#i know someone will read this as an indictment on her character | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

ciboriaadastra · 6 months ago

Note

🔥khoa and/or talia

I can do both! :3 under a cut because I talk too much

Talia my lovely <3

Preface: I won't get into the violent racism of the Morrison retcon and any characterization that builds upon it or the orientalism in pre-Morrison canon because those are obvious popular opinions people should be against. Anti-racism is not a hot take, basically. And there are people on this website who have already talked about this better than I can with the insight of being directly targeted.

Talia shouldn't be the focus of man pain or the target of blame for it, because—aside from the fact that this is lazy, misogynistic writing—she actually has little to none to do with the source of angst for those characters (namely, Bruce and Damian). Fanfic writers are extremely annoying about this.

I cannot read a regular batcentric fanfic that involves Talia, because she is always utilized to be a source of angst when at best she's a vehicle for it and it becomes quite clear this is the writer's way of dumping their misgivings about Talia, either as a potshot at her in a different shipfic or the fanfic's premise is [Character] stands around and yells at Talia for a thousand words.

The angst for Bruce and Damian specifically has less to do with her as a person and more to do with the theme of loss (abandonment trauma, loss of childhood, loss of control in your life, etc.) for which she happens to be a key character in facilitating the events that allow its exploration. Considering that loss is a major theme in her story, it's only natural that characters who are tied to her development experience a form of loss in relation to her.

Neither of them should hold any grudge or contempt towards her over their own pain, because she did not do anything to them that would warrant it; people who think that they should overblow the effect of her actions vs. the effect of the status quo they all operate in. Bruce has abandonment trauma because he developed it after an unalterable traumatic childhood event. It will always be unsafe for Damian to grow up existing as a part of the al-Ghul bloodline just as it was unsafe for Talia. Bruce's issues are internal, Damian's are systemic. It's hardly Talia's fault (especially not solely hers) that these issues rear their heads and strike.

Could they irrationally blame her for their problems? I guess, but most people aren't coming from a perspective where they would purposefully have characters behave irrationally for the realism after which they may check themselves (or be checked by someone else); most are rationalizing the irrational because they would behave that uncharitably to others. And its the misogyny.

Idk. I think Talia's a great character when you don't constantly have a bitch in your ear telling you she's a horrible mother and that she's an example of Bruce having terrible taste in women. My house is open for MILF lovers and women enjoyers.

Talia should have friends who have nothing to do with the Batfamily (or being adjacent to it) and don't know anything about her family or the League of Assassins.

Pretty self-explanatory, but I think it's not enough for her to have friends in the League, friends in fellow assassins, or friends in the bat-network, because it still creates a space where Talia is looked down upon by somebody for factors outside of her control or for not being the kind of woman they think she ought to be.

I also think she should be at the club.

She's transfem because I said so.

The transgender narrative, if you would.

Speaking on a meta level, it's about how trans women and transfeminine people are treated as if everything is their fault (indicted on false, bigoted narratives for things they would never do), having such a small network due to being isolated from a healthy source of community, being a target of fetishization, a constant trend of loneliness due to these factors outside of their control.

It's also about Talia leaving men (manhood) behind to discover who she is as a woman. The transition from an old life to a new one that provides a better sense of power and control over oneself than what existed in the old life. The transgenderisms in the concept of death and rebirth, a theme associated with the al-Ghuls as guardians of the Lazarus Pits.

I know transfem hcs are not popular (especially for canon female characters), so this isn't meant to be a hot take...I just haven't seen anyone else consider transfem Talia before. At least not outside of t4t Brutalia, which is often mostly about making transmasc Bruce make sense in the overarching story (Damian) than it is about both of them having trans narratives/themes. That is a problem more generalized to tmasc4tfem hcs than it is specifically a Brutalia problem, in that usually the transfem character's transfemininity is treated as an afterthought.

Though that last bit is not as annoying as people who reinvent the test tube eugenics baby backstory for Damian because the idea of Talia being trans is so beyond them for some reason. Like...why is eugenics more plausible than transfemininity to you? That's weird!

Minhkhoa you are so... *punches wall*

People who see zero value in his character just because he occupies the same archetype Two-Face represents (childhood friend turned foe) are needlessly obstinate.

The excuse is essentially that they don't want to read about a concept that is like a pre-existing concept but with a different perspective/spin on it. Which is an odd opinion to have when you're reading Big Two cape comics and you are constantly reading new perspectives/spins on the same concept, because an end does not and will not exist for them. And it may in part have something to do with Harvey's canonical whiteness vs. Minhkhoa undeniably being a SEAsian man.

Idk. It's strange to me, because Harvey and Minhkhoa exist in different periods in Bruce's life that do not overlap. Harvey and Bruce went to school together when they were little and reunited when Bruce returned to Gotham. Minhkhoa occupies a specific timespan between Bruce's highschool years and his return to Gotham. Harvey is not present during Fear State when Minhkhoa breaks the truce. When Bruce seeks out Harvey during Gotham Nocturne, Minhkhoa has long left Gotham to train Clownhunter.

In addition, the reasons they are important to Bruce's character are different. Harvey's deal is that Bruce cannot be so personally removed from the politics of Gotham and the plight of the average Gothamite and still think he can make a meaningful difference. Bruce was oblivious to Harvey's personal struggles, so all the help Bruce tried to give him generally did more harm in the grand scheme of things.

Minhkhoa on the other hand encapsulates one of the overarching themes introduced in BTK: think bigger. Bruce is not maximizing his potential to help the world; he's focused on a dinky rotting city off the coast of mainland New Jersey, a small state in the imperial core. He could renounce his status and generational wealth to commit himself to taking down criminal/capitalist empires all over the world exploiting people in countries in the Global South, to no longer be of the exploitative class and instead become an avenging angel for the exploited. Bruce is a one cause, one dedication type of person. Which isn't bad, just different. The point is not who is more right but to contrast different approaches to vigilantism and to critique a different aspect of what makes Bruce's status as a wealthy, ruling class American an obstacle to his efforts to reduce crime.

I hate fanon interpretations of Minhkhoa </3

If I was paid $100 to wallop people with a wooden baseball bat every time they said the word "psychopath" as a legitimate description of him, regurgitated ableist stereotypes around AsPD and personality disorders in general, or elected to flat out erase the struggles Minhkhoa had since his childhood despite it being an important aspect of his backstory and characterization simply because the concept of a person who struggles with low empathy is deeply uncomfortable to them; I would have enough money for a down payment on a house.

I've talked at length about this to you before here last year, but it still holds up. You'd think it'd be hard to fuck up the characterization of a character who only has like...three points of complexity...but then you will always be surprised.

I'm also :/ at the growing trend of Minhkhoa getting sucked into the fanon Batfamily vortex of doom. It will not end well for him.

I don't like the Wight Witch being added to Minhkhoa's lore. She should be her own independent character.

This is part of a bigger issue with Minhkhoa's characterization in which other DC writers strip important things from what Tynion established and adding relationships that don't provide his character with any meaningful development to make up for it. The singular L I've seen Ram V take when writing Asian characters.

I like Rhea Sinha. Her story is interesting and engaging on its own. I don't think Minhkhoa (and Bruce by extension) needed to be part of it. You could replace them with any other men and it'd still be compelling. For once in my fandom life, I want my blorbo (Minhkhoa) out of the good story.

It's also that this is a pattern of women being linked to Minhkhoa just as in-universe proof he exists outside of Bruce. You see this with Angelbreaker as well when she makes a comment during the Shadow War arc about Minhkhoa just wanting her to be his Catwoman. Which was extremely corny. You can have Minhkhoa attempt to emulate Bruce for the parts of himself that he believes is lacking or to outdo Bruce in ways he thinks Bruce could have been better without trying to make them 1:1 in every single way possible, else he just comes across as goofy and like he has no principles of his own besides spite for a man who dumped his ass 20-some years ago. Like...I get he's obsessed with Bruce to an embarrassing degree, but why do women have to deal with his mess?

I'd rather comic writers create characters who are just made to flesh out Minhkhoa's existing lore (at least what can be made cohesive of it) than create characters who are clearly supposed to have their own stories who just get linked to him just to be linked, if that makes sense. Like how Alfred exists to explain who raised Bruce when his parents were murdered and who helped Bruce in his early Batman years and who is there to help Bruce when he's too injured to retreat to the Batcave on his own. Flat and static characters have a place in media.

#per aspera ad askra #ask game

1 note · View note

i-love-you-very-much · 1 year ago

Text

saw Nerdy Prudes Must Die and uh

it's very much not what i expected. unlike Black Friday, it doesn't have the same plot as TGWDLM, and the references to it don't impede the plot (although i do still think it was a bit much). like Black Friday, however, the start of act 2 has a song from a different musical that i would be more interested in watching instead, as i don't really give a shit about high schoolers but i love me some smoked meats.

i haven't seen any of the Nightmare Time stuff, so i don't know if there's more to the story between the Mayor and the Lords In Black, or if they decided to put that into the plot because they could. again, it didn't impede the story, but it seemed... underfounded? i guess? especially for something that's 2½ hours long and takes a break in the middle for The Barbecue Monologues and The Bath Scene (which. i get it was there for character reasons. but it didn't need to be that drawn out no matter how good the song is).

i think Mariah, Angela, and Bryce really carry the show, they were perfect casting for the characters they played. it's also Corey's best acting in a starkid show so far. sometimes it's fun to hear Kim's vibrant and piercing voice in a song where that's absolutely not the style they're going for.

speaking of, the music sounds much more full than the previous two, although the semi-hollowness adds to the charm and atmosphere of TGWDLM (not so much Black Friday though). the camerawork is also much better.

it feels almost a waste to cast most of the actors to characters that don't really fit their vocal strengths. i get that the cast is supposed to be stereotypical high school nerds, but like. you don't Have To make them put on funny voices for the characters.

speaking of the characters: i don't like any of them. not "i don't like how they're written," but i simply find them all insufferable and would hate to be locked in a room them. this isn't a bad thing, sometimes it's fun to absolutely hate characters, but i did find myself wincing at them more often than i'd like to in a musical. they're more "what 30 year olds think high schoolers are like" than "what high schoolers are like." like. they should have been a different kind of insufferable.

i'd like to see someone give an intricately detailed literary analysis of it, mainly because i think it would be fun to read but also because i wanna see how many parts of the story i can throw at it and ask "how does this work with the themes, motifs, and symbolism present in the story to make it stronger and more cohesive?" and if any of the answers are "it doesn't. dude, it's a comedy musical, it doesn't have to be that deep" i will not be surprised.

given that it's a horror comedy, i probably should have expected to experience the hallucinations i did, but there were quite a few moments where i had to look away and try not to pay attention. this isn't an indictment of the show, this is just my personal thoughts on it. if you know someone who doesn't like gore, physical violence, or bullying, do not recommend this to them.

my favorite bits (not in order)

when Max all but dares the audience to leave the theater in Literal Monster Pt. 2

"So you... DON'T want to be bullied?" and the ensuing scene

"Wow, Ms. Tessburger, it IS like that, isn't it?"

"i'll carefully smash it with this hammer."

honestly? The Barbecue Monologues

pronouncing only the first half of rendez-vous correctly when logically it should be all right or all wrong

the fact that Grace's dad calls her mom Mother but her mom calls him by his name

any time Angela makes a face

the beans bit

"the trees are greener! the sun is brighter!" when it's october and neither of those should be happening

"Fuck you, Clivesdale, go get fucked, you're fucking losers and we'll kill you" as an accepted high school cheer

Curt visibly holding in laughter after "they didn't say."

Grace downing 20oz of "strong" hot water in one go

"are you a woman of faith?" "catholic." "i'll take that as a no. imagine you're a GOOD christian."

Steph asking both Pete and the audience "what are we watching?"

overall? 6/10. not bad, but not my cup of tea. if i were to rank the hatchetfield musicals this would probably be the middle of the three.

#iloveyou.pdf #probably won't put this in the main tag cos there's negativity

0 notes

soul-dwelling · 2 years ago

Note

The thing with Izuku is that the initial motiviation could work if it really got challenged and shown as childish and flawed. The whole story is about the society being comodified into literal hero warship, so Izukus development could be realising how his dream of saving people to feel like a hero is kinda selfish in the way that it doesnt ask why there must exist a class that can save and a class of victims, especially when everybody has powers they could develope, even the quirkless

I’m going to respond to all of the My Hero Academia asks in this one post.

So let’s respond to the first one above.

It is challenged, but yeah, not really.

It is shown to be flawed, but solutions are slow to appear.

We’re waiting for the manga’s conclusion to address those solutions (or, read Vigilantes, it kind of responds to some of these problems).

It isn’t quite childish to me, even if I get that merchandising these real-life Pro Heroes is eccentric.

In fact, something about this just came up in Reddit recently. (Too bad I misplaced the link to that post. =_=; )

Just because it’s selfish for Izuku to want to be a hero doesn’t mean that such selfishness is a bad thing. The story does a good job of mostly avoiding this black and white thinking. Yes, Ochaco, Mount Lady, and Uwabami want money--but all of them were still doing heroics, Ochaco is not greedy, Mount Lady does change, and nothing showed Uwabami was bad at her hero work. Yes, there are hero dynasties, including the Iida and Todoroki families, but that doesn’t take away from good work Tenya, Tensei, and Shoto have done. I thought the story did well enough acknowledging that even the most heroic person can have selfish reasons behind their good deeds. Unfortunately, that also means acknowledging that even some real scumbags like Endeavor may have done some good or had some good intentions--because the wife beating, the child torturing, the eugenics, the wife buying, and all of that undermines any good he has done.

Maybe there is justified frustration that the one who really opposes this selfishness is Stain, so it becomes easy to discount any of this criticism by saying, “You sound like Stain”--except even Iida admits Stain was correct on some points, but wrong on a lot of other points, especially the solutions he had (maiming and murdering).

This hasn’t felt like a series that wants to interrogate the problems of commodifying these heroes. I don’t know whether I can find a real world analogue to the merchandising of these heroes within their own story, as we don’t quite have the same thing in our world right now. But this is a franchise that wants to sell merchandise, so that’s why we don’t see serious interrogation into Izuku’s All Might merchandise collection, that Endeavor has dolls and masks, that Uwabami is in it for the ad campaigns. The closest we get to criticizing merchandising is how Hawks gets the Endeavor doll because it’s cheaper, how that shows Endeavor’s worth is not tied into his good deeds but his appeal to get an audience to cheer for him.

But this is still a franchise where someone like me buys the video games and plays at these characters: how do I separate knowing how shitty Endeavor, All For One, and others are, then using them when playing online?

I do push back a bit against the idea that Izuku doesn’t realize some of these problems. I just don’t think the answers he comes to are as good as they could be.

Bakugo’s abusive behavior is an indictment against Quirk society that is obvious to Izuku. All Might’s absence and the gap it leaves is an indictment against Pro Hero society that is obvious to Izuku. Aizawa’s sink-or-swim approach is an indictment against both Quirk society and Pro Hero society that is obvious to Izuku. Endeavor’s abuse of his children including Shoto and Dabi is an indictment against Quirk society and Pro Hero society that is obvious to Izuku. Kota losing his parents, and facing relatives and family friends and aspiring Pro Heroes saying he should be happy his parents were willing to die to protect others, is an indictment against a society that keeps privileging big acts of heroism over the responsibilities of individual people and an acknowledgment that Kota is living after trauma. Gentle becomes a harmless “villain” because Pro Hero society didn’t see a reason to direct his skills for good, and no teacher, not without some fault applied to Gentle, was able to make him understand that theatrics and fame should not be his goals for heroism, another indictment against Pro Hero society that is obvious to Izuku. Hawks’s and Nagant’s actions are indictments against the lie of Pro Hero society that should be obvious to Izuku.

And it’s not that any of this is not obvious to Izuku. He speaks up about most of it, or hears people speak up against it or interrogate it. He narrates to us that Bakugo’s abuse shows that people are not created equal. He sees that without All Might he and other Pro Heroes have to rise to the occasion to make up for his absence. He works harder and smarter to meet Aizawa’s expectations. He tries to teach Shoto that he can use his fire Quirk without becoming Endeavor. He makes himself an example to Kota that the point of heroism isn’t to be so powerful, it’s to take action whenever you can to help others. He sees that, without the experiences he had before, he would have become Gentle, and still could become like him, so he better not forget this lesson. He…says some stuff at Nagant? I don’t know, that story fell apart on me.

I think you’re saying that Izuku doesn’t ask why there are classes of people, some who can be saved and some who are stuck as victims. I disagree. The very beginning of this manga was Izuku insisting he can save everyone--even if he fails right now. I think the story shows Izuku wanting to create a world where there don’t have to be victims--however naive that may be. He wants to save even Shigaraki. That’s noble, but as it is an ideal, which means it’s not realistic. Having that work in fiction should be enough: it doesn’t have to be realistic. But within the rules of this series, it’s not believable. I think the problem is a lack of more awareness on Izuku’s part that he can’t save everyone. Ochaco seems to carry more of this weight, as she is the one who has to speak to the audience that Nighteye could not be saved, she’s the one who sees the victims from the first war and how many are injured or possibly dead, and she may end this series realizing that Toga can’t be saved, either.

Now, onto the second question:

Like the problem with Deku is that even when it seems his ideology gets challanged, he never "loses", never really gets proven wrong - there were many opportunies - like the fact that he really only wanted to be a hero in the way society showed him and got depressed at the mere suggestion that he could be a fire fighter or something (also funny firefighter getting dismissed in the context of FF), more examples but charachter limit

Nighteye dying should have challenged him, should have been a loss. But instead it was presented that, if Eri wasn’t saved, then Izuku lost. Even Mirio losing his Quirk was not treated as that loss. Izuku expresses that regret that his actions led to Nighteye’s death and Mirio’s lost Quirk, and he tries to make amends by offering to give up One For All to Mirio--but Mirio refuses. I don’t get a sense that Izuku carries this weight, of Nighteye’s death and Mirio’s lost Quirk, as loses; he rebounds, he rationalizes that Eri may restore Mirio’s Quirk, Nighteye died as peacefully as possible and died having saved someone. I think if you had a revision to this story to show Nighteye’s death was still bothering Izuku, then something could feel like a loss. Honestly, it should be empowering to see Izuku persists despite everything he goes through, but it also feels like the story doesn’t allow Izuku to define these events as traumas that he will live with.

I do think Izuku, by this point at the end of the manga, is trying to be a hero that is not like what society imagined. There are details that potentially contradict this: if he had been Quirkless this entire time, that really would have been a hero unlike how Quirk society imagined. But All Might has been the example no one can reach; Izuku wants to do so, that strikes me as trying to defy how society shows what a hero should be. All Might tried to talk him out of being a hero, telling him to be a police officer or a firefighter; Izuku still refused. Izuku should have powered through the Sports Festival, even if he would still end up losing to Shoto; he didn’t, he let Shoto take it out on him to take ownership of his fire Quirk. But these are just Izuku acting against “common sense,” not exactly modeling a different kind of hero that this Quirk society is used to.

Now, onto the third question:

The flaws in MHA's society get compartamalised, like oh actually basically all heros are good, there is just some small shady part that does assassinations but that gets delt with offscreen. Oh merchandise is kinda tacky but not a big deal - like it could have shown how beauty standards forced by the ads could drive mutants into villany or make people use their quirks as heros ineficently just to keep the best image etc

Right, the people who actually show Quirk society and Pro Hero society are wrong tend to be the Villains, the antagonists.

There are ideas friends have said to me, or written in their own stories, where you have people trying to reform the system from the inside.

Give us characters studying in the public relations and marketing degree programs at UA who want to point out the hypocrisies of Pro Hero society.

Have Shoji, Tokoyami, Ojiro, Mina, Koda, and others far earlier pointing out appearance-based discrimination and discrimination against mutation Quirks.

Show us that there are characters we are to cheer on because they are right.

That being said, there are also readers who would probably say I’m not practicing critical thinking well enough or media literacy well enough. Once the manga does an entire arc that treats the League of Villains as the protagonists against the Meta Liberation Army, that is the invitation to realize that not all Pro Heroes are good, that the Villains make good points.

And while I appreciate where Horikoshi went with Spinner, Shoji, and Koda, I kind of hate that arc. I had such a bad taste in my mouth when Jiro in the English dub called Tokoyami “bird brain” when up to now the series had shown people were accepting just about every different look people came in.

I kind of wish the series had avoided Spinner suffering discrimination due to his appearance, when something like Vigilantes showed discrimination in terms of body shape and size compromising access to public services, something that seemed easier to portray. Not unrealistic, given how in our real world people will take any physical marker of difference to represent their utter hatred for entire groups of people out of their bigotry.

I say this, because I can’t imagine little kids looking at Gang Orca and saying he looked like a villain--whereas I can imagine little kids being excited seeing Tokoyami, Spinner, Gang Orca, and so on, because they look cool.

(And, not to be horny on main, but we’re really going to act like people, respectfully and not objectifying, aren’t turned on by seeing a Spinner or a Gang Orca? That is not believable.)

Now, onto the fourth question:

Or even the question of anti-status quo groups - the only vigilainte in the main series, Stain, even if sympathetic in a few ways, is basically shown as a deranged killer, the quirk-liberation movement is a shadowy cabal, the yakuza is the yakuza, there are basically no people against the system or outside of it that are basically good, even Gentle needed rehabilitation. Why no comune of quirk users living in the woods, without needing concepts like "hero"?

I agree on just about all of these points.

Gentle at least for me feels somewhat believable, even realistic. There are “law and order” characters within the series who ignore that Gentle, after that one injury in his failed rescue, was drawing attention to bigger crimes, was more so screwing over bigger criminals, that even coming onto UA property in itself is not terrible except that it exposes UA is not perfect and opens the location up to worse attacks.

Like I said above, we already have “good” characters who can speak to these problems in Quirk and Pro Hero societies without being bad guys or getting dismissed as “Villain sympathizers.”

Or, maybe you want to have the story go in that direction, show someone like Tokoyami defending those with Quirk mutations, or even Denki with his “Stain was cool” rhetoric, and have that butt heads with a classmate.

What if close friends like Momo and Jiro were on different sides of an issue, one sympathizing with “lawbreakers” who are reforming Quirk society, the other wanting “law and order”?

It’d be similar to Ochaco and Tsuyu refusing to join the Bakugo rescue--it creates believable character conflicts that can drive future plots, character progression, differentiate Class A so that they have more distinct personalities and are not just, well, extras until they get their big moments in the manga’s final arc.

Now, onto the last question:

Anyway, sorry for the MHA spam, but just think it has a lot of lost potential because of it conformism to the society, that makes all it criticisms of it shallow, as if they were better not included and it all was just a fun school comedy if thats how the questions raised get delt with.

The archetypal superhero story, for a long time, has been a struggle about whether you want your heroes to uphold the status quo or oppose it. The moment you have them oppose that status quo, are they still heroes? The Marvel Cinematic Universe is a cliche example to turn to, but it’s the best I have right now: you have the Avengers, at least in the first film, propping up a status quo; by the time of Civil War, you have Captain America still getting to be the hero even as he’s opposing the government.

For a series such as My Hero Academia that comments on just about everything in the archetypal superhero story, it feels lacking in responding to the status quo question.

I wouldn’t say all the criticisms are shallow, but I think there is more that could be done but isn’t. This can be the problem of just wanting to get to the next chapter, wrap up the next arc, or finish the manga already.

I brought up Reddit earlier, and that was one of the remark made recently: that the series would be better if it slowed down, took breaks between arcs to do more of the school comedy stuff. And it’s not as if a school comedy lacks potential to address big earth-shattering questions.

#my hero academia #long post

1 note · View note

sarah-dipitous · 2 years ago

Text

Hellsite Nostalgia Tour 2023 Day 61

Long Distance Call/Smith and Jones

"Long Distance Call"

Would I Survive the First Five Minutes??: Yeah. Because I wouldn't be driven by the guilt of cheating on my wife to do that.

Is it bad that I can't wait for Dean to die because at least then we can move on to their NEXT season-long argument?? I'm tired of the "we need to get you out of your deal" "we can't do that"

THAT'S where you're wrong, Dean. There IS someone who can (and will) save you. He'll grip you tight and raise you from perdition. You...you do still need to actually, literally go to hell, though

I always love the "I already went over this with the other detectives" that they get. But they always comply anyway...

Okay. I...jumped the gun on cheating. I was a dead ex calling the guy from the opening

I miss when the Ohio plates looked like that...they're ugly af now

Noooo...like, I knew it was coming. I read it in the episode description, but to hear John call Dean?

Thomas Edison's spirit phone is potentially connected to this?

OMG AOL INSTANT MESSENGER??? This ghost or demon is so cruel. Fuck. I hate how it's preying on people's grief

It's at least a new facet of the same argument from the whole season. Dean believing so much in John that he's not even questioning anything that's being told to him, even while he knows there's this whole ghost/demon thing going on....

No no no, don't go after the KID!! DON'T GO AFTER THE LITTLE BROTHER!!

Yeah, the moment they suspected Stewie, I knew it was the other guy from the phone company.

It really is funny how most Supernatural monsters are just some guy with some minimal body horror going on. Like, sure this guy has fangs...sometimes and can unhinge his jaw, but he's literally just human otherwise

Look. Look. I know you're waxing poetic about how scared and desperate you actually are at this moment, Dean, but it's not a terrible thing for Sam to say that he's also going to try his damndest to try to get you out of your deal. That's what he's been doing this ENTIRE season (when he wasn't letting it through the cracks that he's not ENTIRELY Sam, but that's a problem for another season, I'm sure) Neither of you have been much for really expressing your feelings with words..."and me" is not that bad.

"Been On My Mind...": Preemptively saying no.

"Smith and Jones"

Marthaaaaaaaaa!! ❤️ I remember when I was first getting into Doctor Who, there was a lot of talk about how she was the least popular or least liked of the Doctor’s companions. Don’t remember if it was being stated as a fact or if it was an indictment of the fandom at the time, BUT whenever I hear of a female character getting that kind of treatment, I’m always determined to love her. The fandom-disparaged-female-character may not always be my number one favorite, but she’ll always be loved by me

I know this is one of the “weird shit is going on” shows but a lot of weird shit is going on in this episode. Between the Doctor getting admitted to the hospital, the guys in motorcycle helmets, the static electricity…

The rain going up was a lot more convincing and obvious here than it was in spn

Amazing. What is keeping the electricity running in this hospital that is now ON THE MOON

Are 21st birthdays a big deal in England?? I get why they are here in the US, but that’s not their legal drinking age last I checked

Fuck. I really do like Martha. I like that she already has some experience with everything that’s out there, experienced the grief of losing someone to one of the many alien invasions Earth’s had recently, but she still has a positive and curious outlook for the predicament they’re in. She’s amazed to be a part of it but not surprised by its very existence

Ok. I remember the judoon but wtf is up with this lady who had the salt deficiency???

Ok they must be looking for the Doctor, but WHY…oh. Not the Doctor. The old lady who needed the blood of that old doctor. Sure

The explanations in this show are delightful. You can turn up the radiation in some hospital machine by 5000% but it’s okay for Martha to walk into the room seconds later because the Doctor absorbed it all?? Sure. Why not. The Doctor and Gojo could have a lot to talk about. I classify them both as having the power to Just DO That

God…fuck. He treats her so poorly. Kisses her to give her just a trace of non-human dna so the judoon would have to do a full scan to determine if she’s actually human JUST TO BUY TIME. Put her whole ass life in danger

This episode really said the police are useless and only exist to enact violence

Omg Mr Saxon…the first mention…my second favorite is on his way

The effect Donna already has had on him. She had to drag out any details about Rose, and now he’s telling Martha about her without much prompting. Not SUPER openly but still better than last time

Number of Episodes Since the Doctor Last (At Least) Attempted Genocide: 1

Number of Episodes Since the Doctor’s Last Attempted Genocide: 1

Number of Episodes Since the Doctor's Last Potential Genocide:

#hellsite nostalgia tour 2023

1 note · View note

fideidefenswhore · 2 years ago

Note

💜 about henry? :)

my most forbidden unpopular opinion is that he probably would have been better off / happier if he hadn't married cathy of the pom.

#cue the screeches and calls for me to be burned as a witch #anyways this isn't me saying i think it was like particularly horrible to be married to her or anything; it's not even speaking to #compatibility; it's not even speaking to 'better of for england' bcus how the hell would i know #(there are actually a surprising number of catholics on the alternate history forum that say they also wish this but because #they think england would be better off if it never went into schism)#(and i don't care about that lol)#it's neither me saying 'and married to anne boleyn instead!!' bcus i don't really think that either #i think quite honestly tho if he had married another princess he would have been better off #even saying the reproductive tragedies / issues were 'his fault' (and they well could be; we just probably will never know)#most other princesses. if the same thing happened . probably would have acceded to an annulment #maybe not right away. but probably eventually?#what henry did was unusual (not the annulment attempt itself. but how far he went to gain one and render it secure / ironclad)#but what catherine did was also unusual...#i would say just looking at similar cases; most royal women would have taken a compromise at least like three years in.#not have just flatout refused for the remainder of their life #and yes; even if they had a daughter by the marriage.#/shrug #unpopular 2dor opinions #falconqueen #i know someone will read this as an indictment on her character #rather than just what it is.#an airing of an unpopular opinion about him #anyway my only qualm about this is that mary would not have existed.#and i love her... so. altho from a cerebral viewpoint that would be interesting #simply because it is like if everything shaped up the same way who then would stuart england vilify as the catholic tyrant.#maybe henry himself? we got a little of that from foxe

5 notes · View notes

lilyginnyblackv2 · 2 years ago

Text

T&B Clothes and Style Analysis:

This all started when I was thinking of a way to try and get a better gauge on Ryan’s age, but then it started to kind of become it’s own thing. Basically, something I’ve noticed is how aspects of many (though not all) the character designs are indictive of the decade they grew up in.

Let’s start with the oldest of our heroes (I’m limiting it to heroes so this post won’t be any more massive than I’m sure it will already be).

Kotetsu and Antonio: We know that they are both 38 in S2, so that means they were born in 1942. So their childhood and teen years were the 1940s and 1950s, and you can see the influence of those time periods on their outfits.

Back in the 1940s and 1950s cowboy inspired fashion was very popular. My grandfather had a bit of this style too, and he was born sometime in the 1930s. Of course, Antonio’s outfit is also meant to reflect his NEXT persona as well, being Rock Bison and having, iirc, a meat sponsor.

Meanwhile, Kotetsu has that snazzy look about him. Clean cut, button up shirt, tie, sleek and ironed pants, button up vest - his look is, in a way, rather hip in comparison to Antonio’s look. I also feel is has more of an upscale, blue collar vibe to it than Antonio’s, which style originated with blue collar, “working on the farm,” and legit cowboy types. Of course, Kotetsu doesn’t hold himself in that way, though I do think that his outfit is what adds to the moe gap and charm of Kotetsu. He has this put together appearance to him, but his life is a mess and he can be very immature at times, lol.

(This post is SUPER long and image heavy, so the rest is under a Read More!)

Next, let’s take a look at our newest heroes, since the 1980s influence on their style is obvious. All three of them are teens, so it would make sense that their fashion style and sense would reflect the 80s the most.

Subaru’s is, imo, the easiest to draw a link to in regards to possible inspiration. The outfits aren’t an exact match, but that puffy life preserver like jacket + jean pants combo just screams Marty McFly. I know he is also meant to reflect the “Red Ranger” trope found in series like Super Sentai and stuff like that, but I also think that Subaru’s problems with being looked down on and such is similiar to Marty’s with his issues surrounding being called chicken and what not. They can both be impulsive and quick to anger in that regard.

Lara has a school uniform on or, at least, an outfit inspired by one. Obviously, there are some liberties taken with the design, certain elements to make it cuter and more in-line with how school uniforms are often depicted in anime. The blazer top is really what gives it the 1980s Japanese school uniform vibe though. And since Lara is meant to represent magical girls, it makes sense that she would be wearing a school uniform.

Thomas has the most..anime-like outfit of everyone, imo. His outfit isn’t something you would someone wearing just every day, ya know. I tried looking a bit into high fashion/runaway fashion and the like, but didn’t get very far with that. I think the aspects of his outfit that have some basis in the 1980s though is the combo of “very shiny leather jacket” + tight jean combo like we see MJ wearing in his Thriller MV.

Okay, so now let’s take a look at characters that we know the exact age of, or have a very good, general idea of how old they are. First up here is Barnaby.

Listen, Barnaby’s outfit really doesn’t have much going on in the way of 60s or 70s fashion (the eras when he was a teen), but his hair absolutely does! Without a doubt, the inspiration for Barnaby’s hair was Farrah Fawcett and her hairstyle became popular in the 1970s, when Barnaby would have been in his late teens and early 20s. He had more of a general shaggy hairstyle in the few flashbacks we see of him as a younger teen.

This chunky gold chain is also very 70s.

Now we are more in the “we have a general idea how old they are range, and it was confirmed via outside sources.” The one that I feel most concretely on this is Karina, who is 19 in S2. That means she was born in 1961 (one year earlier than my parents, lol) and her childhood was in the 1960s and her teen years were pretty solidly in the 1970s outside of 19.

Whenever I think of Karina’s dress in S1, I my mind just always goes to the kinds of short dresses that were really popular in the Brady Bunch era. Other elements of her design are definitely different, but that dress is such a key aspect. Her S2 design feels more mature and like Mary Tyler Moore-esque.

Ivan, I believe, is 21 in S2. I think it was confirmed, somewhere, that he was 18 in S1. So he is only a little bit older than Karina and his teen years were the 1970s, period. Design-wise Ivan is a complete fish out of water. At least Barnaby had the hair and jewelry tying him to the 60s and 70s. But Ivan is meant to be a Weeaboo, so that whole idea and concept is far later, and his visual appearance reflects that.

However! Edward Said’s book Orientalism, which goes on to describe the term as:

the exaggeration of difference, the presumption of Western superiority, and the application of clichéd analytical models for perceiving the "Oriental world". This intellectual tradition is the background for Said's presentation of Orientalism as a European viewpoint reflecting a contrived Manichean duality.

(Source: The Wikipedia on Orientalism)

And that fits in with Ivan’s Weeaboo persona quite well. It’s a critical concept that is well known today (and which has a long standing documentation of existing before Said’s book was publish), but was only brought into the spotlight with this book in 1978.

Edit: Check out my reblog where I have more information on how Ivan’s outfit actually connects back to the time period.

The last character that we have a general idea of around about what age they are is Pao-lin. She was 13 or so in S1 and around 16 in S2.

The major inspiration for her outfit is obviously Kill Bill, lol. Especially with the martial arts and everything. But, of course, her S1 outfit also takes inspiration from jumpsuits that really gained popularity in the 1970s and tracksuits too. Her later outfits in The Rising and S2 are more masculine presenting and have her wearing tank tops and hoodies, both of which started becoming more commonplace as everyday wear in the 60s, 70s, and 80s. (This could also apply to Ivan, who is wearing a black tank top under his jacket.

Finally, we get into the characters whose ages are vague: Ryan, Nathan, and Keith. Now, Ryan is younger than Barnaby. That’s basically all we have to go off of really, but in The Beginning we can see that he looks in his late teens (he has a slimmer face similar to Thomas and Subaru).

His outfit there also has a very 70s disco vibe about it. Though the hair and other aspects of it are also a bit late 90s/early 2000s in feel too. His earlier designs were quite 60s and 70s inspired too:

The one in the top left almost feeling New Wave / Hippie-ish to some extent (a part of me would have loved if they went with that design, but I love his current design too). His outfit in The Rising (and S2, which I won’t even bother talking about here) are a bit more: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ design-wise.

The closest stuff I could find were like sports jerseys/sport shirts from the 70s and those shorts pictured, lmao. Those shorts are a bit shorter than Ryan’s, and they don’t have the more visually appealing hanging material, etc. But they do show how there were these sort of long shorts/pants in that era as well. Though, visually, Ryan still fits more in the 2000s era here. I started this whole research and post hoping that some of Ryan’s outfit could give more insight into his age...but nope, lol.

More info on Ryan’s outfit! :D

Anyway, our final two are Nathan and Keith. Nathan has made statements that make it seem that she is older than Barnaby and Keith, but likely not quite as old as Kotetsu and Antonio. I’ve always assumed that Nathan was in their 30s. Placing their teen years closer to the late 50s and 60s.

And while a lot of Nathan’s outfits can just be simplified to the idea of being flamboyant, I feel a lot of Nathan’s presence and the air about them is very similar to the Ballroom Scene of the 60s:

While the outfits are not one-for-one matches, there are similarities in posing, feathers, mesh, color choices, and just the outlines that are created. I will say that the shoulder pads in Nathan’s S1 outfit are far more 80s though, lol.

Edit: I realized I forgot to explain what the Ballroom Scene even is and how it relates very specifically to Nathan’s gender identity. From the Wikipedia page:

The Ballroom Scene is an African-American and Latino underground LGBTQ+ subculture that originated in New York City. Beginning in the late 20th century, Black and Latino drag queens began to organize their own pageants in opposition to racism experienced in established drag queen pageants. [...] While the initial establishment of Ballroom mimicked these drag queen pageants, the inclusion of gay men and trans women would transform the Ballroom scene into what it is today: a multitude of categories that all LGBTQ+ people can participate in.

There is a fantastic documentary on this whole subculture and scene called Paris is Burning (link is to the YT video of the full documentary). I watched it back in college in my Queer Studies class. It’s very enlightening and insightful, but it does deal with some heavy topics (SA, suicide, etc.). I definitely suggest giving it a watch if you can though!

Edit: Some more excellent information on Nathan's and Pao-lin's styles. Pao-lin's connection to Bruce Lee and Nathan's fashion connection to the 1970s glam era + visual kei (his The Rising outfit).

FINALLY! We have Keith. His age is completely unknown. I’ve always felt that he was closer in age to Barnaby than Kotetsu and Antonio. His outfit really doesn’t tell us much. It’s a very “All-American, Hard Worker” guys kinda outfit. Definitely something you would find in the 70s (image pictured above is from the 70s) and 80s, though his pants are more 80s-like than 70s (more straight than flared).

(Though, looking at that above image, it seems like Barnaby’s big belt is also very 70s-ish!).

Anyway, I feel I can’t talk about Keith and his appearance and style without also mentioning this:

Keith looks like Tom Cruise, and once you see and know that, you cannot unsee it either, lmao.

Okay, okay, let’s wrap this up! I’m going to be including sources and references for the clothes images and that’s basically it. If you have anything else to add, please do, and thank you to anyone who has read all the way to the end! It’s greatly appreciated and I hope you enjoyed reading this! <3

Sources:

Antonio’s: blue17 and Vintage Dancer

Kotetsu’s: Vintage-Retro

Lara’s: qph.cf2.quoracdn . net

Pao-lin’s: Plaidstallions

Nathan’s: Esquire

Ryan’s: Vintage Vixen and Bored Panda, Dress That Man and The Empire Tribe

399 notes · View notes

joaquinwhorres · 2 years ago

Text

thorough (fckboy!Joaquin Torres x f!Reader)

SUMMARY ››››› When Joaquín texts, you know what he wants. And you also know that despite your better judgement and all of the other things you should be doing, you're going to give it to him.

PAIRING ››››› Fuckboy!Joaquín Torres x Female!Reader (written in 3rd person so you can pretend it's an OC like I do) Read the OC version here.

WORD COUNT ››››› 3,928

WARNINGS ››››› Joaquín's pretty out of character because my angel would never. oh yeah, and smut

A/N ››››› This idea has taken over the entirety of my thoughts. It has consumed all of my free time, so I figured I should try to wrangle some of the vibes and vague ideas into an actual story. So, here is this little imagine which is v smut heavy and v plot light. But, I am thinking of turning this into a fake dating/redemption fic, so lemme know what you think! Divider from firefly-graphics (not tagging because this is a work of smut).

A single notification flashed across her screen.

U up?

Y/N reached over, clicking the screen dark. She was up. But not for him. Instead, she turned back to her textbook and the packets of printed out notes strewn across the desk in front of her. The only men who would be getting her attention tonight were the esteemed scholars Sedra and Smith. And maybe Dr. Barnaby if she got around to reading her lecture notes over. He would have to find someone else. And there would be someone else. There was always someone else for him. She just had to hold out long enough for him to move on and go find them.

Her screen lit up again.

Or has circuits put u to sleep? 🥱

This time she rolled her eyes as she dismissed the notification, a small smile playing at her lips despite herself. Of course he knew exactly what she was doing. Even if he never acknowledged her, he still sat in the same lecture hall as her and dealt with the same lectures and exams.

Y/N returned back to the textbook example problem, fingers sliding under her glasses to rub at her eyes. She withdrew her hands, fixing her glasses before picking up her pen once more. She needed to stay focused. This test was going to be thirty percent of her grade. If she wanted to pass, she needed to learn how to apply input resistance to both Example 6.11 and her own life.

Oh god. She was broken.

Shaking off the thought of her mental deterioration, Y/N pressed her pencil to her notebook paper, copying down the problem in front of her. Just one more section and a skim through of her lecture notes after this. If she powered through, she could probably finish before three and get a solid five and a half hours of sleep before the exam. Yet, as Y/N worked her way through the problem, her eyes continued to slip over to her phone and the dark glass screen that reflected her desk light back up at her.

Circuits.

Not dick.

Circuits.

Not–

Her phone lit up again.

It didn't kill u did it??? 😱🪦

She snorted a laugh through her nose as she picked up her phone, thumb swiping to unlock it. As she began to type out a reply, the white auto suggestion box popped up.

Not today Satan.

She exed out of her roommate's attempt at a safeguard, as if on autopilot.

Not yet but I am slowly dying.

The three dots in response were instantaneous.

Sounds like you need to take a break. 😉

The auto suggestion box popped up once more as she typed, this suggestion an indictment of both her idiocy and predictability. She clicked on it.

Come over.

Very little studying was accomplished in the time between Y/N sending her text off and receiving the text that he'd arrived. The promise of a break seemed too much for her brain to withstand, and she'd only managed to work out an answer for the RIN before she finally gave in and took off her glasses. After that, she'd only had time to shove her dirty clothes in the closet and straighten her sheets up from where they hung off the bed before her phone buzzed.

Y/N put her phone back down, slipping out of her chair and padding across the still apartment towards the door. Pulling it open revealed Joaquín dressed in a maroon ASU hoodie and dark grey sweatpants. His hair was ruffled, and his own glasses were on.

Evidently he'd been studying for Circuits too.

The corner of his mouth quirked up into a soft smile—the same one that he'd given her last fall when they met eyes across the crowded frat. She had known even then exactly what she'd be getting herself into if she smiled back. But there was something about the genuine delight in his smile–the fact that he looked almost awed–that had her lips curving into a smile almost on their own accord. Much like now.

"Hey," he whispered.

Y/N leaned against the partially open door "Hey."

"Is it cool that I parked in the lot?" he asked with raised eyebrows, and she nodded.

"Yeah, they don't usually check for tags at 3 am."

Joaquín breathed out a laugh, hanging his head and shaking it as his own stupidity as Y/N smiled at him. "Yeah, I probably should have guessed that." He looked back up at her with a small smirk, and it was Y/Ns turn to shake her own head before motioning with it that he should come in. He obliged, stepping into the small dark apartment and waiting for her to lock up behind him.

He probably could have made his way back to her room without her, but instead he remained, eyes roaming over the dark living room and kitchenette as if it were his first time there and he was taking it all in. She took this as an act of kindness–a preservation of the little dignity she had left when it came to Joaquín Torres.

So, Y/N quietly led the way back to her room, ushering him in and closing the door as softly as possible behind them to avoid waking her roommate.

When she turned back to him, she found Joaquín bent over her notes, curls falling into his face. He looked intently at what she had written, his eyes following along each line of her solution before he shook his head. "That problem's been kicking my ass for the last hour," he said, tilting his head to look up at her. "Think you could walk me through it tomorrow?"

The sheepish grin he gave her made her stomach flip, and she really should have kicked herself for it. Because there was no way he didn't know exactly what he was doing when he looked at her like that. And he knew that she knew what he was doing whenever he flashed his dimples too. And yet she still couldn't find it in herself to tell him to go to hell.

"Depends how much sleep I get," she said with a shrug, attempting to fix her face into something more smirklike than smiley and feeling like an utter failure at it.

His eyes gleamed mischievously as he straightened up and turned to face her. "How much sleep is enough?"

She shrugged as she walked past him and over to the foot of her bed, setting herself down to sit on the edge and leaning back on her hands. "I don't know, three hours? Four?"

"What if it's two and a half, but I buy you coffee," he bargained, leaning back against her pushed-in chair with his arms crossed across his chest.

"It'd need to be really good coffee."

"Starbucks counts as really good coffee, right?"

She scoffed, and Joaquín laughed softly, his head tipping back as the amusement lit his face up. When he faced her again, it was with an expression of warm amusement. "What if it's Starbucks, but I make sure you thoroughly enjoy all of the time you're not sleeping tonight?" he asked, eyebrows raising up over his glasses as he took a step towards her.

A tingle shot through Y/N as she followed his slow, purposeful movements towards her, and she fought the urge to press her legs together. "I guess that would depend on how thorough is 'thoroughly'." Somehow her voice managed to keep its teasing playfulness even as the look in Joaquín's eyes became more focused, more intense, more hungry.

He stopped in front of her, close enough that the fabric of his sweatpants brushed against her bare knees and she had to tilt her head up just to see his face. She raised an eyebrow at him, and while she had intended for it to be questioning–a prompt for an answer–she couldn't keep the smirk from playing at the corners of her lips, turning the look into almost a challenge.

He didn't answer immediately. Instead, he lifted a hand, brushing her hair back behind her ear, his fingers trailing down her neck and along her shoulder until they reached the strap of her cropped cami. His pointer finger hooked under the strap and he pulled her towards him by the thin piece of silk, until her head was tipped all the way back just to see his face.

Joaquín leaned towards her, his breath warm and promising more than his words could ever deliver on. "Thorough," he murmured, letting the word kiss across her skin, setting her nerves alight with anticipation before he closed the space and kissed her himself.

It was easy to get drunk off of Joaquín's kisses. She wondered if this was simply a paired stimuli given the nature of their first encounters. If the dizzying effects his kisses had on her was her body remembering the weightlessness of too much Jungle Juice and a cute boy's attention. If the way she seemed to melt into him was a conditioned response from him pulling her close to him so easily even when her limbs felt heavy from Jell-O Shots.

But maybe it wasn't classical conditioning or muscle memory. Maybe it was just the natural biological response to the way his hand took hold of her waist, squeezing at the bare skin there as he deepened the kiss and stepped forward, between her legs. Maybe it was just a natural reaction to feel lightheaded when an attractive boy slid his hand up under your crop top and moved his lips along your collarbone with each kiss like a whispered promise.

Her head lolled to the side, allowing him more room to work, and he took advantage of the newly exposed stretch of skin, placing hot, open mouthed kisses there. Y/N sank her teeth into her lip, biting down into it to keep herself from making any of the embarrassing sounds threatening to spill from her just from a bit of kissing. It was a pointless measure though, for as if inspired by her action, Joaquín's teeth caught at the tender skin on her neck and pulled it into his mouth, sucking harshly. Her fingers curled into his shoulders, dragging him closer to her as he moved up her neck, picking a new spot to nip. A gasping noise escaped her as his tongue swiped over the spot, sounding far too much like a whimper for her own comfort.

Joaquín dragged his lips further up her neck to just under her ear. "Fuck you make the most beautiful sounds," he praised, pressing a kiss below her ear. "Drives me crazy." He kissed her again before taking a hold of her ear with his teeth.

Another noise, much like the first escaped her, and her fingers reached up into the hair at the nape of his neck, threading through the strands and then tugging him backwards and away from her so she could see his face. His glasses had slid down a bit on his nose, and his pupils were blown wide and dark, and she knew, she knew, that whatever happened next, it would be thorough enough.

"Did you come here to compliment me or to fuck me?"

He grinned. "Por qué no los dos?"

She leaned closer so that her lips almost brushed his as she demanded, "Cógeme."

Joaquín practically tore his sweatshirt and shirt from his body, his glasses catching in the material and flying off somewhere with the clothes to a corner of her room. Her own arms were crossed across her middle to pull off her top, but she didn't get a chance before his hands wrapped under her knees and yanked her forward so her back fell onto the bed. He knelt before her, hooking his fingers into the waistband of her pajama shorts and dragging them down her legs.

His eyes snapped to hers as he pulled the silky fabric free of her legs. "Impatient, aren't you?"

Y/N reached down, flicking the side of his head. "It's how I sleep."

"Mhmm," he hummed, disbelievingly as his eyes focused back to her parted legs and her center that was completely bare to him, not a scrap of lace or satin or cotton or anything to shield it from his hungry gaze. He lifted her leg over his shoulder, pausing to press a kiss to the inside of her knee and then trailing a line of kisses and nips up to the top of her inner thigh. Y/N squirmed, and he chuckled, moving his other hand to her hip to hold her in place. "I haven't even gotten to the good part."

"I'm sensitive," Y/N breathed out,

"I know," Joaquín grinned, leaning forward to lick a large stripe through her folds, sending her arching off the bed with a gasping moan. "Qué buena estás."

And then he dove back in.

There were a lot of reasons why allowing Joaquín into her bed at three in the morning was a bad idea.

For one thing, she really should have used the time to study for the test that would make up a solid third of her grade in a class that took many people two tries to pass. There was also the inevitable exhaustion that would probably affect her performance on that test.

Then there was the fact that if they woke up her roommate, she would have to deal with side eyed glances, reproving sighs, and little comments for at least a week. Not to mention the fact that her roommate would probably tell the rest of their friends, and then she'd be getting it from all angles.

But the biggest reason this was a bad idea, the reason with the most inevitable consequences, was the fact that he'd leave behind an ache that chased her throughout her morning, reminding her of how stupid she was for doing this.

But as she gripped onto Joaquín's head like her life depended on it, hips chasing a release on his tongue, it was difficult to really think about any of that. It was difficult to think at all. All she could manage were small bits of breathy praise spurring him on.

"Fuck. Fuck yes, right–ah!" She threw her head back into the bed as he sucked harder around her clit. One hand freed itself from his curls, clawing at the sheets to give herself more purchase as words left her in favor of high pitched, gasping noises that sounded vaguely like his name. And then, finally, she could hardly get out any sound as a wave of pleasure coursed through her causing her whole body to go taut as Joaquín replaced his tongue with his fingers to help her ride out the high.

"I've got you. I got you," he reassured, coming back up her body to place kisses along her jaw as she slowly came down, chest heaving. Y/N pulled in deep breath as his lips continued to rove around her chest and collarbone, neck and face, always whispering bits of praise before gracing her skin with a kiss. One hand slid across her bare stomach, taking hold of her waist as he gave one last kiss before looking up into her face.

"And?" he asked with a small smirk.

"And?" she repeated in question, the word coming out more as an exhale.

"How am I doing so far? Thorough enough?" he asked, his hand inching up under her top to take hold of a breast. The pad of his thumb ran over the nipple there, and for a moment, Y/N's mind went hazy. "Or is there something I'm forgetting to pay attention to?"

"I think you already know." Despite the words themselves, her voice came out needy and airy, and it elicited a low chuckle from Joaquín whose hand retreated back to the edge of her top, teasing her with the promise of taking it off.

"I want you to tell me."

"Stop teasing me, and put that mouth to better use," Y/N snapped, and he grinned this time.

"Close enough," he said, pulling her top up and over her head, flinging it away from them.

His mouth was truly a gift from God, but his hands, and the way they massaged her breast, twisted her nipple, worked her in ways that were positively sinful, they could only have been given that skill through a deal with the devil. So, she lay there, fingernails scratching at his shoulder blades as he worshiped her chest, switching between the breasts and from mouth to hands in ways that made her feel holy. Holy but aching.

"Joaquín," she mumbled, hand sliding from his shoulder to his bicep, pressing her away from him. He lifted himself from her skin, eyes meeting hers. "Flip over," she commanded. His face lit up, and he complied so quickly and eagerly that Y/N laughed.

Joaquín tucked his hands under his head, watching intently as Y/N moved to straddle him. "We can't be too loud," she whispered, placing a finger against his lips. "Ok?"

"Got it," he said, biting her finger playfully. She withdrew her finger from between his lips, running her hands down his muscled chest. It was almost criminal, the fact that he always wore loose fitting t-shirts instead of something that showed off the hard work ROTC had him put into his body.

She leaned down, allowing her tongue to explore the planes of his chest, dipping low to swirl around his belly button and lower to the center of his v line. Joaquín groaned, and Y/N hooked her fingers in the waistline of his boxers, dragging both the underwear and sweatpants down his legs and off his body. When she looked up at him, she found Joaquín's gaze fixated on her. There was a quiet desperation to his look, not as needy as she was sure her own faces were, but almost like he was a second away from an answer, and she was the only one who could help him get it.

Y/N crawled back up his body, taking his cock in her hand and teasing it with long, slow strokes. Under her, Joaquín's eyes had closed, a grunt passing through his lips as he managed to lift a hand to take hold of her hip. Her thumb passed over the head, spreading the precum along his hardened length, her hand twisting around him before she dipped down and kissed the head of his cock. His hips jerked up from the bed, as if chasing her as she pulled away. Joaquín opened his eyes, casting her a look of confused desperation.

"I'm not the one who made promises," she said with a tilt of her head and a smirk. He let out a gasping laugh, pinching her hip, and she rolled over him leaving the boy groaning underneath her.

"Hold on," she said, pressing a hand to his chest and leaning up over him to reach into her side table. She fumbled around, fingers slipping over the contents of her drawer until at last the smooth feeling of the condom packet greeted her fingertips. She snatched it up, not even bothering to shove the drawer closed as she withdrew to her position over Joaquín's hips, tearing open the package with her teeth.

She probably could have been more sensual about it–moved a bit slower with teasing touches and seductive glances–but instead she tossed the empty wrapper and immediately went about rolling the condom over Joaquín's waiting cock. Because while she probably could have withstood a little bit more anticipation, a little bit more build up until this moment why should she have to when she could have him now?

Y/N raised herself a little higher, Joaquín's hands coming to her hips and slowly guiding her down onto his waiting cock. He hissed as she lowered herself even further until he filled her completely. Y/N paused, hands flat against Joaquín's chest to allow herself a moment to adjust to his size. "You good?" Joaquín asked, gently squeezing her side, and she nodded.

"Yeah," Y/N breathed. "Yeah, I'm ready."

There was a reason she always seemed to cave whenever Joaquín texted her. A reason she never told him to go fuck himself or any of the other things her roommate and friends suggested she say. A reason she snuck him in and out of her bedroom late at night or times when most people were at class.

And it wasn't because she was stupid enough to have feelings for him again.

It was because he knew exactly what to do to make her body feel electric. It didn't matter if he was letting her ride him slow, fucking her fast from behind, or clutching her close to him as he stroked hard and deep–he knew exactly what her body craved and he gave it to her. He gave it to her with murmured bits of Spanish and breathless cursing and moans that made her chest constrict. He gave it to her with fingers that circled her clit and twisted her nipples and pulled her hair at all the right times. He gave it to her with hot, hard, and fierce kisses.

And as much as he gave, it was never enough.

Even after her second orgasm left her feeling close to overstimulated and boneless, she still clutched at him. While she hardly had enough energy to raise her hips to meet his thrust, she locked her legs around him and pulled him closer as he buried his face in her shoulder. She stayed with him as his hips stuttered and strokes got sloppy and it became clear that he was going to come.

Admittedly, Joaquín's orgasm face was rather dumb, ridiculous even, with his mouth hanging open and only a grunting sound coming out. But she kept her eyes trained on his face, not to remind her that this god in bed was a mere mortal who made stupid faces too, but because after he finished, when his face relaxed, he was nothing short of angelic. The corners of his mouth turned up just barely into a light smile and his eyes fluttered open and looked at her like she really was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.

Joaquín placed a kiss on her shoulder as he helped to lower her legs back down to the bed, finally withdrawing from her to dispose of the condom in the trash by her bedside. It was all Y/N could do to catch her breath, her body hot and sweaty from the activity. Yet as Joaquín climbed back into the bed, she allowed him to pull her in close to him, arms wrapping around her, and chin resting on her shoulder. Because this was part of the deal with Joaquín and something that had almost made her doubt her initial assessment of him back when his body was brand new and she was still discovering all of the things it could do—after sex, he always stayed. Not necessarily the night, but long enough to hold and cuddle her and talk about things that didn't matter.

"Better than studying?" he asked, and she let out a snort and nodded.

"Yeah."

"Good enough for Starbucks?" he asked, tilting his head to try to look at her face, and this time she gave a full laugh.

"I'll meet you there at seven."

#joaquín torres smut #joaquín torres #joaquín torres oc #joaquín torres x reader #joaquín torres x oc #fuckboy!joaquín torres #fuckboi!torres #fuckboy!torres #joaquín torres fic #marvel fic #marvel smut #tfatws fic #fatws #fatws fic #tfatws #college!au #college au #marvel college!au

151 notes · View notes

punchdrunkdoc · 2 years ago

Text

Just Breathe - Ch. 21

Summary: Six months after the events in Gotham Square Garden, Bruce is struggling to find balance between his role as Batman and his responsibilities as Bruce Wayne. His life is made even more complicated when he learns that someone knows his secret identity.

Notes: This is a multi-chapter, slow-burn Battinson/original female character story with romance, angst, and crime solving!

Also available on AO3

Masterlist

Reference pics and stuff

The main story is finished, so I won’t make you guys wait any longer before posting it - chapters 21 and 22 are both dropping tonight. There’s just an epilogue to follow and then this fic will be complete! I’m excited for you to read it, but I’m sad that its all done.

Thanks for all your love and comments over the past few months - its made posting this so much fun!

PDD

-----

Bruce,

Thank you for all you’ve done for me.

You offered me a place of safety when my life was in danger; you rescued me when I was trapped. But more than that, you gave me a home and a place to be myself. You accepted me without judgement or fear, and loved me for who I am - I’ll always be grateful for that. It was an amazing gift for someone who has always felt so alone.

But we were not to be. I understand the reasons why. And though we only had a short time together, that doesn’t make it any less precious. It was ephemeral, but beautiful. Just…not meant to be.

Our stars were crossed, and not aligned.

No, that’s not right.

‘Star-crossed’ implies that our paths will forever diverge, leading us farther and farther away, until we’re distant memories to each other…

I prefer to think of us as binary stars - drawn together by the unknowable universe, revolving around each other, but never able to bridge the distance.

Do you know that for most known binary systems only one star is visible? That lone star seems to dance around an empty space, and the presence of the unseen companion can only be inferred by its influence on gravity.

That’s how I think of us. You changed by orbit, and altered my gravity.

You’ll be my companion for the rest of my life. The one I dance with, unseen, forever.

I love you.

Goodbye.

Bruce carefully re-folded the letter.

It was foolish to carry around a note addressed to ‘Bruce’ on ‘Wayne’ family headed paper when he was dressed as his alter ego…but he couldn’t seem to leave it behind when he left the tower tonight.

He’d read and re-read it so many times over the past three days, he could recite the words by heart; but still, he couldn’t leave it behind.

He needed it with him.

He tried to smooth out the creases marring the thick white paper, but the marks remained from where he’d crumpled the note on first finding it.

He’d returned from the raid on Connell’s compound feeling battered and sore from the fight that had broken out. Connell hadn’t gone down easy; he’d barricaded himself in his study, leaving his goons to battle it out with the federal agents and SWAT teams. Bruce had helped, in a controlled rampage through the mansion that echoed the one from the week before.

But this time, when he reached Connell’s study, the criminal mastermind was too busy shredding incriminating evidence to bother arming himself with a gas-filled shot gun.

Bruce had taken him down easily and handed him over to the authorities - who found enough in that study alone to indict him on several federal charges.

Connell’s planned takeover of Gotham had failed before it even got started.

So Bruce had come home feeling sore to his bones, but with a lightness in his soul and anticipation surging through his veins. He’d jogged up the stairs towards Beth’s bedroom, ignoring the twinges of pain in his knees, eager to see her.

To pick up where they’d left off.

To start their lives, finally free from Newsome, her father and Connell.

But when he’d cracked open her door, all traces of her were gone. The gentle light of the sunrise spilling into her room illuminated her absence. The clothes she usually left hanging over the chair of the dresser were gone; her makeup…gone. The charger plugged into the wall…gone. The books on the bedside table…gone.

She was gone.

The only thing left was the note, resting on the crisply made bed.

His first reaction upon skimming the letter had been to crush it into a ball and throw it across the room. He couldn’t believe that after everything they’d been through, she’d left him with a ‘Dear John’ letter - it seemed too…cowardly…for his brave, fearless Beth.

When the anger passed, confusion took its place.

Why had she left?

After their kiss earlier, he felt they were finally on the same page. He’d poured all the love in his heart into that embrace, telling her over and over again through his touch and his thoughts how much he cherished her.

How much he wanted to be with her.

Had it not been enough? Was the obstacle of her ability too much to overcome?

Had she seen something in his thoughts that spooked her, like the night of the party? Something that convinced her, once and for all, that it could never work between them?

Bruce retrieved the letter and sat on the floor by the bed, contemplating the crumpled ball of paper in his hand. If this was really the end of them - if this ‘goodbye’ was all he would be left with - he would force himself to read it properly.

He smoothed out the paper and absorbed the words, imagining them in Beth’s voice.

…you gave me a home and a place to be myself. You accepted me without judgement or fear, and loved me for who I am - I’ll always be grateful for that. It was an amazing gift for someone who has always felt so alone…

Those words could have been referring to him. Beth had accepted him without judgement or fear. She had seen the real Bruce Wayne…and loved him anyway. She was right - it was an amazing gift. One he would try to appreciate, even when he felt like throwing it back in the universe’s face.

But we were not to be…

It didn’t seem fair. They had managed to find each other, and fall in love - a miraculous feat for two people so closed off from the world. She had brought him back from the brink of a grey and loveless life and shown him what could be possible if he opened his heart.

For them to still be alone after all that…it just didn’t seem fair.

Our stars were crossed and not aligned.

No, that’s not right.

‘Star-crossed’ implies that our paths will forever diverge, leading us farther and farther away, until we’re distant memories to each other…

I prefer to think of us as binary stars - drawn together by the unknowable universe, revolving around each other, but never able to bridge the distance.

The corners of his mouth turned up ever so slightly at her choice of metaphor. Of course Beth would talk about them in terms of stars.

The stars had brought them together, after all.

You’ll be my companion for the rest of my life. The one I dance with, unseen, forever.

The back of his eyes burned with tears at the thought of her alone for the rest of her life, kept company by nothing more than his memory.

But, he couldn’t imagine dancing with anyone else either.

I love you.

Goodbye.

The tears fell. Bruce hung his head as the finality of that last word sank in.

Then he read the letter again.

And again.

A tiny niggle of…something…struck him every time, like a discordant note in a melody. But he brushed it aside, always in a rush to reach those three words at the end.

Those three words that gave him solace, and made the pain slightly more bearable.

I love you

———

“I owe you an apology.”

Bruce hastily tucked the letter into his pocket and turned to face Lieutenant Gordon. “What for?”

“That pathologist - Beth Carraway. She wasn’t involved with Newsome. We found evidence that she was being held in one of Connell’s labs. She must have been there the whole time…and we missed it. I missed it. I should have listened to you.” Gordon shook his head. “That poor woman. She managed to escape on her own, no thanks to me.” He dragged a hand down his face and looked away, obviously wracked with guilt.

The sight made Bruce feel guilty in turn. He had planted the evidence about Beth. And he knew how a good man like Gordon would react to the information...but he’d done it anyway.

He had to clear Beth’s name somehow.

“How is she?” Bruce asked, aiming for a light, barely-interested tone, hoping his desperation for news of Beth didn’t leak through. He’d forced himself to stay away from her while he waited for his theory to be confirmed, and the distance was killing him.

The irony was not lost on him.

For most of his time with Beth he’d fought against their connection; he’d tried again and again to step back, extract himself from the pull of her gravity. But now that she had broken things off, he yearned to be close to her.

“She’s…” Gordon paused while he tried to find the right words, and Bruce held his breath - a thousand worst case scenarios flooding his mind. “She’s different. Withdrawn. She seems…sad. So sad she damn near broke my heart.”

Bruce’s own heart stuttered at the thought of Beth alone and withdrawn.

He wanted to jump on his bike and race to her, but he had to wait.

If he was wrong…he wasn't sure he could take a third rejection.

He spent a few minutes more with Gordon - getting all the latest on Connell’s upcoming arraignment - before he shook the lieutenant’s hand and left the abandoned rooftop. Gordon had seemed shocked at the gesture, and returned the handshake warily. Bruce had reached out on instinct, not thinking much of it until their hands had met.

It was yet more proof of Beth’s influence over him. How much she’d restored his humanity.

You changed by orbit, and altered my gravity

She’d done the same for him. He was a better man because of her.

Bruce’s burner phone rang as he reached his bike on the street level. Knowing that only Alfred had the number - and that there’d only be one reason for his call - Bruce answered quickly, with an impatient, “Are they back?”

“Yes,” Alfred confirmed. “The lab have been in touch and the results are back.”

“And?”

“And you were right.”

Bruce hung up, a mixture of triumph and hope buzzing through his system. He quickly straddled the bike and kickstarted the engine.

It was finally time to see Beth.

Less than twenty minutes later, he tapped on her living room window.

He should have been assailed by a sense of déjà vu. Here he was - again - dressed as the Bat, crouched on Beth’s fire escape, waiting for her to let him in to her apartment.

But this was nothing like before.

He was a completely different man from the one who used to swing by Beth’s place, desperate for a scrap of attention. The man who deluded himself into thinking there was nothing between them but friendship.

And this situation was completely different.

And it was changing by the second.

He’d come here to plead for answers, to show her his evidence and beg for another chance…

But unexpected anger was building inside of him, fuelled by the hurt he still carried with him from finding that goddam letter.

Its why the first words out of his mouth when Beth finally raised open the window were, “What the hell were you thinking?!”

———

Beth took a step back, startled by Bruce’s vehement words.

She was startled by Bruce in general.

What was he doing here?

It had been thee days since she’d left Wayne Tower, and she hadn’t heard a thing from him. Not that she expected to. Their relationship was well and truly over. They loved and desired each other - the passionate, beautiful kiss they’d shared the night she’d left proved that - but Bruce had chose saving Gotham over her.

The note she’d left made it clear she understood that. And he was no doubt relieved that she’d spared him the awkward, painful conversation that would have ended things between them.

So there was nothing left to say.

There was no reason for him to return to her life.

So she had spent the last few days trying to restart that life. She’d been questioned by the police about her kidnapping and had been cleared of all wrong-doing with Newsome; she’d spoken to her boss at the M.E.’s office about returning to work, and she’d managed to convince her bank and various utility companies to reopen her accounts since ‘the reports of my death were greatly exaggerated’. The fun of misquoting Mark Twain to confused customer service representatives had been the only bright spot of the whole ordeal.

Luckily, those tasks had managed to fill the waking hours of her first two days away from Bruce; they’d kept her busy, and unable to dwell on the ache in her heart.

But today was different.

Today was rough.

There had been too many empty hours with nothing to distract her from her thoughts. Her memories. Nothing to distract her from contemplating the endless stretch of…loneliness…that was her future.

Until a gentle tapping at her window had jolted her from her depressed reverie.

Seeing Bruce’s familiar silhouette on her fire escape had set her heart racing. She’d scrambled out of her chair and fumbled with the locks on her window - too desperate for a glimpse of him to wonder why he might be here.

Or why he was so angry.

“What the hell were you thinking?!”

“What?” she asked. He took advantage of her involuntary step back to climb through the window and into her living room.

He wrenched his cowl from his head and ran a gloved hand through his hair, his movements agitated and barely controlled. “I finally get you back after you go missing for almost a week, but then you take off after less than 24 hours? Leaving nothing but this?” He wrenched a folded piece of paper from his pocket and waved it at her. “Do you have any idea how that felt?!”

Eyes locked on the piece of paper - her letter - she answered him in a meek voice.“I- I thought it would be easier-”

“Easier!?” He interrupted, eyebrows raised in disbelief. “Easier would have been staying. Easier would have been talking to me. This has not been easy, Beth. It’s been fucking torture.” The note in his hand scrunched and crackled as his fist clenched around it.

“I- I’m sorry,” she whispered, realising that she’d messed up leaving the way that she had. She folded her arms across her chest, feeling the need to shield herself from the pain and anger radiating from him.

The motion exposed the plaster cast encasing her right hand. Catching sight of the injury, Bruce’s demeanour changed from irate to worried in an instant. He dropped the letter and carefully pushed up the sleeve of her cardigan, revealing the stiff blue fabric that covered the end of her forearm and most of her hand. “What happened?” he asked softly.

She pulled away from him and took a seat on the couch behind her - for some reason, dealing with his anger was easier than his gentle concern. But he just followed her down, his long cape draping over her white sofa to spill on the floor at their feet. She avoided his eyes and picked at a loose thread at the edge of the cast. “Turns out I broke my hand when I punched my father in the face. I got it checked at the hospital yesterday and they diagnosed a Boxer’s fracture.”

“I’m sorry,” he said softly.

She shrugged. “It’s fine. I’ll be good as new in a few weeks. Besides, it was worth it.”

“No, I meant, I’m sorry for yelling at you before. That wasn’t why I came here.”

She raised her eyes to meet his gaze. Now that they were sitting so close, she could see how tired he looked. It made her want to pull him down to rest against her. “So why did you come?”

“Because of this.” He opened one of the pouches on his belt and removed a small glass vial. He held it up between his finger and thumb, and she could see a tiny residue of blue liquid at the bottom. “Dory found this in my bathroom when she was cleaning, along with a syringe. She passed it to Alfred, who staged a mini-intervention; he thought I was doing drugs.”

She bit her lip to keep from smiling at the mental image.

Bruce noticed, and smiled in return. “Looking back, it was pretty funny, even though I wasn’t in the mood to laugh at the time.” He studied the small container, as he rolled it between his fingers. “I recognised this as one of the vials from the lab - the vials that you were so desperate to save. So I had the remaining liquid analysed and I got the results back tonight.” He looked at her then. “It acts to cut off your abilities, doesn’t it?”

She nodded.

“And you injected it the other night, before…our kiss.”

Another nod.

“Which means you didn’t hear a goddam thing I was trying to tell you that night.”

She frowned at him. “I heard plenty when you were talking to Alfred downstairs,” she said, a hard edge to her voice.

He winced, then dropped his head into his hands. “I was afraid of that.” He rose to his feet and picked up the discarded letter, reading part of it aloud: “‘But we were not to be. I understand the reasons why.’” He shook his head. “I understand the reasons why,” he repeated. “I kept getting hung up on that one phrase. It sounded as though the reasons for leaving weren’t your own. That they were my reasons. And I couldn’t figure that out…until we found that syringe. Then I figured there must have been a misunderstanding.”

A misunderstanding.

She shook her head. There was no misunderstanding. “I heard you clearly, Bruce. About me being a distraction. Making you weaker. How ‘the sooner I moved out the better’. You want to talk about torture? That was torture.”

He raked his hands through his hair. “If you’d just spoke to me about it that night-”

She jumped to her feet, feeling her own surge of anger. “And what? Should I have begged for you to change your mind?! Dropped to my knees and pleaded with you? I have some self respect, you know!”

“Beth, I didn’t mean what I said! I didn’t mean any of it!”

She shook her head and collapsed back on the couch. He sat on the coffee table in front of her and took hold of her hands. She tried to pull them away, but he held tight. “No, listen to me Beth. I’d just come back from the hospital where George - you remember the kid I told you about? He died that night. And it all just became…too much. I lashed out and said some shit I didn’t mean, because I was scared. Scared of losing you again.”

She stared into his eyes, seeing the pain of loss reflected in those deep blue depths. She didn’t blame him for being scared. He had lived through her death, after all. She’d gotten a glimpse of the desolation he’d felt when he’d breathed for her in the lab.

A mere glimpse.

He had lived that reality for hours.

She couldn’t imagine what that must have been like. It would be heartbreaking for anyone…but for a man who still hadn’t recovered from the trauma of his parents deaths? For a man who had shielded himself against just that type of pain for decades? An experience like that wouldn’t just break his heart, it risked destroying him.

To lose George on top of that? A little boy he felt a connection to? A responsibility for?

No, she couldn’t blame him for being scared.

But she couldn’t guarantee something like that wouldn’t happen again. Life was unpredictable and it could sometimes be cruel. She wanted to face that uncertainty with him, but she was worried that he’d always have one foot out the door, too afraid to fully commit.

She tried to explain that to him. “I get it, Bruce. I get why you might have said what you did. But it feels like every time we get close, you pull away or hurt me. You’re still too scared of this. Of us.”

He gripped her uninjured hand firmer, and leaned closer. She had no choice but to meet his intense gaze. “No. I won’t let that fear rule me, Beth. And I won’t let it ruin this. When I thought you’d died, I realised that I would have gone through all of it - all the pain and uncertainty and fear - all of it a thousand times over, just to have one more day with you. I realised that every possible bad outcome and worst case scenario that might happen in the future would be worth it…if I got to spend my life with you.”

She bit her lip, still wary of believing him. She’d been through so much in the last week, her emotions were all over the place. She wasn’t sure she could trust the hope that was stirring in her soul at his words.

He seemed to notice her reticence. He sat back and removed his gloves and the gauntlets from his arms. He held out a bare hand towards her.

“Take my hand, Beth. Let me prove it to you. See what I tried to show you the other night. See how much I love you. How much I want to make this work between us. I’m all in, Beth - let me prove it to you.”

She raised her hand until it hovered over his palm, a slight tremble visible as she hesitated.

“Please,” he begged softly. “Trust me, Beth. Take my hand.”

———

Bruce held his breath as her hand hovered above his palm…and exhaled when it came to rest against his.

He curled his fingers gently around hers, cradling them as if they were made of glass - when what he really wanted to do was hold tight and never let go.

He’d come so close to losing her - all because of a few misunderstandings. And he was only sitting here now, with her hand in his, because of a sentence in a letter and a small glass vial. If Dory had binned the vial when she found it, or if he’d thrown away the letter after one quick read…this could all be ending so differently.

No.

He wasn’t sure he believed that.

He was meant to be with Beth.

The universe couldn’t keep them apart for long. They would have been pulled back into each other’s orbit soon enough. And not like the binary stars she compared them to, doomed to circle each other from a distance. They were the opposite of that…

…whatever that was.

Two black holes, maybe? Pulling each other closer and closer until they…collided?

Maybe he should leave the cosmic metaphors to her.

“I think that’s a good idea,” Beth said, laughter in her voice.

“Hmm?” Bruce asked, looking up from their hands. Her head was bent close to his, and he could see the humour sparking in her eyes. “You caught that, huh?”

She smiled and nodded.

He gave her a small shrug. “I’m not that good with words.”

“That’s not true. The way you feel about me, in here,” she lifted her injured hand to brush her fingers over his forehead. “And here,” she pressed the same hand against his chest, over his heart. “And what your soul is telling me through this,” she squeezed her other hand around his. “Its pure poetry.”

He closed his eyes and bowed his head, resting it on their clasped hands. The relief was overwhelming. “So you believe me then? That I want to be with you, no matter what?”

“I believe you.”

He raised his head again, and pressed a kiss against the back of her hand. “And that I love you - completely and with all my heart?”

“Yes,” she whispered. “And I love you too. But…”

He frowned. “But what?”

“But there’s something I need to tell you. And I’m afraid it might change the way you see me.”

----

CHAPTER 22

----

Taglist: @hollandorks @grunge-n-roses5 @xmxrfx @neptunesands @caramelcandescence @blossomedfloweroflove @wanderdreamer @angelsarecallin @stephenismyking @rabbitdictionary @starshipvelociraptor @yanna-banana @batmanlovesnirvana @bees-fart-too @hypnoash @eravanaaaah @anescapistreality @beigetrash @shimmeringgrim @battinsonbaby @blue-aconite

#Batman #The Batman 2022 #Batman fic #Batman fanfic #The Batman 2022 fic #battinson fic #Battinson #bruce wayne #bruce wayne x original character #bruce wayne/OC #batman x oc #Batman / original female character #Just Breathe #Carrawayne

30 notes · View notes

tiktaalic · 2 years ago

Note

Re: the goldfinch. I’m very curious what you think of it because my impression is that it thinks it’s very profound but isn’t in a way I would find very obnoxious. I say this as someone who regularly reads Victorian lit for fun I have a high tolerance for faux profundity but I feel like goldfinch would be too much for me.

However the way some people talk about it I get the impression there is. something about it. probably not something the author intended and not quite ‘the secret good goldfinch’ but. something. however I cannot put my finger on what

this is the goldfinch

i wouldnt describe myself as a donna tartt girlie ebcause i wasnt big on the secret history and i know nothing about any of her other books but i did really enjoy the goldfinch! i can see where you'd get that impression because i mean. pretentious antiques art dealer pov character. but idk i never felt like the goldfinch was going "this says a lot about society". it was very much a journal for the pov character which meant it was very small scale and never felt like it was trying to indict the world at large. i dont think the goldfinch is trying to pass itself off as profound. i think it's a meandering thing with threads you will flip back and forth through 700 pages for to go oh god the fucking themes about and it's something that stuck with me. it just got painted with the #dark academia brush which makes everything seem like a poser. its not that! it's about a kid who experiences a tragedy when he's young and the different miserable experiences he gets shuffled between in the aftermath, and then it's about the very fragile life he builds for himself as an adult. i think its very well summarized by theo the pov character talking to his childhood friend and theo's like yeah you did crazy shit when we used to get drunk and boris is like. I'M the one who did crazy shit? every night with you you would get black out drunk and try to kill yourself while i had to wrestle you away from the roof or away from the road of speeding cars. theo relays things to the reader in a way that suggests he THINKS hes functioning but does so with words that clearly telegraph that he's real fucked in the head.

#ask #anonymous #goldfinch

29 notes · View notes

majorbaby · 2 years ago

Note

If you want, I'd love to hear more about why you don't vibe with Mulcahy in canon, I'm very intrigued!

feel a little nervous posting this but here it is:

It’s largely a personal thing. I was born into a very religious, Catholic family that is only 5th-6th-ish generation catholic after being converted by european colonizers, so a character like Mulcahy (volunteer catholic priest in Asia) sets off kill bill sirens in my head.

Mulcahy himself might be an okay guy, but it’s not about the person, it’s about the vocation and the institution he represents. You know how there’s no such thing as a “good cop”?? Yeah.

So his affable, soft-spoken image does nothing for me. When I am moved to feel some kind of way about him, I’m usually not moved in a good way.

I think Mulcahy is awarded quite a few passes that other characters who subscribe to oppressive ideologies (Charles’ Republicanism, Margaret’s pro-military and right-leaning politics and Potter’s regular army shtick) do not get. Margaret can be grating but she also has to contend with how her own beliefs stifle and oppress her as a woman, and a lot of her more rigid views soften throughout the war.

Charles get a decent amount of flak from Hawkeye and BJ, being in opposition to them is essential to his character. Potter is inconsistent, sometimes he openly laments the war and points out the senseless suffering, but also the guy’s a career military man. So what is the truth lol.

Back to Mulcahy. I don’t think his role as a volunteer priest is ever meaningfully challenged by the show, which is of note because many other socially conservative views are taken to task. He’s not a missionary but he’s shown to be handing out bibles to locals, asking them if they might be Catholic… that kind of stuff makes me raise my eyebrows. That example takes place, hilariously, in an episode called The Chosen People, (!!!!) where Hawkeye and Trapper are opposed to forcing a Korean family to relocate. At the end of the episode they are shown to be (happily?) escorted off their land and the good father hands them some bibles for some ‘light reading on the road’ – uh, what the fuck. Hawkeye says ‘they have offices everywhere’ , which I wish didn't land as a quip. It's on-the-nose, and sobering for me to hear. The Catholic church got to be as prolific as it is by decimating entire cultures and traditions.

Christian missionary work is just another flavour of Western imperialism, which the show (at least in its early years) is supposed to be taking a stand against. Hawkeye and Trapper have a few lines that allude to a personal flippancy towards religion mostly in the early years, but that’s pretty much it.

There’s a few other things that make me roll my eyes. In War of Nerves where he compares Sidney, Hawkeye or BJ’s losing a patient’s life to his own ‘losing a soul’ – nope! Not the same! His clear opposition to his sister leaving the order – blegh. His telling Hawkeye ‘you had to be there’ after Mulcahy’s War after Hawkeye’s been to the front in Aid Station and presumably other times, chill OUT guy.

His whole drama at the end with not being able to rise through the military ranks is boring and annoying to me as someone who really latched on to the anti-military aspect of MASH. I simply do not care.

He's the main lens we have through which we’re meant to see the show deal with religion, and I’m a bit annoyed that he comes off as a literal saint. That is not my preferable depiction of a catholic priest and the fact that he’s never taken to task is a crime for a show that is anti-establishment. I vaguely remember his superior clergymen being portrayed as corrupt and greedy on the rare occasion we hear or see them, but I don’t remember exactly (probably because I’m barely paying attention if there’s a Mulcahy subplot).

I’ll end by saying I have nothing against Mulcahy-enjoyers. These are just my feelings, which are informed by my life as an asian, ex-catholic. This isn’t an indictment of people who love the character. There’s certainly good things to be taken from him, I just don’t care to. I think it’s great that people corrupt him in fanfiction, but I tend not to seek it out because I’m not intrigued by how he is in the source.

Thanks for the question!

#re: mash

17 notes · View notes

firelxdykatara · 3 years ago

Note

I’m just really confused as to where this idea that Zuko is gaycoded came from. Like people are allowed to have that headcanon but I don’t understand where people are coming from when they try and claim that he was undisputedly gaycoded and trying to deny it is homophobic when he’s only ever shown romantic interest in women.

I made a pretty long post on the topic a while back, but the ultimate gist of it is this: there are a lot of elements of Zuko's status as an abuse victim and trauma survivor that resonate with queer folks. This is understandable and completely fine! However, there are some parts of the fandom who have taken that to the other extreme and will now insist that those elements are uniquely queer, and that they can only be read as some sort of veiled gay/coming out narrative, even though that doesn't make much sense since there is no part of Zuko's narrative which is unique to any sort of queer experience.

I think the problem really does stem from two things being conflated--Zuko's history of abuse and trauma, and trauma&abuse being something a lot of queer people have experienced. I suspect it goes something like 'I see a lot of myself in Zuko, and I was abused for being gay, therefore Zuko must be gay too in order to have had similar experiences.' This can then lead to feeling dismissed or invalidated when other people point out that those experiences are not unique to being queer--but on the flip side, abuse victims and trauma survivors whose abuse&trauma do not stem from queerness (even if they are queer themselves) can feel invalidated and dismissed by the implication that their trauma must be connected to their queerness or it isn't valid.

This is also where the 'people don't actually know what gay coded means' part comes in, and I realize now that I didn't actually get into what gay coding (and queer coding in general) actually means, since I was so hung up on pointing out how Zuko doesn't really fit the mold. (And the few elements that exist which could be said to count are because of the 'villains historically get queer coded bc Hays Code era' thing and mostly occur in Book 1, not because of how he acts as an abuse&trauma survivor.)

Under a cut because I kind of go on a tangent about gay/queer coding, but I swear I get back to the point eventually.

Queer coding (and it is notable that, with respect to Zuko, it is almost always framed as 'he couldn't possibly be attracted to girls', rather than 'he could be attracted to boys as well as girls' in these discussions, for... no real discernible reason, but I'll get into that in a bit) is the practice of giving characters 'stereotypically queer' traits and characteristics to 'slide them under the radar' in an era where having explicitly queer characters on screen was not allowed, unless they were evil or otherwise narratively punished for their queerness. (See: the extant history of villains being queer-coded, because if they were Evil then it was ok to make them 'look gay', since the story wasn't going to be rewarding their queerness and making audiences think it was in any way OK.) This is thanks to the Motion Picture Production Code (colloquially and more popularly known as the Hays Code), which was a set of guidelines which movies coming out of any major studio had to adhere to in order to be slated for public release and lasted from the early 1930s until it was finally abandoned in the late 60s.

The Hays Code essentially existed to ensure that the content of major motion pictures would not 'lower the moral standards' of the viewing public. It didn't just have to do with queerness--cursing was heavily monitored, sex outside of marriage was not allowed to be seen as desirable or tittilating, miscegenation was not allowed (most specifically interracial relationships between black and white people), criminals had to be punished lest the audience think that it was ok to be gay and do crime, etc. Since same-sex relations fell under 'sexual perversion', they could not be shown unless the 'perversion' were punished in some way. (This is also the origin of the Bury Your Gays trope, another term that is widely misunderstood and misapplied today.) To get around this, queer coding became the practice by which movies and television could depict queer people but not really, and it also became customary to give villains this coding even more overtly, since they would get punished by the end of the film or series anyway and there was nothing to lose by making them flamboyant and racy/overly sexual/promiscuous.

Over time, this practice of making villains flamboyant, sexually aggressive, &etc became somewhat separated from its origins in queer coding, by which I mean that these traits and tropes became the go-to for villains even when the creator had no real intention of making them seem queer. This is how you generally get unintentional queer-coding--because these traits that have been given to villains for decades have roots in coding, but people tend to go right to them when it comes to creating their villains without considering where they came from.

Even after the Hays Code was abandoned, the sentiments and practices remained. Having queer characters who weren't punished by the narrative for being queer was exceptionally rare, and it really isn't until the last fifteen or so years that we've seen any pushback against that. Buffy the Vampire Slayer is famous for being one of the first shows on primetime television to feature an explicitly gay relationship on-screen, and that relationship ended in one of the most painful instances of Bury Your Gays that I have ever personally witnessed. (Something that, fourteen years later, The 100 would visually and textually reference with Lexa's death. Getting hit by a bullet intended for someone else after a night of finally getting to be happy and have sex with her s/o? It wasn't remotely subtle. I don't even like Clexa, but that was incredibly rough to witness.)

However, bringing this back to Zuko, he really doesn't fit the criteria for queer coding for a number of reasons. First of all, no one behind the scenes (mostly a bunch of cishet men) was at all intending to include queer rep in the show. This wasn't a case where they were like 'well, we really wanted to make Zuko gay, but we couldn't get that past the censors, so here are a few winks and a nudge', because it just wasn't on their radar at all. Which makes sense--it wasn't on most radars in that era of children's programming. This isn't really an indictment, it's just a fact of the time--in the mid/late 00s, no one was really thinking about putting queer characters in children's cartoons. People were barely beginning to include them in more teen- and adult-oriented television and movies. It just wasn't something that a couple of straight men, who were creating a fantasy series aimed at young kids, were going to think about.

What few instances you can point to from the series where Zuko might be considered to exhibit coding largely happen in Book 1, when he was a villain, because the writers were drawing from typically villainous traits that had historically come from queer coding villains and had since passed into common usage as villainous traits. But they weren't done with any intention of making it seem like Zuko might be attracted to boys.

And, again, what people actually point to as 'evidence' of Zuko being queer-coded--his awkwardness on his date with Jin and his confrontation with Ozai being the big ones I can think of off the top of my head--are actually just... traits that come from his history of trauma and abuse.

As I said in that old post:

making [zuko’s confrontation of ozai] about zuko being gay and rejecting ozai’s homophobia, rather than zuko learning fundamental truths about the world and about his home and about how there was something deeply wrong with his nation that needed to be fixed in order for the world to heal (and, no, ‘homophobia’ is not the answer to ‘what is wrong with the fire nation’, i’m still fucking pissed at bryke about that), misses the entire point of his character arc. this is the culmination of zuko realizing that he should never have had to earn his father’s love, because that should have been unconditional from the start. this is zuko realizing that he was not at fault for his father’s abuse--that speaking out of turn in a war meeting in no way justified fighting a duel with a child.

is that first realization (that a parent’s love should be unconditional, and if it isn’t, then that is the parent’s fault and not the child’s) something that queer kids in homophobic households/families can relate to? of course it is. but it’s also something that every other abused kid, straight kids and even queer kids who were abused for other reasons before they even knew they were anything other than cishet, can relate to as well. in that respect, it is not a uniquely queer experience, nor is it a uniquely queer story, and zuko not being attracted to girls (which is what a lot of it seems to boil down to, at the end of the day--cutting down zuko’s potential ships so that only zukka and a few far more niche ships are left standing) is not necessary to his character arc. nor does it particularly make sense.

And, regarding his date with Jin:

(and before anyone brings up his date with jin--a) he enjoyed it when she kissed him, and b) he was a traumatized, abused child going out on a first date. of course he was fucking awkward. have you ever met a teenage boy????)

Zuko is socially awkward and maladjusted because he was abused by his father as a child and has trouble relating to people as a result. He was heavily traumatized and brutally physically injured as a teenager, and it took him years to begin to truly recover from the scars that left on his psyche (and it's highly likely, despite the strides he made in canon, that he has a long way to go, post series; it's such a pity that we never got any continuation comics >.>). He was not abused for being gay or queer--he was abused because his father believed he was weak, and part of Zuko's journey was realizing that his father's perception of strength was flawed at its core. That his entire nation had rotted from the inside out, and the regime needed to be changed in order for the world--including his people--to begin to heal.

That could be commingled with a coming out narrative, which is completely fine for headcanons (although I personally prefer not to, because, again, we have more than enough queer trauma already), but it simply doesn't exist in canon. Zuko was not abused or traumatized for being queer, and his confrontation with Ozai was not about him coming out or realizing any fundamental truth about himself--it was about realizing something fundamental about his father and his nation, and making the choice to leave them behind so that he could help the Avatar grow stronger and force things to change when he got back.

TL;DR: at the end of the day, none of the traits, scenes, or behavior Zuko exhibits which shippers tend to use to claim he was gay-coded are actually evidence of coding--they aren't uniquely queer experiences, as they stem from abuse that was not related in any way to his sexuality, and they are experiences that any kid who suffered similar abuse or trauma could recognize and resonate with. (Including straight kids, and queer kids who were abused for any reason other than their identity.) And, finally, Zuko can be queer without erasing or invalidating his canon attraction to girls, and it's endlessly frustrating that the 'Zuko is gay-coded' crowd refuses to acknowledge that.

#atla #zuko #on queer coding #atla fandom salt #salt for ts #asked #mudbend

135 notes · View notes

guardianofscrewingup · 3 years ago

Text

“artificial” people

I barely participate in the fandom but I’ve seen a few takes, and I’m mystified why anyone would think Adrien possibly being a senti makes him magically not a person? Sentibeing Ladybug was shown to have some free will the second she wasn’t being controlled and it’s treated as horrible by Ladybug and Cat Noir that she was wiped from existence. The canon also has two other completely artificial lifeforms (Markov and Uncanny Valley) that have had plot points or episode tension points about how they were really alive. (Or briefly dead, in Uncanny Valley’s case). Markov even had emotions that could lead to him being akumatized.

In universe characters treat artificial lifeforms as sentient people, even if they’re not entirely human. Out of universe, it’s clear the intent of the show’s writing supports their personhood because the lesson is usually that it’s wrong not to view them as people.

So how does Adrien being an artificial being magically make him not a person? At worst, he’s just not human. (Though biologically, other than a magical tie to the amok and the peacock miraculous, he may actually be mostly physically human for all we know).

Lots of characters aren’t human on the show: Markov, Uncanny Valley, every single one of the kwami, possibly some of the other worldwide heroes like Majestia (if she’s based on a mix of Superman/Wonder Woman influences like her costume suggests, so she might be an alien), the Renlings in the Prodigious, Mei Shi (the guardian of the Prodigious).

They’re all treated as sentient beings with feelings. (Mei Shi gets akumatized too, ergo = emotions). Like it’s clear Adrien and Marinette see Tikki and Plagg not just as their kwami and a source of power, but their friends.

If the senti-being theory is correct and not a misdirect Adrien may have a parent that’s able to override his will sometimes if he’s being rebellious with the amok, but he clearly has thoughts and feelings of his own. He can think things like “I don’t want to be a model” when Gabe wants him to be one. He’s rebellious enough to sneak behind his dad’s back to be Chat Noir even though he knows his dad would hate it. (Gabe wouldn’t approve even if he was exactly who Adrien thinks he is and wasn’t Hawk Moth).

So the argument “he’s now just a thing and therefore it doesn’t matter/excuses if Gabe abuses him therefore ruining the abuse representation” is a crock. It reads like people just disliking the writing choice and trying to find some kind of social justice backing to validate how their dislike is right. Disliking the writing choice is totally valid! It’s down to taste, and also it can reasonably feel like too much has been piled on a character. But it doesn’t need some kind of huge twisting of what we’ve seen to be justified.

Gabe is still ultimately in the role of parenting a child with thoughts and feeling appropriate to his age. Him occasionally mind controlling him makes him more abusive as a parent, not less, and it just makes it worse the way he treats his son as a poseable doll already. He’d be doing this to the kid no matter what, because of his giant ego and control freak tendencies. This just means he has an extra avenue to hurt him that adds onto the list of bs he’s always pulling.

When it comes to an indictment of his actions, this is no different than if someone was occasionally telepathically controlling their normal human child - still abusive, still heinous. Or if they were the creator of a sentient robot tweaking their programming to agree every time they rebelled, against their will. It might cause some identity crises for Adrien but the nastiest part is the mind control aspect, which Gabe would probably do regardless of whether his kid was human or not.

So arguments in the vein of “he’s an ‘it’ so it’s justifying the abuse!” really are off. And as an abuse survivor they pissed me off.

Adrien is a child (a baby!) with clear thoughts and feelings and a sense of self. He’s being abused by his father. The sentibeing theory changes nothing other than making it so his father deserves even more to be tossed in a dumpster because it means there’s one more way he’s abusing him.

Adrien is no more a thing or an “it” than all the androids or other artificial lifeforms in fiction, who are usually treated by the narrative as alive.

I mean, it’s a common narrative that artificial people are people! Even aside from other examples in canon, there are whole movies and episodes of classic shows dedicated to exploring this subject (like “Measure of a Man” in Star Trek: TNG or like ANYTHING based on anything by Asimov), that ultimately come to the conclusion that the robot characters are people that think and perceive the self and humans that mistreat them are monstrous. This is so common:

This comes up so often in fiction, our views on what we should recognize as people are so frequently challenged by media, and the show has shown us so often that he has tons of feelings and thoughts of his own, that it feels like people reflexively calling a character a fake person or a thing or an it says more about them than about the show.

And that’s not even getting into every single sentient nonhuman in the comic canons Ladybug is inspired by, that the creators are no doubt familiar with or they wouldn’t have characters like Uncanny Valley in the first place.

Like...Majestia is clearly based on Wonder Woman given the star/breastplate style design. In the longest stretch of DC timeline that the writers would’ve grown up with, Wonder Woman canonically had an origin of being made of clay.

It is so weird to assume writ large that we’re supposed to read Adrien as un-alive now and base any takes off that. And it’s kind of messed up to say this status justifies a parent he loves and trusts hurting him.

#miraculous ladybug #adrien agreste #gabriel agreste #season 4 spoilers #risk spoilers #season 4 finale spoilers #s4ep25 spoilers #leak spoilers #cw: child abuse

12 notes · View notes