#if you know THAT bit in knight where babs ‘dies’

[nosecondivelived]

caved in and searched up spoilers for a video game while playing it. very ashamed but would do it again. spoilers for arkham knight in the tags

[theredhoodedcryptid]

Alrighty, here's more notes from my Jason Gotham Knights playthrough. I'm not finished yet, but what I've found so far is interesting. Also here's the link to my other post about the Labyrinth which I'll be referencing.

Starting off with basic observations:

When Jason first encounters an Owl's nest he states "Hello? I'm selling owl scout cookies."

Jason can somewhat play the piano. We only encounter playable pianos in Gotham Knights whenever you're infiltrating either an Owl base or the Monarch Theater, regardless both are one time story plots, making the the ability to play them very limited. While I haven't tried this with Babs and Dick yet, Tim can't (or won't) play. He just takes his hand and swipes it down the keys, whereas Jason plays a small part of a song. I don't know which one though.

The cutscene where Jason and Tim are bonding and working on Jason's weapons. This one is pretty familiar, Jason's weapons are leaning a little to far on the dangerous side of non-lethal. When Tim brings this up Jason dismiss it, stating most of their enemies wear heavy armor so it's fine. To make his point, Tim gets in front of Jason when he goes to shoot at a practice dummy, stating that if he really believes they're safe then to shoot him. Now the major thing people will notice with this scene is that Jason hesitates for a moment (I think he's remembering something, perhaps Titan's Tower if that happened in this universe?) before pointing his weapon away. Another interesting thing I noticed in this scene is that after he points his weapon away, Jason goes as far as removing the clip and also removing the rubber bullets. It's possible he's just doing this so they can work on it, but I think Jason is going to these lengths to show to Tim he won't hurt him (again). It's clear from an earlier cutscene where Jason had a knife and he absentminded pointed it at Tim to make a point about the conversation , but Tim flinched back and Dick subtly intervened. Something along Titan's Tower happened here, but to what extent I have no clue.

So far during my League of Assassins stuff they've not ambushed Jason. If you've played or watched the game then you might remember The Court and the League sometimes set up little traps to attack you while you're patrolling. Sometimes it's a hostage, but mainly it's a few dead bodies of the local gangs and a trapped chest with a bomb. In my other play throughs I've encountered a lot of this from both sides, but Jason's a little different. The traps are still there from the League, but nothing happens. I open a chest and it doesn't go off, it's a normal chest. And it's clearly the LOA because you can see black smoke hanging around the scene, which indicates their presence. With Jason they just back off and only interact during the main storyline. Is this perhaps because he was in the League of Assassins after his little bath in the green jello? Or maybe I'm not far enough in the plot for the League to really start attacking me, or maybe I'm experiencing glitches. Whose to say, but I found it very interesting.

I was kinda disappointed with Harley's and Jason's interactions. I mean, Jason was pretty chill and civil around her which is totally fine, but I was hoping for a bit more backstory nods. We have a lot to assume about the Gotham Knights universe, so any little bit helps. But nothing really was mentioned between those two. Even stuff with Talia hasn't been very fruitful so far. If cutscenes don't show me anything I'll have to do a deep dive in the audio files, codex, wiki, and any written materiel about GK. I need to know these people's back stories!

(A small side note of how I had this whole theory written out on how Tim might have been apart of the family before Jason died based on a cutscene, but then I remembered that Bruce's audio files explicitly state otherwise. Also that'd make my Titan's Tower theory have to many holes.)

Now for my favorite part, The Labyrinth!

(This is where my previous post mentioned before comes into play)

Now, during my last few playthorughs I've been trying to map out the reason behind how certain hallucinations happen, whether it's truly random or if it depends on which direction you take in the labyrinth. I haven't cracked it yet, but I hope that after playing as Dick and Babs I'll figure it out. Right now this is just my observations.

Everything in general has stayed the same, except for the order of what happens. Here's how this time went: Turned right at the Spike room, turned left at the phonograph room, weird floating vision, (accidentally walked into some spikes and got sent to the beginning but it lead to the next room without backtracking), turned right at Bruce's Grave, turned left at the Table Room, Vision of Jason in an Owl mask, Turned right at the Pit Room, vision of Bruce and the ending sequence. I got a couple of things different then my last analysis for Jason, but I'm leaning more on the different paths direction then the randomized. We'll see though.

As for the things Fake!Bruce says, it's pretty much the same thing as he said to Tim, only in a slightly different order. The only thing that was different was in the Pit Room, where he says "You were the worst Robin, no better then a killer. Now you're just nothing."

Anywho, I'm not done with Jaybirds playthrough yet, so I'll add to this post if I find anything else.

[crimson-flash]

TOA Anniversary Munday Post

haha i haven't even been here for a month

Celebrating TOA and the people who contribute to make our group what it is.

Repost, don't reblog. Only fill in what you feel comfortable sharing!

Happy anniversary, TOA! Here's to many more years spent together.

Name: Penny

Pronouns: She/them

Birthday (no year): 8/19

Where are you from? What is your time zone?: I'm from the United States of 'Merica, Georgia in particulary.

How long is your roleplay experience? Uh, outside of Roblox, and a little bit of Amino, I basically have none, so a month!

How were you introduced to roleplaying as a whole? I was introduced to roleplaying when I entered a Big Brother RP amino thingy when I was 12, and I won the whole thing while mascaraing as like double my age. It was crazy back then.

How were you introduced to TOA?: I was looking at Joshua art, and then I stumbled across an old Joshua muse which lead me to TOA. I know it sounds a bit crazy.

Do you have any pets?: I have a dog named Mellow! I will protect him with my life. He is my pride and joy.

What is your favorite time of year and why? (Season, holiday, general period): Favorite season is Fall, favorite holiday is Christmas, and my favorite general period of time is whenever I don't have school.

What is your IRL occupation? I don't have a job at the moment, I am just a simple high school senior.

Some interests and things you like/enjoy? I enjoy coding little games, I like romhacking and just seeing my edits change the game, it's kinda like magic, lol. I enjoy going for walks, and racing other people, I also enjoy sleeping, who doesn't.

What non-Fire Emblem games do you play? Pokemon, Stardew Valley, Wildermyth, Ace Attorney, Smash Bros, Mario Kart, Kirby

Favorite Pokemon type & Pokemon: Water, Vaporeon (NOT IN THAT WAY)

Tell us some funfacts and trivia about yourself! Oh, a fun fact? uhhhhh

How did you get into Fire Emblem? I wanted to know where Marth from Smash Bros came from, so I decided I was going to play Awakening, and now I'm obsessed.

What Fire Emblem games have you played? I have played FE7, FE8, FE11, FE12, FE13, FE17

First & Favorite Fire Emblem games: FE13 was my first, and FE8 is my favorite!

List your 5 favorite Fire Emblem characters across the series! Nooo, I can't choose between my bab- Marisa, Henry, Clanne, Joshua, The 7th Platoon is it's own character right?

Who was the first character ever to make you go “ooh I like this one in particular” and why? Can be any context and reason! It was Clanne when I was playing Engage and got really good growths and he MVP'd like the whole entire game.

Any Fire Emblem crushes? 😳 A certain green-haired woman from a game I haven't even played yet.

If you’ve played (or are familiar with) the following games, who was your first S support? Who would you S support nowadays? - Awakening: My first S support was Anna, and I would probably S support my baby Henry now. - Fates: N/A - Three Houses: N/A - Engage: My first S support was Ivy, but now it's probably Panette.

Favorite Fire Emblem class? Armor Knight

If you were a Fire Emblem character, what would be your class and stats? Would you be playable? I would be a reclassable very flexiable unit, but I would always been just below-average in everything, so just like very disappointing. One speed from doubling, and one attack from killing, but I force that luck will always be in my favor.

If you were a Three Houses character, what would be your affiliation? Yellow Team! Uhm, I mean Golden Deer

If you were an Officers Academy student, what would be your boons, banes and potential budding talent? Boons: Reason, Faith. Banes: Axes, Flying (fear of heights), Heavy Armor, Budding Talent: Bows

If you were an Engage character, which nation would you originate from? Solm! I really love Solm and it's characters, it's like Jehanna if it was cool, and didn't have a queen who died in a pretty stupid way and didn't fight back EVEN THoUGH SHE'S A TRAINED SWOR-

How do you pronounce TOA? 🤔(separate letters, to-ah, other?): T-O-A, I will not accept any other pronouncations. 

[zorilleerrant]

I really feel like Knight Terrors: Robin didn't work because like. why put Jason and Tim together? I mean there are thematic elements you could use to tie their stories together, but they... didn't. so it's two separate stories that don't seem to have a lot to do with each other? which is a shame because time looping Jason's death is something he's been through before so it's ripe for a nightmare story. and then instead of knowing right away, they could be talking to each other through each loop and slowly come to a joint conclusion. or like. you could play on the whole "my best friend died I couldn't save him" thing they both have going on, which didn't even come up. and the enemy designs could be based on Roy and Kon (or Steph).

but I really think it would've made more sense to stick Jason with Steph and Cass, and they could all three have joint nightmares about their villain dads, and even have to fight them together. Steph and Cass would realize there was a lot they weren't saying to each other, and they and Jason would realize they have a lot more in common than they realized. you put Damian in with them if you want evil!Talia or evil!Ra's, or you could have Damian in with Babs and he could fight Heretic and she could fight JJ and they could not really know what to do with each other because they don't hang out much and aren't good at talking out trauma. easy to make the parents much larger than the heroes for both childhood physics and emotional magnitude reasons. the sibling thing you'd probably have to go with mirror, mirror style eerie similarity what with the clone bit, but Babs seeing herself in her brother wouldn't go amiss.

meanwhile Tim should be in with Dick as they watch their parents die together and Duke watches his parents get infected, and then you can keep the nightmare versions of the villains. or you have Tim with Dick and Damian as they relive Batman's disappearance and have no idea whether it's real even though they're in a dream world, but now with different interpersonal dynamics. and the nightmare is shaped like an obvious fake Batman (probably Jason's version but more exaggerated). or you have Tim and Babs with the identity change thing, and Tim's not sure whether he can even have a standalone identity and doesn't know what to do with his life, while Babs is reliving being forced into the role of Oracle because she wanted to help and her choices were cut off (not that I necessarily trust the writers to handle that gracefully). and they could talk each other through feelings of guilt and inadequacy. and the villains are an idealized version of their first appearances. or even have Tim and Kate dealing with homophobia together.

I mean, you could group them by who's died and use their death trauma, but that would still leave Jason and Steph and Cass and Damian fighting through the horrors of hell and unable to tell if they're really dead again or whatever. and meanwhile Dick and Tim are stuck where they know they aren't dead but everyone else thinks they're dead, and then you could use the isolation from each other to underscore that. and then I think Babs and Duke would have some kind of survivor's guilt storyline or like the looming terror of the inevitable or something but that's probably too abstract for the current crop of writers to handle.

this whole thing feels like it needs to be driven by an emotional arc and coming to terms with that kind of thing but all the writers are bored by the emotional implications and want to get to the plot. except the plot is very boring and relying so much on being mysterious about it just makes the stakes seem irrelevant. so far Poison Ivy is literally the only one that gave me what I wanted out of a nightmare villain arc putting them in bad dreams. a) dreams thematically relevant to the story being told, b) actually used a fear Pam would have and that hasn't been explored a lot, c) presented the fear in a way that's genuinely unsettling, and d) self-contained story that followed the emotional arc of the character.

[zeroducks-2]

Knight is less overt with the misogyny but yeah it's still there, women still don't fucking exist lmao. As female characters we have Barbara, Harley, Ivy and Selina, they amount to a whopping four same as in City where we have Ivy, Harley, Talia and Selina.

Honestly in Knight it's even more jarring that there are no women around. In City one can stretch the excuse of an only men prison, in Knight it's all free range looters, random goons and Militia. But I agree the dialogues are a little bit better, and they managed to write Barbara somewhat decently. Despite not being the 30 something experienced woman she's supposed to be, she still stands up to Jason, to Scarecrow, is a real help to Bruce once you get her back and the part where you fight the tanks with her was honestly heartwarming. Also her relationship with Tim is stupid but you know what, I'll take it if it means I won't have to deal with Dickbabs lolol.

And while in City Bruce is a stoic motherfucker stick up his ass Noli Me Tangere, in Knight I can see that he really loves Babs dearly, what affection he shows isn't only directed at the boys. Also I like what they did with Ivy. Sure she dies to motivate the male protagonist but it's still better than whatever the fuck they did in the other two games where she looks and acts only as a random slutty plant girl, like boys you really did this one using your dicks didn't you.

So yeah, better even if far from perfect.

God. Right. Heres ur reminder that arkham city is hella trashy about women. "The key was in her boobs" im gonna kill you. Tim really stuck his whole hand in a womans cleavage. 2010s dudebro ass game.

[batarangsoundsdumb]

hae interrogationes multae respondeant quia demens .

if you read this entire ask post you deserve a gold star and financial recompensation

Um, Obviously because when you’re adopted by a white guy you automatically become white duhhh

this is about this post lmao and yeah youre absolutely right, you have to hand your poc card in when you get adopted by a white guy.

Do you think Cass would listen to Yanni, the YouTube channel epic symphonic rock, or some other stuff? There's some cool mashups but idk if that's up your alley, I kinda feel like I'm pushing it with my weird taste of music by recommending an orchestra cover of metal, but i just love that sort of thing and mashups :P @harvestyourcherries 

i haven’t heard of that? but in my personal (correct) opinion steph listens to classical music, and then both modern and older, and then also stuff like black sabbath, iron maiden, but also hardrock and hardcore. i like the idea of cass just liking the most extreme screaming songs full of noise and then also listen to pachelbel’s 370th sonata yanno? THANK YOU for the rec tho

speaking of ur cass playlist hc...reminds of the time (yesterday) i found 2 playlists randomly on spotify from the same user. one was abt 3 hours of instrumental/classical "dark" & "nostalgic" music. the other almost 11 hours of nothing but hardcore bass/synth/electronic music. just an incredible tightrope act to put on in public. the synth one was also called like "psalms for synth sluts" which is Also incredible

tbh i LOVE synth SO MUCH like for no reason at all but then also cannot handle a poppy electronic beat lmao. but this seems like the kinda thing i’d do but just in one (1) playlist bc i just sort songs by vibe instead of genre? that’s how i end up with britney spears and billy ray cyrus in the same playlist. 

Oh, I want Kate Kane playlist next! It would be amazing if you could do one when you have time and will 🙏

how rude would it be of me to just say no? like sorry kate but idk you and also you seem way too keen on the us military for an institution that homophobically targeted you? (and also commits war crimes) but let’s unpack the fact that the institution that caused the death of your mom and sister and also got you blacklisted for being gay is still one you align with???

'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' --- when i tell you i fucking screamed LOL!!!!!!! i can imagine the cameraman not knowing if he should cut to commercial or keep it on these two weirdos fighting on stage (bruce definitely ruffled dick's hair/noogied him right?? 

about this post but yeah lmao. this cameraman just turns to like the audience to get a reaction and it’s just multiple moments of CLEAR shock.

you are the only funny person on this hellsite

how egotistical is it for me to say that i get this ask multiple times a month? bc it literally happens so often it’s hilarious to me.

Wish there was more john/Bruce content 😔😔😔 was so hungry I actually looked at canon media 😔😔😔 (Justice League Dark babeeeyyyyyy)

check out batman: damned for some mediocre content but at least it’s john/bruce (also very interesting story and stuff, just got very >:( over this weird part where harley quinn tried to r*pe bruce or something? it’s not for everyone)

dick grayson but he's nicki minaj

his anaconda don’t want none,,, unless...... 

Dick Grayson was never a cop, he played Marshall on Paw Patrol

you are SO right. also paw patrol is a fucking good show idc. that shit could’ve been the new steven universe on this hellsite.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CS1lI0bLI7-/?utm_medium=copy_link

...

why do people keep reposting my CONTENT. if you are not funny yourself don’t just grab shit off of tumblr and post it on insta,,, get a life. sidenote: should i start an insta and get all these ppl to take my content down that would be funny as hell.

Might I suggest for a Gotham City Meme: something about the true crime fandom thirsting for the rogues gallery

ok can i just say something slightly controversial?? no? i don’t find true crime ppl who are into criminals funny, that shits disturbing irl im not gonna bring that into my very chill universe.

i may have never seen a 'jason cleaning guns in sink' fic but i do know he WOULD

THANK YOU

bestie im sorry to say this to you but while you can, and people do wash their guns in the sink, that is a lot of lead in a very vital part of the kitchen.

people tend to do it in the bathtub.

WHY???? like damn why do you even have guns

i dont think i read many gun sink fics exactly but i have read lots of fics where jason cleanes his guns in the living room. usualy dissembles them and cleans them with a rag i think

lmao fair enough, like i think that’s a large part of what i remember as well.

if you say you've seen/read gun sink fics I believe you. I think those of us who didn't see them are lucky or maybe didn't search for fics by tags or something idk

i mean ive never sought them out but i HAVE seen them,, like definitely i know almost for certain.

saw your tags and I'm interested in Steph/Kara now. They would be the most chaotic couple <3

literally thoooo, i have a wip where they get together in a zombie apocalypse and like UGGGHhhh i am so in love with them.

I am the Breece anon. Thanks for the recommendation; am reading now. I’ve always been a hardcore Superman fan because I love my pure himbo farm boy. My logic is, if one Bruce is a Broose, then multiple Broose are a herd of Breece. And this is a hill upon which I will perish.

fair enough,,,, like moose, meese, goose, geese, bruce, breece. i get your logic and i stand by it as well. (glad you enjoyed the comic recs!!!!)

It's a beautiful day in Gotham, and you are a group of horrible Breece

OH my god dude lmao

there only being 42 fics on ao3 for tim and bernard is honestly so sad i need more

it’s like twice that now!!! we did it lads. (tho very sad that my fic isnt number one but like number 4 :((((  )

i'm too late you already did the poll lol but may i suggest bethy (bernard + timothy)

shit dude that wouldve been so fucking funnyyyyy. think ppl have just stuck to timber tho, tim/bernard kinda died down recently and i think it’s too bad, they’re a great couple and i love them.

Wait, hear me out

Bernothy @redlightofdawn

great recommendation (lmao this ask is from like a month ago) but very sorry to announce that NARDTH is the superior shipname

Wait, we know that bernard likes milfs (Tim's step-mom) but what about dilfs? gilfs?

Wait no, I regret sending that ask

these were two seperate asks and they’re HILARIOUS. in my personal opinion tho,,, milfs, gilfs, dilfs are just about vibes and bernard is just attracted to sexy ppl who may sometimes be milfs, dilfs, or EVEN gilfs.

crime in bludhaven would drop to half if nightwing had a boob window. in this essay i will-

WHERE’S THE ESSAY ANON, WHERE’S THE FUCKING ESSAY

Wait if Barbra and Tim r at opposite ends at all times what happened to Barbra once everyone’s Tim’s ever love before started dying lol

she won a lottery ticket and spent 2 weeks on a resort in the bahamas before returning home and finding out that the joker was arrested for tax evasion and then spent a month staying at her big tiddie goth girlfriend’s house before conner came back to life and she broke her pinkie playing table hockey.

Why is the opposite end thing so funny and compelling to me. Tim comes back from his depression quest for Bruce and Babs is now a literal god

lmao when tim loses his spleen barbara reaches nirvana.

Are you still taking music recs because I have three songs that remind me of Jason that I think you'd like

send to me or lose a toe

🌸 ⭐ put this star into the inbox of your favorite blogs. it’s time to spread positivity! ⭐🌸😋

thanks, i wont tho on account of i wont.

https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMduBy3Sr/

⬆️

This is the whole of Blüdhaven and everyone anywhere.

Nightwings ass alone saves more people in a calendar year and does more for so society than most heroes do their whole career.Also u are one of the funniest tumblr pages out there. The vibes are unmatched and the memes and tags ✨send me✨.Thank u and goodnight @julia-flow 

fanksss also lmao.

That's going to be a little bit difficult to explain, but

There's some music that you listen to and you think, "oh my gosh, I can perfectly imagine Dick Grayson singing this song, with the same voice as the singer because that voice matches with Dick Grayson"?

oh yeah totally lmao. i have a lot of songs that i think are just entirely dick grayson yanno? kind of all of my playlists have that vibe, but i really find bleachers to fit with dick? idk.

"Lois lane/Superman" fics this, "Lois lane/Clark Kent" fics that, (/lh) let's get into the real good stuff. Some people ship Lois, Clark, and Superman as a throuple. Most popular fic tag for sure

yes totally, i think they’d be absolutely killer on ao3 and clark gets so fucking embarassed about it.

I miss your post, hope you’re doing okay!!

haha this was like 2 months ago, but i was doing fine then too! just didn’t have a lot of inspiration in terms of content.

Doot doot!

noot noot

I’m confused. What did DC do now? Like with nightwing? And another sibling? Please spoil everything for me

lmao they gave him a secret sister plotline where they had his dad cheat on his mom with tony zucco’s wife, bc dick’s life wasn’t traumatic enough yet.

sorry but it's so funny that batman is called "the dark knight" when the gotham city baseball team is called the gotham knights. it'd be like if a vigilante was running around new york called like "the scary yankee"

lmaooo no. but like yankee comes from dutch names or something so wouldnt it be HILARIOUS if gotham knights came from like german names and bruce would be running around called the dark KLAUS UND NIEK @graysonnightwing 

(not a batcest shipper) it’s so funny to me that the responses are “i’m a batcest shipper because i can differentiate fiction from reality and and it doesn’t bother me personally, but i understand why you oils think it’s weird” to “i wish all batcest shippers a very fucking die”

yeah lmaoo. i personally basically flipped my entire stance around to ‘i dont care please leave me and everybody else alone’ bc i think there’s really no point in starting a moral dillema over some fucking fandom bullshit. Please just,,, go home,,, log off, find a nice forest to have a little walk in and remember that somewhere in history, somebody probably died in the place you’re standing. and you will also die someday, and somebody will have to look at your internet usage and see you fighting multiple people anonymously while being named ‘nightwingsbuttchin200186′ like... calm down, we’re all gonna die this is not the thing to worry about.

so since like "wards" don't really exist in modern society almost all the batkids are foster kids, right? i used to work in the system and imagine: monthly visits from social workers and guardian ad litems, bruce having to get permission to take the boys anywhere out of state, calling their social worker at like 8 a.m. like "yeah dick broke his arm again... a gymnastics accident this time...." their poor social worker. bruce send her a huge bouquet and box of chocolates every month to stay on her good side

i imagine the social worker just getting into the case like ‘yeah let’s get this kid a good guardian’ and then ending up having to work with 22 y/o bruce wayne and his 50 y/o dad. and so this social worker is like ‘okay we can work with this, this is the best home i can find’ and then like it ends up landing on its feet and then the kid gets adopted and then they get a call a year later like ‘uhm so hi, this kid tried to steal my tyres can i adopt him?’ and like 3 years later. ‘okay so basically, my neighbours’ kid imprinted on me and now they’re dead, can i keep him?’ two years later it’s like ‘okay so this assassin child-’

ever since I saw that one post of yours, the meme that's something like "I know that abba's backup dancer got me" with a picture of discowing, I've been haunted. Every once in a while I'll be minding my own business then the image of abba's backup dancer dick grayson aka nightwing aka discowing will flash in my mind and I'll be frozen in place. Today at work I was in the middle of folding clothes and suddenly once again discowing entered my mind and I suddenly lost the ability to see anything except He. Thank you.

wow. the IMPACT.

Braver than any US marine man props to you🤝

this shit is about the time i wrote an article on batcest, like man,,, the fact that i didn’t get cancelled is MIRACULOUS. also like,,, uh if anybody on here did gossip on me,, send screenshots i’d love to see it.

Hello, just wanted to say your article was great. Thank you for taking the time to provide an unbaised answer. It should provide people with nuances they couldn't possibly conjure on their own.

May I ask where your username originates from?

yes you may (also thanks!!!) i thought it up when i was trying to find an original username bc i didnt want to be called like ‘timdrakes something something’ or ‘jason todd something smoething’ or ‘dick grayson something something’ yanno? so i thought batarangs, they sound so dumb and that’s my username story... now it’s my whole entire brand lmao.

yno that bit in kick ass where red mist asks kick ass if he wants a hit of his blunt, was that the inspo for stoner tim

no? it’s bc i think stoners are hilarious and drugs are great. (dont do drugs tho) 

How would u feel if someone actually wore one of those bruce or ollie pride shirts u edited

fenomenal next question.

Dick as lil huddy and Jason as James gave me radiation poisoning and now I’m screaming crying throwing up so thx for that

(Rico suave as Tim is perfect tho literally no changes needed)

i was so funny for that shit wasn’t i??? lmao i loved those weird ass fancasts

You're doing the Lord's work by providing us with all these Gotham/Metropolis citizens memes, thank you for being so relentlessly funny @nellethiel-aranel

you’re welcome!! i really enjoy making memes, but getting validation for my content and my memes is REALLY nice.

Bruce is such a slut in your memes and honestly i love that for him @rhodey-rhudert-rhodes-main 

he’s that much of a slut irl too dw.

Bruce and Alfred have an emergency pride flag for the batkids. Oliver Queen printed an emergency "I love my gay son" t-shirt and as soon as Roy told him he was dating Jason, Oliver started wearing that shirt everyday and Roy always cringes when he sees it. Oliver also has an emergency "I love my lesbian daughter" shirt just in case for Cissie.

lmao YES i had a post like this bc like all of their kids/family members are so gayy

stop bringing back batfam fancasts it is not real it is not real it is not- 😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀

oh yes it is my darling.

did discowing burn down the notredam because he hates the bees? @allulily

no he did it bc fuck the french.

im gonna beg for 1 thing and 1 thing only. please please please put physical by olivia newton john on dick's playlist

okay then beg. bc i wont. physical reminds me too much of glee and that hurts me mentally.

your playlist is sorely missing some Madonna. Specifically Into the Groove, Like a Prayer, and Vogue

i’m scared of madonna that’s why she’s not on there. she haunts me in my dreams.

suggestion: son of batman by aaron dews for dick’s playlist🤩

sorry, i listened to it and the vibe didn’t agree with me.

Hear me out, metropolis citizens sending rare pair fics of Clark Kent x Superman fics to Lois to edit

yes, absolutely hilarious. even more funny if they send like physical copies, no address attached and lois sends it back marked with red ink, SOMEHOW

Imagine all the smut Clark must of read editing the fics

clark reads smut confirmeeed

NOT LOIS READING SUPERBAT PORN AND EDITING IT A 2AM 

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

hc that alfred is a meta that boosts healing factor of the people around him. if the bats are injured as much as they seem to be they would be doing bat stuff MAYBE half the year. no one including alfred knows about this. whenever the kids move out they inexplicably dont recover from injuries as fast and feel better whenever they visit the manor they just chalk it up to homesickness. bruce just thinks he heals really fast. alfred thinks everyone doesnt take care of themselves properly @finchcollector

that’s actually such a great idea, but i think that alfred would find out and learn how to concentrate it better so he can help more people, bc he’s great and i love him.

One of your dickfast posts reminded me of that tweet that goes: 'so you've had sex how many times? Yeah technically that's not a bromance' lol that's dickwally or dickroy

literally tho. like that’s all of dick’s friendships. once it gets past a certain time dick is like ‘wow i wonder what it would be like to make out with wally, wally come make out with me’ and wally’s like ‘we’ve done this like 40 times, dick, you know what it’s like’ and dick is like ‘sorry are you complaining?’ and they just make out.

superfam and batfam associations??

-batman and superman

-dick/barabara and supergirl?

-conner and tim

-jon and damian

pls enlighten me I am confused

nope,,, uhm batman and superman, but dick and superman as well, and then conner and tim, jon and damian and steph + babs with supergirl

I came across a fic in which Wonder Woman calls Batman "Stella" (like Stellaluna, the children's book) and I can imagine the batkids hop on the trend and maybe copies of the book appear at random places (aka, everywhere Bruce frequents)

sorry can’t reciprocate that was the name of my high school chemistry teacher and it gives me nightmares to think about.

good human what are your pronouns?

wouldn’t you like to know?

I need me some gothamites preferring harley over joker memes

everyone prefers harley over joker youre just very fucked up if you dont

don't understand why people try to add like veteran policy to the batfamily

dick pulling out his veteran batfam member card so he can eat first: step aside, peasants

Do you know the song Simmer by Haley Williams? It (the first verse anyways) reminds me of Jason? It's about rage.

damn yeah i LOVE HAYLEY!!!! youre right thoo

Okay so I like listen to your stoner Tim Drake playlist 24/7 but would he listen to skegss? Also I keep adding songs mentally it’s killing me 😩✋🏼 Anyways,, I literally love and worship your playlist 😃🤞🏼 And uh yeah have a good day ✨

stoner tim drake playlist is lyfeeee. also dont know who skeggs is? i’m stupid? have a good day!!

All the Robins (and Batgirl) decide to trade costumes for one night just to fuck with Batman and all the villains in Gotham. @subspacecadet 

batman knows it’s them youknow but like,,, what does he call them? he’s like ‘red hood?’ and 3 people answer and he’s not about to compromise some identities so he’s just Pissed.

I aspire to treat cops the way my dad treats them. This man is a 45 year old Asian immigrant to the US and the treats them like his pets. He talks about them like unruly children. Sometimes he pays off local cops to shut up and stop acting racist. And usually it works. I don’t know why but I can see Oliver Queen doing this

vibes... and also yes? oliver queen handing a local cop a donut to shut the fuck up lmao. but yanno i commit enough crimes to not really want to ever see a cop ever, so they kinda scare the everloving fuck out of me.

seeing as tim hasn't aged in years, that means he was 17 at peak emo tumblr era. im back on my emo tim bullshit and im not letting it go

emo tim had a wattpad account send tweet

People seem to think that batman is so dark and serious when the rainbow batsuit is right there. He wore it with no shame.

dude the 60s were a DIFFERENT TIME

dick grew up in a circus, jason grew up on the streets, and tim was probably raised by the internet

all of them cuss every other word and you cannot tell me otherwise

bitch i KNOW but dc has to change to an 18+ rating if they want to sell comix with swear words in them so we gotta deal with imagining the swear words in ourselves

thoughts on teen titans and young justice

haven’t seen teen titans on account of havent seen it and young justice was LITERALLY my favourite thing ever, tho i do gotta admit it’s not at all similar to the young justice comics unfortunately. i really wouldve liked to see timmy bart kon cassie and cissie animated on tv!!

ew ew ew how to delete batcest shippers I genuinely digust them

log off tumblr?

Okay as poc who was called racist for calling an Italian pastabrain: in the batfam are Italians bit Damian just yells various insults about the others being Italian. Just him yelling “What are you doing you moronic spaghettihead!” At steph etc

huh? i meant real italians. homeboy is telling steph he hopes she chokes on her fucking garlic.

I think it's dumb as hell to pull the batman is the best fighter in the batfam argument because like it's just irresponsible of Bruce to let his kids fight when they couldn't possibly be on his league or something

fair enough, but also like who cares they could all kill you just sit down and take a beating.

lady shiva, thalia al ghul and Selina Kyle are all milfs @notanothertimburtonenthusiastugh 

unfortunately, i have to admit,,, you’re right

why tf didn't someone give joker a death sentence already? like he's a mass murderer...give him the electric chair treatment wtf

idk i think plenty of people would have tried to murder him already (boring answer is: he is a popular character so they can’t kill him off bc he brings in lots of money)

There’s no such thing as “ copaganda”.

all american media is propaganda. happy to clear this up for you

is it bad that I find lady shiva owa owa

no. find her as owa owa as you want.

aight I'm guessing the order of your favs in batfam:

1. tim

2. Steph

3. dick

4. Duke

5. the rest

you’re wrong but it’s cute that you tried, i generally don’t have favourites, but i have a special place in my heart for steph, tim, dick and cass. bc they were like my introduction to batfam. but damian, jason, duke, bruce, babs and alfred are NOT FORGOTTEN OR UNLOVED

oh my god i was literally just readily willing to believe that italians werent white ty for clarifying it was a joke im so dumb sdkvjskdfs

i mean some italians aren’t white? italian is a nationality as well as an ethnicity, so like ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

since I saw so many people doing headcanons about the nationalities of batboys, I see Dick as an Italian.

dont know if youre serious or not, but sure.

super random but

jason 🤝 damian

old english

lmao fair enough.

tim absolutely has 1 gay uncle and his parents shit talk said uncle all the time so after bruce adopts him he specifically reaches out to this uncle to be like "heyyyy just so you know you majorly influenced my life yes i know i havent seen you since i was 5 and at the family reunion yes i know you dont remember my name idc thank you im gay too" and then they never talk again.

yuppp lmao that’s definitely something that could happen. i can also consider tim having no family members, like none. until he does like a dna test and he realises he has like an aunt living barely 2 miles away from him who’s like some illegitimate child of his grandpa.

I dare you one of them sends clark superman/clark fic and clark corrects the shit out of it and then goes like ps his dick is not that big, just telling as someone who has seen it. internet either explodes or goes who tf did he not fuck at this point.

i think everybody would call clark a buzzkill and try to cancel him over that.

so you're telling me Tim Drake wouldn't buy Starbucks?

no. dunkin donuts all the way

One of my favorite things is imagining people finding out jason came back from the dead and being like "oh no does he have magic powers now?!?!?" and he just pulls out a gun and tries to shoot joker

now he doesn’t even have the gun :) lmao

my favorite batfamily fanfictions are the ones where they use their shitty codenames, unironically, in any context

bruce gets codename ‘ugh’ everytime. he hates it.

crazy that tim being a 17 y/o ceo and a stoner who does brand deals are all actual canon things written in detective comics comics and not made up for shits and giggles by you, tumblr user batarangsoundsdumb @rowdeyclown

SO CRAZY HUH?

batman au where everything is the same but his utility belt is bright pink

absolutely, but i raise you, his boots light up like sketchers when he kicks people.

unbeknownst to the superhero fandom writers in the dcuniverse, clark and BRUCE are one of the most prolific fanfic writers in the superhero rpf tag on ao3. clark writes the best lois x superman angst, full of unhappy endings and scenes that are a so detailed you'd think you were in the middle of a superhero beatdown. bruce made an ao3 account to fuel "the do the butts match" thing, and makes batman/bruce fics from time to time. he wrote a superbat fic as a joke but ended up making it REAL porny. @concrastinator

dude they’re WAY too busy for that. Oliver Queen and Hal Jordan on the other hand are the most prolific fanfic writers in the superhero rpf tag writing what is Mostly porn.

When the dining table topic gets to politics, Steph says "eat the rich" as the solution

bruce just silently takes away her fork and knife while she’s talking.

[galahadwilder]

Hey! I'm following you for ML stuff, but I finally figured out you were into Batman as well, took me awhile. Do you have any advice on where to start for people who want to get into it? I just want to know which Robin is which when I read fanfiction hahaha. Thank youu

So the first thing to know is that there is no single Batman comic that will explain the entire Batfamily, because there are so many of them that the Manor must be running out of bedrooms by now. The second thing is that I’m not great at figuring out a starting place—a lot of comics are sort of aggressively mediocre and I can’t exactly tell the standout ones from the bad. Anyone who has any suggestions for anon, feel free to comment with them!

(In terms of fanfic recs: read literally anything by @unpretty. They are a wizard. Their fanfic is so good it has literally won awards.)

Now, a brief introduction to every member of the Batfamily that I can currently remember—save Alfred and Batman, who I am assuming you already know.

The Robins

Dick Grayson (Robin I, Nightwing II, and Batman IV). Richard John Grayson was a former child acrobat, member of the flying Graysons, and the first child adopted by Bruce Wayne. He is a human disaster of a Hufflepuff who makes terrible life choices, leaves his Nightwing costume on the floor of his apartment where literally anyone can see it, and doesn’t know how to cook anything but cereal. Despite his terrible lack of self-sufficiency, actually gives amazing life advice and is the heart and soul of the Batclan. There are villains who are willing to kill to protect him.

Jason Todd (Robin II, The Red Hood II, Red Robin I, Batman III). Jason Todd is the ballsiest Robin, having met Batman while attempting to steal the tire from the Batmobile, and, upon being confronted by the Goddamn Batman, decided the best course of action was to attack him with a tire iron. Jason is passionate and impulsive, but also extremely studious and intelligent. Well-liked despite his abrasiveness. He is the first Robin to die in the line of duty; when he came back, he and Bruce had a falling out over not killing the Joker, and now their relationship is rather shaky. Jason uses guns and has moonlighted as a crime boss in order to better control Gotham’s criminal element from the inside, which works mostly because he has nerves of steel and the ability to spin stunningly convincing bullshit at the drop of a hat.

Carrie Kelley (Robin II.5): See “Elseworlds and Future.”

Tim Drake (Robin III, Red Robin II, Drake I, Batman Beyond II): Tim has the greatest intellect of the Batclan; however, unlike Barbara (see “Batgirls”), Tim’s wisdom score is through the bloody floor. He figured out Batman and Robin’s identities on his own, and after Jason died he walked up to Bruce and basically told him “I know who you are and I’m Robin now,” which... worked. Tim is the least physically gifted of the Robins, but he makes up for it in detective skills and tactical intelligence. He was the only Robin to still have living parents outside of the Batfamily, though they were murdered soon into his career. He dropped out of high school and was acting CEO of Wayne Enterprises for a time. He has crippling depression and is implied to be suicidal.

Stephanie Brown (Spoiler I, Robin IV, Batgirl III): see under “Batgirls.”

Damian Wayne (Robin V): Damian is the son of Bruce Wayne and Talia al Ghul, and was raised—unbeknownst to his father—by his mother and grandfather to be an assassin, as well as to be the best at literally everything (for context: despite being a young teenager, he technically holds multiple unaccredited PHDs). However, this stunted his social development, so he is rude and abrasive almost constantly, though he has been getting better and his closest friends and family can see that he’s covering for a superiority/inferiority complex a mile deep. Damian has a constant need to prove himself and has taken up his father’s adoption habit, though he prefers animals. Animals are better than people.

Duke Thomas (Robin ??, The Signal): Duke Thomas was the first metahuman Bruce allowed into the Batfamily. Originally decided to take on The Riddler by himself at the age of... seven or so? Eventually joined a collective called “We Are Robin” and fought crime, unsanctioned. After his parents were driven mad by Joker Venom, Bruce took him in. He now fights crime in the daytime, unlike the rest of the Batfamily, using his nebulously-defined extrasensory abilities to augment his Batfamily training.

The Batgirls

Barbara Gordon (Batgirl I, Oracle I): while Tim may be the most intelligent member of the Batclan, Babs is the all-around smartest. Her intellect is damned high, and unlike most of the Batfamily, Barbara is actually capable of making good decisions. She just... decides not to, most of the time. Barbara is the daughter of Commissioner James Gordon and was the first Batgirl; she lost the use of her legs when Joker shot her in the spine, but refused to take a backseat in the Batclan’s war on crime and became Oracle, hacker extraordinaire who directs the activities of every single vigilante in Gotham from her clocktower lair. She has since regained the use of her legs and reclaimed the Batgirl mantle, turning Oracle into a living AI.

Helena Wayne (Batgirl I.5, Huntress I): see “Elseworlds and Future.”

Cassandra Cain/Wayne (Batgirl II, Black Bat I, Orphan I): Cassandra is the daughter of assassins Lady Shiva and David Cain, and had what is hands-down the worst childhood of the entire Batfamily (her father would shoot her in the leg, and if she flinched, he’d shoot her again). She was raised without spoken words, and as a result the language centers of her brain are more adapted for body language than words. This gives her a kind of combat clairvoyance where it’s nearly impossible for a human combatant to surprise her. After her first murder, she swore to never again take a life, and joined the Batclan to atone. I personally believe that she is Bruce’s favorite child and the true heir to the mantle of the Bat.

Stephanie Brown (Spoiler I, Robin IV, Batgirl III): the daughter of Arthur Brown, a criminal known as Cluemaster, Stephanie became a vigilante specifically to oppose her father and then just had a bunch of mission creep. She is brash, sarcastic, and reckless, but has oodles of passion and natural talent. DC editors hate her, so she ends up screwing up or getting pushed aside a lot, but she is much more competent than she appears and is extremely good at getting people to underestimate her.

Others

Kate Kane (Batwoman I): Kate Kane is Bruce’s cousin, dishonorably discharged from the military under “dont ask don’t tell,” though this has likely been retconned thanks to DC’s sliding timescale. She is actually specifically not connected to the Batfamily, being more of an auxiliary member by her own choice—as a military woman, she dislikes their methods and considers them sloppy. She uses guns, has her own rogues’ gallery unconnected to her cousin’s, and is extremely competent.

Jean-Paul Valley (Azrael I, Batman II): Jean-Paul believed himself to be an ordinary college student, but was in fact a genetically modified super-soldier created to punish the wicked through the use of magic and advanced technology. He eventually broke his conditioning thanks to Batman and joined the family, even taking over for Batman briefly after Bane broke his back. (This proved to be a terrible decision.) He fights using powered armor and enchanted medieval weaponry.

Harper Row (Bluebird I): I know very little about Harper except that she is openly bisexual and uses hilariously oversized sci-fi guns.

Claire Clover (Gotham Girl I): a metahuman with Superman-like abilities; however, the more she uses them, the faster her lifespan burns away. Last I checked, she was working with Bane for some reason to do bad things to Batman. Don’t know why. She’s odd.

Lonnie Machin (Anarky I, Moneyspider I): may or may not be the son of The Joker. Lonnie is a genius Anarchist, but not of the “bomb-throwing” variety—in fact, he detests bombers. Briefly acted as Tim’s Oracle, since, thanks to extensive neurological self-modification, he’s one of the few people in Gotham who is actually more intelligent than Tim is.

Helena Bertinelli (Huntress II, Batgirl briefly I think?): daughter of a crime family that got wiped out by a rival crime family. However, she didn’t know her family was mafia, and as a vigilante in Gotham ended up trying to operate under Batman’s rules. Wasn’t very good at that—she’s a bit too vicious and brutal, despite her attempts to rein herself in. Uses crossbows primarily.

Elseworlds & Future

Terry McGinnis (Batman Beyond I): the definitive future Batman. Thanks to Amanda Waller and superscience shenanigans, Terry is the biological son of Bruce Wayne. He wears a highly advanced batsuit that is closer to powered armor than a costume, which gives Iron Man a run for his money. Unlike Bruce’s obsessive preparedness, Terry’s skillset lies in improvisation.

Carrie Kelley (Robin II.5): the Robin of the dystopian timeline of The Dark Knight Returns. It’s been a while since I read DKR, so I don’t remember much about her.

Helena Wayne (Batgirl I.5, Huntress I): Bruce and Selina’s daughter from another dimension.

[hood-ex]

Hi there! I was reading a bunch of your relationship analyses and they’re amazing! I was wondering.. could you do one on Jason and Barbara? With that Three Jokers comic eventually coming out, I’m interested in understanding their history a bit more.

Thank yaaa :)

Okay, yeah, so the thing about Babs and Jason’s relationship is that they don’t really have one lol. They really haven’t interacted a lot even though they do appear in the same panels from time to time. But I’ll post a few panels of some moments they do have together. 

Let’s start off with Babs and Robin Jason. 

We get a scene of Babs and Jason fighting crime together in Gotham Knights #43. 

Now, this takes place sometime after Jason allegedly pushed Felipe Gazonas off a building, which killed Felipe. So Jason is written as being reckless and as someone who uses lethal force against baddies. 

Babs witnesses him using lethal force and she kinda gives him the stink eye for it. So anyways, when she’s talking to Bruce later on, she mentions that Jason has emotional baggage he needs to deal with. 

The issue shows that Babs likes Jason even though he obviously has some shit he needs to work through. She helps him out, they have a little friendly banter, and then at the end of patrol, Babs buys Jason a chilidog (his favorite) and a drink. So even though she witnesses Jason shooting a spear through some goon’s hand, she still realizes that Jason has some issues, but he’s still a kid worth trying to understand/take care of. 

Alrighty, so then Jason dies in A Death in the Family, right. And it’s not like Jason knew a lot of people or really had any friends. But one of the people that comes to Jason’s funeral is Babs. 

As far as I know, that’s pretty much it for scenes between Robin Jason and Babs. 

Then we jump ahead to Red Hood Jason and Babs. For some godforsaken reason, they tried to make it seem like jaybabs was going to happen. So yeah, I’m gonna link you to an article someone made about jaybabs specifically because it has panels of them interacting and I have no idea what issues they’re from. So you can look at them here. 

And I’ll throw in some other panels that they didn’t include: 

After witnessing how Babs almost lets a man die, Jason seems adamant that Babs is a better person than he is (which, lmao, accurate). He helps her realize that she doesn’t actually want to kill the guy, which is, nice… I guess? It just seems a bit weird for Jason to be her voice of reason in this situation, considering his differing morals. 

It also kinda seems pretty contradictory for Jason to be praising her for being better than him for not killing the guy, considering how Jason thought Bruce was weak for not killing people, unlike him. And by that logic, Jason should think that he’s better than Babs specifically because he does kill people (or he used to kill them) and she doesn’t. But yeah, Jason’s characterization is a big fuckin mess, and to me, this scene just comes off more as Jason trying to make Babs realize that killing people isn’t part of who she is. So I guess you could say he has a bit of a soft spot for her. 

Batman Eternal #28

Babs insinuates that there could be something between her and Jason, but Jason either doesn’t think he’s good enough for Babs or he doesn’t want to be a “stand-in” Dick Grayson for her. 

Red Hood/Arsenal #12

This panel shows Babs calling Jason to give him a heads up about what’s happening to Roy. Before Jason realizes there’s a crisis, he answers the phone in a cheeky way, which gives off jaybabs vibes. 

And then there’s the only Babs and Red Hood Jason interaction I personally approve of which is this: 

Batman Eternal #36

As far as I know, that’s pretty much the majority of issues that have them talking to each other. Maybe Babs has mentioned Jason in some other issues, but honestly, I couldn’t tell you where you’d find those moments. But yeah, for the most part, Jason and Babs seem to be on pretty decent terms with each other. 

[our-happygirl500-fan]

You know something? I absolutely hate comic ages and timelines because they keep on switching round and changing and some characters are allowed to age and some characters aren’t so when I try to figure out the age difference between characters I’m just like does this work? Does this work? 

For example Dick’s been allowed to grow into adulthood yet Bruce isn’t allowed to be a day past 45 at most unless we’re looking at a future timeline like the Dark Knight Returns or Batman Beyond.

Damian became 13 with DC Rebirth so he could have his own Teen Titans team yet Tim, Steph and Cass have somehow aged backwards. Like Cass is supposed to be the same age as Jason (a few months older than him in fact), Steph was in college before the reboot and Tim was nearly 18 yet Tim, Steph and Cass have all been aged down to be 16 or the same age as Duke which is confusing (like there is not a three year age difference between Damian and Tim, Tim would have died in their first meeting if that was the case)

Dick’s age when his parents died has been switched around to be somewhere between 8-12, the later making more sense considering that Tim was supposed to be 3 when he met Dick at the circus and if he had met Dick when Dick was 8-9 there would have been a 5-6 year age difference which wouldn’t work since Jason met Bruce when he was 12 and Dick had just gone off to college making the age difference between Jason and Dick 5-6 years.

So to make sense of the ages let’s say that Dick became Robin at 12 Bruce in his early to mid 20′s when he takes Dick in, Dick is Robin for six years goes off to college, becomes Nightwing, drops out, moves in with Titans ect, Bruce is in his late 20′s or early 30′s at this point he meets Jason at 12-13 Jason is Robin for around three years and dies and Bruce is in his early to mid 30′s at this point.

Makes sense so far right? Right? Wrong!

Because we’re bringing Carrie Kelly into this!

A popular thing to do in fanfiction is have Carrie Kelly be the baby that Steph gave up for adoption as it’s a cool thing to do to tie Carrie into the Batfamily and also saves the trouble of making an OC yet it’s not actually possible to have Carrie be Steph’s daughter as the Dark Knight Returns is supposed to take place ten years after Jason’s death and Jason is two years older than Steph and Steph had her baby when she was 15 (got pregnant at 14) meaning that there’s about a 17 year age gap between Jason and Steph’s baby and Steph’s baby would have been around 8 at the time of the Dark Knight Returns and both Carrie and Bruce’s ages are clearly listed as 13 and 55 respectively which means that there’s a 12 year difference between Carrie and Jason.

That makes sense but Bruce being 55 during the Dark Knight Returns means that Bruce was supposed to be 45 when Jason died! Which means he was like what pushing 50 by the time Damian showed up? Which alright that I can give my parents were turning 50 when I was like 11 it happens but still wow, Bruce needs to retire and let Cass be Batman.

But anyway adding Carrie into the mix as well as the age differences we already know and taking into account that Steph is supposed to be nearly a year older than Tim and Cass is two years older than Steph as well as the fact that Cass is a few months older than Jason as she was already 18 when Bruce took her to Jason’s grave on Jason’s 18th Birthday and Jason and Steph’s Birthday’s are really close and Steph ‘dies’ a little later at 16. Also Damian is said repeatedly to be 10 during Steph’s Batgirl run “you’re a ten year old boy who doesn’t know how to have fun” and Steph is 18 in her first year of college and Tim is said to be 17 repeatedly in his Red Robin run which is furthur evidence that there’s around a one year age gap between Steph and Tim meaning there’s a 7 year age gap between Tim and Damian and an 8 year age gap between Steph and Damian. Damian is supposed to be 12 during Robin War and Duke is listed as 16 in the We Are Robin kid’s bios and we don’t really know if he’s turned 17 yet but let’s assume that there’s a 3-4 year age gap between Duke and Damian.

Barbara’s age is tricky because when she was first introduced she was already a grown up, as she was a librarian and already graduated college while Dick was still Bruce’s ward in fact Dick’s crush of Bab’s was originally supposed to be a sort of boy hood crush thing in her early appearances similar to Damian’s own crush on Steph but later on comics decided to make Barbara and Dick closer in age so they could set up a romance between the two and usually make Barbara around two years older than Dick since she went off to college before him. But then again Barbara’s age is funny especially since the reboot where it looks like DC wants to keep her young and they’ve always avoided saying her exact age unlike other characters but for the sake of simplicity let’s just say the age difference between her and Dick is two years. 

So if Bruce is 55 in the Dark Knight Returns then the ages in the Dark Knight Returns that means the ages of the Batfamily in the Dark Knight Returns is:

Bruce: 55

Barbara: 33

Dick: 31

Cass: 25

Jason: 25

Steph: 23

Tim: 22

Duke: 19

Damian: 15

Carrie Kelly: 13

Okay clear concise ages and age differences so going by these ages the ages of the Batfamily during every big event would be:

Day at the circus:

Bruce: 36

Barbara: 14

Dick: 12

Cass: 6

Jason: 6

Steph: 4

Tim: 3

Duke: 0

Damian: -4

Carrie Kelly: -6

Jason Dies:

Bruce: 45

Barbara: 23

Dick: 21

Cass: 15

Jason: 15

Steph: 13

Tim: 12

Duke: 9

Damian: 5

Carrie Kelly: 3

Tim becomes Robin at 13 and meets Steph less than a year later while Steph’s 14, Steph get’s pregnant and the quake happens she has the baby at 15 and Cass becomes Batgirl at 17. Steph ‘dies’ at 16 and spends 1-2 years in Africa while Tim and Cass move to Bludhaven, Jason comes back, Bludhaven blows up, Bruce Dick and Tim travel for a year while Cass gets brainwashed by Slade and then rescued by Tim and Cass gets officially adopted. Damian shows up and then Steph comes back to Gotham then Bruce ‘dies’ and Batman Reborn happens.

Batman Reborn:

Bruce: 50

Barbara: 28

Dick: 26

Cass: 20

Jason: 20

Steph: 18

Tim: 17

Duke: 14

Damian: 10

Carrie Kelly: 8

Dick is Batman for a bit, Damian becomes Robin, Steph becomes Batgirl, Tim becomes Red Robin, Cass becomes Black Bat. After a few months Bruce comes back and starts setting but Batman incorporated, Steph goes to English boarding school for a bit Dick goes back to being Nightwing when Damian is 11 and Damian starts working with Bruce and the Leviathan stuff with Talia happens.Damian is 12 and goes off with Goliath trying to atone from the year of blood and We Are Robin happens, Bruce looses his memories gets them back, Damian is 13 forms his own Titans and Duke joins the Batfamily. 

So currently what everyones ages SHOULD be in comics:

Bruce: 53

Barbara: 31

Dick: 29

Cass: 23

Jason: 23

Steph: 21

Tim: 20

Duke: 17

Damian: 13

Carrie Kelly: 11

Oh and before anyone says that Carrie appeared as a college student in the New 52 the New 52 continuity is a mess. Like Cassie, Connor and Bart all appeared in 2011 Teen Titans but then Bart and Connor disappeared and all three of them were reintroduced in Young Justice 2019. Raven’s age is a mess as well because she’s supposed to be Dick’s age but she kissed Wallace who’s only two years older than Damian and just you know it’s a mess I’m sticking to these ages this is like the third time I’ve tried to calculate this. I don’t even know where Terry or Helena’s even supposed to go.

But any way in conclusion Bruce is old and should retire and give Cass Batman

[pop-culturereference]

Never Touch Him Again

Summary: Barbara finds out what Tarantula did to Dick. She takes justice into her own hands.

I originally wrote this for Dickbabs week but didn’t quite finish it. Also, not really shippy at all. The prompt was “touch.”

Word Count: like 3,000 ish

Characters: Dick Grayson, Barbara Gordon, Catalina Flores

Pairings: Gen

“Don’t…touch me…”

Babs slammed the pause button and shoved herself away from her desk. Her skin flashed hot and cold until she was shaking and she felt like she was going to throw up. She lashed out and hit her books off the desk. She took a deep breath, trying to calm herself down, but it was futile. It was times like these she desperately wished her legs worked; she needed to get up, to pace, to kick something until it was broken beyond repair and her foot was bleeding.

Instead, she yanked her hair up and wheeled over to the punching bag in the corner, where she picked up her escrima sticks and started mercilessly beating the shit out of it. If the punching bag were a person, it would have been dead, the muscles and skin pounded to bloody oatmeal sticking to splintered bones. When the back of her shirt was soaked with sweat, she threw the escrima down in a corner and reluctantly forced herself back to the video. She owed it to Dick to find out the truth.

She’d already found the truth that Bruce wanted: Dick hadn’t killed Blockbuster. He’d been there, and he’d watched it happen, but he hadn’t been the one to kill him. 

She hadn’t been surprised when Bruce came to her. “I need your help; I think Dick may have killed someone,” he’d said. Babs had been horrified, but not surprised. Dick had been very, very… off…  for a while. As soon as Bruce had brought it up to her, she knew that whatever she found would explain Dick’s behavior.

And it was explaining more than she’d expected. Right now, she only needed to watch far enough in the tape to see if Tarantula listened to Dick and left him alone, or if she didn’t and raped him. Babs considered Dick’s recent self-destructive spiral, and her heart sank. She was pretty sure she already knew. After steeling herself with a few deep breaths, Babs watched the next few seconds of the video, then turned it off. Her heart sank down to her stomach and sat there stewing, making her nauseous. Tears burned her eyes and left hot tracks down her cheeks. How selfish, she chided herself. Dick is the one who has the right to cry, not you.

Babs started putting herself back together, piece by piece. She did it, as she always had, with a plan of action. Her eyes still burned as her mind whirred. She had everything on Tarantula, and nothing on Catalina Flores

She had a recording of Tarantula shooting a man in the head. The man was universally hated. Tarantula was wearing a mask.

She also had security footage of Tarantula attacking and trying to kill her while she was at dinner with Dick. Again, she was wearing a mask.

She had evidence of Tarantula bribing police officers. No one cared—not in Gotham, and certainly not in Blüdhaven. 

She had footage of Tarantula raping Dick. Again, she was wearing a mask. If she were ever put on trial, Nightwing couldn’t very well show up to testify. Plus, she had connections. It wasn’t going to work.

Clearly, Babs would have to take things into her own hands.

She didn’t tell Dick what she knew. She didn’t tell Bruce, either. She didn’t tell Helena and Dinah. She could do this herself. She’d beaten Tarantula once before, and this time, Oracle would be the one catching Tarantula unprepared, and on her turf.

The plan was to do this the Bat Way: Lure Tarantula to Gotham, get her to commit a crime here, and let Commissioner Gordon handle the rest.

Babs knew just the crime: attempted murder. Of the commissioner’s daughter, no less. Babs allowed herself a grim smile. She had her work cut out for her.

—————————————————

The next time she went to see Dick, she wasn’t sure how to act. She worried that she was overcompensating by goofing off because she didn’t want to seem too serious, and she also worried about overcompensating with coldness or rudeness to avoid pitying him. She honestly wasn’t sure what he was up to recently; their conversations were concise and infrequent. She figured she had the best chance of cornering him into talking in the Batcave. She asked Bruce when Dick would be there and then used a software security update as an excuse to be there when he arrived.

“Nightwing!” She called, grinning nervously.  “Long time, no see! Get your butt down here!”

It was no longer “get your cute butt down here,” for which she allowed herself a gust of sadness.

He didn’t swing over using the bars around the cave. Instead, he click-clacked down the stairs and over the walkway to her, his leg brace altering his gait just enough that Babs probably couldn’t recognize him any longer by his walk alone.

He gave her a bow with a hand-twirl. “At your service, oh great Oracle.” 

Now that,  at least, was normal. While the theatrics didn’t have as much heart as usual, they hadn’t disappeared. 

Babs had thought over her next words and planned them out to the letter. “I’ll get straight to the point. I miss you, Dick.” He was wearing the Nightwing mask, so she studied the rest of his face for a reaction. All he did was tighten his lips to not give anything away. This close, she could also see that he looked deflated, like one day he’d just decided to shrink half a size, but only his skin had gotten the memo; It was stretched taut, making him look hollow and angular.

He waited for her to continue.

“I’m sorry I haven’t been in contact as much. That’s on me. And…I miss my best friend.” She tilted a sad smile at him. “Can I take you out to dinner this week?”

He just stood there blankly, like she’d caught him off guard and now he didn’t know which expression to paste on next. Babs ached at how worn down he looked, and subtle anger squeezed her heart. Dick didn’t deserve this. She sighed. “That’s okay if you don’t-“

“No, no, that’d be great. I… miss you too, Babs.” He still looked diluted, like not all of him was there, but now he was smiling. 

“Great, I know this really good place a few blocks from my place. Big yellow M on the front, you might have seen it before. Called McDonald’s.”

It was a pretty low quality joke, but Dick let out a huff of laughter anyway. 

“I’m kidding,” she said. “This weekend?”

Everything she’d said was genuine, so she refused to acknowledge any guilt she felt over her ulterior motive.

————————————

Tarantula’s night of crime had taken some careful planning.

First, she’d had to stick surveillance on her to get some manipulation material.

Then, she’d had to find a place to rent with a good insurance policy. She’d also faked documentation for the past few months, just to be safe.

Then, she’d gathered evidence of Tarantula’s crimes in Blüdhaven and planted a file on her in the GCPD’s system.

After finishing the paper setup, she’d enlisted Batgirl as her eyes, ears, and knight in shining armor. Cass had installed the camera system in Babs’s new decoy apartment. Cass had also been the one to deliver the blackmail letters.

Now, all she had to do was go to dinner with Dick then come home to the new apartment and wait for Flores to come try to kill her.

Dick picked her up. He would also give her a ride back. It wouldn’t do for Flores to try to kill her before she got back to her heavily-monitored-and-filmed apartment. Babs had planned everything out to the last letter so she could focus on dinner with Dick, but she still needed a moment to steer her head out of Oracle mode and into friendship mode. While Dick helped her into the car, she methodically threw out any thought of her impending attempted murder.

Dick wasn’t very talkative so far; he didn’t even question her new address, but Babs explained anyway. If her explanation was a little embarrassing, hopefully it would only serve to show Dick her candor and openness with him.

“I’m only here for a week or so. I punched a whole in the wall with my escrima last week, and when they came to fix it, they found a rat infestation. I can’t be there while they’re fumigating.”

Dick maneuvered the car into the left lane, then shot her a glance, clearly disgusted. “Rats? That’s horrible!” He exaggerated a shudder. Babs had another explanation planned for when he asked why she wasn’t staying with her dad or even Bruce, but he didn’t seem to question it. Her heart squeezed; Dick was still dazed and not quite right. She’d already planned to be the one carrying the conversation, though, dinner would be fine.

“Believe me, I know that better than you do at this point. First hand experience.”

“Seriously, that is so disgusting.”

It was Dick, so she couldn’t help but mess with him at least a little. “Yeah,” she said. “They came scurrying out of the wall all together. They were this big,” she said, leaning to show him her hands measuring about the distance of her forearm. “Their noses left little greasy prints on my wallpaper. I thought I could handle it, until one night I reached to untangle the computer chords and I grabbed one of their tails.” She added an authentic shudder. 

Dick gaped and made a gagging sound. Well, not the best expression, but at least he was a little more animated. “You’re kidding! Babs, yuck! Please tell me you’re joking!”

“Kidding!” she said, laughing. “Don’t worry, Dick! I hightailed it out of there the moment I heard the word ‘rat’. I’m not going within a mile of there until every last one is exterminated.”

“Thank goodness. You had me seriously worried for your health and sanity for a bit there.”

“Aw, you do care!” she crooned. It was so easy for Babs to slip back into their old rapport, but the conversation died there. She had to remember that they’d broken up and also that Dick was very traumatized and probably wouldn’t be his old self for a while. She felt a sudden, sweeping melancholy as she realized that things might never go back to the way they were. It wasn’t fair to feel upset right now, she knew that. So instead, she pursed her lips grimly and reminded herself that at least Tarantula would be arrested later that night.

They made a nice little scene walking into the restaurant, Babs in her wheelchair and Dick in his click-clacking leg brace. No less than 4 employees and 3 non-employees offered to help them. Dick just glared, expression blank and flat, while Babs politely reassured them that they could manage. She did not roll her eyes even once.

It was a nice restaurant. The food was good, and the service was good. The conversation was not that good, but Babs hadn’t really been expecting otherwise. Nostalgia stung her the whole night, like lemon juice on a forgotten paper cut. 

She tried to diffuse the awkwardness between them with casual insults, a Barbara Gordon specialty. Dick reacted slowly and gave his chuckles and smiles a little late, but when they left and were once again seated in his parked car, he sighed and apologized.

“I’m sorry Babs, I’ll drop you off. Thanks for dinner.”

Babs locked eyes with him fiercely and fought not to show her anger at Flores. “Don’t apologize. Don’t you ever apologize. I can tell you’re going through some stuff right now. It’s not your fault, okay? Dick? Look at me. It is not your fault. I’m here as your friend, don’t think you owe me anything. I care about you. I-” don’t back down, Babs— “I love you. I’m not going to push you into telling me anything, but just know that I’m here for you, okay?”

Dick wasn’t looking at her, but the passing headlights of the highway reflected bright in his teary eyes. He cleared his throat. “Thanks. I… appreciate that more than you know.” He blinked hard, and drove her back to the makeshift apartment. By the time they got there, he was able to give her a normal, dry-eyed goodbye, and offer his help for her rat situation. Babs squeezed his hand and gave him a reassuring smile before waving a goodbye. 

The next part made her feel like an idiot, but it was necessary. As soon as Dick was out of earshot, she scooted closer to a potted plant that she knew was bugged and murmured sweet nothings in a low voice. She clapped a hand over her mouth to stop the laugh that bubbled up, then made some lip smacking sounds and moaned a little. It wasn’t a very high quality bug, so it wouldn’t be strange that it only recorded her voice because she was supposedly closer. Breathlessly, she said, “you naughty boy, you know I have to work on my thesis tonight. Tomorrow.” She followed up with one more smack for good measure, then left her apartment and closed the door.

The moment the bug was out of earshot, she had Cass on the comms.

“Bait taken?” Babs asked her.

“Yes.” Babs was having a hard time not giggling. That was probably the stupidest, most embarrassing thing she’d ever done.

“Estimated time frame?”

“One hour.” The gravity of the situation settled on her, and there were no more giggles. 

“Thank you. Oracle out.”

Babs let herself back in, and, once again, she wanted to pace. Just as well that she couldn’t, she didn’t want to tip Tarantula off that she was expecting her. Instead, she changed into pajamas and erased the last 10 minutes of footage from her security cameras.

The dinner with Dick had gone okay from an interpersonal perspective, and from a make-flores-want-to-kill-me perspective, it had gone even better. It was pretty obvious from the dinner where Tarantula attacked her that she was jealous of Babs’s relationship with Dick. It should be just the little extra nudge that would get Flores over here to deal with her personally. The day before, Babs had delivered blackmail letters via Batgirl. Dearest Catalina, she’d written. It’s obvious that you’ve got half of Blüdhaven in your pocket, but I know for fact that the other half is in the pocket of Roland Desmond’s only surviving relative. She’d be very interested to know about this. Here, she’d taped a disk with footage of her shooting Blockbuster in the head. If you want my copy destroyed, get in touch. Much love, Barbara Gordon.

This was not Oracle style. When Oracle wanted to blackmail someone, they had no way to trace her, and she usually only did it to get criminals to up their paranoia and sabotage themselves. This time, Babs wanted Flores to track her down. She wanted to look like an easy target. Really, the only thing that "Dearest Catalina” could do now was kill her. It would be too much of a risk for a commissioner’s daughter to have that knowledge, even if the disk were destroyed. Sure, Flores would feel bad about it, but she’d know it was necessary. But, that wasn’t enough for Babs, so she made Flores angry. Batgirl had tailed Flores from Bludhaven yesterday and watched her plant a bug in Babs’s newly-placed potted plant, and the day before, Babs stood right next to it and gushed about her date with Dick. Flores would show no remorse, no hesitation. 100% premeditated murder. Batgirl was ahead of Flores now, and would be waiting for Babs’s signal to jump in and help her out. 

Now, all she had to do was wait. 

.

.

.

15 minutes, and she decided that waiting was the worst part.

.

15 more, and she was so glad she didn’t actually have a rat problem.

.

She hoped Dick was doing okay.

.

Fifteen more minutes, and Cass buzzed in to tell her Tarantula came armed with a knife and zipties but no gun. Good. Tarantula was going to get personal, maybe even tie her up and blabber even more condemning evidence. She got ready and pretended to be asleep. Ten minutes later, her window creaked open. She sighed softly and shifted in under her covers, keeping her eyes closed even though her heart was pounding. She struggled feebly when Tarantula grabbed her wrists and tied them together, feigning disorientation. She held off until she was already tied to struggle with her full strength.

“What do you want! Who are-” Babs was cut off with a slap to the face. Ouch. She tried to wipe blood off her face with her shoulder, but only succeeded in smearing it. It dried there, making her skin feel dry and crackly.

Flores sighed. “You know, I have nothing against you! I would have just let you be!”

“Is this about Dick?” 

“We could have made this quick and easy, but you just had to keep causing problems!”

“Oh, good. So this is just boy drama. Not about you shooting Blockbuster. I thought you were going to kill me.”

“Oh, I’m going to kill you, alright,” Tarantula snarled. 

Babs sneered. “I’d like to see you try.”

Tarantula punched her in the gut. She kicked, hard. One landed in her gut again, but most on her lower torso and upper legs. Hah. All of her spinal nerves down her legs were non-functional. Silver lining.

Babs squirmed but didn’t fight back. She needed to lull Tarantula into thinking she posed no threat.

Finally, Tarantula pulled out the knife. “I hate you. I thought I didn’t want to do this, but for you, I really don’t mind.”

Babs held still until Tarantula grabbed her by the hair to bare her throat. By this point, she was done pretending. She sliced through the zip tie and swung her fist directly into Tarantula’s nose. She grabbed Tarantula’s broken nose in her right hand and twisted, getting a scream. As her hands went to her face, Babs grabbed them and twisted again, breaking wrists and fingers. She kept one of Tarantula’s hands, squeezing it so the bones crunched slightly. She squeezed tighter, feeling Tarantula’s metacarpal bones grinding together, then screamed directly into her ear, rupturing her eardrum and signaling Batgirl. 

Babs leaned to Tarantula’s other ear and hissed, “This? This was nothing. Never. Touch him. Again.”

[jess-the-vampire]

whatcha think of the new episodes

heyyyalll35 said:What do you think about the heart shapes the capes were making at the end of knight shift? 

 Anonymous said:Thoughts about the newest Star VS episodes today?

The Knight Shift:

So this episode was kinda about the fact Marco just well….didn’t really want to be a knight the rest of his life. Apparently knights on mewni have to be knights for the rest of their lives and with a new sibling coming and everything marco kinda realizes maybe jumping into knighthood wasn’t his best move.

He kinda wants to go back to earth cause he can’t stay on mewni forever and he wants to go to college (Which is funny since he left school for knighthood so i wish him luck with that).

Star’s a little selfish about this, because she wanted marco to stay forever but by the end they do realize even if they go separate ways, they’ll always still be best friends and have crazy adventures together.

So yeah, this episode feels like it’s something to prep for the idea that star and marco might take different paths in the future, but it won’t meant they won’t always be best friends or that things have to be different.

which i think is nice.

i know people are gonna take this episode as romantic in a way, especially cause their matching capes seem to form a heart at the end. But the episode seemed to emphasize their friendship more to me in particular since it wasn’t really focused on romance, that even if they’ll be apart, they’ll still be friends. 

I kinda got some Wreck it Ralph 2 vibes from it, where you can’t keep your friends to themselves and they gotta sometimes do what’s best for them. But it doesn’t mean your friendship is over.

Star was overacting and that’s mentioned a few times, they might not live together anymore but they’ll still have more great memories in the future.

Also Higgs and most of the knights are probably gonna stay in the hekapoo dimension.

Also Mr Candle was here, for…some reason. But then again it made sense for him to be here as it was another episode discussing marco’s future.

Queen-napped

So apparently this episode was NOT the one to do with Mina this round and apparently was part of the “Get Eclipsa loved” plotline.

I’m glad we got some cameos of Larry, Babs,ect and got to see at least a LITTLE of the other kingdoms but i am sad we couldn’t get a little more of these kingdoms.

if there’s one thing that bothers me besides the many things that can bother me about the show, it’s that the kingdoms are very underused. We never get to learn much about them or see them and i find that disappointing that we got a magical world and see very little of it and how it works.

Ponyhead’s kinda a jerk, as apparently everything that happened was just a hoax to get eclipsa some fame and attention. Which could’ve literally caused more issues and started a panic, but it’s ponyhead….so they let it slide.

Though they do acknowledge it’s bad and what pony did was TERRIBLE even though it worked.

Not that i’m sure how much this will do in the long run for eclipsa as though it got her attention, her priorities and how she handles some things are still an issue.

Also looks like TPS was not a wasted episode cause it sets up the plot of this one.

Junkin Janna

I mean, yeah it’s both what i was expecting and not at all what i was expecting.

The description is a misdirect cause tom not having much to do outside of star had pretty much nothing to do with this episode other then be there for some laughs and to give tom an excuse so he and janna could find out about mina’s scrapyard.

This episode’s mainly to be for setup for conflicts around mina and possibly eclipsa, not the love plot if you’re curious. Tom and Star are both being lovey dovey and texting each other funny pics and stuff but they’re not in jeopardy in this episode or anything.

Apparently Janna kinda tricked Tom, she made him think he was here to do something fun while Star was busy, but she actually only invited him because mina’s bird kept stealing these giant knight boots she liked to sled in and she wanted tom to kill it.

Which of course, Tom doesn’t do because it’s a bird and doesn’t attack it himself till the bird turns into a giant monster and attacks him. Which implies Mina somehow figured out how to turn people into solarians (Which is odd cause Solaria needed the wand for that so i hope we get some explanation on it).

Tom and Janna are mostly at odds with each other, Tom didn’t seem to mind spending time with her to pass the time and had fun getting their stuff back. But if you were expecting them to get romantic, they really don’t.

Janna finds tom’s texting to Star annoying and kinda well, like i said, was using him for selfish reasons and then got mad at Tom when Tom said no.

And Tom is trying to be polite and hang out, but that’s about it. Though he gets very mad with Janna using him and being rather rude to him at times.

So they’re kinda friends but not really to the same degree as other show friendships, they seem to butt heads a bit.

There’s also a side plot with eclipsa and star, star also sending tom texts and pics, finding it adorable. The MHC are just being rude to Eclipsa and Eclipsa is just kinda sick of their garbage.

the biggest thing to note is the MHC point out strange magic coming from the temple, but at the same time there are a dozen magic users living there, so to star and eclipsa it kinda feels like a waste of time.

and knowing this show, it’ll probably mean something.

Mina’s also building giant armor with the scrap her bird’s been collecting, so looks like she’s making her army herself.

A Spell With No Name

hi so this episode’s description is not even remotely correct, star and eclipsa do not meet up in this episode and their spells never collide. Can i have a talk with whoever’s making these descriptions?

so yeah, this episode takes place in the “Spider with a Top Hat” Universe.

You know how it was confusing that the wand seemed to have a community full of creatures for the spells living inside it? Well, turns out, this is actually a separate dimension, not inside of the wand.

Star’s wand area is one of many in the same dimension, all the spells of the queen’s in fact, can literally visit each other and talk because they have separate chambers for each queen in whatever dimension they live in.

moon’s spells have a room, you see one for solaira, jushtin, meteora….

we get a sneak peek of Celena’s…but it appears empty….strange.

every spell seems to have a creature tied to it, even spells that are just beams.

Apparently eclipsa’s spells are on a black ops mission to capture the spell eclipsa gave to moon to kill toffee that’s gone rouge and is killing other spells in this dimension.

Which…does this mean eclipsa can’t use that one spell that died anymore or what?

Narhwal Blast is the star this time, as spider goes down for the count, and he helps the other spells recover the evil one. But the episode kinda alludes it won’t be the last time we see this spell.

Which isn’t a good sign since yeah….it’s meant to kill.

[bluboothalassophile]

Getting to Know More

Fun facts about Terry McGinnis:

He was a notorious middle child in a HUGE family: Dick, Jason, Athanasia, Cassandra, Tim, Duke, Damian, Alina, himself, Helena, Thomas, Bruce Jr., and Matt. His extended family included Dick’s wife, and Dick’s kids, Thomas, Mar’i, and Jake; Jason’s adopted daughter Lian Harper; Tim’s wife, Stephanie; and Duke’s wife; Claire Clover. His extended, extended family also had Uncle Luke’s and Aunt Babs’ kids; Carrie and Nell, Bette Kane, Grampa Lucius, and, well, at this point one got the picture; huge ass colony of Bats living in Gotham here.

He shredded it where skateboard, hockey, motocross were concerned, but he had the coordination of a spaz for baseball and surfing.

His mom was awesome on epic proportions. Seriously, he didn’t know how she did it but she redefined super mom.

Another thing to know, he totally did not have a crush on the Princess of Atlantis, he was only going with her to this movie because he happened to like it, and because Mareena was the only chick he knew who didn’t like chick flicks (Mar’i, Helena, Lian, and Max could all go Suck It! He was going to see a damn action flick if it fucking killed him this year!) Mareena just also happened to like action flicks, which was why she was here with him.

Standing there in the theatre line he tried not to stare at Mareena who was hiding her identity under a hoodie she had stolen from his room when she had walk up to the Manor with a movie for them to see. Mareena did not have friends in Atlantis who appreciated the arts of action flicks. Terry didn’t care though, he was no longer being that weirdo who was going to a theatre alone. Also, she was a chick Dana could not get jealous over and drive him insane. He would think college meant that the drama would die off with the age grow up, but apparently not. And he was not getting blue balls because Dana was having imaginary jealous fits over imaginary slights.

“Why can the line not move faster,” Mareena huffed.

“Because the line is moving this pace because people are slow. Besides, we’re ahead of the line for the premiere line,” he jabbed his thumb over his shoulder to show her. Mareena frowned.

“You people are annoying,” Mareena said icily.

“How are we annoying, you wanted to go to this movie, so I’m going with you to see this movie,” he said.

“I would’ve asked someone else, but,” she started.

“There’s no one but Don and Dawn, and we both know there’s no way in hell that Barry and Iris would let them come.”

“I could’ve gone to New Krypton,” Mareena argued.

“Oh yes, because watching their movies is so entertaining,” Terry rolled his eyes.

“You land dwellers have no appreciation for the fine arts of moving with a flow,” Mareena argued.

“Pipe down, and don’t draw attention of the paparazzi,” he snapped when her hood started falling off of her head, which had him pulling it more firmly over the green hair of hers. Only disadvantage of going to the movies with Mareena was the fact her hair glowed in the dark. But other than that, trade offs, made it worth it!

“You do realize they’d be more inclined to notice you and not me, right?”

“I’m wearing a Gotham Knights cap, and I am not royalty, I’m just one of a hundred Wayne kids,” Terry point out.

“I thought you were a Prince,” Mareena said.

“No, I’m a Wayne,” he said. “Not royalty.”

“You are also…” she held up her index fingers by her head and smiled a bit.

“Yeah, but that doesn’t count,” he shrugged. Dick had been Batman, Jason had briefly been to save Dick’s wedding, Cass currently was, Damian was next. It wasn’t anything special anymore, it wasn’t special in the family he belonged in. Though B was still the control freak behind the scenes for them so technically B was still the Bat.

“Why not?”

“Cause B’s the big man in charge.”

“Your dad is in a wheelchair,” Mareena pointed out.

“Partial paralyses is not a disability, it just means his legs have to take a break sometimes and Mom has to push him around, it’s not abnormal to what normally happens with him,” he shrugged.

“You guys have issues,” Mareena stated.

Terry merely shrugged. “Dad’s fine, we’re fine, it’s all fine!” he snorted.

“Last time you said that everything was on fire,” Mareena stated.

“Let me restate we’re fine. But mostly keep your hair away so I don’t have to explain to Dana why the hell I’m seen with another woman.” Terry stated.

“Ah, the nefarious Dana, why are you still dating that woman?” Mareena asked. “She was bratty when you were a teen, she’s worse now.”

“Not all of us get fairy tale romances,” Terry shrugged. “Besides, I like sex, sex is a great relief to the stress of everything.”

“You sound like a cad.”

“You should hear my sisters talk,” he shrugged. Mar’i, Helena, Max, and Lian were way worse than him about the sex talks, girls were all about feelings, and emotions and connections, it was annoying, and they always talked about it and guys! Terry probably knew more about women than the average guy and it was a disturbing amount information his sisters had given him. And just to clarify, he thought of Mar’i, Lian and Max as his sisters because he had known them since he was in diapers! It was hard to think of them as anything remotely close to something other than sisters.

“And you shouldn’t knock down romance,” Mareena stated. “Your family has the most epic love stories according to my father. Other than maybe Diana and Steve’s.”

“You’re nuts!” he sputtered.

“Am not, the story of B and Selina, Dick and Kori, Jason and Raven, Tim and Stephanie, B and Talia,” she stated. “Epic romances.”

“That’s just gross, and disturbing to think about my family’s love lives,” he grimaced.

“You guys are secret sweethearts I bet,” Mareena decided with a cheeky smile.

“We are the Knight! We are the Terror of Nightmares! We are NOT Sweethearts! Even Alina is even an epic of epic badasses,” he argued. His phone buzzed and he pulled it out to see the text was from his mom.

“What’s up?”

“After the movie we need to go get Matt, Carrie, Tommy and Nell from school. Babs and Luke had to go to Africa,” he said.

“Oh.”

“So we’ll get them, get a slice, and then I’ll drop you off, or are you tubing?” he asked.

“Why would I be tubing?”

“Cause it’s up or down with you,” he retorted.

“Can I stay? I haven’t hung around the surface too much, and I do not want to go to the Tower,” she said.

“Yeah. Julia will help us set up a room for you,” Terry said. Julia had come to Gotham recently because Alfred was sick.

“Who is Julia?” Mareena asked.

“Julia is Alfred’s daughter,” he answered.

“Alfred is not B’s father?” she said in bizarre wonderment.

“Uh… yeah, not a secret,” he pointed out. “Alfred is awesome, and he’s totally grandpa, but he’s not blood.” Terry shrugged.

“WHAT!?” Mareena sputtered. Terry jumped a bit as he stared at her bewildered expressioned.

“What!?”

“He’s not blood!?”

“No, I mean, like ninety percent of my family isn’t blood.”

“Really?”

“Yeah,” he shrugged. “It’s not news.”

“I…” she started. “I always thought you were related,” he said.

“Really?”

“Black hair, blue eyes, ungodly pale.”

“What about Duke or Damian!?” he sputtered.

“Okay, so you don’t all look alike,” she rolled her eyes.

“Exactly, and we are all pretty much adopted. Only Athanasia, Damian, Alina, Helena, Tommy, Junior, Matt and I are actually B’s blood kids.”

“I thought you were just… you know, cause you’re a huge family and dad says B started young, really young, so I just assumed,” she shrugged.

“It’s all public record,” he shrugged. “B hasn’t been shy about it. Dick, Babs, Jason, Cass, Tim, Duke, Steph, technically and kind of, Harper, Cullen, Bette, and Renee.”

“I just thought you were related, and I thought you were also, you know,” she shrugged innocently.

“What else did you think we were!?” He sputtered.

“Vampires,” she said innocently.

“I hate dad for starting that rumor,” Terry muttered sourly.

“That one is funny though!” She persisted. “Hal told me, before I met you guys, that you were all demons.”

“Well, Rae is,” he shrugged.

“I thought your dad was big anti- anything that isn’t human marrying into my family,” Mareena said.

“Luci made valid points which had B accepting the fact marrying into a family as divine and powerful as Rae’s is a… you know, it’s kind of a divine honor,” Terry shrugged. “Besides, I didn’t know they weren’t married until they were officially married.”

“You didn’t know they weren’t married?” Mareena asked.

“They’ve been together since I was in diapers,” Terry shrugged.

“Really?”

“Yes really. I’m pretty sure they were the ones who found me,” Terry said.

“I’m learning more about you than I ever thought possible.”

“All of this is actually public record.”

“Really?” she asked skeptically.

“My biological mother was Mary McGinnis, she was married to Warren McGinnis, they died in a car crash when I was three days old and they were driving home from the hospital. I’m technically property of A.R.G.U.S. so Waller took me in, Jason found me about a year later,” Terry explained.

“That’s weird,” she decided.

“No, what’s weirder is the fact that Matt is my full brother,” Terry stated. “Mary and Warren were dead five years before Matt was even conceived, and he’s my full brother.”

“What?”

“Yeah.”

“I thought you were B’s blood son,” Mareena said carefully.

“I am. Waller injected a serum into Warren McGinnis’ DNA to scramble his own DNA to match with Bruce’s. Warren was a chimera essentially thanks to Waller’s tinkering,” Terry said. “I’m a ‘clone’ of Bruce’s in a way or I was supposed to be with what Waller set up, and I’m his son, but NO, he did not get involved in the conception of me or my blood brother Matt. He’s the genetic material for us. He’s still Dad though since he’s well, Dad,” Terry shrugged.

“That’s complicated.”

“That’s my family. Also, completely public record,” he shrugged.

“You’re not normal,” she said icily.

“What!? I’m completely normal! I’m going to a movie, and with you no less, in broad daylight, and I’m not turning to ash because of the sun either!” he smiled.

“You’re sounding like a assbutt,” she muttered.

“Asshole,” he corrected. “And you started it.”

“What did you expect from my family?” she asked.

“Lots of energy,” he answered honestly. “Dad always said that you guys were energetic like no tomorrow and wild, also unpredictable, dangerous, and loud, very loud.”

“You expected that!?” she sputtered.

“Did you think I was expecting a mermaid from Little Mermaid, fishtail and all?” he asked her.

“Yes!”

“Nah,” he shrugged.

“You’re an ass,” she informed him.

“I’m aware.”

“Good.”

“Besides, I’m a you know,” he shrugged. “Being unpleasant and assholes in general are required.”

“Oh! The ticket booth! And next time we are dropping your family name to get into the movie.”

“You wanted to be a normal American teen this time instead of being a Princess of you know,” he said.

“I did not want that. You wanted that. Freaking love of invisibility. I swear if you were metas you’d all be like that.”

“Rae cast an invisibility spell once, that was awesome, terrifying and cool.”

“Why!?”

“Oh, the demons were hunting her, I was like seven, and it was a giant hide and seek game,” Terry said.

“That’s not normal.”

“You grew up under the sea,” he pointed out.

“You grew up in Gotham.”

“I don’t like you right now,” she decided.

“You adore me, I’m paying for the movie,” he pointed out.

“True,” she decided.

“Awe, you two are an adorable couple!” the ticket attendant said when they stepped up to buy the tickets for S.O.S. “First date?”

“We’re not a couple,” Terry stated as he paid for the tickets.

“But we are friends!” Mareena declared slinging her arm around his shoulders.

“Barely.”

“You adore me!” she declared.

Terry rolled his eyes as the ticket clerk chuckled but gave them their tickets. “I’ll spring for the snacks, you get the good seats,” he ordered as they had their ticket punched and walked into the crowd.

[buttonpanels]

So far, I’ve looked at the biggest shake-ups in comics status quos in the 2010s. Of course, I think those were important. They’re paradigm shifts that allow for different stories. But sometimes, you need to go smaller, and that’s what this is. This time, I’m going to be highlighting specific moments in comics that I feel were the best in the 2010s.

These can range from a single scene to a single panel, but they’re what I consider the best the 2010s have to offer. They might stand on their own or be the payoff for years of storytelling, but these are the ones that had the biggest impact on me as a reader. As a rule: it can’t be an entire issue. I’m also trying to avoid placing similar scenes on this list. So yes, it’s a loose criterion, but it’s mine. Anyway, let’s see what we have for arbitrarily ranked my personal best comic book moments of the 2010s…

15. “He was an Adventure”, Die #2

Die is a comic that embodies the best of Kieron Gillen. His knack for clever dialogue, interesting ideas, strong characterisation and self-aware contemplative narration are felt in every issue, bolstered by Stephanie Hans’ beautiful art. The concept of a role-playing game that sucks its players in is a bit derivative, but Gillen leans into the RPG side of things and really shows what an RPG made and played by a bunch of pretentious, conflicted teenagers would be like, and the world that would result. Nowhere is that better shown than when Dominic (or rather, Ash) reunites with Sir Lane.

After the cast return to their game as adults after having escaped it as teenagers, they run into immediate trouble. After dealing with it, the party discusses whether to take a horrible route to their destination or the one they used years prior, where everyone knows them. Before they can decide, Ash runs into an old flame of sorts — Sir Lane, a typical knight in shining armour who she was in a relationship with and said she would come back to. She teasingly cursed him so that he couldn’t rest until he saw her again, and now she’s come back… after over a decade and he’s a zombie. They’re forced to kill him, and decide to avoid taking the same path, lest they run into more from their past.

Die is a great series that captures the spirit and fun of RPGs while giving things just enough edge to feel interesting but not like the creative team is going out of their way to be edgy. This here is a great instance of that, bringing a dark edge to a fantasy cliché and taking full advantage of the setting and characters. The first issue of Die didn’t fully land with me, but this issue definitely did, with this dark and morbid scene and the poetic narration. Just a wonderfully executed moment.

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14. “You can’t help yourself… you are Apocalypse”, Uncanny X-Force (2010) #4

Here’s a moment that is heavily carried by the art. Rick Remender’s Uncanny X-Force is great, but this moment, which is otherwise not that spectacular, is elevated by an understated use of layouts and not only established that this would be a very different X-Force run, but the threat to come.

After the new, black ops and secretive X-Force team has hunted down the rejuvenated form of Apocalypse, they are at a crossroads when Psylocke refuses to allow them to kill the now child despot. The team debates before falling to infighting, before Angel finally gets the upper hand after wrestling with his inner demon, Archangel. When Apocalypse says he won’t become who they think he’ll become, Angel says he won’t be able to stop himself and goes in for the kill… only to hesitate… then Fantomex kills Apocalypse anyway. The team leaves with no fanfare or celebration.

The art is what really sells this scene. The fight between the X-Force members is well done and easy to follow, and the narration from Warren is executed very well with some great lettering, but that moment when Angel says that Apocalypse will always be a monster, and the art slows things down with wide panels and extreme close-ups and a peak into Warren’s soul, that is what sells this moment. It is a powerful pause in time that and scene that is emblematic of what the run would entail — wrestling with morality, nature vs. nurture and struggling with one’s inner demons.

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13. “I think about it every day”, Grayson #12

Grayson is a series I will never shut up about, because it just works so much better than it should. Taking Dick Grayson out of the world of superheroes and putting him in the more morally ambiguous and backstab-prone spy world allowed Tom King and Tim Seeley to get to the root of his character, and make it all the more satisfying when he returned to the world of capes and tights. Case in point: Grayson #12, where Dick reunites with the Batfamily. While every reunion is great, the one that was the bet executed in my mind is Dick’s reunion with Barbara Gordon.

Dick is reuniting with his family after his boss at Spyral forces him to come back to the organisation. She lets him get in his goodbyes, however. Having already spoken to an amnesiac Bruce Wayne, he went on to talk to Jason Todd and Tim Drake and gave them a gift of two batarangs, and is now talking to Barbara. Dick had previously run into her in his secret Spyral identity, but she didn’t really know it was him. He tries to explain why he did what he did, but she’s not having it and leaves. Dick jumps after her… off a bridge, and gives her the trapeze pole from when they swung together after she was crippled in The Killing Joke, and confesses all his unspoken feelings for her.

There’s really nothing more to this moment than that, it’s just Dick and Babs reuniting and Dick telling her what she means to him. It’s heart-warming and cute, and the whole “Cluemaster’s Code” that Dick is using — the first letter of every sentence will spell out the real message — is used really well this issue, but I like that Dick repeats himself when he says he’ll come back to her. It’s as if he’s willing to muddle the message and Barbara understanding it just to reiterate how important she is to him. This moment wouldn’t properly go anywhere, since Tim Seeley set Dick up with a new love interest in a terribly executed romantic subplot in his Nightwing run, but for a moment, one of the best relationships in comics got a moment in the sun.

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12. “You’re poison”, The Sandman Universe Presents: Hellblazer #1

Hellblazer is at its best when it acknowledges what a toxic influence John Constantine is on his friends and family. Very few people come out of their interactions with him unscathed, and his addiction to magic only guarantees that those around him will have a rough time of it. Nowhere is that better demonstrated than with how his long-time friendship with Chas Chandler ends, which ushered in a return to form for Constantine.

After coming back from a terrible future and promising his future self to live his best life, Constantine goes to visit his friend Chas. He learns that, since his absence, Chas has contracted cancer and is now in the cancer ward of a hospital. Upon his visit, he finds demons possessing Chas and goes to free his friend, using the bodies of other cancer patients, only for Chas himself to call John out on his years of being a prick, his abandonment and the fact that John gave him cancer. Constantine’s constant smoking in Chas’ cab is what it’s attributed to and he tells John to leave him alone and fuck off. John respects his friend’s wishes just before Chas dies and John is left truly alone.

Despite how their friendship ended, this issue also did a great job giving it something of a heart-warming ending… sort of, as in the future, John tricks Chas into essentially performing a magic suicide bombing, but Chas, ignorant of this, tells John that sometimes you need to step up and be a hero. Both scenes work together to show the nature of this friendship — Chas is a good person at heart and one whom Constantine values and trusts… but he’s still someone Constantine will manipulate, and who will call John out on his bullshit. It’s a fitting end to the character and a great way to kick off this new era of Hellblazer.

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11. “I thought you loved me”, Venom (2018) #11

The relationship between Eddie Brock and the Venom symbiote has always been some level of abusive, but whether or not it’s a romantic relationship has generally not been touched on where it can be avoided. Maybe it’s the idea that Venom fans wouldn’t want a gay relationship, maybe it’s fear of the repercussions of a negatively portrayed gay relationship — the symbiote is identified as male a few times, after all — or maybe it’s just weird that Eddie is in a romantic relationship with alien ooze. But in the end, it’s usually more allegory and not so much a literal romantic relationship… until now, and it is glorious.

After a handful of issues of the Venom symbiote lacking its voice and Eddie’s cancer resurfacing, the Maker is able to “fix” Eddie while he goes through his memories and learns that certain parts were fake — his sister and initial cancer diagnosis being the primary ones he focuses on. He confronts the Venom symbiote, which can speak again, about why it changed his memories and it says Eddie needed to need it. They argue and Eddie wakes up to protect Dylan Brock, who he has just learned is his son.

Eddie’s relationship with the symbiote has always been destructive and unhealthy, and Cates fully leans into that here. The symbiote has manipulated Eddie into staying with it, forced him to become Venom and lied to him about his son. It has fully become an abusive lover and the sheer superhero-ness of this scene lends it a sense of self-awareness in what could otherwise have devolved into melodrama. However, Donny Cates is still able to end the scene with such conviction that it carries all the weight it was supposed to.

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10. “Smoke the meat”, Animosity #7

The biggest strength of Animosity is Marguerite Bennett’s keen eye for worldbuilding. The basic premise of “what if animals suddenly became fully aware” is explored for all it’s worth, with small bits of worldbuilding that truly make the world of Animosity feel alive yet relatable. The way Bennett uses these little pieces of worldbuilding to craft a nuanced and morally grey story is what really sells this series, and nowhere is that more apparent than in Animosity #7.

The scene in question deals with the aftermath of a fight the main characters get into, where they run into some carnivores. While everyone else tends to their wounds and gets some rest, main dog Sandor and the cat Pallas go to deal with the aftermath. They find their dead friends and we learn what they’re actually doing, and that it’s not uncommon — they eat the corpses of the dead. This time, they bury their friends, but the other animals that were killed are eaten all the same, and this isn’t the first time Sandor and Pal have done this, nor is it expected to be the last, and Sandor reminds Pal that, when Sandor himself dies, to feed him to his owner Jesse.

The scene is a wonderfully dark revelation, in a story where we learned more and more about what Sandor will do to protect his owner. It plays really well off the previous issues and does a great job escalating the moral ambiguity of the story. It not only adds more moral complexity to the wider world of Animosity, but furthers the story and characters. Every part of Animosity feels well thought out, and this moment not only advances the world but the story, in an unexpected and dark way.

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9. “He has you and me”, Doomsday Clock #12

DC Rebirth was a relaunch that truly returned some of what the DC universe had lost that made it so great. It lamented the loss of love, legacy and optimism, all of which were indeed sorely lacking, and told a story of how corrupting outside forces altered the DCU’s history and characters to better reflect a cynical outlook. Well, Doomsday Clock finally ended last week, and for all its faults and the discussions that can be had concerning creator rights and Watchmen, I think it delivered on its promise — the return of love, legacy and optimism, the latter of which was best exemplified in the return of the JSA and, as a result, of the Legion of Super-Heroes and Ma and Pa Kent.

After Flashpoint, it was established that Clark Kent had lost his parents at a young age, after they were hit by a drunk driver. Even after the Superman Reborn crossover patched up Superman’s history to essentially be the post-Crisis one — with some New 52 stuff sprinkled in here and there — he still had dead parents. Doomsday Clock revealed that Doctor Manhattan had caused the Kents’ accident, in order to transform Superman into a more cynical figure that he could relate to. However, after Superman inspires him, Manhattan believes in the ideals of love, legacy and optimism and undoes his changes to the timeline — or at least most of them, since DC’s plans clearly changed as this story was being published — and the restoration of the Justice Society of America is what kicks things into gear. Not only are the JSA my favourite superhero team, but their existence now changes Jonathan Kent’s outlook — instead of a cynical, protective outlook that causes him to discourage Clark using his abilities, the JSA’s existence causes Jonathan to encourage Clark instead, and he saves his parents as Superboy. The emergence of Superboy in turn causes the Legion of Super-Heroes to exist again. And they save the day, and all ends well, and Clark goes to reunite with his parents.

This moment is the perfect pay off to the entire Rebirth saga. There’s some wonkiness here as a result of rewrites, clearly. The Legion of Super-Heroes, as written now, are not inspired by Clark as Superboy but by Jonathan Samuel Kent as Superboy helping to found the United Planets, but the dialogue pretends like this is the Retroboot Legion from a few years back. Ignoring that, however, this moment just works. After the darkest parts of the story, with Imra fading away and Johnny Thunder broken and defeated, Superman’s inspiration is what undoes the changes and brings those people back. The legacy of the JSA that creates a new world of optimism, one that extends into the far future, and the return of the Kents is just makes it that much more satisfying that optimism and hope won out. This is a perfect ending to the story that Geoff Johns began in 2016, one that embraces what the DCU is about, even through its various reboots.

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8. “I’ll still hold your hand”, Doom Patrol (2016) #1

Gerard Way’s Doom Patrol run is a bit uneven, at least if you read it as it was ongoing like I did (you know, when every issue after the second was released late). But the first issue is a great introduction to the Doom Patrol, and the opening scene does a wonderful job setting the tone for Way’s run and introducing a character who is probably one of the best audience surrogate characters in comics.

The scene is pretty short and simple, giving a quick intro to Casey Brinke as she drives an ambulance during her day job. The narration is what sells it, as it carries this sense of poetry and angst that feels like it has enough conviction to be done well. Casey’s narration doesn’t feel ironic, self-defeating or cliché, but oddly reassuring — fitting, given she talks about what her job means to her. There’s some fun, of course, helped by the cartoony visuals and the neon colours, but otherwise it is just a relatively quiet intro to a character.

This introduction to Casey really does set the tone for the rest of Way’s Doom Patrol run, the more modern, straightforward and character-focused run. While there are stranger elements, such as when Casey and Terry None (a woman) have a biological son together and the cult that wants to transport itself inside Crazy Jane, at its core Way’s run was about the characters moving forward with their lives and Casey finding a place on the team. This introduction is great for setting that up, especially since some of the poetic narration is actually literally true, which was a very unexpected twist.

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7. “Batman punches people in the face”, Batman (2016) #53

Tom King’s Batman run is a thoroughly mixed bag, but it has moments of brilliance. One such moment is during the “Cold Days” arc, where Mr. Freeze is on trial after being captured by Batman, and a jury discusses his potential conviction. All are in favour of a guilty verdict but one — Bruce Wayne, who laments Gotham’s worship of Batman. This moment is probably the best culmination of Tom King’s Batman run up until this point, and gave real hope that his run would recover after the controversial wedding issue.

With Mr. Freeze arrested and on trial, Gotham’s jury is quick to label him as guilty despite the lack of evidence. Bruce attributes this to Gotham’s hero worship of Batman that he compares to worship of a god, because of the jurors’ perception of Batman is all-knowing, with his will having power over life and death. When asked what Batman means to him, Bruce tells the jurors that after his parents’ deaths, Batman was something he could believe in to keep him going, something he could rely on to always be there and save him. Not anymore; now that being Batman has taken Catwoman away from him, Bruce has become disillusioned with Batman.

This moment, as understated as it is, does a wonderful job paying off what had come in King’s Batman run. Bruce’s suicidal nature, his reliance on Batman as a means of achieving peace, his own obsession to keep fighting as Batman and the recent dissolution of his engagement with Catwoman resulting from his need to be miserable in order to be Batman, it’s all wonderfully played off by this moment that gives the readers a peak into how his breakup has shaken his foundation and made him doubt Batman. King’s run has a lot of flaws, but every now and then it delivered a powerhouse moment.

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6. “A man shouldn’t…”, Redneck #16

Redneck‘s core concept is relatively simple: vampires in the South of America. Donny Cates milks this for all its worth, with engaging characters and interesting lore. But what makes Redneck great is the characters, and how Cates is able to imbue them with a real sense of life. After a long string of tragedies, Cates gives his characters a few issues to breathe, and the result is one of the best scenes of the 2010s that deftly defies expectations.

The central family of the Bowmans is given a chance to breathe after their home is destroyed, they are betrayed from within and their generosity almost gets them killed. One character who is given a bit of a spotlight is Greg, who we learn is gay and who has a cute fling with minor character Winny. They talk about it becoming more when the patriarch of the Bowmans, his father JV, walks in on the two. What follows Greg trying to calm his father down, who walks away in shock, and Greg assumes his dad isn’t okay with his sexuality and ends up verbalising it for the first time ever… and it turns out his dad was more shocked because, well, he just saw his son after said son had just fucked someone. The two bond for a bit and JV says Greg should do whatever makes him happy.

The scene is just a really heart-warming moment and well-done, in addition to playing with expectations. The southern dad having a problem with his son’s homosexuality is pretty played out, but this series has its roots in the south, from its characters to its dialogue, so it wouldn’t be out of place for that trope to be played straight — especially given that JV is very old. But Cates defies expectations — and rather than think that is what makes a good story, actually does something with it, delivering what one of my favourite gay scenes of the 2010s. Cates gets a lot of praise for his narratives, but I don’t think his dialogue and character work gets as much praise as it deserves.

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5. “Everything lives”, Secret Wars (2015) #9

Jonathan Hickman’s multi-series Marvel saga is a sight to behold. A grand story told across multiple series, spanning the entire Marvel Multiverse, the sheer scale of it is unprecedented and expertly executed. Secret Wars (2015) was the culmination of his Marvel work, but rather than a gigantic event that stood on its own, it — for better or worse — served as the grand finale to his saga and specifically an ending to his Fantastic Four run. Taken like that, it hits it out of the park.

Secret Wars (2015) follows the birth and destruction of Battleworld, a patchwork world created from the remnants of the multiverse by Doctor Doom. Doom saved what he could, but has taken to ruling over everything with an iron fist, and a surviving Reed Richards ends up fighting him for the right to fix the world — at great risk, possibly destroying what remains. The fight ends when Doom admits that Reed would have done a better job, and the Molecule Man ends the fight and gives Reed the power. There’s an epilogue where Valeria Richards explains what happened, but the last scene is of a smiling Victor von Doom, mask removed and face restored by his friend Reed.

This ending is a perfect ending to the themes of Hickman’s Fantastic Four run. The idea of believing in the future and not being fearful of saving what’s left, but instead building what comes next is the given a literalisation in the final battle between Reed and Victor. Reed and Franklin rebuild the multiverse together as one last act of father-son bonding, after the theme of fatherhood was so central to Hickman’s run. And, finally, Reed proves himself the better man, that his morality is what makes him who he is, as he gives Victor one last gift and a new lease on life, setting up stories for the future. This ending is so emblematic of all things good about Hickman that it was the perfect note for him to leave the universe on… but then he came back and reinvigorated the X-Men, and that’s also a great thing.

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4. “How could I ever forget you?”, DC Universe: Rebirth #1

It wasn’t too long ago that DC Universe: Rebirth #1 released and heralded the return of much of what made the pre-Flashpoint DCU so great. A return of love, legacy and optimism, Rebirth truly revitalised DC’s comics and moved things forward, while not neglecting the past. And it all took the form of the Flash fan from Blue Valley, Nebraska coming home.

After years of questionable output from DC, Rebirth was the much-promoted revitalisation of the line. It was leaked that Wally would be returning, but given that it’s literally the premise of the issue, it doesn’t really affect the comic — in fact, it probably got more people excited for the relaunch than anything (especially since they teased his return beforehand but excluded him from the Rebirth panel). And when Wally finally returned, it was glorious. Wally traverses the New 52 and laments the loss of what fans loved, while simultaneously embracing the new. And after Linda fails to remember him in this issue, Wally goes to say goodbye to Barry in a heartfelt monologue, and it’s possible this really was going to be the end for Wally, but then he’s saved from the Speed Force.

Wally is the perfect character to usher in the Rebirth era. He is a character defined by his connection to the Flash legacy, whose love for his wife Linda has saved him on countless occasions and he’s a character who has never been defined by the tragedy in his life. Wally is the character that was all about moving forward, embracing the new — he represents what was so great about the DCU. As a long-time Flash and DC fan, this was everything I wanted — essentially an apology for how these two things were treated for most of the 2010s. Johns’ dialogue is sentimental and earnest, and it really resonates as a result. There are a lot of meta moments like this in the 2010s, but this one landed with me the most.

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3. “Did we do a good job, son?”, FF (2011) #23

While Jonathan Hickman is known for his epic scope, I think what doesn’t get enough attention is his keen eye for human emotion. His aforementioned Fantastic Four run spans the multiverse, but at its core is about family. The larger than life scale of his run lends a grandeur to the sentiment, but in the end, the stories are about family — and it all ends with Reed and Sue talking to their son in his bedroom, before he’s gone forever.

There’s comic book science involved, obviously, but an adult Franklin Richards spends the day with his younger self before telling his past parents that he needs to return to his own time. What follows is a heartfelt, earnest scene that anyone who even has a passing interest in parenthood can relate to — Reed and Sue tell Franklin about their worries, their concerns if they did things right, and ask Franklin if they were good parents, and Franklin tells them yes.

Hickman’s Fantastic Four run was about the family, but a running element was Reed and Franklin’s relationship, and how they just aren’t similar. Sue expresses the concerns that a mother would express, but Reed getting to the root of it is a beautiful way for Hickman’s run to end. After he neglected Franklin and they’ve bonded, after he gained a broader view of his children, he’s finally able to reconcile his parenting with every other part of him.

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2. “You’re the fastest man alive!”, The Flash (2016) #50

Yes, another Wally West moment. After Wally returned in DC Universe: Rebirth #1, it was assumed by many that he would be given a greater role in the DC Universe. Instead, he appeared in a mediocre-to-bad Titans series where nobody seemed to know what to do with him. After several badly received stories, Wally was returned to the Flash book, where he was given a lot of prominence and importance, and Joshua Williamson showed a strong love and affinity for the character. Then came “Flash War”, a story that I dreaded for its tagline of “there can only be one fastest man alive”, and anyone familiar with DC’s heavily contrasting treatments of Wally West and Barry Allen can tell you why.

However… “Flash War” was great. It mined Flash lore for interesting ideas, tackled the plot point of Wally’s forgotten children when it seemed like writers forgot about them, and delivered a triumphant moment of Wally. As Barry and Wally start losing sight of a Speed Force-empowered Hunter Zolomon, Barry speaks the words that we all knew to be true — that Wally is the fastest man alive. Wally catches up to Hunter and, in a way that gets to the core of the character and what the Flash legacy means to him and to readers, defeats Hunter.

The epilogue issue that followed was also great, with some great meta-commentary, but I’m keeping it to one issue per series. So, make it an honourable mention. And sure, what followed “Flash War” for Wally was terrible and speaks of how badly creators can screw up characters, but for a brief time, Wally West was where he belonged — with his family, as the fastest man alive. Instead of Titans encouraging him to let go of his memories, The Flash has him embrace them and his past, because that’s what makes him who he is.

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1. “Dawn”, Silver Surfer (2016) #14

Dan Slott’s Silver Surfer run is a joyful ride through the strangeness of space and is a soaring tribute to the Silver Age. However, at its core, Silver Surfer is about the relationship between Norrin Radd, the Sentinel of the Spaceways, and Dawn Greenwood, an average girl from Earth. This moment typifies that in the best way possible.

After Norrin and Dawn travel to before the Big Bang, they are stranded and decide to live their lives there. They get married and Dawn eventually passes away from old age, and Norrin doesn’t. As the old universe dies, Norrin travels through the event and ends up in the current universe once again, throwing Dawn’s essence into the Big Bang, creating the signature red and black dots of the power cosmic from her ladybug motif. Later, we see that every species has the same word for the sun rising: “Dawn”.

This moment is a perfect ending to a perfect run. It is goofy and weird, but also epic and heart-warming, paying tribute to Jack Kirby’s art and honing in on what made this run so great. If Dan Slott’s Silver Surfer was a tribute to the Silver Age, this moment is a testament that, for all the high concepts and strangeness, the Silver Age was about joy and wonderment.

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There you have it, my personal best comic book moments of the 2010s. Probably nobody is going to agree with me on these, but these are the ones I liked the most. There were others, but I had to be a bit strict, so this is what is left. Hopefully the 2020s will have just as many good moments, and of just as high a quality. But I don’t know, I don’t have 2020 vision.

(Sorry).

As the decade comes to a close, I've decided to look at the best moments in comic books from the 2010s, a decade which delivered some of my favourite moments in comics. So far, I've looked at the biggest shake-ups in comics status quos in the 2010s. Of course, I think those were important.

[pupcrimes]

gasp,,,, i just checked liett's tag and,,,,,, my heart,,,,, can you maybe tell us some more abt him?? im sorry im just.... so intrigued.... bab eby,,,,

sure, I’d love to talk about him! Líett is my Jedi Knight. He’s an easygoing, tenderhearted kind of person, always willing to lend a hand or give a hug or just be there with a person if they needed some company. He’s pretty much what my idea of a perfect jedi would be: kind, understanding, emotionally open, loving and honest, with an affinity for the Living Force.

He grew up in the lower levels of Coruscant, pretty much raised himself - he doesn’t remember much about his mother, and his father died when he was maybe six or seven. He managed to survive by endearing himself to the locals, offering to help people with moving or running errands for them, things like that. He actually became pretty well-known for his helpfulness, though the rumor mill liked to focus more on his friendship with the entertainers at Skol’s Pleasure Palace, a local bordello where people down on their luck could find work in dancing and prostitution. Lee pretty much adopted them as his family and, even though he’s seen people come and people go, he still holds to it that they are his family and keeps in contact with them whenever he can.

Though he’d been on Coruscant for as long as he could remember, Líett wasn’t discovered by the Jedi until he was 11 or 12. By that point, he had already found a lightsaber crystal and, not knowing what it was but feeling inexplicably drawn to it, wore it on a necklace to keep it close to his heart. When the Jedi who’d discovered him explained what it was, Líett decided to go with them to the temple to start learning about the Force and how he and every other thing connected to it.

It was during his time at the Temple that Líett’s fascination with plants truly blossomed. Though he came to enjoy life at the Temple, it wasn’t what Lee truly wanted for himself. So, after almost two years of studying with the Jedi, at thirteen years old, Lee put in the request to join the Order’s Agricultural Corps. It was while he was with AgriCorps that Lee to met the man who would become his first Jedi master, Tendo Wran. Unfortunately, their time together was cut short when, two years later, Coruscant was invaded by Sith forces and Wran was killed in the chaos. Months later, Amiri Ziven, one of Wran’s close friends and a former apprentice of Orgus Din, asked Líett to become her first padawan. Líett accepted.

For seven years, they traveled the galaxy and trained together. Ziven taught Líett advanced lightsaber combat alongside the philosophy of the Living Force, their lessons usually a bit on the chaotic side – Ziven was very much a Jedi of action, with a tendency to stumble into trouble-in-progress, so sometimes their lessons would be shouted over the noise of blaster fire or during a high-speed chase… not that Lee was complaining, much. However, this came to an end when Ziven decided to leave the Jedi Order, and so Líett was called to Tython to continue his training, where he met Orgus Din and then became his padawan and yeah, vanilla class story stuff, don’t really remember how it all goes since I’ve only played it once and it’s been a while, but Lee becomes a Jedi Master at age 26 or something like that, so that’s cool.

Fast forward to Shadow of Revan, and Líett meets Aric Jorgan while they’re both working in the Yavin Coalition. At first, Aric’s a bit skeptical of Lee’s competence in battle since Lee doesn’t really give the impression that he’s a Jedi Battlemaster, but he’s quickly swayed when they come across their first set of enemies. After that, Aric is Interested with a capital I. He and Lee become fast friends; Lee shows Aric the benefits of meditation and Aric points out plants while he’s on patrol with Líett just to hear Lee talk about them. Even after the Yavin Coalition parts ways, Lee and Aric remain in contact, though they don’t start dating for another two years. One of their first dates is actually at the celebration of my Havoc Squad sniper oc Yaro Zhedovi marrying Elara Dorne, so of course Yaro teases her commander about how the two of them share an anniversary.

Then, later on, sometime during KoTFE, Líett meets Dego and the two of them really hit it off, much to Aric’s chagrin, and there’s a lot to unpack about this whole dynamic so I’m gonna skip to the happy part: the three of them all manage to work it out and become a happy little triad. It takes like four years to get there, but it does happen, and that’s what’s important.

that’s probably waaaaaaay more than you were expecting but i’ve got a lot of info about my ocs and once i started i just couldn’t stop! and believe me when i say i could keep going because really, i love lee a whole lot and im happy someone took an interest in him! so thank you!!

[forthemultiverse]

Come Back To Me - Jason Todd x Reader

So I read a post about the nickname Jaybird and got inspired. Requests are coming soon 😊

“Jaybird…” your voice was tired, and you just hoped he could still hear you.

Every Robin has their Batgirl, every Batgirl has their Robin. You didn’t make the rules, and Bruce hadn’t even noticed the pattern until Damian complained about his lack of partner’s. 

“They all have an advantage!” Damian stuck his nose in the air whilst trying to prove how he was the best Robin.

“Maybe if you were a little bit nicer, people would want to work with you.” Stephanie rolled her eyes.

“You can’t beat the first Robin, Dami.” Dick ruffled the boy’s hair and smiled.

“Um! I only had to give up the mantle because you gave it to him, and you got fired! Prooves I’m number one!” Tim pointed out.

“(Y/N)?” Damian noticed your lack of interest in the conversation. “You were Batgirl once.”

“Yeah?” you turned up from the computer and raised an eyebrow. You didn’t think this conversation should involve you. You weren’t Batgirl for long, and you’d even given up the game for a bit. 

“Who’s the best Robin?” Tim looked at what you’d been doing and corrected a few of mistakes whilst asking. You nodded your thanks but still weren’t too invested in their little competition. 

“You really want my opinion on that?” 

“You’ve worked with all of us as Robin.” Tim shrugged

“So’s Babs,”

“But she’s Grayson biased.” Dick shot Damian a look.

“Yeah, I guess I can’t be biased…”

“Jaybird, please…” Tim had hacked the Red Hood Helmet for you, knowing you might be able to get through to him.

“What do you think you’re doing!” a young you yelled out of your bedroom’s balcony door. The garden attatched to your house was large, and the balcony gave you a perfect view of the stars, your manor located just outside Gotham’s Clouds. Your parents had built the house there for that reason. They wanted the sun to always be shining on them. They didn’t bother with the night time, they work in the morning and flights abroad to catch. They didn’t know you could barely sleep in the practically empty house, or that you’d stay up all night reading with the balcony door open. “Is that man bleeding!”

Robin was just under the balcony, attempting to drag a large and cloaked man across your lawn. A large and cloaked man, who you suddenly realised was Batman.

“Oh my god, you have to let me help!” you slid on to the other side of the railing and hoped to the nearest tree. You’d snuck out enough times to know you’d be down in a minute. The years of gymnastics and self-defence you parents had put you in to give you something todo paying off in unexpected ways. 

You put yourself under one of Batman’s shoulders and helped to support his weight.

“What…?” Robin couldn’t finish the sentence and you didn’t let him.

“I can help.”

“How?”

“There’s no way you can get him wherever you’re going. This is my house, I can get you in and you can call whoever you need to.” 

You put the backdoor code in and Robin followed. You could tell he was conflicted, even if you couldn’t see much of his face, but he was definitely out of options. Whilst he phoned someone, you started to bandage up the Dark Knight as best you could. Putting pressure to stop the blood flow.

“How do you do that?” Robin asked you carefully, coughing slightly like he was trying to change his voice.

“Common knowledge?”

“That’s not common knowledge, and I’m rolling my eyes by the way.”

“Whatever, Birdboy.”

“Robin.”

“Birdboy.” if he was going to be rude, so were you.

“Jaybird, listen to my voice.” You were too far from the fight to save anyone, but you were still going to try, dragging your suit on as you spoke.

“Who’s that?” Jason asked Bruce, pointing to you as you arrived at the Wayne Gala with your parents.

“(Y/N)(Y/L/N). Her parents are in charge of international relations with the company I’ve just partnered with to support this Charity.” Bruce nodded to your parents, “Why?”

“Nothing.”

“Do you have a crush, Jason?”

“No!” Jason scowled

“Miss (Y/N) was the one who helped Jason the other night when you were bleeding out Master Bruce,” Alfred explained. Jason glared slightly, he hadn’t exactly told Bruce he’d gotten a civilian involved.

“You got a random person involved?”

“She caught me trying to get you back to the Manor and I didn’t have an option. I phoned Alfred who phoned Leslie to come and patch you up properly,” he mumbled.

“You should talk to her,” Bruce suggested.

“Why?”

“You’ll be seeing her at all of these events and she’s one of the few people your age.” 

“Jaybird, listen to my voice, stop for just a second to listen.” The gunshots were still being fired and Bruce was running out of options. Tim was already on the floor, and if Jason couldn’t hit Bruce, he’d shoot Tim. 

You caught the fist of the thug and flipped him, despite him being double your size. You were not about to hand over anything to him, and you were not going to wait for someone to save you. Placing your hand on the pressure point on the back of his neck, you lowered him carefully to the floor and took his knife. You tossed it into the trash, making sure it dropped to the very bottom. He could try and get it back, but he wasn’t going to see it anytime soon. 

“Smooth,” Robin said, dropping into the alley and examining the passed out man. 

“We have to stop meeting like this.” you joked. This was about the sixth time you’d met Robin in the past month. Ever since you’d started swim training at a later time in the evening, people kept trying to jump you whilst you waited for your taxi. He’d arrive just after you’d kicked the amateur criminals butt and sometime’s he’d even help you out.

“You need to stop putting yourself at risk.” he wasn’t saying it out of kindness, he spoke bitterly.

“Then you need to get here quicker.”

“Why don’t you just wait at the sports centre?”

“Where’s the fun in that.”

“Well, Batman wants to talk to you.”

“You don’t sound too happy about it…should I be worried Bird Wonder?”

“Robin.”

“Bird Wonder.”

“Jaybird! Stop, think about what you’re doing!” You were getting desperate. You needed to get through to him. Jason had meant so much to you before he died, and you’d thought you’d meant something to him. You’d been Batgirl and Robin. 

“I did pretty well for my first night.” You smiled, swinging to the floor in the Batgirl suit. Batgirl was a lot more fun than any other activity you’d started to give you something to do. Your parents were good parents, but they were distant and busy, and you were getting a bit sick waiting around for them every day. The company they worked for helped people, and you wanted to help people too. As Batgirl you could.

“Sure.” Robin scowled, sending you a glance as you landed int he Batcave. Batman had let the two of you go out alone for your first night. He called it teambuilding. Robin didn’t seem so onboard with the idea of you, you’d put up with it all night. Finally, you were done trying to be nice. 

“I’m not going to replace you.” you snapped, knowing exactly why he wasn’t being nice. It was written all over his face from the moment Batman said he wanted you to be Batgirl. 

“Obviously,” he growled

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I’m Robin!” he held out his hands in one big gesture. “You’re just some rich girl who got bored and was in the right place at the right time. From your list of other ‘clubs’, it’s obvious that you get bored and give up. You’ll get bored of this too, and go back to your balcony in your big house and I’ll still be here.”

“Whatever chip you have on your shoulder, don’t you dare take it out on me. Yeah, I am just some rich girl, but Batman wanted my help. I’m good at this, and I’m not giving up. So either get on board or get out of my way before someone gets hurt because your ego can’t take a partner. Maybe Batman wanted me because you need to learn how to work with people. I’m not replacing you, and you’re not getting rid of me. We don’t need to like each other, but we need to have each other’s back - can your attitude problems do that or am I going to have to fight alone out there, Birdie? 

“What is it with you and nicknames?”

“Their fun.” you shrugged.

“I don’t like them.”

“You will.”

“Jaybird! I know this isn’t you, and I know the real you is in their and can hear me.” Batgirl and Robin was just the brink of your relationship. Batgirl and Robin were what the public saw. You’d both been so much more than that. You’d been Jason and (Y/N). You’d drive each other crazy in just the right way. 

“You okay, Birdbrain?” You joined him on the roof of some building in Gotham. Batman wasn’t out that evening, and your parents were at a gala you definitely didn’t want to attend. Robin had become better with you after the first month together. He wasn’t an actual one hundred percent asshole. From what you could tell, he just had very big replacement anxiety and attachment problems.

“Don’t you have somewhere to be tonight?”

“Nope, why?”

“Just figured you were busy…”

“So, we know you know who I am, am I ever going to know who you and Bats are?”

No response. That hurt you a little bit. A lot actually. But it didn’t matter, you both were patrolling the city. You had better things to do, and it wasn’t like you thought Robin would tell you, take his mask off, and exchange real numbers or anything. The question was always going to be a long shot, you just wanted a face.

That entire patrol was extremely tense, not between you guys but the city. It was like it knew Batman wasn’t there and decided to go crazy. But crazy in a small way. No big name criminals trying to blow building up, just constant bank robbery attempts and thug violence on civilians. You were both tired, you were both becoming sloppy, and Robin currently had a gun shoved at the base of his head.

“Trust me?” you asked him, the criminal smiling like an idiot thinking he’d won. He nodded slowly and you threw the Batarang into his thigh. Robin shrunk down in pain and the criminal stepped back in shock. You fired two at him, using the distraction you’d caused. He was pinned to the wall and you tied him up, calling the police to his location. 

“Quick thinking…” Robin said, biting down on his lip.

“You can cry, I won’t judge.”

“I could’ve ducked.”

“Because you can duck faster than he can shot.”

“Good point.” he stood up straighter and rubbed the cut. “You didn’t throw them very hard.”

“I wasn’t actually trying to hurt you. Pain wearing off?”

“Yeah, It’ll sting for a bit.”

“But it won’t leave a scar.” You assured him. You had only thrown it hard enough to make actually reach him, nothing else. You barely ever throw a punch with the intention too truly hurt someone. Batman said you and Robin balanced each other out. You only punched as hard as you had too to get the point across, Robin punched with everything he had, he was trying to prove his point too much. Too little meant people underestimate you and too much meant Robin could go too far.

You both returned to the cave, calling it a night and hoping the police could deal with anything else that might happen.

“Jason,” Robin said when you landed in the cave

“What?”

“Jason Todd,” he took off the mask. “It’s unfair for you not to know.”

“Aer you warming up to me!”

“No!”

“Oh my god, you are! This is breakthrough!” You declared, ignoring the fact that it meant Bruce freaking Wayne was Batman. 

“Don’t make it into something.”

“But I’m going too.” You tried to ignore how cute his face was, slightly regretting seeing it now. 

“I regret this already,” he complained

“No take backs!”

“Jaybird!” you were pleading into the helmet. Swinging across the city and trying to find them. 

“It’s working.” Bruce sent a text through the comm system, not wanting Jason to know you were being used as a tool against him. “You’re messing with his head.”

That’s where you and Bruce were different, you didn’t want to be a tool, you didn’t want to mess with his head any more than it already had been. You wanted to help your Jason. 

“Jason!” you yelled, seeing him at the Gotham Academy gates. He made eye contact with you and tensed up. Two of his friends were with him but you still ran towards him. 

“(Y/N),” he looked at his friends quickly before focusing back on you.

“Pretty girl…” one of them whispered, bright red when you looked at him. 

“I saw you and thought I’d say hey.” you didn’t go to Gotham Academy. Your parents sent you to an all-girls school that worked on the idea that girls thrived without distractions. 

“Hey.” he was glaring at his friend’s awestruck faces. “What are you doing here?”

“Our school’s coming to some lecture going on here today.”

“Oh yeah, Bruce signed me up for it I think.”

“That’s cool, none of my friend’s are here, so can I sit with you?”

You motioned to the gaggle of girls behind you, a few staring at the boys like they were some foreign currency, some looked overly bored, some were just dismissive. 

“Sure.” you gasped, “Don’t look so surprised. We are friends and you asked.” you smiled at that. No way were you going to let him forget that he’d said it, you were tempted to make him say it again so you could record it and make it his Robin ringtone. 

“You are both witnesses for when he tries to claim he doesn’t like me!” the boys nodded their heads in unison, still awestruck by you. Jason snapped his fingers in their faces, neither of them reacting. He looked at you again, thinking over the pretty comment It was true, you were very pretty, and you were trying so hard with him even though he’d been so cold towards you at the start. And you were clever, and you called him annoying names, and you were his Batgirl. His. You’d had no connection to Batman before him, and you never tried to compare him to Dick. 

He did not have a crush on you. Not at all. Defintiely not. 

“See you later then…Jaybird.” you winked and disappeared, leaving him unsure of what to actually do with himself.

“Jaybird, my Jaybird. You can stop this. I’m nearly there, wait for me, I can help you the way I always did.” you were so close to Bruce’s location, so close to him. You hadn’t wanted to believe that Red Hood was Jason, that he was killing people and screaming for blood, but it made sense. Jason had loved Bruce. He’d thought of Bruce as his family. His real family until his ‘mum’ reappeared. You’d seen him as Red Hood, with the helmet off. His helmet hair looking annoyingly perfect but his eyes crazy and unfocused. Bruce had made you take a step back, he didn’t want you to be at risk. 

“Something’s different Alfred.” Bruce raised an eyebrow at you and Jason, who were out in the Garden and reading together. Your legs layered on top of each other and the occasional rant coming out about something in the story or a character. 

“World’s Best Detective.” Alfred rolled his eyes,

“But what is it…They’ve been different in the field too, making small jokes, choosing to train together, collapsing on the safe after training. They don’t even speak before doing some kind of trick. They just do it. She lept off a building yesterday. I caught them doing homework together…Kids don’t do homework.”

“Jason is exceptional at school, you know that Master Bruce. He loves it and they trust each other.”

“No, this is more than trust.”

“World’s Best Detective.” Alfred repeated, shaking his head, “You honestly need me to tell you what it is?”

“Is it that obvious?”

“Yes.”

“Then what?”

“They’re, what the kids say, crushing.”

“Crushing…” he paused, “Crushing!” he spun round to stare at them again, suddenly noticing the small happy looks Jason was giving you as he tapped your leg lightly and the laugh you gave him as you swatted his knee. “

“Jaybird…” your voice was tired, and you just hoped he could still hear you.

“Jaybird?” You asked, opening your balcony door as he tapped it. You’d been sleeping, and hadn’t expected to be woken by him - at least not in normal clothes. You guys had plenty of late night talks in costume, often after Bruce had sent you both to bed he’d make sure you got home and then you’d talk for about an hour. It was a nice little thing you’d developed. 

“I’m going to my mum,” he said, rubbing his arm and pacing up and down the balcony as you leant on the railing.

“Really?” You’d heard him talk about his mum being alive, you’d seen him and Bruce arguing, you’d seen how the Dynamic Duo didn’t seem to fit together anymore.

“Yeah, I can’t deal with it anymore. I need to know, I have to go, I’m done with Bruce and his complaints and standards and comparisons. I’m done living in that stupid Manor and having the whole damn thing for literally two people, I’m done with everything and I can’t stay here.” he sounded stressed - like he was going to break down at any second.

“That’s…” you didn’t know how to respond. You didn’t want him to leave, you wanted him to stay and be your Robin. “Are you sure.”

“Everything here sucks, it isn’t me and I don’t want it to be. It can all burn,” you knew he was angry but it still hurt. He caught your eye and groaned. “I didn’t mean that at all.”

“Go, Jason, go find your mum.” you nodded slowly. You didn’t say it angrily or accusingly, he didn’t need that and you wouldn’t have your last conversation with him before he left as an argument. 

“I didn’t mean you.”

“I know…” you nodded with full sincerity. 

“You cut me too much slack.”

“No I don’t.” you sighed, “I just care about you enough to let the small things slide.”

“I care about you too,” he whispered. “I mean, I’m an idiot, I was so awful to you at the start.”

“You grew up though, grew out of it.” you pointed out.

“I grew up.” he smiled at you. A soft smile he’d only ever let you see. “I grew up and realised how awesome you were and how much I needed you in my life, even though I hate the Jaybird nickname and would rather you called me literally anything else. But it’s you, so it’s okay, because you’re perfect, and I had to do one last thing before I left, and I wouldn’t have killed myself later on if I didn’t just get up the courage to do it, I mean I’m leaving anyway so what’s there to lose.”

He stopped pacing, turning and walking straight towards you, kissing you before you had a chance to ask what his one last thing was. He kissed you softly and carefully, placing his hands on your back as yours slipped perfectly around his neck.

“Jace -” you pulled away for a second only to lean back in and continue kissing him. 

When you did finally pull away properly, he disappeared without a word. You were sad, but you understood and you didn’t blame him. He needed to find his mum, and if he stopped to talk to you, you’d end up giving his a reason to stay. So you let him go, assuming he’d come back to you eventually, once he’d done everything he had to.

The gun was pointing at Bruce, shaking slightly, but the bloodlust made it clear he wasn’t going to miss. He was about to pull the trigger when you came crashing through the door.”

“Jace!” you screamed,  it killed you so much to finally see him again. Seeing him like this. Broken and insane. He was in pain, and there wasn’t anything you could do to help him. “Come back to me, Jace!” you begged, weak and about to cry.

The gun dropped to the floor and he looked at you. He was panting, his entire body shaking, his eyes becoming clearer. He was angry, confused, and silent. He didn’t say anything, you didn’t move any closer. He left without a word. He left you. He left you again. Disappearing out of the window before you could say anything to make him stay.

[lizartgurl]

These Were The Moments Never To Be Forgotten... [My Young Justice Secret Santa fic for @fight-me-boi]

So I am a terrible person for getting this done so late, but it’s not New Year’s yet! @fight-me-boi, I was your Secret Santa this year. I had a lot of fun with your ideas and I wanted to include as many as possible, which ended up not happening. But I still loved writing this [Fluff, morning routine, bonding, day-off-ish], and I hope that you love reading this too.

*takes place druing the five years in-between seasons one and two*

Dick loved sleeping over at the cave.

It was noisy when he woke up, compared to just him, Bruce, and Jason in separate rooms of a Manor a mile long. At the cave, Gar, Wally, and Jason would try to see who could get up earliest and choose which video game to play before the others woke up.

This tirade of competition and friendly insults- directed either at the competitors or the choice of game being played- served as the soundtrack for everyone else as they were awakened, and filed into the kitchen for breakfast.

Alfred made incredible meals, of that there was no doubt. But Dick loved being able to pitch in and help M'gann and everyone else make breakfast. It was like another team exercise, only much more delicious.

Then the guys would all jockey for a position at the sink or the showers, while the girls took things in a much more organized way, passing the toothpaste and brushing each other’s hair.

Maybe it was a guy thing, but Nightwing enjoyed the organized chaos the could never come within a mile radius of the Bat-Cave. Articles of clothing strewn over the back of the couch. Dishes left in the sink with the empty promise of loading the dishwasher later. Gobs of toothpaste littering the sink. Video cases and game consoles somehow winding up in the garage with the spare parts for the motorcycles, and the pencils used for schoolwork mysteriously disappearing into thin air.

(Dick solved that particular mystery a month ago- Wolf was hoarding all the pencils to make his puppies pay attention to him).

After breakfast came the actual training exercise, whether in uniform or workout clothes. Black Canary worked them to the bone, but at least that was better than Batman's glare of disapproval when Wally proved severely disappointing in tactics.

Martian Manhunter taught disguise. Superman's training sessions were just him telling them a story about some old couple he met while on  hero-duty as a reminder to be compassionate to the people they saved (Connor decked anyone who talked during Superman’s stories).

Artemis and Rocket had been disappointed at first when Wonder Woman said she wasn't there to teach them secret Amazonian fighting tips, but everyone found her lessons on world culture fascinating, and certainly more informative than anything they learned in Public School Social Studies.

And then after training, if there were no crises that needed to be handled by an undercover covert ops team of extremely volatile meta-teens, the team hit the harbor.

Hoodies and shades all around, they looked like a gang until they walked into the fifties dinner and ordered about a dozen milkshakes with fries to dip in them.

They were probably the only reason that the Bowl-r-Rama was still in business at the time. twice  a week almost twenty teenagers trooped into the building still stuck in the sixties, playing the Jackson Five as Mal shot a strike down the center of his alley, to be promptly rewarded by a kiss from Karen. At which Megan would cover Gar’s eyes to protect his innocence, even though everyone knew she and Connor were just as bad. Chuckling, Dick covered Jason’s eyes, just to make it equal for the two boys.

Babs and Artemis would tease the two of them as they hopped up next, signature yellow and green balls in hand, just before Kal’s cell went off, and everyone would groan.

Mission.

“He promised that there wouldn’t be a mission today!” Wally whined, yanking his jacket on.

“Since when does the world stay saved for very long,” Raquel grinned.

With the growth of the team, it was rare to have all team members aboard the bioship at once.  It was quite unnecessary to have such a big team, and the load slowed down the bioship considerably. Still, it was more fun to go on a mission all together, all cozy and close in their seats, and Nightwing found the backup and security extremely comforting.

Still, no matter how many members went out, someone always came back with some sort of injury.

Aqualad would berate himself for getting injured, they always would in one way or another, but with their leader, everyone seemed to notice it a bit more.

Dick was just grateful that no one had died. Gar ignored M’gann’s pleas to stay in bed and rest up, but he insisted on getting better. He wouldn’t let that happen to him again. He would train harder, get better, get faster.

Dick watched and shook his head from the shadows of the training room as the green boy hit and kicked at thin air, his injuries throwing him off-balance.

“Your form is off,” Piped a voice that always seemed to be carrying anger. Jason- Robin to everyone but Rick and Babs- stepped out of the hall.

The two were the youngest on the team, Jason a year Garfield’s senior. They were just barely allowed to go on missions, but the argument stood that experience was one of the best ways to train.

Gar pretended that he hadn’t been holding back tears. “What?” He asked.

“You’re unbalanced. Upset.”

“How would you know. You’re so mad all the time.” Beast Boy pointed out.

“Yeah,” Jason snorted, owning the fact, “But Batman’s teaching me to center my anger, to focus, and use it, not to let it distract me from the fight.”

“Huh.” Gar had run out of comebacks.

The angry boy walked up to the green boy, positioning his arms and legs just so.

“Center yourself,” He repeated. Dick chuckled softly to himself, detecting a hint of gruffness in the boy’s voice that mimicke Bruce’s. No matter how much the second Robin pouted about Batman, he really looked up to the dark knight.

He left the two swinging fists and grunting, heading for the kitchen, where he found smoke, and the circle of his closest friends.

“Should we let Gar go on missions anymore?” M’gann asked, her voice a high-pitched squeak as she pulled her fifth tray of burnt cookies out of the oven. “I know he has powers, but he’s so young, he’s so untrained-”

“He’s learning, though,” Wally pointed out, absentmindedly gnawing a lump that was supposed to resemble chocolate-chip.

“But the question still remains; is there an age limit, despite training or prowess or experience, that should keep people from joining missions?

“I am not saying that it should prohibit anyone from joining the team. They can join and we can train them until an appropriate age, without sending them out into the field.” Kaldur clarified.

“Are we really going to be raising a bunch of child soldiers?” Artemis asked, thoroughly soaking her cookie in a glass of milk.

“You guys know Gar won’t like it if we try to make him stay behind while we go off on a mission. And Robin would be even worse.” Connor pointed out.

“And you’re forgetting something very important,” Nightwing strode across the room, stroking an invisible beard on his clean-shaven beard.

“And what would that be, o wise one?” Wally asked sarcastically.

Dick grinned as he sipped his glass of milk. “You guys do remember how we started this whole thing, right?”

Kaldur sighed, and Wally grinned half-heartedly.

“By denying a bunch of authority figures, we know,” Zatanna said, lounged across the couch reading a book, appearing as if she wasn’t paying attention.

Dick nodded to the oven, just in time for M’gann to take out her first perfect batch of the day.

“If we keep Gar and Jason from missions, they might do the same to us.”

“So we keep them with us, where we can keep an eye on them.” M’gann said.

Raquel sat up, pointing her cookie at the Martian. “Okay, now you’re starting to sound like the League.”

M’gann clasped a hand over her mouth, a faint pink blush coloring her cheeks as she smiled sheepishly.

“I guess, now I know what Uncle J’onn feels, having the responsibility of taking care of someone else on your shoulders.”

“We all do,” Artemis sighed loudly. Try as they might, no one could resist becoming protective of Beast Boy, Robin, or even the two partners of Captain Marvel, who showed up maybe once a month to help out if it was really necessary.

The eight looked at each other with wide eyes at the realization for a long moment, before bursting into laughter.

“Fate, we’re old.” Wally said, shoving three more burnt cookies into his mouth.

Dick nudged his best friend.

“Just wait ‘til we’re in college.”