#SHE SAID IT'S VERY SUPERHEROEY

[kitxvoss]

Kit Voss & her superhero love of her life Randolph Bell at their home

[davidmann95]

So, here's the big question: How do you thibk various RWBY characters react to and interact with Superman? Not just the main teams, but anyone you think would be interesting: supporting cast, antagonists etc.

(Not Superman but the only remotely professional-looking DC/RWBY art I could find. Since, oddly, this is actually an official poster?)

That’s an interesting question, because much more than when I was previously asked what Superman meeting the Kingdom Hearts leads would look like, making that happen would require navigating that RWBY and the DC universe are built around entirely different storytelling engines. For the average superhero, they’re the masters of their domains so to speak - Batman watches over Gotham, Green Lantern oversees Sector 2814, and so forth. They protect their territory from threats within and without with consistent effectiveness, and as such their capabilities are scaled up appropriately so as to be able to plausibly face off successively greater threats. RWBY however past the setup of the first few seasons is a quest, and for that quest to be constantly filled with peril and be of any length, there’s a degree of necessary vulnerability. Hunters are absolutely super, but they have to fight to survive against essentially wild animals, and trekking across a world that’s already mapped-out and filled with assorted advanced civilizations still takes months. That’s what they’re built around: they have a journey to grow across the duration of, whereas superheroes by and large have established base personalities and concerns with the challenge of the story being to find new nuances to dig out of them. Have RWBY and JNPR graduate Beacon without incident and start functioning on basically superheroic terms as Hunters (i.e. they have a base of operations and a clearly-delineated ongoing task) you either start telling a totally different kind of story with them or they remain basically static; put a superhero on a quest and it’s typically gonna be a single story arc where you have to contrive some sort of special circumstance, as in the recent Superman: Up In The Sky where he’s solving a mystery with almost no leads spanning the entire universe, to justify why they aren’t doing at least the ‘journey’ part of this instantly.

(Kingdom Hearts is something of an exception since I brought that up: they’re on a quest, but it and therefore their capabilities are so mythically scaled-up and abstracted, and the heroes’ goals on any given world are superheroey enough, that them meshing with DC or Marvel wouldn’t have the same practical or narrative complications.)

Therefore, if Superman and RWBY met - and I realize this was just a character-interaction question, but the first character interaction past confused introductions would probably be ‘hey, can you help out?’ - on Remnant, the only way Superman doesn’t just take half a second to dash over to Salem and yeet her into orbit so she can take a metaphorical deep breath and rethink her decisions is if they mention the Brothers and he flies into space to sort them out first. And if RWBY ends up on Earth DC, I see there’s a sizable and popular fanfic titled Hunters of Justice exploring that very possibility, and at a glance I’m not surprised to see they apparently mostly hang out with the Bat-Family and the Teen Titans rather than Superman or the Justice League; besides their popularity, that’s much more the scale they tend to operate on as opposed to battling alien armies and mad gods. The latter obviously opens plenty of story possibilities in a way the former doesn’t, but either way they’re not going to be in a position to chat much with Superman beyond “Wow, you’re a superhero!” + “I like your cape!” + “Keep up the good work!/You too!”

Fortunately however, there’s a preexisting mode with Superman that not only largely circumvents these concerns, but opens up avenues all its own.

However you might contrive to put Superman on a t-shirt and jeans level again it not only puts him on a ‘power level’ comparable to the RWBY crew that means they could hang out and work together for a bit, it adds a complication that would deflate his aura of Superman-ness for awhile that might otherwise bar them interacting as equals: they would have every reason to think he’s just a crazy guy. Dude shows up in a weird shirt saying he’s an alien superhero from a parallel dimension and he needs their help to get home? Sure, he’s got some kind of strength Semblance that’s pronounced even by Yang and Nora’s standards, and that cape he carries with him is tough, but not even Ozpin’s fairy tales matched up against the yarns this man is trying to spin. Yet as they get to know him while trekking across Remnant, he sure seems to have the goods as a hero, and there are moments - the times he, as Wally West once said, smiles that one smile that reminds you he’s not really from here - where they really have to ask themselves if he’s the deluded fanboy who might get them all killed all logic screams he must be, or if as impossible as it may seem, he might just really be the miracle they need to give them a fighting chance.

As for the character interactions that would crop up, there are some obvious ones to be had with Ruby and farmboy Oscar, and he’d probably find Weiss, Ren, and Qrow each reminding him a bit of Bruce in their own ways. The main character I think he’d really hit it off though is actually Blake if he ever learned about her bow: that was essentially Clark Kenting, and there’d likely be a whole discussion to be had between them on the cultures they come from, their different relationships to them, passing, their commitments to justice, and being really into cocky adventurous women who don’t take any shit and have complicated relationships with their parents.

[eirianerisdar]

On Justice League

I’ve just come back from the movie, and here are the figures. (very slight spoilers)

10 upskirt shots. Two down-boob shots. A fair few completely unnecessary shots zooming or panning with Diana’s hips/butt/upper thighs in the extreme foreground. One Barry faceplanting into Diana’s boobs.

Uncountable Amazons dressed in bikini armour.

Yes, my twin and I double-checked each others’ counts. We only started counting because there were three extended upskirt shots of Diana within the first three minutes of her appearance.

Note: By upskirt shots, I have excluded those quick ones you might see in fight scenes. So a kick or a pan here or there were fairly discounted. Even Hippolyta had an arguable upskirt shot if you counted one moment when she was sliding under something - we didn’t count that one. I also counted a shot with Diana’s tight-trousered butt very uncomfortably taking up two-thirds of the shot.

Oh, and this quote:

“The banks jump like cougars if you miss a dime.”

You’ll never guess who said that sentence.

Clark’s MOTHER.

*applause*

Okay, all in all, it wasn’t a horrible film. A solid 2.5 stars out of 5, really. The problem both my twin and I had with it was that after seeing Wonder Woman, you really can’t help but notice the difference. What is there to be gained by stripping the Amazons of their warrior armour in favour of what the ironettes (Iron Man 2′s dancers) wear, or starting many shots where Diana entered a scene by placing the camera at hip level or lower? Is there a point to all this? Does it make a better movie?

No. No it doesn’t.

I’m not saying you shouldn’t watch the movie. It was fairly enjoyable in its own superheroey way. But given all of the above, it was just somewhat...saddening.

[davidmann95]

What are your thoughts on Infinity War and do you think the portrayal of Thanos is gonna make it harder for DC to do Darkseid in a future move due to comparisons?

Extended disconnected musings below the cut because world-shaking spoilers fucking obviously, but for the section of my audience that hasn’t seen it yet but is fine with simply seeing my immediate reaction and placement of it: it’s so very good, y’all. Hype as modern blockbuster filmmaking gets. Not a top-5 MCU flick (which is a credit to the MCU, not in any way a ding against this), but if you only count the Avengers movies that actually have “Avengers” in the title, this is definitely the best of that lot.

* I had been, while not concerned per say, very curious how the Captain America team would handle this - the writers might have been there from the beginning and done some pretty bombastic pulpy action in the first Cap movie, but the Russo Brothers had been entirely on the grounded side of the franchise, even doing the relatively grounded Avengers movie in Civil War - given this would be the most cosmic and superheroey of the bunch, and they acquitted themselves magnificently in every way imaginable. It’s big, it’s funny, it’s ballsy, it’s engaging, it’s fun, it’s weighty as hell, it’s emotional, it’s the gold standard of this sort of thing. I have no idea what they’ll do if they ever stop doing Avengers movies, because at this point the sky is the absolute limit for them.

* I know people have already inevitably been complaining about this being dependent on previous movies for continuity and character, to which I say

1. Fuck you, this is the sequel to a once-in-a-generation filmmaking blockbuster that completely changed the game, of course you’re going to know who the goddamn Avengers are, most especially if you’re going to see this movie. Don’t act like you’re that cool. You’re not that fuckin’ cool.

2. This may not have been a movie of character development, but it’s by no means a movie short on character. It’s very much in the vein of Grant Morrison’s JLA, in that it banks on familiarity and iconography not to change our understanding of these characters, but to do the most conspicuously *them* moments possible. Captain America might be a minor presence, but he’s Captain America as heck in this, and so forth.

3. This only banks on you having seen the first Avengers. Banner is our entrypoint character because he himself doesn’t know what’s going on so the Avengers breakup can be recapped in broad terms, the initial conflict you don’t really have to know about Ragnarok to understand (they could’ve been fleeing Thanos destroying Asgard for all a casual viewer would know), Spider-Man’s role is obvious even aside from him being a cultural icon, Panther is Cap’s secret ally the rest of the team barely knows about so and Wakanda are broadly understood, and the Guardians and Strange are reintroduced. Strange you immediately know all you need: Wong defers to him so he’s clearly a big deal, but he’s also still telling him things about magic - even if jokingly - so clearly Strange is not the most seasoned veteran and hasn’t been in this hidden mystic world forever. The Guardians are space bozos, and based on Star-Lord’s manchild nature and 80s nostalgia and lack of familiarity with the Avengers you can guess he hasn’t been to Earth in a long time even if he clearly hails from there.

* Thanos was…good? Though I would have yelled “BULLSHIT!” at my monitor when I saw Starlin declared Thanos in an interview to be exactly as he had always envisioned him had I seen this at the time, because this is very much from the Slade-in-Teen-Titans “scrap everything, and it’ll wind up better because there’s nowhere to go but up” school of villainous improvement. But seriously, while surely people will write eye-rolling thinkpieces on his nature and goals, he’s a proper vile bastard of the sort we haven’t quite gotten in these movies before that more than justifies his place after 6 years of buildup, with humanity to spare keeping him from being a caricature; it should avoid Darkseid comparisons quite deftly (and vice-versa), even if none of what made this work can translate back into the comics. And as much as the sidekick baddies might have been traditional uncanny-valley CG, this guy might be the most amazing effect I’ve ever seen in a blockbuster: I totally bought this was a real flesh-and-blood living being existing in recognizable 3-dimensional space whenever they zoomed in on his expressions. And more importantly, they acknowledged he has a nutsack for a chin.

* Speaking of effects, that’s how you do a fuckin’ magic fight!

* And speaking of villains: SKULL. What a payoff, and I sure hope he stays and fills the role Mephisto did in the original Infinity Gauntlet as Thanos’s right hand man, because I want to see him face down with Steve as Captain America one more time. In a very different movie/s, I could have seen him seizing the Gauntlet and promising Thanos he too will wipe out half the universe, but much less indiscriminately, with the great tyrant dying with the ultimate monstrosity his endeavor has brought about evident to him at last. And then you’d have the ultimate Nazi as the final boss, since not only are he and Cap enemies, but he battled Iron Man’s dad, was well-versed in Asgardian mythology and stole one of Odin’s treasures, and is like Hulk a failed Super Soldier. What we got should be pretty good too though. Fingers crossed he at least sticks around to menace Bucky and Sam once one of them takes over as Cap.

* Outside the villain, boy, who would have expected Thor would basically be the closest thing to a main character of this movie? I guess Marvel rightly expected Ragnarok would be fire, and knowing that he’ll now be the major remaining original Avenger, are trying to build him up in double-quick time. And with only half of Asgard gone, they can keep the setup Waititi provided after this (even if I wish they hadn’t brought back his eye. I’m not worried for him personally though; his godly constitution should be more than capable of resisting mere alien raccoon ass germs). And given Ultron was the Iron Man-centric flick and Civil War was literally a Captain America movie, it feels fair they gave this to the third member of the core trio. By contrast, I’m not sure whether Black Panther was too late for them to account properly for him, or they did know, and that’s why the final action was set in Wakanda even though it’s relatively irrelevant.

* The characters getting to bounce off each other was much of the heart of this, and while Downey vs. Cumberbatch was totally reasonable - I wish Strange and Spidey had more time together as promised as fellow Ditko creations, but doing Sherlock vs. Holmes makes sense, with “Do you concur, Doctor?” almost feeling deliberately evocative - I never would have expected Thor and Star-Lord to be the standout comedic pairing. And yet, as Drax put it, it entirely makes sense: “He is not a dude. You are a dude. He is a man.”

* What most leapt out at me as signalling this is the post-Trump movie relative to Civil War’s summer 2016 blockbuster? There, the question of whether or not the government can be trusted is the inciting incident that drives everything. Here, that the government is actively working against the right thing is so plain that Rhodes - who had previously said his critical injuries were more than worth standing up for the Accords, so passionately did he believe in all they stood for - immediately, casually acknowledges that the entire thing is fucked and bails with no fanfare, and that’s the end of it.

* I’d expected this to be an all-out invasion flick and so had been disappointed no Defenders or whatnot would at least cameo, but as it really turned out I’m not surprised there wasn’t a place for Daredevil to stick his horns in. And despite assurances, no Hawkeye! I’m sure as many as 5 or 6 people were quite disappointed.

* Betting pool on who’s actually dead? Obviously everyone vanished will be okay, but the others? Gamorra looks pretty stiffed, but she seems a safe bet to return. Vision’s end felt gruesomely final, but they put so much effort into implying he might be able to survive without the stone, and now they have a seminal story to draw on for a potential solo movie of his. Loki, I think, is most likely to remain in the ground. A last-minute return and final prank against Thanos wouldn’t be out of place for him by any means, but his character has come full circle, and I think it’s more likely that if he returns it’ll be as Kid Loki.

* Speaking of the vanishing, I really appreciate the thought that clearly went into who was taken off the board. The castoffs either really had nothing to do with the Thanos conflict, even and indeed especially if they were big for maximum shock value (Black Panther, Spider-Man, White Wolf, Falcon, Mantis), or DID have something to do with Thanos but whose arcs in terms of physical confrontations with him reached their logical climaxes (Star-Lord vented regarding their shared relationship to Gamorra, Drax tried and failed as he was always going to because that one-sided hate he wanted fulfilled isn’t as much at the core of his character as Gamorra’s relationship with Thanos is). Or in Strange’s specific case, the enigmatic type with an ace up his sleeve who could logically leave a final mystery and hope for others to have to rely on. And as a whole, it means the final OG Avengers movie ISN’T going to be an even bigger crossover movie than this the way we thought. This, for the MCU’s 10th anniversary, was the big crossover movie. The last Avengers movie as we’ve known it up to that point is mostly just going to be the founders (plus Captain Marvel, a mandatory Wakandan representative or two, and Rhody since he’s the other hero who was introduced in Phase One) getting one last hurrah. And it makes sense to go with that smaller cast, because they’ll want space to really zero in on Steve and Tony before they go, and since going at Thanos head-on is no longer an option, there’s not really going to be an opportunity for the same kind of massive super-war we got in here anyway, because then he’d simply de-create them.

* Steve and Tony are going to die, and going into pure fanfic, I think I know how it’ll happen. Steve will get the Gauntlet, and it’ll kill him to use it, but in an homage to the climax of Kree-Skrull War, he’ll use his last breath to not only revive everyone, but bring together an army of superheroes to defeat a depowered Thanos once and for all (Gamora or maybe Nebula almost certainly striking the final blow), raising his returned shield high, exchanging a last look with Bucky, and finally crying out “AVENGERS ASSEMBLE!” And Tony? Tony is going to knowingly walk to death in a doomed fight against Thanos as a distraction to give Steve that chance, becoming the guy who lays down on the wire and lets someone else crawl over him. It not only reaffirms his partnership with Steve and the idea behind the original Avengers just as both die, but brings his character arc totally full circle: he faces down the embodiment of his nightmares, and after having lived as the ultimate egotist, he dies as the man who sacrifices himself so someone else can secure the win. And Thanos was I believe introduced in an Iron Man comic, so that aspect’s pretty appropriate too.

* Jackson finally almost got to say motherfucker in one of these! And that’s the second Marvel movie with a character nearly saying fuck. Take the leap Disney, I believe in you. And much as that last shot in the stinger was neat, and much as this alternative would have been literally impossible, how much cooler would it have been if that screen had shown a “4″?

* My #4 title prediction? Avengers: The End. There was a big Thanos story by Starlin titled Marvel: The End where he destroys everything but ultimately turns it back, and that’d be both ominous enough to fit the warning that we should be scared of this title, and spiritually truthful. And since the Spider-Man movie right afterwards will according to Feige mark the start of the new MCU, they can title that Spider-Man: Brand New Day in accordance with said new beginning.

* Post-all this? It’ll be awhile yet before the Fantastic Four and X-Men come on stage, so ‘Phase 4′ will basically have to stall until they can bring in Doom to be the true final boss before the inevitable reboot a decade or so down the line. Spider-Man’s the new lead (hence the Iron Spider armor, which in Homecoming seemed deliberately to be overly gaudy as Tony’s vision of a Spidey remade in his image but now seems an indicating as his leading man status, the red/yellow/blue color scheme marking him as Peak Superhero) along with Panther, Captain Marvel, and likely Thor as the old standby. The Avengers likely disband for a bit due to losing the core and break up into different teams - your Ultimates, Champions, Young Avengers, etc. - before coming back together in New Avengers, managing to make the Avengers movie after the next one an event by making it about the reformation. Osborn leading the Cabal’s the big bad; he’s the leading man’s leading villain, he has the pedigree thanks to Dark Reign while still being able to put on a Goblin suit at the end, he lets them do the inevitable “all the bad guys get together to fight the Avengers” story, and while it might not work as well as it would have post-BvS pre-Justice League, using Sentry/the Void - a compromised, frightening, unsure, ‘realistic’ Superman figure - as his muscle and the true threat would be hella charged at the moment in a way I could see the MCU being cocky enough to go for, even if they never outright do Avengers V Squadron Supreme.

That’s what I got. As the god of thunder would say, farewell and good luck, morons.