#Sidekick Books

[fromtheseventhhell]

it's wild to see people say stuff like "sansa is a politician, arya is a warrior" while not being able to point out a single political act sansa has achieved, and not being able point out any of arya's "warrior skills" that isn't the handful of fencing lessons with syrio she received for like five months max lol

Politician!Sansa and Warrior!Arya are two fascinating ends of a fanon ouroboros; Neither concept exists outside of the other and neither concepts are based on the books. This fandom is just so attached to the idea of Sansa being this incredible politician, with intelligence above every other character, that her having nothing in her own chapters to support that idea doesn't stop them. That's why Arya's intelligence, skills, and entire character arc get reduced to her being nothing but a walking, talking weapon. Like you said, her "warrior" capabilities are essentially the handful of lessons she had with Syrio where her most important + relevant lesson was how to observe her surroundings. Her only "combat" training with the FM was her defending herself with a staff when she lost her eyesight. There's nothing to suggest that she's going to be a warrior, in fact we get the exact opposite. We get constant reminders of Arya's small stature and lack of strength that prevent her from fighting/defending herself in certain situations. All her kills rely on sneak attacks/stealth and she's never been in an outright swordfight with anyone. George even refrains from calling her a warrior like Robb and Jon. Brienne and Asha are examples of female characters who are actual fighters and if you compare their chapters, you can see the difference.

But then Arya's entire existence is antithetical to fanon!Sansa's. Her Harrenhal arc is what people pretend Sansa was doing in KL, her relevance to the North gets transferred to Sansa, and her intelligence and political activeness are erased so that Sansa can shine. They'll write essays on how Sansa is the most intelligent, politically savvy character and how Dany/Jon/Tyrion's arcs only exist to highlight her own ruling arc but the second someone asks them for evidence from the books, it's crickets. I don't understand why their enjoyment of her character hinges on her being the most important/intelligent one. No Arya stan is under the illusion that she's going to be the political character or outclass Dany, Jon, or Tyrion. It's just part of her story so we acknowledge it. Arya is going to have her political arc in Braavos and Sansa is going to have her political arc in the Vale, they aren't mutually exclusive. The only issue is that some people want Sansa to be the only one with a political arc and that's not the story that George is telling.

[wandixx]

Ghost of fries and Hero of cookies part 2

All work words count: 14 593

Words in this part: 1 794

Summary of whole work: Duke wasn't expecting to wake up from his quick rooftop nap to some meta kid with fries. He also wasn't expecting kid to stay Or Danny asked Dani to stay safe while she was in Gotham. Where would she be safer than under the wing of local hero? And he looked like he needed bad day combo anyway

This part summary: Of new names and teasing

Beta read by @audhumla-sailor though English is second language for both of us, so proceed with this in mind. I also know all of the charaters through fics alone, so probably ooc. Stay catious if it's something you don't like

First part

Duke knew that Dani was in their agreed meeting point, he even vaguely knew where she was floating but not much more. She used her invisibility, which was weird since she knew it didn't work correctly on him. It was fifth time they met, of course they knew. 

"Hey Signal, remember how you said that I need a codename if we're going to hang out in future and that all my previous ideas were horrible names?" a disembodied girly voice asked. Duke smiled. Ever since he raised the idea, the girl would come up with ridiculous names to be called, proposing them with absolutely straight face. It was expected from someone who thought Dani Phantom was a good alias. It didn't make her ideas any less amusing.

"Of course I do. Whatcha got for me today?"

"Alright, since you don't let me be a name stealer, I decided to take a sheet from local nightlife's notebook–"

"You mean take a leaf from their book?" He was sure she was rolling her eyes on him, but it didn't stop him. No one could maim English language like that with him around.

"Whatever. I chose to steal their idea and became a bird. It's only fair since I can actually fly!"

"Can't exactly disagree. So, what did you get this time?"

"You'll like that, I promise. But now, I introduce to you…"

Duke got ready to shut down every Robin iteration and all Birdgirls he could think of.

"HOOPOE!" Dani yelled, popping back to the visible spectrum. She was covered in bright orange cape with weirdly shaped hood and flimsy mask "I even did some costume changes to fit the name better–" in all honesty, one, yeah, he wasn't blind he realized, two, he needed a moment to remember how these birds looked (his first thought was 'wait it's a thing?!'). But then he got it and yeah, those were funny little creatures, just like Dani. It fitted her "–so even if you don't like it, it doesn't matter," she added, sticking her tongue out.

Duke patted her on the head. He was there, he knew it mattered.

"It's a great name Hoopoe"

Dani visibly though probably unconsciously, relaxed. Her mouth curved into a proud grin and her aura brightened. Normal auras didn't do that. He got used to Dani surprising him like that sometimes.

"Of course it's great, I made it."

Duke chose to not remind her about almost two dozen times she came up with absolutely not great names or about the fact that technically she didn't quite make this one either. He wasn't in such a petty mood. Maybe in future if he needed blackmail.

Oh, it was such a Bat thing, wasn't it? He needed to spend some more time with his civilian to get it out of himself, he liked his ability to interact with normal people in a healthy way. 

*

"Wait, is your mask a paper?"

"What else could it be, titanium?"

"If you stop three muggings on the next three patrols each I'll get you a better one, okay?"

"Hey, my mask is perfectly fine"

"Yeah, but it can tear too easily. I can get you a mask that is more sturdy."

"Aha."

"It's the same material every Robin and Nightwing wear…"

"Don't care, my mask is flawless"

"..."

"Okay, better mask would be cool"

***

On the third patrol Dani joined, about a week and a half ago, they exchanged numbers. Duke knew how hard it was to come to terms with new powers on one's own and God strike him with a lightning or something if he ever lets anyone go through similar bullshit. Especially since she didn't seem to have anyone taking care of her. Girl her age shouldn't be able to hang out or respond to messages within ten minutes at any given time. Only twice she didn't do that, because she was on a celebrity hunt for autographs as she later explained. He would be teased endlessly if any Wayne or their associate learned about it, but he considered introducing Dani to Bruce. She needed help, okay?! He didn't inherit adoption tendencies.

But he hadn't done that, partially because he didn't want to scare Dani off and partially because of fear of teasing. And bet. Because of course in the meantime somehow there happened a bet. 

He smirked at the video Dani sent as a response to the hydration check. She was tossing a coin and playing an elimination game to pick one juice from eight drinks she had. Steph jumped over the back of the couch to join him. At the start she was in front of him so to do that she had to run around the furniture but such minor inconveniences couldn't even wish to stop her dramatics.

"You're smiling at your phone ergo you either text your secret girlfriend/boyfriend/enbyfriend or watch memes. Show me the memes," she demanded, nudging him in the arm. Duke chuckled.

"Wrong guess. I'm texting my sidekick," they agreed it would be a funny way to introduce Dani to people who asked. Duke tried his best at this whole having sidekick thing anyway. As well as he could without help from other Bats because of this damn bet.

Steph froze for a moment.

"Your what–"

"And the lucky winner is… an apple with mint juice! Damn I really hoped it would be lemonade,"  Dani from the video announced cheerfully before opening the bottle" Shame it didn't make it past semi-finals. Happy hydration break. I'm going on an autograph hunt so I may not respond for the next two hours or so. Wish me luck, bye~"

Duke paused the video before it replayed. He glanced at Steph who finally rebooted.

"How come you got a kid and I learned about it just now?"

“In my defense I'm like 60% sure you're the second person in the family to learn about her. Depends if Tim got his ‘I have to know everything, gotta check body cams’ paranoid spree in the last two weeks or not. There was no teasing from Babs or anyone else if I'm being honest and no lecture from B, so they have no idea.”

“First was Alfred?”

“First was Alfred. I still don't know how.”

“That's our grandtler for you. You are forgiven but you have to tell me everything about her,” Steph demanded excitedly. “And show me the photos''

Duke snorted.

“She goes by Hoopoe and is about Damian's age. She can tell you her real name when B inevitably finds out and tries to interrogate her.”

“What if Spoiler drops by during the day?”

“You can try but give it another week and a day, okay?”

“Why?”

“We have bet that I'll hide her from B for three weeks. Tomorrow is the end of the second week. We both know how he is, he'll have questions if you randomly show up during the day."

"Stakes?"

"Speedster worth of winners favorite Batburger meal, 2 quarts of chosen drink and cookies"

"Valid. I ain't snitch, but I want to know more. Is she a meta?”

"Yeah. Powers I know of are invisibility, intangibility, superspeed, enhanced hearing and flight. Probably more. I think she already had some training with it because she has quite amazing control over this stuff. Like, it comes naturally to her. But her hand to hand is atrocious."

"Are you jealous?"

"No."

"Omg, you totally are! Don't be, she is just a baby with a better idea of what's going on with her powers than you have with yours. There is nothing to be mad about Duke, it's okay Duke–"

"Keep going and I won't tell you anything about her," he dared, trying not to snort. 

"Sorry, sorry, you're doing great, please continue," she nudged his arm again "Don't be such softie, dude" He stared at her at the comment, disbelief clear on his face. Steph at least then looked a little ashamed "Okay, sorry. You're honestly doing far better than any of us would. Excluding Cass and Alfred."

"Excluding Cass and Alfred," he agreed easily enough.

"So, you think your kid has some training with her powers," she recalled eagerly.

"Yeah, probably from when she was helping her cousin. He is a hero in Amity Park, Illinois, his name is Phantom. It took very little digging even though Hoopoe does her best to stay mysterious. I swear this kid has no brain-mouth filter. But! I got my second shovel talk from her cousin!”

“The what?”

“After a week of hanging out with her, I got message on Signal’s twitter from Phantom that basically read as ‘I have nothing against you, really dude I’m a fan but here is list of my most powerful enemies, and let me tell you, there were some scarily powerful guys there, I won with all of them, if something bad happens to Hoopoe I can and will destroy you.’ After some research, yes, I think he could try and have considerable chance of success. Even if he didn’t fight would be painful enough to be a lesson. He and Hoopoe have the same powers and she worked with him for some time. She most likely learned then. She was called Dani Phantom, boy went by Danny Phantom then”

“Dear gods, their aliases were so horrible, who even let them go with it?! Are those their first names?!” Steph sounded genuinely offended by it.

“I don’t know,” Yeah, he knew, but he preferred to keep at least this secret to himself ”In boy's defense, because Hoopoe came much later,  he was fourteen and Amity went to shit really fast, so alias was probably not his first concern. And it’s much better than Invioso-bill, name he was given by the press. And he uses some intense gaslighting to make people believe it’s just Phantom now. And allegedly they’re both ghosts. Apparently ghosts don’t exactly have secret identity”

“You doubt it”

“You would too. She eats, she breathes and she is tangible by default. From what I know, ghosts don’t do that”

“They don’t, I checked. I went on a research spree when I first learned about Deadman. I just thought it was so cool you know. Ghosts being real and all,” Steph leaned towards him, almost vibrating with anticipation.

“Really?” he asked, knowing what he was getting into.

“Yeah, you see…”

And on she went, releasing expected infodump as if she waited for this opportunity ever since she first read about it.

********

Some additional name getting shenanigans

Signal: I won't call you Dani in the field

Dani: Why?

Signal: Ever heard of secret identity? Name is, like, half of it. Disguise is other half but it can be exchanged with lore. Superman made it work. Just make up enough lore for people to not question it.

Dani: Oh, okay *gremlin^2 mode activated*

Random they just rescued: And who are you little one?

Dani: *looking them dead in the eyes* I am clone of dead child hero, travelling around the world to find identity separated from my template befre mistakes made during my creation make me turn into puddle of primordal liquid and my conciousness fades forever

Random: *petrified* What?

Signal: *internally* I have miscalculated

Dani: Kid Signal

Signal: No.

Dani: It works in Central

Signal: We're not in Central

Dani: Signalgirl

Dani: I mean, Batgirl exists

Signal: No.

Dani: Monochromatic Signal. Y'know, Red Robin route?

Signal: ...

Signal: Just no. Don't make my name part of your name

Next part

Do you want to see some Hoopoe doodles I made? There were redesigns!!!

[mostsanescarletspiderfan]

I Will never understand the criticism that sidekicks are groomed into that position.

The history of child superheroes has always been rotted into the idea of giving the children the power to control their own lives, even if they started out as support characters it's undeniable that the story is about being able to fight agonist the world.

There isn't much you could even do to stop a child from trying to help others, people give a lot of shit for Batman to take in kids as crime fighting partners but honestly what could he possibly say? The man himself is proof that you can't really stop someone that you have little to no authority over (looking at how young bruce ran from home to start training).

You might make the argument that Bruce wasn't a teen hero when he came back but he ain't the only one who started out young, look at Superman, Spider-Man or hell even Aquaman. All characters who became heroes at an extremely young age and would later on take sidekicks because honestly the best possible scenario is that the adult superhero can train them to be better, the reality is simply that the one who chooses to be a hero isn't the adults, it's the children.

[vertigoartgore]

Radioactive Man & Fallout Boy painting by Alex Ross (published in The Simpsons/Futurama Crossover Crisis slipcase edition).

[mainalias]

thinking about compiling screenshots of golden/silver age batman exclusively calling dick his ward to combat the allegations that it was “initially a father-child relationship”

[unreal-unearthing]

Nancy drew cw you will always be famous to me. Really asked ‘what if everyone’s favorite plucky and precocious teen mystery-solver grew up to find out her quaint hometown was actually, like, super fucking haunted?’ and didn’t wait for an answer.

[magnetothemagnificent]

The gender envy I get from Golden Age boy sidekicks......

[idanit]

AU where the Grace kids are Black but they're still their canon ages and involved in the canon plot

[whatthehellami]

The hero saw the villain's lips move but could hear absolutely nothing over the gunfire. Whatever, they must be saying something about how they'll be killed. The hero knocked out the last of the villain's sidekicks and wiped their sweat. They looked back at the villain and saw their lips were still moving. This lad speaks a lot, huh?

The dust settled as the hero and  villain circled each other. The villain was again saying something.

"Huh?" The hero asked. The villain seemed disgruntled but repeated again. Absolutely zero clue.

"Uh huh, I get you, yes, right." The hero replied cursing their hearing ability.

The hero put up their defenses as they noticed the villain inch closer- they were almost at arm's length.

"Are you not right in the brain? I just asked whether I should kill your family after dismembering your body and you just yes?" The villain almost seemed concerned about the hero. Oftentimes due to trauma and exhaustion, heroes do give up but they jump right back after their family's mentioned.

"What? No, wait...it's just, I'm not good at hearing." The hero sheepishly smiled.

The villain laughed and knocked out hero with a straight punch.

"This is the country's famous and celebrated hero? Tsk."

[wanderingmind867]

You know, Marvel had less of the teen sidekick trope than DC. I think. Bucky Barnes, the original Human Torch's sidekick Toro and Rick Jones. I think that's it for teen sidekicks. I mean, we had some teen heroes (spiderman and the o5 X-Men). But only three teen sidekicks.

But then we look at DC and we have enough teen sidekicks for me to think we need to call child protective services on all these child soldiers. Just going by wikipedia, we've got Robin, Aqualad, Kid Flash, Speedy, Snapper Carr, Green Lantern's rascist Inuit/"Eskimo" friend Pieface, etc. Seriously. Do I have to call social services to report 15 child soldiers in the greater united states!? This is bordering on the surreal. At least Marvel didn't do the child soldier thing nearly as often! Maybe Stan Lee just understood it was a bit weird. I don't know. But I'm glad Marvel had less child sidekicks.

[motziedapul]

Queer Filipino Monster Romance at The Sidekick Comic Cafe in Toronto!

💖Coming to The Sidekick on February 10 for Valentine's Weekend💖

I'll be selling some of our Queer Filipino monster romance (and action horror) comics for you to enjoy~ 🏳️‍🌈🇵🇭

Come hang out with me from 1pm to 6pm at The Sidekick comic book cafe at 1374 Queen St E Toronto M4L1C9!

[alvindraperzzz]

Joking aside though, Cassie’s disconnect from Diana’s mission is weird on several other levels.

One. We know Cassie is eloquent and persuasive when she wants to be. Inspiring, even. She convinces Zeus to give her powers. She’s almost as guilty as Tim is for number of rousing speeches. It’s called into focus in the lead up to Sins of Youth, when Tim makes Cassie the spokesperson for Young Justice; despite her doubt she convinces the nation, and the League, to give YJ a chance. She becomes leader of Young Justice because her teammates voted her to be leader (out of universe because she won a fan poll, which will never stop being astounding to me). As leader of the Teen Titans, she acts as liaison to city officials and other teams.

Why isn’t Diana using this? There are entire demographics Cassie can reach that Diana might not be able to. 

Two. Public perception. Cassie does a lot of crazy stuff. I’m not just talking about her shenanigans with YJ. Cassie has been kicked out of multiple schools, most for behavioral issues, at least one of them for being Wonder Girl. She technically kidnapped the President (Amazons Attack was garbage start to finish and I hate to acknowledge it, but unfortunately it happened). See Wonder Woman and Teen Titans for other major fights and major property damage.

Cassie is Wonder Girl. She is publically associated with Wonder Woman, as her protege and sidekick. There’s no mention of how what Cassie does could reflect on Diana. Diana, an ambassador from a foreign country who regularly speaks to the United Nations. You’d think Diana’s PR team would have something to say about that.

There’s more but like. This disconnect is so weird. Is it because she’s a teenager? She fights supervillains and risks her life everyday, I think she can handle outreach and a little public speaking. Is it because she’s uninterested? I don’t think Diana would have accepted Cassie if she had complete disinterest in her cause, or at least, we’d see more conversations about it. Is it because her training got handed off to Artemis, who has a different upbringing and set of values from Diana? That… actually has merit. Doesn’t explain everything, but it does account for some things.

[nilolemillion]

WE ARE ROBIN! (P13)

[silverlinedeyes]

A Court of Dancing Shadows

As Recorded by Gwyneth Berdara

A potential summary and description of the Azriel Gwyn Nesta book idea* that is floating around, the plot of which I can’t stop thinking about and trying to imagine:

Follow Az and Gwyn in dual POV as Az and Nesta go on a journey to revive dusk and establish Valkyrie HQ with Gwyn as their sidekick.

Gwyn is there as an official scribe, making sure this gets recorded for Prythian history (I mean what else is her role?), but also I guess as Az’s girlfriend? (I am refraining from continuing down this path of thought before I say something bad.)

Gwyn’s POVs focus on Nesta, what she does, how she uses the Starborn power or whatever to revive dusk (I know I know Nesta’s power is death, how are she and Az, whose power is shadows, going to bring the land back to life? It’s not my job to answer these questions. This is their story. But I digress.), and also how obsessed Gwyn is with Az and his shadows.

Gwyn almost gets eaten by a Wyrm. Nesta saves her with a Trove weapon Gwyn can’t wield.

And while they travel the land, at night, Gwyn sings around the campfire and Az’s shadows dance. Az sometimes joins in the singing. Nesta watches. And then Gwyn and Az sneak away from Nesta once she’s asleep to f*ck. Hopefully she doesn’t hear.

One brother, one sister, and a bestie (and the shadows who love her).

Cassian is…nowhere to be found on this journey lol. Nesta could leave him behind (and he let her apparently).

And we get more Valkyrie training scenes and get to see them ride the Pegasi after they free Dusk and establish Valkyrie HQ.

Oh, and Gwyn somehow heals Az (even though I thought Az needed therapy first?) and makes him love Illyrians again.

The end!

I can’t 🤣🤣🤣

*this is a shitpost and a joke but also…..someone please help me understand what the actual plot and romance and storyline of this book would be because I’m at a loss.

[sadanddumbcat]

Every time a comic image is posted and tagged with Stucky an angel dies. 😔🙏

Save an Angel! stop tagging comic panels with Stucky.

[weirdo-from-bonesborough]

Hey I’m sorry was Bucky Barnes introduced as Winter Soldier and Jason Todd introduced as Red Hood in the same fucking year?