#i aspire to be like this man

[mintaikk]

The Alastor pin is his new bestie

[uncanny-tranny]

Huge shout-out to John Cena for dropping my new transition goal that one time last year. Look at this and earnestly say this isn't peak male performance.

[thepatronsaintoffilth]

that tonal shift between Meet The Grahams and Not Like Us is absolutely wild to me in hindsight. Plus it felt like a direct response to all the people sleeping on Kdot's banger/bop credentials. Just picturing everyone crying on the floor in despair from MTG, only for Kdot to burst through the wall like the kool aid man yelling "YOU MUHFUCKAS SAID YOU WANTED TO DANCE, GET UP NIGGAS, LETS DANCE"

[isogenderskitty]

can we please talk about steph having a bigger body type than the rest of the cast & yet even in a show centred around the theme of bullying it's never so much as pointed out let alone mocked & she's universally regarded by other characters (and a large portion of the audience, from what i've seen including me) as cool and sexy. because it means a lot to me actually

[giddlygoat]

three gay caballeros <3

[opuestocomplementario]

I don't talk much about AlanJeff bc there's not much I can say that there hasn't said before but my god the one face Alan was making with his eyes close in absolute ecstasy and pleasure while fucking Jeff and the way he smiled after... I'm sorry Mr Sailub Hemmawich, but I need you to have at least 15 dramas more for you to make more of that

[fujii-draws]

Finished Gates 👍 me n Aria are crying in the vc

[silverwhittlingknife]

hi Silver! o/ because that fanart made me wonder - would you happen to know when/where Dick's stuffed elephant plush Zitka turns up in the comics?

GREETINGS CAM <3333 THAT ART WAS SO CUTE

Yeah, I think your instincts are right - it's a truly adorable bit of transformative fandom, but I'm 95% percent sure it's not comics canon. Barbara has canon plushies, but I don't think anyone else does.

I got kinda invested in the investigation (it's hard to prove a negative!) and I ended up typing out an entire History of Elinore/Zitka, so, uh, if you're curious, meet me below the cut for:

Where does Elinore / Zitka - the animal - appear in comics?

Did Dick ever have a stuffed elephant toy in comics?

Where does Elinore / Zitka appear in comics?

We're gonna go in chronological order!

Dick's circus elephant friend was first created for practical reasons: in Batman 436, Marv Wolfman does a big expanded flashback to Dick's circus backstory as a way to subtly show us Tim before officially introducing him (so that we can have a technically-solvable mystery-of-Tim's-identity in LPoD). In this comic, there's an elephant named Elinore who loves Dick:

Aww. Such a cute elephant!

Batman 436 comes out in August 1989. New Titans 60 comes out a few months later, in November, and guess what? When Dick visits the circus, he is suddenly surprised by an unexpected blast from the past! It turns out that even though it's been years, Elinore still remembers him!

Here's the part where Elinore remembers Dick:

SUCH a cute elephant. I love her.

(Guess who else still remembers Dick even though it was so long ago. Guess which other character is about to be an unexpected blast from the past. Guess which character Elinore is directly paralleling guess guess guess sorry everything is about Dick and Tim in my mind but I can focus I swear)

Four years later, in 1993, Batman: The Animated Series retells Dick's origin story. They like and keep Wolfman's elephant, but they change her name to Zitka:

Wolfman doesn't return to the elephant beyond those two appearances, and a few years down the line, New Titans gets cancelled and Wolfman's not writing Dick anymore anyway. So the animal gets abandoned for a while, until Devin Grayson, a fan of both Wolfman and B:tAS, revives the Wolfman-era Titans team in JLA/Titans and then the ongoing series Titans 1999.

Grayson then brings back the elephant in a flashback to Dick's past in Titans 16 (Jun 2000), where she imports the B:tAS name. Sometimes I'm skeptical of TV-to-comics imports, but honestly, I endorse this one. You lose the alliteration, which is a shame, but IMO Zitka is a better elephant name than Elinore.

Here's Dick with the newly-christened Zitka in Titans 16:

Grayson also briefly references the elephant in Gotham Knights 20 and - in a final angsty callback - in Nightwing 88 (Feb 2004), where Zitka tries futilely to comfort Dick in the midst of his trauma conga line:

... And... honestly, I think that's it for comic appearances? The two Wolfman comics plus the three Grayson comics.

Both Wolfman and Grayson are writing multiple titles - Batman, New Titans, Titans, Gotham Knights, and Nightwing between the two of them, spanning a big chunk of Dick's post-Crisis canon - and both writers use the elephant for heartwarming moments of nostalgia, which means if you're doing a post-Crisis readthrough for Dick, Elinore/Zitka feels memorable. But I don't think she actually shows up that much.

For post-2011, I am not as well-informed - throwing this out to the dash? anyone know? - but I feel like Zitka the heartwarming symbol of Dick's heartwarming circus past is, uh, thematically very at odds with the Court of Owls evil!circus vibes, so my instinct is that this story element was almost certainly dropped in the reboot.

Did Dick ever have a stuffed elephant toy in comics?

In WFA, yes; in main comics continuity, no. Technically, I have not read every comic ever published, so I could be wrong!! But I don't think so.

Below, find my rambling reasoning on the tonal vibes of pre-Crisis, post-Crisis, and post-2011, and why this particular story element doesn't seem right to me for the first two.

Pre-Crisis (...okay, mostly the Silver Age): stuffed animal, yes or no?

tl;dr no, requires too much background knowledge on the part of the reader, plus the elephant wasn't a thing until later

Elinore doesn't get created until post-Crisis, but also just generally, pre-Crisis callbacks are more along the lines of this reference in Batman 129 (published in 1960), where, wow, Batman and Robin are hunting jewel thieves - and it turns out Robin recognized this strongman! BUT HOW?!

The comic goes on to recap Dick's entire origin story in flashback, on the assumption that you may not know it.

(BTW, if you'd like to know more about Haly's Circus throughout the years, nightwingology has a great post here summarizing a lot of fun plotlines and characters!)

Basically: Silver Age comics are very self-consciously episodic and kid-friendly; they're not generally gonna do overly-elaborate callbacks because they don't know what comics their kid readers may have randomly picked up or remember.

By the time of post-Crisis, comic books were being written for an adult audience buying from the direct market, i.e. readers who are collecting whole runs & don't need or want Dick's origin story to be recapped to us in full every time it's referenced. That's why in post-Crisis, we get stuff like "hey, neat, this particular soda brand is getting mentioned in several different books!!" or "in order to understand this story arc, buy SIXTEEN DIFFERENT COMICS in FIVE DIFFERENT RUNS and read them ALL ACCORDING TO A NUMBERED ORDER and also you better be following the individual plotlines and recognize these five minor characters who we don't bother to introduce!! Good luck!!" But the elaborate post-Crisis plotlines - and subtler worldbuilding like a stuffed animal callback to Dick's backstory - don't make a lot of story sense UNLESS you're imagining your readers as completionist adult fans.

So IMO a stuffed animal wouldn't be a pre-Crisis thing unless it was The Episodic Story Of the Week, and I don't think a stuffed animal is action-adventure-y enough for the fast-paced storytelling of the Silver Age. (Unless it, like, came to life and tried to eat you or something.)

Post-Crisis: stuffed animals, yes or no?

tl;dr: no, Dick's a manly tough guy, he's not gonna have a stuffed animal, that'd be lame, like something Tim might do

Part of the edgy grimdark adult vibes in 80s/90s comics is that some characters who used to be kinda silly & goofy & lighthearted - like Batman and Robin - get reimagined as Serious and Angsty and Edgy in a Tough Cool Manly Brooding Way. This massively affects characterization for Bruce, Dick, and Bruce and Dick's relationship.

(I obviously love this change & love the tense Bruce-and-Dick interactions, but plenty of fans of the earlier fluffy comics really disliked the edgy retcons of Miller / Wolfman / Starlin / et al.)

The upshot is that post-Crisis is a period when you could have a recurring reference like a stuffed elephant, but you wouldn't have a stuffed elephant, not for Dick. I think a toy like that would be too cutesy / childish / effeminate to give a male character in post-Crisis, unless you were poking fun at him.

Now, you could probably let Tim have a stuffed animal, because Tim is sometimes cool but also sometimes a tryhard loser who is faking being cool and not entirely pulling it off (see e.g. the Robin comic where he practices tough-guy faces in the mirror, or the Teen Titans comic where Conner discovers his cringy Enya CD, or when he's fanboying over Connor and it's awkward, etc etc.). A stuffed animal would be deeply embarrassing, and you'd have to be careful to compensate by having Tim do something cool afterward - but Tim's character concept allows for "he's kind of a loser sometimes."

But Dick isn't!! In post-Crisis, Dick's a tough / impressive / "cool guy" character, the kind of guy anyone would want to be, even in the flashbacks where he's Robin, and even in the stories where he's more lighthearted than angsty. It'd be kinda lame for Dick to have a stuffed elephant, so he wouldn't. I feel like Dick would be more likely to poke fun at it if someone had one, like when he's making fun of Wally for liking the Hardy Boys. Dick could have a Batman action figure, at most, and if he had one he would have it ironically.

Basically: in post-Crisis, a male character hugging a stuffed elephant feels more likely to be a punchline to me, not something poignant. (Even with Tim, Tim could have an embarrassing stuffed animal, but he couldn't hug it when sad - that's too far. Maybe Booster Gold might do this. Probably he wouldn't, but spiritually, he would. Sorry Booster ilu! <3)

Instead, Dick instinctively deals with his inner turmoil like the TORTURED ACTION HERO he is: by punching things and brooding and yelling and joining the mob and sleeping on rooftops and going on obsessive secret missions and acquiring Angsty Stubble!! Just like Batman!

(Technically I don't know if Bruce ever joined the mob but you know he would.)

Anyway as you know this is my favorite continuity and I am poking fun affectionately, but uh, yeah sdfsfdsfs. No stuffed animals.

Post-2011 / Infinite Frontier / Wayne Family Adventures: stuffed animals, yes or no?

tl;dr it's in WFA! Probably not anywhere else, but it could be.

Post-2011 stuff tends to be cutesier overall, most of all in the current Infinite Frontier era. So I don't feel like this would be tonally out-of-line with IF comics. Taylor tends to go for more meme-y references rather than fanfic references, though.

So the obvious best fit is WFA, which is aiming for a rough approximation of Silver Age family-friendly vibes - wholesome, episodic plots, Teaching Good Moral Lessons For The Youth, etc. - plus lots of Easter eggs for fanfic readers and some comic references.

And look, here we are:

Aww.

Whew - that's everything I could find!

Anyway as you can probably tell, I LOVE the elephant, so this was a very entertaining rabbit hole to go down, thank you <3

[peachetteprice]

Born For It | Kyle "Gaz" Garrick

Enter: Rich-boy!Gaz who was never born into wealth, but rather, born for it.

Thankfully, his blagging skills were never subpar, as convincing the wealthiest blonde bimbo at a conference in Fort Lauderdale would have proved tricky had he not mastered the art of running his delicious mouth. It was, in his own words, piss-easy to convince the woman he was 'in love with' that he was, in fact, a very well-off, well-known auditor for numerous major tech companies, and he was, additionally, all too talented at forging the paperwork for a 2024 Kia Stonic in cerulean blue – that certainly did not cost him a month's worth of groceries to rent for two weeks – to prove that it was truly all his. And, goodness, thank the creator that his father was so devoted to owning three gorgeous, pin-striped Italian suits before he passed, otherwise he would have nothing prim and proper to wear on their first, second, third, fourth, and fifth dates! Well, before he devoured her on her velvet couch and stole her hand in marriage, of course.

Naturally, he takes to the role of pompous, spoilt, entitled husband like a moth to a flame, as he has an inordinate ability to stretch the truth with his long Ralph Lauren fleeces tucked at the elbows, VVS diamond-studded watches, and tinted Versace sunglasses.

Oh, but don't be fooled by the crass social act: the man knows a con artist when he sees one.

He doesn't spend long at the country club with a glass of red in hand, talking to Brian and James and Marcus and their wives Tiffany, Tiffany 2, and Tiffany 2.5, respectively, about the recent tax evasion scandal from Johnsons and Co. (and how they all might do it better without getting caught) before he spots you across the outdoor pool on a sun chair: the young, recently wed beauty with ample time left on your wrist to be doing anything with your life other than seduce poor, geriatric, twice-divorcée, once-widowed, thrice-Viagra'd Mr. Shepherd – or, more crucially – the vast riches he carries in those flabby jowls of his, just ripe enough for the taking as soon as that weak heart of his drops him dead in the shower on a cold Tuesday morning, months later.

It's a shame, really, that the old dog didn't put his conversation skills into the will, because it takes Kyle no more than three minutes of ogling to read the smudged guilt and lost desire on your face, and poses, to you, over a kiss on the knuckles and a well-timed whisper into your ear, the question of joining him one day for lunch in his large, supersized, monstrous mansion that hardly gets used by his married-to-her-work-first wife who, herself, would never think of Kyle wishing to screw another woman on the weekends to entertain himself in such a lonely... drab... suburb.

It does perplex you a little a first, especially when you aren't certain why he wants you of all the women at the country club, when every wife, waitress and pool girl would burst open their bras and dangle their naked breasts in his face at just a chance of that silver tongue on their bodies, because he's simply that irresistible.

Not only because he knows your golden secret to greed, and has been known to – again – run that scrumptious mouth of his to anyone he can throw under the bus for another grand or two, but because it's clear to anyone that dear-old Shepherd's cock does nothing for a pretty pussy like yours, and you desperately need to cream over his thick, severing, thigh-splitting one until you cum, to make up for all the flab he wiggles in and around your folds at nine in the evening before he conks out in his silk pyjamas – he has to wake up early to catch the morning run of his favourite radio show, don't you remember?

Though, you do agree that he is irresistible. In fact, you have to.

And you wouldn't tell on Kyle even if you could, even if he didn't have his wife's lawyer on speed-dial, due to that legally-binding, twenty-three page contract locked within a safe in your makeup drawer which clearly states that anything of yours from the inheritence – whenever your old biddie shoots the gun, kicks the bucket or collects his final paycheck, that is – is automatically his, too, as well as the properties in Toulouse, the estate in Dubai, the stocks and shares in Google and Facebook that only ever seem to be going up... oh, and that divine cunt of yours he laps up like a starved dog whenever his wife is away.

| Masterlist |

[only-the-shippers-can-bully-nrmt]

(Original Japanese on the left with translations under the break, Fan Translation in the middle, and Official Translation on the right.)

Saw some things flying around that have (unintentionally or otherwise) been giving people the wrong idea, so here are the comparisons to show that, yes, Miles was referring to Phoenix near the end of the second Miles Edgeworth Investigations game. Miles does bring up Gregory too, but Gregory being "that man" during the famous "shines brilliantly" scene was actually a change in the official English release that does not line up with the original Japanese version (even MTLs will get across the Wright meaning).

Also, "shining brilliantly in one's eyes" can be both how a son might look up to his father but also how a ruffly prosecutor might strongly/romantically see his courtroom partner; the line is simply intense enough to not easily carry the label of an "average" relationship. We don't need to elaborate when we tell family members/friends/significant others "I love you" (even if it's at the same time) for similar reasons, and I don't see anyone arguing that this means that Miles must see Phoenix like a father because he grouped them together in some form.

TL;DR: The official translation mucked up some context and stuff happened because of it. Keep shipping and feel free to use this as a reference post because the shippers did not misinterpret anything. We can have a conversation about how the change affected the moment, but the original context is still important and Phoenix was part of it.

Besides the translations, there are other points under the break as well, including a bonus of one of the nice and harmless additions the official translation changed/added with the "saved me from myself" line:

Translations (provided by a friend of mine who knows Japanese; edited at times to sound more natural in English or help get across the intended meaning)

........以前、 ある男が言って��ました。

……..In the past, a certain man once said:

被告人の唯一の味方になって あげられるのが弁護士だと。

the only one willing to be the defendant's ally is their lawyer.

依頼人を信じることで、《真実》に近づいていく････

By believing in the defendant, the truth draws closer....

その男の姿は、私の目にも まぶしく映りました。

The image of that man was so bright in my eyes, it was engraved into my mind.

There's a bit more added here for clarification's sake and people like me who have a habit of taking metaphors too literally; essentially, the first part that's in the game is saying that the sight of "that man" was so blinding that it stuck in Miles's mind/memory eternally, so the translation in the fan version is correct in a direct translation and what it means is closer to the official.

(fun fact that if you go for an MTL, a translator may translate what in English was "image"/"sight" as "appearance" or "figure" which is technically accurate but obviously not the intent when translated, just as "so bright"/"shining brilliantly" may become "dazzling"; doesn't mean I won't mention it for people to imagine/have fun with though :3c "That man's figure was so dazzling in my eyes." my god)

法廷で戦う父と、同じように････

In the same way my father fighting in court does….

(without the clarification it's more like "In the same way my father fought in court...." but as above, message is clearer this way)

しかし、それはあくまで その男や父の生き方です。

However, that's just the way that man and my father lived their lives.

This is the big one since it makes a clear and blatantly obvious separation between "that man" and Gregory himself.

Here's another translation in a reblog of the post I linked, which follows even closer to the fan translation and is more straightforward.

My asks are open for any further translation clarifications people may want to make (don't want to bog down reblogs when edits can simply be made) but this was a long-winded way of saying that the fan translation was super on point with accuracy and the only thing of note is the "burning into memory" that the official one has to help get the point across (though I think more was definitely lost the way it was done).

Other Points

1 - Staying on the official translation, its use of "that man" is rather... bizarre, even if one hasn't seen the original. Such a use is typically for:

someone the game wants the audience for figure out on their own (so the character knows it but the player needs to go talk to the person themself once they figure it out)

someone who the character speaking isn't really familiar with (like, "oh yeah, that guy, I kind of remember now")

someone the game tries to keep secret a little longer for the sake of mystery (example being the fan translation where Ray refers to Gregory without a name drop for the build up that Ray worked for him)

Miles using the phrase and then saying "my father" in the very next sentence made me do a double take because I was totally caught off guard by how it was done.

The shot of Miles sepia toned in the courtroom (the fourth shot) doesn't even make sense anymore if he's only talking about Gregory since obviously he's never seen Gregory from across the courtroom while Miles has been behind the prosecutor's bench (nor do they do a camera slide as if Miles is only imagining himself across the courtroom from him; it flashes to white instead). It only makes sense if he's taking about Phoenix.

2 - Looking at it from a fan's perspective, it makes 150% sense why "that man" would immediately be associated with Phoenix in the context of the moment. Not only did the last case of the first game have that exact thing too ("In a situation like this… what would that man do…? What would he who can turn any desperate situation around do…?"), thus making it a near-perfect continuation of that, but "a defendant's only ally being their attorney" was a huge part of the original trilogy.

In fact, the official translation actually actively makes it weirder to leave Phoenix out of that bit because of the change "a friend to the friendless" it did, which catapulted me back so violently to Turnabout Sisters - the first serious case in the entire series - that it could've put me in a coma.

This is even disregarding how important the whole "trusting clients" and "finding the truth" stuff was in cases, especially 2-4.

It's like, "ah yes, Mr. Fender, that was yours and my father's life, not mine and also no one else's; honestly, not a single other important person in my life who I could have mentioned comes to mind" lol)

3 - From my own personal perspective, I'm not stirring up a fuss over shipping, it's not about that (though shippers getting thrown under the bus absolutely sucks). I'm far more baffled that it takes the already-not-around Phoenix and chucks his mention away for later.

4 - Anyone lamenting the loss of "shining brilliantly" for something else without the context has every right to be confused and should not be criticized for it. Shipper or otherwise, most wouldn't imagine for a second that the end of Miles's arc/self-reflection would have a significant change that takes 50% of the original meaning out.

This taken into account with my comment about the visual aid of Miles behind the prosecutor's bench in sepia during that very line furthers this. Obviously people will (still) think it's about Phoenix.

5 - I only linked to one of the comments/posts I saw in case I was accused of making things up. I don't actually recommend approaching/confronting anyone because I don't think it's worth the time/effort, so this is more for anyone who felt gaslit/like they'd gotten it wrong or wanted the actual evidence. I did check the blog of the person who I linked and they made a long answer to a person who was complaining about the people complaining about said post, but hadn't made an edit to their original post telling people that there were misinterpretations being made.

That's not actually me being aggressive in any way (it's their business and their blog), but pointing out that it's not something important to people like that. I'll also grant that some might simply not know enough about the fan translation/original meaning to get it, so don't stress about it is all I'll say. :)

6 - Here's the "saved me from myself" line as promised, congrats on listening to me babble and making it all the way down here~

[namearentfunfr]

jeff blim's hatchetfield characters as different eras of his hair

legends have it rim tim himself possessed me to make this post. anyway this will only include characters in my jeff blim family tree, so like trent monroe and some background characters arent gonna be there

1. Mr Ken Davidson

this fuckin hairstyle jeff rocked in S.W.A.T lives rent free in my head

mr davidson is like, 50< in my mind. he might be balding, in which case we dont really have a hairstyle for him. but i stumbled upon this one and i just felt like itd fit him a lot

2. Sam Sweetly

no idea where i got this image from ngl. just google ig??

anyway, sam's hair is long and well taken care of. he needs to look hot so zoey would fuck him after all. this hairstyle is kinda slicked back?? idk probably so he can chase criminals and then run his hand through his hair prettily

i just think hes like, down bad

3. General John MacNamara

just his hairstyle, but in tgwdlm

this ponytail. THIS FUCKING PONYTAIL BROKE ME. he looks good while also staying practical, unlike a certain cop we talked about earlier

4. Barry Swift/The Man In A Hurry

jeff's ruffled hair from the trail to oregon

our first bit change everyone. i believe barry cut his hair pretty short so thered be less maintenance required, but then became too busy to cut it again once its grown out a little. also kinda ruffled because hes in too much of a hurry to yk, take good care of it

5. The Coffee Jerk

jeff's hair from ttto, except less ruffled

cj and miah are brothers but they keep getting mistaken for each other because of the hair. they both dont wanna change their hair (the entire jeff blim family likes to look pretty, w/ the exception of miah and hidgens), so theyll just have to make do. less messy than miah because he isnt in a hurry thank god

6. The Principal

this bun he had in 911

i just think jeff looks neat with a bun or tied up hair alright?

there are more to come but i ran out of images so uh, part 2 coming soon?

[hirakiyois]

i think for any dating show to be worth anything, they need a real yearner in there and since his man 2 had junseong, an s tier yearner with a major in pining and a minor in flirting like a victorian man, literally nothing else may ever compare again

[tsururoach]

Hi guys. so about the idol cadets.

[nyxofdemons]

“one day im going to have to make like a three hour long video essay that's just called In Defense of Helluva Boss” Please do. I see more anti videos than I do with defense ones. Like the ones that say season 2 is terrible even though it’s barely completed and the ones that say Stolitz is a bad despite them barely having a relationship.

no literally i am sick of seeing more anti content than actual appreciation videos but the anti talking point i see most that drives me up the fucking walls is that it's "bAd RePrEsEnTaTiOn," as if that is all that queer people are allowed to have; just the vague nebulous concept of "Rep(TM)." the fact that if a straight character is a bad person then it's just that This Character is a bad person, but if a queer character is a bad person then This Is Bad Representation Of The Community And Is Homophobic. can we not just HAVE characters?? vehicles to tell a story??? tools to craft a compelling narrative??? this is part of why Helluva/Hazbin being adult shows is such a THING because i see this get shut down a lot under the guise of "uhh well just because it's an adult show doesn't mean that it can handle whatever topic it wants however it wants" and like. yeah buddy! that's true! and that's not what this is fucking about!! when people say "it's an adult show" what they mean is that it's made to be engaged with under the assumption that you would know better than to take information to shape your worldview and perception of other real life people from a fucking cartoon! the show doesn't NEED to tell you that Um Hey Guys Just So You Know This Isn't Actually Meant To Reflect How All Real Life Gay Relationships Are because you are an adult who should already be able to discern this.

"bad rep" doesn't mean "characters that are nuanced, morally gray, or just bad people." "bad rep" would be if helluva boss was a show that said "the REASON these characters are in toxic relationships / are bad people is BECAUSE they are queer, or at least directly correlated to that fact." which is. you know. very fucking different than "these characters are in toxic relationships / are bad people because they 1) live in a classist society that actively encourages them to be their worst selves and 2) are extremely traumatized."

[deus-ex-mona]

when the slowburn makes the ship extra cute~~~

[circumpolarvampire]

I think the white trans dudes on this site frequently forget there are trans dudes out there who aren't white. Not all of us wanna look like Gerard Way.