#canon-critical

[chiisana-sukima]

What's your opinion on the take that Sam is always running away?

The short answer is I think spn's ethics are insane.

The longer answer is that if you did a rewatch and counted up all the times that Sam objectively "runs away" from a problem/his family/etc and all the times Dean "runs away" from the same, I'm not sure who would actually win. But I do think the narrative frames Sam as the one who runs, and that, over the long term, it treats "running away" as his cardinal sin.

For example, when Dean runs away from his mistakes in Road Trip, the narrative does frame that as immature and self-destructive, and punishes him with the Mark of Cain. But by s11, this is reframed briefly as a "we" problem in s11a (Sam: "if we don't change, right now, all of our crap is just gonna keep repeating itself") and then never held against Dean personally thereafter. Whereas Sam's equivalent attempt at running away--the s4 demon blood arc--continues to be held against him by the narrative until at least 13x21 (Cas: we let Lucifer out of the Cage.)

Even more interestingly, at least to me, with the exception of Stanford, the narrative also tends to treat Dean's episodes of running away from Sam as "abandoning" him, but Sam's episodes of running away from Dean as "betraying" Dean.

This is Dean abandoning Sam to his fate as Lucifer's vessel. The narrative punishment is extreme, but not only does Dean get a do over in the same episode and it never comes up again, but the quote is remembered by fandom primarily as a quote about how close they are. And I do think that's borne out by the narrative. If Dean abandons Sam, the world will literally end.

Meanwhile though:

When Sam screws up with Dean, he's betraying him. The problem isn't just that Sam is an addict or that he ran away from Dean's attempt to forcibly detox him for his own somewhat questionable "good", but that he did so with a demon whore. It's portrayed as a personal betrayal in a way that Dean abandoning Sam to Lucifer is not.

In some ways, Sam is even the more steadfast brother. He may physically leave Dean at times but he never stops believing in Dean's capacity for good. When it's his turn to lock Dean in the panic room because Dean gives up and runs to destruction at the hands of Michael, he doesn't do it. And in the Mark of Cain arc, he affirms that even if Dean kills him, he accepts it as necessary and still believes Dean is a good man.

Which brings me to spn's ethics and fandom's response.

If there's one single thing that spn is entirely, completely, one hundred percent consistent on, it's that tumblr is wrong. You can't just walk out; leaving is always wrong and will usually end the world. It's wrong if it's temporarily for the evening because you'd like to have Thanksgiving dinner and your family doesn't do that, or for four years because you want to go to college, or for forever because all your remaining loved ones have been killed before your eyes, or if it's only a partial withdrawal because you want better boundaries in the face of years of violence and autonomy violations. (To be clear, spn thinks the violence and autonomy violations are wrong too; it's just especially adamant that the only appropriate response is self-sacrifice.) The only reason Sam is finally allowed to temporarily leave in the finale is because he so obviously no longer wants to.

And all of this, to be completely blunt, is batshit fucking crazy. And I mean that in the clinical technical sense of the word. As a system of ethics it's an enormous mess, as a behavioral guide it's guaranteed to result in inappropriate assignment of blame and unnecessary suffering, and it's hard to interpret it all for me personally as anything but a response to trauma.

I do think that on an emotional level there's something wildly compelling about it though, and it's fiction, after all, so there's nothing wrong with it as a fantasy. The idea that if only you could prove your loyalty strongly enough your family would finally accept you, flaws and all, is an impossible wish many of us have spent a lot of our real lives trying to actualize. And seeing it happen on screen when it can't happen irl can be cathartic, much like revenge stories can be cathartic even though irl revenge is a terrible idea. The vibes are, in short, without flaw.

The thing that's hard for me though is remembering that everyone irl grows at their own speed. Not everyone is in a position to cleanly separate their emotional enjoyment of a plotline or theme from their intellectual calculus about whether or not it makes any fucking sense--especially when those plotlines or themes are about violence, betrayal, abandonment, and abuse. And it's hard for me to remember sometimes that huge swathes of meta aren't actually the result of [insert negative judgement here] but are just reflective of a different series of experiences than the ones I happen to have had.

Honestly I find it frustrating. I wish people would be better about separating out what the story is saying from what they think of that message themselves. I feel like the format of fandom meta is often kind of a disaster. It adopts an authoritative, academic tone, but is usually actually used to express personal feelings and wishes without acknowledging that it's doing that.

It's not that I think people should have to disclose their personal experiences to write meta--on the contrary, sometimes that's helpful but sometimes it just makes it worse. Rather, I wish people would get in the habit of using more "I" statements and acknowledging their subjectivity more overtly. Back in the days when dinos roamed the earth and I was an undergrad, I learned that the use of the third person passive voice in academic writing is a political choice. It grants the illusion of more authority and objectivity than actually exists. I wish fandom would take up my professor's call to abandon it to some extent and say "I feel hurt that Sam left Dean alone with John to go to college" rather than "Sam is always running away".

[gilmores-glorious-blog]

happy pride month to vax’ildan, who didn’t believe that it was possible for any man to be straight

[nitw]

i'm so used to popularized fanon jon sims designs that when i see someone draw him like a generic white guy i have to do a double take. who is this. where is my beautiful archivist

[batbabydamian]

A Quick Guide to Damian’s Furry/Feathered/Scaled Companions

LEFT: R:SOB #1 Cover RIGHT: R:SOB #6

GOLIATH THE BAT DRAGON

Introduced in: ROBIN: SON OF BATMAN (2015) #1

DAMIAN'S BABY AND BEASTY BESTIE!! On a mission during the Year of Blood, Damian kills the family of bat dragons guarding his objective. Goliath, despite being the youngest and last of his kind, forgives Damian. Goliath goes on to become one of Damian's most loyal companions, even featuring beside him in Batman Beyond (2016) #10, #11, #43-#47!

LEFT: B&R #13 RIGHT: B&R #4

TITUS THE DOG

Introduced in: BATMAN AND ROBIN (2011) #2

A Great Dane gifted to Damian from Bruce as an effort in fatherhood. Funny enough, Damian finds him a nuisance at first and briefly refers to him as "Dog". Titus is a good boy that follows Damian's every step, even joining Bruce on his mission to resurrect Damian!

LEFT: Batman Inc #1 RIGHT: Batman Inc #7

BAT-COW THE COW

Introduced in: BATMAN INCORPORATED (2012) #1

Bat-Cow, branded with a star signifying which cattle were contaminated, was saved from a slaughterhouse to run some tests (which they do find of a mind control variety). Damian declares himself a vegetarian, and calls her Bat-Cow! She also sorta has a running gag of literally standing in the face of danger to save the day.

LEFT: Batman Inc #6 RIGHT: Batman Inc #7

ALFRED THE CAT

Introduced in: BATMAN INCORPORATED (2012) #6

Considered a "hopeless case" by the animal shelter, Alfred gifts him to Damian. The cat is a bold lil guy, which Damian takes an immediate liking to, and names him Alfred (likely because tuxedo cat = butler lol). After hours of chicken, playtime, and scratches, Damian and Alfred become friends! He makes his first appearance alongside Damian’s first appearance as Batman in BATMAN (1940) #666

LEFT: Batman: Li'l Gotham #2/#1 RIGHT: Batman: Li'l Gotham #23/#12

*JERRY THE TURKEY

Introduced in: BATMAN LI'L GOTHAM (2012) #2 (Digital) #1 (Printed)

The Penguin unleashes an army of turkeys at the Gotham Thanksgiving parade which Damian turns into his own li'l turkey march by playing the trumpet. He ends up bringing one of them back for Thanksgiving dinner (as a friend), and Jerry becomes a fairly regular appearance in the world of Li'l Gotham!

*WIGGLES THE DRAGON

Introduced in: NIGHTWING (2016) #42

A sort of filler issue where Damian has been kidnapped for his blood by the "Crimson Kabuki" in Tokyo, and Dick goes through a series of boss battles to save him. The dragon's blood has been the group's main source of power, so it ends up teaming with the duo, and returns home with them.

Wiggles was originally named by a fan, "Shanootnoot" on Twitter!

*Goliath, Titus, Bat-Cow, and Alfred the cat have been Damian's main canon cast of furry companions, but SUPER-PETS SPECIAL: BITEDENTITY CRISIS (2024) may have just added Jerry and Wiggles!!

[prokopetz]

this ask came to me in a dream and i must speak on its behalf: what do you think about homestuck beyond canon

I think it's too early for me to have a well-formed opinion at this point, for a very specific reason.

I basically agree with the majority opinion that the post-epilogue story which would eventually become Beyond Canon is characterised by a whole lot of spite toward its target audience. Where I differ is that I don't think this is anything new; a certain sneering contempt for their audience has always been a hallmark of Andrew Hussie's work, and it's present in Homestuck right from day one. At most, Hussie getting burnt out from the Hiveswap fiasco resulted in a text that's somewhat less willing to entertain the polite fiction that its readers are in on the joke, but that's not a change – it's just saying the quiet part out loud.

The interesting part is that this contempt isn't merely undirected bile: it's motivated by a particular stance regarding the purpose of fiction. Writing a story which invites emotional investment, then turning around and calling you a stupid baby for actually becoming invested in it is one of Hussie's favoured narrative sleights of hand, but it's not the Charlie Brown-esque football pull it appears to be – or, rather, it's not only that. Lurking under it is the insistence that fictional characters are, ultimately, objects: tools for exploring a narrative space. Ironic detachment is the only "correct" way to approach works of fiction, because when you emotionally relate to a fictional character (or, heaven forfend, actually identify with one), you are fundamentally committing a category error – like you've mistaken a hat for your wife.*

To what extent Hussie actually believes any of that, and to what extent it's just a very committed bit they're doing is a fair question, but that's not important here; sincere or not, the opening stages of (what was not yet) Beyond Canon are dyed in the cloth with it. Care of the comic has subsequently been handed off to a separate creative team who, to all textual evidence, don't buy into this notion of what-fiction-is-for at all, but they're building on a foundation that's steeped in it. What we're looking at now is a serialised narrative which disagrees with its own premise. I genuinely cannot imagine what sort of flower they're expecting to grow in the soil they've been given, and I don't think we're far enough in to draw any well-supported conclusions just yet.

All of which is a very complicated way of saying that I'm just here for the show!

* With apologies to Oliver Sacks.

[ciderjacks]

despite Laios low self esteem making him think that if he’d been eaten, Chilchuck and Marcille wouldn’t have helped Falin,

theres a small part of me that thinks the reason Chilchuck stayed with the party and went back in the dungeon in the first place was because he didn’t want to leave Laios alone. That Laios was moreso the reason he stayed.

[oddthesungod]

got over my initial knee jerk reaction so canon braius sketch just to feel out his design in my style, and ngl i see the vision mr riegel

[mebssann]

Amity pestered Principal Bump enough times that he finally allowed Hexside to have a student council

[liltaireissocute]

kiss kiss fall in love

[autisticrosewilson]

While we're on the topic of De-aging AU's I wanna talk about Jason and Damian if Jason was 14 again real quick.

Do you guys think that Damian looks at this version of Jason, so different from the version he knows, nothing like the person he was told Jason was, and feels uncomfortably seen?

Damian was always told that Jason died because he was reckless, because he disobeyed orders, he was fired as Robin and he got himself killed. A cautionary tale, not a threat to his position. He dismisses Jason because Bruce does, because Dick does, because sometimes even Babs and Alfred do.

That's not the kid that he's looking at now. This Jason is happy, and smart, and full of love that has not yet soured into grief. He hangs on Bruce's every word, trains until his hands bleed and his body gives out to perfect the moves Bruce teaches him. He looks at Bruce with stars in his eyes and he calls him dad.

And Damian can't help but think, that this is the perfect Robin. The perfect son. And if Jason - sweet, loving, strong, Jason - can be fired, can die and have his room locked away and his pictures torn down, can have his last memory as Robin be as A Good Soldier, how could the rest of them ever compete? What could Damian do to stand a chance?

Jason will never grow out of the shadow of Robin, like the rest of them did. As long as Bruce, and Dick, and Babs, and Alfred look at him and see a dead kid who came back wrong, he will never get to be anything else. He will not get to be looked at through who he is now without the shadow of a dead boy looming over him.

And the worst part? Jason is exactly the same person he was back then. Bitter, sure, angry, justifiably, but he is still the boy with too much love in his heart and righteous fury festering in his gut. He is exactly the same boy who threw himself in front of an explosion to save his mother.

(The lines between the mother that betrayed him and the father that disgraced him are so very blurred. Fire or blade or crowbars or fists it does not matter. It ends the same way it always does because Jason Todd always dies, in every universe, in every timeline, Jason dies and crawls out only to be killed again and again and again.)

[distant--shadow]

"You're not a bad person,

You're not a bad person."

(ko-fi//inprnt)

[denkies]

[spideysenze]

oh eleven and his cool hats

[maddyscrsideblog]

[ID: A digital illustration of Essek Thelyss and Caleb Widogast from Critical Role. Essek is a floating purple goat and Caleb is an orange sheep. End description.]

Aeor is for lovers (getting turned into farm animals)

[longing-for-rain]

Anyone else notice how Katara says “I have healing abilities” instead of “I am a healer” because she didn’t want to be defined as a healer but as a Master and warrior first?

[stormcallart]

Beach day and date night 💙❤️