#bcus the thing is that if she was... how did she justify. any of that?

[fideidefenswhore]

Who is your most hated Seymour? For me, it's John, Thomas, Edward and Jane.

roflmao, tbf, i know intellectually that there's not enough there there to justify hating john seymour, but he does give me bad vibes...whatever happened with catherine fillol was weird and i do get the sense he was involved even if not in the rumored way. and also, when siblings hate each other to such an extent, it's often bcus they were pit against each other by their parents, so i get the sense he was not a good father (there's some debate on whether he died late 1536 or 1535, tbf, but if it was the former it's strange that none of children seemed to mourn his death, that he wasn't mourned at court as the queen's father, etc) . margery doesn't have enough about her known for me to judge; it's sort of weird to me that this stereotype has fallen she and jane had a bad relationship and her favorite child/daughter was elizabeth (this occurs in like...several...novels). we don't have an equivalent positive remark to 'next to mine own mother, no woman alive i know better' (AB, about her own, and to bridget wingfield), nor any records of them often being in each other's company during significant events or eras, but we don't have anything negative either. i get you have to make choices in fiction and 'neutral' is not an interesting one but like...damn.

what's interesting about edward and thomas is that, even before their sister becomes queen, edward is not spoken of well by his contemporaries. very early (iirc, 1535) on, his 'small conscience' is decried, and he becomes such an avaricious figure that cromwell and the king have to interfere in his attempts to manipulate and loophole property laws to his own advantage and the impoverishment of others (and, not usually in his favor, despite him being a royal in-law). thomas, however, seems like he's better liked in the 1530s, although this can maybe be attributed to him being more of a nonentity (a comparative example is some tudor authors insisting GB was 'better liked' than his sister anne-- not true, it seems-- or more often, that their sister mary was...which is probably true, but also probably more indicative of relative lack of power and positions and leverage than 'kinder' personality)...it's not until the 1540s that we get comments of the same genre ("somewhat empty of manner"). thomas thus seems more like a figure of gradual corruption, his arrogance was increased by his nephew becoming king, it seems, and resentment brought out an ugly side of his character (arguably, the same with edward, just earlier on).

it's extremely unpopular to say this on here, but yeah, jane is definitely not a favourite of mine, either. but i don't think my reasons for this are really common...i don't care if she slept with henry before marriage, i don't care if she didn't, i just find her biographers weirdly contradictory in their judgements of her character, the nature of her rise, and her own beliefs. there's also like, this sense of historic illiteracy from some of her defenders...joining a royal household (as far as the most prestigious positions, that is) was not the equivalent of serfdom (as in, they could leave at any time). jane's supporters were courtiers who hated anne, so it's reasonable to assume she did, as well. so, there's this sort of moral hypocrisy about jane as a figure and her advancement and how she came to her position that has always prevented me from warming to her as a figure. 'she hated anne and all she stood for' explains her involvement in her downfall, but not her securing the position in her household in the first place. and by virtue of her close proximity to anne as queen, she also knew that it was nigh impossible that she was actually guilty of the accusations of adultery.

what else...her defenders insist that the oaths of supremacy and succession were anathema to her moral compass, yet she likely did have to have had taken them herself, just as a subject, and if not that then definitely as a member of anne's household. this wouldn't have martyred/imperiled her life, althought it probably would have her career (elizabeth darrell never took these, so i wonder if the penalty for women was different...? barton is often cited as an example but this was not in her indictment. princess mary seems to almost have been a victim of this, but it might've been more that her signing was more important since she was a rallying point for dissenters).

and even if jane never took these, the presence of noblewomen serving anne as queen lent to her greater image of royal legitimacy. she had to have known that, and if she didn't believe her position was legitimate...then why be part of that tapestry? there's not an equivalent to her predecessor to be made here, not when anne left her own predecessor's household and began her own as soon as she came to believe catherine was not legitimately queen or henry's wife. any credulousness towards contemporary report of this time would suggest anne was extremely hostile towards her rival, but there is a difference between declaring that you'd sooner watch your rival hanged before revering them and, well...actually doing that (...effectively, if not literally).

actually, i don't think there's actually much to suggest jane was set against the religious supremacy unless you make some suppositional leaps (the dissolution wasn't so explicitly connected here, her support of mary as princess, even if rather cosmetic, could be seen as support for her decision not to take those oaths herself for nigh on two years...). nor against succession acts as brought by parliament, since the same illegitimized any potential rivals to her future children, and she seemed to make a point in one of her only pieces of writing we have in emphasizing edward's legitimacy (implicitly, at the expense of her stepdaughters).

the narrative fiction i probably dislike about jane the most is this idea that she was so reverent of catherine's memory, it's really fucking weird, honestly... it bothers me because i know it's embellished to increase reader/viewer (the tudors comes to mind) sympathy and somehow for me it does the opposite, lol. there's something about the concept of her trading on the memory of this beloved woman (who, herself, probably didn't even remember jane, there's nothing to suggest any kind of friendship between them) who was exiled, this woman whom jane did not a single thing for (not even abstaining from joining the household of her rival), that just really grosses me out. henry was the one who was her husband, and obviously he was a fucking asshole to and about her, but there's at least something more...direct, in his attempted erasure of her memory. it's always bothered me that it's never acknowledged that the antecedent (which was carried on throughout) to jane's queenship was the erasure of both her predecessors, the illegitimization of both their daughters, both of them being subordinated, and, more or less (mary present for christmas, elizabeth not, but both there during the rebellions) equally expelled from court.

[jackietaylorsghost]

I have a bit of a hot take regarding tlou/tlou2 which is that sometimes a parent will make a decision that goes against a child's wishes for their own wellbeing. I've heard it said "What parent wouldn't make the choice Joel did" and I think it relates to that, taking in everything with the fireflies and that Ellie is A Child, I think Joel was in the right to make that choice for her. I hope this doesn't come across as dismissive of Ellie, because I'm more trying to think of it from the point of view of a parent. Sorry this was so long.

i honestly think this is a very normal take and any to the contrary i find so baffling lol. like look we can debate all day about whether joel did the morally right or wrong thing in terms of the wider world and in regards to his lying too. i personally think he lied to alleviate ellie of this burden she was carrying that she personally had to save the world to make it up to her loved ones that they died and she didn’t. in the context of him telling her that he’d struggled with surviving but you had to find something to live for i can see his wish for her to not carry that burden cus ofc as a parent you wouldn’t want that and for me i think it’s a bit of a superficial take to say he saved her and then lied out of selfishness cus he couldn’t bear to lose her bcus whilst yes it benefits him too, i don’t see that as his primary reasoning - I think this is backed up too when he tells ellie that he’d do the whole thing again. that’s so striking to me cus the (stupid) consequence of his actions was losing a kid for a second time but despite that pain, knowing that consequence, he’d do it again. doesn’t smack of selfishness for me, i think that’s incredibly selfless of him actually considering he’d lost a kid before and took so long to get over it. but that’s MY interpretation and everyone’s will be different and i can at least acknowledge that.

but this continued nonsense about joel doing the wrong thing for ellie when he saved her bcus he was taking away her agency makes me want to die actually. it’s so fucking weird. ellie is ready to die bcus of TRAUMA. and that’s not actually a good reason to let a 14yr old kid die. if we wanna talk about agency/autonomy let’s talk about how the fireflies were attempting to manipulate/exploit ellie’s trauma and survivor’s guilt in order to justify what they were going to with her, cus that’s far more fucked up and is what ACTUALLY takes away ellie’s agency. it so fucking exploitative. ‘you know she’d want this’ well first of all then at least have the decency to actually ask her and second of all yeah i think she’d have agreed to it but wanting to out of guilt and trauma isn’t actually a free choice lol? and there should be no fucking debate on that. joel absolutely did the right thing to stop them.

i think a big part of this agency/autonomy thing is a result of part 2 lol. i think it’s easy to use it as some war cry to justify why joel had absolution coming to him and deserved to be beaten to death the disgusting way he was. almost as though it’s some sort of justification for abby and liking her. joel had it coming blah blah he stole the cure from the world and he took away ellie’s agency go abby!! which is just bullshit imo but what can you do.

what i think is the biggest shame of all is that part 2, in its attempt to justify a complete estrangement between joel and ellie so that her suffering would be Worse when he died (cus they didn’t give her enough trauma in that horrible game), went with this idea of ellie being mad that joel took away her chance to have a life that mattered. that fucking sucks for me cus she’s my favourite character and i wanted more for her. i wanted to see her overcome that trauma and let go of her guilt by realising it wasn’t her fault her friends died and i most of all wanted her to realise her life ALWAYS mattered and that’s why joel saved her. instead ofc the narrative wouldn’t work unless we had 25 hours of it being shoved down our throats that joel was so Wrong for saving ellie that they didn’t examine his actions and the reasons with any nuance or care, it was just so superficial and boring and heavy handed. how sad that at 14 ellie was ready to die bcus of trauma and thought her life didn’t matter/have value unless she was a cure and at 19 she still thought her life didn’t matter cus she wasn’t a cure. she deserved better. from the narrative AND this fandom that, if they actually cared about her as a character, wouldn’t keep banging on about joel taking away her agency/autonomy and would have wanted to see the same growth in her i wanted to see instead of thinking it’s some great masterpiece that she’s completely stagnant, even after she’s been tortured relentlessly for 25 straight hours lmao. i find it all so bizarre to see ppl claim to care about ellie but don’t see anything wrong with how the devs treated her in order to tell their misery porn story. these are the same ppl who so patronisingly write on this app about how they’re ‘the real fans’ (ive had this directed to me personally) cus they were sooooo clever to understand part 2 lmfaoooo.

anyway this got away from me and was far bitchier in parts than id intended it to be ajsjjs it just Grinds My Gears when this agency crap comes up cus it’s ridiculous BUT yes i agree with you completely.

[cringengl]

this is about the troy/angela el poll

a lot of the people in the tags are confusing me?? el hitting angela was not self defence and was not justified. yes angela was a terrible person and a bully, but i feel like people are blinded by the ‘girlboss moment’ with el that they forget how wrong it is?? it was a complete overreaction and irrationally violent behaviour. i’m not trying to say el is an awful person but i do think mike was justified to be upset with her.

bullying is not okay but neither is assault. she was bringing a gun (or roller skate ) to a knife fight and caused more harm than good. it was defo not self defence cus she waited and did it after because she was angry, not to protect herself. sure, it was her way of standing up to angela, and maybe her past has given her the wrong ideas of how to deal with conflicts in day to day life (like when she was being bullied in the lab, she had to use her powers to defend herself) so she acted irrationally. i can understand why she did it, but it still can’t be justified.

troy literally convinced mike to try to kill himself and almost succeeded if not for el, not knowing the full context besides the fact troy was putting her friends in danger, she was right to injure him. how would she know if any more damage could be caused? troy had a knife held up to dustin’s face and caused such a hostile environment that el’s response was appropriate. and she saved mike’s life. that’s why he was happy.

the thing about defending herself vs defending someone else isn’t it. she wasn’t really defending herself, she was taking revenge and it was way over the top. she has killed people in order to defend herself before and nobody gets mad about that because it’s justified

Yeah exactly, El wasn't defending herself and what she did wasn't justified.

This almost seems like a commentary from the Duffers about El and how people paint her as a 'girlboss' because whilst El is probably the Stranger Things character that changes the most, one thing that doesn't really change is her relationship with violence, specifically how she uses it. El is one of the most violent characters on the show, which does make sense since it's a show where monsters are killed and she's the one with powers, but that doesn't make it any less of a fact.

So many characters and lots of the audience are so concerned about whether El is a superhero or a monster, without realising that what she wants to be and what she needs to be, is a human person. Previous to El's attack on Angela, pretty much every time El is violent, it's praised, mostly because she's helping people. Whether that's killing government agents, destroying big fleshy monsters, or hurting violent bullies.

And so while everyone is concerned about teaching El how to style her hair and break up with her boyfriend, the only time her violence is addressed in a bad way is when Hopper calls her a brat after she explodes stuff in the cabin in s2 (while she didn't hurt Hopper I would definitely count this as violence) which was shitty parenting 101 from him as he just puts it down to an attitude problem bcus she's a teenager and then never talks about it again.

So when El sees that someone is being a dick, she does what she knows best, and hurts them. And while I would say everyone's (including Mike's) reaction is understandable, no one really gets why El would ever do such a thing and now El is concerned about whether she's a hero or a monster- she's neither. Her relationship with violence needs changing.

The thing about s1 El is that she's almost alien. No one can tell whether she's a boy or a girl, she has a shaved head, is wearing a generic hospital gown, can hardly speak, and she doesn't even have a name, just a number tattooed on her wrist. So now they're in an abnormal situation with an abnormal girl and now her violence is justified because to the other characters and the audience it's a cool sci fi show!!!!

But s4 El is different. She isn't an alien, a superhero, or a monster. She's a girl, who goes to school, has long hair, a sense of style, she can now speak etc. And now that she's done what she's been doing this whole time, just not in this abnormal world anymore, the normal world, where only now people are realising it's a problem.

Although I'm in 100% agreement about how El isn't justified, what she did was definitely overkill (even if Angela was a cruel bully who needed standing up to- hitting her with a rollerskate wasn't the answer), I think that it was honestly only a matter of time until something like this happened because El and so many of the other characters are focused on whether El is a superhero or a monster when she's just a girl. It is partially the fault of Dr Brenner as well as those who are now raising her (Joyce, Hopper etc) because they've never seemingly addressed this issue. El's capacity for violence shouldn't be ignored just because it's 'useful'.

[dickie-gayson]

The Batman Effect

I’ve been sitting on this thought for a while and figured I’d finally share it. I’m calling it the ‘Batman Effect’ bcus I’ve noticed it occur most notoriously with Batman - tho it’s present with other characters in varying pieces of media ofc.

‘What is The Batman Effect?’ you may ask. Well, I’ll tell you!

The Batman Effect is when a character is propped up on a sort of pedestal and the characters around them suffer in characterization. Whether it be competence, skill, intelligence, personality, etc. See where I’m going with this (and why I chose B-man)? This is kinda lengthy, so I’m putting it under a cut.

For Example:

Dick Grayson: We know he’s hypercompetent. He made an excellent Batman himself. He’s won numerous fights against extremely difficult enemies. He’s led arguably some of the most - if not the most - teams in the DCU. However, once Batman - Bruce specifically - steps into the picture, his competence drops dramatically. 

He’s a mild example.

You ever notice how irritating it can be when Batman or another such popular character enters a title/scene bcus somehow they seem to outdo everyone even when they feasibly shouldn’t? 

‘But he’s The Batman!’ you may cry.

Yeah. That’s the point I’m making. He was never this bad. Never a point of such intense flanderization until he reached critical popular success. He’s been a staple for decades, yes. But he was...manageable. Real. That’s the downside of fame. Once a character hits a certain point of fame they lose the ability to, well, lose. They have their faults but those faults are almost never larger than the faults of those around them. They take precedence.

Let’s take it a step further. 

Those in association with Batman seem to get a sort of...boost from the writers (depending on the writer) that causes them to give that ‘Batman Effect’ to those around them. Everyone is fine and then a Batfamily member enters the scene and suddenly the power dynamic shifts. It’s centered on That Person. Competence fluctuates unfairly. It drives me absolutely nuts. This works with other non-Bat characters, of course. If That Character™ has others associated with them, then those associates get a sort of unfair boost as well (but never greater than That Character™).

There seems to be a sort of hierarchy too. When multiple Bats are around, it depends on A) Which Bats are present and B) Who the writer is. Damian gets an unfair boost due to being Bruce’s ‘blood son’ - which is just ridiculous (ily Dami). It gets more complicated when it involves other Big Name Heroes (such as Supes, Hal, Flash, etc.) Then you need to take into account which Bat(s) are present and which Big Names are around. If the Bat ‘outranks’ that Big Name (in the eyes of the writer) then BOOM, Batman Effect. 

Need a more extreme example?

How about...Selina Kyle. I love here but how in the ever-loving fuck did DC justify her being able to take down multiple running speedsters without a single problem? 

That makes no sense at all. I still get angry just thinking about that tbh. There isn’t a single feasible reason she’d be able to see them and land a hit that they wouldn’t notice and dodge OR get massively injured/killed due to hitting something that’s moving at super speed. She’s tied to Batman and was engaged to him in that comic. Therefore she must be able to do such feats! -sarcasm- The Batman Effect. 

Characters get demoted to ‘sidekicks’ to the Bats once they’re on the scene. Example: Jason Todd and Roy Harper. Ever since Outlaws, Roy has been intrinsically tied to Jason and only Jason, reduced to ‘Jason’s bffl’ and ‘Not As Good As Jason’ despite his incredibly rich and complex history, very notable skills, and many ties to other heroes/teams. Koriand’r too. I am not getting into that. 

‘But you’re a Dick Grayson/Batfamily stan! You should be happy!’

No. No, I am not. Not in the slightest. I like proper, realistic characterization that doesn’t shit on other characters just bcus someone rocks a Bat-symbol. I have many favorites that aren’t Bats. EVERYONE deserves fair characterization. I can openly admit that Dick Grayson gives off The Batman Effect when around many other characters (never Bruce, tho. Gotta remember he’s tHe BaTmAn™). Just bcus he’s my favorite doesn’t mean I appreciate it. I want him and those around him fairly and accurately portrayed (that’s a rant of a different time).

It’s also most noticeable when it’s someone's main title. I understand that since it’s a character’s title comic it should be in their favor. However, I don’t think it should be unfairly in their favor. The writers have to make it work without pushing characters down low. There’s no reason to degrade or dumb down a character just to make another look good. If you have to do that then you aren’t doing the story or the characters justice. Something isn’t working with what you’re writing.

‘Are there any other examples?’

Ohhhh plenty. The most notable is: Big Name Heroes/Villains vs Legacy/B-list/Lesser-Known Heroes/Villains. If you’re against a fan favorite or pop culture icon then big fuckin RIP to you. Things get weighed in the former's favor bcus they’re The Money Maker. Regardless of the skills/abilities of the other characters, the more popular ‘Money Maker’ usually finds a way to come out on top UNLESS it’s ‘For The Plot’ to lose. They get flanderized in a way that isn’t fair. It doesn’t just make the other characters suffer, it makes them suffer too. I’m actually to the point where I can hardly stomach Bruce being in anything bcus the inevitable downgrade of those around him. 

Like stated earlier, there’s a Hierarchy. It's almost like a popularity contest any more or the writer’s personal feelings on the character(s) and not their established characterization :/ 

‘They’re trying to make money! It’s a job, after all!’

They can make money without destroying their characters. Yes, even the greatest will one day fall bcus people will just get sick of them. Like I said, every character suffers from this. 

I can list so many characters who’ve lost good portions of themselves to this phenomenon - whether being the one causing the Batman Effect or the one targeted by it. It’s almost heartbreaking.

This, of course, isn’t just a DC problem. It’s liable to happen in any comic or any piece of media. And, again, this doesn’t always happen but it’s enough of a problem that I almost dread reading certain titles with certain characters for fear of the characterization due to the pair-ups. Sometimes it’s not all bad. Not every writer does this, thankfully. It’s just prevalent enough to be a problem for me. Hence, this post. 

So, from now on, when I see shit happen in comics/tv/movies/etc with characters that make no sense other than to make one look better than the others, I’m marking it down as The Batman Effect.