#i like??? them both?? and think that honestly they should have all been homoerotic rivals bc it would have solved so many problems

[lupuslikethewolf]

i have both anti-snape maruders-stans and pro-snape maruders-antis following me and i really dont know how i got here and im scared of posting anything marauders/severus related bc i'll always be pissing Someone off

[rest-in-bees]

do you have a live action bl series with a serious plot you would recommend? i like the stuff you’ve been reblogging but i can’t choose which to start with

hi anon! i wasn't quite sure what you meant by serious (like focused more on the plot than the romance or like more serious tonally) so i went with a mix of the two with the help of the group chat! for the record everything in this list has a happyish ending except for one

a lot of the stuff I've been reblogging lately is from Kinnporsche, which is a thai mafia bl with romcom vibes but it's also v dark. and honestly i don't even know how to explain it? but i want to steal the genders of most of the cast and wear them like little hats (esp this one guy named vegas who i also want to put in a washing machine set to maximum spin) anygay there's three couples and they're all living in different genres, and there's def a reason everyone i know calls it a revolutionary bl. it can be found on dramacool, tws for sexual assault tho and there's also sex on screen if that's a squick of yours

another good one (still airing tho) is The Eclipse, which is thai and airing on youtube every friday. it's inspired by some real life events where the first openly transgender member of thailand's parliament was removed from office due to authoritarian measures (pls do not ask me what they are im too tired to google it) and so they decided to make a bl about an all boys high school fighting against an authoritarian school board! i really like the main couple and the side couple both, it's telling four different queer journeys and i love how all of them are portrayed

there's also Not Me which is thai and on youtube as well, and it follows a dude going undercover in a biker gang to figure out who put his twin brother in a coma. fair warning it's a little over the top at times (white is kind of an idiot but he's sean's idiot) but the pride rally episode makes it worth it imo

next up is Manner of Death, which is a thai crime drama on dramacool and was so cool to watch, bc it was the first bl I'd ever seen in which they could've been a straight couple and v little would change. they're adults and they have really good chemistry even if i think sometimes the characters engaged in some Poor Decision Making™️

and ofc i have to mention Cherry Magic! it's a japanese office drama on dramacool which covers a lot of serious topics and has a great ace character so i think it deserves to be an honorable mention. shoutout to the side couple for being hilariously cringe

next off is 180 Degrees of Longitude Passes Through Us, which i would like to say up front i have not seen! but it does come highly recommended to me and has a serious plot so i wanted to mention it. tws for kind of a big age gap and a sad ending. it's thai and can be found on dramacool

another one i haven't seen yet is Young Royals which is a swedish bl on netflix and looks like it's only angst so I'm ignoring it as that's not my thing but it might be yours! it's a prince and a commoner story set in a high school and my friend said i should suggest it to you since it's serious, season two is about to air!

is Bad Buddy serious? sort of so I'm adding it to the list bc it was so so so good. it's a childhood friends to rivals to lovers romcom and it does cover serious topics and i really like it so i highly recommend it. it's a thai bl on youtube

and ofc i have to mention The Untamed, which is a chinese bl (and as such is censored) and can be found on netflix, but it's based on novel called The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation by MXTX and just so you understand the vibes: the first line is "Good news! Wei Wuxian is dead!" and uh. wei wuxian is the mchecking main character. but the plot follows a lot of conspiracy and murder and a lot of the characters are heartbreaking but i swear it does end in marriage

NOW. there are two dramas that are not strictly bls but are both v homoerotic and so i really wanted to mention them anyway bc they are v serious and i liked them a lot

first off: The Devil Judge. the man himself becomes the head judge in a televised courtroom in a post pandemic south korea in an attempt to remove courtroom corruption and foul play from high priority trials. along the way he engages becomes the beast to a fellow judge's beauty (not a joke they literally said it was based on beauty and the beast and it's kinda obvious) and it has a bittersweet ending, can be found on dramacool

and last but certainly not least is Beyond Evil which is a kdrama on netflix and is this one guy trying to catch a serial killer, but the other one thinks he's suspicious and ofc insanity ensues but in a v dark and murdery way. bittersweet ending again and there is an age gap but it's not technically a bl even tho there's a lot of hinting imo

and ofc look out for Big Dragon when it starts airing on oct 8, it's one I'm really looking forward to (another thai mafia bl ofc)

and that's all I've got right now! anyone else pls feel free to add on to this list and anon def feel free to reach out with any questions! I'd love to know which, if any, you end up watching and your thoughts on it!

[tillman]

Hi, it's Valentine, back with another essay on Lancelot again. I’m deranged and you all have to accept this. Anyways this ones been a long time coming mostly because i'm lazy and only now had some free time to sit down and delve into so many sources to find quotes and proof for the main claim of this post: Mr Lancelot du Lac is an autistic man. Hes also trans and gay and i have proof for both of those (one is literally not even subtext) but those are for different essays. 

Anyways to start off with some smaller bits I wanna at least mention the history connecting autistic people with changelings or fae. The idea of a normal seeming child being “replaced” by something not entirely human to explain neurological differences has been around for a while and can tie in with a lot of autistic people's feelings of being different or completely disconnected from those around them. Thematically all of this ties in with Lancelot’s narrative of being “stolen away” by a fae as a child and coming back different. He grew up in a realm of fairies, and Chrétien de Troyes in Knight of the Cart, which may be the first story about Lancelot, simply calls his mother who in later texts grows to be the Lady of the Lake, “a fairy.” Another smaller point is Lancelot tends to go nonverbal when he gets extremely upset which is neat! One bit i can’t get a quote for (vulgate pdf when) is after Galehaut’s death, he locks up completely and his mother, the Lady, who is wonderful and perfect, explains the situation for him. You could also look at all the times Lancelot runs off into the woods and refuses to speak for a while for more proof of that. He does this a lot. It's just a thing people expect from him.

Anyways, I wanna talk about Lancelot’s inability to comprehend emotions or communication in general. Please, I've been dying to talk about Lancelot’s issues with communication for days. God he has them and I can relate so hard. Covering the dutch prose first just look at the story of the hart with the white foot. A lady comes to court talking about how whatever knight will get the foot of his hart will get her hand in marriage. Lancelot actually ends up missing the lady speak about what will happen, and after hearing Kay fail to do it, declares hell go after this hart instead. "When he heard this account / he spoke impetuously: / "By my faith, I fully intend / to follow this little dog.” He doesn’t think it though, he doesn't really know what he's getting into, Lancelot is just a yes man who likes doing knightly deeds. He has to in the end be rescued twice by Gawain, one from his fucking up while hunting the hart, and the other by accidently leading a lady on thinking that he’ll marry her, something Gawain negotiates Lancelot out of. Moving onto not the dutch prose since i just spent 3 hours reading up on it, let's move onto le morte.

Malory pulls a lot from the french sources, and i'll talk about what he left out in a sec cus . god. But I mostly want to touch on his relationship with two of the people he’s closest to, those being Guenevere and Gawain. Guenevere is a very weird case considering her literal emotional manipulation of him in moments he is very vulnerable and just how not great she is to him in general but his take on their relationship is honestly pretty easy to pin down. Lancelot honestly idolizes Guenevere, as his queen, as his lady, as a person who showed him basic respect when he first came to court. He has the mindset that a knight should love and do anything for his lady, and after Guenevere knights him really without any thought to what she was doing, he decided he would do anything for her. The vulgate does a better job dealing with their relationship through the mediator figure of Galehaut who is a whole other bag of worms, but Guenevere mostly indulges him for the fun of it. She sees that he’s a young knight who’s willing to die for her and uses this to her advantage politically and for other reasons. This constantly goes over Lancelot's head, until towards the end of le morte where he finally realizes how much he suffers for this relationship while she doesn't even care, “This is not the first time, said Sir Launcelot, that ye had been displeased with me causeless, but, madam, ever I must suffer you, but what sorrow I endure I take no force.” He resigns himself to put up with a relationship he admits is actively hurting him because he believes it’s love, and as a good knight, he should love his lady. His relationship with Gawain is less dicey, and more him constantly not getting Gawain’s implications. He admits to his love of Gawain only during their war saying in the vulgate, “But he will never be able to hate me so much that I stop loving him." Like. bold of him to just ignore all of Gawains previous advances until theyre in a life or death war. Bro accept your homoerotic rivals and move on already. 

Another casualty from Lancelot not realizing emotional connotations until too late is Galehaut, who literally dies of longing over the knight. Like Elaine of Astolat but worse because Galehauts just genuinely one of the best people in Arthurian literature. He doesn’t realize until too late that the person who actually loves him is the one willing to do anything for him, and ends up almost killing himself over Galehauts death. I have too much to say on that and it's not relevant to anything in this essay but god know i yearn over them all the time. 

Other thing is Lancelot has a lot of struggle with mental health anyways,  he really just truly is traumatized and that’s kinda fucked. He has a lot of problems with depression and poor coping mechanisms. I mean his main coping mechanism is falling asleep instead of dealing with the issues. That's not completely on topic but it's a big mood and ties in vaguely and also i don't have any other way to end this. There are way more bits to add but i am falling asleep at my desk and need to get lunch before it gets too late. Anyways this is probably not great i wrote this in 4 hours directly after waking up at 12 and spent 2 of those hours reading literary essays on the dutch romances. GOOD NIGHT . 

[comicbookuniversity]

Logan: A Discussion

Sorry for the delay; we’ve been sitting on this since opening weekend. You know how life can get. Enjoy

Before:

Weird Beard: Alright, what are your thoughts going into this film?

Bunnypwn Gold: My first thoughts going into Logan are optimistic. I liked the early X-Men films, but honestly I wasn’t happy with the soft, sentimental Wolverine we got because he never had a chance to be the stone cold badass we all know and love. The solo Wolverine films were weak and basically were about “Wolverine is good at killing things with his claws!” instead of having an actual plot. That’s such a cliché idea that it’s been his catchphrase for two decades at least. Logan, though, looks different. I was expecting it to be as mediocre as the others, but the trailers and advanced info changed my mind; they focus on him as a person, where he’s going, and what his plans are with Laura more than showing him cutting people up. I expect that he’ll be doing a lot of that anyway, so I don’t need to see it in the trailers if there’s really anything else to the film. I think I’ll be pleased with Logan.

WB: Yeah, when this was first announced, I thought, ‘Oh, here’s going to be another dud, because the first two Wolverine films are garbage.’ That isn’t to say that they didn’t have cool details within them, but that they were just poorly made and thought out. But then, I saw the first trailer and I was like, ‘That was a great trailer for what’s going to be a crappy movie. At best, it will be a watchable but otherwise forgettable film.’ So yeah, I definitely was not really paying much attention to the news about it or really looking forward to it in a way beyond maybe seeing a cool trailer. It wasn’t until reviews for it started coming in that I started to get hope for it. My bar for success for this film before the reviews was whether it was coherent, which is the most basic thing you should expect from a film. After the reviews, I started looking forward to it, and not simply because they were positive, but that people were saying it was easily one of the best superhero films.

When people started saying that about it, I started to be more interested in it.

So, have you seen both of the last Wolverine movies, or just Origins?

BPG: I didn’t see either of them. I was going to see The Wolverine, but I kept hearing everyone say it’s silly and underwhelming.

WB: Yeah, it’s superdumb. Like, it had the parts to be a cool film: Japan, ninjas, traumatic past haunting our hero, a conspiracy involving Silver Samurai. But then it was like the producers and everyone decided it would be better to just do everything in the most boring way possible.

I think I hate it more than Origins simply because you can see the working parts that would have made it a decent movie, whereas Origins was just a fucking mess from page one of the script to the final studio executive mandated edit.

Oh, and I really don’t like that Silver Samurai was not an actual samurai.

Oh wait, I was wrong. There was some samurai dude in there, but it was not a good take on him.

BPG: I saw the ending to The Wolverine, and I don’t like that it was about him wanting to die so he could be with Jean--that whole romance is bad writing to me--and I don’t get how Silver Samurai got Wolverine’s healing enough to get young (which isn’t what healing does because age isn’t an injury or illness) but not enough to save him when he blew up.

WB: Yeah, the whole thing is just nonsense. And to move on, I agree that we never really got the tough guy take on Wolverine in the films that he was in the comics. Jackman’s Wolverine was always a more damaged and sensitive take. Not that I didn’t think it was necessarily a bad choice, but I always wish he had been more gruff than romantic. And the Jean romance never helped, because just like in the comics, Jean Grey really wasn’t developed much beyond a set of powers and plot points into an actual character, so the question is: what, beyond lust, is the attraction based on? The answer is nothing, because one is a character and the other is a narrative mechanism shaped like a character.

BPG: Exactly. Wolverine’s soft personality in the films was basically a nice loner who occasionally goes into a murderous rage, because vague, angry screaming means you’re tough. And then Jean had just about no agency at any point in the series; she’s always been an object, but not a subject.

WB: Yup. I think, before he really blew up in the 90′s, Wolverine really was well balanced in that he could appeal to the tough guy patriarchal image, but he didn’t subscribe to it completely because you could see his pain from having been forced into that role of badass. He understood his power but his power was not a choice, and that’s what makes him heroic: he transformed trauma into positive, world changing motivation.

It’s similar to Batman or Spider-Man in that regard: each of these three men were forced in a way to accept that their power couldn’t and shouldn’t be used for selfish reasons and should be aimed toward making the world a better place despite the pain it caused them to have it.

BPG: Exactly. They sort of did that in the films, but they never showed him being “the best at what he does.” They showed him constantly trying to run from what he does but doing it anyway. Watching someone constantly cajoled out of retirement isn’t very compelling when he also doesn’t care that much about it happening.

WB: Exactly, and then he along with others got dragged into the hyper-masculine trend of the 90′s, and that kind of hurt him for two reasons. One, he was spread too thin, a trend that only got worse with time. And two, by giving into the hyper-masculinity, it took away from the character because it became more about displays of toughness and power. I’m not going to condemn the entire decade, but those were two prevalent trends that I think did more harm than good for the character.

And that’s what the movies were looking to when they were looking for more on Wolverine. So I think they overcompensated to help appeal to a wider audience.

BPG: Which was already pretty wide; they needed more people to like superheroes and build on the success of the X-Men franchise and films, not more men to like another man being manly.

WB: Truth. Considering the inherent diversity of the X-Men, the initial films could have done a lot more to cast a wider audience simply by embracing the international-cosmopolitan nature of the team, rather than relying upon the popularity of Wolverine to anchor the introduction to the team.

BPG: And let’s face it, he was basically the main character. He’s the whitest guy there, on a team with multiple women, one of whom was black, a team with multiple disabilities (since Cyclops’ visor can be read as the kinds of glasses you need when you’re legally blind but not totally blind), and... I guess Rogue can be read as a person with a compromised immune system, or a carrier of a highly infectious disease. The only person who rivals Wolverine in whiteness is Iceman, and those two duked it out for Top White Guy the whole second movie.

WB: Yeah, Wolverine’s trauma was romanticized for the films, rather than allowing it to be what helped connect him to the rest of the X-Men via their metaphors for power can come from anywhere. The X-Men films were interpreted through the lens of a harlequin novel when they should have been films about the power of a political minority working towards peace in a violent world.

BPG: Because, you know, that’s what they’re about. Do what works, you know? But with that being said, the films did OK most of the time and were successful; in order to keep moving forward, they only had to keep expanding the way they were trying to go, by injecting more of the identity politics that make the comics successful. And with the Wolverine movies, they did the opposite because they thought it was better to have him cut more things than be a good character.

WB: Yeah, Wolverine is an obvious action-movie character, so you shouldn’t try to design a movie that shows off his fights. Those are automatically going to be dope, so you just have to make the story good. But both his solo outings before this failed so hard because they were more interested in continuity and fights than character. Admittedly his powers and gimmick are cool, but that’s not why people love him. They love him because he’s the tough loner who is the best there is at what he does even though it takes a toll on him.

BPG: His whole character can read as a great metaphor for the problems of hypermasculinity. With just his healing and adamantium skeleton alone, he’d be awesome. His claws are entirely unnecessary and, let’s face it, shitty weapons; however, these six phallic symbols coming out of his hands (can you say homoerotic imagery?) are his main attraction to people despite this. He’s forced into a life of violence and constant use of his claws when he’d rather not be involved in it, but one day he realized he would never be able to turn it back off, so he instead turned it to something good.

WB: Yeah, his claws are pretty shitty weapons; a regular knife is a way more versatile blade. And I’ve never thought directly about the phallic imagery of his claws, but yeah, that’s definitely true and can be read as to say agents of violence as a form of prostitution. And I’m not going to lie, the idea that those are dicks coming out of his hands is straight up funny.

BPG: It’s hilarious; he’s always killing people by giving six handjobs at once. Also, it adds another level of insult to when he gave Cyclops the middle claw.

WB: Hahahaha yeah.

After:

WB: Saw it. Loved it.

BPG: Yes. It was amazing.

WB: I agree, but I do have ​a problem with something people have​ been saying about it. I don’t think it’s the best superhero film, because I don’t think it’s a superhero film.

BPG: Not at all. He’s retired, for one. Just because he has powers and comes from a comic does not make him a superhero. It’s like the Chris Nolan Batman movies: they were great Nolan films, but I’m still waiting on a Batman movie.

WB: I don’t know if I would agree on that for the Nolan films, but this was definitely a Western in the same sense that Firefly was. It’s about the myth of the cowboy in a sci-fi setting that stars former superheroes. And if it wasn’t clear that it was a riff on Westerns, they play a Western film that influenced it in the movie itself.

And they chose a fantastic quote from that film.

BPG: And in the Deadpool trailer before the movie, there were a bunch of Firefly posters. But yeah, this was a cowboy movie. Wolverine wasn’t trying to stop the bad guys or fight for truth and justice or even show basic compassion to his enemies; he just killed people before they killed him and drove for a few days.

WB: Yeah. This was a violent film and the first Wolverine film to really show off the violence that should be associated with the character, and this was definitely more of the asshole tough guy I’ve always wanted to see, even if we’re now seeing him in his old age.

BPG: Exactly. This was a great Wolverine movie, and it did everything right in that sense. The violence was truly violent instead of fight scenes choreographed like a dance. That aspect reminded me of the way Punisher fought in Daredevil S2. But in no way was this a superhero movie. It was a comic book movie, but not a superhero movie

WB: Yeah, and while I’m sure a lot of people know in their heads what the difference between a comic book film and a superhero film is, I wanted to take a brief second to talk about how I define them to show how this film is not a superhero film. A superhero film stars a character who through tragedy or conscience chooses to use their power, super or otherwise, to fight off evil in both the material and metaphorical realm by creating a figure to fight against a specific threat but with the understanding of a continuous battle against generally nefarious forces. And it’s important to state that the superhero is fighting on a metaphorical plane, because they are fighting against the very idea of crime or terrorism itself by showing the strong arm of goodness through their icons.

And Logan doesn’t fit any of that. And it’s better for it, because I think it would have hampered the themes of the film.

BPG: Very much so. This is a time when Logan, Caliban, and Charles are basically the last surviving mutants, and the battle is for the brief survival of a few mutant kids. It’s about winning hope from the jaws of impending genocide. Which is great, but it’s not a superhero story.

WB: Exactly. I think Jackman and Stewart delivered some wonderful performances. I liked Caliban, but he was probably the weakest link after the evil Doctor guy because he was just kind of generally evil and not terribly impressive.

BPG: Very true. They both could have been better. But I want to go back for a second, because I genuinely think the mass public doesn’t understand the difference between superhero and comic book movies. They’re synonyms to most people. I mean, superheroes are heroic because they have enough power to be heroic. Like…police more and more are using tactics that involve using multiple officers on one person as both a deterrent and because, if they do engage, they can overpower the person without drawing a weapon or really hurting them. They can do that with multiple people because a group has more physical power than an individual. That’s the power superheroes have, the strength to subdue and end threats without resorting to killing the person. On our level, as humans, we basically have those two choices: spend a long time hoping to end a fight before anyone gets more seriously hurt than needed or kill the other person fast. Superman doesn’t have to make that choice. But Wolverine was always different than those other heroes because his powers mostly enhance the normal human capacity to kill without giving him enough strength to show mercy. And I’m fine with that because Wolverine, Punisher, and others like them are cool. But it also means they can’t be superheroes, nor would they want to be. And now that people have seen Logan succeed as an R-rated “superhero movie,” DC is going to do a bunch of R-rated movies. Superman, Wonder Woman, Flash--these are not R-rated characters, and they never should be. But the confusion about what constitutes a superhero has confused the comic book industry for years, and that trend will now head into the films.

WB: Oh yeah, WB and DC have already said they’re going to do something R-rated based on this and Deadpool’s success, which sucks because you’re right: they don’t have R rated characters.

X-23 as played by Dafne Keene was a really great debut for a young actress and just a great performance and character arc.

BPG: There are those out there to choose from. I’m sure people would like a solo Will Smith Deadshot movie now. A Harley-Ivy movie would be awesome. Deathstroke is always cool. But those all come from the supervillain side. They don’t have good R-rated heroes, except maybe a Savage Hawkman movie.

Oh, hell yes. I loved their X-23. She was amazing and Keene killed it. She really acted as a great foil to Logan.

WB: Yeah, the film absolutely slayed it when bringing that character to life on the big screen, and I really, really hope that Fox is smart and gives her a solo vehicle. Quick question: do you think it’s just her claws that are adamantium or all of her skeleton? In the comics, it’s all, but the harpoon they shot through her made me question that assumption.

BPG: I thought it looked like all, but I was wondering about that. If they did all of her skeleton, she wouldn’t be able to grow past three feet tall.

WB: Yeah. I’m going to guess they’ll ignore that because Dafne will grow. I don’t mind, but yeah, seeing a little girl get shot with a harpoon was hardcore violent.

BPG: Yeah, that was intense. They were not holding back. And did you see how many people were stabbed in the freaking face? Stabbing faces is really brutal and personal; people usually cut off the whole head or just slash at the cheeks.

WB: Yeah, it was such brutal violence, and I loved it.

BPG: It’s hard to find good, quality violence in movies these days. They used it here to great effect and with a purpose, which is much better than the hypermasculine displays of status seen in most brutally violent movies.

WB: Yeah, and this film’s violence works for the same reason season one Daredevil’s did: they show the protagonist getting hurt first, which allows the audience to sympathize more and have a greater reaction to the retributional violence. It’s the Jackie Chan principle.

BPG: True, true. Wolverine may be able to heal, but that doesn’t negate all of the danger or the pain. They pretty much forgot this in the first few X-Men movies, but they made sure to highlight that here; even if Logan wasn’t healing the way he used to, he still could, and we got to see Laura having the same level of violence used against her with a full healing factor. They still get hurt, being able to heal doesn’t negate all danger in a fight, and we see them actively work to a life where they don’t have to be violent anymore if they don’t want to be.

WB: Yeah, they’re each trying build a life where they can escape the pain. And yeah, the first few films didn’t really show you that just because Wolverine can get hurt, doesn’t mean it doesn’t cause him pain. They mention it, but there’s no real emphasis.

What did you think of X-24? I genuinely wasn’t expecting that.

BPG: Me, neither, but it’s a really good idea. The whole goal of weaponizing mutants is already a gut punch for any mutant, but especially Logan, and seeing him with X-23 was basically seeing him at a time when he could still be redeemed. X-24 is a much more in-your-face way of showing Logan exactly what he had become and what his whole life amounted to. X-24 was an amazing idea and he was very well executed.

WB: I 100% agree. At first, I was expecting something​ like that terrible version of Deadpool they did in the first Wolverine film, and in this context, that wouldn’t have been a bad idea on the bad guy’s part. But having it be a direct clone of Wolverine, the version who was without the influence of the X-Men, was a such a simple and brilliant twist to reinforce the themes of the film.

BPG: It was a truly smart choice. Arguably, it lacks subtlety, and this film actually had a surprising amount of that for a gritty story about a man killing a bunch of mercenaries before his death, but I guess the decided X-24 didn’t have to be subtle.

WB: For this, it was measured, rather than subtle, and I’m ok with that. I do have a problem with The Reavers: they’re shown having cyborg enhancements, but not being any more dangerous than the SWAT teams they work with. It’s a nice visual, but an underwhelming aspect of the film that could have served the film better for action and crafting a believably credible threat out of the villains.

BPG: Yeah, they weren’t particularly enhanced for someone who goes out of his way to say, “I’m enhanced.” Also, they were only called Reavers like once in passing. In the end, I think them having cyborg parts was more about showing how dangerous their targets were than showing that they were stronger than normal; the kids were regularly amputating them at Transigent, as near as I can tell.

WB: Yeah, but still. The point stands that they missed an opportunity with the Reavers.

BPG: For sure. And they missed a point in terms of talking about the lack of mutants. It’s mentioned, and their demise permeates the film, but it’s never really talked about until they’re in the woods at the end and the unusually cool-named but forgettable evil scientist says he got rid of mutants just because.

WB: It’s true, but that missing point doesn’t bother me as much, because I think focusing more on that would have shaped the focus of the film itself differently. I just wish that once they revealed the reason that it would have been something better.

BPG: That’s part of what I’m saying: not only should it have been better, but the lack of mutants in that world is sort of unnecessary to a story about Wolverine’s death. And let’s face it, it kind of was useless to this story. They kept talking about it, but the fact that Charles was talking to Laura and the existence of the Weapon X program or whatever that was are enough. Mutants could have been flourishing in that world and it would have largely been the same movie.

WB: No, the fact that there were no more mutants and Charles meeting Laura was important. I agree that they probably should have done something more, but I don’t know what. I would have really been OK with like the Shi’ar coming down and saying no more mutants or something. That would have been a bombshell and ridiculous to this film, but it is definitely better than what was given.

BPG: At the very least, they needed to show more of a connection between the downfall of mutantkind and the downfall of Charles and Logan. What work were they doing before this point in their lives? What was their reaction at the time it first became clear mutants were dwindling? What, if anything, did they do about it? We don’t know, nor do we have any word before this film talks about it at a point convenient for the plot that the government or whoever had any plans to go from using mutants as cannon fodder to weapons. Which seems like a really big thing to set up since that’s Logan’s whole life and the repetition of this pattern is integral to the themes of the film.

WB: They were originally going to show the Westchester incident, but the director said that changed the focus too much, and that the mystery of their misery before we see them was something better left unsaid. I’ll agree with that point, but yeah, I still can’t excuse the lame explanation for why there are no more mutants.

BPG: The vagueness of their misery was used very well, I agree, but part of me also feels like it’s kind of a cop-out, so they don’t have to answer any questions about their past.

WB: I know what you mean, so my answer is pick an emotion dammit. Just kidding, but seriously: can we please have the Shi’ar coming to the big screen?

BPG: I would love to see the X-Men in the movies do something besides fight Magneto in a different manner than the last time they fought Magneto.

WB: Yeah, they really do have some cool villains who have been put aside for Magneto or lamer choices--I’m looking at you Apocalypse, you overpowered Ivan Ooze looking eugenics nonsense.

BPG: Yeah, they really do have some cool villains who have been put aside. Ivan Ooze would have been a better villain for the X-Men, honestly. Why can’t we see Mojo, or whatever that fat, gladiator-reality-TV guy was named?

WB: Yeah, it’s Mojo. He’d be hell of a lot of fun now that superheroes are so big at the box office, because his character is all about making fun of the studio executives in media.

You’d be able to critique and make fun of a lot in TV and Hollywood.

BPG: He would be pretty fun, and the best part is that he’s pretty insane, so there’s no way around throwing him in as-is without trying to have him make sense.

WB: He makes sense. He’d be like Q on star Trek TNG, but less powerful

BPG: But Q made more sense in Star Trek because they constantly used god-like power in the series before that; in the X-Films, there hasn’t been any sign of aliens, so Mojo would be a huge break from the norm

WB: Yeah, and that is what Logan is: a huge break from the norm. I say they should embrace it.

Alright, back to Logan for a moment. Do we think Eden was real or was something else going on when Rictor was talking on the radio?

BPG: Eden was in North Dakota; the people in Canada weren’t Eden. Eden was fictional, so they made it real and used it as a base to get into Canada. Wasn’t that clear?

WB: Yeah, but since there wasn’t supposed to be anything there because it was middle of nowhere North Dakota and they just happen to find someone on the other end, that doesn’t strike you as strange?

BPG: It strikes me as a well-made plan by the nurses working on an international pathway to Canada, where mutants are safe. Remember when they were making that whole plan to save all the children?

WB: I guess, but with the coordinates being pulled from fiction within the fiction, we have to entertain the idea that something strange was happening or that you’re right and it was a much better plan than the audience was initially led to believe.

BPG: I think the latter is almost completely stated by the film, and quite frankly it makes way more sense than a vague mystery thrown in at the end with no resolution. The whole film was about Logan remembering that he can make a better world, even if it doesn’t look like one exists anymore. The idea that they just made their better world--picked coordinates from a sort of legend to give them hope and then worked out the rest of the details around it--fits perfectly with what they were doing. Randomly throwing in a new, mysterious, metafictional place at the end cold just seems weird and detracts from the work as a whole.

WB: Well, when you put it like that…yeah. I had seen some people think it was supposed to be a mystery, but it didn’t bother me too much whether it was real or not.

I’ve been asking questions; do you have something you want to discuss that I’m forgetting?

Or haven’t talked about yet?

BPG: I think this film directly attacks the hypermasculinity that has been plaguing Wolverine since the nineties. Logan spends the whole movie physically and emotionally pained by his violence and claws, he actively steers Laura away from that same path she was forced on (which was intended to make her “useful,” as happens to all shallow, fake-feminist female protagonists), and X-24 is nothing but the masculinity without the conscience. It’s pretty great. He dies a soft father figure wanting to open up emotionally to his daughter.

WB: Yeah, it’s a fantastic ending. What I really hope is that now with his death in comics and film means that we can all hop on board with X-23 as the best there is at what she does.

BPG: I hope so, too, but they didn’t really kill Logan in the comics. They should have, but they really just put in place a bait-and-switch, where they can have Old Man Logan for a while until they decide Young Man Logan should come back.

They weren’t going to get rid of a good paycheck, and so they basically didn’t.

WB: No, he’s like an adamantium statue. Last I remember he was sick before he got covered in adamantium. I mean, its comics, so they’ll find a way if they want him back. And yeah, adding in Old Man Logan was a dumb idea.

BPG: You basically made my point. They’ll just melt the adamantium off of him and he’ll heal the burns. Then Old Man Logan will finally die like he was supposed to, or go back to the future.

WB: I know, but he’s about as dead as you can be.

And X-23 in her Wolverine comic is getting great reviews so far. I’m genuinely interested in reading it.

BPG: I’d like to see where that goes, too. I hope she does end up with a good career, like Kate Bishop. In fact, I’d like to see them have a buddy cop comic. Or a buddy cop movie, if Fox ever cooperates with Marvel and they ever introduce Clint’s top SHIELD trainee, Kate Bishop.

But that being said, the keeping on of Old Man Logan is a dead giveaway that they aren’t really parting with the first Wolverine. Fortunately, they seem to be doing that for real in the movies, so let’s see where that goes; maybe Fox will let him be in Avengers, but that’s the only other option.

WB: Bringing​ him over to the Avengers is a…bad idea now. Maybe a year or two ago, I would have been down for it in some way, but now after Logan, I would feel cheated. I’m not saying don’t have X-Men crossover, but leave him dead. Also, the Avengers don’t need him: they have​ Bucky.

BPG: I agree, but it’s what Jackman would agree to.

WB: I know. And admittedly, it would be fun to see him having fun playing Avengers, but he just did this one and it’s like...Nah man. That’d be overkill.

So yeah, Logan was great. People should definitely see it.

BPG: For sure. I loved it.

WB: Where does it fit in the pantheon comic book-based films for you?

BPG: It’s up there. It didn’t hit me the way others did, but I liked it like a less witty Tarantino film.

WB: Comparing it to Tarantino’s a high compliment still. It’s in my top ten, but not my top five. Well, maybe a couple more days of thinking it might get that high, but this is definitely now my number one X-Men film.

BPG: Yeah, it’s better than the rest of those; First Class and DoFP could have gotten up there, but they didn’t hit the themes as hard as Logan did.

WB: No, they didn’t. Those are the top three easy.

BPG: Yeah. And Logan is the top.