#an aspect of Jason’s death not often talked about
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Batman (2016) #125
#bruce wayne#tim drake#jason todd#tw: child death#Batman#batman 2016#Jen reads comics#an aspect of Jason’s death not often talked about#poor Bruce tbh on top of the trauma of losing a son#as someone who uses to work at a mortuary dressing the dead isn’t easy either#i can only imagine what it was like for him#i have a lot of feels about this#but also Bruce wth is wrong with you thinking of them as soldiers#they’re children my dude#/your/ children#greatest comic hits
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Hi. I love every second of your blog going "Fuck Chuck Dixon. All my homies hate Chuck Dixon." concurrent with "Dixon could often be remarkably competent as a writer with legit interesting ideas." Please never stop writing metas.
listennnnnn i hate dixon he's awful. he's also written stuff i really enjoy despite the many glaring faults.
the thing with dixon that i'm always trying to suss out tho. like, i think because current day dixon has been radicalized in a truly awful and horrendous way, there's a lot of desire to place his current day radical beliefs onto every aspect of his past works and blame everything on him and him alone as this one terrible writer who ruined all characters for ever and ever just because he's a conservative. but like. i think that because he's an awful person it's easy to place blame on him retroactively for some things that weren't necessarily solely a product of his conservatism or his fault alone.
and mmm. i never ever deny the conservatism present in his works. it's present in his robin book with tim, it's present in his nightwing book with dick, and it's present in his batman books with bruce. but people sometimes act as if he was working in a batoffice that had the current day issues it does where writers are given a carte blance to do whatever they want with all characters with little regards to continuity or character growth. that did not happen during his tim under denny in the 90s--denny o'neil was known for running a fairly tight ship (i can't find the interview but there's an interesting retrospective interview he does wrt jason where he talks about his failures as an editor and how he was too hands off and not firm enough allowing writers to do what they pleased which led him to become a much stricter and firm editor following jason's death because he learned from the experience). dixon in that interview i posted made it clear that o'neil wouldn't even let dixon touch the joker until dixon had demonstrated to o'neil he had a grasp on the character that o'neil approved of. dixon would not have been allowed to do whatever he wanted with characters like robin/tim. without o'neil putting a stop to it if he had gone too far. and for the record, o'neil was a big old bleeding heart liberal that, at the time at least, dixon is noted to have gotten along with very well despite their political opinion differences even at that time. dixon says he was an avid read of grant's work on batman. he's awful now, but at one point he was probably younger and a bit more willing to entertain ideas that weren't his own too.
so when i look back on his work as a historical work, i'm always trying to tease out the following - is this representive of dixon's brand of conservative views in particular or is it representative of a different, overall more conservative time era. and there's a lot of things that fall under the second umbrella that get attributed to the first tbh. listen i love no man's land and understand that despite my love it is full of copaganda and downright conservative ideals by today's standards. but NML wasn't written solely by dixon to push a uniquely conservative pro-cop view--o'neil approved of the story and was the editor of the office at the time. rucka was a huge player in helping tell this super pro-cop story (he even wrote the novelization!!) and nobody ever really puts blame on him for these things the way they do dixon afaik. NML being written in a 'democrats trying to be tough on crime' era absolutely means it's not solely the fault of dixon and his evil conservatism, but he often gets the flack as if it were despite the fact that he was getting these stories okayed by people on different ends of the political spectrum than him + these stories were not his evil conservative brainchild alone.
so these are the things i'm thinking when i read through his works. and maybe that gives me a rosier view than it should, but a lot of my thoughts come from "what can reasonably actually be attributed to showcasing what dixon's views actually are" vs "what might actually not be his fault and his fault alone".
and when i say that tim generally isn't the one who showcases his personal views, i'm not trying to minimize the fact that there is inherent conservatism baked in to his character along with everyone else written by dixon, i'm saying that we need to be realistic and realize that dixon did not have as much freedom to do with tim what he had freedom to do with tim's side characters. tim, after all, had to ultimately fit in o'neil's batbible framework of what he was supposed to be because tim was ultimately an IP character who was part of a batman and robin mythos that o'neil was very, very protective of in the 90s given his previous failures to maintain control of the ship. so when you consider dixon's particular conservatism in tim's books you need to consider that the vast majority of it came from the characters surrounding tim (such as his dad, dana, steph, etc) because dixon had more freedom with those sorts of characters, rather than tim himself who often doesn't have any particular opionion of his own--he's just reacting to all the different opinions being presented to him. and that's not to say that those character should be evil conservatives forever and ever--in fact, i personally think they shouldn't. but take the racist and classist inner city kids are bringing guns to school storyline in robin #25-26. as a whole it's a conservative story. o'neil allowed dixon to do the story in the first place when he could have said no. in the story tim wanders around not knowing what to do about karl bringing a gun to school--which is why he has to go to his dad and dana, who represent "go to the cops/don't be a narc options"--his dad is the one who tries to talk to karl's dad--karl is the conservative one who thinks that they need to protect themselves from inner city kids compared to tim who thinks that guns shouldn't be in school. but tim also thinks that they shouldn't go to the cops and wants his dad to handle it by himself, but eventually comes to the realization that he should have gone to school administration to begin with. in these issues, steph is also the one who dixon uses to link karl's shooting to the inner city kids who are getting bused in to the suburban schools--we talk about that panel of steph declaring herself the protector of the suburbs, but also that panel in context is within the confines of the story--steph is essentially saying "maybe the suburbs need a spoiler (to protect themselves from the inner city people coming to bring crime out to them)" which absolutely is a conservative dixonism that you can pinpoint to his particular kind politics in comparison to the milquetoast of tim's "i don't know what to do/talk to a trusted adult to get help before tragedy happens PSA/overall conservativeness" that happens. that the story itself that exists in tim's book is conservative, yes, and i won't deny that tim also has a few conservative dialogue here but to me the difference is that o'neil would not let dixon use tim drake to go on any overtly political rants or represent any specific ideology *himself* that could make him controversial with readers of the time given how protective o'neil was of not repeating his previous mistakes. you're generally going to find the more egregious dixonisms outside of tim. like "robin 1993 is a conservative book that has a pro-life storyline" (true) =/= "tim goes on an anti-abortion rant" (not true, literally never happened). tim shares blame because ultimately it is his book that presents a conservative worldview but tim as a character tends to exist as a more moderate (not completely, but more) character to have other characters present options and opinions to him rather than he himself saying he has those opinions. robin cannot take sides like that. o'neil wouldn't have let that happen.
and like. when discussing dixon my goal is never to completely absolve tim of dixon's writing. i just don't often see a need to completely rehash the tim-conservatism points because it's been discussed already over and over again to the point there's a pretty widespread misconception that tim is the ultimate dixon conservative mouthpiece who is solely at fault for all of robin 93's conservatism when actually there's a lot of other interesting places dixon's conservatism presents that are almost never discussed in comparison. my goal is not to be "tim's not at fault" or anything but it is to seriously consider and think about where i see dixon's personal opinions shining through more overtly based on what i know of the conservative mindset (as much as i don't agree with it). dissecting dixon and how he writes in consideration of his beliefs is fascinating and fun to me.
anyways he's awful.
#scintilly ask tag#mirrorfalls#anyways you will see dixon blamed for everything as if he was the sole arbiter of 90s comics#and like i blame him for so much#but to act if he's solely culpable for everything ignores who all else was involved in okay-ing the things he chose to write
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Hello to the one blog I've been loving to read for the past few days :) <3
Just wanted to add a little something that I started thinking abt after reading a few of your really cool posts, I think we should also discuss abt how Bruce's argument abt killing (with Jay) are often framed with "you're not the judge, jury & the executioner" which is really telling of who he thinks can exersise this legitimately? ? ?
I think it'd be constructive to actually properly discuss this aspect of Bruce's philosophy too. Plus, we get more nuanced Bruce characterisation. (Also keeping in mind uh... comic book propaganda of the writers and DC themselves)
YES ABSOLUTELY! Like what if someone is given a death sentence by a court of law? Does Bruce still care? I'm sure most writers would tell you no because Bruce has become a cop allegory. He's a violent enforcer of the law, and he seeks to uphold the law. Which is a recent switch! Batman comics used to be more radical, but now they're being written by old white men. So it's another one of those things where you can ignore it for your PERSONAL INTERPRETATION but you can't say that it's not A Thing because it's been like this for at least a decade.
His argument would likely be that everyone deserves a fair trial, that everyone has the right to be seen in court. Something which I do think Jason would agree with because when he's being written well he's not just shooting petty criminals! Jason's stance comes in with the big players, the disgustingly rich or well connected upper class who get away with murder. This has been true since the Garzonas case, the whole point was that Felipe was virtually immune to the law, and Jason couldn't allow that.
I think what it comes down to is whether they believe in reformative justice or punitive Justice, and I can most assuredly say that Batman believes in the latter. You can argue that Bruce is an advocate of prison reform but we don't really have evidence of that. He considers himself a punishment for criminals, he considers himself an equalizer but that's not true because he just delivers criminals into a system that is fundamentally corrupt and unfair. Do you actually think a trial in GOTHAM of all places is going to look at a rich man vs a petty crook the same way? That rarely happens even in real life.
And I don't think that Bruce does what he does out of inherent malice. Bruce is a deeply empathetic person, the core of Bruce Wayne is that he cares. But that's not enough, Bruce was allowed to grow up sheltered and it gave him an intrinsic idealism. He only has a Birdseye view of what the common people go through, that is not enough to stand there and say that he understands . Because he doesn't. He literally can't. And I think this bias, certainly one projected by the writers but that's another issue, comes through the most with Jason and Steph.
As far back as Jason's Robin era - widely regarded as Bruce's peak of being a good dad - he still makes some pretty big mistakes. Because he finds this homeless kid whose family has been ripped apart by the corrupted systems, who has actively experienced the worst Gotham has to offer, and he comes to the conclusion that if he doesn't take Jason home Jason will inevitably become a criminal even after Jason explicitly says he doesn't like stealing. So he takes Jason in but he makes that position as his son synonymous with Robin. And this is where we have to talk about meta because Jason is intrinsically tied to meta narratives. I'm not sure if you saw my other posts about Robin, as a concept, but I'll summarize here.
Child sidekicks are fine, in early comics. When things were campy light hearted whodunnit mysteries with a few action sequences, when you always knew that the child hero would come out unscathed, would always live till the next issue. And so when Bruce makes Jason Robin you have this veil of suspension of disbelief. But Jason's era is where you start seeing these kids' storylines get worse. More gruesome, more violent, more cruel. They start really testing the limit of Bruce's morality.
Batman: The Cult - Robin Jason has to crawl through a pile of dead bodies and while Bruce is having a mental break this MAYBE 14 year old is trying to get them out. The Diplomats Son - Jason watches a rapist be let go, because he's powerful and his dad has money. He sees exactly the kind of damage it does to the victims, he's the one who finds Gloria Stanson. A Death in the Family - Jason is murdered. Tortured and murdered and betrayed. He's dead and he was always intended to STAY dead. And all throughout Tim's run and then into Steph's the writers retroactively change everything about who Jason was because it has to be HIS fault, because if it's not Jason's fault then it might be Bruce's. Because how can audiences see Bruce as just and good for taking in new kids after what happened to the last one?
The suspension of disbelief shatters. Because now Jason is back and he's angry. Because maybe we as readers know that Tim, and Steph, and Damian need to be Robin because Robin makes money with young readers. But you know who doesn't know that? Jason, who no doubt assumed that his survival depended on being Robin. Who was sold out because he was Robin. Who was badmouthed and disgraced the entire time he was gone by people he loved and trusted. Jason doesn't know that he's in a comic book, but I argue he knows he's in a Batman story.
If not from his first appearance then definitely in recent ones. What can you do besides lay down and forgive and keep coming back when you know that the universe revolves around one man? How do you get rid of the terror and anger at realizing that you can never leave, that no matter how much he hurts you the universe will bend itself in half so that he is still just and right? When you realize that the love that has defined you is a disease rooted so deeply that to rip it out would be to kill yourself, that you can't even stay dead because Bruce does not want you to be.
And they couldn't even stick to Jason being the problem! Because then Steph dies. And all I could think was "Of course she did. She's an East End girl whose been compared to Jason constantly. Or a version of him. Of course she would be tortured to death trying to get Bruce's approval." Here we are, history has literally repeated itself, and...Tim is Robin again. Why? Because this is a comic book, and Batman needs Robin.
But what do you think everyone in-universe thinks? What do you think that looks like? How can you possibly still call Bruce a good parent under these circumstances? Bruce calls Robin a blessing, a gift, a necessity. He relies on Robin, physically to watch his back and emotionally to keep him in line. He trains them, he molds them, he loves them.
But sometimes love just isn't enough and the good Robin does shouldn't negate the harm they get in the process. Robin then becomes this horrible force of change, you get it and you know that this has doomed you, one way or another. Because Bruce believes that suffering is noble, that pain can reform people. It's baked into his character. Even if he doesn't intend to hurt his kids, it's not like we haven't seen him justify it to himself and others. "I love you, I did this for your own good, I thought I could help you, it was your fault I did that, it won't happen again, I lost control of myself but only this once, we can be a family again if you just come home." It reads an awful lot like an abuser trying to convince you or himself that he's not in the wrong.
This was longer than I intended it to be, but I guess my main point is that Bruce and Batman can't ever be fully separated. Something that I think his relationship with Cass shows us he's aware of but chooses to ignore. We know that Batman is dangerous, that he wouldn't hesitate to hurt his kids, we saw that with Zurr-Batman (WHO BRUCE ADMITTED WAS A FACET OF HIMSELF YOU CAN'T SAY IT WASN'T HIM BECAUSE HE HIMSELF SAID THAT IT WAS). So why try and act like it's this impossible out of character thing for Bruce to be harmful? For his kids to feel angry and hurt about his actions or for their feelings to be as or more valid than Bruce's. Batman has and will hurt his kids and Bruce will try to rationalize it all away because he loves them, he would never want to hurt them. And the narrative will tell us that Bruce is right, that this is good and fair and just, that Bruce's perspective is the correct one, that his kids deserve this, because this is a comic book and outrage sells. Or they'll retcon it and pretend it never happened. Or they'll just never bring it up again. Or Bruce will be forgiven regardless just to hammer home how good and right he is.
Because this is a comic book about Batman, and Batman is a hero, he is our protagonist, and so he is reliable and we should never doubt him, or call him out, or be mad at him. Naturally.
#ask#dc#glad you enjoyed my blog!#sorry I hit you with this but I've been stewing on it for a while#jason todd#bruce wayne#bruce wayne critical#meta analysis#character study?#of a sort
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i often include some obscure symbolism in my fics without any real desire to point them out but i was rereading an old piece of mine and remembered one i was rather proud of;
it's from YOU MUST KNOW LIFE TO KNOW DECAY. which is a canon-adjacent story about jason's experience with rain throughout his life. it spans over many years, starting from before his parent's death, to the present as red hood.
the rain itself is the massive metaphor and motif, obviously, but within that i snuck in some other key aspects to jason's character. the one i want to talk about it from the second section of the fic (unofficially dubbed "No!" and the period in time where jason was homeless):
in this scene jason's belongings have been dumped out of his bag into the rain over a misunderstanding, amongst these scarce objects are two things — an old book belonging to Willis Todd, and a photograph of Catherine Todd (the one jason has at his place when bruce comes to find him in Batman (1940) #408).
this photo always fascinated me and so i wanted to give it its own backstory. this moment however has two stories happening. a story of sacrifice for Willis, and the story of grief for Catherine.
the book willis used to love and jason remembers him reading often is the last remaining object the boy has to his father (because most of his belongings were left with his neighbour, and jason doesn't get those back until Batman (1940) #426).
unlike a picture or a letter, this book is a vessel between them, nothing about it actually is Willis' other than the memory attached to it. a nod to the fact that even in death, he had nothing other than the memory he left with his family.
catherine however has a picture, something that is entirely hers, but even that is all it is; her face. jason is young when his mother dies, and as he grows up, he'll soon forget the memories he made with her, but he'll never forget her face because of this last photo he has. her existence, prior to the disease and suffering and death, is forever immortalised for jason. she exists only before her death.
neither willis nor catherine are ghosts that follow jason. he mourns them and misses them deeply (and this grief is the entire catalyst for why he runs away in A Death in The Family) — but they don't come to him when he's doused with fear toxin or battling exhaustion. he doesn't see them when he closes his eyes. because they are not concepts he mourns.
they are a book, a photo, people he has lost forever. jason being a young carer, would have had to watch his mother slowly die to her disease, so he knows death in its raw forms. i have spoken before about how jason views love and loss, as being very literal and blunt understandings, and it's the same here.
so, we have a book and a photograph.
the book being destroyed by the rain is another nod to the modern characterisation of Willis Todd (in both canon and fanon). of the explicitly abusive and negligent father. how his character being "ruined" is usually to paint catherine as the weak and pitiful victim of circumstance and nothing more. neither of them have any true personality other than their surface level one's, which are often classist and ignorant.
on the other hand, willis' book being ruined but protecting the photograph of catherine underneath is to represent his story in jason's life. he was an absent idea because he was working to provide for them, jason didn't really know him outside of this story, and willis dies as a mere idea for his family.
it's not enough, however. willis dies, but it's still raining. catherine's photo may have been saved by some of the rain, but jason is still homeless and he will still have to endure it alone.
the second section of this fic is the saddest one to me, because while jason is the only todd present in this scene, there are three stories being told.
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cherrystainedknuckles
I guess the only problem with being asked to take a “marie kondo approach” is that in order to find any fanfic that appears to be based in actual canon timeline and plot points and characterization (which does exist, and I’m not sure why fanon fans seem insistent that it doesn’t), I literally have to search for hours. I’m not joking, I consistently make fic rec lists, and I have to search for hours and hours for actual canonical basis. same thing with character tags on tumblr.
I’m not saying fanon fans have to stop enjoying fanon or making up their own content. I’m just saying that when the tags used for both fanon tim drake and canon tim drake are the same tag it just becomes incredibly annoying sometimes, and I understand why people who like to engage with canon (me, often) become frustrated
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I have definitely had periods where I got incredibly frustrated with fanon! Around 2019, I was wondering if I needed to leave the Batfandom, because it had been so long since I read a new fic where the characters felt 'right'.
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But, if you're willing to, I'd like you to consider what you mean when you divide 'fanon' from 'canon'. Because I struggle to find a hard line between the two, for several reasons:
1. Fandom is transformative. Every fanfic is going to have some interpretation of the source material. The line between what is too much interpretation and what is acceptable is different for every person. For me, I find it can even vary based on writing style or other odd things - lighthearted fic can have more noncanonical stuff in it than heavier fic, and still seem true to canon.
2. 'Canon' is subjective. I do not consider the movies or video games to be 'canon', and it annoys me when things from those creep into the fic I'm reading. (I'm okay with SOME Battinson.) Some aspects of the cartoons are okay. I consider precrisis Jason Todd to be an alternate reality version, but Donna's precrisis origins are more canonical than the dumb retcons. Wayne Family Adventures isn't my main version of the characters, but I'm not bothered if some elements show up in my stories. I'm ignoring most of the nu52, but I like Duke and I'm still watching this new Lian to see what happens. I doubt your divisions are identical to mine.
(Also, some things that I think of as 'fanon' have shown up in nu52 canon! I do not accept them as any more canon because of this.)
3. Most 'fanon' is based on canon. Canon Tim has weird sleep habits. 90s Dick is really lighthearted and joking around some characters in ways similar to fanon. Dick can canonically not be trusted to take care of himself if his mental health gets low enough. Jason likes classical literature. Etc.
These are exaggerated and/or twisted in a lot of fic, but where is the line where they stop being canon? I wouldn't bat an eye at a lot of this stuff, if it didn't show up SO OFTEN.
4. Most 'fanon fans' do know some canon. What line are you going to set where it will be 'enough'. And are they allowed to mention parts of the canon they haven't read yet? Is anyone allowed to talk about Dick's early Robin days, or only the tiny amount of people who have read the golden age stuff? A lot of the 'mistakes' I see are obviously made by people who have read ABOUT canon, but don't know quite how it fits together.
5. 'Canon' is FULL of contradictions. Yes, there are canon events. Yes, there is characterization that is consistent across 3/4s of comics. But. I'm still working on my sidekick timeline. I've devoted days to figuring out ages and passage of time. I've spent over a decade trying to figure out Jason Todd's motivations, and why Tim treats him the way he does. I've read all the 90s and early 2000s CANONICAL character assassination of Jason.
I spent years thinking that Donna's death was almost as foundational as Jason's, only to later discover that I had just happened to read the specific comics that focused on the fallout, and she only stayed dead for a short time. That happens to fans ALL THE TIME! We read a character summarizing an event we haven't directly read, and just accept it as what happened. But characters have biases, and not all writers care about accuracy.
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I've read some Tim Drakes that I consider to be almost entirely 'fanon'. And quite a few that were so scarily 'canon' that I got chills. (Not all of which were similar to each other.) But the vast, vast majority have fallen somewhere in the middle.
I definitely do not want the responsibility of deciding which ones count as 'canon'! And I think I would strongly dislike anyone who tried to decide for me.
Being frustrated is logical, and I empathize. But the original post was about the impossible expectations some fans feel. The expectation to read thousands of comics, synthesize all the contradictions, and come to conclusions that match the 'true fans'. That's a perfectly reasonable thing to be complaining about.
If that's what some fans are experiencing, of course they're not going to want to engage with canon! There's no way for them to succeed, so why should they even try?
When you join THAT conversation to discuss your frustration about fanon, it strengthens that perception. When you call them 'fanon fans' it emphasizes their belief that you don't think they belong. And rather than trying to change, it's more likely that they'll double down. Canon is full of gatekeepers, so they'll avoid it.
#gatekeeping#fandom policing#fanon#canon vs fanon#usually don't do stuff like this anymore#I'm old and tired#but sometimes the words want to come out
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Love your ideas for the death of family au! How does Damian feel about this situation and what would the other members of the batfamily think about the situation with Damian and Jason. Would they want to try to get involved with this situation? Also, kudos to Jason for dealing with birth Bruce and Talia while protecting Dami in the bad scenario.
Many kudos to Jason for somehow having the skill to outmaneuver them as briefly explained in this.
Damian, from that tiny infant moment, was taught that Jason is his brother who loves him, is there for him, and will guide him. Talia, his mother, enforces this perception. Jason is also the one who is around Damian the most in this AU. I doubt Talia is going to become a stay at home mom for Damian. She's got a lot of responsibilities, her own people to protect/command, and she needs to constantly ensure her position in the LoA is stable (this is applicable to both good mom Talia and bad person Talia).
Few aspects to establish about Damian's childhood in this AU:
Talia's frequency of in-person contact with Damian (is she traveling a lot, busy, and distant, or does she make as much time weekly to get someone time with her son)
Jason's role in the LoA (is he training, taking missions, and leaving Damian for extended periods of time)
Ra's al Ghul's feelings/behaviors towards Damian (caring grandfather or the person who wants to use Damian's body as a vessel)
Talia's attentiveness to Jason and Damian (does she notice the manipulation, the words Jason says regarding her and Bruce, and Damian's closer bond to Jason)
Jason's protection of Damian (how often does he step in, comfort, or teach)
I'm sure there's more, but that's a few to consider.
Overall, Damian trusts Jason the most. His older brother has proven time and time again that he cherishes Damian. He may feel conflicted (and Jason may be a bit not mentally well if the Talia is a bad person route), but Damian will follow Jason's lead. The older one managed to put himself as the one to listen to above Talia, LoA, and Bruce.
For the others, it depends on their relationship with Bruce. Regardless of how good Bruce is, Jason doesn't trust him. Even more, he doesn't trust him with Damian. Perhaps that could change in the distant future, but that's the starting point. If the others have a good relationship with Bruce, Jason won't trust them for a long time either.
Tim may try to convince Jason to go back to Bruce. Jason would despise and loathe him for that. There's also the possibility that Tim never becomes Robin in this AU. He's not mentioned except for when he becomes Batkid (Tim presumably isn't Robin because Jason survived for that route, but he's not really mentioned in the other routes). Maybe Tim is hyping himself up to knock on Bruce's door when Jason comes back to town (this would be years of Bruce spiraling more and more until Tim couldn't ignore it). Somehow, Tim could get adopted by Jason, similar to how he does when he becomes Batkid. In that case, Jason sighs as he reluctantly let's the kid in.
Dick will face many difficulties in getting Jason to trust him. Hopefully, he has a horrid relationship with Bruce, or Jason won't talk to him for at least a year.
Anyways, Jason's definitely keeping everyone away from his kid until they prove worthy enough
#look at me figuring out how to incorporate word links on this platform#dc comics#dc universe#tim drake#jason todd#damian wayne#talia al ghul#thank you for the ask!!!!#dick grayson#dc au
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Cassidy Jade - Carnage of Earth-7103984
Often seen as a rebel, a delinquent and an all around bad influence, this girl has a much darker secret hidden within herself.
TW: Mention of suicide of a family member. Violence. Murder. You have been warned.
Cassidy doesn't talk much about herself, her home life or her past. No one at school really knows much about her, aside from the fact that she's a rebel and that she can often be found smoking in the bathroom or behind the school. She's a year older than Spindel, having been held back for a year.
Spindel met Cassidy at a very low point in her life. She had just managed to recover from the death of Gwen Stacy. Everyone understood how much time she needed to recover, being aware that Gwen was her girlfriend, but they had no idea how much Spindel blamed herself for being unable to do more to save her.
Spindel had heard of Cassidy, of course, though she'd only ever seen her walking down the hallway. Once she truly met her, she was bewitched by the rebel persona she had. Eventually, the two began dating, which was something Spindel's friends strongly advised her not to do, but she was blinded by her little crush. Eventually, however, as the weeks passed, Spindel started seeing why they warned her. Whether it was her sometimes violent temperament, her disregard for other people or her genuinely cruel behavior, Spindel was starting to open her eyes. Cassidy tried to explain herself. How her mother killed herself, how her father was a piece of shit, how they always moved before she could make any real connection. It worked at first, but Spindel quickly realized that they were just excuses and broke things off.
She was completely unaware that she had dodged a bullet. There was something far worse than a toxic relationship in the future.
A while later, none other than Spider-Woman was struggling against Venom near one of Cassidy's usual smoking spots. There was a bit of a mess, but nothing major, with Cassidy ending up with a simple cut on her arm, watching as the Spider and the Symbiote took the mess somewhere else. Cassidy hadn't even noticed that a bit of Venom's goo had managed to sneak into her wound, giving birth to something far worse.
While anyone would've thought that Cassidy would use her newly acquired powers for... Well, she wouldn't use them to better humanity, but still, no one could've guessed what she had in mind. The symbiote didn't give her any new ideas, but rather, it was just the push she needed to make them happen. During her first day with the symbiote, she killed her good-for-nothing father, leaving his corpse to rot in the upstairs floor while she continued living in the house like normal. Little by little, she started going out more at night, taking new victims, having more and more fun each time, becoming more creative. Eventually, she just left her home, not bothering to go back, even to sleep there at night. New York had one new great problem... Carnage.
Personality wise... Cassidy is a textbook psychopath. She cares about no one other than herself. If she shows any interest in other people, it's merely from the angle of how they could benefit her and nothing else. Even her relationship with Spindel was seen as nothing more than a momentary amusement. If one were to ask her why she's like that, she might mention her mother's suicides her bad father or the fact that she never managed to make a real connection with another person growing up. Hell, she might even make something up. In reality, all of this is just another manipulation tactic to get whatever it is she wants at the moment. She has zero redeeming qualities.
As for some non in universe story... A big inspiration for the character, mainly her backstory, was Jason Dean, from Heathers (the movie). The original idea I had for her was way more heavily influenced by the character, but I didn't want to have a carbon copy. Still, she retained many aspects, like the similar past, the rebel style and their nicknames (Jason Dean = JD | JaDe=JD, using her last name).
Art commissioned from @Angelesrevill_ on Twitter.
#marvel#marvel oc#oc#ocs#across the spiderverse#atsv#my ocs#oc art#original character#spiderman oc#carnage#oc artwork#spiderman into the spiderverse#spiderman#Cassidy#earth 7103984#spiderverse oc#spiderverse original character#spiderverse#into the spider verse#marvel original character#tw murder#tw sui talk#tw violence
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I have such a complicated relationship with the softer aspects of characterization in DC comics, like one of the reasons I don't read much of Wayne Family Adventures is because it's just not scratching that itch of what I personally want, the biting drama of the mainline comics is where it's at for me. (I am glad WFA exists, though!! it's cute and fun and a great entry point for those who want to start there or just for those who enjoy it!!) But then I'll turn around and any Soft Batfam Characterization in the comics will get me right in the feelings place, like I think one of the reasons I enjoy Taylor's Nightwing so much is because, look, over the 20+ years I've been into comics, I have been put through the fucking wringer with Dick and Bruce's relationship, there's no way I'm seeing some Soft Dad Bruce and In A Pretty Good Place Dick Who Hugs His Dad and not grabbing onto that with both hands and holding on with a death grip. I have earned this!!! This is my reward for all the pain I went through because of Knightfall! All the pain I went through because of Battle for the Cowl and RIP! All the pain I went through because of Nu52! I WAS THERE, I LIVED THAT PAIN. IT IS MY TIME IN THE SUN NOW. It is also very, very easy to clip a lot of these moments out for posting on tumblr, like it's sooooo easy to post a panel of a hug between Batfam members and slap a crying emoji on there, because that is how I feel in the moment, I love that stuff! I wouldn't make it through the meaner storylines without it! But it often probably seems like I'm just here for the Soft Batfam stuff like because I enjoy Taylor's writing doesn't mean I'm not also eating up the absolute batshit drama of Gotham War or kind of losing my mind at Gotham Nocturne being so much better than I first realized or suddenly I'm just now sitting up in interest at World's Finest: Teen Titans because of a conversation I had about the darker aspects of it with a friend. I love the silly stuff, I love the idea of Dick and Cass baking together in a super silly little story, I love that Dick and Jason said "I love you" to each other in that recent backup, I am delighted with every issue of World's Finest I read that is light-hearted, I'm okay that the current Nightwing series doesn't have a whole lot of dark depths being explored, because for me it's balanced out with all the other storylines I've read/am reading It's just--
It creates a sort of conflict in my head, where I love the more complicated relationship dynamics, I love the meaner edges of the characters, I love the hard bites they take out of each other, but those are often harder to talk about compared to how easy it is to cry about how cute the softer panels are, it's easier to talk about the moments of the characters having good relationships because my entire reason for being here is the Three Ring Circus of Batdad Issues That Dick Grayson Has Just Right There On His Sleeve For The World To See, but also I get kind of tetchy when that softer content is expected to be the norm in the comics, as if the characters having hard edges at times is out of character and that the only way to write them is softer. (This isn't about preferences, but about putting that expectation on others, feel free to dislike it all you want, that's fine!! but it's not ooc for the characters to be shitty to each other and be assholes sometimes and for others to enjoy that kind of drama.) It's hard because I enjoy the softer moments in the comics, but I also kind of glance askance at some of them, like, these moments scattered across the stories make sense, characters who are just assholes all the time are ones that aren't very fun for me to read about, people can be assholes and sweethearts, I think it makes for richer characterizations, but I don't want it to be like that all the time, either. And all of that is kind of hard to put into words, especially when I'm very aware we're reading comics, which have a whole genre of Comic Book Logic (things do NOT work like they would work in the real world!) and Comic Book Structure (the nature of so many different authors and some truly batshit apparent decisions by editorial make everything an incoherent mess that I cannot even try to make a singular vision) that affect things, too.
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MARK ESSAY! BIGASS MARK POST!!!
A lot of y’all already know I love Mark. Bro isn’t even my favourite SMG character but he’s also currently the one I feel the strongest about simply because I don’t see anyone else literally anywhere willing to defend him. Emily and Emma don’t need me rn y’all they have fandoms but THIS is a job for ur girl only it seems (woop woop) so I wrote this essay about why he deserves more recognition and less hate from the fans. I can’t promise it’s very well written bc I wrote it from like 2-4am and I haven’t exactly proofread but whateverrr.
LONG FUCKING POST AHEAD
A common thing I ALWAYS see from Mark haters is that he’s “boring” or “dull” compared to the others. While it’s true that his personality isn’t quite as distinct or individual as the other four, is that not… literally one of the aspects of his character? That he follows what the people around him do rather than voicing his own thoughts and opinions? It’s literally a part of his character so I don’t see the issue with him usually just falling behind Charlie or Kate for example, because it makes sense to me that he’d do that.
People often argue that he’s “too nice” and doesn’t have enough flaws. Why is that an issue when it comes to Mark when the same could be said about characters like Salim or Sam who are infinitely more loved? I also really like Sam and Salim but for the sake of this argument I’ll point out a few flaws in the fact that people seem to think they’re significantly more interesting than Mark. You can argue that it’s because of Salim’s arc with Jason, but that’s the arc more than the character himself. Really Salim doesn’t have any real flaws at all and isn’t all that deep of a character, as likeable as he is. And people have said it’s because of his action scenes, but I’ll get to that point about Mark later. With Sam, similar things can be said. Point mainly is, the idea that Mark is boring because he’s “too nice and lacks flaws” doesn’t really make sense if you’re not consistent with it when it comes to other characters too.
Something that @108garys pointed out that I agree sm with is that a lot of people tend to ignore the relatability of his character. I feel like I can especially talk about this one as Mark is one of the SMG characters I relate to most, possibly even more than Brad. With characters like Kate or Erin, it’s easy to relate to them because of their anxieties, and you see a lot more people admitting to relating to that where you don’t with Mark. He relies on other peoples opinions rather than his own, doesn’t like making decisions and can end up passing up opportunities that are better for him because of it. You can see in his interactions with usually Kate or Charlie that if they disagree with him about something, it doesn’t take much for him to step back and agree with them because that’s just how he is. I don’t know about other people but I find all that to be extremely relatable so I wanted to point that out as probably one of the reasons I ended up so attached to him in the first place.
Another think I see him hated for is because of his plot armour. Now this would be fair coming from someone who just hates all forms of plot armour but I see a loooot of inconsistency with this one. Out of all SMG characters with plot armour, Mark’s is a rare case that actually makes sense in the plot. Du’met had specifically selected Mark to be the next ferryman, of course he wasn’t going to kill him. I’m going to use Mike from UD as a comparison but a lot of this can apply to the other plot armour characters too. If you want actual plot armour, Mike is a perfect example. Where through TDIM, Mark isn’t actually in danger of death in most of his scenes (The only exception is when he and Charlie are crossing over that beam, in that case I definitely think he should have been able to die there but this is aside from that) Mike is put in dangerous situations where he can’t die SOLELY because of plot armour. Du’met isn’t trying to kill Mark, he’s trying to contain him which he does in fact do if he captures him. The Ws in UD are actively trying to kill Mike and yet never actually do, for no plot related reasons at all, just because the game doesn’t want Mike to die yet. Another thing that’s different about these two cases is what happens when both characters lose their plot armour during the respective climaxes. In the climax of UD, Mike has ONE singular death and that’s it. Once he can die, he can only do so in one way. With Mark, he has the most death opportunities in the climax out of anyone. Du’met targets him during the entire fight. By default, Charlie and Erin have single QTEs to survive the end, Jamie has one choice, and Kate (Or Jamie/Erin if they’re the second to last instead of her) can only die if Mark is killed. Once Du’met is pinning Mark over the axe, it literally takes one fuck up to get him killed from that point on. I know I used Mike for this argument but similar things can be said about others like Jason, Salim and Nick. Mark is one of the only characters whos plot armour makes sense and yet I see his get shit on far more than any of the other examples when so many of those are worse.
(This part is a bit more of a ramble about his role in the story and relation to Du’met than anything. Bear with.) Anyway another point I need to point out is that people really have no business acting like Mark is somehow unimportant when he literally has the most personal conflict with the antagonist?? So for starters, Mark was specifically targeted by Du’met, and I’d argue has the most personal conflict with the guy. He was the only one that ever could have worked for ultimatum (It would have to be a man making the call, and Charlie doesn’t really care enough about any of the others for it to work with him.) So he’s at the centre of Du’met’s entire game, and I’ve always felt that the fight on the boat feels kinda personal for this reason, because Du’met would honestly have such a hatred for him by that point now that I think about it. Du’met had this entire plan that he thought would go smoothly and time and time again Mark actively fucks it up for him. He breaks through Kate’s window in breathless, and right after that in workshop he ends up avoiding the cage he was supposed to fall into. After that he’s the first to escape the hotel, and next time he runs into Du’met they fight. By this point, sure Du’met is still not trying to kill Mark, but he chooses to attack Mark when he could easily just chloroform him as usual. Something about the way he fights Mark here makes me think he probably had a personal hatred of him at this point. Assuming qtes are failed, he’s out here stomping on the guy, hitting him with an axe handle, literally picking him up and throwing him and kicking him in the ribs while he’s down. And we know he’s not trying to actually kill him here so that whole thing screams anger or frustration more than anything. Then on the boat later, he targets Mark the entire time. (plus the way he deliberately shows Mark, and Mark only, his face definitely makes it feel more personal imo) He’ll spend half the fight trying to shove Mark into an axe, the whole time just swiping off Kate/Jamie/Erin when they try to save him. And out of everyone, Mark is the only one who can directly kill Du’met. (at least until he’s revived) Also this is just the boat ending. Ultimatum is a whole new thing. He literally is forced to work for Du’met to continue the cycle. So when a character has this obvious (to me at least) of a personal conflict with the main antagonist, you’d think the fandom would do more with that, since they seem to do it with other characters, but then I remembered it’s Mark and nobody thinks about Mark </3
(This entire thing I realise can be used as Du’mark propaganda. It’s not exactly what I was going for with it but fuck it, it is because it was things like this that made me point out the ignored potential of that dynamic in the first place. You can’t tell me people wouldn’t go wild if things like this happened with like… anyone else.)
So I find it weird that people seem to not really do anything with any of this? For example, ultimatum is such a horribly amazing concept, and it specifically involves Mark at the centre of it, and yet on the rare occasion I’ve found an ultimatum fic, it never involves Mark. I’m being so fr rn, until 108garys posted their recent ultimatum fic I’d never seen an ultimatum fic with Mark. Lemme repeat that there were ultimatum fics, but no ultimatum fics with Mark. How tf r u gonna have an ULTIMATUM fic and exclude the ultimatum guy???? There’s also people who think he didn’t adopt Connieeee guys wtfff literally whooo else can he have one thing omg omggggg😭😭
Sorry got a bit unhinged there at the end but look whos living up to the name <3 anyway yeah as Mark’s no.1 fan😍 this post was always gonna happen. I jus think he deserves a lil bit more credit yk??? ���
Anyway gonna tag @queerkearney in this bc the whole idea came from our chats I love our chats <3
#the devil in me#mark nestor#Du'mark#theres that one part that kinda makes this count as propaganda so fuck it i'm shoving that tag in
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Reading Robins. I know it's not popular but I've been enjoying it so far.
I managed to ask Seeley about what inspired Anita during an AMA and he said he wanted to flip the script: everyone's told stories about the bad of being a Robin, nobody talks about the bad of not being a Robin and that's what she represents. It's meant to show being robin in a different light than we're used to.
An interesting page.
An interesting show that Anita has tucked herself inside the Batcave and has access to everyone's secrets. I do think that Damian here is doing sibling joking over threatening, this book has been really focused on the familiar bonds so...
I do appreciate how much Seeley is presenting Dick as the experienced, smart one. But also giving Steph experience and value on the team!
The silly tone of this book does wonders for it.
Of note here: they're technically here to save some villians that Anita kidnapped to use as live bait for the Robins. This leads to:
The most beautiful panel of Dick EVER. Plus seeing Tim removed from Bruce and being far more morally grey and ready to not save the bad guy. I do think this is pretty damn in character for the guy. I do appreciate Rivas delivering some amazing art on the second page, fucks expression capture the mood perfectly. However I really am interested in the point being dragged up here: Tim's argument of the rules of robin being defined by being Dick is really interesting.
Genuinely some of my favorite Tim in a while. He's not perfect, he's not the bestest boi of the batfam: he's hit headed, he thinks he's invincible and perfect, hell he thinks he can beat the rest of the Robins in a fight. He's the teenager here! Pure stupid testosterone teenager! Plus you see a hint of the fact that this guy is the only one who actually has privilege to throw around. This feels VERY rich white boy the way he's acting in a way that I think most people forget. Over all Seeley captures Tim in an aspect that I wish we saw more often.
Additionally, we see evil-Tim™ pop up from under the surface. It's no secret that in most futures Tim becomes an evil Batman who kills anything that gets in his way and I can't help but feel like Seeley is hinting at that future here.
It is important to note that this takes place AFTER Zdarsky's Urban Legends 1-6, which means Jason is actively currently trying to make amends with Bruce, and viceversa. A reminder to that Jason often is portrayed as the mirror to Batman, with Bruce often describing Jason pre-death as a happier, kinder version of himself. Even after, Jason tends to mirror Bruce a lot more than the rest of the fam bar Cass. I think there's something to be said there about how Tim made this big deal about Damian telling him he'll never be batman, saying he'll make sure the criminals die, and Jason being the one specifically to stop him.
Also AGAIN with Steph being shown to pull her weight on the team! Look guys! It's the bare minimum that we ask DC for!
I hit image limit, sadness. RB coming.
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I feel like, in TTC anyway, it was implied that the big three kids, maybe just Poseidon and Zeus's kids, typically have a difficult and tenuous relationship. I liken this to the fact that the ocean doesn't play by rules, it is unpredictable and chaotic, which goes against the law and order nature that Zeus has going on. Which is why I like to think that Hades's children naturally bring their cousins together because they play on both sides due to the underworld's nature, but without them the other two struggle to get along.
It's also implied, at least in the first book that I remember, that demigods sometimes take on the attitude of their parent towards other demigods. So like Annabeth struggled to like Percy at first because he was the son of Poseidon and Athena doesn't get along with him. And Zeus and Poseidon have a tenuous relationship and that's represented in Percy and Thalia and Hades is reclusive and private, possibly due to family alienation, and that's represented in Nico pushing people away after Bianca, his only family, died.
So the kids are representative of their parents. And I like that aspect. But if we take that and apply it to Jason and Percy, then yeah their relationship should be bumpy at best, especially when you factor in that in Rome, Neptune is reviled and Jupiter is bigger factor than Zeus had been (I mean he was always important but in Rome, I think he was more... Centered? I guess? I can't find the word, but you get it), which amplifies all the traits that Percy cannot get along with and with Jason, he sees Neptune in Percy, the terrible unforgiving sea.
I think the bro thing came from MoA, after the fight scene between the two of them, if I remember correctly they jokingly call each other bro as they talk about the possibility of killing one another - and I'm pretty sure the implication here is that they're both annoyed by the concept that the other person thinks he could've actually won.
So yeah canonly I think they try to ignore each other for the most part. They'll be friendly if they have to, but ultimately they don't really like or enjoy being around one another.
Ofc fandom is fandom and fanfic is fanfic and people can write them being buddies or in love or whatever, hell knows I do it sometimes 😂
Honestly I think a lot about the relationship between the big three as cousins and friends, even between each other as siblings, and how their powers might affect or cancel out each other and how they're written to be almost human representatives of their parents.
Like I think Hades's kids are often very close and loving with one another, because death is a very communal thing through grief bringing people together, and funeral practices being committed. Additionally wealth is often passed down and inherited through families so that keys in the predominant Pluto money side. On top of that you have the implied isolation from other demigods in past, which obviously bring them closer since they don't have other people to rely on but each other.
I think Poseidon's kids are very touch and go, they love each other but they'd also kill one another if they had to. They'd be distressed about it, yes, especially if they were close, but when it comes down to it the ocean is ruthless and so are they. Neptune's kids are probably more standoffish and don't get along with anyone, even each other, as a result of their father being reviled. They probably have little interest in most people.
Limited loyalty, I can imagine, is a very big thing across all his kids, and it's not just something that happened for Percy. Like personally I headcanon Poseidon as a very limited loyalty type of person as well. His love is strictly for his wife, and maybe a couple of his kids. He likes other people, even loves other people, but their lives are very meaningless to him when it comes down to it and he'll drown them if he has to. Fuck, he'll drown them if he's bored.
Zeus's kids struggle to get along with each other. I headcanon that they're often very rules oriented and they get iffy if they believe the others aren't following the "right" rules. As a result they often question one another's leadership capabilities and will argue frequently or get into fights about it. Despite this, they're very hierarchical - a trait that is more amplified in Jupiter's children. They do care about each other, but there is always the undercurrent of "I should be making the decisions" even if one of them doesn't actually want to be the leader, and that's what trips them up a lot. I headcanon that in the past some of them have killed the others in order to become the leader.
Percy is limited in his friendships because. That's just who he is. He's too one-minded to really open himself - like he didn't even like Tyson when they first met, they only hung out because they went to the same school and Percy felt bad for him (and also didnt have any other friends so like why not go sit with the other friendless weirdo). And Jason is just. You know, Jason's got his own thing going on.
But anyway. Yeah because of this it's so funny to see people writing them as hanging out, and being friendly with each other. And like!! I am guilty of this too, because it's fun to write the seven as being buddies and I love the concept of "Jason forced everyone to be his pack mates" but the reality is they probably aren't that close. Like I think Annabeth probably is friends with all of them so all the get-togethers are because of her and when she's not around, they immediately split up into their own groups
Anyway - I will elaborate the friendship circles later, but rhe point of this post was basically, like, lmao.
Whenever Jason and Percy are hanging out with someone and the other shows up to hang out too, their immediate visceral reaction is just, "Ugh. He's here's too" and I just love the concept of them trying to hang out with Nico and he's like oh I invited the other one and they're just smiling like "oh cool! I haven't seen him in a while" but internally they're just "oh my god i fucking hate that guy, what does nico see in him"
This makes my being into mutual perjasico even funnier but lmao. Look sometimes headcanons can be conflicting 🤷♂️
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gonna be an unpopular opinion but the way fans treat tim is really indicative of how society views autistic people. tim is HIGHLY autistic coded, from his extreme interests to his social awkwardness.
in early comics with him in them, tim is actually a pretty good representation of autism. he is shown to have a strong interest in batman and robin/nightwing, he doesn't realize when he's upsetting people, and he often goes about things in a blunt, clumsy way. even the way he speaks fluctuates between being incredibly articulate to incredibly childlike. he seems simultaneously innocent and all-knowing, childish and an old soul. all of this is common in level 1 autism spectrum disorder. tim is clearly gifted but he isn't a super-genius, he's just a talented and dedicated kid. although he didn't have to work the hardest of all the robins in general by any means, he did have to work the hardest to become a robin, as he lacked any training before that and came from a privileged background where he had been somewhat coddled by his families wealth. even jason had fighting experience, tim did not.
another aspect of tim's character that is a good representation is his empathy. there is a theory of empathy that says there are 3 types, emotional empathy, "I feel as you feel", cognitive empathy, "I understand how you feel", and compassion, "i want you to feel better" like many autistic people, tim is somewhat lacking in the second category but has an abundance in the third. he talks openly about the death of jason in front of bruce dick and alfred without realizing it could upset them and is shocked when they react with anger. he often gets himself in trouble by saying things that come across as rude or blunt without meaning to. however, he is incredibly compassionate and deeply cares for the people around him, showing that he is very capable of empathy.
a major autistic trait tim embodies is what psychiatry calls an "uneven profile". uneven profiles are when someone is very skilled in some areas but behind in others. tim is a clear example of an uneven profile because he is highly intelligent and learns practical skills like fighting quickly, but he is lacking in non-practical skills. he has a black-and-white way of thinking about good and evil that is more commonly seen in young children than in teenagers. he idolizes batman and nightwing and it takes him years to learn that they have flaws like any human. a large part of tim's journey is learning to overcome this style of thinking but it is still a clear developmental delay in the beginning.
overall, tim is a compassionate, warm, and intelligent, yet flawed character. he is a sweet and clever kid with a big heart (sometimes too big).
so why is it that in fanon, tim is portrayed as a cold, calculating, all-intelligent super genius with no autonomy? disregarding the fact that it is an insult to his character, it is also an insult to autistic people in general, especially when people claim they headcanon him as autistic but use the fanon version of him.
there are 3 main ways that autistic people are viewed in fandoms:
The Artificial Intelligence. the artificial intelligence autistic stereotype pins us as robots, capable of great feats of intelligence but incapable of emotion. this is the most neutral of the stereotypes, as we are not seen as human and therefore not stigmatized as humans.
The Man Child. despite its name, the man-child autistic stereotype can apply to any age or gender. the man-child autistic's primary trait is being annoying. they are likely savants, but they use their skills to be obnoxiously pedantic. they are unreasonable and demand everything be to their specifications at all times. sheldon cooper from the big bang theory fits into this category.
The Woobie. these woobified autistic characters will always be found wearing oversized clothes and having shutdowns but NEVER meltdowns. they cry often and need to be held and comforted by friends and family who serve as caretakers to the 'helpless baby autistic.'
and when the people who claim to like him write about him, tim is never held responsible for his actions, he never takes others into account, he is a tech genius and he has questionable morals, or doesn't seem to have a moral code at all. he has a troubling coffee addiction and lacks sleep at all times but, like any good supercomputer, he can go out and patrol just fine despite it. he is a machine, running on air and spite.
it is mostly tim's haters who portray him in the second way. that's when you get a tim who is selfish and snobbish, mostly towards poor innocent damian wayne who has never done anything wrong in his life.
sometimes, tim is written so he can't take care of himself. when he does have emotions, they're all sad ones. he cries himself to sleep, and dick or bruce or even jason for some reason have to come and comfort him. they force him to stop drinking so much coffee and to go to bed at a reasonable hour even as an adult.
now, don't get me wrong. there are some autistic people, quite a few actually, who do need to be taken care of as adults. hell, I'll probably be one of them to some degree. but even with someone who will never be able to live alone, autonomy is the most important thing to remember. people should always be allowed to make their own decisions as much as they are capable of. and tim in fanon has almost no autonomy. it is, plainly speaking, a huge fucking insult to the disabled community.
When the first and third stereotypes are mixed, you get a cruel mockery of an uneven profile. similar to the manchild trope, this is a tim who needs everything his way, but this time it's all given in to by those around him.
so, in conclusion: in early comics tim was an excellent accidental portrayal of low support needs ASD, but fanon took away all his positive autistic traits and turned him into a shallow stereotype of an autistic person and a mockery of all his actual autistic traits. even the seemingly harmless coffee-lover headcanon feeds into the horrific stereotypical treatment of his character.
#tim drake#batfam#autistic batfam#autistic tim drake#tim drake robin#tim drake rant#rant#autism headcanons
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How do you think that jason acts when he and his s/o fight?
I think that he kinda just go out to think, bc he dont like yelling and dont like to fight with someone he cares. I think that he doesn't like conflict. I can understand it bc Im kinda like him in that aspect. So he go out, think, and give his s/o a time to calm down and think about everything. Then he comes back, and apologize.
i completely agree.
but i stand by the fact that they don’t fight often because jason is very soft boy deep down and i doubt he would ever date someone who doesn’t understand that sometimes he gets moody and can’t share anything. so the fights are rare but kinda explosive when they get bad because they are so inconsistent.
i have this idea that jason is so used to such rough and tough love for so long after coming back from death, so when he finally finds someone to help smooth some of his jagged edges the last thing he wants to do is toss an edge at them.
i also think that because jason is always yelling and using his temper to his advantage in the field when he’s with you he’s always scared that his time bomb of emotions is always close to exploding whenever the two of you get on each other’s nerves or in a really heated argument.
jason definitely keeps quite because of the fear that he may say or do something he regrets so he keeps his mouth shut and allows you to spew your hurt, anger, frustration, etc.
he allows you to speak and he’ll answer or defend himself if need be, but he HATES it. and he hates it even more because he knows that normally it’s caused by his lack of communication or his over, overprotectiveness (he loves you so so much).
but he won’t yell, he’ll let you yell as loud as you need. he does answer you, calmly and in attempts to explain. he’s very good at keeping a level head, so he listens to each word and actually digests them.
but he does leaves after, but he lets you know and he says he’ll come back at night or in the morning if he needs to be stitched up because you and him both know that you will always help regardless of how angry the two of you are each other.
but he will leave because he needs to get his anger out and he wants to be as far from you as possible, and you take this time for yourself as well.
he needs to think about his actions and just focus more on the issues you brought out into the light, in turn you worry about him not coming home to you each night and holding you close.
this why fights don’t happen often in the slightest.
and after a few days, or if he comes back sooner after patrol or because he needs something from the house, the two of you end up talking and work things out time and time again.
i could go more into detail about the making up but it’s pretty generic and you can kinda see the big picture :)
#batfam#batfam au#batkids#jason todd#soulmates#jason todd fluff#jason todd x reader#jason todd x y/n#batfamily#dc comics#dc red hood#red hood x you#red hood x reader#red hood headcanon#red hood#jason todd angst#dc jason todd#jason todd headcanon#dc batfam#batanimation#batfam headcanons
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Addictions in media change constantly often to reflect different issues at the time or because of restrictions. It isn't good but it is a fact of industry. Roy's addiction has changed in other stories and the arc was completely rewritten in the Young Justice Cartoon. But even then Lodell wasn't in charge of all aspects of N52 which included changing Ollie and Dinah's history and the original Titans didn't exist in that reboot. So he couldn't have used them. Either way it got reconned back so just do the comics pick and choose. Not sure why you are so upset about Ollie. Relationships in comics get more dramatic all the time. Like you point out Bruce was originally much nicer then became colder. Even then they reconcile and care so the relationship and love is still there. Also I would say a lot of people came away from RHATO as Roy and Kori fans. Like look at a RHATO fan blog you will find nothing but love for the characters and people using it as a starting point to get to know them better. There are several Roy Harper fan blogs that point to RHATO as their starting point. Sure the older fans you talk to share your point of view but you will always have an amount of confirmation bias in the reactions you see. Fans who disagree with you aren't likely to speak to you. You will likely not engage with fans of RHATO so you won't get to learn if they are an older fan or not. There have actually been several old fans talking about how they felt Justice League: Cry for Justice and Rise of Arsenal were the low points of Roy comics and RHATO actually saved the character and allowed him to recover from that point. Like do you spend time listening to people who like the comic and engage with them in a non judgmental fashion. Do you have fun with them and make up head cannons or talk about aspects you enjoy or things you would change/explore? I'm not saying you have to like RHATO I'm asking are you able to have fun with people who do and play in the sandbox of ideas it affords.
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1. YJ is a TV show and isn't canon at all?? Like, the Light and the Reach and clones aren't a comic thing and don't fit into the continuity. I take noncomic media as elseworlds - simply because events just don't fit into established contuity.
2. Sure, Roy relapsing and Lian dying WERE low points, BUT they were meant to be! Like the death of Jason Todd or Alfred were to Batman.
It was a huge event and the death and Ollie killing and Roy relapsing and then recovering were meant to be significant. The New 52 'fixed' that by completely erasing Lian. As it did most of Roy's previous traits/experiences - to the point that if not for the name and red hair, he was almost unrecognisable. That's not what I call helping the character recover?!
Especially since literally no comic EVER references Kori and Roy's RHATO experiences except for red hood ones. Roy 'recovered' as you put it, through Rebirth - joining the Titans and re-establishing his relationships with Ollie and the other arrows.
3. People can't be fans of RHATO and pre-52 Roy and the same time because they're so different! I can't really pick and choose because BOTH just can't have happened! The two simply don't reconcile!! Both have incredibly different experiences and are simply NOT the same person to an even greater extent that other characters in N52, who atleast mostly stayed the same tone wise, if not experience wise. Like, I could read N52 Nightwing or Batman or Flash and go, 'Yeah, they're histories are wrong, but the characters still mostly act like they did before'.
Which is why DC erased the N52 and Rebooted with Rebirth. Because there was literally no other way to reconcile pre and post 52 characters into one cohesive character.
4. If people are fans of RHATO Roy and Kori, once they read previous issues (which they will, because they're simply so MANY more) they'll see how much they were changed - and I've never met ANYONE who thought erasing Lian and Dick from their lives was a good idea. I'd love to talk to people like that and see what I'm missing, if you know any.
And just objectively, the pre-52 stories addressed more complicated topics and emotions, were deeper and there were so many more!
5. Yes, characters change, but it's usually a slower, more gradual and more understandable process - Bruce, for example didn't go from crying as Dick left for college to saying he'd get rid of Bruce Wayne and only be the Bat (in Bruce Wayne murderer) in a single issue. It was a slow process and even so, the New 52 Bruce was almost unrecognisable in his treatment of the robins. Again, just like most other characters.
6. I'm upset about Ollie because N52 and fandom really screwed him over - they're this weird commonly accepted assumption that Ollie was somehow is terrible father who needs tell off by Bruce of all people!? And N52 kind went with that premise. In Snowbirds, where Ollie kicked Roy out after finding him shooting himself up, Ollie is shown being distraught about it and deeply regretting it and MOST importantly, he apologises to Roy almost immediately, welcomes him back and acknowledges what he did wrong and the issue is mostly resolved by the end of the issue and only improved with the years - to the point where Roy would greet him with a hug and a 'Dad!' and Ollie would kill for Lian.
Ollie, especially in contrast to Bruce, was a more relatable kind of hero - the kind who took things personally and CARED so much about his family!
Of course I'm upset with what Lobell did to his and Roy's relationship.
And yes, it was Lobell who wrote that Ollie and kicked Roy out and forgotten about him! And yes, the Titans didn't exist in the N52 version, but then how had Roy and Kori been close to Dick, Garth, Vic and the others - as in evidenced by Roy asking her if she really didn't remember any of them?? And Roy clearly knew Dick enough to make jokes about him and Kori to have been engaged to him. Why erase the part about how they (Dick and the others) were the ones who helped him recover and instead make it as if they abandoned him as soon as he, how did Lobell put it, 'fell off the wagon'.
I'm sorry, but I hate when writers shit on and recon away previous relationships - making Jason out to be a 'bad' Robin, for example, still pisses me off.
The unsubtle and awful changes are literally what I hate about new 52. I think it was terrible and DC shouldn't have done it. Telling me to engage with it more is kinda weird since my whole problem is that I don't WANT to engage with it.
I won't mind if people would tag things properly - many regular Nightwing or Titans fics go off of the RHATO version of Roy while still keeping the others Rebirth. Which, as I said, I assume meant they just didn't know the character's history or thought RHATO was the correct version in EVERY continuity (Which, FYI, it isn't - Rebirth erased it back to the pre 52 version).
Sorry, this is a long and rambly way of telling you why I can't do the usual comic pick and choose with N52 Roy and Kori (and even Jason a bit).
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You think when Jason first went to Bruce’s him and Dick had an interaction that went like this,
Jason: you don’t know what it like
Dick: Bitch I’m sorry which one of us went to juvie
LOL I get the joke and all but see, I do wanna be clear:
(And this is just in general rather than aimed specifically at you or this ask, anon).
I spend a lot of time talking about being anti-Trauma Olympics and that extends both ways. I don't want Dick perceived as more traumatized or having had it harder than anyone else in his family, just that his own traumas and hardships aren't erased or invalidated in favor of propping up someone else. At most, I'll talk about something like the Forever Evil situation and how he was 'more' the victim there than they were, but that's because that's a specific situational thing where both he and other characters' feelings and hurt in regards to the exact same set of circumstances are being compared, and I'm like, well if you're GONNA do that, you kinda gotta look at who was most directly impacted by events versus had feelings about what HAPPENED to the first person in the first place, just....conveniently leapfrogging over that dude's actual feelings about those exact same things.
But ultimately, although I'll spite-LOL about this sorta joke in response to other fans Doing the Most in the other direction, like.....tbh, I wouldn't be any more in favor of this kinda interaction in fics or canon.
What I WOULD love to see is rather than the kids being pitted against each other in a kinda pseudo competition, see them use traumas and parallel situations as a basis for common ground and building stronger bonds. Like, how much more powerful would it be if what we got instead was Jason finding out about Dick's past experiences with juvie in order to make Dick someone he feels DOES get certain things. I mean, Dick never DID experience various things that Jason did living on the street or earlier living with Catherine and Willis....but like I've always posited that in the early years Dick had a primal fear of fucking up and being sent back to juvie by Bruce, Dick absolutely would be able to understand the fears of a kid who was caught committing an actual crime by Bruce in their first encounter and feared what might happen if Bruce ever decided he wasn't worth giving the benefit of the doubt and ultimately would never be more than a criminal.
Part of what bums me so much about the direction most fics and headcanons take towards Dick and Jason's earlier interactions, is there's a huge chasm in experience, perspective and privilege between Bruce and BOTH his two eldest. That chasm is not nearly as vast between Dick and Jason themselves. Where they diverge in prior experiences tends to have a lot to do with specific situations and circumstances rather than axis of privilege. (Especially when you consider - and god I'm tired of this - how often people default to being like 'well Dick at least had loving parents' when ahem, HOW OFTEN has Jason made clear that he has very affectionate memories of Catherine because she was at times a very loving and attentive mother, and that's WHY her addiction and death hit him so hard, not unlike how the murder of Dick's parents hit him so hard BECAUSE they were loving and nurturing? Like, how often do people throw characters' own stories and canon away JUST to make the case that they have it harder than another one? Can we stop this? Forever preferably?)
But point is, there are tons of areas where Bruce just fundamentally didn't relate to Dick and never was going to be able to, because Bruce was never in a position of being at the mercy of various institutions. Bruce never had to worry about being thrown out by his guardian, Alfred, who technically worked for his family even as he raised Bruce. He never had to deal with peers looking down on him because of who he WAS rather than giving him shit for specific circumstances or events. He never had to worry about his parents or past being demeaned as worthless, he never had to balance trying to retain a sense of self without being subsumed into Bruce AND the Waynes' larger than life shadows, history, and perception in the eyes of the public.
However all of these and more are areas where Dick and Jason absolutely overlap and this could be greatly of benefit to each other, if it was ALLOWED to be. For Dick, Jason's arrival can be an opportunity for him to finally have someone who gets various aspects of growing up with Bruce that will just fly over other peoples' heads as being a problem or them having issues with at all. For Jason, Dick can be an opportunity for him to have an easier time understanding Bruce when these gaps in perception and experience appear, or making himself understood by Bruce, by drawing upon and learning from Dick's own experience trying to navigate those very same gaps between Bruce and himself in years prior.
And even where Dick and Jason's experiences diverge, there's still plenty they could learn from each other that they STILL couldn't have in common with Bruce. Like yeah, Jason - even with a loving relationship with Catherine factored in - didn't ever have the benefit of Dick's history being part of a huge communal family in the circus, and around people who were open and generous with their affection and all that.....and frankly, Bruce never had this either, even factoring in his own relationship with HIS parents. But its something that Dick could definitely impart wisdom in, that would be helpful to Jason in learning to be part of a larger community of superheroes overall, and how to interact with a bigger family that wasn't limited just to himself and his guardian or guardians....as well as helpful after their family grew to include more siblings.
And Jason did have a ton of experiences and perspective born of living on the streets and being entirely self-sufficient from a young age, with wisdom he could share with Dick there, who was MORE likely to get the benefits of that than Bruce even, because Dick did have experience with a closer mindset to what Jason had had at the time, and even if Dick's own experiences running from juvie or in Robin Year One were far more finite than Jason's ever were, there's enough of a foundation there for them to build a common awareness of major events in each other's past and like....thus be able to talk about them, unpack them with each other and not have to worry about being judged by someone who just fundamentally might not get it or understand where they were coming from when they made certain choices based on those mindsets.
And then back again, part of why it bugs to so often hear Dick's years growing up in the mansion talked about as wholly a good thing when there's no separating them from the years he spent as Robin, is because Dick has knowledge and awareness of the streets and crime that's predicated entirely on his years as Robin, that's still broader than Jason's in the sense that Jason's knowledge is limited just to his personal, more contained experiences, whereas Dick as Robin interacted with all sorts of crime and criminals and victims. And who better than Dick to learn from in regards to what its like to even BE a teen vigilante, because for all Bruce's experience as Batman, he debuted as an adult, he'll never be able to relate specifically to the fears and finer points of taking on people who are older, bigger, more experienced than you, when you're that young and small. But again, all of that requires like, ACKNOWLEDGING that Dick went through some SHIT when he was younger, and that doesn't have to TAKE AWAY anything from Jason's own hardships, but it has all the capacity in the world to ADD things to Jason's toolbox for dealing with his hardships.
But yeah, ultimately, like....it annoys me to see Dick's own experiences so often glossed over or romanticized in order to act like he's so oblivious to what someone like Jason's life was like, but more than that, it just bums me because its a waste of so much potential material and just.....erases the opportunity for so many stories that could explore actual new, uncharted territory rather than just retread the same old beats about how oh Dick is just oblivious to what REAL hardship is like but Jason gets it, see.
That's gonna get a yawn from me, lads.
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Sweet Little Bird
Rachel was going to throttle Master Jason when she found him again. They had come to the city; a city which she loathed to meet with one of Jason’s employers. Hidden in a ridiculous fedora, and spectacles, it all felt ludicrous. But she was carrying a special parcel for Master Jason, and she was armed. Apparently, she was to meet one Etta Candy for a little informational drop, it was rather irksome, but Rachel did not want to upset Master Jason, and he was paying her handsomely. Also, she now owned a pair of custom, lace up boots, which properly fitted her feet; it was a bit of a novel concept really, and she rather liked how they felt on her feet.
So, she was walking through the city, a dangerous place, looking for Etta Candy, one of Jason’s employers. Jason had informed her there would be people looking for the parcel, so while she delivered it he would be providing a dangerous distraction. Unaccustomed to the charade of cloak and dagger work, Rachel had agreed on the acknowledgement they would not be using her real name.
Sir Patrick Morgan had coded her Ravena, Jason called her Raven, as it would suit all of Master Jason’s horrid habitual pet names, he called her: Rae, Little Bird, Sunshine, etc. and it would be a good code name. She had not spoken out and disagreed, though she loathed the nickname passionately. It was a bit degrading, but Rachel was honestly thinking this was just an aspect of Jason’s personality as he nicknamed everyone; he called his father B. A letter, not father or Bruce, but B, it was rather demeaning and degrading. And this was not including what he would call his brothers. Master Jason had a most unusual aversion towards names and saying them in a general sense.
Still, she found herself anxiously walking down the street, gripping her parcel with a death grip in fear of enemies’ agents following her. She was aware that if she was captured, she did not exist to the British nor the Americans; which had not endeared her to aiding Jason in his quest of espionage. Bloody Americans, always so brash and rash, and bloody reckless, she wanted to hit Master Jason over the head with a book to get it through his thick skull she was not meant for this sort of employment!
Her breath shuddered from her lungs as she kept a focus track on her path, because she would not be caught; she would not, she refused, it was not even a possibility she was entertaining.
“Lovely weather we’re having, shame I forgot my umbrella,” a perky, happy voice of a dotty little redhead announced as the woman appeared on Rachel’s side. “Oh look, such a swift little bird fluttering about!” she squealed.
“If you are in need of an umbrella, you may use mine; do you mind that it is blue?” Rachel asked tightly.
“Blue is the loveliest of colors,” the woman informed her giddily.
Now Rachel stopped to take in the short, round woman. “Miss Candy?” she asked softly.
“Oh heavens, I was warned you are a formal one, all about propriety,” she sighed. “Etta, love, please call me Etta. I haven’t been Miss Candy since the schoolyard.”
“Rae…” she said uncertain of what name the woman would be in possession for Rachel. No one had confirmed which name they would be feeding Etta Candy; if that was her real name. Rachel was a bit baffled seeing this woman working as a spy, but then again, it was probably because she looked the part of being the last woman to be a spy that made her a spy.
“Rachel Roth, yes, I am aware, let us go speak, I know a wonderful café for a spot of tea. Do you like tea?”
“Yes,” Rachel answered uncertainly as they walked.
“Good, come along,” Etta ordered. Rachel was cautious, but she kept strid with the woman, aiming to keep stride with the smaller woman. It wasn’t often someone was actually shorter than Rachel.
They ended up at the café Etta wanted and Etta supplied a happy stream of chatter. Rachel was surprised but she wasn’t, the woman seemed to talk about everything and nothing all at once. It was rather a unique accomplishment. Finally though they had both been served their teas, and parcels were exchanged rather neatly; Rachel was surprised at how smooth of a trade off it was.
“Well, it was lovely meeting you, Miss Roth, and we must do this again,” Etta declared, giving Rachel a pert set of kisses on each cheek before leaving. Rachel counted to thirty five as instructed, before paying their bill and leaving herself. She took a bus back to where she had started, walking to Brown’s from there.
She made her way back to Master Jason’s reserved quarters using the maid passages with ease. Rachel had spent most of her life navigating the servant passages so she knew how to use them in hotels too. It did not take her long to make her way into Jason’s room. Pulling out her key, she opened the door and silently slipped back into the room. Master Jason was sprawled over hs bed, ankles crossed and a sniffer of amber liquor in his hands resting on his stomach.
“I must admit you are impressive little bird,” Jason rasped. “Even Sir Morgan’s pompous agents lost you.”
“You informed me to discard all tails, your parcel,” she held it out for him. He peeled open and aquamarine eye as he looked at it then her then back. He took it carefully from her fingers and she walked away, peeling off her wool coat as she undid her bun to re-do it. “I conversed with Miss Candy, she is a rather lively creature so we had a good chat. There is nothing of importance to tell you about my journey.”
“You actually got to Etta?” he sputtered.
“Yes, and returned, so, am I done being your messenger?”
“No.”
“I am not a spy,” she hissed furiously.
“You’re a dangerous little bird,” Jason stated. “And we are heading to Greece, I have a meeting with Princess Diana and her younger sister, Princess Donna, this is important, little bird.”
She scowled as she stood in front of him.
#bluboothalassophile#historical au#jayrae#redrae#raex#jason todd#raven#rachel roth#raven roth#etta candy
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