#Willing to bet this is the case

[aingeal98]

More Jason and Cass thoughts (sorry but also not sorry) but if I was magically given full control over DC and could write what I'd want obviously I'd make Cass Batman but I've been thinking of what sort of reaction and role Jason would have in response. I think I'd write his version of "Congrats on the new job!" as a test, involving the Joker and civilians and gangs and Red Hood and a ton of explosives. Bruce failed me, and now he's given up. You're his successor, let's see how you handle this dilemma that freaked him out so badly he threw a batarang into my throat rather than let me avenge my own death in front of him.

So obviously Cass will overcome the traps and the puzzles. That's the fun part to show how competent both of them are and sprinkle in little character moments as we go. But then we reach the emotional crux of the matter, probably laid out as some sort of saw trap because it's Jason. Here I am, a victim of murder. You say nobody dies tonight but I did, and I want the man who did it dead. Not only did Batman fail to avenge me but he failed to stop the Joker from going on to create even more victims. What right do you have to stop me from getting justice for myself? What right does this man have to life after what he's taken from me and from countless others? I'm not trying to kill a random stranger, I'm specifically demanding justice for my own death that I never got while I was gone.

There are two ways this could go. The straightforward route if I knew my time on this run was limited would probably be a pyrrhic victory like the ones Cass's og series was so fond of. Just like Bruce in utrh, she acts on instinct and saves the Joker (and Jason this time) . A win technically, but she fails the test. Jason is once again vindicated but with nothing to show for it. The story ends with Cass sending the Joker back to jail and going back to the batcave, where the old Robin costume looms judgementally, highlighting her failure. It would be the most fitting end given their character molds, all tragedy and conviction and unstoppable force meets immovable object etc.

However... I think the option I prefer would be a little different. Cass levelling with Jason, a killer talking to a murder victim. She has no right to stop Jason from getting justice, she has no love for the Joker but she knows any death she allows to happen like this would devastate her, just like that death row inmate long ago she tried to break out but ended up letting go once the family of the victim talked to her and demanded justice. I think... In this specific situation, she'd just be honest. Morally she has no right sure. Personally she just really really doesn't want anyone to die. Give her one chance, please. Let her try it her way. Not demanding, not lecturing or insisting, just... Please. Don't do this. Let me try another way.

And then what? Jason asks.

In the end a deal is struck. Cass will take the Joker and lock him up, ensuring he never harms anyone again while also trying to rehabilitate him. But the second she fails and he gets free, Jason kills him and she won't stand in his way. It's the kind of deal that leaves both of them mildly disgusted and dissatisfied with themselves, neither of them naturally creatures of compromise when it comes to this specific topic. But Cass is willing to do anything to avoid death and Jason did not expect the new Bat to be so... Flexible? Kind of? Of course maybe she won't actually hold up her end of the deal and when the Joker gets loose she'll try and stop Jason from killing him and he'll get his miserable vindication, but right now this is something strange and new and he's mildly confused and curious about where it will go. He doesn't believe in her ability to contain the Joker forever but he's willing to let her try because her reaction to that future failure interests him. She's given him a sword of damocles to hang above her head and he didn't ask for it or expect it. It's the type of power he never thought the Bat would just... Hand to him.

The conflict ends with neither of them fully winning or losing. They both don't really know what to feel about this.

The thing is, the second Cass let's Jason kill the Joker she's hanging up the mantle. She's staking the Bat on this, because it's always go big or go home with her when it comes to saving others, even someone like the Joker. In this magical universe where I have unlimited power, Cass would lock the Joker in a secret bunker and have Leslie Thompkins talk to him daily, mostly because I think her pacifism speeches and debates in the comics would make a fun contrast to the Joker's evil sadism. (But what about his rights? Doesn't he deserve a trial and to be held in a regular prison? I'm going to be honest I think Cass would be very comfortable bending the rules on this specific situation. Morally questionable but I'd have fun with it. She's going to let Leslie treat Joker like her personal pet project to save his soul because yes she wants him to change but also she's got a city to save every night so go crazy Leslie, have fun.)

And the Batman series would continue with Cass as the lead, new challenges and new antagonists and every twenty issues or so for the first hundred we'll cut back to the Joker briefly if his chats with Leslie can help highlight some thematic element of the current arc. But bit by bit he'd slowly fade away onto oblivion, maybe getting referenced every hundred issues or so until eventually no one remembers or cares about him because there's so much else going on. Meanwhile Jason's got a good thing going as Red Hood, primarily based in Park Row and a tentative ally on the occasion when their vigilante work aligns. Unlike Joker he's a much more frequent character in the comics, and after say 10 years (this is my magical fantasy universe Cass's batman run is going to last for a very long time alright) when people think of DC characters they think of Red Hood long before they think of the Joker.

Is any of this realistic? Right now of course not. It's why I'd go with the pyrrhic victory if I actually got the chance, because it would be the best way to tell the story in the larger context of the Bat narrative. But it's my fantasy DC editor and writer daydream and I'm going to dream big. They're never going to be normal happy siblings, their personal demons will never fully let them be free and the looming possibility of losing everything they currently have narrative wise if Bruce comes back as Batman will always be there. But it's maybe the closest to peace they'll ever get. Unsatisfying and tame compromise that probably violates several laws and ethical codes but whatever. Cass has never read the Geneva convention and Jason's not going to shed tears over the Joker. Let him die relevancy wise if not physically.

[strohller27]

Rewatching the Mysterious Affair at Styles again because yes

And I love how Poirot recognises Hastings right away even though he apparently hasn’t seen him in years

And he immediately comes in to embrace him (and there’s Hastings’ hand on Poirot’s waist again @darthlenaplant !!)

And of all of these pictures of their embrace in this episode, I will never be over this one (Poirot’s hand on Hastings’ shoulder. Standing cheek to cheek with Hastings all too briefly):

Or the fact that they sit there holding and shaking each other’s hands and smiling at one another for a good solid like. 20 seconds after embracing

And moments like this are the closest Poirot can get to the object of his affections within the confines of societal heteronormativity in 1917

Excuse me while I go cry about it

[i-spilled-my-soup]

post ttc nico thinking bianca might have lived if he was only smarter and stronger and better, and bianca being the only role model he'd had for all the life he'd remembered he absolutely overcompensates becoming a caricature of distrust and seclusion. but he isnt used to it like bianca was and his desire to help (to prove his worth? to prove that he has a right to live when his sister didn't?) manifests in clinging to any opportunity of progress, anything that could earn him graditute or at the very least repentance

[howly]

me and who

[aphverse-confessions]

Y’all really love to ignore how genes a cannon creep in both myst and mcd

Same with Michi

It’s not sexism to not like an implied rxpist

.

[autisticstarscream]

I always get so confused when I see art of Swiftpaw either just before or after his death and hes.... kitten sized. they draw him like the stereotypical apprentice size.

Like... Y'all do realize he's older than Cinderpelt and Brackenfur in the first series, right? He was well within his rights to be pissed at not being a warrior. Hell, CINDERPELT got her full name before him, and even that took longer than Brackenfur getting his name. This is especially ironic considering Cinderpelt and Brackenfur were apprenticed /before they even reached 6 moons/. So he was even older than them, at least by a moon or so.

Swiftpaw was a full ass adult but trapped in the apprentice den. Hell, Ashfur and Ferncloud, two cats also in the apprentice den with him when he died, were BORN in Into The Wild, while he was apprenticed in early Fire and Ice, which takes place literally right after Into the Wild.

Swiftpaw was approximately only four moons away from being /2 years old/. Most warriors these days are made such around 1 year old. Brightheart and Thornclaw also were practically adults when in the apprentice den. All three should've been made Warriors a whole lot sooner, and were right for being mad about it.

Hell, taking into account as well that it almost feels like Thornclaw and Brightheart were apprenticed LATE. We have to go by the assumption that Bluestar wouldn't immediately brand herself a hypocrit and apprentice kits at 3 moons, because SEVERAL moons pass in Fire and Ice, between the times of Cinder and Bracken being apprenticed and the end. Meanwhile, Thorn and Bright are apprenticed in the next book, during which Cinder has ALREADY had her leg injured, healed, and "decided" to be a medicine cat.

EDIT: not saying no one can draw swift small thats perfectly fine!!!! just saying it feels like we're infantalizing him a little bit...

[dayurno]

jean moreau sticker collector is a factoid that will forever be close to my heart. he was just a BOY..!!!! a little light. a little joy. something of his own. but they were just On his nightstand. when he gets to USC i hope he covers all of his notebooks for classes in colorful stickers and his water and his locker and And. and the Trojans start giving him stickers. and renee mails him some she thinks he would like. and he gets to put them on things. im nauseous how about you

ihavent had a single good hour since i learned it actually. i hope everything he owns is covered in stickers and i hope it looks horrible and they all crash and i hope he gets a thousand billion stickers for everything all the time ever. i want to see jean trying to set up a planner like kevin and renee do and immediately failing but covering it in stickers anyway. my god i want to give jean moreau stationary

[aro-culture-is]

Aro culture is being pissed off when you are on a colleges website completing their "fun" little quiz that reccommends what majors you should look into and HALF of the questions are about romance or dates and you are just sitting there wondering how on earth this even slightly relates to what you want to study

.

[annikathewitch]

I wish there was like. A Wikipedia Wrapped. That showed you which wikipedia articles you visited the most, what topics you visited the most articles on, etc.

[todayisafridaynight]

dude I was just looking through the 'daigo dojima' tag and literally everything is you. every last photo is you. I mean thank u for providing but holy FUCK man. you need to be studied by scientists

i just got prescribed bupropion if you wanna start there

[soulofamy]

waittttttttttttttt khaos reigns comes out on the 24th, not the 14th???

[nexus-nebulae]

cannot believe that i see posts out there talking about how ableism is bad and then see tags on it like fucking "narcissistic abuse" like ok you're part of the problem here

[mydaroga]

I can't remember if I included this when I did Davies but there's more context here:

The fact that Paul failed was not because he couldn’t sing, realised Jim McCartney, it was because ‘he deliberately cracked his voice in the audition’.*

*In an interview for a self-produced TV special, Ghosts Of The Past (BBC1, 8 October 1991, included on DVD of Paul McCartney’s Liverpool Oratorio , issued 2004) Paul said, ‘I failed the audition for the Cathedral choir because I didn’t have the piano – the musical knowledge. I tried to get in on the singing alone.’ Ronald Woan says, ‘This isn’t right. If I had only accepted boys who could read music there wouldn’t have been any choir.’ Another Merseyside choirmaster, Peter Seaman, confirmed in an email to the author that young trebles aren’t expected to read music but ‘are taught to memorise the “melody lines” of hymns, anthems, motets and chants’.

Mark Lewisohn, Tune In

[thesaintofpatience]

I reckon aziraphale would have let Gabriel (Jim) jump out the window and that would have been reasonably sensible and indeed sexy of him

[halloweentual]

i looove reading stuff by authors i know are known for writing the most tragic characters known to man. i'll be looking at a new character like "yo so when's the trauma reveal?? 🤨☺️"

[dearhaos]

if uni is blocked im going to laugh n cry n laugh some more