#I combined the original post and the Endgame add-on so it's a bit easier to read.

[hawkbucks]

Through The Years (a.k.a the fic I’m surprised I finished) Wordcount: 11014 Relationships: Natasha & Tony, Natasha/Pepper, Tony/Bucky A/N: C*v*l W*r simply does not exist. Originally posted to my original blog. Inspired by an anon who I hope can see this again someday. 

Barely beta’d and beta’d barely. Please let me know of any typos.  Summary: Tony brings home Natasha one day, proclaiming her to be his new sister.

Natasha takes this all in stride.

Tony is 8 and Natasha is 12 when Tony brings Natasha home for the first time.

“Mamma!” he brightly exclaims as soon as Maria opens the door, holding up one of his hands that is intertwined with one of Natasha’s. “This is Natasha! She helped me while I was walkin’ home from school today.” Before Maria can say anything, Tony is already rushing past her, dragging his newfound friend into the living room with him. He leads her to the rather lavish, cream-colored couch that’s bigger than necessary and tells her to sit down, letting go of her hand.

“Some’a the kids at school were followin’ me and sayin’ bad things to me,” Tony starts to explain as he takes off his patent leather shoes, remembering what his mother said about tracking dirt into the house. “But Natasha made ‘em go away. Then she said she’d keep walkin’ with me so that I’d get home all safe. She was really awesome!”

Natasha’s pale cheeks flush, almost as if she’s embarrassed about the praise Tony is singing about her. She quietly takes off her own battered and beaten shoes, a neon blue bandaid sitting right above her left ankle. With her wild red hair and skinny arms, it’s hard to think of her as someone who would be able to shoo away a group of rowdy 8-year-olds.

Tony finally joins her on the couch, sighing as he sinks into the cushions. “Mamma, I think Natasha should be my sister,” he says with a decisive nod. “I like her. She can have the room nex’ to mine and everything!”

Maria’s head still feels like it’s spinning from Tony’s explanation of what happened, so she settles for a smile as she walks over after locking the door. “It is good that Natasha helped you, ‘Tonio.” She rests a caring hand on Tony’s cheek, and he leans into it with childish affection. “I have no doubt that she would make a good sister–” she glances at Natasha, whose flush seems to have gotten even deeper– “but she probably has a family of her own, bambino. You bringing her here… what if her parents are worried?” she gently scolds.

Tony’s eyebrows furrow as guilt spreads across his features. “Oh.” That’s all he says.

Before Maria can offer any soothing words, Natasha speaks up. It’s so soft that Maria has to strain her ears to hear her: “I don’t have any parents.” Both Maria and Tony turn to look at her, but she keeps her gaze on a spot on the carpet a few inches to the right of the coffee table in front of her. “No family. Well, I live with an aunt, but…” Natasha bites her bottom lip. “She’s not very nice.”

Maria’s heart clenches at how raw the girl looks like right now. Her eyes hold a deep sadness that she is far too young to be harboring.

Tony doesn’t even think before he wraps his arms around Natasha’s shoulders, a soft distressed noise leaving his throat. He continues to hug her until Natasha pushes him away, the beginnings of a smile on her face.

And yet, Maria notices, the smile does not reach her eyes.

(Howard snorts, gesturing vaguely with a crystal tumbler in his hand. “Another child? Anthony is already a handful, and you want to bring in another child?”

Maria’s jaw sets, eyes alight with a determined flame. “I am not asking that we adopt her, Howard–not yet. I am asking that we at least give her a place to stay.” She shakes her head, thinking back to the scene on the couch earlier. “I would not feel comfortable sending her back to her aunt. She almost cried, Howard. At the very least, she should be able to sleep without being scared!”

It isn’t until Howard looks at her, eyebrows raised, that Maria realizes how passionate she sounded. “Whatever,” he mutters. “Just know that she is your responsibility.”)

Tony is 10 and Natasha is 14 when the papers go through and Natasha goes from being a Romanoff to a Stark. It’s kept quiet from the press, thanks to Howard’s exorbitant amounts of money.

Maria hugs her, warm and motherly. Tony excitedly latches onto her side, talking her ear off about all the cool things they can do now that they’re brother and sister. Hell, even Howard begrudgingly says something about how she does seem like a nice girl.

All of that, of course, makes it harder for Natasha to tell them the truth: she’s a spy. And an assassin. Or at least she was. She blurts it out the second they step foot back into the house. It’s better they know now, she thinks, instead of years down the line. She would never do anything to hurt them–never–but they deserve to know. If it results in her being kicked out, well… the past 2 years have been the best of her life.

Maria, at first, is horrified. She immediately ushers Tony away while he’s still too shocked to protest (To protect him, Natasha realizes, from her. Just in case). Natasha braces herself, ready for Maria to yell and scream at her, but all she does is sigh heavily, eyes turning downcast. “You are so young,” she says, sounding pained, “and you do all that?”

Natasha inhales, eyes flickering between Maria and Howard. “I used to. The organization–the place I worked for, I ran away.” She waits for any interjection, any sign that she’s not welcome in the house anymore–not welcome around Tony–but none comes. So she continues. “I guess they never caught up. I lied by omission, I guess. Doesn’t make it any better, but I figured I should tell you guys now.” More silence. “And, just so you know, I wouldn’t have hurt any of you.”

Surprisingly, it’s Howard that speaks up next. “Why don’t you work for S.H.I.E.L.D?” he offers.

“Howard!” Maria gasps, scandalized. “She just got out of that life and you–and you want to put her back in it? And she’s so young–”

“S.H.I.E.L.D is a hell of a lot safer a bet than whatever hack job organization she was running with originally! They must not be that good if they can lose a child,” he shoots back. “Protection–we can protect her there. She can help this country, atone for her past!”  

Maria’s face is openly appalled. “She is 14–”

“I’ll do it,” Natasha interjects, jaw set in determination when Maria and Howard–mom and dad, she corrects–look at her. “I’m proficient in over 7 different styles of martial arts, along with receiving specialized marksman training. My entire life, I grew up immersed in the arts of espionage.” She squares her shoulders, like she senses a challenge. “I can do it.”

(“You’re an assassin. Does that mean you’ve killed people, Nat?” Tony asks, innocently enough, as he scribbles down measurements and observations about a weapon he’s taken apart to study.

An ugly sound tears itself from Natasha’s throat, somewhere between a snarl and a growl. “Don’t ask that question, Tony.”

Tony flinches. “Sorry. Sorry, I won’t–sorry.” He bites his bottom lip, worrying the already fragile skin there.)

Tony is 14 and Natasha is 18 when Tony gets accepted to M.I.T.

Natasha insists on accompanying him under the alias of “Natalie Rushman.” They fudge her papers, place her in classes that’s she’s never going to have to attend, and put her up in an apartment off campus. Howard asks about what’s going to happen should they need her at S.H.I.E.L.D. She says they should be fine, but if it’s truly an emergency, then they can call.

She hangs out around Tony, saying that she’s his old tutor who was positively ecstatic when she found out that Tony would be attending the same college that she does and decided to take him under her wing the second he stepped on campus.

Tony resists at first, saying that it feels too much like she’s babysitting him. “I’m not 8 anymore, Nat,” he grumbles as he spins around in one of the spinny-chairs he has in his dorm. “You don’t need to protect me everywhere I go.”

Then a few days later, because the universe likes laughing at him, a bigger, older student tries to pick a fight with him. They taunt him, saying that he only got into M.I.T because of daddy’s name and daddy’s money. He can barely hear over the blood rushing in his ears; all of the shit he’s been through, all of his hard work, and there are still people out there who only see him as Howard’s brat, Howard’s son who relies on dad to do everything for him.

He turns around to shout something back, something even more inciting, but Natasha’s already there–and she has the bully on their knees, twisting their arm around their back. “That’s not very nice,” he hears Natasha whisper, venom dripping from every word. “I know you were trying to invoke him. Trying to get him to swing at you so you have an excuse. That’s pathetic.” She lets them go and they fall face-first onto the ground, a puff of dirt billowing up. Some students stop to watch. A couple have their phones out.

“Go,” she says coldly, stepping over their body. “Don’t let me see you around him again.”

Tony whistles as they get up and scurry away, not daring to look back. “I take back what I said,” he says, shoving both of his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “I guess it’s good to have you around.”

She gets him into a headlock and ruffles his hair.

Tony is still 14 and Natasha is still 18 when she meets Rhodey, Tony’s roommate and future best-friend-for-life for the first time.

He’s nice, she determines when Rhodey greets her with a genuine smile and a firm handshake. “I’m glad there’s someone else looking out for Tony. It feels like a full-time job sometimes,” she says, placing a hand on Tony’s shoulder.

Tony shrugs her hand off, pouting petulantly. “I’m not that bad.”

Rhodey laughs again. “Tones, you wrote an angrily-worded letter to a teacher after you said they, and I quote, ‘explained thermonuclear dynamics like a drunk orangutan.’”

“Because they did!”

Tony is 15 and Natasha is 19 when they decide to tell Rhodey the truth.

“It’s only fair that you know, man.” Tony continues fiddling with his seat, making himself go up and down and up and down. “You’re gonna have to sign some NDAs and stuff, but yeah. Technically Natalie is my sister. And she’s the best spy in the business.” There’s a hint of pride in that last sentence.

Rhodey’s eyes narrow as he looks from Natasha to Tony and back to Natasha again. “This feels like an elaborate practical joke,” he mutters. He further scrutinizes them, but apparently finds no evidence to support his thoughts. “So, Tones, with all of this…” he looks at Natasha, “is Natalie even your real name?”

Natasha simply smiles.

Tony is 17 and Natasha is 21 when Tony graduates M.I.T with a degree in electrical engineering.

She takes a jet straight after finishing a mission in Germany. Sure, she’s a tad bit sleep-deprived and she has some bruises on her ribs, but like hell is she going to miss Tony’s graduation.

“Good job.” Natasha takes off his cap and ruffles his hair once again. “I’m proud of you.” Howard and Maria have already given Tony their congratulations; she can still see Maria’s lipstick stains on Tony’s cheek. No matter how much he scrubs, they wouldn’t come off.

Tony beams up at her with so much pride and admiration in his face that it feels like she’s the one that’s graduating. “I should thank you, you know. Um, you really… you really helped me.” When Rhodey wasn’t available, it was Natasha who helped him deal with the stress of his entirely-too-large workload. It was Natasha who listened to him list off his insecurities–his fear of never being good enough–and helped him work through them. It was Natasha who guided him with a firm, yet gentle hand. “I’m… I’m glad that you stayed with us.”

Natasha smiles. “I’m glad that I stayed.”

Tony hugs her (not seeing her wince) before running off to join his friends.

Tony is 20 and Natasha is 24 when their parents die.

Tony freezes when they’re told the news. She can almost hear the gears in his brain turning, trying desperately to comprehend what he’s just been told. Then, he runs to his room like a scolded child, slamming the door behind him and rattling the pictures hanging on the walls.

Natasha’s shoulders deflate. Maria and Howard might have not been her biological parents, but they were there. They took care of her–spoiled her, in her opinion. Any normal child living a normal life probably would’ve never worried about getting enough to eat or having enough clean clothes to wear, but Natasha is far from normal. All of the things they gave her were precious.

(Okay, maybe it was more Maria than Howard, but at least Howard gave her a place in S.H.I.E.L.D and never really complained.)

She gives herself 10 minutes before she goes after Tony. As she approaches, soft sobs slip out from underneath his door (which still has the T-O-N-Y stickers in red and gold they stuck up there on his 11th birthday), and it makes her heart squeeze. It seems… wrong for Tony to cry. He’s usually so full of life that it just… it’s wrong.

She gently knocks on the door thrice. Tony doesn’t respond, but she opens it anyway.

The room is pitch black, save for the moonlight filtering in through the window. Her eyes land on Tony’s trembling form, curled up on tightly on his bed that he looks more like a blob than an actual living person. “Not now, Nat,” he croaks, sniffling.

Natasha sighs, walking into his room and sitting down on the edge of his bed.

He shies away.

It hurts, but she tries not to let it show. “Tony, I’m not going to let you sit there and wallow–”

“Don’t pretend,” he cuts her off.

She swallows. “Don’t pretend?”

“Don’t pretend like you’re not affected!” he snaps, looking up at her with puffy, bloodshot eyes. “They were your parents too, Nat. My mom was your mom too.”

Natasha feels the wall she doesn’t even know she put up crack. She doesn’t–she didn’t–she can’t cry. That’s weak. (A small voice at the back of her head–Maria’s voice–tells her that it’s okay to cry. It’s natural. She shouldn’t hold it in.) But Tony’s words bounce and bounce and bounce around in her mind.

She watches as Tony rubs at his right eye with the heel of his palm.

“I’m not pretending,” she says, voice cracking at the end. She feels a tear slip out. “I’m not pretending.”

(The funeral service, to put it nicely, sucked. No one really knew who Natasha was, just that she seemed to be a friend of Tony’s. No one consoled her. No one told her that “Howard and Maria should be proud that they raised such a fine child.” Everyone focused on Tony. Everyone only knew Tony. She doesn’t resent him for that. She’s not jealous. But it would’ve been nice to hear someone–anyone–tell her that everything’ll be alright in the end.  

She gives the paparazzi deadly glares as she escorts Tony away from the service, hiding his face with her black jacket. “Vultures, all of them,” she hisses.

Underneath the jacket, Tony chuckles.)

Tony is 21 and Natasha is 25 when Tony becomes the CEO of Stark Industries, taking over Obadiah, an old family friend that Natasha never particularly liked.

“I don’t know,” Tony says, scrubbing the side of his face with his hand. “I’m not sure if this’ll work.” He stares down at the prototype of a missile system he’s working on. Jericho, he calls it.

“The weapon or the demonstration?” she asks from her spot curled up on a couch he has sitting down in the SI lab, scrolling down some webpage that claims to have the juiciest gossip on the most relevant celebrities of today. It’s her guilty pleasure; sue her.  

“Both,” Tony admits sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck. He’s always been charming, he’s always known how to play to a crowd, but this would be his first major sale since… since the accident. It’d be his first major sale as the CEO. He needs to prove himself. Needs to show everyone that he’s more than just Howard Stark’s son. He’ll be the one to bring about world peace.

He can’t see it, but he just knows that Natasha is rolling her eyes. “It’ll be fine, Antoshka. You’re a smart man.”

He preens. Just a little.

“Plus, Rhodey’ll be there, right? It’ll be impossible for you to make a fool of yourself then.”

He pouts. Just a little.

Tony is still 21 and Natasha is still 25 when they meet Virginia “call me Pepper” Potts, a potential candidate to be Tony’s personal assistant.

“You should hire her,” Natasha says breathlessly after Pepper leaves her interview. She watches as the other’s perfectly styled ponytail swings side to side. “Her previous experience is much more extensive than the other candidates, plus her references had nothing but good things to say about her. She seems like the kind of professional, put-together person that you desp–”

“You think she’s pretty~” Tony lilts, giving her a shit-eating grin. He barely manages to get out of range when she swipes at him and laughs. “Don’t worry, I was already planning on hiring her anyway. She does seem like–what were you going to say–’the kind of professional, put-together person that I desperately need’?”

Natasha scoffs, kicking at his shin.

“I smell an office romance!” he giggles.

She kicks at him some more.

(Natasha does end up asking her out, but makes it clear that Pepper doesn’t have to accept if she doesn’t want to.

Pepper accepts, thankfully, and their first date is spent at eating at a deli and feeding the ducks at Central Park.

As Pepper laughs, Natasha thinks she’s never seen anyone more beautiful.)

Tony is 22 and Natasha is 26 when the Jericho demonstration does not go fine.

Rhodey calls her in a panic, saying that they lost Tony in Afghanistan after being attacked.

Her blood runs cold, heart plummeting to her stomach. She’s already lost Maria and Howard. If she loses Tony too, then… she doesn’t know what she’ll do. Her tentative relationship with Pepper is put on hold as she commandeers one of S.H.I.E.L.D’s jets and makes her way to Afghanistan as quickly as she can. Pepper, of course, has questions. Many of them, in fact. Such as: what is S.H.I.E.L.D and why does she seem to have so much pull in there? What is she hoping to achieve in Afghanistan that the U.S. Army can’t? Who is Tony to her?

Natasha promises to answer all of her questions when she comes back.

“It’s my fault,” Rhodey mumbles in the humvee on their way to the base, wiping tiredly at his eyes. “I left him alone. If I was with him–”

“You would have gotten killed,” Natasha says sympathetically, placing a comforting hand on Rhodey’s knee, “and that wouldn’t help him at all.” His guilt rolls off of him in waves, and she can tell that it’s eating him alive. She knows how that feels like.

Rhodey shakes his head and sighs for what seems like the nth time today. “Let’s just hope we find him.”

“That’s all we can hope.” She tries not to think about what might be happening to Tony. If his kidnappers were ballsy enough–powerful enough–to get to him past an armed escort, then there’s no telling what they’re capable of doing to him.

Tony’s not a trained spy. He doesn’t have the pain tolerance built up through years of harsh training. And he’s–he’s so stubborn, so firm in his stances that Natasha thinks nothing short of death would get him to cooperate.

She tries not to think about them finding a limp, breathless body.

(“They keep telling me to give up,” Rhodey whispers to her when they’re alone, an edge of frustration to his voice. “They keep telling me that he’s dead. That it’s a waste of resources–a waste of my time. But he’s not dead. I can–I can feel it, you know?”

Natasha nods solemnly. “I know.”

For both of their sakes, she hopes that he’s right.)

Tony is still 22 and Natasha is still 26 when they find Tony wandering the desert, 3 months later.

It’s Rhodey that spots him first, doing a double-take when he sees a figure frantically waving their arms in the sand down below.

“Tony?! Oh my god, that’s Tony!” he yells so loudly that Natasha is sure that they didn’t need the headsets to hear him all the way in the cockpit. “Land! Land right now!” He looks like he’s seconds away from jumping out of the helicopter himself, the vein in his neck bulging.

They land quick, the helicopter’s blades roaring above their head. She doesn’t even have time to unbuckle her seatbelt before Rhodey’s already jumping out, running with a couple of other soldiers towards… towards Tony.

By the time she’s out, Rhodey and Tony are embracing like a father and his child, Tony’s arms around Rhodey’s neck. Rhodey holds Tony tightly, bringing him close like he’s afraid Tony’s gonna fly away if he lets go.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she hears him sob. It breaks her heart. “It’s my–it’s my–”

“No, Tones, no.” Rhodey pulls away from Tony, cupping the man’s face in his gloved hands. A bolt of shock jolts through Natasha’s body when she takes in how skinny his face is. “S’not your fault. None of this–none of what happened–is your fault.”

Tony closes his eyes and shakes his head, not believing a word of what Rhodey says. Natasha takes that time to kneel down next to the duo. “Hey, Tony,” she says softly.

Tony’s eyes fly open. “Nat?” His voice sounds downright pitiful as he stares at her with disbelieving wide eyes. “You’re… here, am I hallucinating?”

Rhodey manages to laugh, although it’s more to lighten the mood than to express amusement. “No. She’s really here. Stole a S.H.I.E.L.D jet and everything.”

“Commandeered a jet, Colonel Rhodes,” she amends.

Rhodey grins. “She stole it.”

Tony doesn’t say anything, looking at the both of them in a dazed confusion, mouth slightly agape. “So–so… this has nothing to do with how I haven’t had anything to drink for the last few days?”

Natasha raises an eyebrow.

A split second later, she finds herself with an armful of Tony. He’s shaking so badly that Natasha is afraid he’s gonna turn himself into the sand that surrounds them. Rhodey is stroking Tony’s neck, whispering comforting words as Tony continues to shiver.

Part of Natasha hopes that the people who did this to him are still alive.

She wants to kill them herself.

Tony is still 22 and Natasha is still 26 when Tony tells her about the arc reactor and the shrapnel. About Yinsen. About him being Iron Man.

“I shouldn’t be alive,” he says, sounding far too fragile than she’s comfortable with. If she takes a step closer, he looks he might break. “Unless it was for a reason. I’m not crazy, Nat. I just finally know what I have to do, and in my heart… I know it’s right.”

Natasha swallows. Her little brother–god, that’s weird–is out there, barely old enough to drink, risking his life on a daily basis to try and make up for the things he did before, all the weapons and the bloodshed and… and it reminds her of her.

She has yet to see if that’s a good thing.

(They also decide to tell Pepper and Harold “Happy” Hogan, Tony’s sort-of bodyguard, the truth about their relationship.

“Oh. So, I’m dating your sister,” Pepper says calmly, but Natasha knows that she’s exploding inside with even more questions. Happy looks at Pepper weirdly, like he can’t believe that peppy, sprightly Pepper is dating brooding, silent Natasha. Natasha can’t say she blames him.

“Okay. That’s… okay. I’ll be good to her, Tony.” Pepper smiles reassuringly, but Natasha can tell it’s more like she’s reassuring herself than her brother. It’s not everyday that you find out that your girlfriend also happens to be the adopted sister of your boss who could probably buy your entire life with a snap of his fingers.

Yeah. She can see how that might be strange.

“You better be!” Tony exclaims with no real heat behind it. He likes Pepper too much to actually threaten her.)

Tony is still 22 and Natasha is still 26 when they find out Obadiah Stane was behind Tony’s kidnapping and subsequent torture.

Natasha wasn’t there when Pepper pushed the button that fried Obadiah, but god she wishes that she was.

(Tony reveals who he is shortly after.

���Is he always like this?” Coulson exasperatedly asks Natasha. The reporters are busy yelling and screaming and shouting, nearly trampling each other in an attempt to get closer to Tony. Tony looks over at the two of them and actually smiles, that idiot.

Natasha smirks. “You have no idea.”)

Tony is 23 and Natasha is 27 when Tony starts dying from palladium poisoning.

He doesn’t tell anyone. Only J.A.R.V.I.S knows. Rhodey… Rhodey kind of knows. The only thing he’s aware of is that the palladium burns quick, it burns ugly, and it leaves a stupid-looking futuristic crossword puzzle crawling up his neck.

Tony goes on a bender. Starts drinking heavily even though he would barely touch a wine cooler when he was younger (thanks to Natasha). He shows up to board meetings sloshed and his signatures are barely legible.

(He locks himself in his lab and sobs, clawing at his chest and cursing the ironic powers that be for bestowing upon him an object that simultaneously saves and kills him.)

He makes Pepper C.E.O when she comes down to his lab to confront him about his recent behavior. Immediately, she asks if he’s okay. She places a cool palm on Tony’s forehead. “You’re scaring me, Tony,” she chokes out. They haven’t been working together for that long, but she sees Tony as the little brother she’s never had. “The way you’re acting… it’s like you’re dying.”

Tony scoffs, swatting away Pepper’s hand. “M’not, don’t worry. You won’t be getting rid of me that easily.” Now would be a good test of the acting skills Natasha taught him when they were younger. “Just… I don’t think I can handle the stress of running SI and, you know, doing the other thing at the same time.”

Pepper nods stiffly. She doesn’t fully believe him, he can tell, but she also doesn’t want to push the matter further. She steps back, giving Tony space. “C.E.O?” she sniffs, the corner of her mouth curling up in partial amusement.

“Yes!” he enthusiastically shouts, sounding relieved. “Ms. C.E.O, I think we need to celebrate!” He waves a hand, and DUM-E comes rolling in, chirping happily while carrying a platter of sliced meats and cheeses. U follows close behind with a bucket filled to the brim with ice, a bottle of expensive champagne, and 2 crystal wine glasses.

(People start to speculate as to why Tony would step down as C.E.O of SI when they’re just starting to build their stocks up again. Pepper, poor Pepper, is just pretty enough that they start saying she’s Tony’s illicit lover who’s taking advantage of his loneliness to take over Stark Industries.

“As if!” Tony throws the paper into the trash, hands clapping together the second it lands. “I don’t see how people can believe this bullshit!”

Pepper snickers, daintily covering her laughter with a hand. “I know! You’re not even my type.”

Natasha strolls over, pressing a kiss to Pepper’s temple. “We all know you prefer redheads.” She sits herself down in Pepper’s lap, tucking her head under Pepper’s chin.

Tony groans, turning his entire body away from the affectionate couple. “My god, get a room!”)

He lets Rhodey take the Iron Man armor. He wasn’t even drunk; all he had in that flask was a bunch of apple juice, but acting drunk was cathartic in a way.

He hears the pain in Rhodey’s voice when Rhodey tells him that he doesn’t need to do this.

All he remembers after that is a bright flash, Rhodey taking off, and then darkness. He doesn’t know how long he lies in the rubble that used to be his living room, but he does know that he’d fucked up.

(“You’re dying,” Natasha hisses, slamming both of her hands down on his desk. Despite the sting in her words, her eyes are soft, if a bit calculating. “Does anyone else know?”

Tony doesn’t even flinch, eyes looking around the room–looking at anything but her. He expected this kind of reaction. “No,” he grits out. “Only me. And J.A.R.V.I.S. And now you. How did you know?” He swore J.A.R.V.I.S to secrecy and made sure to leave nothing lying about that could even suggest that he’s ill.

“We know the symptoms of palladium poisoning, Antoshka,” Natasha says, gently now.

Tony tilts his head. “We?”

At that moment, the door slides open. A rather severe-looking African-American man walks in, a patch over his left eye. “You’re not an easy man to get an audience with, Stark.”

Tony’s face flashes with betrayal, and Natasha would feel bad for being the one who put it there if she didn’t think that Tony needed this. “I told you, I don’t want to join your super-secret boy band,” he mumbles, sinking in his seat.

Fury grins.)

He synthesizes a new element, thanks to Howard (and somewhat thanks to the pain-in-the-ass Nick Fury).

It feels good. His blood no longer feels like acid and he can breathe, damn it.

He’s never felt better.

(“Natasha was the one who recommended you, you know,” Fury says, tapping his fingers on the metal desk melodically.

Tony thinks back to Natasha calling S.H.I.E.L.D a “circus run by monkeys–except that monkeys would probably do better!” and snorts.

Fury picks up a pen and twirls it slowly, never taking his eye off of Tony. “She sees something in you, Stark. I don’t know what it is, but she sees something.” He places the pen down with a click. “Don’t disappoint her.”)

Tony is 24 and Natasha is 28 when the Avengers are assembled.

Natasha can’t say that she’s fond of the way Steve talks to Tony like he’s not deserving of his title, but she tries to keep her cool. The last thing she needs is for them to bombard her with questions as to why she’s so defensive of Tony.

But, just to let the others know that Tony is under her protection, she lets them see the way she brushes his bangs from his eyes, the way she allows him to sprawl over her on the couch, and the way she generally lets him get away with things that she would flay other people alive for.

(“You think she likes Stark?” Steve grunts, leaning his hip against a table in some lab that S.H.I.E.L.D set them up in and crossing his arms. Things could get complicated if she does, and they really don’t need anything else to add to the volatile stew that is their team chemistry.

Bruce clicks his tongue and makes a show of stepping away from Steve. “Sorry, but I’m not about to get involved in that kind of speculation,” he says, although his tone doesn’t make him seem actually apologetic. He rubs his hands together. “But, um, speculation about that blue-glowy thingy? I’m all up for that.”)

Their confusion amuses her. Yes, she know all about the theories they have about her and Tony’s relationship. (She tries not to retch every time she hears one.) They need to tell the others soon.

But for now, she supposes she can have some fun in confusing them even more. When Pepper visits, she makes sure to up her usual affectionate gestures whenever they’re in eyesight of one of the Avengers. Back hugs, kisses on the cheek and temple, and whispers of sweet nothings in Pepper’s ear.

(“Perhaps they are all in a relationship together,” Thor offers, shrugging his shoulders. “It is not an uncommon practice on Asgard, as long as all parties consent. I have seen relationships that consist of more than 2 people.”

Steve stares at the table. Bruce continues to tap at some hologram. “Speculation,” Bruce sighs out.)

Tony is still 24 and Natasha is still 28 when Tony does something stupidly heroic–emphasis on stupid–and flies a nuke into a wormhole.

The right side of her head is matted with blood and sweat, and the left corner of her mouth stings like nothing else. Her head continues to pound as she throws the scepter to the ground. Everything fucking hurts.

But none of that pain compares to watching as Tony falls out of that wormhole, body limp.

(She’s just glad he was able to fall out before it closed, because if he got stuck up there, she’d have to live knowing that she’s the reason.)

Thor swings by, carrying her down to the ground, but her eyes stay glued on Tony. She knows she’s gripping onto Thor’s bicep a bit too hard, her nails digging into his skin, but he’s a god. He can take it.

Banner, thankfully, doesn’t seem inclined to let Tony turn into a red-and-gold splat on the pavement as he catches Tony’s falling body before it hits the ground. She rubs at her forehead, stress building up in the back of her head.

She, Thor, and Steve run over and kneel near his body. Thor rips off Tony’s mask, revealing his pale face, both of his eyes closed. Quietly, she gasps, sitting down on the backs of her legs, eyes raking up and down his body. She takes in the damage done to his suit and prays that Tony’s just unconscious instead of… instead of something else.

Steve leans over Tony’s chest, trying to hear a heartbeat or the sound of breathing or anything that would say Tony’s alive.

Tony doesn’t open his eyes.

Before Natasha–or Steve, if the way he’s staring intently at Tony’s mouth is anything to go by–can start on CPR, Banner roars and Tony is jolted awake with a gasp.

“Alright, hey!” Tony says weakly after being informed of their victory. “Good job guys. And Nat!” He does a pathetic attempt at a finger gun, barely able to lift his hand more than a few inches off the ground.

Natasha snorts. She’d hit him on the forehead if she wasn’t afraid of some underlying injury.

He struggles to swallow, smacking his lips before talking. “You ever try shawarma? There’s a shawarma joint about 2 blocks from here.”

Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Steve smile. Maybe they’ll get along after all.

Tony is still 24 and Natasha is still 28 when Tony is thought dead after an attack on his Malibu mansion–an attack that Natasha knew was going to come, but couldn’t do anything about.

“He could still be alive,” she says as a statement rather than a bid to placate, wrapping her arm around Pepper’s waist as they stare out of a window in some hotel room that Pepper booked. She’s seen Tony get up and dust himself off after a near-death incident one too many times for her to be comfortable with, but it gives her hope that he’s survived. It’s gonna take more than a few missiles and half of his mansion to take down Tony.

Pepper wipes at the corner of her eyes. “I’m going back to the mansion in the morning–or what–what was the mansion. I’ll see if… if there’s anything we can save.” Her sniffles die down, and she leans into Natasha’s hold.

(Then Pepper tells her about the message Tony left her. He’s alive.

That’s all Natasha needs to know.)

Tony is still 24 and Natasha is still 28 when Pepper is kidnapped, injected with Extremis, is subsequently removed of any trace of Extremis, and Tony gets the shrapnel removed.

Tony dusts off DUM-E and U and Butterfingers, cooing something about how they’re okay, how dad’s here. “I’m still Iron Man, you know!” Tony says to the both of them, twirling around in his seat before fitting a DUNCE cap on DUM-E.

“You’re a child, is what you are,” Pepper teases. She bites her bottom lip afterward to keep herself from bursting into another round of tears. It’s been an emotional sort of week.

Natasha kisses her cheek, returning her girlfriend’s grateful smile. “I agree with Pepper.” She tucks a stray lock of Pepper’s hair behind her ear.

“Unfair!” Tony protests, bursting their reality bubble. “She’s your girlfriend, of course you’re always gonna agree with her!”

Tony is 26 and Natasha is 30 when Natasha finds out the truth of how their parents died.

Steve gulps. “I don’t think we should tell Tony about this,” he whispers to Natasha, hand on her forearm. They’re so close to finding Bucky–so goddamn close–and this revelation certainly throws a wrench into their plans. “If he finds out, he would never–”

Natasha swallows down a ball of fury. “Tell him,” she says sharply, looking at him with as much fire as she can muster. He blinks, grip loosening. “You need to tell him. You think his reaction right now will be bad?–” she shakes her head, glare never leaving his face– “It will pale in comparison to his reaction if you keep hiding this from him and he has to find out himself.” She thinks back to her own painful confession she made back when she was younger, the kind of confession that can break families. She’s just grateful it didn’t break hers.

Steve purses his lips. “Why can’t you tell him then?” He holds out the flip phone and waggles it insistently.

She pushes it to the side, unwilling to let Steve run away from this. If she was able to make that confession when she was 14, he can do it now. “It’s not my best friend that did this. I’m not the one using Tony’s money to fund this chase. Tell him, Rogers.” She jabs at his chest with a finger, ignoring the way he winces. “Or I’ll make you.”

Steve closes his eyes and takes a few deep breaths, exhaling slowly on the last one. He flips open the phone with just enough force to not break it in half and dials a number. “Tony?” he says into the receiver, eyes flickering to Natasha, “We need to talk. In person.”

A satisfied smile works its way onto her face.

(The smile drops when Steve turns his back. She clutches at her chest, a burning in there she hasn’t felt since that cold December night.

It wasn’t actually James, she tells herself, he was brainwashed. It wasn’t actually him.

She breathes in shakily. It wasn’t him.)

Tony is still 26 and Natasha is still 30 when Tony finds out the truth of how their parents died.

His eyes turn into steel and his walls build themselves back up. “Fuck off, Rogers,” he snarls, words turning into knives trying to find a chink in Steve’s armor. He starts to walk off, but he’s stopped when Steve grabs his wrist. As much as he struggles, he’s no match for Steve’s enhanced strength. “Let go.” His eyes flash dangerously and the bracelet on his other wrist beeps, ready to call the Iron Man armor.

“Tony, he was brainwashed–used by HYDRA,” Steve desperately says, staring Tony in the eyes in hopes that those words would sway Tony’s feelings.

“He killed my mom–” Tony’s voice cracks on the last word.

Steve shakes Tony’s wrist, tugging him closer. “It wasn’t him. He was being used as a weapon. Tony, please,” he pleads.

Tony blinks wetly. “Does Natasha know?” he asks quietly.

Steve nods, confused. “She–she does. Why?”

Something blazes in Tony’s eyes. “She told you to tell me, didn’t she?” His tone is borderline accusatory. “Would you have told me if she didn’t ask you to?” he asks, searching Steve’s eyes. He wants his answer to be yes. He wants to know that his trust in Steve wasn’t misplaced, because honestly? This is… this is a fucking mess.

Steve stays silent.

He lets Tony’s wrist slip out of his hand as Tony walks away.

(“He told you,” Natasha bluntly says as she enters Tony’s lab, J.A.R.V.I.S turning down the Metallica blasting from the speakers.

Tony throws a screwdriver across the room, probably breaking something that costs more than what most people make in a month. “I wish he didn’t. Could’ve–could’ve just left me in blissful ignorance.” He angrily runs a hand through his hair, curling into himself.

Natasha walks over, picking up a screwdriver for herself. “You would’ve wanted to know, Tony. Don’t lie to yourself.” Like Tony, she throws it. Except this time, it embeds itself into the wall, startling Tony. “Steve was right. It wasn’t him.”

“How can you defend him?!” Tony explodes, standing up from his stool so quickly it knocks over.

“Because I’m not being a child, Tony!” Natasha snaps back, heart squeezing when Tony flinches and steps back, nearly tripping over the stool. “I told you–Steve’s been telling you–it wasn’t James. I know you’re angry. I was angry. But, Tony… you can’t blame him for this.”

He looks away, jaw clenching. “Just go.”

“Antoshka–”

“Go!”)

Tony is 27 and Natasha is 31 when Steve brings Bucky home.

She finds herself getting quite close to the ex-assassin. She helps him adjust to the modern era, whether that means accompanying him whenever he ventures outside or simply making a list of his basic needs. Sometimes they spar; it’s nice to be able to test her skills against someone on the same level.

(Tony is still awkward around the other man. Outside of regular arm maintenance sessions, the most Bucky gets from him is stilted smiles and jokes that fall flat. It’s enough to make even her cringe.)

“How… how can I get Tony to be more comfortable around me?” Bucky asks quietly, swirling a glass of orange juice as the both of them stand in the communal kitchen.

Natasha raises an eyebrow as she looks at him. Where in the world did that question come from? “You just have to give him time.”

However, that seems like the wrong answer as a gentle crease forms between his brows. “Give him time? After what I did to him, I don’t think all the time in the world could help.” He lets out a breathy laugh, sounding near hysterical at the thought of Tony disliking him.

She has to bite her tongue to prevent herself from saying that she warmed up to Bucky just fine even after what he did. “Why do you seem care so much?” she asks, genuinely curious. “You’ve never tried to talk to him before.”

Bucky shuffles on his feet, flushing just slightly. “He’s kind,” he starts, “an’ generous. From what I’ve seen, he’s… he’s a real hero.” He rubs the back of his neck with his free hand, already sufficiently embarrassed. “He doesn’t deserve to be scared in his own house.” Vulnerability shines through his voice.

Natasha thinks there’s more to it than just that, but she leaves it be. “He’ll come around.”

Tony is still 27 and Natasha is still 31 when Tony starts coming around. (Natasha’s refuses to take credit for it.)

It starts as Tony actively trying to converse with Bucky more, seeming determined to talk to him for longer than 10 seconds. His smiles become less and less forced, and his jokes actually get a laugh now. Hell, sometimes he even brings Bucky coffee in the mornings (though it’s obvious that Tony himself hasn’t slept yet).

Routine arm maintenance used to take 10 minutes; Bucky could go down to the lab and come back up before the commercial breaks for Cake Boss are over, but now? It drags on for hours as they talk and talk and talk about anything and everything they can think of. Bucky always comes back up with a lovesick look on his face (and Clint and Sam razz him about it any chance they get).

Tony even starts to invite Bucky to the Lord of the Rings and Star Wars marathons he hosts for a local community center near weekly; in fact, he starts calling himself Bucky’s official teacher on the pop culture of the 21st century. It’s not unusual to walk in on Tony excitedly explaining the plot of Stargate Atlantis or giving a basic rundown on the accuracies and inaccuracies used in shows like Star Trek to Bucky.

And Bucky listens to all of it, a smitten smile on his face.

Their shoulders and elbows touch whenever they sit together on the couch. They trade whispers and shy smiles like they’re the only people in the room. Bucky looks at Tony like he hangs the sun, while Tony looks at Bucky like he’s the moon and stars all wrapped up in one person.

It’s so obvious to everyone but them.

(“Do you think Buck’ll ever make a move?” Steve whispers to Natasha, sounding like a tired older brother as he glances at Bucky and Tony get close to each other on the couch and start their oft-talked about Mythbusters session. “Hell, do you think either of them’ll make a move?”

The corner of Natasha’s mouth curls up. “I doubt it.” She knows the both of them. They’d rather do a little dance around each other until the day they die than confront the other about their feelings.

Steve’s eyes hood, unamused. “Yeah. I doubt it too.”)

Tony is still 27 and Natasha is still 31 when Bucky tells Natasha how he feels (as if she didn’t already know the second Bucky threw those heart-eyes in Tony’s direction).

“He’s gorgeous, Natasha,” Bucky groans during one of their yoga sessions. He blows a strand of hair out of his face, grumbling something about ponytails and their uselessness.

Natasha hums, lowering her pelvis down to the ground, switching to the cobra pose. “He is handsome, isn’t he?”

Bucky follows her lead. Something in his back pops, and he hopes it’s a good kind of pop and not the you-messed-something-up-bad pop. “He has–he has the prettiest eyes I’ve ever seen.” Natasha glances at him, expression unreadable, and he stiffens. “I mean, uh…” He thinks back to what the other Avengers have whispered about Natasha and Tony and frowns. “…You don’t–”

“I don’t have a crush on Tony, no,” Natasha says, irritated. God, they really need to tell the others soon. She loves Tony, she really does, but not like that. Ew. “You’re good for him, though.”

Bucky nods, his hair bun wagging up and down. He didn’t even know that he was searching for Natasha’s approval, but he feels so much better now that he has it. “Thanks. I’m… I’m hoping that I can make him happy.”

(Then he clears his throat. “So, I guess you wouldn’t mind if I said that he had a nice butt?” he tries to joke, but Natasha can tell he’s being serious.

A significantly more taxing, intense regime pops up in her mind. Totally a coincidence, she swears.)

Tony is still 27 and Natasha is still 31 when they decide to tell the Avengers the truth.

Pepper is there for moral support, holding Natasha’s hand and whispering encouragements into her ear.

“Oh, man,” Clint mumbles, fiddling with an arrow he retrieved from his quiver. “So, those rumors… oh man, that’s bad.” He refuses to look either Tony or Natasha in the eye, instead settling for staring at his scuffed boots.

Tony snorts. “Yeah. It is. We’ve been meaning to tell you guys, it’s just that we keep forgetting. Y’know, ‘cause we’re idiots–” Natasha gives him the stink eye– “uh, actually, I’m the idiot. I’m the only idiot.”

“It makes sense,” Bruce says, twiddling his thumbs. “You two are too close to be just friends, but you two are obviously not like that. Yeah, I see it.”

Tony beams at Bruce. “I always knew you were the smart one, Brucie!”

Bucky, meanwhile, seems to be having a breakdown in the corner of the room. Steve is trying futilely to calm him down. “I shouldn’t have said that,” he cringes, face scrunching up.

“Said what?” Steve tilts his head to the side.

“I told… I told Natasha I thought Tony had a nice butt,” Bucky admits, head hanging low.

But he must’ve said that louder than he thought because everyone turns around to look at him. Bruce manages to look sympathetic, but Clint and Sam are wheezing and slapping their knees. Thor looks like he might die of embarrassment along with Bucky–a side-effect of being empathetic, Bucky supposes.

“You think I have a nice butt?” Tony blurts out, cheeks turning a rosy red.

Before Bucky can reply, Natasha stands up. He gulps and all but leaps out of his seat. “I’m gonna go–” he breathes out, sounding terrified– “I’m gonna go!” Steve can only watch as Bucky bolts out of the room, hair frazzled and his jacket slipping off of one of his shoulders.

Natasha cackles as she sits back down.

Tony is 29 and Natasha is 33 when some aliens land on earth demanding the Infinity Stones.

Despite Bucky and Natasha’s protests, Tony hops on one of their spaceships.

And doesn’t come back down.

Tony is still 29 and Natasha is still 33 when she witnesses everyone around her turning to ash.

She wonders how she’s going to tell Tony about Sam. About Bucky. She chokes on her grief.

Looking up at the sky, she hopes that Tony was spared–she hopes that he’s alive.

When Steve tries to talk to her, all that comes out is a sob.

Her tears hit the forest floor.

Tony is still 29 and Natasha is still 33 when he finally makes his way back down to Earth after near a goddamn month of being missing.

Rhodey and Pepper rush to his side. Thin, is the first thing that pops into her mind, far too thin. The next thing is how much good a heaping plateful of Maria’s risotto would do him. She shakes her head at that thought and jogs over to join the trio.

(”Nat,” Tony croaks, sagging into her side as she takes Steve’s place. “Nat.” He looks up at her through thin eyelashes, his cheeks sunken, with a sickly grey undertone to his skin. “You’re okay.”

“I am okay,” she whispers, frowning as she wraps one of her hands around Tony’s wrists. Definitely too thin.)

Tony is still 29 and Natasha is still 33 when all of them start to look for a way to reverse the snap.

Natasha watches as Tony slaves over some blueprint, hooked up to an IV drip. Trying to get him to eat, drink, or rest is near impossible short of shoving the food and water down his throat or sedating him. He squints at the holographic screen in front of him before yelling, frustrated, and swiping it all away.

She gets up and walks over to him as he curls up into a ball in his wheelchair. “Let Bruce take a crack at it.”

“It’s outside his area of expertise,” he mumbles, form shivering slightly.

“I know. But you at least get a break.”

(”Are you… really doing okay, Nat?” Tony asks around his mouthful of peanut butter sandwich. It was less of a struggle to get Tony to eat this time around, but Natasha suspects it largely might have been out of pity.

She pauses with her glass of water halfway to her mouth. “Am I fine?” she ponders. All those people. Gone. The family that she’s built up. Gone. She could’ve done more. Something. Anything to spare them all from the pain of losing a loved one–a spouse, child, sibling.

She takes a sip, closes her eyes, and recomposes herself. “Yes.”)

Tony is 32 and Natasha is 36 when they take a small stroll down to the convenience store that’s only being kept open due to its diligent owner and the fact that Tony drops a couple hundred bucks in there every time they go.

“Can I ask you something?” Tony picks up a Snickers bar and turns it over, checking under the flap for the expiration date. Even with half the world gone, they’re still pretty careful with stocking non-expired products, but Tony doesn’t particularly feel like gambling today.

Natasha hums, throwing every variety of Lays into her shopping basket.

“When are you gonna propose to Pep already?” He lets the question rush out before ducking behind the shelves. He’s learned to never underestimate the force at which Natasha can throw things, not even when it comes to cellophane bags that are more air than actual product.

“Tony!” she growls, going on her tiptoes to look over the aisles and find the tell-tale tousle of Tony’s hair. She finds him cowering next to the Sour Patch Kids and launches a well-aimed bag of barbecue flavored chips at his head.

“Just propose!” he whoops, laughing as the bag bounces off of his head and tumbles down onto the floor.

She joins in on his happiness, and in the back of her mind she realizes how much she misses this. How much she misses being normal. Or as normal as someone like her can get, anyway.

(”We should get married,” Natasha casually says as she and Pepper lounge on the couch, watching old, old videos on YouTube.

Startled, Pepper jolts upright, looking at Natasha with wide eyes and her mouth agape. “Are you– are you being serious?” She looks like she’s torn between kissing Natasha senseless or yelling at her because what kind of proposal is that.

“Not right now, of course, because I know you would want to invite everybody…” she trails off, the ‘everybody who was dusted’ lingering in the air. “But we should, at a point.”

“Do I at least get a ring?” Pepper ribs.

Natasha shows off a kiwi-flavored Ring Pop. “Brand new. In its wrapper, even.”)

Tony is 34 and Natasha is 38 when Tony bursts into her and Pepper’s room in the middle of the night, eyes wide and bright off of the high of a brand new discovery.

“You won’t believe this!” he exclaims as he excitedly jumps into their bed like he’s 10 again and trying to wake Natasha up on Christmas morning. “You won’t– I can barely believe it!”

Pepper grunts, displeased, while Natasha’s eyes flutter open. She’s known Tony long enough to know that he won’t stop babbling unless someone sits down and listens to him. “What?” Her voice is rough from sleep, and she can barely see past the blur in her eyes, but that doesn’t stop Tony from tugging her up into a sitting position.

“You remember Scott?” He’s breathless, giddy. “His entire time travel thing?”

She nods slowly. “Yes. You called it bullshit.”

“Except that it isn’t!” He points, index finger trembling, towards the wide open door, a pale blue light washing over the doorframe. “I think… I think I figured it out.”

Natasha scrambles out of bed so quickly that she nearly knocks Tony off and pulls on one of Pepper’s jackets that’s hanging over a chair. “Show me,” she says, voice stained with hope.

Tony smiles.

(”Antoshka,” she breathes out, fondness seeping through in every syllable of the endearment. “This is amazing.” Her eyes roam every inch of the blueprint, hungrily soaking up every single detail from the notes written in tiny font to the side of the screen to the giant, green text proclaiming the success rate to be 99.9%.

He engulfs her in a sudden hug, and, as soon as it happens, it’s over, his hands resting on the sides of her biceps. “We can bring them back!” His eyes shine, and she too begins to feel a prickling behind her eyes.

“We can bring them back,” she repeats, grinning proudly.)

Tony is still 34 and Natasha is still 38 when they get the time machine up and running, having spent countless hours engrossed in heavy lifting and wire connecting.

They have a plan. 3 teams. 6 stones. 1 chance.

“Come back safe.” Pepper presses a gentle kiss on Natasha’s cheek, tucking a lock of red-blond hair behind her ear. “Bring them back. We’re going to have a summer wedding.”

“I fully expect to be the best man!” Tony pipes up from where he’s talking with Steve and Rhodey, looking at the both of them with a hint of wistfulness in his eyes.

Pepper smiles at him, biting her bottom lip like she always does. “We wouldn’t have anyone else.”

Natasha draws her in for another kiss.

(”Vormir, right?” Clint twirls his sword.

Natasha nods. “That’s where we find the soul stone. Rhodey and Nebula will take care of the power stone.”

If Nebula’s jaw clenches at the mention of Vormir, of 2 of her teammates going there, not fully knowing the price that is to be paid, no one notices.)

Tony is still 34 and Natasha is still 38 when Natasha and Clint land on Vormir and are faced with an agonizing choice.

They argue for what feels like hours, trying to justify why it should be them and not the other, until they stand together, forehead to forehead in one last comforting gesture.

Then, Clint flips her onto her back, knocking the wind out of her. “Tell my family I love them,” he says, ready to start running towards the cliff.

Natasha turns the tables, bringing him down harder and faster. “Tell them yourself.” She sprints, braid whipping in the wind.

It’s a scuffle, a full-on brawl as they try to beat the other to the edge, to be the one who gives their life for the salvation of the universe. Clint gets close, so, so close. He can taste the ice in the air, the snow, the iron that’ll fill his mouth once his head makes contact with the ground. He jumps.

Natasha tackles him, slaps the other end of her grappling hook on Clint’s waist and comes to an abrupt stop as Clint holds onto her wrist in a death grip, keeping the both of them suspended in the air, braced against the cliffside. “Damn you,” he chokes out, pulse racing. He reaches out towards her with his free hand, but the stress on his hip is too much, too painful, he retracts it, holding back onto the wire of the grappling hook.

She looks behind her, at the ground below. “Let me go,” she says. There’s no fear in her eyes, and that scares Clint shitless. She looks reassuring, accepting, expecting.

“No.” He grimaces, the strain of keeping both himself and Natasha from plummeting starting to take its toll. He’ll hold onto her all day if he has to. Some of the others will come. They’ll find another way. There has to be another way. “Please, no.”

She nods softly, understandingly. “It’s okay.” He can barely hear her over the blood rushing in his ears, but her words just serve for him to tighten his grip more.

Before he can react, she kicks off of the cliffside, tearing her wrist from Clint’s grasp.

He’s forced to watch as she falls.

(The wind rushes around her, cold and biting. Her heart threatens to leap out of her chest. Clint becomes nothing more than a speck in her vision.

She spreads her arms, thoughts racing at a million miles per hour in her head. No goodbyes, no apologies. People like her don’t get happy endings. She was foolish for thinking that she might have been the exception.

She hopes that Pepper will forgive her. She hopes that Tony will forgive her. She hopes.

In her last second, she thinks only of her family.

And she smiles.)

Tony is still 34 and Natasha is– Natasha is… when they come back.

Tony’s the first one to notice. “Where’s Nat?” He tilts his head to the side in question. Could she be running late? A bit odd, but given how experimental this entire process is, it’s not entirely implausible.

But Clint looks at him with so sorrow and grief and apology in his eyes, his jaw wound shut so tightly that Tony’s almost afraid he might turn his teeth into dust. He thinks he knows what might have happened. He hopes to god that he’s wrong. “Clint?” he ventures again, “where’s Natasha?”

Clint looks away, his adam’s apple bobbing and throat clicking as he swallows.

That’s all Tony needs. His hands start to tremble and terrible, hiccuping sobs start to pour out of his throat as his eyes glue themselves onto the ground. His knees buckle, and he would’ve fallen onto the ground had it not been for Steve’s steadying hands.

After all they’ve been through.

He didn’t even get to say goodbye.

(Pepper shoves her face into the crook of his neck, bawling her eyes out as she hugs him fiercely, like he might disappear too. Her snot and tears get all over the fabric, but instead of being disgusted, he rubs her back soothingly, his own tears rolling down his cheeks. He can’t help but to think that it should’ve been him instead.

As he holds Pepper in his arms, he wonders, briefly, if this was how Natasha felt whenever she’d comfort him after a bad dream or when Howard was a bit too harsh. “We’re gonna be okay,” he croons.

It doesn’t really hit him until he’s staring out over a lake with the other Avengers that Natasha is well and truly gone. She’s not gonna tease him anymore. She’s not gonna be the one to listen to his incessant ramblings when no one else will. She’s not gonna make him her signature borscht or spends hours with him eating pepperoni pizza and watching trashy reality TV.

He’s known her for all of his life.

When she died, a piece of him did too.)

Tony is still 34 and Natasha is dead and gone, and she’s never coming back when Thanos comes into the future with his dumb golden armor after Bruce snapped his fingers using the gauntlet Tony built in his basement–take a goddamn seat, Thanos.

Everyone comes back.

(Except Natasha.)

Everyone helps.

(Except Natasha.)

Everyone is relieved to see each other again.

(Except Natasha.)

He fights, just a touch too much on the side of recklessness, blasting and carving and flying his way through swaths of Outriders. He falls. He gets bent, dented, bruised, and scraped, but he finds his way. He even manages to give Bucky a relieved kiss when they cross paths.

Carol is close to the time-machine-van when Thanos issues his orders to blow everything up. He braces himself as he lands on his stomach.

The Gauntlet tumbles and tumbles and Thanos reaches for it, but he tackles him, effectively buying them some precious few seconds before being punched back out. He glances at the good, ol’ Doctor Strange out of the corner of his eye while Thor and Carol are busy doing what they do.

Strange holds up one scarred finger, and Tony knows exactly what he’s supposed to do.

He rushes at Thanos and fumbles with the Gauntlet. He’s pushed away, flat on his ass as Thanos smirks, relishing in his victory over the weak Terrans. “I am inevitable,” he taunts.

Snap.

Nothing.

Tony holds up his right hand, the Infinity Stones taking hold in his makeshift gauntlet as their power courses through his body. 1 chance. “And I–” he takes a rattling breath– “am Iron Man.”

He snaps his fingers.

Tony is still 34 and Natasha is waiting on the other side for him as he sits against the metal carcass of a ship.

Rhodey has tears free falling down his face as he places an armored hand over Tony’s left cheek, and Tony would laugh, tease his platypus about being so emotional over him if he wasn’t in so much fucking pain. His entire right side is burnt so badly it’s numb, and the nerves that haven’t fully died yet are giving off yeah, we’re hurt super goddamn badly signals.

He can’t even talk.

Bucky and Pepper rush over, and Jesus Christ, Bucky basically slides on his knees for the last couple of feet. “He’ll be fine,” Bucky says, although it’s more of a statement than a question. Figures that Tony would fall in love with the one person who’s more stubborn than he is.

Pepper shakes her head and reaches out to grab Bucky’s metal hand with her own. She doesn’t say anything, just reaches out to rub at Tony’s shoulder.

“He’ll be fine,” Bucky insists.

Tony starts to slip, slip, and slip, his breaths becoming more ragged and his chest becoming tighter. His vision starts to fade, and he feels… peaceful. Like all of this weight has been lifted off of his shoulders.

“He’s at rest,” Pepper whispers.

The last thing he registers is Bucky’s chapped lips pressing against his forehead.

Tony was 34 and Natasha was 38 when they saved the world.

Somewhere, they meet again.

[lavaeolus]

The Hong Kong Minimum-Kills Run

Typical, isn’t it? You’re making a game, you add in a small little touch, and suddenly players are trying to build their whole approach to the game around it.

So it is with Duncan’s Subdue, which takes people out without actually counting as a kill; the only catch is that you need to reduce them to 0 AP and stun them first. Shadowrun: Hong Kong is a little on the easier side and it’s also the entry in the trilogy where talking and tricking your way past things is most supported. These two things in mind, I set out to beat the game with as little kills tracked as possible.

As you can see I didn’t quite reach 0 kills, but considering my first character had a killcount above 100 I’ll call this a success. You might find it interesting that all kills I couldn’t dodge come in the endgame, and none of them are people. I had to kill 8 Matrix ICs to free Raymond, and had to kill the final boss and their minions. Had I been a little faster removing the Queen’s ability to summon extra minions, I could’ve shaved off two kills there.

I’m told in original versions of the game you could actually Subdue the Queen and co., which is hilarious, but evidently no longer supported. I did still get the ‘best’ ending, but she’s nonetheless registered as a death on the stats. So for the RP-conscious amongst you, my hands are still pretty clean. The most questionable, kinda-lethal thing I did was refuse to side with either person during the Whistleblower mission. This ultimately resulted in a bloody fight where everyone but the two ringleaders (Subdue’d by yours truly) died. C’est la vie.

Build and playstyle

My character was a Mage and a Decker, but the emphasis was very much on the former; just enough Decking to save a party slot that might otherwise be spent on Is0bel. As you’d expect, my spell-choice focused on a dash of utility combined with sources of AP damage like Stunbolt. Note that despite its description, Petrify doesn’t seem to actually enable Duncan’s Subdue, although it’s still convenient to be able to disable people for a few turns.

Otherwise, if attempting something similar to this post, I’d advise grabbing a Shock Glove and Geichu himself (Metal Stance) from the Whampoa mission as your first run. Oh, and be aware sometimes you don’t actually have to stick around for a fight and can just walk to the mission’s exit.

Etiquette-wise, I used Gang, Shadowrunner and Socialite. In hindsight, swapping Socialite for Security might’ve let me bypass a guard in the final level. (As-is, I just had to KO him and the two others he summoned; Ku Feng lived, but was not taught to be a better monster.)

Tricky spots

This was done on Hard difficulty, but as mentioned Hong Kong isn’t a tremendously difficult game. Generally speaking, once I’d picked up AP spells my goals weren’t too unmanageable; when you and your team are entirely spec’d around AP, you can shut down people pretty hard while Duncan’s cooldown passes. There are a few tricky spots, though:

The opening: You just don’t have the tools at this point in the game. In the initial fight I tactically lured people into shooting me and Carter over Duncan. In the escape, I summoned a Shaman spirit solely to be a bullet sponge. I’m a hero.

Prosperity Tower: Specifically the fight to free Raymond. I brought Is0bel along because I wanted to keep my character available to Stun people, but that also means there’s just a lot that can go wrong: Duncan can’t go down, or you’ll be unable to Subdue people. The decker can’t go down, because they need to free Raymond. The decker can’t be detected, or you might have to add kills. You can’t go down, because you’re the main character. (You should also be aware that I metagamed a bit and just remembered passwords from a previous run, saving me some kills of software in the Matrix; things get complicated if you’re strict about doing it in a more legitimate manner.)

The final boss: The final boss is mostly the same as always. It’s just since you’re probably spec’d around damageless subduing spells, you might not be ready for the switch to Overt Firepower you’ll need in the second phase, to bring down the boss without taking down her healing sources.

What couldn’t be done?

I tried to be relatively completionist, but the following missions were left undone. If anyone has any thoughts on how to finish them up, I’d love to hear it.

The Feng Shui mission: I thought I had such a clever idea here. I wanted to use Gobbet to ‘Steal’ the spirits. Doing so seems to immediately end combat… releasing the spirit. Combat immediately restarts. Maybe you can make this work through cheese, but it’d be a pain.

The Dig: You can get the paydata and one of the two books required without fighting. The other’s in front of some monsters and if it were ever possible to Subdue them, it doesn’t seem to be so in my version of the game.

The Sinking Ship: Be careful not to trigger this one. You can actually get quite far here, if you’re willing to rely on NPCs to do your dirty work, but the doors in the basement of the ship automatically lock until you kill some rats.

Gaichu’s mission: I think this one might be doable. Sort of. You’ll always kill one person who you separate from the others, but because this isn’t done through combat it shouldn’t count in the stats. IIRC you can’t Subdue Ishida, but since he’s left alive for the cutscene it might be fine. The reason I’m foggy here is that for RP reasons I just didn’t do this one: yes, you can technically Subdue almost everyone and render the point behind the mission a little comical, but you’re explicitly setting out to kill some people. Now, it’s for justified reasons and to protect a crewmate, but we’re trying to avoid wetwork here.

How was it?

Always using Duncan’s Subdue feature can be a bit of a pain in the sense that sometimes the game knows to react to it, other times it’s all “Oh, so I heard you killed X”. The game generally assumes you’re a killer, of course, albeit perhaps a relatively nice and peaceloving killer, and the dialogue choices mostly reflect that. There’s some bits you might otherwise miss; I don’t think I’ve ever actually not killed the Talon before, since even if you’re planning to flee the fight early he immediately runs up and makes himself a prime target.

Still, it was fun looking at encounters from an alternate perspective. I used Duncan in my first playthrough and spec’d him around KOs, but obviously using him to take some people down is another matter entirely to trying to keep the entire battlefield in a constant state of paralysation. Actually getting past some of those mentioned tricky spots was pretty satisfying, of course.

I don’t always know going into a challenge how well the game will support it or how frustrating it will end up. Other than the intro and the missions I mentioned above, however, this approach was surprisingly viable; for a lot of the game it wasn’t so much a challenge as it was just an alternate playstyle. That said, while the vast majority of missions supported it, it was admittedly only metagame knowledge that prevented me from walking into or triggering a mission where it would've impossible to proceed. Still, apart from Gaichu’s and maybe Gobbet’s personal missions I don’t think I’d ever be forced to kill any ‘people’ (aka anything the Shadowrun setting would dub a metahuman).

I’m not so sure this approach would work as well in the game’s expansion. While we could still go through with a lighter-than-usual touch, I remember many of its enemies having Jolt Alert — a feature which automatically jolts them back from 0 to 1 AP, no-selling our main combat strategy. Could we still get through with clean-ish hands? A question for another day, perhaps.

This was originally published in 2021 to r/ShadowrunReturns on Reddit, but is now being crossposted here and on my WordPress blog along with some of my other posts, with a small bit of expansion.

[fridge-reviews]

Hades

Developer: Supergiant Games Publisher: Supergiant Games Rrp: £18.99 (Epic) or £19.49 (Steam) Released: 17th September 2020 (Official full release) Available on: Epic and Steam Played Using: An Xbox One Control Pad Approximate game length: 20 Hours (for main storyline)

No one said that family was easy. It's especially not easy when you're dealing a god within the Greek pantheon. Let's just say that their family history is... complicated, very very complicated. Every so often though the family works together (mostly) to overcome a problem. In this case its that Zagreus wants to leave the underworld and his father, Lord Hades himself, doesn't want him to and is very willing to put every obstacle he can muster. Thankfully you're family, high up on Olympus, are willing to give you a helping hand.

Originally released in early access in 2018 through the Epic games store, Hades is an Isometric roguelite in which you play as Prince Zagreus as he tries to escape the underworld. His father, Lord Hades, is none too pleased at this impertinence and will pit every soul he can muster against you, and when you consider that Hades rules over the entire underworld where every soul that has ever lived will end up, he has quite the roster to pick from. However all is not lost as Zagreus has got allies in the form of the Gods of Olympus who are willing to bestow boons upon our hero.

The main thing to remember about this game is that it isn't meant to be completed in a single run, in fact it's impossible to complete it in such a way. Sure, it is possible to get past the final boss on your first try (though it'd be incredibly difficult) but the actual story requires repeated completed runs, at least eight by my count. In the very likely event that you do die, Zagreus will return to the House of Hades. Something that is important to note is that unlike most roguelites there's no such thing as a wasted run as you'll always be progressing something in some way. I'd actually say that in this game death is your ally (in more ways than one), being defeated and sent back to the House of Hades is by no means a punishment as there things you can only do there that will make your future runs easier. You can also interact with the various NPCs that inhabit the House of Hades such as Achilles or Dusa these various NPCs are incredibly well written and each is fully voice acted and they all have their own storylines that you can interact with. You can also perform renovations to the house, most of the changes have no real effect on your various runs (though some definitely do) but can affect the various NPCs and trigger storylines. Of course one of my favourite reasons to return home is to hear the various admonishments from your father, which is always entertaining.

As you make your runs through the underworld you'll come across multiple currencies, Darkness, Gems, Obols, Cthonic Keys, Titan Blood and Diamonds. Thankfully none of these are tied to any kind of micro-transaction and each has its own quite specific purpose. The main thing to remember is that all the currencies carry over from run to run with exception of the Obols which are coins that you earn through killing enemies (and occasionally find as a room reward). These coins are used to purchase items from Charons shop, many of these purchasable items only apply for that run and for a set amount of chambers. However he also sometimes sells other currencies and the Gods boons.

During each run you will gain boons from the God's of Olympus, each time they do you're allowed to choose one of a choice of three. The boons and abilities you currently have affect what other boons you can acquire later on, in quite a few cases a pair of gods will combine their powers, often to devastating effect. As you accept these boons you'll find out more of Zagreus's plight and of the various Gods interest and involvement. You can foster this relationship by offering nectar to them (once per run) which will make them view you more favourably (and will also net you a reward). The Gods aren't the only ones you can give to, the various NPC's in the world also love the stuff and giving them it will improve their relationship with you. However, at a certain point the various Gods (and other NPC's) will no longer being willing to accept nectar and will instead want Ambrosia, which is only attained after having defeated a specific boss.

The way out of the underworld involves you making your way through chamber after chamber battling the inhabitants within. Before entering a chamber you can see a preview of what the reward is for successfully defeating it once all the enemies are dead. The underworld rearranges itself for each run, sure you'll always go through Tartarus, Asphodel, Elysium and the final area but the rooms will have changed with some not appearing at all. There are of course some set locations, such as boss rooms.

Once you've managed to escape that's when the game really starts to open up. You get to redo the runs but this time add in new conditions that make it more difficult through something called the 'Pact of Punishment'. Each new condition you add to your run adds 'Heat' that fills up a 'Heat Gauge' within the Pact of Punishment. It's advised that you gradually increase the heat rather than go in with everything turned to full, partially because the game will be insanely difficult but also because building the heat up gradually actually nets you rewards. The changes in the runs can be quite subtle such as increasing the prices of the items in Charons shop, where as others will allow the bosses to use 'extreme measures'.

Strictly speaking this game is without an ending, there is a story line that once complete causes the credits to roll and after that there's some post endgame content that lets you attain an epilogue and tidy up the loose ends if you so wish. But even once you've done all that you can keep doing runs.

If you're having trouble there's an option to activate 'God Mode'. This doesn't mean what it traditionally means. You aren't immortal or anything like that, however you are quite a bit harder to kill. This is an option that can be toggled on and off within the options menu with no consequence.

This game has so much depth to it, every time I thought I had the measure of it something new would pop up. This is still occurring even now when I'm at least a hundred hours in. There's even content to complete after the credits have rolled, because it turns out that initial quest was only the start. There are several systems and unlocks that I've not touched upon because all of that is post endgame and has even more impact upon the plots of various NPC's.

I'm not sure if it's obvious but I really like this game, in fact I absolutely adore it. However I recognise that it won't be everyone's cup of tea, I can see that having to do the same action (even with different weapons and abilities) over and over and over again will grate on some peoples nerves. But funnily enough the repetitive nature of this game is VERY Greek Mythos, with poor Zagreus forever seeking the surface only to return to the depths time after time after time.

If this appeals to you perhaps try;

Children of Morta Dead Cells

[caps-clever-girl]

thoughts on endgame.

fair warning, i am not going to be kind. i enjoyed watching this movie, for the most part. it was funny; it had many good jokes and good, pure and well done interactions between multiple characters. but i didnt like it, and here are the reasons why.

unfortunately, this isnt a ‘nitpicky’ post. my main problems are with a lot of the bigger points points of the film, and had quite a few. this is a LONG post.

• “marvels first gay character!!!!!!!!!!!!” shut up. you joined the ‘fad’ late for brownie points and it was a cameo character who got about 3 lines. there are plenty of canon queer and gay characters who could have been introduced, either as cameos or in earlier films. dont even get me started on the fact that tony has more canon bi material than most others and marvel could have taken the time or even the slightest bit of effort to make this. while i enjoyed the jokes about steve being Incredibly Hot and his ass being Gods Gift To America (which honestly??? correct!) that could have been expanded on. several characters made comments about how nice steve’s ass is, and could have been used as actual material for a queer character, instead of sticking a random chharacter in there. i get the whole ‘gay people could be anyone! its normal!’ thing by giving the ‘role’ to a regular person, but you would also prove that by making any one of your 30+ main cast actually queer instead of making gay jokes and hints that could be retconned and explained away by humour.

• slapping someone out of a panic attack, and treating the panic attack like a joke. yeah, i get it, they didnt have a lot of time. still, come on. did iron man 3 teach you nothing? apparently not since tonys ptsd was pretty much never brought up again.

• speaking of thor. now, i am not an expert, but when a person gains weight, they do not keep their abs. certainly not after five entire years - not even asgardians. i also found it odd that thor became the way he did. i understand gaining weight and comfort eating after all the trauma thor went through losing his home and brother and people, i really do, but 1.) do it properly, at least, and 2.) thor is the leader of his people. does he want the task? not particularly. he hasnt wanted to be king since the first thor movie, but hes been forced into the role. even depressed i dont think thor would shy away from it, not completely. hes always wanted to do right by his people and i think that hed stuck to it, especially after The Snap backing him into a corner, if that makes sense. to clarify, i dont have a problem with chubby/fat thor. (IF done right instead of with weird, shitty cgi, that is.) i have a problem with the fact that thor, even though he doesnt want to be king, would abandon the last remanents displaced people to build a new home all on their own and become a hermit gamer boy. ESPECIALLY with valkyrie around. she’s been through a derpressive, alcohol fuelled time in her life and thor pulled her out of it. (mostly anyway, asgardians are party animals and im p sure she still gets trolleyed on the reg) i have bo doubt that after years of wallowing she would do her damned best to try and kick his ass out of it, even if it were just because his people need a leader, instead of letting him drop everything on her and just let him stew while new asgard gets on with it. i also didnt like the fact that all of thors emotional moments were treated as jokes and made to be funny when hes genuinely Fucked Up about eveything thats happening and made his image into a whiny crybaby.

• professor hulk. more of a personal one, this, simply because i just didnt like it. fair enough if y’all disagree on this one, im not going to fight it. i just never saw him wanting to combine himself with the hulk. ever. when he apleared on the screen i was completely blindsided, and his explanation, and the way he interacted with the kids????? i just want to know where all of this confidence suddenly came from. i use the term ‘suddenly’ loosely, since its been five years, but bruce has never been the guy to care about strength or looks or fame. hes always been shy and nerdy. not afraid to stand his ground or make his opinion known. hes bot a catchphrase, posing and flexing ‘hell yeah lets take a selfie’ guy. i get that thats maybe the result of the hulk and bruces combined personality but it just felt WEIRD to me, like, there wasnt a time in the film where i felt comfortable with the character. this was the final avengers film, with all of the original six avengers in it. but it didnt feel like that, it didnt feel like bruce or the hulk was in the film, even though there was a lot of funny and good moments with orofessor hulk, it felt like a stranger with some familiar characteristics. it ruined any feelings of nostalgia for me. i like bruce, and i like the hulk. i like the way their differences add to the story and the way they interact with eachother, and the slow change in their relationship. sorry if its petty but i prefer them seperate, theres just so much more to them for me.

• clint and natasha’s journey for the soul stone. both times, in infinity war and endgame, a male character and a female character went to get the soul stone. both times the male came back and the female died, and we lost possibly two most developed and main-line female characters in the entire mcu. now i understand the reasoning for both, and out of the characters that went there, i agree with the choice. thanos and gamora; it was thanos who was aware of the sacrifice and who chose to make it. gamora didnt get a choice and was unaware until it was too late. thanos was never going to die there. he knew there would be a sacrifice and chose to take gamora, because she would be the most likely sacrifice to actualky sucsesfully yield the soul stone because she was the most loved by him. i get it, but we lost gamora and i dont like it. clint and natasha; looking at it completely objectively, clint has a family, a wife and three children, that he wants to get back. natasha does not have any children, nor any (blood) family. if i had to choose, based on facts like that, id choose her too. but i still hate it, because there goes the only female member of the avengers. also, nebula (and i think maybe rocket?) KNEW that a sacrifice would be made and either accidentaly or deliverately left out the terms of aquiring the soul stone. it would have been easy to tell, if not easy to solve. but nothinb was said, and two best friends had to make a fucking awful and horrible choice when they might not have had to.

• on the ‘feminism’ tangent; the random congragation of women in the end scene??????? i dont????? okay so i am marking myself as a hypocrite here because i did love this scene!!! it made my lil gay heart go boom to see so many good and strong women all in one place - ESPECIALLY rescue - and it also made me realise how many women there actually are across the mcu??? which was really nice?? but it just felt... so forced? the way they ALL suddenly apleared and stood together even though they were all mixed in around the battlefield. it was a wonderful thought and i did enjoy it, but it seemed too Off and Odd to seem as much more than a bid for Feminism Brownie Points.

• captain marvel. i dont know about you, but i was actually looking forward to her being in the film. for a character so hyped to be the saviour of the avengers and the end of thanos, she was barely in the film. ‘i have other planets to save, the earth isnt the only one affected by thanos’ yeah but earth is the only plannet actively attacked by him. its where the people who are rallying to fight him and reverse what he did are. dont you want to stick around and help them? surely it would be a hell of a lot easier with your help, and faster too. yes, she blasted theough the ship at the end, but she did fuck all to help defeat thanos himself, and the help she did give with the ship came at the end. i genuinely think they kept her out of the movie because she was too powerful, and would have made fighting thanos etc too easy to get all the suffering and noble sacrifices in. if she had been a side character i dont think id be as mad, but she got a whole MOVIE in which she is clearly the start of the entire avengers initiative; she is their HISTORY!!!! she is so powerful!!!! and yet she has 5 mins of screen time!! it pisses me off that she was So Strongly implied to be the character the avengers NEEDED, the one that without whom it would be IMPOSSIBLE to defeat thanos; the woman that really tipped the scales in there favour, and yet she did fuck all. (and lets not even get started on the carol/rhodey and carol+tony bromance we COMPLETELY missed out on.)

• (speaking of bonding what the fuck happened to tony and nebula????? after they were rescued it was like they never met)

• the whole entire concept of time what the fuck!!! ‘dont change anything’ okay well for the most part you did okay, and the PLAN and CONCEPT was actually really easy to grasp, at least to me, which is hard when working with paradoxes and wibbley-wobbley timey-wimey stuff. but that went out the water when past!thanos and his army were brought into the future and disintergrated. does this mean they’re dead in the past - since they would have just. Left and not come back and therefore ceased to exist from that point???? or did tonys Snap simply send them back to their point in time, with no memory of what had occured? idk because it aint explained.

• speaking of; loki. again - his past changed; he managed to escape, with the tessarect. this is not explained nor expanded upon. assuming the events of thor 2 came about - which were impossible if he escaped - then his timeline would carry on as normal, and would PERHAPS explain the tessarects wacky timeline. (i dont know for certain, because i cant work it out anyway). but loki disspearing means he wouldnt have gone to trial on asgard, nor would he wouldnt have been in thor 2 - also by extention meaning that frigga is still alive. technically if he went back to get odin off the throne anyway, everything else after thor 2 involving loki/asgard would still come to pass. either way, we dont know. it was a nice way for endgame to give fans what we wanted; the posibility of loki coming back. but it doesnt make a lick of sense, and we have no idea if hes still alive/escaped or not, and why. personally i have no fucking idea and im pretty sure it was a cop out so they could give us what we wanted. which brings to my other point:

• giving the audience what we wanted. we got loki interaction. we got loki ‘escaping’ and ‘surviving’ (????) we FINALLY got rescue, who many fans have been asking for since i think iron man 2, and even more so since The Badass That Was Pepper Potts in im3. we got morgan stark and tony and pepper married, we got jokes about steves ass, and more jokes about male characters admiring how hot other male characters are. and, most importantly, we got tony having the nice relaxing life he wanted out in his cabin in the woods with his wife and kids (even if it was a horrific way of getting there). i dont quite know how to explain it, but to me it seemed like they were shoving as many ‘fan-requests’ into the film as possible - so that when they killed off 2 of the original 6, and removed another by ageing him out of use, they could lessen the backlash and justify the changes by going ‘but you got so mych that you wanted beforehand!!’. a tactic they drenhed us with because one of those 2 was a fan favourite that people were BEGGING not to be killed off because they felt that he hadnt recieved anywhere near the peace or happiness he deserved so far - and now never will. which brings me to:

• tony’s death.

there are two parts to this.

one, i was incredibly pissed off because strange’s Big Plan, the ONLY reason he saved tony in infinity war, was so tony could use the gauntlet and kill himself anyway later. anyone in that film could have used that gauntlet - and many wouldnt have suffered fatal injuries; captain marvel, steve, t’challa, peter quill to name a few possibilities - basically, anyone who is in anyway enhanced would have had a better chance of surviving and would have therefore been the better choice; aka, half the mcu. i think it was a proximity thing; tony was closest. he had the oppertunity and the others didnt. but tony didnt know about the option of using it until strange looked at him and gave him ‘the signal.’ the signal to sacrifice himself. and of course, this is tony stark. when is he ever going to refuse that.

but reason two, and this is the one that stings the most; tony started the mcu.

in my opinion, he is the character who has put the most in during the whole ten years. he, of ALL the characters, deserves his happy ending of marrying the love of his life and having a kid, without constantly fearing that hes foing to have them ripped away from him, that hes going to have to fight to the death to keep them safe.

one of my friends, when i complained about tony dying, said; “it was his time. plus, he had a legacy! with pepper and morgan, and the iron man name. how can you be upset?”

i can be upset because tony got the happiness he wanted after losing exactly 50% of what he held dearest. i can be upset because hawkeye got his family back, but tony only got five years with his wife and less with his kid, instead of getting the oppertunity to grow old with his wife and watch his kid go to collage like clint will. i can be upset because the character that has gone through the most trauma, both physically and mentally, who spent the last ten years trying to better the world and everything in it and protect it, who got the most shit for every decision he made and who ended EVERY SINGLE FILM with a broken limb or his face littered with bruises and cuts while every other film centric character ended the film usually scrape free, didnt get his happy fucking ending. sure, he has a legacy. but i dont give a shit, because that legacy - of iron man, of morgan and pepper and stark industries - would have been there whether tony was alive to see it flourish or not. but he wont be.

this goes beyond being a ‘tony stan’ or tony being my favourite character. out of every single character, from start to finish, anthony edward stark fucking deserved a happy ending and by god he deserved it the most. i will argue that until my end of days.

i watched tony stark on screen for ten years, and i watched him get progressively more scarred and fucked up. his parents. the ten rings. losing yinsen. obie. vanko and hammer. the palladium poisoning. new york; the nuke and the wormhole. the ptsd, the panic attacks. the iron legion and retirement attempt. killian and extremis and the end of that returement attempt. wanda’s vision. jarvis being destroyed. the accords and subsequent civil war. finding out about the winter soldier and his hand in his parents death. finding out that steve knew. siberia. struggling to balence iron man and the accords. losing peter. being stranded on titan, in space for weeks.

tony in that wheelchair, shaking and rail thin and unable to stand for more than a few moments will haunt me forever.

i watched him suffer for ten years - longer, even, in-universe - clawing for his quiet, happy ending while fighting for the happy ending he thought the rest of the world deserved, and instead of getting rewarded he just got beaten down and beaten down. after ten fucking hears of watching the backbone of the entire franchise get nothing but shit piled on him until he struggled to breathe for it, excuse me for thinking he woukd finally get the chance to crawl out from under it and be happy. no strungs attatched, no awful, sacrificial price to be payed, just for a man who had given so. fucking. much. to finally get something for once, and be allowed to keep it.

well i was wrong. and i feel so incredibly fucking stupid for even hoping otherwise.

and thats what i didnt like about avengers endgame.

[81scorp]

My top 9 movies of 2019

Originally posted on Deviantart Jan 26, 2020)

Hey kids! Its that time again, when I talk about the movies I`ve seen in the cinema and rank them according to my own personal taste and bias. Why 9? Because I`m not a professional filmcritic who has time to see most of the movies that came out this year and sometimes other duties got in the way. So I only had time to see 9 movies in the cinema. And yes, two of these movies came out 2018, but they didn`t come to cinemas in my country until 2019, so they still belong on this list. M`kay? M`kay.

9: Destroyer (2018) Erin Bell (Nicole Kidman), a former undercover police officer arrives on the scene of a John Doe murder and informs them that she knows the identity of the murderer. The victim is a man from her past.Raw. That`s the simplest way to describe this movie. This is a crime movie, a type of movie genre that has a very broad appeal but it is also very unstylized, it`s the kind of movie that Michael Bay wouldn`t do.I have to admit that the biggest reason I saw this movie was because I wanted to see a film festival movie (I usually don`t go to film festivals.) and because it was highly praised by critics. Probably mostly because Nicole Kidman plays a character very different from the kind of characters she usually plays. She`s not even wearing glamorous make up, that`s when you know that an actress means serious business! Jokes aside, Kidman delivers a good performance. It also had a little twist at the end that took me by surprize. It`s a kind of movie that is easy to praise but hard to recommend. In some places it may be a little to raw for it`s own good, like a scene where Erin does something R rated on a bedridden former criminal in exchange for information. Still a good movie and I`m glad I saw it.

8: Alita: Battle Angel Dyson Ido, a White man with a japanese surname finds a female cyborg warrior in a junkyard with amnesia. Hijinks ensue. I feel bad putting it this low on the list, I wish I could have placed it higher but I also wish that it could have been better. Too many ideas squeezed into a movie not long enough to give these ideas enough room to stretch their legs and develop properly. It feels very sequel begging, is burdened by it`s high ambitions and Christoph Waltz`s character is stuck with a lot of expositional dialogue. On the other hand, Rosa Salazar delivers a good performance and the CGI on Alita is impressive. It takes a risk and commits to what it does and that is admirable. Who knew that you could make a good live-action manga adaptation by not pissing all over the source material? Even if it has some irritating flaws that a competent screenwriter could`ve avoided, I would like to see this get a sequel.Let`s hope that this is not a swansong.

7: Captain Marvel A digitally de-aged Samuel L. Jackson finds a female warrior from space with amnesia. Hijinks ensue. Standard MCU movie quality. It`s not better or worse than the average kind of MCU movie that we`re used to. This one was almost a tie with Alita, it gets a better spot because it has a better structure. It knows how and when to setup future sequels without intruding on the main story. 6: Ralph breaks the internet (2018) Unnecessary and necessary at the same time.Unnecessary in that the first one was such a self contained movie that said all that it could say and there really wasn`t much (if any) material left for a sequel. It felt like a believeable development for Ralph that he, after not having had a real friend for years, would be so possesive of Vanellope. But it feels like he got hit in the head with the dumb-dumb stick for the sake of the plot. His neediness could have started small and subtle in the beginning and then grow bigger and more noticeable as the story progressed. (There`s one scene in the first act that bugs me where Vanellope`s sad and Ralph could have been more empathic.) Necessary in that it has a good message about how friendship doesn`t have to end just because you live further away from each other. The princess scene was still funny even after Disney had shown almost all of it in the trailers. Personally I like this movie. I have a weak spot for movies that gives me the feels and this movie gave that to me in a scene where I felt it was earned. It`s good but not as good as it`s predecessor.

5: Shazam! Funny and silly in the right places and serious when it needs to be. An inellectual property, known for being silly, combined with the style of a director known for making horror movies creates an interesting result. This is how I wish the Superman movies from the 1980`s could have been. It has jokes in it like they did, but it also has heart. Heck, part of me wishes that Man of Steel could have been more like this. Casting Zachary Levi in the title role was a smart move, he knows how to balance comedy and heart. Glad it made money but it could probably have made more if Avengers: Endgame hadn`t come out so soon after it. 4: Missing link Sir Lionel Frost, a struggling investigator of mythical creatures comes in contact with a lone sasquatch who wants to find more of his own kind. Like Alita: Battle Angel I wish that this could have done better at the box office but unlike Alita I don`t wish that this movie was better, because it is already really good.(Maybe not quite as good as Coraline or Kubo and the two strings, but still.) And thats the tragedy of this movie, great quality but seen by very few people. Maybe someone should have started the Missing link challenge.At least it won a Golden globe for best animated feature. That`s always something. 3: Avengers: Endgame Avengers 4, or as I like to call it: Avengers 3 part 2. The impressive juggling act continues, now with time travel! Why not? they`ve had viking gods, shrinking superheroes and talking racoons in space, it was only a matter of time before they got to time travels.This time the impressive juggling act is much less about the number of characters and more about how the movie uses the time travelling to affect the characters and their inner journeys while also escalating the conflict in a way that feels natural. All leading to a satisifying, climactic third act battle. You did good Marvel, you did good.You can rest now Tony. 2: Frozen 2 The first Frozen felt (not unlike Wreck-it Ralph) like a self contained story that didn`t need a sequel. But unlike Ralph breaks the internet I was more welcoming to the idea of a sequel to Frozen. Why? Because when Frozen was made it had a very hectic production and there are traces of that in the finished movie. I felt that it could have been better. Now, the message is great but it`s narrative flow suffered. This time they had more time to make their movie. Personally I like it... a little bit more than the first one. Wouldn`t call it better than the first one but I wouldn`t call it worse either. On one hand it adds more material to a finished, self contained story, like in Ralph breaks the internet. On the other hand it does one thing better than the first Frozen: it saves it`s best part for second last instead of peaking in the first act, and "The next right thing" is a much better eleven o`clock number than "Fixer upper". Like it`s predecessor it`s stronger in the music department than in the story department. And like I`ve mentioned earlier, feels are my Kryptonite and this movie gave me the feels in a scene where it felt earned. And now, drumroll please, my number one pick for 2019 iiis... 1: The Lego movie 2: The second part Unapologetically silly in the best way possible. It really takes advantage of being a movie about toys that you can take apart and rebuild. Yes, it didn´t have that wow factor that the first one had with that twist at the end, but personally I didn`t expect it to be more twistier than the first one or even have a twist at all. At least not a big one.So, why is it so high on this list? 1: Because feels. 2: Because in the sea of jokes, silliness and a song that`s really gonna get stuck inside your head there was one character who added a little extra depth to a film based on a toy. Rex Dangervest, the "Cool guy" who shows up in the story is like a dark reflection of Emmet. He is the image that small boys and insecure, adolescent guys have in their heads of what type of person they should aspire to be. Rex says something about toxic masculinity and superficial maturity. Better than the first one? Debatable. As good as the first one? Maybe but certainly not worse. You can still feel the passion in the finished movie.

Maybe not as impressive as Moana or Coco, finding a clear winner this year was a little trickier than previous years, then again, since I only saw 9 movies this year I most likely missed out on a few gems. Maybe the winner in next years list will be easier to pick. And that`s my list, feel free to disagree.

[weekendwarriorblog]

WHAT TO WATCH THIS WEEKEND June 14, 2019  - MEN IN BLACK INTERNATIONAL, SHAFT, LATE NIGHT, THE DEAD DON’T DIE

I apologize for taking last week off, but I really needed a break, especially considering how late I was running on writing anything for the column. I also worry that the fact I write so much about the wide releases over at The Beat -- hitting the ‘net in about an hour -- means I don’t have so much to write here, and I don’t want to disappoint those who click on the link.

Hopefully, some of you are using this column to check up on limited releases and repertory screenings. Feel free to drop me a line or hit me up on Twitter if that’s the case, as I hate working in a vacuum.

Sadly, I don’t think there’s been much buzz for MEN IN BLACK INTERNATIONAL (Sony), the attempt to revive and reboot a franchise without the original movie’s two stars. This has rarely worked in the past, and Will Smith is so well-liked, as seen by the success of the recent Aladdin. Directed by F. Gary Gray (The Fate of the Furious), the new MiB are played by Chris Hemsworth and Tessa Thompson, both popular thanks to Thor: Ragnarok and the recent Aven gers: Endgame but not quite up to Smith when it comes to being a box office draw. I’m happy to see Emma Thompson back, although I’m sure she’ll be better used in this week’s expanding release Late Night, while Liam Neeson can be fun when given the right part.

Mini-Review: It’s officially the summer, so studios are starting to hope that film critics will go easier on their movies meant to be entertaining summer “popcorn fare.” That was certainly true of the original Men in Black, which combined a simple premise of an alien-fighting government agency with the charm of Will Smith.

Men in Black International has the same premise, but this time, instead of Smith, it has Tessa Thompson as Molly, a young girl who discovered the presence of the Men in Black. Twenty years later, she wants to become one herself. If you’ve seen the trailers and commercials, you already know that she’s accepted into the group and paired with Chris Hemsworth’s British Agent H.

There’s no point getting further into the plot, because it really doesn’t matter. It’s the exact same rookie MiB agent trying to keep up with the more experience agent who is having none of their youthful shit, as they encounter weird and often deadly CG aliens.

There’s a good reason Tessa Thompson has been cast in this movie, and that’s because she has a likeable personality in everything she does, and presumably, that’s enough to carry an MIB movie.  Similarly, I like Chris Hemsworth as an actor, but right now, he’s in danger of turning into Johnny Depp, basically famous and popular for one character then trying to imbue every character after that with what he thinks works with his audience. In Hemsworth’s case, Agent H is another arrogant and dumb dope always getting things wrong and being corrected by someone else, in this case Thompson’s Agent M. Those looking forward to seeing this movie for Emma Thompson or Liam Neeson may be disappointed by how little they actually appear in the film.

I certainly don’t entirely fault director F. Gary Gray for the movie’s problems, as he clearly was working with what he was given and doing the best he can. The CG and action are well done and so well-blended there’s no problems there, although the only alien that doesn’t seem like a rehash to previous MiB movies is the one voiced by Kumail Nanjiani, who gets in a few fun jabs at Hemsworth.

The best part of the movie probably comes in the third act when Rebecca Ferguson turns up as an alien arms dealer (with extra arms, of course) and somehow, the combination of her with the other three actors delivers some of the movie’s strongest moments… and then it goes back to the tired plot that didn’t really seem to be going anywhere

I’m sure plenty of people will enjoy Men in Black International just fine, but one really has to go into the movie with lowered expectations to think it’s any sort of improvement even over the worst of the previous movies (MiB 3).

For the most part, Tessa Thompson shines in an otherwise uninspired and mostly unfunny reboot that really doesn’t give much hope for the future of this franchise.

Rating: 6/10

I have to admit that I also wasn’t a very big fan of Tim Story’s SHAFT (New Line), which reunites Samuel L. Jackson and Richard Roundtree 19 years after the previous Shaft movie, which I also never really liked. Joining them this time is Independence Day: Resurgence star Jessie T. Usher, who also will be appearing on the upcoming The Boys series on Amazon. You probably won’t know it from the amount of coverage you’ll be seeing from me this week, but hey, work is work, and who am I to pass up a chance to interview Jackson and Roundtree, not once but twice? No idea when that coverage is running but I’ll post links here when it does.

Adding a bunch of my features on the movie:

AM NEW YORK FEATURE

COLLIDER INTERVIEW WITH JACKSON, ROUNDTREE AND USHER

COLLIDER INTERVIEW WITH DIRECTOR TIM STORY

I’m always excited for a new Jim Jarmusch movie, even though I’ve been mixed on some of his more recent films, including Only Lovers Left Alive, his vampire movie starring Tilda Swinton and Tom Hiddleston that I seemed to be one of the few people who wasn’t that into it. With THE DEAD DON’T DIE (Focus Features), Jarmusch explores the world of zombies, and I think the tone and mood of this one are more in line with Jarmusch’s earlier work but also with Romero’s zombie movies, although there isn’t as much zombie gore as some might hope.

My Review of The Dead Don’t Die from The Beat

Also expanding nationwide this weekend (presumably) is Amazon Studios’ LATE NIGHT, the Mindy Kaling-penned comedy co-starring Emma Thompson. I was mostly bummed about not doing this column last week because it meant delaying my review, but I do hope that people will go out see this very funny movie based on Kaling’s own experiences in late night. I think it’s one of Thompson’s best performances in a long time, although I did think she was great in last year’s The Children Act, a movie that was sadly overlooked by most film critics/writers.

Mini-Review: Anyone who has ever underestimated Mindy Kaling from her TV work on The Office and The Mindy Show will never do so again after seeing Late Night. I’m saddened to say that I’m one of those who has learned that lesson the hard way.

The premise is simple with Kaling playing Molly Patel, a young woman with dreams of being a comedy writer, something that becomes more possible when she’s hired as a writer on the prestigious talk show “Late Night with Katherine Newbury.” What Molly doesn’t know is that she’s a bit of a “diversity hire” once Katherine (Emma Thompson) realizes her writing room is all white males. Molly has troubles fitting in at first but her bright personality proves to be what Katherine needs to start examining her own life, as the network tries to take her show away from her.

Directed by Nisha Ganatra, an indie filmmaker whose work I have sadly overlooked until now, Late Night is a great example of the quality of work that can be created when an actor is allowed to make her passion project.  It’s immediately obvious what Kaling has brought to her television shows as a writer, performer and producer as Late Night.

Kaling and Ganatra’s impeccable storytelling includes many characters around Molly and Katherine that add to their story without taking the attention away from them.Thompson has always been a fine actor but in Katherine Newbury, she’s been given a present that will bring her back to the forefront come awards time. Thompson creates a character that can be funny in the same was as Meryl Streep in The Devil Wears Prada but also quite sympathetic, and that’s a hard balance to create.

Overall, Late Night is just a joyous breakout film for Kaling.  If you can imagine a cross between Tina Fey’s “30 Rock” and Kumail Nanjiani’s The Big Sick, then you may have a better idea whether Late Night will be your thing. Rating: 8.5/10

Interview with Director Nisha Ganatra

You can see how I think the above movies will fare over at The Beat.

LIMITED RELEASES

Although the big news this weekend is Late Night (presumed) expanding nationwide, as well as the wider-than-usual release for Jim Jarmusch’s latest, there are still a number of movies opening in select cities I want to draw attention to.

One of my favorite films from this year’s Tribeca Film Festival was Jeff Chan and Andrew Rhymer’s PLUS ONE (RLJE Films), which stars Jack Quaid (from The Hunger Games and the upcoming The Boys series) and Maya Erskine from Pen15as long-time best friends Ben and Alice who decide to accompany each other to an upcoming round of weddings, acting as wingmen to help the other one pick up men and women. As you can imagine, it only works out to a point.

I’m not embarrassed to say that romantic-comedies are a bit of a guilty pleasure with me, and Plus One is a really good one, since it’s both funny and romantic, which isn’t something we often get from studio fare in this vein. I absolutely love Maya Erskine, though I haven’t had a chance to check out her Hulu series just yet; there are few actors who are so talented at being hilariously funny but also delivering on the drama when necessary. I feel like Quaid is trying to keep up with her. If you’re the type of person who gets dragged to weddings every other weekend, this movie is definitely for you.  Plus One will be in theaters and On Demand this Friday, and I definitely recommend seeking it out, especially for a fun date night movie.

Another really good drama coming out this weekend is Sienna Miller’s AMERICAN WOMAN (Roadside Attractions/Vertical), which stars Ms. Miller as Debra, a 30-something woman whose teen daughter goes missing, leaving her to care for her grandson. She’s able to deal with the loss with the help of her sister (Christina Hendricks) and mother (Amy Madigan), but also ends up with a series of bad men until she meets Aaron Paul. Directed by Jake Scott, Ridley Scott’s son, who made the drama Welcome to the Rileys back in 2010, this movie lives or dies on the performance by Miller, and she is pretty fantastic in a role that covers 11 years in this woman’s life. This is definitely a smaller slice-of-life movie that covers the things her character goes through in order to find her best self, but I generally liked the entire cast, which is quite diverse, including Will Sasso (from Mad TV) and the underrated Pat Healy as one of the most abusive men with whom Debra ends up.

Opening at the Metrograph Friday and in L.A. on June 28 is Sophie Huber’s documentary Blue Note Records: Beyond the Notes, a terrific look at the classic jazz label that’s still going strong thanks to current President Don Was (yes, he of “Walk the Dinosaur” fame) but is also branching out into other jazz-influenced genres. I really dug how Huber told this story, featuring new interviews that’s framed by a recording being done by the current incarnation of the Blue Note All-Stars. If you like jazz or  even have a passing interest, it’s good to know the history of the genre and Blue Note’s part in it.

A movie I’ve been wanting to see but just haven’t had the chance to is FRAMING JOHN DELOREAN  (Sundance Selects), directed by Don Argott (The Art of the Steal) and Sheena M. Joyce and starring Alec Baldwin as the visionary who made his way up through the auto industry only to be disgraced when charged with drug trafficking. Also starring Morena Baccarin, Josh Charles and more, it opens in select cities on Friday.

Miranda Bailey’s BEING FRANK  (The Film Arcade) features comedian Jim Gaffigan as the title character. Set in 1992, it stars Logan Miller as teenager Phillip, who wants to leave his small town to go to music school in New York, something his father (Gaffigan’s Frank) forbids. Philip decides to go on a wild spring break but he then discovers that his father has another whole family in another town.

Jay Stern’s SAY MY NAME  (Electric Entertainment) opens in select cities and on VOD Friday. It stars Lisa Brenner and Nick Blood as two strangers who have a one-night stand that’s interrupted by a robbery, sending them across Wales to try to retrieve their stolen property.

Thomas Stuber’s German drama IN THE AISLES  (Music Box Films) stars Franz Rogowski (Transit) as a guy who just started working at a big box store where he becomes obsessed with a co-worker (Sandra Hüller from Toni Erdmann) but when he starts delving into the secrets she’s keeping, he begins returning to his own dark habits. It opens at the Village Eastin New York on Friday.

Less than a month after her last film Poms bombed, Diane Keaton is back in Joel Hopkins’ HAMPSTEAD  (IFC Films) starring opposite Brendan Gleeson as Emily, a widow in an expensive apartment in the title London neighborhood that she can’t afford. Gleeson plays Donald, a gruff loner living in a cabin who just wants to be left in peace, but when his home is threatened, Emily has found her new cause. Based on a true story, it also stars Lesley Manville, and it will play at the IC Center this Friday.

Kat Rohrer and Gil Levanon’s award-winning doc Back to the Fatherland  (First Run Features) will open in New York (Cinema Village) and L.A. (Laemmle Music Hall). It deals with the friendship between the two filmmakers despite their different backgrounds – Kat is the granddaughter of a Nazi officer while Gil is that of a Holocaust survivor – and they seek out other grandchildren of Holocaust survivors who have moved back to Germany and Austria.

Opening on Wednesday at the Film Forum is Muayad Alayan’s psychological thriller The Reports of Sarah and Saleem (Dada Films) about the clandestine affair between an Israeli café owner from West Berlin and her Palestinian bread vendor from the East, made more complicated when their spouses find out. So it’s sort of a retelling of Romeo and Juliet set in Israel? It actually sounds intriguing.

I’m bummed that I didn’t get a chance to see divisive Mexican filmmaker Carlos Reygadas’ latest, Our Time  (Monument Releasing), but at three hours, it was just hard to find time to watch it. This one is about a Mexican family living in the countryside raising fighting bulls who is torn apart by the woman of the house falling in love with another man. No, I have no idea why this story had to be three hours long, but it will open at the Quad Cinema in New York Friday.

Lastly, there’s David Hackl’s Daughter of the Wolf  (Vertigo), starring MMA star Gina Carano as a military specialist who comes back from the Middle East to claim her inheritance only to find her son has been kidnapped.  Also starring living legend Richard Dreyfuss, it opens in a bunch of theaters, but this is more of a VOD special.

STREAMING AND CABLE

Premiering on Netflix (and in select theaters) Wednesday is Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story by Martin Scorsese, an amazing film resuscitated from 1975 as Scorsese goes on the road with Dylan during his 1975 fall tour. (Besides streaming on the network, it can also be seen in select theaters like New York’s IFC Center and Film at Lincoln Center.)

Also, Adam Sandler is back with his latest comedy MURDER MYSTERY, reuniting him with Jennifer Aniston as a couple who go on a trip to Europe where they’re invited for a party on a yacht by a billionaire (Terence Stamp) who ends up being murdered with them being the prime suspects. So Sandler, a New York detective, needs to work with a local crimefighter, played by Luke Evans.

Also, the doc Life Overtakes Me which looks at the Resignation Syndrome being suffered by refugee children in Sweden as they end up in a coma-like state for months and years with their parents having few options to help them.

LOCAL FESTIVALS

A few decent festivals are starting this weekend, a couple in New York and on in Chcago, but the one that definitely shouldn’t be missed is the annual BamCinemaFest, which kicks off tonight with Lulu Wang’s amazing Sundance favorite The Farewell, starring Awkwafina. Unfortunately I didn’t get to nearly as many of the screenings as I hoped, but I’m sure you can find one or two gems in the line-up this year.

The annual Human Rights Watch Film Festival will kick off at Film at Lincoln Center this week with a wide variety of documentaries, dramas and foreign films. I haven’t seen any of the movies but really, with this festival, you can rarely go wrong in terms of learning what’s going in the rest of the world.

Kicking off in Chicago this week is the Cinepocalypse Genre Film Festival, which features a wide variety of genre films both old and new. It kicks off on Thursday with the World Premiere of Glenn Danzig’s Verotika and in a similar vein, there will be events like Gwar vs. Rock ‘n’ Roll Nightmare and Gwar vs. Cinepocalypse plus there’s lots of vintage genre including Tammy and the T-Rex from 1994 and Joel Schumacher’s Flatliners (1990) in 70mm! Some of the big horror films from other festivals like Villains, The Lodge and Satanic Panic will also get their Midwest Premieres. It’s a fairly robust schedule that runs from June 13 through the 20.

REPERTORY

METROGRAPH (NYC):

The Jim Jarmusch retrospective continues through the weekend with Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (1999) with Jarmusch in person Thursday night, and 1991’s Night on Earth as well as a couple reshows. Late Nites at Metrograph will be screening the action-comedy The God of Cookery (1996) starring the amazing Stephen Chow, while Playtime: Family Matinees will screen Jimmy Stewart’s 1962 film Mr. Hobbs Takes a Vacation.  Sine Sunday is Father’s Day, the Metrograph is screening a couple father-friendly baseball comedies like the 1962 movie Safe at Home!, starring Mickey Mantle, as well as John Badham’s 1976 comedy Bingo Long Travelling All Stars and Moto Kings, starring Billy Dee Williams, James Earl Jones and Richard Pryor.

THE NEW BEVERLY (L.A.):

The Wednesday matinee is Alfred Hitchcock’s Marnie (1964), starring Tippi Hedren and Sean Connery, then the Weds-Thursday double feature is Dean Martin’s The Wrecking Crew co-starring Bruce Lee with Hammerhead, both from 1968. Friday and Saturday will be screenings of Stanley Kubrick’s classic 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), then Sunday and Monday is Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time In the West (1968). (Not sure if you noticed a trend there but all four movies are from the same year!) The weekend’s KIDEE MATINE is the Japanese sci-fi film The Green Slime … from 1968! Friday’s midnight movie is Tarantino’s own Inglourious Bastereds while Saturday is Journey to the Far Side of the Sun (1969 – changing things up a little).  Monday’s matinee is The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford  (2007) from Andrew Dominik, and then Tuesday’s Grindhouse double feature is Model Shopand They Came to Rob Las Vegas.

FILM FORUM (NYC):

Opening Friday is a new restoration of Jennie Livingston’s Paris is Burning  (1991) which looks at New York in the ‘80s from the perspective of the African-American and Latinx drag scene. The movie ran for six months back in 1991 when it first played at the Film Forum. This weekend’s Film Forum Jr. is Spike Lee’s Crooklyn from 1994. The Jewish Soul series continues this weekend with Maurice Schwartz’s 1939 film Tevya, while Alain Resnais’ Last Year at Marienbad will continue playing for another week, as well. Also, if you haven’t had a chance to see Gillo Pontecorvo’s The Battle of Algiers, it will play as part of The Hour of Liberation series which also ends on Thursday.

EGYPTIAN THEATRE (LA):

Cassavetes & Scorsese: Love is Strange, the series that just won’t end, continues on Friday with Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymoreand A Woman Under the Influence, both from 1974 and a pretty good double feature actually.  On Saturday from noon until midnight, there’s a Camp Void 6-Film Marathon, co-presented by Cinematic Void, which includes a number of classic genre films, as well as a couple comedies from the ‘70s and ‘80s.Kubrick’s long-time assistant Leon Vitali will be back to present a screening of The Shining (1980) for Father’s Day. Although it’s already sold out, the Egyptian will have a special John Woo double feature of Hard Boiled  (1992) and Face/Off (1997) with John Woo in person!

AERO  (LA):

As with New York’s Quad, the AERO is sharing the Pauline Kael centennial love with The Pearls of Pauline: Kael at 100 with Children of Paradise (1945) on Thursday, a double feature of Bonnie and Clyde (1967) and Thieves Like Us (1974) on Friday, and then Diner (1982) and Melvin and Howard (1980) on Saturday. For Father’s Day Sunday, there’s a special Indiana Jones TRIPLE feature of the first three movies, all in 35mm with the third film Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade celebrating its 30thAnniversary.

QUAD CINEMA (NYC):

Because I had to skip last week’s column, I wan’t able to write about the Quad’s amazing new series Losing It at the Movies: Pauline Kael at 100, which pays respect to the film critic who would have turned 100 next week. The movies being shown this weekend include Brian De Palma’s The Fury (one of my personal faves from 1978), Clint Eastwood’s The Gauntlet  (1977), the horror classic Re-Animator (1985), Woody Allen’s Hannah and Her Sisters (1986) and more.

IFC CENTER (NYC)

Waverly Midnights: Parental Guidance  goes with David Lynch’s Eraserhead  (1977), Weekend Classics: LoveMom and Dad will screen Vittoio De Sica’s Bicycle Thieves  (1948), while Late Night Favorites: Springgoes with Ridley Scott’s Alien(again), Suspiria (again), The Holy Mountain (again).. and Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction.  Seems like Bicycle Thieves is the best bet in terms of stuff that isn’t shown a lot.

FILM OF LINCOLN CENTER (NYC):

Besides the Human Rights Watch Film Festival, the Upper West Side theaters are beginning an extensive Ermanno Olmi Retrospectivethat includes films from the Italian director ranging from 1958’s Time Stood Still and 1961’s Il Posto through 2014’s Greenery Will Bloom Again. I honestly don’t know if I’ve seen any of his movies but it’s an amazing series with two screenings of each movie.

MUSEUM OF THE MOVING IMAGE (NYC):

On Saturday, MOMI will screen Burt Reynolds’ Hooper  (1978), directed by Hal Needham, in 35mm, as well as Sidney Lumet’s musical movie The Wiz (1978) starring Diana Ross and Michael Jackson as part of a StarringDiana Ross series. That series also includes Lady Sings the Blues (1973) and Mahogany (1975), both screening Saturday.

MOMA (NYC):

The extensive Jean-Claude Carrière will finally conclude on Sunday, and as before, I have nothing to add about it.

ROXY CINEMA (NYC)

Richard Donner’s The Goonies (1985) will be shown on 35mm on Friday and Saturday

LANDMARK THEATRES NUART  (LA):

This Friday’s midnight screening is the 1987 film Hard Ticket to Hawaii.

Next week, Disney is back to dominate with Toy Story 4 as Woody and Buzz Lightyear shouldn’t have too many worries facing the return of Chucky in Orion Pictures’ Child’s Play.

[ciathyzareposts]

The Kingdom of Syree: Won! (with Summary and Rating)

The king of Questron made me a baron. The King of Syree knighted me. Remind me what Lord British did for me again?

           The Kingdom of Syree

United States

Everlasting Software (developer and publisher)

Released in 1992 for DOS

Date Started: 20 May 2019

Date Finished: 6 June 2019

Total Hours: 20 Difficulty: Moderate (3/5) Final Rating: (to come later) Ranking at time of posting: (to come later)

Summary

An Ultima clone right down to the keyboard commands, The Kingdom of Syree nonetheless tells a somewhat original story about a hidden wizard seeking to overthrow a kingdom that has achieved peace for the first time in millennia. In true Ultima style, the player slowly gathers clues from NPCs in castles and towns, collects artifacts, and develops his magic ability. While the game uses Ultima IV-style keyword interaction for NPCs, it unfortunately uses very basic Ultima II-style combat, and its few spells are far more useful for puzzle-solving than for defeating monsters. Although the game doesn’t last too long, its indoor areas are a bit too large, making it difficult to track down every crucial NPC.     

***

       The Kingdom of Syree isn’t going to be “Game of the Year” for 1992, or even my favorite Ultima clone, but it managed to pull off a few original ideas and surprises before the end, and I concluded feeling relatively satisfied.

The six major steps of the game turn out to be:

          Amassing enough gold to afford equipment and transportation

Amassing enough gold to increase attributes in the dungeon Kehol, then trading some of those attributes for wisdom to gain magic points

Finding clues as to the game’s various spells, some of which are necessary to navigate

Finding the Sword of Emara, the only weapon that can kill the evil wizard

Delving all the dungeons to learn the “Dispel” spell

Finding, revealing, and killing the evil wizard

         I had accomplished the first three goals during the first two sessions. It wasn’t much longer before I checked off the third goal, although it was a bit odd. The corpse of King Emara in his sarcophagus had told me to ask about the SABER in the city of Coel, but doing that revealed nothing at all. Instead, I found the sword with clues from other cities.

In River Bend, someone told me that “Shepard” said that the Saber was in the Valley of Haunts. I tracked down Shepard in Doe Shameh, and he said that to enter the Valley of Haunts, I would have to go to coordinates 19,42 (just north of Lost) and cast the YASHAB spell, then go as far north as I could, then “die an unnatural death.” I already knew how to do that with the MAVETH spell.          

The character kills himself.

          YASHAB ended up taking me into a few squares in the middle of a mountain range. I did what Shepard said, went north, and cast MAVETH. The game said that I died, but then I woke up in a completely dark dungeon. Fortunately, in Garrett, the former court wizard (now being tortured for not giving the same information to King Dakar) told me that once I was in the “spirit world,” I should go 20 west, 8 south, 3 west, and 5 north, then search for Emara. I followed those instructions and got the sword.           

Finding the Sword of Emara in the dark.

            Unfortunately, at this point I was stuck. Leaving the dungeon with the SEQUITU spell just put me in the same mountain squares with no way to get out. It was only by making another circuit through the towns that I found a new NPC in Lost who told me that ANASTASIS was a spell of resurrection. Casting that while in the Valley of Haunts put my character back on the mainland, outside Lost, with the sword in hand.

The rest of the stages took me a while because I misinterpreted the clues to mean that the “Truth” spell (ALETHEIA) is what would break the evil wizard’s facade. In the end, I never found any use whatsoever for ALETHEIA. I suspect it works on one or two NPCs whose advice either I didn’t need or got by simply cycling through all the letters of the alphabet.

“Dispel” turns out to be EMETH, which you piece together by mapping the bottom levels of each dungeon. The last level of each of the five dungeons always turns out to be curiously open, and when I mapped the first one–Mysti–I realized it looked like a letter “E.” From there, it was easy enough to pick up the others. I didn’t know the order to arrange the letters, but there are only so many combinations. (Technically, there are 120, but I could eliminate those beginning with TM, MT, HT, and so forth.) Fortunately, when you cast a spell that doesn’t exist, the game says “no effect”; whereas when you cast a real spell in the wrong location, it says “failed!” So I just had to try combinations of the letters (THEME, HETEM, etc.) until I got the right message.           

The three levels of the dungeon Mysti, including the “E” at the bottom.

            I already had a sense that King Dakar of Garrett was probably the evil wizard, since he had a torture room where people were boiling in pools of fire. Also, Grover the Terrified in Yew claimed that Dakar was not what he appeared. I headed to Castle Garrett and cast the spell in front of the king.

It turns out that EMETH not only dispelled Dakar’s illusion but the entire castle’s, which was a hellscape of fire, guarded by balrons and dragons. I died the first time when monsters killed me before I found the wizard.             

Just in case you weren’t sure where the wizard was.

         Things got much easier when I figured out that the wizard was in the far southern part of the city, and I was able to wait until I reached that area before casting EMETH. I doffed my armor to protect myself from his magical attacks (previous NPC clues had told me that skin is the only protection against “unnatural” magic). I killed him with a few blows of the Sword of Emara.            

Note that the wizard is said to be inhabiting “the corpse of King Dakar.”

      The endgame consisted of a brief ceremony in front of the King of Syree, who knighted me “Sir Chester.” Some final words set up the sequel.               

Note that the king has stolen the Sword of Emara from me. I just have a generic “greatsword.”

         One unsolved mystery has to do with the city of Phanteo Eifcon, which sits on an island in a lake. The “part water” spell (BADAL) doesn’t allow access to the island–it only seems to work at the Dungeon of Water. After I won the game, I reloaded and edited the save game file to put my character on top of the city. The game wouldn’t even acknowledge it was there. I’m not sure what was going on with that. Maybe the developer never programmed the city. Or maybe I was supposed to find a hidden way into it, and its NPCs would have made some of the game’s steps more obvious.               

BADAL causes this land bridge to appear to the Dungeon of Water, but it works nowhere else.

           A couple of other oddities have to do with blatantly incorrect information coming from NPCs. For instance, the ghost of King Emara told me to ask around the city of Coel about the SABER to get information as to the location of the Sword of Emara. That keyword got me nowhere, and I learned nothing about the sword in Coel. Another NPC said that the entrance to the Valley of Haunts was near Phanteo Eifcon, which it wasn’t. You’re thinking maybe these were lies that ALETHEIA was supposed to expose, but I tried the spell and it didn’t make the NPCs say anything different.

Aside from those elements, I liked how the plot came together, and how the wizard was literally disguised (although we’ve seen that plot twist in Might and Magic) rather than in an obvious evil castle. In a GIMLET, the game earns:             

3 points for the game world. The backstory has just enough detail for a game of this scope, and the map itself is nice. Unfortunately, the game doesn’t remember any of your own actions. I’m waiting for an Ultima clone where NPCs stop telling me where to find the Sword of Emara when I have it in my hands.

3 points for character creation and development. There isn’t much to it, but I liked the way experience adds directly and immediately to your maximum hit points. Using altars to develop attributes worked fine, too.

4 points for NPC interaction, a clear strength of the game. I’ll never get sick of keyword-based dialogue, although I like to see more role-playing opportunities within that dialogue.

2 points for encounters and foes. The monsters are nothing worth commenting on, but the game had some satisfying puzzles.

2 points for magic and combat–definitely a weakness. Combat couldn’t be more basic. While I liked the acquisition of spells via clues, and some of them were useful for navigation, I never cast a single combat-oriented spell.

                Specifying “attack” and a direction is about as tactical as this game gets for combat.

           2 points for equipment. You have only half a dozen weapon and armor types, some keys, and a sextant.

4 points for economy. It’s not very complex, but it remains relevant throughout the game. When you don’t need money for equipment anymore, the altars serve as a useful money sink.

2 points for a main quest with no side-quests or options.

3 points for graphics, sound, and interface. The icon-based graphics are fine. Most of this score goes to the interface; I’ll always approve of games where each command is mapped to a different key. 

5 points for gameplay. Syree has a surprising amount of nonlinearity; you can even rent a boat if you want to explore the world before you can afford to buy one. I found the difficulty and pacing just about right, too.

        That gives us a final score of 30, not epic, but higher than I expected when I started.

I spent some time (in vain) trying to track down the game’s author, Thomas Steven Himinez, whose life seems to define the word “eccentric.” He claimed in the game manual that the game was based on the “books by Lord Steven”–a fact amusingly parroted by multiple web sites, as if said books actually existed. To get in touch with the author and pay the shareware fee, users were asked to go through a BBS belonging to a doughnut shop in Los Angeles. “Lord Steven” did eventually publish a trilogy about a couple of tigers, which was turned into a play and an audio drama, and as I mentioned in the first entry, he got involved in the Doctor Who audio dramas. At some point, he changed his name to Thomas S. Lonely Wolf, began contributing to conspiracy and “prepping” web sites, and moved to a remote town in the Pacific Northwest, apparently anticipating imminent nuclear war.

We’ll see Lord Steven’s work again in The Kingdom of Syree II: Black Magic (1994) and The Kingdom of Syree III: The Depths of Hell (1998). It doesn’t appear that the games ever stop being Ultima clones with iconographic interfaces and very basic, Ultima I-style combat. But the graphics and sound improve a bit, and by the third game he’s doing some interesting things with still images during cut scenes.             

From the character creation part of the third game.

         Speaking of sequels to Ultima clones, my random approach to title selection has scheduled Telnyr II next–perhaps a bit unwisely. We’ll see if my patience holds.

source http://reposts.ciathyza.com/the-kingdom-of-syree-won-with-summary-and-rating/