#but. y’know. what’s the difference?

[sincerely-sofie]

Thought I’d try out that favorite character bingo thingy… I feel like there’s a pattern here, but I’m scared to identify it.

Blank version under the cut!

[pynkhues]

Idk if uve discussed this before, im new haha but I really enjoy your readings of the show and I’m curious, would u call louis a femme? Idk i think it’s a widely accepted canon in the fandom and i constantly see it spread all over twitter with no argument whatsoever and im over here like i.. i dont see it?? Idk!

Hey! Welcome, anon! And thank you for your kind words! You’re very sweet!

I think I’ve probably discussed it in fragments before, but not outright said it, but no, I wouldn’t call Louis a femme. It’s certainly a largely accepted fanon in a vocal part of the fandom, particularly on Twitter and ao3, and yeah - - I mean. I’m really glad people are having fun with it! I do also sometimes feel they’re watching a different show to me though, because it’s honestly not something I see at all. I don’t know if their arguments are necessarily organized in the one place (although I could be very wrong in terms of that!) but I might use this as an opportunity to collate my thoughts and the previous posts I’ve made addressing the arguments around this particular topic. SO! Okay! Let’s break it down and dive in:

Louis is femme because he’s a Gothic Heroine

I just don’t agree with this argument, I’m sorry. I’m not going to get into the weeds of this one, just because I feel like I’ve done so already, but I don’t personally read Louis as a gothic heroine at all. In fact, I see him as a very archetypical Byronic Hero, which I talked about in this post, and in others in my Byronic Hero tag.

Louis is femme because he is a Battered Housewife / relying on a Sugar Daddy

This point often gets tied up into the gothic heroine one, and it’s one that always kind of surprises me a little bit. Even putting aside the fact that it’s an ugly, misogynistic trope in general, Louis’ relationship to being a quote-unquote ‘housewife’ is one that – to me – is symbolic of his feelings of emasculation in the Rue Royale household not as a result of Lestat alone, but as a result of the white power structures in New Orleans that would disempower and disenfranchise him. He doesn’t like it, it doesn’t make him ‘femme’, in fact, my interpretation is the opposite – it emasculates him as a Black Man, and he feels that in every part of his life to the point that both his daughter and sister weaponize it against him, and I personally think it’s a factor in his periodic impotence in his marriage. Respectively, Claudia calls him the housewife, and Grace calls Lestat his white daddy – these aren’t compliments, these are callous insults from both of them designed to bruise his pride and force him into action. The fact that neither of them work to move him the way they want doesn’t mean Louis identifies with them, rather it means he’s – at the time – committed to Lestat for better and worse, but their words compound in a way that fuels his resentment of Lestat as both an adulterous husband and a symbol of everything wrong with his life.

Further to that – and I say it in the Byronic Hero/Gothic Heroine post that I link to above  – but a vital part of power dynamic tropes in gothic literature is that women lose power through marriage, they don’t gain it, and Louis does, in fact, gain it. Lestat’s a ticket to social advancement for Louis because as much as Louis (rightfully! It’s extremely racist!) hates being forced into a servitude role publicly at the theatre or in lease agreements, it’s Lestat’s whiteness that allows Louis into more conversations politically, and eventually allows him to buy the Fair Play Saloon and turn it into The Azaelia. It’s a limited power, of course, as a result of his race and the era, but the show actually explicitly lays out certain things for us like the fact that Louis pays Lestat back in full, and pointedly, that Louis never felt that he had to pay Lestat back at all:

The last line of which is Louis greeting Lestat not as a sugar baby or a housewife walking out to his sugar daddy or husband, but as a business man to his husband.

In fact, the interesting exchange of power in that sequence actually leans to the reverse as Lestat ends up playing host to a new client while Louis lords over an empire.

(You can't see it exactly in these subtitles, but it's Louis who says 'you about five years late', and Lestat honeytrapping with taking the man away).

It's a dynamic that repeats with the musician who tries to leave that Lestat coerces into staying - Louis' king of the castle, and Lestat, the show implies, I feel, plays the placating partner smooting over the edges.

But isn’t Lestat a symbol of patriarchal power in the Rue Royale Household?

I’ve had a couple of asks about this and have a long reply in my drafts that I’ll try and post this weekend, but yes and no? I think in Rue Royale, Lestat’s definitely a symbol of patriarchal power to Claudia, and I think Louis sometimes feels him that way too, but I don’t think it’s actually true for Louis in the way that it is for Claudia. Gender isn’t what divides Louis and Lestat, it’s race, and every time Louis has the chance to exert patriarchal power against anyone outside that house or inside it, he uses it – from coercing Lestat into Claudia's rebirth to physically assaulting Claudia over Lestat’s murder, to even trying to influence her diet and guilting her into staying, to throwing Lestat out of his own house and then fucking him in his lover’s bed (which, obviously, are after Lestat's singular act of violence), to being literally a pimp, strongarming his sister and his mother, to giving less than 0 fucks about Lily’s murder and the attempted anal-rape of Bricktop - - just.

Yeah. There are two patriarchs in the Rue Royale household, and both their names begin with L.

Eldest daughter syndrome

Sometimes men are also eldest siblings who feel the burden of responsibility?

Even beyond that though, I think Louis’ response to Grace is particularly paternalistic, a pattern he’d repeat with Claudia, which I talk about here. I do think Louis has a lot of responsibility and weight on his shoulders as an eldest child, absolutely, and I actually think there’s a lot to talk about in terms of his complex position as brother-father to Paul and Grace in s1 (and I empathise with him intensely in this regard as someone who’s been a sibling’s guardian), but like. That’s not a feminine trait, nor is it one that makes him an eldest daughter. I’m not one, and he’s not one either. Sibling dynamics aren’t cut and paste.

But Louis buys and reads Madame Bovary and obviously relates to Emma

I mean, he doesn’t buy it – the show literally, explicitly makes the point of telling us that it’s Lestat’s copy of the book that he’s reading, which honestly makes sense to me. I talked about it here (where I include the caps of it being Lestat's book too), but Emma as a character cheats because she finds monogamy boring, provincial life even more so and dislikes her daughter, while married to a successful man in a regional town. Louis’ not the Emma in that equation, Lestat is, given he's fucking Antoinette – allegedly because he wants variety – escaped the Auvergne in Paris, and can’t cope with parenthood and/or Claudia.

Interestingly too, Louis’ focus in that scene is on the 'denseness' of the prose and 'the absence of metaphor' not the content, as he ignores Lestat having a meltdown directly opposite him. My interpretation of that scene is that the writing is pointing out exactly how disconnected they are from each other, and that Louis can read a story that parallels a lot of Lestat’s experience, and fail to relate it to, or empathise with Lestat at all, even as Lestat indulges Louis’ depression and hoarding, which ! I love Louis, but Lestat does in that sequence (not that that justifies anything that Lestat does, of course).  

Isn’t Louis compared to Juliet and Mélisande?

Mmm, yes and no? Armand does put him in the Juliet role, which Louis riffs with Dreamstat about, but I tend to interpret that more to be about the involvement of the balcony than I do about their roles as Romeo and Juliet – because, y’know. Not everything’s actually about gender, particularly with same sex couples of that era who had limited reference points generally, and certainly limited mainstream ones.  

And Melisande - - not at all, actually? I do have to say that I’m a little bit baffled by this particular argument given we have the lyrics to Come to Me and Lestat puts himself in the feminine role of Mélisande (and I actually do think you can mount the argument that he's done that because he’s intending for Antoinette to sing it, which I thought for a long time before hearing Long Face tbh, and now I actually do think it’s deliberately playing into Louis’ sense of masculinity), and he does cast Louis in the masculine role of Pelléas. The chorus literally goes:

Ruin each other Like star-crossed lovers Your Pelléas, my Mélisande Oh, come to me Come to me

So, yeah. Again, that argument just doesn't quite land for me.

Wasn’t he jealous of Grace’s pregnancy though?

Was he? That wasn’t my interpretation, but I’d actually genuinely be interested to hear a case for it, because I feel that’s kind of tasty on a narrative level, haha. My interpretation of that entire sequence though kind of feeds back into that eldest sibling thing again where he a) resented Grace building something of her own before he could, and b) was terrified of the idea that her having her own family would mean that she’d pull way from him which she, of course, did.

I tend to see Louis’ desire to have Claudia as a fairly impulsive one, and I actually see (in the show’verse) his desire to have Lestat be the one to turn her as a part of him further interlocking him and Lestat together, particularly after he's effectively just broken up with Lestat. It's messy! But yeah, I mean, I think 2.07 laid out pretty cleanly that Louis' choice to turn Claudia was inherently a selfish one, and I personally don't see it as one borne out of jealousy so much as needing an anchor. 

Anne bases Louis on herself

She also bases Lestat on herself and/or everything she wants to be, and also washes her hands of Louis as a character for books at a time, and like - - I’m sorry, this is not the tone I usually take, but like - - lowkey, who cares? Everyone in this fandom loves death of the author until Anne says one thing they can use to justify their headcanons, and I just don’t really get it. Why are you trying to interpret a vampire novel as a memoir? Obviously it’s not factual? Anne’s not a man, she’s not drinking blood, she’s not romantically entangled with her dead daughter, like I do understand that it can feel noodly sometimes with authors and characters, but as someone who works with a lot of writers, I can promise you they’re dipping in and out of characters like crazy, haha.

It doesn’t mean a character’s them, and it certainly doesn’t mean you’re interacting with Anne when you're interacting with Louis, which I suspect a lot of people don’t want anyway? I don't know, personally I view this one as a bit of a non-starter.

Louis’ pretty though

Yeah, he is! He’s your Helen of Troy! He’s beautiful! He’d look amazing in tights and heels! That doesn’t mean he’s canonically femme though.

[oscargender]

Heartbreaking: “problematic” danmei everyone told you to avoid is actually pretty decent and has mildly interesting things to say about poverty and class

[bluuscreen]

more sillies

[tenwhiteandalusians]

so no one was going to tell me if i got literally one episode further tenax drops that he’s the one who saved scorpus from his mom’s pimp AND that he’s intimately familiar with scorpus’ dick when he was younger. guys. guys.

[signanothername]

Finished watching S2 of Earthspark and-

WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED

[sophfandoms53]

And if I said the multiverse twist this season should’ve been them recreating the twists from the past seasons each week?

Like imagine, one week is the duos twists, one week is the saboteur, one week is teams, one week is a have nots comp, one week is pandora’s box, one week is america’s player, one week is the third nominee, one week is battle of the block, one week is the hacker, do you see the wasted vision?

This season was supposed to celebrate the shows 25 season run anyway and they did not do that😭

[eyesthecolorofarson]

Three hours ago Damian went MIA.

He was supposed to be on patrol but three hours twenty-six minutes and forty-five seconds ago he veered off route and hasn't answered any texts, calls, or alerts since. Luckily he hadn’t turned off his tracker so they could see he was on the seventh floor of a children’s hospital in the upper west-side.

Tim would be lying if he said he wasn’t worried. Damian had been disappearing more and more often lately, but this was the first time he disappeared on patrol. Behind him Bruce was losing his mind, muttering to himself nonsense Tim didn’t bother trying to understand.

He was at the Batcomputer, hacking into the hospitals seventh floor emission room cameras and flicking through them to try and find Damian. Dick was at his left, scanning the footage for any clue of their brother’s whereabouts. Jason had his feet kicked up on his right, pretending like he didn’t care, but he was watching just as intently.

Case was trying to get Bruce to sit down and actually breath, Steph was still on patrol and Duke was dead to the world. He was pretty sure Alfred knew where Damian was going and probably had a good clue as to where he was now, but if he wasn’t saying anything Tim knew better than to ask.

Finally, they got something. Well, a bit more than something. Ok, a lot more. It was a double room, with a standard bed in front of the door and a crib across up against the wall. To the left of the standard bed were two nightstands. The first one had a light show projector shaped like a UFO, a phone charger, laptop, several fidget toys and a kalimba. The second was empty and the crib had a collapsed gate inside it. Next to the bed was a couch with a few bags sitting next to it.

In the standard bed was Damian, drawing in a sketchbook he knew wasn’t his just from the stickers on the cover. But next to him, cuddled up to him, was a girl. She was African with gold eyes and curly baby blue hair in a bob. The ends of her curls faded into multiple colors, giving the impression of a rainbow and blue sky. She was wearing a hospital gown, and Damian was wearing….a shirt that said ‘cotton candy club’ in pastel blue purple and pink with cartoon cotton candy???

The computer told him her name was Lydia Lippet, who’s family, friends and nurses nicknamed ‘Fireworks’. She was sixteen and suffered from the genetic disorder AIP–Acute Intermittent Porphyria.

He, Dick and Jason stared for a second. “Uh, B? Cass? We found him, but—Well, your not going to believe this.” “O. M. G! A girlfriend! He has a girlfriend! Oh how could we ignore the signs!?” Dick cheered as Bruce and Cass rushed to the batcomputer. They all watched as the girl-Lydia-snuggled closer to Damian, who smiled and pulled her closer by the arm around her waist.

Bruce watched silently, almost gaping. Cass just smiled. Jason took a picture then started texting so fast Tim worried he’d break his fingers. “Tim, rewind the footage and find out when Damian entered.” Bruce said, sounding confused and a little worried. Tim rewinded until he found the moment Damian, as Robin, entered through the large window.

They watched as he stared at Lydia for a minute, his eyes wide and trailing all over her. Now the crib was next to the bed and the gate was open, and the area between the beds had a blanket and all sorts of baby stuff laid out and the couch was under the window. The baby gave a little gurgle and he jumped like he didn’t know it was there. Lydia sat up and looked towards him. “Damian.” She sounded breathless, a little rough with a thick Gotham accent. “Lydia.” He sounded almost heartbroken, rushing to her side.

“What—Is this why you haven’t been answering your phone? Have you been here for two weeks? What happened?” Lydia laughed sadly. She scooted over and patted the bed, making Damian paused. He looked to the door and the nurses window then back at her. “Can I change before we speak? I don’t—“ he stopped and took a deep breath. “I’m not going to leave you.” Dick ruined the moment when he ‘aww’ed. Jason told him to shut up.

Lydia nodded and motioned to a possum-shaped plush backpack on the table across from the cradle. “I ‘ave some shirts and pants in Moonstone. The bathrooms that door.” Damian grabbed the shirt they’d seen him wearing and a pair of pink pajama pants. He was in and out in less than five minutes, which was a new record. Getting out of costume took time.

Lydia giggled softly. “Ya’ look great.” Damian huffed. “I could say the same about you.” She giggled again and hugged him as soon as he got in the bed. He stiffened for a second before relaxing and practically melting into the hug. Damian sighed and whispered, “I missed you.” Lydia hugged him tighter. “Missed you more.” They pulled back and stared at each other—

And Lydia burst into tears.

Unfortunately a nurse walked in right as she threw herself onto him and cried. The nurse stood dumbfounded as she watched Damian Wayne shush and comfort Lydia. He noticed the nurse and leaned forward. “Please leave. And don’t let the press know. For her,” he motioned to Lydia then behind him, “and the infant’s sake.”

The nurse nodded and quickly left, and Tim pulled up another camera. Thankfully the nurse kept to herself and even put a ‘do not disturb’ sign outside of the room and closed the blinds on the door and nurses window. He kept that camera up just in case but focused back on Damian and Lydia.

She was talking as she cried. “I-hic-I wanted to call ya’—“ she choked on her tears and Damian pulled her to his chest. “You don’t need to explain,نجم شمال, just let it out.” She shook her head. “I—Jazz—“ She bit her lip and looked at the cradle. The baby, Jazz, gave a tiny coo and Damian seemed to understand.

“Ok, breath for me, in and out slowly. Just like that.” In five minutes she was calm again, cradled against Damian’s chest as he ran his hand through her hair, lightly pulling a strand on his finger than letting it bounce back. Lydia had her eyes closed, a content expression on her face. “Thank you.” She whispered, opening her eyes and gazing up at him.

“Of course.” He whispered back, continuing to play with her hair. Dick was silently screaming, jumping up and down. Bruce had sat down and was watching intently. Cass was jumping with Dick. Tim was trying to piece together how long this has been going on. Damian started disappearing about two and a half years ago, so they’d definitely had time to get to know one another.

“Five years ago,” Lydia started, “I was diagnosed with AIP—Acute Intermittent Porphyria.” She pressed a button on the side of the bed that made the back end start to raise. “It’s a rare genetic disorder that has a lotta stupid triggers,” she continued, “like infections, hormones, and sunlight. Well, those are my triggers.”

“AIP sucks cause’ it’s not only rare, but symptoms and triggers are so different b’tween every person. Don’help that a lot of them are asymptomatic. It took like, a whole year in this hospital to get diagnosed.” She chuckled sadly and leaned against the bed when it was raised all the way up.

“What are your symptoms?” Damian asked softly. She huffed and put her ear to his chest. “It starts with a lot of vomiting. Like, not like there’s a lot of vomit, more like I vomit everything. Food, applesauce, pills, even water comes up in less than five minutes. Sometimes thirty seconds.”

Even water? That wasn’t good, and he could tell Damian was thinking the same thing from the way his eyes narrowed. “Then the pain starts. Abdominal pain so bad that it hurts ta’ breath. Talkin’ becomes unbearable, much less moving. And—moving.” Lydia stopped and sniffled, raising her hand. Or, trying to. A little below her neck her hand stopped and began shaking, like it was stuck in place.

He was confused for a second, but then he took in the way her hand was curled into a fist, how her fingers twitched but then returned to the same position, the tears filling her eyes. “You can’t move your hands.” Damian realized. He sounded horrified. “And if talking hurts, then singing—your instruments—“ He looked around the room before looking back to her. “Your legs as well?”

Lydia nodded sadly, letting her hand drop. “My body can’t get the nutrients it needs, so it takes it from my muscles.” She tried to open her hand with her other, but that hand was stuck in a fist too. “My body is cannibalizing itself. We’re lucky we caught it early this time. The last time it started attacking my bones.”

“You can’t sing.” Damian said again. “You can’t dance, play your instruments, draw. You’ve lost your music.” Lydia nodded again, biting her bottom lip. She took a shaky breath before continuing. “Another thing that happens is that—well, all this starts ‘cause m’body doesn't have an enzyme that it’s supposed to. And that causes it to produce another, really bad enzyme.”

“All this—we don’t really know why this is happening since it hasn’t happened with many other people with AIP, but—um.” She took another deep breath, looking Damian in the eye. “My kidneys are shutting down.” At Damian’s expression she backtracked. “Well, they were, but now their not! But their in real bad shape and that ain’t even talkin’ about my liver or appendix which by the way? Did’ya know all this could cause my appendix to burst?”

She smiled weakly as Damian immediately began fussing over her. Asking if she was in pain right now, pressing different parts of her stomach and asking if it hurt, if she’d drank any water, if she could. It was honestly really cute. He and Jason shared grins as Dick and Cass began talking about stories they could tell her, how they could introduce themselves. Bruce sat silently, looking stunned but a little pleased.

“This attack isn’t as bad as last time,” She reassured him, “and it’s nowhere near as bad as the first.” There was a story there, a sad one from the way she said it but she didn’t continue and Damian didn’t push. Jazz began babbling loudly and crawling around the crib. Lydia smiled.

“That’s Jasmine, but I call her Jazz. Baby’s ain’t suppose’ to room with anyone older than one but she needed to be emitted badly so they asked if she could stay with me. Obviously I said yes. Hiya lovebug!” Jazz squealed and sat up, clapping her hands. Damian watched as Lydia cooed and played peek-a-boo with her blanket, Jazz babbling like crazy.

“Uh oh,” Jason snorted, “I know that look.” He was right—they'd seen that face more than once. Usually before Damian brought home an animal he realistically shouldn’t have been able to find in New Jersey. Damian stood up and went around the room, putting on bright red shoes and a pastel rainbow puffer jacket and picked up the possum bag. “What’cha doing?” Lydia seemed amused. Probably because her fashion style looked a little ridiculous on Damian.

“Im going to your apartment and collecting things I know you'd like to have. And while you are not capable of using some of them such as your instruments and sketchbooks I’d enjoy practicing your art style and learning a new instrument. Jasmine would also enjoy some entertainment, no?”

Lydia stared for a few seconds before her eyes filled with tears. She used her shoulder to wipe her eyes and motioned Damian forward. When he was within reach she pulled him down by his shirt to hug him. She whispered something in his ear that made him smile and say something back before leaving through the window. Tim sped up the footage until Damian returned, which was an hour later. The bag didn’t look to be full, and thinking about it, how was he supposed to fit instruments and sketchbooks in a backpack that size? He gave the backpack to her, took off the shoes and jacket and got back into the bed, smiling as she gasped.

She reached in and pulled out the kalimba from before which was wider than the bag and a colorful hip-chain with six rainbow stars, each one with a clip on the bottom connected to a ribbon that seemed to be a backwards rainbow. The first three ribbons were wrapped around and holding small poké balls, while the other three were empty.

Lydia positioned her hands on the kalimba before playing. Even with her hands, which took her a minute to get into the right position, she played it beautifully. Damian listened to the upbeat song for a moment. “An Irish jig?” Lydia nodded. “The Butterfly by Tommy Potts.” Jazz squealed at the song, clapping her hands and crawling around her cradle.

Lydia smiled and continued playing, asking Jazz if she liked it when she was done. Jazz screamed and babbled happily, bouncing in place and waving and clapping her hands. Lydia looked in the bag again, this time pulling out a flute longer than the bag?? Tim looked between his siblings and father as they took in the footage.

Jason began laughing, probably at Bruce’s face. “The brats girlfriends a meta! An unknown meta in Gotham!” Bruce, who had unfortunately taken off his cowl while watching the footage, looked simultaneously devastated and confused. “She could be a magician!” Dick said, patting Bruce on the back. “Maybe it’s like Mary Poppins or Hermione Grangers never ending bag!”

Damian gave her a look, but Lydia said she needed to exercise her lungs. He huffed, but helped her raise her hands. The next song she played was very different from the one before, and Tim recognized it immediately. “That’s Isabella’s Lullaby from The Promised Neverland.” Dick and Jason nodded, Cass doing the same from her seat next to Bruce. Bruce looked a little confused before Cass signed to him ‘anime’.

Jazz made a ‘whoaaaaa’ sound and listened intently. Damian was listening as well, and as the first verse ended he began to sing.

‘Let me sing a lullaby

As you close your eyes

And as your drifting off to sleep

How I hope that the dreams that find you

Are bright’

Damians voice was surprisingly nice, slightly deep and his accent a bit more pronounced. He had an arm wrapped around Lydias waist and his eyes closed. He looked calm.

‘Love can we meet again soon in the bluest of skies?

Where a tomorrow waits for you and I

So hold me tight one more time, but don’t say goodbye

‘Cause I know that I’ll see you on the other side’

Lydia had her eyes closed too, swaying slightly to the tune. Jazz looked mesmerized.

‘I will think of our song when the nights are too long’

Damian opened his eyes and gazed at Lydia

‘I’ll dream of you for that’s where I belong

Love, can we meet again soon in the bluest of skies

Only, in my dreams, do we meet again’

Damian’s voice ended on the same tune as the flute, and when the note ended Lydia opened her eyes. They locked eyes and stayed that way until Jazz squealed. Damian blinked rapidly for a few seconds before blushing, Lydia laughing even though her face was turning red as well.

“You’ve gotten better.” She leaned into him as Damian huffed, looking away but pulling her even closer. Damian was going to retort but the door opened again and two people entered. One was a black women shorter than Damian with greying thick curly hair similar to Lydias pulled into a large bun, and the other was a tall heavyset white man with a receding hairline and grey beard. The computer told him they were Laura and Logan Lippet, Lydia’s parents.

They had styrofoam take out boxes and a drink carrier. They stopped when they saw Damian, but then continued on. “Hey Damian!” Mr.Lippet said, putting the boxes on the table. “Was wondering when you’d show up.” Mrs.Lippet and Lydia laughed as Damian smiled, accepting Mrs.Lippets hug. “When’d you get here? Or how’s a better word.” She laughed and handed a box to Lydia and sat a drink on the nightstand.

“Garlic pasta!” She cheered, kissing her moms cheek. “I just came back after, uh. I broke into your apartment again, but only to collect Lydias things.” Mr.Lippet threw his head back and laughed as Mrs.Lippet smiled and shook her head. “As to how, don’t worry about it.” The Lippets laughed again. “Did you see the brownies Liam made?” “Yes, he added pistachios this time.”

“They seem weirdly chill about a billionaires son breaking into their house and getting into their daughters hospital room.” Jason commented, Tim and the others agreeing. Lydias parents had expected Damian to not only show up, but eat their food when entering their house? Either Damian was closer to these people than they thought, or the Lippets were a little crazy. Judging from the records he was seeing, it looked like the latter.

“That’s weird,” Tim hummed, “there’s records of her meta gene, but for some reason we didn’t get an alert.” Usually every time a meta was documented in Gotham they would be sent an alert about it through a not-so-legal chain system Babs set up. But even though Lydias meta gene was reported when she was three, they’d never gotten an alert. Well, now that Tim was looking, they had. But it’d been deleted very recently.

Apparently her ability was ‘Art Manifestation’. Tim didn’t know what that meant, but he had a feeling they’d find out. He brought up the file next to the camera where the Lippets and Damian were talking and laughing. Damian was holding Lydias drink just out of reach, laughing as she tried to grab it with her teeth. “Use your hands,” he taunted her, “it’s physical therapy!” Her parents roared with laughter as Lydia began hitting him as best she could. She was laughing with them.

A little while later Jazz's parents came in with a nurse. They had the normal reaction to seeing Damian Wayne cuddling with Lydia. “Hey Joseph, hey Ariana!” Mr.Lippet called to the stunned couple, “This is Damian, Lydias boyfriend.” Damian greeted them as politely as he could with Lydia teaching him how to use the portable loom she’d apparently forgotten she had in the possum bag.

“Their dating!?” Dick gasped. “Isn’t that what you said?” “I was joking! Oh my god, Damian actually has a girlfriend!” Jason laughed again and Dick began panicking. “Oh we were supposed to spy on their first date! And mess with Damian about it, figure out her favorite things so we could tell Damian, oh my god we missed seeing them on Valentine’s Day!” Cass patted his back. ‘There will still be valentines days to see and things to bully Damian about. I do not think they’ve had sex yet.’

Bruce choked. “Cass!” She gave him a confused expression as Jason laughed harder. Dick continued to sulk. “I don’t wanna know about that stuff…..I hope he at least tells us about their first date.” “I’m more interested in how they met. Lydia seems pretty forward so far.” Jason snorted. “You think she asked him out?” Tim shrugged. “You think Damian would’ve?”

Apparently Jazz was getting moved to Boston Children’s Hospital for further treatment. Damian and the Lippets helped her parents pack up Jazz’s toys while Lydia tried to persuade them to let her help. “I can stand!” She whined. “But you can’t for a long time,” her dad responded, “and while your stretching has helped a lot we don’t want you over exerting yourself and getting hurt.”

“Has she been seen by physical therapy?” Damian asked. Her mom huffed. “She’s supposed to see them every day, but just like last time we’ve only seen them the first day. They come in, tell us she’ll be seen every day and then we never see them again!” Damian gave an unpleased ‘Tt’ as he folded Jazz’s blankets.

In a few minutes they were ready to leave and the Lippets cheerfully said their goodbyes, Damian doing so awkwardly. After they left Lydia reached over and opened her computer. “Now it’s horror movie time!” The Lippets laughed as Damian raised an eyebrow and sat next to her. “You couldn’t watch them before?”

“Not with Jazz in the room,” she muttered, switching between scrolling and typing. “Don’ wanna traumatize the baby. Y’all feeling like a thriller or gore?” Her dad looked over her shoulder from where he was standing. “Damian, you ever seen ‘Someone Marry Barry’?” Mrs.Lippet snorted as Lydia groaned.

“We are not watching a romcom.” “Why not?” Her dad whined. “Netflix just got like seven new more!” Damian smiled as Lydia argued with her dad. He seemed more relaxed with them than he did at the manor. Lydia and her dad got into a slap fight. It felt weird to watch normal people play fighting. Usually when they play fought it’d involve actual weapons and strategies to find the best place to tickle.

But Lydia and her dad were normal people. They slapped each other harmlessly, without worrying if they’d accidentally hurt them. Lydia shrieked with delight as her dad grabbed her and shook her around, chanting ‘Romcom, romcom, romcom!’ “Alright alright alright!” She giggled, “we’ll watch one horror one romcom, how’bout that?” Her dad agreed and pulled the table from across her bed to the foot of the bed. He then moved the crib to the position they’d first seen it in.

While Lydia found a movie Mr.Lippet moved the couch from under the window next to the bed. He and Mrs.Lippet settled on the couch, Mrs.Lippet with crochet and Mr.Lippet with his own computer. “We can watch the Evil Dead series! They just made a new movie!” Lydia said excitedly, showing Damian a movie screen that he’d seen trailers for. Damian tilted his head.

“How will we watch a series when we’re switching genres?” “We watch one, watch one of dad’s shitty romcoms, then the second movie, and so on!” Mr.Lippet snorted, “Just for that I’m going to make your Roblox avatar ugly.” They all laughed. “Hey! Don't do that! I can’t fight back, we’re watching movies!” Her dad playfully rolled his eyes and muttered “hang on,” and began typing very fast.

“Lydia, turn on the TV.” She did. They waited as he typed very fast for a few minutes before the hospital TV glitched, blacked out and then showed Lydias computer screen on Prime. They cheered. “What the fuck?” Jason said, “How the hell’d he do that?” Tim shrugged. “I’m not surprised,” Barbara’s voice came through over comms, “He’s the configuration manager for TSA, and before that he was IT, and before that he was CIA, and before that he was Navy Seal. He’s on the no fly list because he used to be a spy in the CIA.”

Oh. “And he lives in Gotham….why? Does he have any connection with any rogues?” “He was born in Michigan, Laura in Texas, and they married in Virginia and then moved around a lot because of the military. They were in Hawaii before they were deployed here at the harbor, Logan retired, and they had Lydia and her brother Liam. They’re Irish twins, she’s October 15th 2007 and he’s the 17th 2008. No connection to any rouges other than accidentally meeting Scarecrow in civies and telling him to go fuck himself for his bad parking.”

They all laughed as Lydia used the hospital remote to choose the first Evil Dead movie. Then she pulled out another computer and handed it to Damian, and pulled her computer off the table and into her lap. She typed a little, then gasped. “Hey! That’s not nice!” Damian laughed as her dad retorted, “Calling romcoms shitty isn’t nice! Enjoy your skeleton!” Damian snorted. An actual snort.

Was he dead? Hallucinating? Dreaming? Or did he actually hear Damian Wayne snort? “Well, I approve.” Jason laughed as Lydia and Damian began playing Roblox with her dad. “She’s making him laugh, he’s relaxed, he gets along well with her parents and her parents are apparently super cool with all his weirdness. I think we’re looking at the future Mrs. Wayne!” Honestly? He wouldn’t mind having another new and weird addition to this family.

[lameow-l]

this was literally the only question i was curious about, thanks for asking that for me paimon

like fontainain people married other nationalities yeah?? how did they have kids if they were oceanids.. anddd umm if they could fuck normal humans wouldn’t that make the oceanid in springvale falling in love with a boy from mond a bit problematic lol especially since it’s no longer a fairytale but an actual thing that happened and we witnessed it last patch??

so it’s not the case and new oceanids are just turned into humans but wait!! so celestia allows that?? it keeps constantly happening but they’re not stopping it.. ok sure but also

i wonder how many generations of fontaine people will it take for them to realize that they have to sexually mate to create children now

[mars-ipan]

god i cannot wait to be off these steroids…

[an-ivy-covered-summer]

i think that some people have fully lost the plot. maybe i’m just a cupcake, but idk, i personally think that if you want to abolish prison and death penalty and you want rehabilitative justice to exist, you kinda shouldn’t rejoice when people who were in clear need of help and who were victims of abuse in a toxic environment before they became abusers themselves die.

like, i don’t know, but i do think that death is kind of a fucked up thing to wish for people who fucked up if you preach about changing the system, making the world a better place, owning up to your wrongdoings and the harm you’ve caused and becoming a better person, and redemption. whether you like the people or not.

maybe it’s just me, but it does feel hypocritical and makes everything you say about social justice performative at best. but what do i know!

[nat-seal-well]

I love my body but I do wish my voice was deeper. And that I could talk right. I sound like a child 😭

[deus-ex-mona]

with how expensive the lxl concert tickets are, they had better do ↑this↑ at the bare minimum during their self intro, or so help me

[comfymoth]

can we forget the priest. can we love socks and mama hidalgo instead -clover anon

honestly i’m just as surprised by the enthusiasm for mama hidalgo as i am by the enthusiasm for father anderson, just in a much less cursed way ahdkdjd

she wasn’t even supposed to be a part of that set of parent designs at first, i just drew her as a bonus at the literal last minute to make myself sad ToT i’m glad you guys like her though, i like her too :]

[gayboyrocklee]

Love posting my Spotify receipts for the month bc you can always tell when I’ve had smth big to write for one of my classes bc the one Jash song (Dream (Outro from Calamity)) will make the receipt. I did not end up a Jashinator but I do like having a song I can rely on to make me write things.

[sophfandoms53]

I wish Hazbin had more than 8 episodes this season bc 1) the pacing is all over the place (outside of episode 4) and 2) it would’ve been so nice to actually see when and why Alastor started to genuinely care about the hotel.

The pilot and the first episode of the show characterize him as sticking around for the entertainment because of how silly the idea of redeeming a sinner is to him but then episode 5 has him fully backing up Charlie’s wishes for the hotel and even tells Mimzy she’s welcomed to stay if she actually wants to try redemption and was upset she had put the hotel in danger with her presence.

I think that turnaround in Alastor’s perspective is so interesting but when did that happen? Why did that happen? How did that happen? What made him care?

He clearly still has ulterior motives, there’s 0 denying that given his scene with Husk in the same episode, but he does seem to actually care about Charlie and her hotel. Which can be connected to the leash Husk claimed Alastor is bound by but Alastor is also the most distant from the cast.

We never see him around everyone for more than a few minutes at a time. Everyone went out to the club in episode 6 but Alastor is nowhere to be found in the entire episode.

That bond with anyone in the hotel, even Charlie, that would explain Alastor’s sudden support in the hotel has not been shown on screen and I really wish the show had more time to do that.

That’s really what Hazbin lacks. Time. Time to slow down and just let the characters breathe. Everything is moving so fast because they probably didn’t know a second season was coming until later which I can understand but that also means the plot takes priority over the characters and a majority of the cast is suffering from it.

Angel’s the only character who’s gotten an episode solely about him and exploring, expanding, and developing his character and his bonds in the hotel are what we see the most. This makes sense given he’s the main guest in the hotel but no other character has been able to have their own character and arc be explored the way Angel has.

The show needed more episodes like Masquerade to explore the cast before diving headfirst into the Heaven vs. Hell redemption conflict. That was always going to be the direction the show went in but they needed so much more time to do it because there are so many characters to juggle and so much is happening. Big moments that are supposed to matter don’t hit as hard as they should bc the cast is overstuffed and everyone is fighting for screen time.

This isn’t the teams fault, they’re doing a decent job with the limit time they were given but 8 episodes is not enough time for a show this ambitious with everything it’s trying to do. Doubling the episode count to 16 would’ve done wonders for the pacing and the show could slow down and take its time.

A lot of what Hazbin presents are good ideas. It’s all interesting but none of it is given enough time because the big Heaven and Hell plot has to take a majority of the shows focus. I do hope season 2 fixes this but that’s also gonna depend where the show is going after season 1 is over. We’ll see next week.

My main wish for the show going forward is each character gets their chance to be explored just as Angel has.