relatable everyday issues and failing that stuff that s clearly allegorical to said issues. In this case Annie’s powers are allegorical to a kid with a disability, special learning issues, or someone with a particular aptitude for learning that would make a normal school more challenging.

Special props goes to Peter relating to how he struggled in school and not wanting that for Annie. In MJ’s case though she wants to keep her daughter close. This makes sense retroactively when you consider she’s already lost one child and if you pretend RYV vol 1 happened then she spent years keeping Annie close out of fear that she died.

Putting those aside though it could be a commentary upon MJ’s own childhood growing up where she was constantly being uprooted and saw her family and her sister’s family fall apart. For MJ it’s likely very important that the family unit stay close together.

Conway’s writing shines because he organically (albeit not as subtly as he could) has them switch positions creating yet more potential conflict and makes sure Annie has her own view on the matter. She likes the school, she likes Shine but she doesn’t want things to change and justifies this in a childish way by making out a popular kid in her school is a bigger deal than she actually is.

My major point of condemnation though is that I feel way more could’ve been done with the premise (e.g. having MJ and Jean connect over super powered kids) than actually was because so much of the plot is dominated by villains invading the Xavier school for the umpteenth time.

Actually goes into two other problems with the arc. This is an incredibly generic X-Men storyline because obviously it’s from a Spider-Man perspective. Like if an X-Men story tried to present a window into the world of Spider-Man it’d be a typical thing about him making rent, working for Jameson and missing a date or whatever. It’s like default setting X-Men and whilst I like that because I miss those days before X-Men became a clusterfuck, it’s not the most compelling main plot in the world.

And honestly it wraps up too quickly and easily, MJ just decks Emma Frost and the story is done. Annie and Peter don’t get involved enough which is weird because isn’t this a team book? I mean as the story highlights it makes Mj look cool but I don’t like doing that at the expense of the other characters.

Now in fairness that might’ve been set up for the next arc, which I know is about MJ becoming Venom. The last page or two of the arc implies this because it features an overtly villainous Liz Allan.

At first I raised my eyebrow at this. Around that same time Liz had been presented as evil in the 616 books and I thought this might’ve been lame out of nowhere synergy.

But in thinking about it, if this really is a Liz Allan who is recently went through the stuff she dealt with in DeMatteis’ Harry Osborn arc from the 1990s (as is the implication) then Liz would be a darker person, would be more hard hearted to protect her son and she wasn’t the nicest person to the Parkers at that time.

Although issue #4 had MJ refer to Normie as creepy implying the Osborns and Parkers generally aren’t all that close in this universe.

Regardless Liz with the Venom symbiote targeting MJ and having the there be an explicit thematic connection between them via their shared motherhood was a darkly delicious moment.

As many mixed feelings as I have for this arc over all I give it a solid B.

*Hence I personally also loved Emma Frost just being a plain villain and getting decked by MJ because I goddam hate Emma Frost I really do.

[ncrosha]

does josh hate logan, or resent him?

THAT’S… a really hard question. It varies wildly. Josh is still incredibly emotionally unstable and can sometimes shift from being neutral on someone to, well. Not.

But his feelings on Logan are incredibly complicated and as much of a mess as anything else in his life.

So, canonically - Wolverine was Josh’s favorite teacher and X-Man for a very long time. Josh looked up to him because of his brutality and savagery, admired his ability to ‘do anything’, and also just thought he was a cool guy. He was Josh’s hero.

 Then he killed Northstar. I didn’t read the surrounding event so I’m not one hundred percent sure what happened, but to my understanding, he was possessed or controlled and it wasn’t his fault. Dani explained it to him and Josh grudgingly accepted it, but Wolverine was no longer the best in his eyes. He saw what Wolverine being able to ‘do anything’ meant, and… you don’t really go back to that kind of blind worship after.

Then things start getting bad. The stuff with Danger happens - this might be before, again I’m terrible with the chronology of things - but there’s an instance where Josh is trying to heal all of the X-Men and just collapses on the floor. Logan’s exact words are, ‘this one’s used up’ and they just leave him on the floor while they go do whatever they need to do. There’s no effort to make sure he’s okay or even to get him up on one of the beds, they just leave him on the floor when he’s exhausted himself to the point where he can’t move. 

So follow that up with his time on the X-Force. Where Logan, again, basically just uses him as a means to make sure everyone else doesn’t die. Rahne tears Josh’s throat out and Logan wakes him up and gives him ten seconds to heal himself before throwing him at everyone else to save them. Josh is in miserable shape and just does it, because that’s what the X-Men have now trained him to do. No sense of self-preservation. No encouragement to take care of securing his own oxygen mask before he helps anyone else, just the demand that he hurries up and fixes someone. Which of course instills the idea that he matters less than them.

( which is why years later, he walks into a trap to save his dying friends and gets shot through the head - learned behavior ) 

Later, he tells them point blank he doesn’t want to be a part of this. He pours his heart out and says, you know, I know what you’re doing and I don’t want to stop you but I can’t become this. But I think Scott and Logan have both decided that if the X-Force is going to exist, they need a healer to patch them up. Since Angel’s gone all Archangel. He gets pulled along on the mission and then ultimately stays because he feels like he has to.

They have him put the tumor in Vanisher’s head and he’s not happy about that. He really didn’t want to but they had him do it, and sure he had fun with it, but he’s also aware that he put a fucking tumor in another living person’s brain. Because he hates this side of his powers and this isn’t a ‘you need to face your darkness to control it’ kind of thing, it’s ‘you use them and you’re embracing something horrific’ and he knows and and tries to tell them to absolute dead silence.

When he kills Kevin that’s his point of no return. He couldn’t heal – and suddenly then they’re fine with him not wanting to be involved and, ultimately, dropping off the map without a word. They make no effort to look for him and don’t seem to care where he is. To Josh, that’s pretty much confirmation that he was only good so long as he could heal. And it gives him such a terrible complex that when the M-Pox hits, he goes into hiding again because he can’t fix it and has a crisis.

He doesn’t know if he hates Logan or not. All he knows is he doesn’t feel like he was ever a person to any of them, Logan especially. He feels more like a tool that was used up and discarded than a teammate or a student whose life and future was valuable. And as a result he internalized a lot of the lessons they taught him by example. He gets into a lot of meaningless physical relationships to try to drown out the noise and guilt in his head, he uses his powers to hurt people and to his own benefit, and then has periods of just not knowing what the hell to do with himself so he does charity work or goes deeper into hiding. He’s fundamentally broken in so many ways because he was never taught proper coping mechanisms, let alone self-care.

( and in my headcanon he found the very basis of schism laughable because he doesn’t think either scott or logan gave two shits about him and there they are fighting over who is better suited to lead and teach mutant kind? )

But he also just desperately wants someone to acknowledge that he did go through something awful and it hurt him in a way he doesn’t think can ever be fixed. He is now one of the most powerful mutants in existence and is also one of the most lost and confused ones.  The entire reason he’s signing up for the Brotherhood Magneto is because Erik treated him like a person, even if it was at Monet’s behest, and his time on the X-Force taught him that killing absolutely a-okay and necessary for the cause. He knows he’s still just a valuable tool to him, but he actually spoke to him and asked him where he wanted to go instead of just pushing him at something that needed to be done with the expectation that he would do it.

He resents and despises Logan in equal measure to how much he admired and cared about him and just wanted to be treated as someone worth teaching and protecting. But if anyone treats him like a kid he lashes out, because he’s not a child anymore and wasn’t afforded the luxury of being treated like one long before that became necessary.

I think all in all what he wants is for someone to guide him and he’s just starting to hate everyone who expected things of him without giving him anything in return. He wants to be acknowledged but he also wants to hurt them the same way he was hurt, but then doesn’t because that’s such a terrible thing to think. He wants someone to tell him what to do but he also wants to be asked. He wants to be thanked at the bare minimum, and apologized to in the most desperate and sad way. He wants a father figure but he also wants to be treated as an equal.

And he just doesn’t want to be alone anymore and wants to stop being mad.

[fvstboi]

[ jesus castro, he/him, 29 ] pietro maximoff has been spotted in gotham city! the hero is publicly known as quicksilver, and have often been described as determined, but also arrogant. they have also been affiliated with the avengers, and said to mainly operate in new york city. will they help find answers, or add to the chaos? [ han, she/her, 23, mst ]

triggers: childhood trauma , kidnapping , experimentation , HYDRA mentions , minor violence , auschwitz mentioned , mental illness , death. 

hey fam !! here’s my fast boi , pietro maximoff. i love him bunches. 

so first things first: he is comics based with mcu tie-ins. and comics before marvel ruined his backstory by making him not actually erik and magda’s son and not a mutant. can u tell i love my son and hate what marvel has done to him ? keep on reading to find out. 

pietro was born in the wundagore mountains to magda eisenhardt , a romani woman that magneto met and fell in love with. ( she survived auschwitz because of him i stan ). although pietro and wanda didn’t know it at the time and wouldn’t for many years , erik lehnsherr / magneto / max eisenhardt was their father. magda didn’t stay around for very long , though. not long after , magda fled into the woods with the fear that her husband would find her. pietro and his twin sister would soon enough be given to the maximoff’s , a romani couple who lived down the mountain and had always wanted children. ( note: while pietro was both raised romani and is romani in heritage , a lot of it was lost to him after his adopted parents died which was when he was quite young. he does want to make sure his daughter knows about it and where she comes from but he’s not an expert since everyone from the romani side of his family is dead. )

he was literally that obnoxious older brother but he’s also hella protective and loyal ? he’s a bit of an ass . scratch that , he is 100% an asshole :’)

pietro and his twin , wanda , were raised in transia / sokovia by the maximoff’s , who were an amazing couple and even better parents. eventually , their “ adoptive “ father , django , began to steal food so that he could feed his family. enraged villagers attacked the ( romani ) camp they were living in. pietro was able to get him and wanda out , thankfully , but the trauma from that event was so severe that they wouldn’t be able to recall anything from their childhood for years and not even small details. they had nothing. they’d then travel across europe , fending for themselves and only relying on each other. the streets were really hard. they were hungry and tired on most days and pietro would steal food and warm clothes with his powers but wanda would always say he would get caught one day. ( he didn’t ).

one day , wanda accidentally caused a house to burst into flame through her hex powers , which she could not yet control. superstitious townspeople began chasing her. pietro would try his best to protect and defend her but they were outnumbered and overpowered. thankfully , magneto ( dad !!! ) came to their rescue. they would then join the brotherhood of evil mutants , feeling like they had to serve him since he saved them from what would have been horrible mob violence.

when magneto was defeated in a battle against some powerful guy who took him away from earth , pietro and wanda took it as their chance to leave and went back to transia / sokovia / whatever it’s being called now.

( mcu tie ins ) pietro and wanda were kidnapped by HYDRA ( aka not willingly joining HYDRA ) and experimented on with one of the infinity stones , which only augmented their powers. the second HYDRA fell , they left it and joined ultron ( pietro blaming tony stark for the reason why sokovia / transia was in such turmoil due to seeing stark industries on a shell that hit their home that trapped pietro and wanda for nearly two days ). at some point the twins allied themselves with the avengers and also joined them and fought against ultron , who they had previously sided with. 

pietro was injured in the battle against ultron and almost died and so he stayed with the inhumans for awhile. he formed a relationship with crystalia amaquelin , princess of the inhumans. the whole thing was somewhat forbidden since he’s not an inhuman but they soon enough got married. it was p rushed, which is super on brand for pietro. they eventually had their daughter , luna and ? not only did he find out that magneto is his dad during this time but pietro’s a dick and almost killed her by putting her in the terrigensis ( this was much later on , not right after she was born omg ) but hey , she got powers so ! he’s never been the best dad , honestly ? he’s run away from a lot of responsibility , even stuff that wasn’t luna related lol. but he’s trying ? ( with pietro’s age , luna is about ? 5-6 years old. his lil princess. )

the relationship that pietro had with crystal would become rocky due to pietro’s mind being elsewhere and not paying all that much attention to his wife. crystal would then cheat on pietro ,,,, ( note: crystal left some other guy for pietro sksksk ) pietro wouldn’t forgive her and “ vowed vengeance on her and all those he perceived as having wronged him “ but !! crystal’s cousin , maximus , was manipulating his mind and augmenting pietro’s anger towards crystal which was prob meant more for the avengers. he did a lot of dumb shit during this time basically. moreso than usual. but he wasn’t in control of himself or what he was doing so really ? it wasn’t his fault. 

pietro and crystal had a messy relationship after that. they’d reconcile , get back together , breakup , fight , get back together , fight together , etc. it was a messy relationship for awhile. 

pietro lost his powers for a bit and ,,, it was hard fam he was actually depowered due to m day but i’m just saying he lost his powers w/o m day since it’s a big part of him

honestly !! pietro was in a pretty horrible state at this time. he was taken to attila which is basically inhumans hq , where his medical injuries were taken care of. pietro couldn’t stand being human so much that he underwent terrigensis even though king black bolt said no since it can kill u ! wtf u doing pietro !! he then started to plan a way to steal and bring the terrigensis crystals to earth. pietro ,,, no. angel boi. slow down u gonna kill everyone. 

then he made his daughter undergo terrigen ,,,, which could’ve killed her since nobody knew if her inhumans genes would just cancel out her mutant ones.

lots of shit happened ,,,, its just 2 much 

pietro was then put in jail and while there he had a serious of hallucinations. o boi

but ig it was also the end of his episode , u could call it ?? his powers were restored and he rediscovered his desire to be a hero !!

pietro recovered the remaining terrigenesis crystals returning them to the inhumans and clearing his name of criminal charges through a lie that a skrull committed all of his felonies. 

he joined all new x-factor which was his half-sister’s x-men team !

he actually just claimed to have a falling out with the avengers ,,, which wasn’t rly tru ,,, lorna’s ex bf , alex summers , just wanted pietro to spy on her sksksk 

but like ? pietro in x-factor with lorna was one of the best things marvel could’ve done. just siblings working together and on a team together who usually never interact. goals. ( might lowkey have a thing for a certain cajun mutant ) 

he taught at avengers academy for a hot second !

he’s paid a ton of money for luna to go to a fancy school in england which she eventually just ,,, ran away from lmfao

he’s a hero. but he also doesn’t pay much attention to authority and if he thinks someone is wrong and he’s right then he’ll follow his own path and ignore everyone else. he’s tried to repower mutants with the inhuman crystals and continued to do so after mutants got sick and some even died. while that’s not really canon it does give a good insight to who pietro is. he’s not bad and most of his bad ideas do have good intentions. 

he’s been off and on with the avengers for awhile and never stays with them for extended periods of time but they all mean a great deal to him. he loves many of the founding / returning members and cares more for them than he’d ever care to admit. 

pietro once ran 300+ miles so he could punch erik in the face lol [ x ]

pietro is in gotham to see what’s going on ? he also has luna while crystal is away doing stuff. so single dad pietro ! he’s never been alone with luna for more than a few days before ! it’ll be fun ! 

tldr; pietro is messy, an asshole and a drama queen but he’s trying HIS BEST.

stats - tba / pinterest / wiki page.