#because I. did not study at all.

[dreamsy990]

drew some of my fav ody designs! wasnt originally meant to be also replicating the styles but thats sort of just how my brain works. except i didnt copy the lineart styles of anyone here so its DEFINITELY a bit uncanny for a couple of these (LOOKING AT YOU QINNY IM SO SORRY) but whatever

the designs featured here (from left to right) belong to: me, @gigizetz, @neal-illustrator, @irunaki, @bigidiotenergytm, @qinnyanimation, and @foopsie-daisy

[quailsprout]

what's better than one prowl? zero prowls-- i said zero! zero!!!! nooo!!!!!!!

edit: template added below the cut bc i originally put it in another post lol

[thewhizzyhead]

how genderbending the warriors (2024) is done not for the sole sake of "bad-assery"

okay here we go feminist ramble time for our newest chick on the block: warriors. now i'll be honest, prior to listening to the album, when i first heard that the warriors main girls were originally dudes in the movie and the novel, i thought that the decision for the genderbending, in lmm's perspective, were from the following: 1.) girl power move in like a very basic meaning of the word "bad-ass" 2.) simply a twist on a cult movie about big gang bros loved by the film bros, and 3.) a way to have the schuyler sisters back together gjfkdfldf

but when i read more about warriors and its development and how lmm took inspiration from the gamergate controversies of 2014-2015 aka among the peak of gamerbro misogyny campaigns, that's when i realized that Oh Shit Is Serious - because adapting a story about a group being framed and targeted and harassed for something they are accused of doing without any substantial proof other than a man screaming "THE WARRIORS SHOT CYYYYRUUS" with 21st century misogyny campaigns in mind makes the theme of fighting back a lot more complicated and a lot more resonant, going beyond just marketing a cast you can call "badass"

take the hurricanes' quiet girls, for example. the hurricanes (concept album version) is the only gang that lets the warriors off the hook and with a stern warning: quiet girls don't make it home. here, the hurricanes berate the warriors for not saying shit or attempting to defend themselves from accusations they know well aren't true. THIS MESSAGE IN PARTICULAR is what stays and influences ajax, fox, and swan til the very end of their stories.

literally one song after this does ajax show how easily she resonated with the hurricanes' lesson by finally sticking with her gut and actually choosing to fight back against both the baseball furies AND against the sleazy undercover cop. the latter encounter is one of the instances that really solidifies the recontextualization of the story because in the OG movie, ajax (a dude) WAS the sleazy fuck up harassing a woman in a park - and now with the literal character switch, ajax goes from being just a rebellious gangbro dude bro into someone whose want to fight is warranted. such a want to fight is seen in fox seeing as fox is the first to comment on the quiet girls scene and that, in the concept album, she is the one that instigates the rumble against the police in union square - saying that she is sick of being afraid of them and their 'fuckin powder blue' colors (also notice how she is the only warrior that really does say fuck the cops i think that's cool BUT I'LL TALK ABOUT FOX MORE NEXT TIME)

to a less obvious extent, swan also gets the receiving end of this recurring theme - by the album's finale, the usually violence-averse caution-first interim leader becomes a lot fiercer in protecting her crew. but perhaps among what i consider to be the biggest recontextualized change in the feminist sense is MERCY and her motivations to join the warriors in the first place. according to the wiki, her attraction to swan and the warriors and um seeing the orphans as wimps is what led her to switch sides BUT IN THE CONCEPT ALBUM, mercy's motivation to become a warrior is deepened, rooted in admiration rather than attraction - wanting to be like those women who hold their head up high. and again, we see this in Sick of Runnin' when she takes part in the rumble, finding her bravery within their ranks as they fight back. here, mercy becomes less of a swan tagalong and more of someone that wants what the warriors have: pride.

of course now that i type this out i realize that warriors is not based solely on the feminist rhetoric as with their theme of hope amidst adversity, the story is more intersectional and rooted in community struggle and wanting for more than that. but nonetheless, i genuinely believe that the twt filmbros arguments on why the genders should not have been changed in the first place just for "woke" points is kinda like,,,very shortsighted because not only does the narrative of women narrowly escaping unwarranted accusations actually fucking fit, but the act of learning to fight back amidst all odds - be it that of disbelieving, predatory men or the power of oppressive pigs - stays resonant for women yesterday, today, and the days to come.

ultimately, warriors (2024) is not solely a tale of female badassery - rather, it is a tale of the need for such "female badassery" in the face of past and present realities, which is why it somehow fucking worked.

[selin-aka-puppydogs68-on-tt]

Sooo is anyone else obsessed with willtresor after the recent chapters or…

“study for your calculus exam or open a tumblr account for the sole purpose of posting toxic yuri/yaoi art” my honest reaction to that information:

ugh im so obsessed with them they’re so stupid now give me 500 fics of them (“IT’S A MUTUAL SHIP ITS NOT ONE SIDED I SWEAR” i scream into the void)

[tea-cat-arts]

Shen Yuan getting transported into pidw isn't "the system punishing him for being a lazy internet hater," but instead representative of "step 1 of the creative process: getting so mad at something you decide to go write your own fucking book" in this essay I will

[slavhew]

baby blue

i couldnt decide you get 2 other vers of that last one pfffrrththttjt

[dreamyblanket]

Sorry guys, wafer on the brain, it's terminal u.u

Anyway, I'll elaborate on this in the tags bc omg I'm going to yap your metaphorical ear off.

[surreal-duck]

Tuesday is chuu day! (x)

[inspired-lesson-plans]

This is a very long post. If you do not have the time, then please at least do the quick activity up top. The lesson plan that took me 4 days to write will follow the ⁜ symbol.

HW Due Mon:

Open https://mysolartime.com/ in a new tab and allow the website to track your location.

Open https://www.utctime.net/ in a new tab.

Reblog this post the current UTC time and your local time, using the following format:

21:00 UTC, 4:00 local

4. Vote in the following poll.

⁜

Social Studies, Grade 5, Geography 6.1.5.GeoSV.3: Demonstrate how to use digital geographic tools, maps and globes to measure distances and determine time zones, and locations using latitude and longitude.

Do Now:

Provide students with a paper copy of a population density world map and 2 minutes to fulfill the following instruction:

Draw lines on the map in order to separate the world into 24 time zones. Try not to separate dense population centers into different time zones.

⁎

Class Discussion:

Use the projector to share and discuss the maps of any students who are willing to share. Have fun with this, there are bound to be some good ideas and bad ideas because 5th grade is like that.

Then, project the official world time zone map, and discuss the good ideas and bad ideas present here.

Exemplary discussion points:

The 0-point of the timezone map is the Prime Meridian, which cuts right through England. Why do you think it's in England?

How come some countries like the US and Brazil are cut into multiple time zones, but China isn't?

Why do you think the lines are pretty straight in Europe, Africa, and North and South America, but so confused in Asia and the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans?

⁑

Direct Instruction:

Long ago, nobody really cared about the exact time. All you really needed was sunrise, sunset, and noon, and you could figure those out with your eyes. If you wanted to be fancy, you could put a stick in the ground and trace its shadow over the course of the day to measure out hours.

Perhaps the first recorded complaint of time-keeping technology comes from Rome in 250BCE.

The gods confound the man who first found out how to distinguish hours! Confound him too Who in this place set up a sundial To cut and hack my days so wretchedly Into small portions! When I was a boy, My belly was my sundial: one more sure, Truer, and more exact than any of them. This dial told me when it was time To go to dinner, when I had anything to eat; But nowadays, why even when I have, I can't fall-to unless the sun gives leave. The town's so full of these confounded dials, The greatest part of its inhabitants, Shrunk up with hunger, creep along the streets. [x]

In other words, "Kids these days are always looking at their sundials. Back in my day, there were only three times, Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner. All we needed to tell the time was our stomach!"

Please note this was a satire, so if it sounds funny, you are correct.

But for 18th century British sailors, accurate timekeeping was no laughing matter. These sailors used fancy math (called trigonometry) to calculate their latitude. So long as they knew the angle between the sun and the horizon, and the time when that angle was measured.

Ship's captains would keep logbooks of these measurements. That way, another ship's captain would be able to reference the logbook in order to replicate the journey, much like replicating a science experiment.

Now... think about this... how can you do that unless the next captain is using the same time as you. We take this for granted today, but how can you be sure that two clocks are synchronized?

Scientists in the town of Greenwich, England (pronounced gren`-ich) recorded the solar noon every day of the year and calculated the Greenwich Mean Time. By keeping an accurate and exact time in one exact place, GMT eventually the Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) for everyone in the world. That's why in the time zone map, the 0 runs through one specific part of England.

This is important. For the first time in human history, the clocks in different places were synchronized. Solar noon happens at a different time in London than it does in Greenwich, but if they both use GMT (otherwise known as UTC), then they can coordinate their schedules. This was very important for railroads, where exact, coordinated schedules are very important.

Soon, the entire country of England existed within a single time zone.

When the United States built railroads that spanned vast lateral (East-West) distances, they needed to create different time zones for cities that were far apart from each other, such as New York and Chicago. Thus, the US became the first country with multiple time zones.

As the rest of the world industrialized, they needed to pick their time zones. You can see this on the map. Each time zone is, at least in theory, as wide as 1/24 the circumference of the Earth. It's like the space between the numbers on a clock! Most countries are smaller than this, so they can comfortably fit within a single timezone. Others, like Brazil and Australia, divided their landmasses into two or three time zones.

China did not have widespread industrialization until post-WWII dictatorial communist rule. This was a very uncaring and inconsiderate government, to put it mildly. Suffice it to say that for Chinese farmers in the far west, having to get up 2-3 hours earlier every day would have been the least of their worries.

⁂

Modeled Activity:

Show students how to use this Day and Night world map as a way to visualize the day and night cycle across the world.

Additionally, show them how to use https://mysolartime.com/ to find their current time where they live.

Give students a moment to calculate the difference between their Local Time and the official time in their time zone, and what that means.

(I am currently in Philadelphia, which is 11 minutes East of New York City)

Finally, show students how to use https://www.utctime.net/ to find their exact, current UTC.

Have students calculate the difference in minutes and hours between Local Time and Official Time.

00:41 - 19:30 = -5:11 (Philadelphia is 5 hours and 11 minutes East of Greenwich, England)

Explain that every internet connected device in the world uses a service like this one, then adds or subtracts hours to fit the time zone of your current location.

Higher Order Learning:

Students work in small groups to look up the local time in different major cities around the world, recording their data on a worksheet. As they do, they should discuss the following questions:

Are time zones still relevant in our always-online society?

If you can know your Local Time and the UTC any time you look at your phone, then what purpose do time zones still serve?

How would it feel for schools and businesses to use UTC instead?

How would you feel if your school day went from 4:20-10:50 UTC?

Finally, each student must individually write at least 3 sentences responding to the following question:

Would you advocate for or against your school district dropping references to the time in your time zone and instead referring to UTC and Local Time? Why or why not?

[shadowduel]

all i wanna do is untie all your knots, dissolve all your thoughts

[romans-empire]

Hot take but I don't see Clover ever becoming a lawyer like most adult Clover HCs. In my eyes, they would become a detective or private investigator.

The kid climbed up a mountain with a missing poster on hand and willingly jumped down to the Underground unknowing if it was the right choice or not just to find out the truth of the missing children. Additionally, the entire process of learning about the Ketsukane tragedy-mystery!!! They are very determined to find out the truth by their own hands and deliver justice when needed!! Clover is a very hands-on person and I don't think arguing and presenting evidence would cut it for their brand of truth-seeking and justice.

[starrynightarchive]

i think it's fucked up and foul that during situations he feels trapped or unsafe, oikawa doesn't have a fight or flight or freeze reflex. to be specific, he does have a fight reflex, but it doesn't involve fighting by himself. if he thinks he's unsafe or trapped or in danger, he turns to iwaizumi.

during the last set of the second seijoh v karasuno official match, you can see oikawa beginning to crack when karasuno bridges the gap and makes the score 16-16. his next toss goes to iwaizumi, because he knows his iwa-chan will be there. he knows his palm will connect with the ball. when he loses his footing, he reaches out his hand, blindly trusting iwaizumi will pick him up. and he does. everytime, he does.

kageyama mentions once that iwaizumi and oikawa are always in sync, both by body and mind. and it's true because even when they're on the court, they're not the ace and the setter. they are iwaizumi and oikawa. iwa-chan and shittykawa. oikawa knows iwaizumi's favorite beetle and the flex of his wrist when he spikes. iwaizumi knows oikawa's real smile from his fake one and he knows the number of milk bread packets he eats per week (too many) and that's just the thing, isn't it? even in court, they're not just players. this is a dance that only they know the steps to, a kingdom that has always been theirs to rule. how beautiful it is, to know the sound of his footfalls without looking, to know the exact place he's going to set to in a court of 6 players without hesitation, with full certainty.

during the final point, oikawa sets the ball to iwaizumi. he could've chosen the person closest to him. he could've crafted his toss so masterfully that no one can see whats coming. but he chose to get it to iwaizumi at the other end of the court. it doesn't matter if his set isn't perfect or clean. it doesn't matter, because it's set to iwaizumi and that's enough. he knows he will take care if the rest.

and the thing is, the thing is, right, i firmly believe that in that moment if he chose to set to someone else, it wouldn't have been as beautiful and perfect as it was when he set to iwaizumi. there's something about knowing someone like the back of your hand and being aware of the beat of their heart more than your own that brings that kind of perfection. when oikawa reaches out, iwaizumi always reaches back. he knows iwaizumi will do everything he can to spike the ball.

and just like that he is 7 again with a scratched knee crying for iwa-chan to carry him even when he's not by his side. but he screams for him because he knows with absolute certainty that he will come. he will help. he is not alone.

the final set of his official high school career goes to iwaizumi, loud and proud. he points to him before he sets. he tells the court to watch. watch me. because he is certain that when it's him and iwaizumi, they're invincible. he wants the world to know of his worthless pride. he wants the world to know who he is proud of.

and just like that he is 7 again, screaming "iwa-chan!" in hopes his best friend will find him.

and he does. he does.

[apollokyler]

omg @saintseiya-zone posted the Underworld fanzine :) thanking them for the project ands inviting you to go see everyone's works<3 am excited to participate w papillon myu🦋 close-ups and some butterfly yapping under the cut

took some liberty interpreting his wings ands his eyebrows as i stated on here earlier😏 gives him split eyebrows bc 1. it kind of looks like he has them in the manga 2. he's an aquarius 3. it's moth-core 4. it's cool.

i love butterflies. their species and placements also matter :) butterfly namez from left to right: 🦋 Chazara Persephone 🦋 Agrias Narcissus 🦋 Leptosia Nina, the Psyche 🦋 Zerene Eurydice 🦋 Lycaena Hermes seems like everyone is understandable except maybe Narcissus, unless you read Homer, the hymn to Demeter, where the flower was kind of used as a lure for Persephone:

It [the narcissus] was a wondrous thing in its splendor. To look at it gives a sense of holy awe to the immortal gods as well as mortal humans. It has a hundred heads growing from the root up. Its sweet fragrance spread over the wide skies up above. And the earth below smiled back in all its radiance. So too the churning mass of the salty sea. [Persephone] was filled with a sense of wonder, and she reached out with both hands to take hold of the pretty plaything. And the earth, full of roads leading every which way, opened up under her. (homeric hymn to demeter. 10-16. translated by gregory nagy)

🐛The caterpillar species is also chosen intentionally, although untagged in the piece. It's a Papilio Polyxenes' caterpillar, aka parsley worm for feeding on parsley before turning into butterflies. I read books state parsley was dedicated to Persephone ands used in the funerary cult. still looking for the original source though

aight yapping over for neow. just look at him

[florwal]

funeral home wip

[letsmcfreackingloseit]

So yes I have OF COURSE read @naffeclipse new fic Apex Polarity and yes, I AM OBSESSED!

So I decided to make a little comic of how I think their "first encounter" might have looked like from Eclipse's perspective.

I can't help but think about how alien and scary we most look to him (especially if there is a history of fasco hunting polar sirens in the past). With all that gear we look like emotionless beings, just observing and uncaring of this ice world. But then when y/n shows up and probably exudes this joy and wonder for his world + shows respect for the creatures and the environment??? Mmh yeah, I can see Eclipse falling for y/n, especially considering how alone he might be...

So yes, that's what I have for today! If you want to read the fic I'll link it right here. I can't recommend it enough, but as always, read the tags so you know what you're getting into! And lastly I also want to @themeeplord beacuse Eclipse's design is basically their design in my style (god I love their design so much, their character/creature designs are the BEST) so all the credit goes to them! Polar!Y/N is my design thou! ;P

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go read the two latest chapters-

YIPPEE!!!

[necrotic-nephilim]

@sasheneskywalker i love when you enable me to ramble about things because oh my god do i have thoughts.

so recently, i made a post discussing the phenomena of DC x DP and DC x MLB crossovers and why they exist and part of that post was discussing how largely speaking, at least half, if not more of the Batfamily fandom doesn't read the comics. if they interact with canon DC material, it's adaptations that are their own sequestered universes and oftentimes not remotely comic accurate or seeking to be. the most obvious example is the Young Justice cartoon. i'm adding a cut to this post because it just got so long i'm so sorry.

a lot of times, when people are discussing the "why" of this oversaturation of fanon-only fandom, they blame Wayne Family Adventures. and i think, to a point, i agree WFA is responsible for a boom in this fandom. but as someone who's been in the fandom long before we had WFA, to me it's the other way around. WFA was DC's way of meeting the demand for this easy-to-get-into, easy-to-consume content about the Batfamily that predicates itself on the comics just enough to be vaguely the same characters, but has a more sitcom, slice-of-life sort of vibe so DC could profit off of this section of the fanbase that otherwise wasn't consuming its primary material. and well, it's definitely worked. not only that, but i have a weird theory that the decline in the MCU also led to the rise in the Batfamily fandom. when you consider the fan content that made the MCU popular within fandom, it's that 2012 "they all live in Avengers Tower and Thor is eating poptarts and Clint is in the vents and there are movie nights every Friday" sort of vibe. those were the fics that were a hallmark of the fandom. and as the MCU has strayed from well... quality content in general, but specifically well-thought-out crossover content where characters can have their own arcs but also exist in a wider story where they clearly care about each other, that fandom was sort of homeless. so where do you go, if you like a superhero found family where you can have villains for angst but also stick them all in one big family-like home for silly crack and have a plethora of options for gay ships? well. you go to the Batfamily. if you write a crack/fluff Batfamily genfic with silly vibes and low stakes instead of say, a fic about a very specific comic issue even if it's a popular comic, you're *going* to get more traction for the former. because the fanbase largely just isn't reading the comics.

and i feel... complicated about this. because on one hand, Don't Like Don't Read has been a tenet of my fandom experience. i'm very pro-fandom and that includes fandom content i don't like. and to an extent, i do think this sort of should apply to Batfamily fanon. i enjoy having my moments with other comic purists, giggling over exceptionally painful OOC headcanons or even facepalming in pain over some content but it is on me to not interact with that content. you don't make fandom a better place by being hostile to fans who engage with canon in ways you don't approve of. and frankly? we as comic readers are not going to get non-comic fans to read the comics by being asshats to them. no one is going to want to pick up any comic if we get a superiority complex about it. and also, i feel like we're all lying to ourselves a little bit insisting comics are so, so easy to get into. they're not. we can just all agree, they're really not. i've been single-handedly helping my sister get into comics, specifically Wonder Woman and no matter how simple i make it, i watch her get frustrated trying to understand what pre-Crisis and post-Crisis and New-52 and Flashpoint and all these things mean and what a retcon vs a reboot is and what a Crisis Event is and what the hell Diana's current backstory even *is*. sure, you can give someone a beginner list of comics to start with and slowly dip their toes in the water but sooner or later, *something* is going to confuse them. comics as a medium straight up aren't going to be everyone's cup of tea. and if someone *just* wants to read silly fluffy fanfiction about the Batfamily, i can't entirely begrudge them for not wanting to take the hours and hours out of their day to understand this medium. it's not an accessible medium to get into. "read this and this, but this run is out of print and this run wasn't collected in trades at all but also make sure you read that event in order and this is a good comic but the backstory in it is retconned and you *have* to read this it's so important but it's also really bad because the author kind of sucks" sounds. ridiculous for someone who like. just wants to read some stuff about Nightwing. sometimes, we all make reading comics sort of sound like a chore, not a hobby.

so my point is, i do extend some grace to Batfamily fanon for existing. i think my biggest gripe is, as i said in my other post, misuse of tags (if you're not creating content about comics, maybe you don't need the comics fandom tag on Ao3, just the all media types umbrella tag) and my far bigger gripe: when panels are taken out of context to support fanon only headcanons. if i could impart *anything* onto the Batfamily fandom as a comic fan it'd be this: if you haven't *read* the comic, don't spread the panel. if you don't even know what comic it's *from*, don't spread the panel. it's fine to use comic panels to discuss your headcanons, but so often i see someone spreading a comic panel from a comic they haven't read, and when asked where it's from, they can't source it. a silly example that comes to mind is a post going around, taking a panel where Dick, in his internal monologue goes "here comes the sun. do do do do." and the post is claiming it's from him getting buried alive. when that panel comes from Nightwing (1996) #140, and he gets buried alive in Nightwing (1996) #127, two completely different moments frankensteined together. if you're going to not read the comics, that's completely fine, but unless you're sure of the source and the context, panels shouldn't be spread around. i'm sick of this specifically happening to Red Robin (2009), with ppl claiming Tim has totally killed people because he blew up some of Ra's' bases, when those panels within context, make it clear he gave everyone time to escape. and in a later arc in that very comic, Tim grapples with the idea of murdering Captain Boomerang, and *specifically chooses not to*, because he doesn't agree with murder, even against the person who has hurt him the most. if you'd like to write fanfiction where Tim is pro-murder and has done some sketch things, i'm totally on board and would probably like to read it. but there's no need to pretend it's canon from a few panels you saw out of context.

beyond that, i think it's not *entirely* correct to say that fanon is harmless. whenever i see very WFA-positive posts, they often default to the argument that WFA is fun and silly, and comic fans are killjoys for not liking it. which. i think is complicated because the issue is, WFA and fanon don't exist in a vacuum. if you like WFA power to you, i don't think it's the worst thing ever, but i do think it's degrading to these characters because honestly? they feel incompetent in the webtoon. it's one thing if WFA was solely a slice-of-life sort of deal, just having silly episodes where Bruce is taking on a PTA mom or they're all fighting for the last cookie. but when WFA attempts to take on more serious plots with these characters, it *fundamentally* falls flat in understanding them. i get it, Bruce comforting Jason having a panic attack because a noise reminded him of the crowbar felt cute in a microcosm, but i'm so serious when i say that storyline destroyed how like. half of this fandom understands Jason Todd's relationship to his trauma. it doesn't understand how he reacts when he's triggered, what coping mechanisms he seeks out, and how he would handle Bruce comforting him. even if i can believe for a brief moment Jason *would* be triggered by something like that, him running and trying to hide and then getting a hug from Bruce to make it okay is just. painful. WFA needs everything to be wrapped up in a nice, neat little bow. so even when it starts to tackle interesting concepts, it makes them fall flat with its need to be soft, low stakes, hurt/comfort. there was a two-parter episode that dealt with the complicated mutual hatred/jealousy between Tim and Damian that *almost* really interested me because for once, it felt like the webtoon wanted to explore canon messy dynamics. but of course, it had to be fixed with one conversation and a hug. you don't mend the *years* of issues these characters have like that. WFA isn't in character because these characters are hyperbole cartoonified versions of themselves to fit within the medium and be a cute happy family.

because that right there, is the crux of it. the Batfamily fanon seeks to simplify the Batfamily and force them into a nuclear family. there are so many fantastic posts on here discussing how the nuclear family-ification of the Batfam is eroding decades worth of complex histories so i won't go too far into that. but what i will say is that there's this need, in the Batfamily fandom, for the Batfamily to exist as a unit. they are a *family*. (honestly i think calling it the Batfamily is a misnomer and has been for years but we're in too deep now.) they exist to each other first, and any teams or friends they have come secondary to this family unit. you can *specifically* see this demonstrated in what headcanons are becoming popular these days. i have an entire lengthy meta in my drafts about how i *loathe* the "the Batfamily meets the Justice League" genre of fanfic because it makes no *sense*. in order to have this genre of fic exist, you must operate under the assumption that no one in the League, or adjacent to the League, knows the Batfamily exists and are thus utterly shocked to discover Batman has kids. and to make *that* work, you have to strip *every single Batfamily member* of such important dynamics and friendships so you can lock them all in Gotham for their whole lives. Dick can't have the Titans, Tim can't have Young Justice, Duke & Cass can't have the Outsiders, Jason can't have the Outlaws, Damian can't have the Supersons, Babs can't have the Birds of Prey, and so on. because if they had these relationships, they would be known to the League. the Batfamily fandom doesn't care about this, it's just "silly fanfiction", it's not trying to be serious. but how can you say you like Dick Grayson as a character if you don't understand the Titans *are* his family? at some points of his life, moreso than the Batfamily even is. it is constantly repeated to us in most comics with Dick how much the Titans mean to him. he *needs* them to be who he is. the same extends to every other Batfamily member, most of which have been full League members at this point. but in fanon, that doesn't matter. the Batfamily are a sequestered unit first, and all of those side relationships are secondary and easy to toss away, if it makes your fanfic work better.

and because they have to be a unit first, you have these forced relationships that dump years of actual canon material for the sake of making them get along. the Batfamily fandom has its favorites and well. it's no secret it's usually the boys. Jason and Tim by *far* stand out as fandom faves so, their dynamic is a heavily explored one. it does matter that in canon they don't tend to get along and especially don't see each other as family. what matters is that you can push dynamics onto them. and so fanon gets all twisted up about which Robin Tim actually idolized as a kid (Dick) and what member of the Batfamily is pro-murder but still an older sibling figure to him and looks out for him (Helena, or if you want the dynamic of once tried to harm Tim but they've reconciled, Jean-Paul) in favor of who's the most popular. Dick, Jason, Tim, and Damian are always going to be the standouts for popularity, but it's specifically Jason and Tim who are getting fanonized the most. and that's because really, we don't have much canon content of Tim that *isn't* the comics. for Dick you've got Young Justice (tv), for Damian you've got the DCAMU, for Jason you've sort of got the Under The Red Hood movie, but Tim sort of lingers in this limbo. (yes, he's in Young Justce (tv) and Titans (live action) but in neither is he the main character nor given much depth) so, he gets a *lot* projected onto him and has become fanonized. and even with Jason's animated movies, you don't see him interact with Tim, so people build it from the ground up how they want to see it, disregarding of canon comics. i think it's what makes him so popular in the first place- he's malleable into whatever you want or need him to be.

and of course, the fanon ignores other characters in the Batfamily it doesn't know about. i feel like you could create a tier list of Batfamily characters by their popularity, going from the fandom main characters: Tim, Jason, Bruce, Alfred, Dick, Damian. to the underrated: Steph, Duke, Babs, Cass. to the forgotten about unless they're convenient for a story: Kate, the Foxes, Helena Wayne, Carrie, Selina, Harper Row, Maps, Minhkhoa Khan. to the absolutely unknown: Helena Bertinelli, Jean-Paul Valley, Onyx Adams, the Clovers, Julia Pennyworth. it's not lost on me that the ignored characters tend to be women and people of color. which is both a canon and fanon problem, DC will continue adding interesting characters to the Batfamily, play with them for a few years, then drop them to default to the "Batboys" again. and it's a vicious cycle of the fandom only caring about the "Batboys", and thus people entering the fandom via fanon osmosis won't have content about the other characters, therefore, they won't be interested in those characters enough to create it, and it's just this ouroboros consuming itself, no matter how much canon content we have of these other characters. and it's ridiculous just how large the Batfamily is becoming because of this, which is why i'm a pre-Flashpoint fan, because then the Batfamily was contained enough to actually feel like a family with every character having nuances relationships with each other, but i digress because those thoughts could be their own post.

and the thing about fanon is it doesn't exist in a vacuum. DC has started turning the comics to accommodate for what fans are asking for, because fans will beg and beg for content they're not going to consume. Tim Drake: Robin had Tim as a coffee drinker because that's the fanon accepted headcanon. and the resolution of the recent Gotham War arc was for Bruce to buy this new manor for everyone to move in and call him. nevermind that most of these characters have their own homes and have zero reason to be moving in with Bruce. Tim had his marina in Tim Drake: Robin, Dick has Bludhaven, Cass and Steph have their little side of town in Batgirls (2022), and so on. these characters are being forced together as a unit, as one big happy family living together, to appease what non-comic fans want and it's damaging comic relationships. Robin: Knight Terrors saw Jason and Tim team up and working together, which i've seen varying opinions on but i personally despised. their interactions made zero sense for any of their canon history, but it appeases them being this close sibling relationship that fanon acts like they are. also the fears they faced in their respective knight terrors didn't make sense for either character and *only* worked as a moment of bringing them together so they could reassure each other and have this weird dreamscape bonding moment. the canon is bending itself to the will of fanon rather than building on the pre-existing complex relationships. Tim barely even gets along with his most important team in Dark Crisis: Young Justice because it seems the only important relationships the Batfamily can have is with each other. and when we do see them outside of the Batfamily, it only seems to be to relive the glory days like with World's Finest: Teen Titans, instead of developing them as they currently exist. this isn't recent in the comics, it feels like you can trace it back to the New-52, but it does feel a *lot* worse over the recent years. WFA is fine when it exists in its own bubble, but the simple truth is, DC content never exists on its own. the adaptations will reflect back onto the comics. (the damage the Young Justice cartoon has done to some characters should honestly be studied) and so it does frustrate me a bit when fanon-only or adaptation-only fans act like we're being nothing but killjoys for being frustrated with this. since they don't read the comics, they don't see how the comics are suffering as a result of this.

people argue about what's out of character for the comics they don't even read. i'm sorry, but "bad dad Bruce" is consistently canon. that man is just kind of shitty. when you take someone who has the drive he has, who has this need for the Mission first, who needs a teenager in spandex next to him to keep him off the ledge, that guy is sort of going to be a shitty father figure. he just is. not on purpose or with malice, but when you compare him to any other dad in a big DC family, he sure takes the cake. it's why characters like Oliver Queen tend to *really* fucking hate Bruce for how he treats his kids. Bruce loves fiercely, but he doesn't do well with putting that love first. and his love is a controlling one, he is very particular about controlling how others in the Batfamily are "allowed" to operate. it's what drives the wedge between him and Dick, it's why Steph is never a true daughter to him. (besides the reason of her needing to be a love interest to Tim first, anyway-) i've never understood the massive outcry of people reacting to Bruce kinda being shitty in comics they're not reading. there are some moments that get ridiculously OOC with how cartoonishly evil he is (the whole Gotham War arc and that... complicated mess with Jason) but largely if you want sitcom loving nuclear father Bruce, you have to accept that is a fanon thing, not a canon one. the Batfamily being a nuclear family in *general* is fanon. most of the "Batkids" don't actually see Bruce in a particularly fatherly light and begging for moments where he calls them his kids or they call him dad outside of incredibly specific circumstances is just OOC.

it's getting harder and harder to exist peacefully in this fandom it feels like, if you don't comply to the standard fanon has set. i'm happy people are having fun with their blorbos, even if in ways i dislike, but that "harmless fandom fun" does ripple it's way back to canon, eventually. so i end up pretty tangled with my feelings because are fans at fault for DC making these poor decisions? probably not, but it certainly feels like an unfortunate cause-and-effect situation whether at the end of the day, nobody is happy. and of course, i know some fanon-only fans are striving to be more canon accurate and care about canon dynamics more than others, but for them it's always going to be an uphill battle with the above-mentioned out-of-context panels thrown around and ever-pervasive fanon overtaking anything that's truly seeking to be canon compliant. so really, it sometimes feels like we're all losing.