#being a norman stan during this chapter was the best thing

[spaceoceania]

Okay so chapter 153 was a rollercoaster of emotions but you literally can't tell me Emma and Ray just proposed to Norman..

LIKE IT LITERALLY SOUNDS LIKE THEY'RE FLAT OUT PROPOSING TO NORMAN

I MEAN LOOK AT THIS

AND NORMAN SAID YES😭😭😭💖

I'm so happy my best boy Norman is back and that the full score trio didn't break up :')

[just-like-playing-tag]

Me???? Still not over that Apollo Ray AU in 2021?????? It's more likely than you think.

I jumped into the water and now I need to keep swimming

If you're new to the AU, you can check out this post where it's explained where the name comes from and this other post on what Apollo Ray differs from Minerva Norman.

Tonight, I'd like to expand the plotline that Apollo Ray would choose to imprison Emma and Norman to prevent them from getting in his way to demons' eradication. I know y'all might cringe at this but you have to understand, he's REALLY convinced it's for their best.

This is how I can imagine things to go: Ray kinda tricks them and traps them somewhere inside of the Paradise Hideout. Not really a prison, he'd probably just lock them in a room and be like “you just got back from a long, dangerous journey, why don't you take some rest? In the meantime, I've got some stuff to do at, let's say, the Royal Capital :)”

Sounds familiar?

Like mother like son

Very relevant detail is that the room MUST be without locks. Make it an electronic key or a biometric iris recognition lock or whatever. Ray knows Norman well enough and he's not falling to the magical hairpin trick lmao.

Now, I like to think Gilda would take sides with Ray. I've always thought about Ray and Gilda having a lot in common (often seeing the glass half empty, loving Emma unconditionally; furthermore, they were the only ones who agreed that escaping from Grace Field with everyone was unequivocally impossible). At some point, paralleling how Norman asked to talk with Gilda and Don, Ray asks for Gilda only to come into his study. They have a long talk, during which he persuades her to join him. On Ray's end, he needs somebody he trusts to stay in the Hideout while him and his squad go to their fun trip to the Royal Capital, to keep an eye on Emma and Norman and make sure they won't escape or try and go to the Seven Walls. Now, Gilda probably wouldn't look like his first choice, for she is endlessly loyal to Emma; however, Ray plans of making that very factor, her love and dedication for her friend, his trump card. By talking to Gilda and calmly describing their situation, he makes her understand how hopeless is the mission Emma is so desperate to fulfill; that no one ever came back from the Seven Walls, and they're most likely to die there. Moreover, Ray persuades Gilda to believe that his plan of demon eradication is without doubts the most certain route, that will surely lead to the safest future for her friends - even though they can't understand it yet. However, their safeness and happiness is above anything else, even their own temporary freedom- isn't it? They will understand, once everything is over, that him and Gilda were only acting for their best.

Although initially hesitant, as never in her life she had gone against Emma, Gilda ends up firmly accepting, for she's determined to do anything to save Emma's (and Norman's) life- including betraying her.

I don't think it shouldn't be too surprising to have Gilda accept Ray's plottings; already in the manga, she's shown as being maybe the most condescending to Norman's plan, since she believed it was the less dangerous route to secure Emma's safety- and, to her eyes, consequential happiness.

In this AU, Ray's using the very feelings of affection that build Gilda's loyalty to Emma to bring her to his side; he's persuading her that the mission Emma and Norman are trying to carry out is a suicidal one, and that if they let them go they will lose them forever- which is something he knows Gilda would do anything to not let happen.

I know it may seem like he's manipulating her to get what he wants, but I want to underline I don't think that'd be the case: by saying he's worried Emma and Norman are going to lose their lives going after the Seven Walls, he's putting genuine sentiments on the line, and he's as determined to prevent it from happening as Gilda is. In comparison, Norman has been way more dishonest when he spoke to Gilda and Don- as Gilda would have later learnt, he was never intentioned to spare Musica (thus having plainly lied to them).

On the contrary, Ray's intentions of simply wanting to protect Emma and Norman were sincere, and he was way more honest with Gilda with his plan, fully entrusting her with it.

On the other side, Don would obviously take sides Emma, which would eventually lead to a very cool conflict between Gilda and Don?? I'm certain Don would support Emma because he grew up to be very similar to her. Brings back to my mind this old old post I once made, which considers the events of chapters 138 and 139: Don shares Emma's point of view on many matters, so I'm confident he would be ready to support her. When you think about it, he was the fastest to take sides with her in canon too, probably second to Ray only; and when Ray's choice was likely driven by his undying loyalty to Emma, chances are that Don was supporting Emma not only because he believed in her, but also because he was the first one to truly believe in her ideals as well, the first to believe they would have really been able to find a solution that would have brought happiness for everyone.

Now Don openly supporting Emma would inevitably lead to him and Gilda clashing which I find being the absolute COOLEST thing. I mean I love them, and I love how they love each other; still the thought of them being compelled by the circumstances to collide intrigues me so much!!!! I think they'd have this extremely angsty confrontation that will eventually end with Don convincing Gilda that trusting Emma has took them so far, and that the best thing to do is give up and help him to free Emma and Norman (maybe Ray had entrusted her with the keys / password to open the room Emma and Norman were locked in?? Dunnot)

Besides, I think it would make a lot of sense taking the whole tpn plotline?? It would end up paralleling Gilda and Don's chapters in Grace Field in so many different ways. First of all, I have to say it would be very nice to have a new spotlight on Gilda: her role in the first arc was relevant indeed, with her and Don being the key to the success of the escape; however, she didn't really got to have enough space for character development. The moment when the trio revealed them the truth was more about Don, while Gilda had never doubted of their words in the first place; moreover, the space she had as a possible spy was mostly used to deceive the attention from the true spy, and the revelation that she was never intentioned to betray them was more of character development for Emma, who consolidated her will to trust and protect her family, than a growth of Gilda herself.

But now, for Gilda to take sides against her dear Emma, the person she's more loyal and devoted to, what a great potential for character development that has!!!!!!! I can imagine her, once she finally accepts to help Emma, to echo the words Emma once told her at Grace Field: “I'm sorry- to protect you, I was prepared to be hated by you; yet, I wasn't ready to believe in you!”

To sum up: the Apollo Ray AU is still my jam and Gilda and Don deserve way more space than what they were given in the manga. Also stan Gilda.

[tempo-takoyaki]

So why do you have a norray fic reading preference? I’m going to take a shot in the dark and assume it’s because of how people sometimes write Emma in ship fics?

Well, people, let me enlighten you to my internal conflict about fanfictions and our three main characters. It’s long, complicated, and a mostly me ranting about little stuff.

(yes, it’s long to the point I put a “read more”, I don't want to bother people who don't want to read my rants)

Let’s start with the beginning.

To put more context to this: I ship Norrayemma. So, all those ships separately don’t bother me (I like Rayemma, Noremma and Norray). So it has nothing to do with my personal bias on ships, or the story itself. Really, like you have guessed, it comes from the fandom.

I arrived in the TPN fandom (after fleeing the Danganronpa fandom like I could) during the broadcast of the anime, so they weren’t lots of people yet (and it was still alive as a fandom unlike AssClass… I can still hear the crows). And as such: not a lot of fics! Which gave me time to… uh… read 60% of the fandom’s fic? (You think it’s easy, but then you haven’t been in big fandoms then with their 30 000 fics, TPN had like… 200 fics back then? Not a lot.) Which narrowed down the choices a lot. And made me able to make some conclusions about certain types of fic.

As such, I was able to conclude a few things. First of all: 90% of Rayemma fics are filled with rainbows and unicorns and will give you diabetes with how sweet they were. (When it’s angsty, it’s using tropes). Second of all, Noremma fics were… at 80% of the time… Not only sexist as shit but also gave some of the worst characterizations ever created on earth. (How to say that I preferred reading RE at the time). And Norray fics were non-existent (NO KIDDING, they were like… 10 of them and they all had the same plot, they switched the roles sometimes but that was too daring, sarcasm intended).

Well, that’s not including smut, because Rayemma smut has always been very well written overall for me, while Noremma one was just a cheap pack of chips probably already opened by rats. And Norray was non-existent. (One of the reasons why a lot of shipper still feel like they are in the ‘rare-ship’ category even though they have overthrown the market)

How to explain, that when the first REAL Norray fanfictions arrived, with their incredible characterization, developed plot, and detailed universes arrived I jumped on the occasion immediately. DAMN even the smut was better than the Noremma ones! (and if you have been in fandoms for longer than me, you know how gay smut is used and re-used.)

It was not about if Noremma or Rayemma was toxic or not anymore, it was about how dedicated you had decided to become to your stories to develop it into something slightly likeable! Which Norray shippers do, as well as those who really want to finally put into the spotlight the OT3. And it just seemed that people doing gay shits did that better.

Oh I’ve seen a few good Rayemma or Noremma fanfics, but it’s still in the minority. I also managed to find a good love triangle story once but dropped it because I… needed to re-read it every time I wanted to catch a new chapter. But it was very good.

Like you, anon, suggested, I have a problem with how people characterize Emma too. Like @vinokurinner showed in their recent posts on insta… Fanon!Emma and Canon!Emma are very different, both in western and eastern fandoms. (Actually, the best characterization of Emma I’ve seen overall are from Korean artists or people who like to draw stupid stuff). Like they say…

Being an Emma stan is suffering. (except for goodies, I love my nendo)

The quality of a fic depends a lot of how Emma is characterized to me (because it just shows how well you are at guessing how a character acts), so of course, most Norray fics can pass the test as long as they don’t make of Emma a recurrent character in their fic (but all of my favs have her at least as an important side-character). But also, most of them do something that makes me addict (and you can too, with 80% of chance of succeeding):

Because boys don’t seem to want to smooch in canon, they do AUs, and most importantly: develop those AUs. And I’m a sucker for good written universes.

 Now the question comes: but what about gens? If only there was enough Gens John… If only… ヽ(￣ω￣(。。 )ゝ We live in a world who is ruled by sexuality and relationships focused on strong feelings, not leaving enough room for simple and pure friendships…

What about mystery driven fics that are not ship-focused? I have some, but I’m mostly satisfied with mines.

Are there really no good Rayemma and Noremma fanfictions? That’s wrong! There’s a lot of very good ones (I recommended two earlier), but you will find the best content amongst fanarts. RE and NE are fanarts ships, while Norray is best in fanfictions to my own opinion (fanarts tend to fetichize those type of relationships sadly, mostly is eastern fandoms). Though if you want to, I was a big fan of two Noremma fanfics set in fantastical universes (one was a Mermaid AU and the other set in some kind of Chinese fantasy magic thing… it was cool, weird, but cool), as for Rayemma, if most are very cute, it doesn’t mean they are bad in any way.

Is there another reason as to why you are very picky about Emma fanfictions? I headcanon Emma as being either aromantic, or asexual, or both. It’s not the case all the time, but I like it that way (I even gave some hints in Giver). So either the romance is good enough to make me forget about the headcanon, or you meet the wall that comes with it. And not only that, but as my fav character, I wish people would show her more respect.

You’re sure you don’t have a thing against Noremma? Not the ship. The fans. And not everyone, some of them. (I like Norman too after all)

Anyway, thank you for reading all of my little rant ! 

TL;DR : I read more Norray because those fics are often better written than Noremma or Rayemma.

[mrsspidermanmaryjanewatsonparker]

...

“I was really enraged over “One More Day”. Having been on the Ditko side of the argument for so long, I finally saw that Marvel was totally against letting Peter Parker age and develop new stories. I had planned on protesting the books. But, then they hooked me with the creative teams. Then, they brought back Norman Osborn.”

 Er no they didn’t they brought HARRY Osborn back...pointlessly....

 “Plus, they were trying new stuff and it wasn’t terrible.”

 By new stuff I wonder if they mean ‘Guess who this Goblin themed character is’ and ‘Oh no Spider-Man is framed’ or ‘Yuk yuk Peter just can’t get a date lulz!’

 And by not terrible I wonder if they mean ‘Hey look it’s the Chameleon and his whole history with Peter Parker is being ignored so we can imply he’s raping a woman’ and ‘Here watch this woman take advantage of Peter when he’s drunk before turning on a dime into a racist and sexist sterotype of Latin American woman’ or ‘Let’s ruin the Lizard and Kraven’s Last Hunt for everybody’.

  “What was going on here? Constant creative rotation to keep things fresh and lively?”

 Fresh as in a fresh way to suck shit as inconsistent story and artistic beats pile up to insanity.

  “Villains being reintroduced as the classic threats we know them to be?!?”

 Because we didn’t have that before OMD and needed the marriage gone for that to be the case.

  “Then, we got to see Marcos Martin and Dan Slott on the book. Spider-Man had entered into a new Golden Age. ”

 John Romita Senior’s run was a Golden Age.

 Roger Stern’s run was a Golden Age.

 2004 was a Golden Age.

 Mary Jane dates a loser cleberity because she’s out of character whilst Peter Parker invades people’s privacy which is even MORE out of character and here comes Mysterio alive and well ignoring everything we knew about him for the past 10 years isn’t a Golden Age. Its just hot trash.

  “But, what of Mary Jane? She was Peter’s wife and the mother of their disappeared baby. Would we ever get some sort of closure? Hell no. What was more surprising was how little it mattered.”

  WTF does ‘it didn’t matter’ even mean in this context?

  It mattered to most of the readers hence they kept teasing us with reconciliation to spike sales over and over again before just giving us an AU book...then bringing them back for real!

  “ Does that say a lot for Mary Jane and her defined role in the Spider-Man universe. I venture to say that it did. But, why are now realizing the futile nature of Peter being married and its importance to Mary Jane?”

 Yeah. It’s so futile to have character development for the lead and second biggest character that was the bedrock of 20 years of stories that by and large were better than the objective trash that followed int heir wake and fundamentally damaged both characters going forward.

 “Mary Jane has always never made sense for Peter Parker or Spider-Man. It was wish fulfillment for a guy that went from puny nerd to crushing multiple samples of poon in a three year period.”

  This sexist bullshit again.

  Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and even if that wasn’t true Peter is himself attractive and even if he was ‘average looking’ someone as attractive like MJ would marry someone like Peter all the time in the real world.

 It was their personalities and shared histories that made the relationship make sense.

 To dismiss MJ’s backstory and the inter-personal emotions between them that made the relationship happen is ignorant and a clear sign of either not having read or not having paid attention to the material.

 The hard truth is MJ pretty much ALWAYS made sense for Spider-Man. She wasn’t wish fulfilment she was her own well rounded character who organically developed in tandem with Peter, as Nick Spencer himself has corroborated.

  “Gwen was his equal,”

 How?

 Gwen was more financially affluent than Peter, had a higher social standing afforded by her father’s job and their comparative wealth to Peter.

  If we are talking her brains, Gwen wasn’t anywhere close to Peter’s league. Peter was the kid whipping up web-fluid in his bedroom as a teenager. Gwen was...someone who was in his science class. A statement that could apply to Harry.

  “ Betty was the older woman and Mary Jane was the neighbor’s niece thrown upon him. ”

 Betty was younger than him canonically Stan lee said so in a letters page but even if she wasn’t in the context of the times she wouldn’t been a few years removed from high school and Peter would’ve been a senior. Big whoop.

 Betty’s place has little to do with her age but more to do with just being his first romantic experience.

  As for MJ putting aside how she was retconning to not be his neighbour, that assessment for her character applies to the Silver Age and literally no other period of time beyond it. That was NOT her role in the Bronze age in the 1970s, the DeFalco run of the 80s and obviously not the time during the 1990s or 2000s when they were married.

  WTF is with his toxic notion that a character is not allowed to develop FFS!

  MJ hasn’t been the nieghbour’s blind date for him for the majority of her existence.

   “Mary Jane doesn’t even show up until the classic final page of her debut issue. Sure, it’s one of the best entrances in comic history. However, Mary Jane already feels like a put on intruder into a world that she doesn’t understand.”

  Correct and Norman Osborn wasn’t revealed as the Goblin until 4 issues before that, Gwen Stacy didn’t die until 7 years after that and Venom never showed up until 22 years after that.

  I guess all that shit is irrelevant to the character and mythology of Spider-Man and is just totally optional and superfluous.

  I’m sorry I never realized only the first 4 years and few months of Spider-Man mattered.

  I never realized Venom, Hobgoblin, Carnage, KINGPIN and all the OTHER shit from after ASM #41 were ‘intruders’ in Spider-Man’s world.

  Give me a fucking break.

   “She spends the next year dancing through the comic and pushing off the boys. ”

  And again, the early years of a character don’t = the inherent nature of the character that is never allowed to develop beyond that ever. If it did the X-Men would’t ever need Wolverine or Storm and Dick Grayson being Nightwing wouldn’t matter at all.

  “Peter grows closer to Gwen until she eventually dies, then he’s forced back onto Mary Jane. ”

  No, he and MJ over the course of 2 years of masterful stories by Conway gradually grow closer organically.

  Can you spell ‘Gwen Stan’?

  “Mary Jane rejects him, then he starts associating with related ESU students, Marvel Team-Up guest stars and the Black Cat.”

 That’s YEARS later. Gwen dies in 1973. Peter and MJ hook up in 1974. They break up in like 1978!

  “When all of those go into the crapper, Mary Jane shows up and he proposes. ”

 Oh dear god this is a quintessential example of buying into Marvel propaganda.

 That isn’t the sequence of events.

  First of all MJ showd up DURING his relationship with Felicia.

 THEN she revealed she knew he was Spider-Man and became his confidant.

  THEN peter and Felicia broke up.

  THEN he and MJ began growing closer and closer.

  THEN he had one last fling with Felicia following a seeming rejection by MJ.

 THEN he proposed to MJ.

  All that shit played out between approximately 1983-1987. That’s about FOUR YEARS of publication with THREE titles running simultaneously!

 “Parker gets rejected, then MJ accepts due to a pending marriage in the Spider-Man comic strip.”

 Again no. Yeah the wedding we got occurred due to synching with the newspaper strip but the build up to it was in the works for years by DeFalco and Frenz who were in charge of the book and embellished by Peter David and other people on the satellites. It wasn’t intended as actually leading to them crossing the threshold as man and wife but the build up to make that happen and for it to hypothetically happen anyway still existed.

 “That’s right, kids. Peter and Mary Jane only got married because Marvel wanted to tie it into an unrelated storyline in the national newspaper comic strip.”

 Again that’s true but the build up for to nevertheless make sense in story was still there and still paid off 4 years of character development.

  “The key point of Peter and MJ’s relationship was based on editorial interference. ”

  Peter and MJ’s relationship began in 1973 nearly 15 years before they got married and it occurred out of a sincere desire by the writer to tell a story about grief.

 “Tom DeFalco had actually spent a storyline early explaining how MJ figured out Peter’s identity, but kept it to herself. ”

 Er...no he didn’t. He explained she knew his identity but never explained how.

 And...this kind of egregiously undermines the central argument right here.

  “Then, made a very reasonable argument for why she could like Peter as a friend. ”

 And then along with Frenz his collaborator and Peter David spent the next 3 or so years developing their relationship as clearly much more than friendship so why is this fuckwit taking one line from ASM #259 totally out of context and ignoring all the stuff it led to.

 Oh right....in order to support the argument via lying.

  “Cut to two years later....”

 It was more than 2 years.

  “forced attacks and a second rejected marriage”

 Forced attacked? Alastair Smythe made the natural presumption that MJ was affiliated with Spider-Man based upon his encounter with her in ASM Annual #19.

  “then MJ is cool about dealing with Peter.”

 No. MJ has a change of heart after resolving her commitment issues directly connected to her estrangement from her sister and her bad blood with her father which Peter helped her to resolve in the course of the story where she accepts his proposal.

   Learn to read the damn stories!

  “Why was it such a big deal? Why did we loft MJ up to this status that doesn’t seem deserved?”

  Because it was wholly deserved based upon the actual stories that were written and not the propaganda assessment this article is pushing.

 “The marriage issue is so confusing. It happened in the first Amazing Spider-Man issue I ever read and most of the imagery has come to dominate my opinion of Spidey through the years. Whether it’s the marriage nightmare with the villains attacking the guests or the robbery with Electro; these images are what I see in my head when I see Spidey. Everything after that point was an excuse to force MJ into action, whether it was Venom attacking for the first time or the creepy landlord stalking her. ”

 Putting aside how ‘everything’would have to mean literally 100% of each Spider-Man story ever when there were many issues MJ either didn’t appear or had a small role...why would this be a bad thing?

  You have a supporting character...they are important...they are used within the narrative...this is bad because why again?

  The sexism and hypocrisy is strong with this point because half the time MJ gets shit because she didn’t do ENOUGH in the marriage. But when she is involved within the super side of things in some capacity it’s forced and bad.

  How?

  A super villain knows Peter’s identity and invades his home, targeting someone clone to him who he maybe lives with. That’d been happening since the silver age with Aunt May, Betty Brant and Gwen Stacy.

  As for her getting kidnapped by a stalker, this happens in real life especially to women and famous people and famous women. Spider-Man is a reflection of real life so WTF is the problem with this? HOW is this forced.

  “For next decade, everything became about MJ’s pregnancy, habits and constant fears for Peter.”

  Again, ‘everything’ would need to mean 100% of stories.

 MJ was pregnant for under 2 and a half years, not a decade.

 Not every story revolved around her fears for Peter.

 Her smoking habit lasted for less than 2 years too.

 And there was after all a period of time when Peter wasn’t even the main character of the damn series.

 And of course the notion of ‘everything’ or even ‘most things’ REVOLVING around MJ is bullshit because hate to break it to you but MJ was never the main character, Peter was.

 Everything revolved around him and since she was his wife a lot of stuff revolved around her which is called ‘Godd Wrting’.

 Notice how a shitton of screen time and subplots revolve around the wives of the main characters of drug dealer and mafia boss Walter White and Tony Soprano in the 2 most critically acclaimed TV shows of all time, Breaking Bad and the Sopranos.

  USING supporting characters and giving them screen time is IMPORTANT!

  It’s also the reason people hated Aunt May for decades until JMS started doing this in 2001! That’s near damn 40 years of Aunt May being mostly underutilized and useless to the point where people hated her and wanted her to die. THEN a lot of stories or story moments began involving or revolving around her and opinions changed.

  “The comic was quickly becoming a relationship drama, when we weren’t dealing with fake robot parents, clones, the Superhuman Registration Act or Aunt May getting shot. ”

 a)     The dumbass who wrote this referred to events across the decade following the marriage and then included 2 things AFTER that point in time

b)     This is again a lie it wasn’t a relationship drama

c)     God forbid there be relationship drama in a book that heavily involved soap opera elements and also the real life of the hero who could be you, i.e. someone who has to deal with relationship drama a lot because most people in real life do

 “Enough was enough, as the time came to re-evaluate what MJ brought to the team. ”

 A grounding for Peter. Character development for him. Strong female representation. A human hero who didn’t need to fight villains to be heroic. A realistic flawed and complex human character in a series all about that? A confidant for the main character? An exposition device?

  “The answer was that she is a party girl who worked better as an X Factor.”

  Get fucked and read some comics beyond the Silver Age hack.

MJ STOPPED being a party girl or an X-Factor in 1973!

  “The mystery created by Romita and Lee was long dead and that revealed something didn’t work. ”

 It’s so interesting this author will quote one line from ASM #259 and then totally ignore the rest of the entire issues which developed MJ into a supporting character and confidant who mirrored Peter.

 Because she just didn’t work.

  Get fucked.

  “MJ isn’t meant to be understood by Peter, she’s out of his league.”

 There is no such things as leagues. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and any two people with enough time, compassion and empathy can come to understand one another. Peter came to understand MJ via her tragic backstory which echoed his own.

  “Ultimately, what matters is that Mary Jane stays a viable character in the Spider-Man universe”

 Which she was for over 2 decades and even longer before that when she stopped being a party girl.

  “While she is a personality mis-match, she’s a life-long friend that knows a lot about the man behind the mask. ”

  How are their personalities mis-matched.

  “That kind of grounding is absent outside of a direct family tie to Peter. When MJ makes Mephisto end their marriage during “One More Day”, ”

  GET FUCKED!

  Mj doesn’t MAKE Mephisto do shit. This is yet more of the author swallowing and regurgitating Marvel’s sexist lies. Peter put MJ on the spot with an untenable position then she sweetens Mephisto’s deal. Mephisto made the offer though. MJ didn’t make anyone do shit, especially Mephisto. She just complied with his wishes.

  “she whispers something that we don’t find out until “One Moment in Time”. Unfortunately, this twist is negated by the fact that Peter forces MJ to remember their life together as it was, but the duo chooses to split and move on.”

 Fuck this article even fails to accurately represent the events of the bullshit storyt hat supports their claim.

 MJ’s whisper to Mephisto takes places before he changes time and Peter forcing MJ to remember (more like he forces her to not forget) occurres for unrelated reasons after time has been altered. The two things aren’t directly connected.

  Moreover the duo don’t CHOOSE to split, MJ leaves him.

 At least represent the bs you are defending accurately.

  “It’s a tricky setup, but it’s one that has led Spider-Man back to the promise of the early 1980s”

 It’s not tricky it’s hacky.

 It didn’t lead Spider-Man back to the promise of the 1980s because things weren’t written as well.

 Moreover the early 1980s were when O’Neil was writing Spider-Man and the series sucked shit, why would you want to go back to that?

 In fact even if it didn’t suck why would you want to go BACK to something antiquated as being 25-30 years old FFS!

  “There are multiple people in his life demanding certain things, but they all want to push him forward. Even Mary Jane has setup her own business and works as an outside factor in Peter’s life.”

All of which didn’t require ending the marriage or a deal with Satan to facilitate.

 “The book is “The Amazing Spider-Man” for reason and not “Mary Jane Knows Best” for a reason.”

 Get fucked the book was never that during the marriage either.

 “ Supporting characters work when they have a defined role for our central figure.”

You mean like a life partner, best friend, confidant and life line to normalacy.

 “After a quarter century in the main book, MJ lost that focus and the story suffered.”

 After what feels like a quarter century reading this article I feel like my brain has suffered from the lies and misinformation contained within it.

 “While we have turned back the clock on that matter, something harsh remains. Why can’t a woman be on par with Spider-Man?”

She can be but when she is sexist jackasses like this knock her down and just plain lie, misrepresent or twist things to pretend things are untenably bad when they aren’t.

 “ Much has been made out of his MC2 counterpart Spider-Girl. Sure, it’s his daughter as a legacy character keeping the identity alive, but she manages to find time for her retired father in her book. But, her book keeps getting cancelled and the readership of that title is a tenth of what Amazing Spider-Man pulls down. Point rested.”

 Point no rested.

 Spider-Girl suffered in sales because it was a female led book at a time when that wasn’t something the market was kind to. It suffered because it was a mass market book sold on the direct market. It suffered because it underined Marvel’s desired narrative and was spearheaded by a former EIC, people who traditionally generate a lot of bad blood courtesy of consequent editorial regimes who throw them to the wolves. It suffered because they wanted to promote another character with the name. It suffered because it was an out of continuity title.

 It has shit to do with anything related in this dumpster fire of an article.

  In summary:

  This article is hot trash peddling sexist propaganda in line with a false narrative Marvel wants.

 Kill it with fire.

But what can I expect from a writer who doesn’t even know Eddie Brock wasn’t a photojournalist or thinks Ned Leeds was ‘tricked’ into becoming the Hobgoblin.

[weekendwarriorblog]

The Weekend Warrior Home Edition June 12, 2020 – THE KING OF STATEN ISLAND, DA 5 BLOODS, ARTEMIS FOWL, YOU DON’T NOMI and more!

Sorry about the delay in this week’s column. Some stuff came up that was out of my control… like the actual summer.

If this were a normal weekend, I’d be writing about the box office prospects about a few movies, including Judd Apatow’s new comedy THE KING OF STATEN ISLAND (Universal), which teams him with “Saturday Night Live’s” enfant terrible, Pete Davidson. Instead, I’m once again writing about movies mostly not playing in theaters except for a few sporadic drive-ins across the country.

I already reviewed The King of Staten Island earlier this week – you can read that here – and though I know it will be playing in some regional drive-ins, I have no idea how many nor do I think Universal will report any box office if it does make decent bank. I think there will be general interest among younger people who like Pete Davidson on SNL but I’m not sure anyone over a certain age, say 30 or 40, will have much interest in what Davidson and Apatow can do together. The general gist of the movie is that Davidson plays Scott, a Staten Island slacker whose widowed mother (Marisa Tomei) starts dating a fireman, much to the chagrin of Scott, who lost his fireman father at an early age. You can read my review to see what I think, but it’s relatively tame for Apatow compared to his earlier films. I’m not sure that makes it necessarily better but people seem to be digging it.

One of my favorite movies from last year’s Tribeca and what is essentially this week’s “Featured Film” is Jeffrey McHale’s YOU DON’T NOMI (RLJE Films), which takes an in-depth look at Paul Verhoeven’s 1995 movie Showgirls, thought to be one of the worst movies and biggest bombs in its day but also a movie that has grown a built-in cult audience that adores it. It’s a pretty straight-ahead doc that relies on a number of experts to discuss the problems and virtues of Verhoeven’s film, including David Schmader, who did the DVD commentary for Showgirls, and author Adam Nayman, who is responsible for the book, “It Doesn’t Suck: Showgirls.” While I never fell into either the love it or hate it camp for Showgirls, I love how McHale’s doc acts as a thesis piece to explain exactly why so many critics took issue with Verhoeven’s much-maligned follow-up to hits Basic Instinct and Total Recall.

I won’t spoil the movie’s climax showing Showgirls finally achieving redemption, but it’s a pretty amazing event from 2015 that shows that maybe Showgirls has gotten past the hatred and ridicule that followed it around for decades. If nothing else, You Don’t Nomi will make you want to rent and watch (or rewatch) Showgirls almost immediately after seeing it. You might even agree with this film that it’s a misunderstood masterpiece on second viewing.

I’ve also decided to scrap the sections in this column, since two of the other big movie releases this week are going straight to streaming services, although both would probably have gotten some sort of theatrical release if not for COVID.

One of the other major releases of the weekend is Netflix’s streaming of Spike Lee’s DA FIVE BLOODS, his look at the Vietnam War through the eyes of four black Army vets who return to the country to retrieve the body of their fallen comrade… as well as a cache of gold bullion they found and hid during their previous tour.

I’ll be the first to admit that the quality of Spike Lee’s filmmaking over the past couple of decades has been somewhat spotty at best, although BlacckKKlansman was probably one of his better films over the past couple decades. Da Five Bloods reunites Lee with his BlackkKlansman co-writer, Kevin Willmot, and though it’s a fictitious tale, there are a few themes and elements in common.

Delroy Lindo and Lee regular Isiah Whitlock Jr. star as two of the Bloods, Paul and Melvin (along with Clarke Peters’ Otis and Norm Lewis’ Eddie). We meet them as they’re reunited in Vietnam, soon joined by Paul’s son David (Jonathan Majors) along to keep an eye on his father’s health. Chadwick Boseman plays the group’s leader, “Stormin’ Norman,” in the flashback sequence to the war era showing what happened to the Bloods on the fateful day their chopper went down behind enemy lines. There are a few satellite characters, played by M​élanie Thierry and Paul Walter Hauser (making a return from BlackKklansman), as well as Jean Reno, ​Jasper Pääkkönen and Johnny Trí Nguyễn, who all become involved in the Bloods’ search for gold

When you think of Vietnam War movies, it’s impossible not to think of Apocalypse Now, and Lee throws in a few obvious nods, whether it’s using “Flight of the Valkyrie” or the Chamber Brothers’ “Time Has Come to Day” but in general, the musical choices are solid. I wouldn’t say that the screenplay is particularly enlightening, the story being far more simple than

Just when you have settled into what you think is a fairly laid-back pace, Lee throws a “Holy shit!” moment at you that completely changes the complexion of what you’ve been watching, and that’s when the movie starts breaking into a few more action setpieces, some better than others.

Honestly, it’s a little strange seeing all these old black guys running around and shooting guns without Samuel Jackson being among them. Make no mistake that this is first and foremost Delroy Lindo’s film, as he gives a strong if not somewhat erratic performance, and he’s the crux of the story, but Whitlock and the other actors have some nice moments, as well. The bonding between the four guys is pervasive, to the point where it almost feels like the other characters are interfering, maybe because they are.

It’s a great time to release Da 5 Bloods, due to what is going on in this country, and like with BlackKklansman, Lee throws in a few shots at Trump, the guys referring to him as “President Fake Bone Spurs.” At least in this case, it’s incorporated into the story, but I hope Lee realizes that these Trump references will ensure these movies will feel dated if watched ten or twelve years from now.

That all said, Da 5 Bloods is a decent Spike Lee Joint, maybe not quite on par with BlackkKlansman but better than his last attempt at a war movie, 2008’s Miracle at St. Anna.

Rating: 7/10

As expected by quite a few people earlier during this pandemic, Walt Disney Pictures decided to send the Kenneth Branagh-directed ARTEMIS FOWL movie directly to their Disney+ streaming service, despite the movie having been in various stages of development for a decade or more. Unlike Da 5 Bloods and The King of New York, this movie based on Eoin Colfer’s book series, is far more streamlined with a kid-friendly running time of 95 minutes. Phew!

It centers around 12-year-old super-genius Artemis Fowl (Ferdia Shaw) whose father (also named Artemis Fowl and played by Colin Farrell) goes missing, forcing the young “Artie” to look for a powerful mystical device called the Aculos. Joining him on this quest are his non-butler Domovoi (Nonzo Anonsie), Dom’s daughter Juliet (Tamara Smart), an elven police officer named Holly Short (Lara McDonnell) and an oversized dwarf played by a bearded Josh Gad. Oh, yeah, and in this world, fairies, trolls and dwarves are real, but most humans don’t know about their existence due to their secrecy as well as having a way to erase humans’ memories ala Men in Black.

I’m quite sure the latter will be a qualifying benchmark for those who review the movie without having read any of Colfer’s fantasy series – like myself -- but it takes similar ideas as David Ayer’s Bright and the Amazon series Carnival Row and transforms them into something that attempts to be in the vein of Harry Potter or Fantastic Beasts but maybe comes across more like Percy Jackson. The irony is that Chris Columbus directed the initial chapters of both Potter and Jackson, but Artemis Fowl benefits from having Branagh at the helm.

I will freely admit that I’m very much a bonafide Branagh stan, and much of that is due to the way he’s handled bringing fantasy worlds to life in movies like Thor and Cinderella. Artemis Fowl is right up his alley, and he does an exemplary job even if most of his cast other than Gad… oh, yeah, and Dame Judi Dench, who plays the head of the “fairy police” – are fairly inexperienced. You can kind of tell that’s the case with first-timer Shaw, and his inexperience might be one of the tougher things for which older viewers might have to contend. Younger viewers won’t take issue with any of the problems that might throw off those expecting more from Artemis Fowl, because the storytelling is kept at a fairly brisk pace with a few decent action setpieces.

Artemis Fowl could have been released theatrically and been one of the summer’s sadly forgotten films. It finds a fun way of setting up the characters and ideas – presumably most of them taken directly from Colfer’s book – plus it sets up the possibility for even more fun family-friendly fantasy storytelling.

Rating: 7.5/10

There are a few other movies below I was hoping to get to, but see my note at the top of this column about why it was delayed by a day. If I get to any of the ones below, I’ll update and mention on social media.

One of the movies delayed from March but now getting a digital release is Carl Hunter’s drama SOMETIMES ALWAYS NEVER (Blue Fox Entertainment) -- not to be confused with Never Rarely Sometimes Always with the two movies at one point in danger of coming out on the same weekend!  It stars Bill Nighy as tailor Alan, who has been searching for years for his missing son Michael, who stormed out after a Scrabble Game. When a body turns up, Alan must try to work things out with his younger son Peter, played by Sam Riley, and an online player they think could be Michael.

Jonas Alexander Arnby’s Danish film EXIT PLAN (Screen Media) stars Nikolaj Coster-Waldau from Game of Thrones playing insurance claims investigator Max, who follows the clues of a death to the remote Hotel Aurora, a facility that specializes in assisted suicide, uncovering some disturbing revelations in the bargain.

Joshua Caldwell’s  INFAMOUS (Vertical Entertainment), which will be available via VOD and in select Virtual Cinemas, stars Bella Thorne as Arielle, a down-on-her-luck dreamer seeking popularity who runs into Jake Manley’s Dean, an ex-con working for his abusive father who dies in an accident sending the two of them on the run.

The dance drama, Aviva (Outsider Pictures/Strand Releasing), directed by Boaz Yakin (Remember the Titans, Max), was supposed to premiere at the SXSW Film Festival in March, but it will instead get its premiere through Virtual Cinema this Friday. It’s a love story that explores gender dynamics with dance sequences choreographed by Bobbi Jene Smith of the Batsheva Dance Company. Aviva is a young Parisian who gets into an online romance with a New Yorker named Eden, eventually meeting and getting married with the story told by four different dancers/actors simultaneously.

I haven’t had a chance to watch Flavio Alves’ The Garden Left Behind, starring Michael Madsen and Ed Asner, but it was a winner of the Audience Award at the 2019 SXSW Film Festival, so I’m definitely interested in learning more about its story of a young trans woman from Mexico who lives with her grandmother as undocumented immigrants in New York City.

Released in a union between Shudder and RLJE Films, The Dead Lands (Shudder/RLJE Films) hit Digital HD yesterday.  The supernatural fantasy set in New Zealand is co-directed by Peter Meteherangi Tikao Burger and Michael Hurst, and it stars Te Kohe Tuhaka as Waka, a murdered Maori warrior who has returned from the Afterlife who goes on a quest with with a young woman named Mehe (Darneen Christian) to discover who broke the world. Not quite sure why didn’t get to this one, as I’m usually interested in New Zealand-based films as well as supernatural fantasy.

Daniel (For the Bible Tells Me So) Karslake’s new doc For They Know Not What They Do (First Run Features), which will hit virtual cinemas this Friday, which looks at the intersection between religion, sexual orientation and gender identity in America through a number of families of faith learning to accept their LGBTQ children. It has pretty much run the festival circuit through most of last year, winning a number of audience awards.

Coming to the Film Forum’s Virtual Cinema this Friday is Bill Duke’s 1985 directorial debut The Killing Floor and Alastair Sim’s 1954 schoolgirl romp, The Belles of St. Trinian’s. Uptown at Film at Lincoln Center, besides the Human Rights Watch Film Festival (see below), they’ll be debuting Hong Sangsoo’s 2014 film Hill of Freedom (Grasshopper Films) in their already quite robust Virtual Cinema.

A few other films I wasn’t able to get to this week, include Return to Hardwick (Gravitas Ventures) and The Departure  (October Coast), so I guess I did better than last week?

A few film festivals taking place mostly virtually this week include the annual New York edition of the Human Rights Watch Film Festival, running from June 11 through 20, and the Fine Arts Film Festival in Venice, California (June 8 to 14). The latter is offering 92 films from 27 countries with different packages including the entire festival for $20 or individual series for $10. Also, the Oxford Film Festival continues its virtual festival with two music docs, Dillon Hayes’ short All I Have to Offer You is Me about country-Western singer Larry Callies, as he tries to get his voice back after a degenerative disorder, and Dennis Cahlo’s feature In Flowers Through Space, in which the filmmaker tries to use the Fibonacci Sequence to try to create a unique music album. You can also check out Ben  & Bo Powell’s Mississippi doc Nothin’ No Better about Rosedale, Mississippi, and more short blocks, all available on Oxford’s Virtual Site.

Also, the June episode of Hulu’s horror series “Into the Dark” is Good Boy, a movie directed by Tyler MacIntyre, starring Judy Greer, Steve Guttenberg and Ellen Wong (from Scott Pilgrim!) that has Greer adopting an emotional support dog that kills anyone who causes her anxiety. Just in time for Pet Appreciation Week! Yeah, I’m gonna have to see this one.

Next week, more movies (mostly) not in theaters!

By the way, if you read this week’s column and have bothered to read this far down, feel free to drop me some thoughts at Edward dot Douglas at Gmail dot Com or drop me a note or tweet on Twitter. I love hearing from readers … honestly, I do!  

[mysterykidscasefiles]

Mystery Kids and the Case of the Whispering Rock

Summary: Norman, Neil, Coraline, Wybie, Raz and Lili arrive at Grunkle Stan’s Summer Camp with the hope of having a summer of fun, or in the case of the two Psychonauts, with the intent of investigating a psychic disturbance. When they meet two twins that seem to be experts on the secrets of Gravity Falls, they find themselves reluctantly teaming up. But how much can they actually trust each other? There are secrets in this town, but more surprising are the secrets being kept from each other.

Table of Contents

Chapter 17: Coraline’s Nightmare

“Lili, wait!” Raz called after her, but the door to the Shack had already slammed closed behind the angry girl.

Raz followed after her quickly and yanked the door open, the worn wood of the door protesting loudly against Raz’s harsh treatment. He stepped inside and scanned the Shack for Lili. He found Stan slumped over asleep in his armchair; the glow from the TV flickered across Stan’s face as some black and white soap opera continued to play.

Lili was nowhere to be seen, so in a move that was as reflexive as breathing, Raz opened his mind and reached for her in hopes that her emotions would help him locate her faster.

Instantly, Raz was hit with an unexpected wave of regret and self-loathing that caused him to recoil and take a step backwards. He quickly sensed that these emotions were not from Lili. They lingered from a time long since passed and hung in the old Shack in the form of psychic residue. Usually, psychic residue would decrease overtime, but the maelstrom of betrayal, loss, and desperation clung stubbornly to the walls of the Shack like an old grudge. Regret was a bitter taste in the air, and Raz could almost swear he could hear long forgotten words that were never said but should have been.

Raz gritted his teeth and took a step further into the house. His instincts told him to shield his mind again until the psychic residue was once more nothing but a muted murmur in the back of his mind, but he had to find Lili, and the quickest way to do that was to keep his mind open and search for her.

However, the longer he left his mind open, the more Raz could feel himself self drift deeper and deeper into the kaleidoscope of emotions the old Shack contained. He could tell the psychic residue came from at least two different people, one lost in the throes of desperation and paranoia and the other just… lost.

Raz got the distinct impression that he… no not himself, but one of the people who left such an imprint in the Shack (although it was getting harder to tell the difference between where his emotions ended and the other’s began...), had lost something important. Something as a part of him as an arm or a leg. Something irreplaceable.

No… it wasn’t something… it was someone.

An unshakable, feeling of hopelessness crawled up from below the floorboards and clawed at his chest, it’s fingers winding around his heart and squeezing until he could barely breathe.

What have I done?

This is all my fault…

I need… I need to get him back!

Raz gasped, his heart pounding wildly as he yanked mind away. He forced his lungs to take a deep breath, and he used everything he could remember from his Psychonauts training to untangle his own emotions from the residue.

Raz stared down at the floorboards where the most intense emotions were seeping up from. Did this place have some sort of basement, and if it did, what in the world had happened down there so many years ago?

Raz took a few breaths to steady himself and he continued to break his mind free from the psychic residue. These impressions left behind seemed almost familiar in a way, but Raz knew he couldn’t dwell on them any longer or he would risk getting sucked in again. His extra sensitivity came in handy as a psychonaut, but right now it would only burden him if he couldn’t learn to control it.

He forced himself to focus on only the newer emotions. He thought of Lili, how she was probably feeling right now, and it didn’t take long to locate her once he had managed to orient himself properly to the emotions in the Shack. He could sense her in the room the twins had introduced them to as the guest room.

Raz followed followed Lili’s emotions and hesitated before the door, the waves of anger and hurt coming from Lili only made him feel more nervous about entering. Raz thought about knocking, but he pushed the notion aside and entered the room. He knew full well that Lili had already sensed him, and she wasn’t one for pleasantries, especially not when she was this upset.

He found her sitting on the ugly orange couch with her arms crossed and her back half turned away from him.

“Lili…” Raz said softly as he closed the door behind him.

“Save it, Raz,” She cut him off harshly. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“I think we need to talk about it.” Raz insisted cautiously as he moved to sit on the couch next to her.

Lili shifted further away from him and he sighed.

“Lili?” he prompted again.

Silence was his only answer. How was he supposed to do anything to help her when she shut him out like this?

Gently, Raz mentally reached out to read her thoughts, but he wasn’t surprised to find she had put up a mental block between them. Not even a passing surface thought would get through the barrier she carefully constructed around her mind.

Raz mildly wondered if she had blocked her thoughts and not her emotions because she wanted him to know how angry she was, or if in her anger, she had forgotten to hide her emotions.

Raz knew that he could push through into her head. Lili was a powerful psychic, but he had her beat when it came to mental defenses and he could find a way to get through her barrier if he tried. However, he knew that invading her privacy would only make things worse between them. She had to want to talk to him, and right now, it felt like she didn’t want anything to do with him.

Raz sighed and leaned back against the couch. He had no idea what happened, or why Lili had gotten so upset. He and Lili fought occasionally, but usually when they did, they would argue, get their points across, and when things had finally cooled down they would figure out a solution. It was a pretty good system, and as partners they needed to be able to work together even when they had conflicting ideas.

However, this was different. Now Lili was just shutting him out! How was he supposed to make anything better if she wasn’t willing to talk about it?

“Are you mad that I didn’t agree with you or that I didn’t back you up?” Raz asked finally.

One of the first things the Psychonauts taught them were partnered Agents were always supposed to present with a united front. Even if they disagreed with each other privately, they weren’t supposed to let it show to others when they were on a case. If their enemies sensed that they lacked cohesion, then that could be used against them. Raz had to admit, he probably could have handled his response better, but she had asked him the question so suddenly he hadn’t known how to react without lying.

Slowly, Lili unfolded her arms, but she didn’t turn around to look at him. “Both, I guess…” She admitted softly. “I just didn’t think that you would disagree with me.”

Raz looked over at her in surprise. “Lili… do you… do you really believe that?” he asked. “Do you really believe that normal people can never accept psychics?”

To Raz’s surprise, Lili turned to face him and there was a small, pitying smile on her face. “Sometimes I forget how new you are to the psychic world.”

“What do you mean?”

Lili sighed to herself and pulled her feet up on the couch until she sat cross legged. She was staring down at her hands in her lap, her expression distant.

“Did you ever ask any of the kids in camp what their life was like before they came to Whispering Rock?” Lili asked. “Did they ever tell you about their family or the kids at their school?”

Raz gave his girlfriend a look. “I was a little busy, Lils. I was trying to gain every merit badge before I was forced to go home, and then there was that little matter with everyone’s brains being stolen.”

Lili rolled her eyes. “I thought so.” Her eyes met his gaze again. “Well, if you had talked with them more, you would have heard the same story again and again. Psychic kids with normal parents who don’t know what to do with them, so they ship them off to a psychic summer camp.  Sending them away is easier than having to deal with their kid’s weird powers. Of course that’s not true for all of the kids. Some of them come from psychic families, but not all of them are as lucky.”

“Come on, I’m sure not all non psychic parents are looking for an excuse to get rid of their kid,” Raz reasoned. “Most parents want what’s best for their kid, right? They can’t teach their kid how to control their powers, so they sent them to Whispering Rock to get the training they need.”

“And I’m sure that’s exactly what they tell themselves,” Lili said spitefully. She paused and seemed to be carefully considering what she was going to say next. “You went into Doctor Loboto’s mind in the Rhombus of Ruin. I read the report. His parents feared and hated him for being psychic. Unfortunately, this isn’t uncommon for psychic children who have normals for parents. Even at school, psychic children get shunned by the other kids and teachers. Many normals can tell that there is something different about them, even if they can’t tell what it is. And psychic kids feel like outcasts, because they have to hide who they really are.”

“Luis said something about that happening at his old school,” Raz noted. “And you said you had the same problem with your school too. You said it was best for psychics stick with their own kind.” Raz felt like he was looking at his girlfriend anew. During the conversation earlier that day on the lakeside, Lili had mentioned she never felt like she got along with normals. That conversation had worried Raz a little bit, but he had mostly chalked it up to Lili not wanting to be social. It wasn’t until now that he realized that she truly believed that friendships between psychics and normals were impossible.

“I guess…” Raz said, trying to wrap his head around this new realization. “I guess I didn’t realize how strongly you felt about this.”

Lili shrugged. “Most of the psychic world feels the same way.”

“But-”

Lili cut him off with a shake of her head. “I’m sorry Raz, I know your mom’s not psychic. I wasn’t trying to say anything about your family. I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“It’s okay, Lili. In a way, you’re right. My mom is still trying to get used to the psychic thing. My dad too, and he actually is psychic.”

Lili nodded thoughtfully. “It’s okay if we don’t agree on everything, but while we’re working on a case we can’t disagree openly like that. We need to be a team.”

She gave him a pointed look and Raz nodded. “You’re right, I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay… I didn't exactly handle it the best,” Lili admitted, playing with the end of one of her braids. “I shouldn’t have run off like that.”

“It’s been a long day,” Raz supplied. “We’ll both do better next time, right?”

She smiled for a split second before it faded. “Raz… I know we don’t agree on this, but I have to warn you. Just because you feel comfortable blending in and being friendly with normals, doesn’t mean they wont turn on you the moment they find out you’re a psychic. Normals will never be comfortable with what we can do and it will always scare them.”

Raz opened his mouth to say something, but Lili cut him off.

“I know you don’t want to hear that, but that’s just how it is. You might be able to blend in, Raz, but you will never fit in.”

If Raz was anyone else, that statement might have been too harsh and would have caused him to draw away from her. Instead, Raz reached over and grabbed her hand. Lili blinked at him in surprise and gave him a curious look.

“Good thing I don’t care about fitting in then,” he said with a cocky smile. “Standing out is much more fun.”

Lili laughed and shook her head. “You’re such a show off, Raz.”

Raz chuckled, happy that he had been able to lighten the mood, but as his laughter died away, he thought back to what she said. Maybe Luis’s parents would never have been able to accept him. Maybe they would have feared his ability and that would have pushed him away more. Maybe Lili was right. She obviously knew more about this stuff than he did.

However, he couldn’t help but still think this generalization about normals and psychics was a bit ridiculous. Maybe it had to do with his circus family and how even though he was psychic, he now understood they would accept him no matter who he was or what he could do. It was an adjustment for the family, but they still loved him.

Lili tensed and he felt the presence of the other kids coming down the hall. Lili pulled her hand away and stood up just before the door opened. Raz followed her example and stood next to her.

Coraline was the first to enter and her eyes quickly took in their awkward expressions. “If you guys are making out might I recommend the twins bedroom?” Coraline suggested while gesturing to the ceiling.

“What? Ew! No!” Dipper protested.

“Kidding, kidding, Pines,” Coraline soothed with a laugh. “What, only your sister got the sense of humor in the family?”

“And the sense of fashion,” Mabel chimed in as she and Neil lead an exhausted Norman onto the orange couch. As soon as they laid Norman down, his eyes closed and didn’t open again.

“How’s he doing?” Raz asked, eyeing Norman with concern. The boy was even paler than the last time he saw him a few minutes ago and the bags under his eyes made it look like he hadn’t slept in weeks. Norman’s life-force had always been difficult for Raz to sense, but combined with the fact that he currently resembled a corpse more than a sleeping person, Raz couldn’t help but worry.

“I think he’ll be fine,” Dipper said as he pulled the blue blanket that had been laying on the headrest of the couch over Norman’s body. “His breathing and pulse are both steady. I think he’s just really tired.”

“Well, out of everything that could have gone wrong today, my cousin passing out is probably best outcome we could hope for,” Coraline said. “We were… surprisingly successful.”

“Yeah, we achieved a lot together,” Neil agreed. “We went to the lake, we explored a haunted house, and we even helped Luis talk with his parents again!”

“And that's just on the first day here,” Coraline added with her hands on her hips. “Neil’s right, we did do a lot, and you guys weren’t too shabby at it either.”

“So, camps not too boring, huh?” Mabel hinted with an enthusiastic grin.

Coraline glanced at Wybie who shrugged.

“Terrifying, but definitely not boring,” Wybie admitted. “And if we called your parents and went home now, you will be complaining about what you might have missed out on all summer,” he said to Coraline.

Coraline frowned at her best friend but didn’t correct him.

“Besides,” Wybie added. “It’s not like this ‘camp’ is going to get any scarier than psychic ghosts, and you did want an adventure, Jonesy.”

“Okay, okay,” Coraline relented. “This camp might be a scam, but it might be worth it to stick around for a bit, as long as Norman is okay with it.” She frowned down at her sleeping cousin. “He was able to help Luis, but he ended up putting himself in danger. He might not want to stay after that.”

“You really want to stay?” Dipper asked in surprise “Even with that Other Mother thing after you?”

Coraline shot him a tired glare. “It looks like it doesn’t matter where I go, she can still find me. Plus, running isn’t my style. Now come on,” Corline ordered. “Norman has the right idea. Let’s all get some sleep.”

Coraline was the last one, besides Raz, to fall asleep that night. The twins had left for their beds in the attic, Norman was still asleep on the couch, and everyone else was in their sleeping bags on the floor. Coraline, Wybie, Neil and Norman had been smart enough to bring small air or foam mattresses for an inch of extra comfort. They offered Norman’s mattress to Raz and Lili, but they had both turned it down, since their sleeping bag were padded. It was standard issue for psychonaut agents.

Coraline’s cat was curled up against her side sleeping peacefully. Raz wondered when the cat had arrived and how it managed to figure out where she was staying. Coraline had offered no explanation and had acted like this was a common talent most cats possessed.

When Raz was certain Coraline was asleep, Raz mentally reached into her mind. He needed to find out more about this Other Mother creature in order to figure out if it might have something to do with the psychic disturbance he and Lili were looking for.

The surface thoughts of her dream were easy for him to hear, but he needed to go deeper. He needed to see what she had seen, and to do that, Raz had to access her memory. He could have done this when she was awake, but searching through her memories had the possibility of causing Coraline to relive them. If this happened, Coraline might try and suppress them, especially if they were particularly upsetting, and that would make the memories harder for Raz to access.

Raz could have used the psychic door and enter Coraline’s mind as an astral projection, but he would need special permission to use the door on a minor. In addition, although the psychic door allowed for a better understanding of a person, it wouldn’t necessarily lead to the memories Raz needed to see, since the mental world was more abstract and symbolic.

Raz shifted through Coraline’s memories and just focused on one word: Other Mother.

There were walls and barriers surrounding those two keywords that were impressive for a non-psychic to construct. The harder Raz had to push, the closer he knew he was getting. Finally he reached a mental image of a small door barely big enough to crawl through. The door was locked so he had to step back from this image and search for the correct key within her memories. It took a few minutes, but he finally found it hiding in a deep hole in her subconscious. It was a black key with a button on the handle. He knew for certain it was the right one, because the same feeling of dread that was emanating from the small door was also emanating from the key.  He turned the lock with the key and found himself in the place Coraline never looked, but always carried with her.

I’m your other Mother, silly.

Colors and lights and warmth. It was all so fantastical, and it was all for her.

You could stay here forever if you want to.

‘Yes, please!’ screamed every fiber of Coraline’s being. It was better than any dream she could ever conceive. Why would she ever want to leave?

There is one tiny little thing we need to do…

Buttons?

For you, our little doll.

The sudden terror that shot through her froze her to the spot.

I want you to let me go!

Where are my parents?

She had never felt so small and childlike. This world used to make her feel loved and powerful, but now she saw herself for what she really was: Nothing but a fly caught in a monster’s web.

YOU HORRIBLE CHEATING GIRL!

YOU DARE DISOBEY YOUR MOTHER!

DON’T LEAVE ME!

DON’T LEAVE ME!

I’LL DIE WITHOUT YOU!!

A muffled scream reached Raz’s ears and he wasn’t sure if it was his own or Coraline’s as he was ripped out of her mind. Blinking in the darkness of the room, he felt sick and shaky. He hadn’t just watched her memories, he lived them as if they were his own.

Maybe he probed too far. Maybe he should have gotten more training on this ability before he used it. One thing was for sure: that was truly one of the most terrifying things he had ever experienced.

Coraline was sitting up in the dark, breathing heavily on the floor not too far away from him. She clutched at her chest as she tried to calm her breathing.

“Coraline, are you okay?” Raz heard Wybie’s voice ask in concern and watched his silhouette sit up next to his friend.

Coraline didn’t answer as she continued to to struggle to take calming breaths.

Wybie reached a hand out to Coraline, as if he was going to put a comforting hand on her back, but then he froze uncertainty before bringing his hand back down to his side.

“Did you… did you dream about her again?” he asked hesitantly, his voice low so he wouldn't wake anyone else up.

Coraline managed to take a proper deep breath before she nodded her head jerkily.

“Coraline, maybe you should-”

“I’m fine, Wybie.” Her dismissal was cold, but Raz could hear the slight waiver of fresh tears in her voice.

“Jonesy…”

Coraline sighed and shook her head. “Really, Wybie,” she insisted again, but this time there was a sincere tone to her voice mixed in with the exhaustion. “I’m okay. It must have just been because of what Luis said today. It just brought back memories, you know?”

The hint of vulnerability in Coraline’s voice caused Raz’s stomach to constrict further with guilt. Not only had Raz invaded Coraline’s traumatic past, but he had caused her to have a nightmare, and now he was listening in on a private conversation. He shouldn’t have done this.

“She’s not going to get you,” Wybie said suddenly, his voice carrying a little too loudly in the small room.

Coraline seemed to feel the same as she glanced around to make sure no one had woken up.

“And how did you come to this brilliant conclusion?” she asked in a quiet voice, and Raz was relieved to hear some of her teasing nature color her tone.

“Because you already beat her,” Wybie said simply. “And because now you’re even stronger and smarter than you were back then, and this time you have me to back you up. She doesn’t stand a chance.”

Coraline considered him a long moment in the dark. “Wybie… go to sleep,” she said at last. But then she added as she laid her head back down on her pillow: “If you are going to be any good as backup then I need you to be well rested.”

Wybe gave a short laugh as he settled back in his bed.

Raz felt terrible as he closed his eyes in the dark. A part of him wished he had never looked into Coraline’s mind because he felt guilty and the other part of him wish he hadn’t done it because of the terrible monster saw. Now Raz had understood Coraline’s inexplicable and sudden terror at the mere mention of this creature. It was no wonder why Coraline didn’t want anyone involved.

Most people wouldn’t stick around town if they thought a creature like that was looking for them, but then again, most people wouldn’t have been able to beat it in the first place. If he could say nothing else about Coraline, she was definitely brave.

But one question remained. Was this creature, this Other Mother, the one making the psychic disturbances he and Lili were sent to find?

He hoped not, because as much as Raz was usually up for a good fight, he really didn’t want to go head-to-head with that thing.

Oh man, I really hope this chapter is good. I had to rewrite it so many times. I kept getting writers block and changing my mind. It was a mess. Also... happy late Parapines day I guess? 

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[mysterykidscasefiles]

Mystery Kids and the Case of the Whispering Rock

Summary: Norman, Neil, Coraline, Wybie, Raz and Lili arrive at Grunkle Stan’s Summer Camp with the hope of having a summer of fun, or in the case of the two Psychonauts, with the intent of investigating a psychic disturbance. When they meet two twins that seem to be experts on the secrets of Gravity Falls, they find themselves reluctantly teaming up. But how much can they actually trust each other? There are secrets in this town, but more surprising are the secrets being kept from each other.

Just so you guys know, I started planning this fic back before the second season of Gravity Falls even came out, so some stuff with Gideon has changed for this crossover. It will eventually get itself back on track and line up with the canon of the show, but it’s going to diverge a little bit when it comes to Gideon.

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Chapter 13: Bad Blood

The kids walked through the streets of Gravity Falls in tense silence. Their minds were either on what had happened back in the mansion with Luis, or the heated argument between Lili and Coraline.

Norman thought it was strange how well they had managed to work together when trying to calm Luis down, and how they had even put their own lives in danger to protect each other, but as soon as the danger passed, they devolved into arguing. The fight was mostly between Coraline and Lili, but Norman could tell Lili wasn’t the only one annoyed at Coraline’s secretiveness around the subject of the Other Mother.

However, Norman couldn’t blame Coraline too much for not wanting to talk about it. It took him a long time before Norman felt ready to tell Neil what happened between Aggie and him.  Plus, Norman knew what it was like to want to keep something a secret.

As he walked, Norman’s thoughts drifted back to Luis, alone in the huge mansion, probably still feeling lost, confused and conflicted about his parents. If Luis was going to have any kind of resolution so he can move on, he would have to talk with his parents.

Norman looked up to see Coraline and Wybie walking just ahead of them. Neil, Dipper and Mabel were beside him, and without looking back he knew Raz and Lili were walking behind them. Luis’s situation was unusual, but what was even more unusual were these kids.

When they had first refused to leave Norman alone with Luis, Norman thought this would cause a problem. He was using to handling ghosts on his own, and he was worried the other kids would further irritate Luis and make everything worse. However, the kids surprised him. They had actually been willing to stop and listen to Luis. They didn't just freak out and come to their own conclusions, they actually listened. But it was more than that. They showed an honest desire to help Luis even though it would put them in more danger. They actually cared about him even though he was already dead. Norman could tell that he wasn’t just a ghost to them, he was a lost kid that needed help.

But… why didn’t they freak out? Why didn’t they escape when they had the chance? Why did they have enough presence of mind in a terrifying, abnormal situation, to stick around long enough to listen?

Something Coraline said during the fight between her and Lili had caught his attention, and would maybe even explained a few things: No one deals with the supernatural that easily their first time.

Coraline had apparently dealt with a supernatural creature in the past, could it be possible that the other kids had too?

Norman glanced at the boy walking next to him. Dipper seemed to be lost in his own thoughts as he frowned to himself, and Norman was reminded of something Dipper had said in the mansion.

“Umm, Dipper?” Norman asked, causing the boy to blink in surprise as he came out of his thoughts and look over at him. “Back when we were talking to Luis, you said that ghosts always have a reason for sticking around. I was wondering... how did you know that?”

Dipper’s eyes widened before glancing at his sister. “W-Well isn't that what all the movies and ghost stories say?” Dipper said in a rush, nearly tripping over his words. “Ghosts are supposedly still on the earth because they can’t move on, right? They have to have a reason for being here. If that many people are saying it, there has to be some truth to it… right?”

“Oh, right…” Norman agreed, somewhat disheartedly. “That makes sense.”

Norman wasn’t sure what he expected or why he felt so disappointed. Had he hoped that Dipper had seen a ghost before other than Luis? And what would Norman even say if he had?

“You did really a really good job, though,” Dipper said, causing Norman’s head to snap back up at him in surprise. “With the ghost, I mean. You didn’t seem scared at all. Didn’t he attack you before we all arrived?”

Norman shrugged. “He was just upset and confused. He didn't mean it.”

Coraline glanced back at the group and slowed her pace until she was walking alongside them. She seemed to have calmed down since her fight with Lili.

“He’s right, Cuz,” Coraline said. “The way you talked to the ghost was just…  I don’t know how to explain it. It was like you knew the right thing to say. I know we haven’t really been super close or spent a lot of time together, but I’ve never seen you more confident than when you were talking with Luis.”

“I just wanted to help him,” Norman explained, looking down at the ground shyly. “I knew he didn’t want to hurt us, not really.”

“Well, you were great,” Raz said, giving the boy a smile.

“Thanks…” Norman said quietly. He glanced at Neil who was giving him a proud, knowing look. Norman could feel his face redden thanks to the unexpected compliments. Norman still wasn’t used to receiving compliments, especially about his ability to communicate with the dead. Even though the kids didn’t know the full extent of his abilities, it was still nice.

The kids finally reached a bus stop and took the bus across town. They didn’t say much to each other during the trip, but the tension between them had begun to dissolve. Coraline and Lili still weren't talking, but that was probably for the best for now.

When they arrived at the huge mansion, Norman couldn’t help but stare. It was even larger and more grandiose than the Cardinal’s previous estate. Mabel rang the doorbell and they only had to wait a few short seconds before a man in a suit answered.

“Excuse me,” Dipper said, “Are Mr. and Mrs. Cardinal here? It’s very important.”

“I’m sorry, young man, but they are out for the evening.”

The kids glanced at each other worriedly.

“Can you tell us where they went? Please?” Coraline asked.

“I believe they went to that show they enjoy so much. The one with the young psychic.”

The twins clenched their hands into fists and their eyes narrowed in unison. “Gideon…” they muttered hatefully under their breaths with the exact same loathing tone.

“Uh…” Wybie said, staring wide-eyed at the twins. “That was a little creepy how you guys did that. Probably the creepiest thing I saw all night, and compared to what we saw tonight, that’s pretty impressive.”

“Do you know when they will be back?” Norman asked the man.

“They left an hour ago but they always stay for an extra reading. They won’t be back for a few hours. It would be best if you come back in the morning.”

“Okay, thank you!” Dipper said quickly. “Come on guys, let’s go.”

As they walked down the long driveway, Mabel turned to her brother. “We’re going to have to go see Gideon now, aren’t we?” She seemed to be dreading the answer.

“Yep,” Dipper said, “but hopefully we won’t have to actually talk with him. By the time we get there his show will probably be close to ending. Hopefully we can catch them leaving without having to go inside.”

“So what’s with this Gideon guy?” Raz asked. “You mentioned he’s fake and your worst enemy, but what’s the story behind that?”

“It’s a long story,” Dipper waved him off.

“Well, we have time,” Raz encouraged as they stepped off the driveway and started walking down the dirt road. The rest of the kids looked at Dipper and Mabel expectantly.

Dipper glanced at Mabel who shrugged. “Well,” Dipper began. “We met him not long after we first came here in the beginning of the summer. He wanted to date Mabel and he wouldn’t take no for an answer.”

Mabel crossed her arms over her chest. “He still won’t, the creepy little jerk.”

“He hates me,” Dipper continued, “and tried to steal the Mystery Shack from Grunkle Stan.”

“Steal it? Why?” Neil asked.

Dipper shrugged. “I'm not really sure. He’s obsessed with it, and us, especially Mabel. A few weeks ago, Gideon was arrested. He was busted by our Grunkle in front of the town when he proved that Gideon was a fake psychic who had been recording everyone in town with secret, hidden cameras. The problem was, Gideon had a good lawyer and he’s really good at getting people to like him. The charges against him were dropped when he convinced the court that someone had planted those cameras on him and tried to frame him.” Dipper sighed in frustration. “The town is so stupid they bought the lie too! Almost everyone accepted Gideon back with open arms. I guess they would rather believe that Gideon was framed over the idea that their precious Gideon was a liar.”

“Wow, that sucks,” Lili said. “Fake psychics piss me off.”

“Is there anything that doesn’t piss you off?” Dipper joked.

The glare Lili sent Dipper was so deadly Norman was surprised he wasn’t seeing Dipper’s ghost.

Dipper laughed uncomfortably. “O-Okay then…” He glanced away from her nervously.

Luckily, the Cardinal’s new mansion was only a thirty minute walk to Lil' Gideon's Tent 'O' Telepathy. By the time they got there, the show seemed to be over. They could hear an enthusiastic applause from the audience that seemed to go on indefinitely.

“Do you guys know what the Cardinals look like?” Neil asked as people finally began filing out of the tent, excitedly talking about the show.

Mabel nodded her head emphatically. “Yeah, I’m good with faces and they’re on the news and in the paper a lot. I’ll be able to find them.”

“Hold on, what are we going to say to them?” Wybie asked. “We can't just tell them-”

“There they are!” Mabel shouted, pointing to a middle aged couple.

See, I told you this chapter wouldn’t take too long. The next chapter should be out pretty soon too!

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