#it was just kinda there in the background BUT comics themselves have always been with me. theyre a keystone to me i think

[xxplastic-cubexx]

sorry if you've already mentioned but what (re?)ignited your love of comics/x-men/cherik? curious because there are so many different adaptations of them

i think im gonna speak for a few (or a lot of) people when i say that TL;DR the wolverine x deadpool movie that came out this summer is what pulled me back into comics and i COULD leave it there but i will go into excruciating and unnecessary detail instead because i love an origin story and i love oversharing.

under the cut tho because im nice sometimes (there's also wxdp doodles in here. if you want to see that)

ironically (and probably commonly), growing up i was more of an avengers kid. Kinda. Loosely <- binge watched the cartoons and movies and read copious amounts of comics and fics and i am hoarding fanart in my old dresser as we speak ok 'loosely' is a modest lie.

embarrassingly i remember getting into discus cause of captain america LMAO so yeah needless to say i was a Humble Fan- me joining my school's comic class/club didnt help either (shoutout to my teach from that she was the realest one out there for. A Multitude of reasons). she definitely is was inspires me to even draw still and make comics and i often think bout the tips i learned from her class tbh she was great

back to the movies t and comics tho, i got into em because my brother would offer to take me and that's how we'd hang out (i rarely saw movies in theaters and i even more rarely went anywhere as a teenager. still kinda like that today tbh ooops) and yk. it just snowballed after that.

my brother and i have always liked comics- he just more than me for a while (though he still very much loves comics and As We Know From My Posts we still talk about them whenever i see him To An Exhausting Degree)

durin then i was really into stony and i have a few surviving doodles i made but those are between me and god. and anyone who asks tbh LOL

'snap can you make this related to x-men again this is long' ok so fast forward to This Summer again I Still Don't Really See Movies but my brother offered to take me and this was the first time i'd actually seen an x-men movie in full

as a kid i only remember seeing the 'perfection' scene between erik and raven in first class while i was channel surfing. pretty sure i changed the channel after seeing mystique naked cause i was scared my parents would get mad at me if they caught me watching it LOL

BUT MOVING ON As A Kid i think it's also natural you'll sometimes watch 92 if it's on And I Did though evidently it didn't stick too hard (i do remember really liking beast and gambit though.... still do really): my knowledge of x-men was. INCREDIBLY sparse. like diabolically so so i didnt have too much expectations (aside from the fact i vaguely liked deadpool beforehand).

tbh i dont know why my bro never took me to see any of the x-men movies. it's not like he doesn't Also like x-men (90% sure nightcrawler's his favorite but my brother will be caught dead saying he has absolute favorites like that)- he owns a bitch load of deadpool comics/omnibus sets too (of which ive read over the years and reread this year) but Shrug moving on

Much Like Most Of The Internet i fell down the rabbit hole that way. i have some doodles i made a couple days after seeing WxDP that i now have an excuse to throw at all of you Look And Perceive

and so. As I Do. i got curious and told myself i'd binge watch all the x-men movies the week before i went back to school And Then I Did ft. My Brother Sometimes and then i said i'd binge watch all of '92 and And I Did That ft. My Brother Sometimes But Less So and now we're here. currently watching Evolution...

once i got to school i realized i lived near a comic shop and started getting into the comics that way (the first ones i got since going down this rabbit hole was Magneto Was Right!, The Resurrection of Magneto, and The Trial of Magneto. if you were curious !!!!! clearly i didnt care too much about context i just needed to see My Guy jelvejlkvj i have no regrets and Evidently ive read more since)

i'm pretty sure what dragged me into cherik specifically was the fact i saw a clip of The Famous ending to 92 where erik's aghast at the notion jean even has to question his love for charles. i think that was what officially had me refocus my lens on them: not a single poolverine thought after that LOL (all the cherik posting i saw on twitter definitely helped too but that was the nail in the coffin for any other interests i had: i was locked into cherik and x-men in general now)

that clip specifically, i was surprised at the fact they- frequently even- have the x-men franchise say erik loves charles and vice versa so bluntly. even if it's not meant to be romantic, i fear im just a fan of how casually the word's thrown around with them two and i got tender bout it all. Then Yk. i just live for the drama. the hilarity even. the sincerity .... they make me sick if i think of them too long so im gonna end it here

before i go tho ironically enough, the first x-men issue i owned was This one (story a this is that while stuck in some wacko dimension charles accidentally gets himself trapped in logan's mind while utilizing his astral projection. if you were curious). pretty sure i got it for free with another comic set i got years ago since our old comic shop loved to do that, but it's poetic aint it. maybe ill doodle something referencing it..

i should probably look into finishing this arc someday im Dummy curious to even know how it started and how it ends.....

[theodoraflowerday]

ok so im seeing quite a bit of upset people over the changes to the ferris wheel scene, and while i understand why people are upset (because like, duh, we all want ace tori and pan michael), i think from the show's perspective it makes a LOT of sense and i liked the change:

one, because it gave good closure to tori's storyline of the season: she is allowed to have close relationships with people who aren't her brother. I think she'd been so worried about charlie that she needed him to remind her that she's her own person and she doesn't have to neglect her own life for his sake. and also I think because she was SO focused on charlie she genuinely thought the lack of "feelings" she was experiencing were entirely because of her stress over the charlie situation and now that he's finally given her the "out" (as a manner of speaking) she can actually think about her life and her feelings for michael for what they are instead of through the lens of a worried sister. so I think it was necessary for her character development.

two, because the events of solitaire did not happen in the show while in the comics michael is already an established character and we know him, in the show he's been there for approximately 5 scenes. so of course he's not going to show up as a fully realized character. remember in the comics how tori is like "surprised neither you nor nick have noticed, bro's kinda obnoxious (affectionate) about it"? yeah well he's interacted with nick once and charlie like three times on screen. and also, he and tori just MET on the show. and this season was also a little busy with darcy, isaac and imogen going on their own sexuality and gender journeys so in my opinion, dropping a michael reveal in the ferris wheel scene would've felt kinda shoehorned (especially because it wouldn't even be michael saying that to charlie, and that tracks in the comics because of their background and bc tori assumed charlie knew, but not in the show bc they barely know each other and tori would essentially be outing him)

i hope hope HOPE we get a season 4 because tori and michael need and deserve a little more breathing room (and again, that's not a failure of this season at ALL, but solitaire not existing in tv verse DOES inform the way their joint storyline was written), and I want nothing more than a full season where they get to know each other better, learn about themselves and each other, and come out to the important people in their lives in their own terms ((and also I just honestly want a sprolden spinoff because I will always be first and foremost a sprolden shooter))

[ectonurites]

Are Tim and Cass Cain actually close in canon? Or is that more of a fanon thing that gained canon status?

Alright, so the tldr answer is that yes pre-reboot they were close—but it wasn't something that happened immediately/right off the bat, it took time, and they didn't always perfectly see eye-to-eye. But like, it's not just some totally fanon thing, they were absolutely close.

I'm using past-tense in the above though because it's like... all the actual content with them becoming/being close is pre-reboot. Anything post-reboot with them either had them back at square one (during N52 stuff) or like, just sort of handwavey 'oh they're close again' without much actual elaboration/explanation. Theoretically nowadays everything's canon again so all the old stuff applies, but as far as I'm aware nothing has really dug all that deep back into the two of them/their dynamic.

Now, to give a brief crash course on Tim & Cass's relationship in canon...

Early on they weren’t all that close because Tim was absolutely intimidated by her & her background and like, in general seemed to just find her kinda off-putting:

(Robin (1993) #73)

However Tim eventually gets over himself & after working side-by-side with her a little bit realizes he shouldn't let being intimidated by her stop them from being friends and working together:

(Batgirl (2000) #18)

After this point they work together on several occasions, definitely communicating much better than in their initial appearances together and clearly getting along well. They're a fun lil duo:

(Superman/Batman Vol. 1 #5, Superboy Vol. 4 #85)

Then… after a while, War Games happens. Gotham goes to shit, Steph dies (well, we nowadays know she didn't really, but they sure were both grieving) and so they both independently move to Blüdhaven, which leads us to the Robin/Batgirl: Fresh Blood crossover. Which has some fun little moments with them:

(Batgirl (2000) #58)

As well as some on the more tense side, as they both navigate mourning Steph and the clashes in their ideologies/approaches to hero work—the fact that Cass wants to be & be like Batman, and the fact that Tim absolutely does not:

(Batgirl (2000) #59)

After the crossover they mostly do their own thing staying out of each other's ways in Blüdhaven—though they do get another little story together in this timeframe in Batman Allies: Secret Files & Origins that sort of rehashes the above conflict during some training together & a team-up.

And we DO also get the cute (and oft-mentioned by the fandom) moment where Tim mentions she frequently breaks into his house to shower & steal rice krispies (just for clarity sake, while fandom almost exclusively calls her 'Cass' largely to avoid confusion with Cassandra 'Cassie' Sandsmark, within the comics themselves both Cassandras get called 'Cass' and 'Cassie' at various points—considering Cass is the one who lives in the same city as Tim at this point in canon, that's definitely who he's talking about here)

(Robin (1993) #138)

So like, at this point they are absolutely comfortable with one another and pretty close, but just, they don't see eye-to-eye on everything so it's not some flawless friendship (and I say friendship specifically because at this point we're still a few years out from them actually becoming siblings). But it's absolutely an interesting dynamic!

Then… after Infinite Crisis we get to the One Year Later/OYL era which is... bad for Cass. Terrible horrible character assassination we all refer to as the 'Evil Cass arc' which began in Tim's book. I don't wanna pull panels from it because it's just... it's bad!!!!!!!!!!!! There's a reason it got retconned into Cass having been brainwashed—because it was bad.

I guess the only thing worth bringing up here in relation to Tim & Cass's relationship though (because as mentioned, Cass gets retconned into it having been brainwashing so anything from her in this era is irrelevant/moot) is the fact that Tim was obviously very upset about the whole situation because Cass is someone he cares about and he even says he considers family.

To fast forward through that mess, when we get to the end of it and the 'oh it was brainwashing haha!' retcon, Tim was the one to have on hand a counter-serum that could free her from Deathstroke's control:

(Teen Titans Vol. 3 #44)

Once Cass is no longer forced to be evil and ooc, she gets a little mini at the end of which Bruce formally offers to adopt her (and Tim, who had earlier been adopted by Bruce, is present for this—so from this point on they go from a more general 'we're like family' to actually 'we are adopted siblings').

Buuuut then Final Crisis & Battle for the Cowl both occur and Cass gets extremely pushed aside by DC, giving up the Batgirl mantle to Steph and heading off to Hong Kong.

At which point we find out that Tim & Cass have actually kept in contact (just... off-panel) during this time when she's been out of Gotham and he's been off doing all sorts of stuff:

(Red Robin #17)

When they see each other in person again, Tim urges her to be a Bat again. Maybe not Batgirl if that's not what she wants, but to wear the symbol and be part of the family. (Which she does take him up on, keeping the suit he brought her and becoming Black Bat).

She pops up again at the end of Red Robin to save Tim & also help him pull off a fake assassination attempt on himself—ya know standard stuff.

And then right before the reboot we get to see them working alongside Damian and Dick in Gates of Gotham, and see one final time that yeah—these two have kept in touch after everything, and are definitely far more on one another's wavelength nowadays than they were back in the 'fresh out of War Games' era:

(Batman: Gates of Gotham #2, #5)

So like, does fanon over exaggerate them and their relationship? Aaaaabsolutely—that’s what fanon does. But they did definitely become close after everything they went through and had a fun dynamic together!

Sadly though, as I mentioned at the start of the post, the n52 wiped everything back to a clean slate. And while nowadays post-Infinite Frontier everyone’s histories have been restored their dynamic has never really been the same again.

[inxamista]

Okay now, imma gonna rant a bunch about x-men 97, Gambit, lazy writing and the culture of "plot twists and shock value" to engage the audience in a show.

So, yeah, spoilers ahead, proceed with caution, etc.

First and foremost: Gambit DID NOT HAVE TO DIE to put Rogue in a spotlight. Actually, this is the whole "Wanda and Vision" story and an actually shitty trope of "the woman who overcomes herself through grief and denial of her love (and, at some degree, her womanhood). Like, it's been done a fucking lot of times already and in each and every new try it just gets stale to me. Now we'll have Rogue grieving and suffering and raging until she overcomes this *bad feelings* and finds her center, sublimating the loss of her one true love. At the top of my head I can tell at least three women heros (and anti-heros) with the same bullcrap background.

Second: Gambit is, and always have been, a fan favorite. Back in the day, he even had his own monthly title with very interesting story arcs. So, killing off *Gambit* has a weight. It has the "WOW! PLOT TWIST!" effect to the show. Like, "oh, game of thrones!" kinda show, "no one is safe" and blah blah blah. Which grants a show buzz, clout and engagement. Look at us: they've killed Gambit two weeks ago and here we are, raging at that, so mission accomplished. Lazy as fuck, but effective, right?

And last, but not least: it's been said by the showrruners themselves that "an important character would die in the 5th episode" (just as mentioned before, quod erst demonstrandum and all) but they were debating who this character would be and weighing their options. And - oh, snap! - they've decided to kill off the Thief Cajun with a no-so-family-friendly backstory. You know, Disney being Disney.

So, yeah. I was stoked to see the X-men again, back in their old glory from my early days and all, but then again, this one show don't seem to me to make those beloved characters of old me justice. It's the times we live in, perhaps.

Gambit is a complex character that goes WAY BEYOND his relationship with Rogue. So is Rogue. But I genuinely think a Disney show won't touch Rogue’s terrorist past, her inner conflicts and debates in a way that will make her real justice. And, about Gambit, they won't even BEGIN to make him justice if being Rogue's love interest and occasional comic relief is all they have in store for him bc his backstory as a thief with shady connections with Sinister and Marauders is off limits.

Maybe he's better off dead on that.

[imagionationstation]

Hi! I read your TMNT 2012 separated au that you made with ellestrade and it really gave me brainworms so I wrote a small one-shot for it! The characters kinda ended up writing themselves haha.

anyways, wanted to share it with you and also make sure that you're okay with it. Not sure how you feel about other people taking inspiration from you ideas, so if you would like me to take it down, just let me know!

Thanks for sharing such fun ideas. Here's the post (I've also tagged you in it but sometimes tags are weird and don't always show. Also its on my fandom specific sideblog, but I am the same person haha)

Gotta love those brain worms! (Ironic statement from a 2012 viewpoint, actually-) HOLY CHALUPA, BRAIN WORMS IN THIS AU UNIVERSE, WAIT WAIT ACTUALLY WAIT-

*background rambles and spazzing*

Okay, I’m back.

I’m always a-okay with whatever fan things anyone wants to create with inspiration from something I made or helped make. As long as it isn’t containing some stamp that says “this I deem canon” when neither me (nor my partner) deemed it canon, no one ever has to worry with me getting upset over some story/comic/art.

I’m going to give some thoughts and I want to disclaimer.

When I discuss my thoughts on your POV of events in the AU, I will never, in any way, intend to diss or attack the story. I think the flow was excellent and Raph’s analysis of the events occurring was intriguing. I loved it! And nothing I say will be a statement otherwise.

But, since I have a distinct inability to keep my mouth shut when it comes to turtles and you asked, I have thoughts 🧐

My brain is now turning and ya’ll have to deal.

Characterization:

Donnie: Much distrust. Much sass. A strong sense of duty to defend his brethren turtles who don’t deserve it but he’s doing it anyway.

Very on point. Much approval 👌

Mikey: Could not be more perfect. I love him. Sweet soul ✨

Leo: He’s a bit less… Forceful. Cold and calculating. Than I envision.

I’d imagine that he had to learn to shut feelings down in order to survive. Fidgeting/smiling/visibly hesitating is out of the question. Staying in Shredder’s graces meant learning to play the game. His silence is what earns Raph the ability to be loud. The only times that he’s himself is when him and Raph are alone, outside of the sight of cameras, or when someone in is danger and fear/fury overwhelms all else. He seems bland to outsiders and it takes the Hamato brothers a while to see that that he’s just a scared little boi at heart that’s just trying his best in a cruel world.

He’s also set in his beliefs, so he’s going to assume that they’re being tormented mentally, if not physically. There’s no place in his mind that wonders if they were actually safer elsewhere.

I do like your POV, though. Plenty for me to play with.

Raph:

He’s ABSOLUTELY the first to question the differences between how Shredder treats them and how Splinter treats their brothers. He doesn’t jump the gun, but as devoted as he is, he’s never really liked Shredder. I love the implications that he’s been filing away concerns subconsciously and his brain keeps poking him like “HELLO?!”

He’s very deep. I can’t decide how I feel about that 🤔

Shredder would have wanted to fan that temper into something unforgiving and vile. Or course, that doesn’t mean he stops being a sensitive soul. It could… Have something to do with Shredder manipulating him into being angry when he wills it (basically all the time) and solemn and still when he doesn’t (such as during lectures, punishments, etc).

His brain registers this situation as one where he’s not meant to be loud and angry, and so he’s kinda… Shut down. Sassy, but mellow. Processing. Adapting. Letting what happens happen because he’s not meant to stop it.

It’s a reason that Leo gets so defensive when punishments come into play. It forces Raph to feel small. It make him vulnerable.

HOLY MOTHER OF MUTATIONS- I AM IN LOVE WITH THIS NEW TAKE ON THE AU @ellestrade TELL ME IF I’M ONTO SOMETHING

Anyway, commentary:

“in one of Takeō's strategy books he couldn't care less about”

It’s like Space Heroes. He claims so and YET he read, recalls, AND clearly has DEBATED the passage so I call sus vibes.

I get giddy when I think of Takeō discovering Space Heroes-

“Junkō and Kōta— or Donnie and Mikey, whatever false name they’d been given—”

My brain made connections. I don’t know if it was intended, but I always believe that they knew them by Shredder’s names through the beginning of season one, end of season one/beginning of season two they were associating them as both, and then by the time that the City is under attack, they’ve adapted to using their real names. (But the Saki brothers still keep their Foot names.)

So, now I assume this is somewhere in that middle plot.

Fun little Easter egg~

“Takeō and Akihitō were the offense, and Donnie and Mikey were the defense” “They held their own. In fact, they dominated.”

I’m in love with Raph’s simple acknowledgment of their roles in battle. It’s a very practical outline of exactly how their dynamic on the field plays out and he's so certain of his place.

On the other hand, I’m a bit uncertain about whether they’d dominate. I do believe that they are trained and can hold their own, but I don’t know about them being as impressive as Raph&Leo, simply because Splinter trained them to defend and Shredder trained them to kill. The Hamato brothers haven’t had much time to practice in the offensive, especially since that’s Leo&Raph’s job. (In non-AU canon, they are all offensive/defensive.)

I think Mikey might learn that kinda strength at the farmhouse after being taught by Leo&Raph, and Donnie will step back from that, finally finding his place not as a fighter/leader, but as a scientist.

Definitely an interesting take, tho 🤔

“Only now does he think that, perhaps, there was a reason their master made their primary weapons blunts and not blades.”

I am chewing on this line so hard. It’s so powerful.

I can’t even tell you why. It just is.

“Akihitō knows that Takeō isn’t lying. He’d already tried to take tonight's blame all on his own shoulders, spare Akihitō of the punishment. But Akihitō knows all his tricks and he won’t let his brother suffer alone. Again.”

100% behind Raph learning to butt in when Leo tries to take the fall as they get older and punishments get worse.

“Seeing the situation, the evidence glaring at him, Akihitō cannot deny that this wasn’t exactly a great sell. Takeō and him are tied to the ground, trying to convince these two strangers that they would be safe with them. That their clan would not hurt them while that same clan was just about ready to beat them to a pulp.”

I was thinking the same thing 🤣

Leo, dude, seriously. Look around. Think for a second. You are not selling your point. You are doing the opposite.

In the end, it doesn’t even matter. Sensei will always find them no matter where they run. It was better to follow than be chased.

SOMEONE NEEDS TO TEACH THESE KIDS THAT THIS IS A TOXIC RELATIONSHIP. YOU SHOULD NOT FEEL MOTIVATED TO STAY WITH DAD BECAUSE HE WILL FORCED YOU TO REMAIN OTHERWISE. BRUH. RED FLAG.

These were Foot Ninja binds made specifically to hold them. Mutant strength and all.

It makes sense that Shredder would make these. But.

But man. He made those. For them.

Takeō tries to take control of the situation again, the bossy oldest sibling coming out in him.

HA. Got him. Leo is Leo in any universe.

“His name is Mikey.” Donnie glares. “The rat is lying and he has—” “Donnie, its fine.”

Absolutely how they view things. Mikey doesn’t care what they think or do as long as no one he cares about is paying the price. Donnie feels it is a manner of principle that they accept logic and truth.

Leo talking over both of them is valid. This kid, I swear.

“Then tell your older brother to shut up about—”

LEO IS IT OFFICIAL YOU HAVE BEEN DISOWNED

“Sounds like a you-problem.” Donnie stands. “Mikey, we saved them. It's time to go.”

Donnie would die for them <3

A hand lands on his shoulder, and he recognizes it. Takeō always knows when to give support. He’s a good brother. He hopes Donnie and Mikey will know that one day too.

OH. OKAY. WELL. 🥺

THOSE FEELS CAME OUT OF NOWHERE-

He loved his big bro sm hjkhkjhkjhjkkjhkjhkjhku

If Akihitō didn’t know any better, he’d say it was longing.

Oh, don’t worry, he is dying to have other people in his life who genuinely care for him, but as long as you guys are with the enemy, you’re a threat to his baby brother and daddy and not to be trusted

And, just maybe, it could be their world too. 

Oh, so that’s what pain feels like. Glad to be reminded.

[wisyhana]

These are some pages that I made as fanart for a fanfic i Really Love. It's something rare that I look back and actually kinda liking the result- 😂 I've been trying to improve my panels flow(?)/pacing And the Lettering- adding words in comics is pretty hard 🥺 if you had some insights, pls let me know ❤ or just give me what you think... Thank you so much!!

Hi! Thank you for waiting this long hahaha

First of all I love your Yugi, is so freaking adorable, big fan over here aaaaaa.

And okay we're gonna talk about comics. Oh boy. It's not a topic I dont like talking but it's something I get way too.... intense, even if I feel I don't have much to defend with. Anyway I'll try to not be so detailed and serious about it so I can bring a decent commentary!

Disclaimer that I have a lot of issues with the use of thought bubbles, but that's a me thing. Myself I try to avoid them so I can focus on a "show more, talk less" type of flow. So if I start talking about them it's because of that, not that you'r doing a bad thing or anything.

I like how you use the panels, by themselves and ignoring the dialogues, they work perfectly fine! I think my thing with the pacing is that I'd draw a 3-4 pages comics instead of 2 for this scene alone. It's a pain I know, but I think for this type of scenario adding a little more of time could help to appreciate some details, like Kaiba being notoriously angry, the moment he touches Yugi's forehead, etc. But this is also a very personal opinion because I'm a sucker for very sloooow interactions, so all this I'm saying is for the sake of a slower pacing. Sadly you gotta draw more or write less if you want to get that effect, also you can get in a situation where things end up vague and ugh, what a pain hjdfhjhds.

I have a serious problem with dialogue bubbles, I never know where to put them Dx. I always feel they're on the way or that they hinder the reading or that they look straight up ugly hahahaha. I think you use a good space for them! they're not in the way of the faces or important scenes, but I can see you needed to add arrows for the conversation to work. In my opinion the dialogue works perfectly without the arrows. We all know there are two people talking so having only the faces on the bubbles was enough to understand who was talking and what order follow.

Now, if you want to work on bubbles without using the faces to show who's talking and don't lose the order in the way, I could recommend something like this:

Sorry if it looks way too clumsy! But a thing we artist have to deal is how the order of the bubbles affects on the flow of the dialogue. Specially when we don't have a specific way to show how the person talks (for example japaneses have many ways to show character's expression so it's easier for them to identify it.) So we need to focus on the flow.

A wonderful person who talks TONS of this matter is the motherfucker Scott McCoud!

This is just an example of how dialogues can contribute to the time and spaces and how the order affects the reading. This is not the exact example for what I mean but Scott is a badass of the comic and the complexity of it.

Understanding Comics The invisible Art is a masterpiece, I blame him for making me doubt is I'm doing a good job or not.

Okay before I go way too into this, one last thing and this is personal opinion. I love white background but you gotta be very careful to not make it look like lazyness. You don't need to draw a full background but maybe adding some shading can help to make the illusion of space rather than having a blank space. Of course this is just my opinion.

Anyway, I really like how you work! my huge recommendation would be to simply take your time on it, I feel it shows a bit of impatience or nerviousness, but that's just my idea. So far you're going a good way on creating comics and I'd love to see more of them :3

Hope this helped you in some way! And as always don't forget to have fun drawing your beautiful bois!

this is me everytime I draw comic and find a inconsistency.

[drifting-pieces-blog-blog]

Breaking down the comics: BENDIS. PART 2.

READING THINGS SO YOU DON'T HAVE TO! 

See Part 1 HERE. 

And we’re back! Weeeee! 

Here’s some more brief Comic book history! 

Alright, so it's always been brought up that ALL the heroes live in New York and no where else. 

So back in 1985, they came up with "The West Coast Avengers". They operated out of Palos Verdes, California. 

A lot of readers considered them to be the B team of heroes even though it had bigger names. 

It had Hawkeye, Mockingbird, Wonder Man, Tigra, and Iron Man. 

It ran until about 1994 then petered out. 

It was revived in 2018 with Hawkeye, Kate Bishop, Gwenpool, America Chavez, Quintin Quire, and Johnny Watts. 

I know who, like... half those people are. 

It got canceled again in 2019. 

So... There is a chance that Moon Knight and Echo was Marvel testing out the waters for another California based set of heroes. 

Considering how this run ends… I’m going to say they kinda sabotaged themselves? 

Issue #6! 

Not a fan of this cover either. Is his art going down hill? Was he getting rushed? If this was the case, why did he keep doing his own covers? Why are his hands so big and weird there? Why is everyone staring at the reader so disapprovingly? 

TRIGGER WARNINGS: It’s occurred to me that I need to figure out trigger warnings for this run, because they are there. They aren’t as straightforward as Bemis’ run was. Or even as blatantly obvious as Aaron’s. But I know they are there. How? Because I inadvertently triggered myself pretty hard with this issue so if I got triggered, I know there needs to be a warning. 

These are going to be a bit more specific and a bit more vague. And I know this because I have some VERY specific triggers that aren’t exactly commonplace. 

**Dissociation, possible derealization, possible depersonalization, mentally struggling, cry for help unheard…. Something in that general thought house without being overly obvious. Does that make sense? These next issues are going to get very difficult when it comes to how he starts to depict Marc’s mental illness and how much he starts to drown without anyone helping him. As well as wrongly depicting WHAT mental illness he has and overall generalizing mental illness as a whole into one big problem**

This is going to be your only warning. Please treat yourself with kindness. 

SO! 

Opening up, we find ourselves back with Buck, who is examining the Ultron head while he has the news on in the background. 

On the news: "Has the mysterious Moon Knight made Los Angeles his new home?" 

I love how Moon Knight is still always 'mysterious'. 

"Residents of West Hollywood were treated to a very rare super hero appearance as Moon Knight had a run-in with local law enforcement." 

Then we see amature footage of Moon Knight zooming by on the back of a car. 

....This is not the first or last time we have ever seen him just standing on the top of a vehicle that's driving away. He has a ....HISTORY...with vehicles. 

"Has Moon Knight made Los Angeles his quote unquote Territory? And is this the beginning of a New West Coast Avengers?" 

Buck pauses and calls up a secret number then gives them a code. 

The person on the phone tells them that they "No longer have that item in stock". 

He declares a "Code White" and asks to speak to agent 13.

They tell him that they'll see what they can do then hang up. 

Hmmmm...

Back at Marc's place, we see him taking a shower. Lots of blood to wash off. Not to mention the punched up face. 

Captain America tells him to get sleep. 

This is why Captain America needed to be Steven Grant. He’s trying to take care of them. To take care of the body. To come up with strategy and plans. Also trying to take care of Marc, who is spiraling a bit. Alright, and we're back with Night Shift. 

They're about to explain to the boss lady Snapdragon why they failed and had to be bailed out of jail. 

"I'm looking for one stripper and one C-List crazy Super Hero and I sent the, let's see, 1-2-3-4-5-6 of you. I sent SIX against TWO." 

(Everyone always makes this mistake against Moon Knight. He fights best against groups. One big guy? He's gonna get his ass handed to him a bit. But a group? Half the time his fighting style ends up using the group against themselves! He is trained in the art of fighting when the odds are not in his favor! HE WAS A SPECIALIST FOR CRYING OUT LOUD.) 

The leader, Tik Tok? Asks to make it up and face Moon Knight again at no additional charge. 

The BIG boss isn't interested. In fact, he's there himself. 

He shows up and the team is pretty scared. 

We've seen this guy's silhouette a couple times and I gotta say.... I have not yet figured out who he is. If he's supposed to be some major player, I'm missing it. Supposedly he says he's faced Moon Knight before. We'll see if I'm impressed by the big reveal when we finally get it. 

Here’s a picture. Let’s see if you figure it out before me. 

Mystery Boss calls them all idiots when they have no idea what he wants from Moon Knight. 

One of the Night Shift members gets upset and mouths off a bit. 

Mystery Boss basically sets them all on fire and does to them what he did to the guy on the boat in the first issue. Turns them into a large pile of ash. 

He tells Snapdragon to hire better people so he doesn't have to keep getting his hands dirty then disappears. 

Back with Marc, we see him sleeping fitfully and having nightmares. 

He wakes with a start and finds Echo in his room. 

"I didn't want to wake you." 

He stares at her, REALLY stares at her for a moment. 

"I just came here to say...Are you okay?"

"Are...Are you real?" 

"What? What are you--Don't!" Marc touches her to see if she's real and she recoils. 

"What is WRONG with you? What do you mean: Am I real?" 

"'Msorry, Echo."

"What is wrong with you?" 

"I was having very...Vivid dreams." 

PAUSE: So... This part breaks my heart a little. Because we VERY seldom see Marc suffering the side effects of his PTSD. We don't get to see him break down, have flashbacks, have nightmares, or question what he's seeing. We don't see his dissociative episodes, his derealization moments. We only ever see him angry. We don't get to see him STRUGGLE. 

And in this moment, you feel the hope for a good comic. You feel the "This could be something" and it is so disappointing that it isn't. And maybe that's part of why this run is, to me anyways, listed as a HORRID run and not just a mediocre run. The 'what if' of seeing...REALLY seeing Marc Spector is just sitting right out of reach and it makes me want to cry. 

UNPAUSE. 

Marc turns away from Echo. 

She tells him to look at her so she can read his lips. 

"Did you come here to apologize for punching me in the face?" 

"Yes." 

"Repeatedly." 

"Yes." 

"I'm sorry I kissed you without permission. I was--I was caught up in the moment. I clearly misread the signs." 

She tells him that he didn't entirely misread the moment. 

But the moment has passed. 

She notes that the lifestyle is getting to her and she isn't acting in ways that exactly 'resemble what I think of myself.'

Marc assures her that this is common for people in their line of work. Especially since she was undercover and having trouble getting out of that role and back into who she really is. 

I'd also like to point out that Marc has REPEATEDLY been asked what his problem is and he has avoided the question every single time. It's to the point where perhaps that so many people ask him that as a means to discriminate against him or as a way to just call him crazy without actually wanting to help or understand, that maybe he's given up trying to explain himself. 

She apologizes and asks if she can stay with him since she has no where safe to go. 

"Why DO you have a giant empty house?" 

"Probably for the exact same reason you have NO house." 

"What does that mean?" 

"Because I--I don't know how to act normal and I'm doing the best I can to keep up appearances." 

(Fuuuuck. When it's good, it's very very good and it's why when it goes bad it's SO BAD. He could have done so much better! I think anyone with mental health issues can relate to this. Doing the best they can to appear to be doing fine, but not sure what that looks like so they just make themselves empty.) 

Another issue is that while this is such a very good scene.... Bendis has done zero research onto D.I.D other than probably watching a few movies or a quick google. So his take on Marc's failing mental health at this point is VERY general...and currently bordering on a completely DIFFERENT psychosis all together. And this is going to start becoming a problem as the comic goes on. 

I'd very much like to remind everyone of Moon Knight issue # 9-10 by Moench (Reviewed HERE). When Khonshu's statue was destroyed and Marc had a total meltdown. 

THAT was far more accurate and done so wonderfully. 

ANYWAYS....

Echo goes to use his shower and Marc takes a moment then finds the Avengers in his room with the Helicarrier outside. 

Captain America: "Moon Knight." 

"Wh-What's...What's going on?" 

"You don't answer your phone." 

"My phone?" 

"You're an Avenger. I need you to answer when I call." 

Clearly Marc is distressed by this. 

This time there are more than Captain America, Spider-man, and Wolverine. Captain Marvel, Black Widow, and Luke Cage are now there. 

Is this real? Or is the problem expanding? 

Captain America: "Are you okay?" 

Spider-man: "Dude! You live here? Can I have a student loan?" 

Marc: "It's real. It's... It's really you." 

Captain America: "So, the BIG question is-What are you doing with this?" 

Luke Cage holds up the Ultron head. 

And Marc freezes up. In fact, one could argue that he suddenly VERY heavily dissociates. He still can’t tell if this is real or just the other people he’s been seeing that he knows aren’t real. 

It's actually painful to read because you can tell he's NOT okay, and while they ask him repeatedly if he's okay, they do nothing about it and make no other acknowledgement that he isn't well. 

The Avengers everyone! 

At this point, Maya comes back from the shower. 

"Oh. The Avengers. Captain America." 

This snaps Marc out of it. He asks what they are doing here. 

Turns out Buck called them to say "Moon Knight gave him this Head of Ultron for safekeeping." 

"Buck called you." 

"He was worried about you and thought this was too dangerous an item to be tucked away in the prop department of a TV show set." 

"So did she. She called us." 

Maya had called to ask who Moon Knight was earlier. 

Marc tells them all to leave. 

"You--You all have to leave here. You--You're blowing my cover. You have the whole damn Quinjet out there!" 

"It's cloaked." 

Captain America asks why they even have an Ultron head. 

Marc explains that there is an LA Kingpin, whose identity he has yet to discover. 

Captain America expresses concern that this is a big problem and that it should be an Avenger's problem.

Marc tells them that this is NOT an Avenger's problem. The new Kingpin is trying to stake a claim, not face the Avengers and if they start causing problems then the guy will just 'pull up stakes and get out of town'. 

And now we have another panel that a lot of you have seen floating around! I love finding context for silly panels like this! 

Captain America confirms with Maya that she is teaming up with Moon Knight as Echo. 

He asks for the next step. 

"I'm going to offer him the head of Ultron. And he's going to come get it himself. And then I'm going to bring him down. I promise I'll call the second I need you." 

Cap points out that this is a VERY dangerous move because if he gets the Ultron up and running...An AI that wants to wipe out humanity....

Sure you do, Marc….Sure you do…

END ISSUE! 

This one was rough. It’s hard to watch him very obviously start to be in distress to the point where people NOTICE and still no one is willing to talk about it because mental health is SO taboo to talk about in this group. Perhaps in this world. 

Let’s see where the next issue takes us. 

ISSUE # 7

This is an interesting cover. I think that’s supposed to be Snapdragon? She’s kinda hovering over the cape though, and not really standing on it. The perspective is a little off. I don’t know… I find the ones where they just stare ahead to be unnerving. 

Looking at the intro on the title page we got more problems. 

"After a brutal fight, Moon Knight and Echo are victorious and manage to evade the police. Regrouping at Marc's mansion, they receive an unexpected visit from the Avengers. Despite his televised getaway from the police, Marc assures them he has the situation with the Kingpin well in hand, along with all of his other personalities." 

I'm frowning so hard right now. 

We open on Buck again. 

"You told on me, Buck?" Marc addresses him. 

"They got ahold of you already?" 

"Yeah. The Avengers came to see me." 

Buck apologizes. He didn't know what else to do. 

Marc is disappointed, saying he thought Buck knew how to keep a secret and could help him. 

"I like you, I do. And I dig what you're about. In theory. But, and I'm gonna be honest with you..." 

"Please." 

"I think there's something really wrong with you, and normally I wouldn't judge, but you're playing a dangerous game." 

Ouch. The repeated telling of 'there's something wrong with you' is just more salt in the wound. 

Marc gives him the Ultron head, telling him to keep it then. 

Buck is shocked that the Avengers let him keep it. 

"Captain America trusts me. Which you'd think would be enough to get anyone to trust me. I wonder what I would have to do to get you to." 

"It ain't that I don't trust YOU." 

"Sure it is." 

"It's that I don't think you're all right. Bipolar, aspergers...I don't know what..." 

This...This is about to get VERY uncomfortable. 

That’s right… “I hear voices.” 

"What do the...Voices tell you to do?" 

"In general...Make the world better." 

"Maybe you should see someone, get that evened out." 

"I don't WANT to." 

"See, that's where you lose me..." 

"I dress up like a little-known Moon God and strike fear in the hearts of men... Did you really think I was normal? Do you think that any of us...ANy of the costumes are normal? We're all crazy." 

Uuuuggghhhhhh noooooooo

"But we're the exact kind of crazy that the world needs right now. The EXACT kind." 

No. Bendis...No. Marc does not 'hear voices'. And the jab about 'what do the voices tell you to do?' is a CLASSIC discriminatory move when they find out someone IS hearing voices. As if the voices will suddenly control them and make them do violent or scary things. 

Not everyone who hears voices is violent, scary, or unpredictable. Some people just shrug them off. Sometimes the voices just say stuff and don't tell them to DO things. 

And DID is not 'hearing voices'. DID is about the 'voices' being other people in the head. And again, Marc is deflecting. He isn't telling the whole story. ANd part of the reason is I feel like if he did, these people would instantly think him not only INSANE but also treat him differently. 

He's struggling and he's grasping at what he knows people can handle because he's had to handle it before! He's telling the story that he feels is understandable and acceptable and not the real story! 

GAH. 

So... Buck buys it. He apologizes for screwing him over. 

"I won't lie to you... It bummed me out." 

"I didn't like doing it." 

"You want to make it up to me? Do it again." 

Back at the strip club! 

We find Dragonfly upset that she can't find any good for hire crews to bring her Moon Knight. 

One of her girls interrupts her telling her that there's a guy bragging about having the head of Ultron and he wants to sell it. 

Dragonfly goes to meet the guy. 

Buck tells her that he works for Moon Knight and that he needs off the 'crazy train'. He wants out and he wants Dragonfly to pay him for the head so he can get out of dodge. 

He gives her a piece of Ultron to show to her boss as proof that he's legit. 

He tells her that he wants to go directly to the big boss with this and not hand it over to her. 

He tells her that if she doesn't take the offer by midnight he's going to Hydra. 

She tells him she wants Moon Knight. 

"Hey, when he finds out I turned on him... I think you'll see as much of that Lunatic as you want." 

So she goes to her boss to tell him the deal. 

The boss sees through the plan, of course. 

"Moon Knight is trying to draw me out into the open." 

"Yes, should I just kill the guy? That would send a message back." 

He tells her that he's annoyed. Annoyed that of all the superheros out there, MOON KNIGHT is the one giving him troubles. 

After a debate, he tells her to ask the man to step out back so that he might have words with him. 

"You're here?" 

"I am." 

"Here?" 

"Moon Knight wants me to come out into the open because he thinks he can take me down. He thinks this is a street fight." 

Yeah I...Have no idea who Count Nefaria is. I'm going to have to look this one up. 

Alright... This one is a villain that dates back to Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and Don Heck 1965. So he's not some new guy. 

So either he's a big deal in other runs of other comics that I don't read (a common problem if you don't read every comic ever), or he was a big villain back in the day, got forgotten about, then they dug him back up in the desperate search for bigger badder villains to 'bring back'. 

A quick Wikki read later. Okay. He pops up now and then. I guess he's been in a few random things I've read, but I had no idea who he was then and I still don't. So to me, he's just some guy. Maybe you've heard more of him. 

For whatever reason, I've just never found Moon Knight to mix well with villains like this. Traditional ones that fight the big fights with Captain America or X-Men just never really clicked or had the same sway over Moon Knight. 

He always just kinda shrugs and goes "You're supposed to be scary?" Like, the man has no reasonable fear? And when it comes to the big leagues, he just kinda goes “Ain’t my circus” and bows out. 

To each his own I suppose. Bendis is used to writing the big leagues. Writing for the Avengers, he goes for the big guns. So I’m not surprised that he would pull out a heavy hitting power villain like this. Just… Not for Moon Knight. It’s kinda like throwing Magneto at Spider-man. Why would you? 

Moon Knight was indeed watching and he recognizes who this villain is. 

He gets into an argument with Not Spider-man/Captain America/Wolverine on if he should handle it himself or call in the Avengers like he agreed to do. 

Hey look! Another well known panel! Now we have it in context! 

(Why are all the good meme panels from this run?) 

Snapdragon brings out Buck. 

To his credit, Buck sticks to his guns. 

Buck insists that he just wants out and to get paid. 

The Count demands the Ultron head. 

Buck demands the money. 

The Count tells Buck to get him the head and MAYBE he'll be granted mercy. 

See... A big hitter Villain like this with all this power? Why is he trying to get money and become a Kingpin in LA? I just don't buy it. 

So Buck goes to his car and pulls out the Ultron head. 

The second he holds it up, it explodes. 

It's a fake! 

The Count demands the real head. 

Buck stall and reveals the REAL trap. 

"We WERE going to bring you the real one, we were. But then it dawned on us that we didn't need to take that chance. 

See, all we needed is proof that you'd even TRY to barter for the head of Ultron. Which is on the same list as plutonium in terms of things that you are not allowed to have or buy or sell. I mean worldwide illegal tech." 

The count goes in for the kill. But Buck isn't done. 

"See, not only did you come out and reveal yourself to be the Kingpin of LA and try to steal an Ultron, you did it on video." 

And Echo waves from a nearby building, holding a video camera. Oh, and one more thing…

You see, the Count was enhancing his powers with Mutant Growth Hormones (new street drug that gives people mutant powers). 

Moon Knight had been asking Buck to not only enhance his own tech and weapons.... But to make him some pretty potent and illegal chemicals that only a former SHIELD agent had access to. 

The Count lays on the ground: "He did somethinggg...to me... My powers." 

"It's a chemical Agent. Used mostly on mutants. You released it when you crushed the tin can fake ultron head. Just like you were supposed to. Nick Fury thought it inhumane. Which he was right about. Except there's you." 

Buck reminds Moon Knight that it doesn't last all day and they need to get this over with quickly. 

The Count panics and flies off while he can, leaving behind Snapdragon. 

While Buck and Echo are pleased that it worked and they have Snapdragon, Wolverine is not happy. 

"He's going to hunt and destroy you for this, you idiot." 

Spider-man comes to his defense. "Hey, he took on a thor bad guy and lived to tell-Give him a break." 

Captain America agrees: "He doesn't get Ultron and we have his general. It's a tactical win." 

And here's the problem... 

While Moon Knight is 'chatting it up' with his own personal Head Avengers...

Echo keeps the video rolling. 

He hasn’t talked to her about ‘the voices’ yet. She just knows that ‘something isn’t right with him’. Also? Echo is a lip reader. Even with a mask on, if the fabric is thin enough, she can still read lips. And Moon Knight? His fabric is thin. She just witnessed the whole pretend conversation. 

I hate this. I hate that it’s implied that she now knows about his crazy and it’s going to be an issue. 

Speaking of issues… This next one is a doozy. 

ISSUE # 8

This cover I like. The birds, the moon, the outline of the building…. It’s just a pretty use of space and light. 

We open with the Detective from before heaving up to his car. 

He finds a knocked out Snapdragon on the hood of his car. 

"A present for you, detective." 

Moon Knight shows up and the detective pulls out his gun. 

"Put the gun away, Detective. We're on, basically, the same side." 

The detective fires his gun and Marc uses a new tech weapon to create a forcefield that appears like Captain America's shield, deflecting the bullets. 

"Jeez...Settle down." 

"What the hell is this?" 

"Well I'm trying to have a conversation with you, jumpy. Two guys talking. More or less. Try to focus...Listen carefully..." 

(I bet Moon Knight is missing Detective Flint right about now....I know I am.) 

He informs the detective about Snapdragon, the Count, and the Kingpin of LA. 

Moon Knight then hands him a USB of the video of the Count basically confessing. 

The detective really hates the vigilante crap but Moon Knight isn't worth the paperwork so he lets him go. 

Next up? We're back in TV land watching the show about Marc's life. 

Except we have Marlene and 'Jake Lockley' vs. a werewolf. 

Marc is upset by the werewolf's design. 

He argues about how he wanted it to be a real looking werewolf. He gets push back on that.

"I thought this was all based on your old life as a soldier of fortune." 

"It is." 

"Why a werewolf??"

"That happened." 

"You were attacked by a werewolf?" 

"There's a lot of crazy in the world and--" 

(Why is Marc growing a goatee? Does Steven know about this? Does Jake???) 

In private, Marc addresses the 'Avengers'. 

"What now? What am I doing wrong now?" 

Wolverine: "You tell us, big hollywood producer guy." 

Captain: "I'm a little confused by you, Moon Knight." 

Spider-man: "Guys, leave him alone. Without a Civilian life, you could lose all sense of self. you--" 

They tell him to stop goofing off and get back to work as Moon Knight. Count Nefaria is still out there and looking for him. 

Marc says Echo is looking into some intel and coming up with a plan. 

We head back to the mansion and find Echo still staying with him. 

She watches as Buck helps Marc suit up in some new tech. 

Marc asks for a web shooter, Buck wants to know why. 

Finally Echo gets introduced to Buck and they make friends by him giving her some new fighting tech. 

Back at the police station, the Detective is showing his Captain the video. 

His captain tells him to get it to the feds, as this is above his paygrade and also illegal since it was gotten by a vigilante. 

The Captain dismisses him and the Detective is not too pleased. 

Know what time it is? TIME FOR A MONTAGUE. Or, in comic book land, a quick way to move things along over a period of time without taking up too much time to tell you about it. 

You also get a lot of single frame wordless art out of it, which can be nice. 

So we get Echo and Moon Knight hitting up known places that the Count was investing in. All while the Detective interviews Snapdragon for his own intel. 

He tells her that she isn't his problem. The FBI special cases is on the way. He also tells her that he thinks it's interesting that she's been with them for over a day and no one has come to try to break her out or bail her out. Not even a fancy lawyer like what happened with Night Shift. 

He goes to leave and she stops him. 

MORE MONTAGUE OF MOON KNIGHT AND ECHO KICKING ASS. 

They are lighting up the money laundering areas now. 

Snapdragon has told the Detective where the Count hangs out. He goes to the Captain with the news and the Captain doesn't want to hear it. 

Detective recommends they call in the Avengers and the Captain says they don't have a way to do that. 

Detective asks him "With all due respect... How come I get the feeling you don't want to take down the Kingpin of Los Angeles??" 

The Captain just leaves. Now that's fishy. 

Marc and Echo stake out the next place to hit. 

Echo tells him to take off his mask when talking to her so she can 'hear' him. 

"Deaf, right. Sorry. You just don't ACT deaf." 

"Now what the hell does THAT mean?"

"It means either you can't take a compliment or I can't give one." 

Marc...You should know better. You've been on the bad side of discrimination since you were born. 

But also... She totally CAN read his lips with the mask... She's lying to him. 

Or perhaps it's just easier to do it without the mask and they aren't in a life or death situation so it's fine. Hmmmmm....

He asks how she's feeling, she tells him that she's feeling better and that she needed this. 

Spider-man pops up and tells him to kiss her. 

Captain America tells him to get moving against Nefaria. Spider-man starts to argue with him about giving Marc a break. 

We see Marc physically flinch. Echo either doesn't notice or she ignores it. 

Marc asks why she never thought to call the Avengers despite this huge operation she was trying to run alone before he got there. 

"I --I never belonged there." 

"But this is a big muscle operation. We're going to have to call them eventually. We have to call Somebody." 

She kisses him. 

She tells him they can do one more "rousing bit of super villain vandalism". 

"Nefaria IS a Thor-level bad guy." 

Marc tries to remind her that this is out of their league.

UH OH. 

Okay so, Anyone else getting a vibe that Marc’s mental health is crashing down around him and EVERYONE is ignoring it? Just because he’s ‘sorta’ told them he hears things doesn’t mean he’s told them the problem. And they clearly don’t understand it. So they’re just looking the other way. Everyone just assumes “That guy’s nuts” and goes with it. 

And despite Marc knowing that the three ‘Avengers’ are just in his head, he’s starting to see them more and associate them with him doing a poor job. Seeing them as there to chastise him. He’s also starting to physically respond to them talking to him. Reacting and getting more upset at their appearance. These are all signs of a failing control of the situation. …..They are ALSO signs of a different mental illness. But hey, in Bendis’ world, all mental illnesses are the same, right? 

NEXT ISSUE! 

Issue #9! 

Now THIS is the famous cover! The one you think of when you hear Maleev’s name. 

Those whites. Those colors. The way he uses a water color technique. DAMN. He was saving up for this one. 

Wait a minute... They changed the title page blurb. 

"While attempting to loot the temple of an ancient Egyptian god called Khonshu, mercenary Marc Spector was beaten nearly to death by a trasonous partner. Left to die in the desert, he was taken by a group of Egyptian people to the statue of their diety Khonshu who offered to save his life but only if Spector would become his avatar on Earth. 

Spector agreed, and began his career as the costumed crime fighter known as Moon Knight. Night falls, the Moon Knight rises, and neither sorcery, science, nor mortal sin can win against him!" 

WHAT THE FU- That's not what happened! That's not even close to what happened?! EGYPTIAN PEOPLE?! LOOTING THE TEMPLE?! Even the most CASUAL Moon Knight fan knows how the story went! How do they manage to fuck that up so badly!? Where's the continuity editor?! Why did they change it?! WH...GAHHHH! 

"Unbeknownst to all, Moon Knight has developed split personality disorder-And his personalities have adopted the roles of his former Avengers teammates: Spider-Man, Wolverine and Captain America, all of whom give him guidance on how to be a hero." 

Noooooooo. That's not what happened! He didn't just 'develop' D.I.D. 

^%$##%^& Okay. I see it now. I see what they did and are doing. 

They disliked the Steven and Jake aspect. They really had no idea how to deal with them. ESPECIALLY Bendis, who clearly knew NOTHING about Moon Knight except what the Marvel editors were telling him. 

So they tried to give him a bit of a 're-write'. They took away Steven and Jake, made it so he JUST NOW developed DID out of the blue? And now his alters are the Avengers who can tell him how to be a Superhero and give him life advice... 

I...I am not okay with this. 

And on top of this? They did NO research into his mental health issue, probably watched some old Hollywood movie or two and then based it off of that. Then went with all the lines about him having "Schizophrenia" and just tossed those symptoms in there too for funzies. 

I can't. I just cannot. 

This run is SO triggering. In so many BAD ways. GAH. Okay. I'm...I'm going to keep going. I'll save it. Because I know how it ends and boy howdy.... 

BACK TO THE COMIC. 

Alright, our comic opens up with...and I kid you not: 

"Marc Spector's stately awesome house, last week". 

He's trying out his new shield like Captain America's. And why is Marc growing a goatee? It looks terrible on him. 

"No, Buck, I asked for a sheild like Captain America's."

"That IS a shield like Captain America's." 

And they argue what his shield looks like. Buck questions Marc's Avender status because he's never seen him on the TV with the other team. 

"Can you keep a secret?" 

[....] 

"I'm a secret Avenger." 

"Moving on. See, Captain America's original shield is made of a vibranium/adamantium alloy." 

"I know." 

"Well then you know neither vibranium nor adamantium is exactly growin' on trees. I mean, you're rich but you ain't THAT rich." 

So instead he made him a 'zero point energy shield'. Basically a retractable force field that pops up in the shape of Cap's shield. He can also throw it. So that's cool. Portable shield. 

He asks Marc why he wants a Cap shield. Marc just says it's cool. 

PRESENT TIME 

And.... I have to laugh about this. 

You have this god level bad guy with scary powers...

And he's just pissed off that MOON KNIGHT, of all the people in the world, MOON KNIGHT is the one that's just annoying the hell out of him. Just a regular guy. 

And that's just spot on Moon Knight energy right there. Being obstinate and annoying to the bad guys since the OG run. 

Cap deflects the incoming blast with his shield and tells Marc that they're out of their league and they need to get the heck out of there. 

"Retreat, regroup, and plan the attack to your own strengths and your own rules. RUN!!" 

Everyone keeps talking about how this guy has fought all the avengers and fought Thor to a stand still. LIke, we get it. He's powerful. I've still not got him on my list of known top villains but SURE! I Don't know every bad guy that makes their rounds in the comics. 

But I still just feel like putting him in a Moon Knight comic where he's having break down issues is just unfair. And then the other Avengers KNOWING who he is facing and not standing by to help him... 

"Superhuman strength, speed, durability.... He can kill you with his optic blasts. He can fly. Not going to listen to me? Then at the very least get HER out of here, Spector. If you're crazy enough to fight this fight, fine. But you get her out of here!" Cap continues to argue with Marc 

Marc grabs her and shoves her into a building while he runs around to distract The Count. 

Echo is pretty pissed at being tossed aside. 

"And I thought I hit rock bottom hooking up with Murdock!" 

(Oh honey, he's everyone's rock bottom.) 

Captain America continues to lecture Marc about how this fight is above him. How the Count could kill him in an instant and is just toying with him. 

Flash back to last week! 

We see Buck fitting Marc with Web-shooters. 

Buck once again asks Marc why he wants Web-shooters when that's Spider-Man's thing. Marc doesn't answer. 

PRESENT. We see Marc get blasted off a building and he uses the web-shooters to stop his fall. 

Spider-Man now tries to reason with Marc. 

"Look at him. You gotta give him credit for dressing like Old School Dracula. I mean, seriously, where do you even BUY a monocle nowadays? What is he the Count of anyways? I bet nothing. He just decided to call himself count." 

He says what I'm thinking. 

I appreciate that. 

Moon Knight turns on the villain and Spider-Man tells him to "NOT get within arm's length of the Super-Powered Bad Guy." 

Yeah, Marc gets blasted back. 

"Look, it's safe to say, when in doubt, ALWAYS listen to Captain America. I mean as religions go, that wouldn't be the worst one I've ever heard of." 

Marc manages to get tossed aside but also web the Count down a bit. 

Spider-Man tells him to get running. 

He looks back and finds Echo there beating on the Count. 

While she distracts him, Marc attacks and throws him into a car. 

Yeah, way to arm the dude. 

And for the second time in this run, Marc gets a vehicle thrown at him. 

Ah. I see. 

So, Marc puts himself up close and personal to attack again and this makes Spider-Man nervous. 

"YOu're doing that thing where you're getting too close to the big super baddie." 

But you see, this is Moon Knight's fighting style. Marc KNOWS he can take hits And when you are close, the attacker has a harder time fighting back. Especially one that uses fire and explosions. They can't explode you without hurting themselves. 

Spider-Man's fighting style is always stay out of range, wear the bad guy down, and attack with long range. 

In fact, Marc gets up face to face with this guy. 

FLASHBACK TO LAST WEEK! 

We see Buck fitting Marc with Wolverine retractable claws. 

"It's not Adamantium, but it's the best I could do." 

Buck explains that it's stronger attached to his arm than it would as a sword. It will reinforce his arm while also lending strength for damage. 

"Good. I need close quarter weaponry. This is very good." 

"You want to be Wolverine too?" 

"I need to make sure if I get this close." 

"You want to be Spider-Man, Captain America AND Wolverine...All at the same time." 

Marc doesn't answer him. 

"The voices in your head. The ones you told me about... Are these them?" 

PRESENT. 

Wolverine is now goading on Marc. 

He pulls out the claws and stars stabbing. 

"Gut the son of a bitch!!! Don't let up. Get in there. Cut off his @#$@$@ HEAD!!!" 

And suddenly they are start arguing. 

This is a problem. The three 'guides' are arguing wanting different things and even MARC wants something different. 

Echo jumps in again and beats on the Count some more. 

Marc attempts to cut off the Count's head with the claws and gets thrown. 

This let's the Count turn on Echo and blast her. 

Yeah... That's not good. 

Warning for Character death I guess. 

(She comes back in later comics. Nothing stays gone in Comics. Plus she's getting her own show in the MCU. You know they gotta bring her back so they can push her on the people. She's a deaf native woman. Marvel's gotta exploit the HELL out of that.) 

Okay....Things are about to go SOUTH. 

Wolverine goes Berserker mode. Captain America argues that they are better than this and don't kill. Wolverine wants blood. Spider-man wants them to just stop. 

So Wolverine attacks Captain America. 

That’s some really nice art. I love the lines for the shadows. The crisp edges. The colors. The shredded cape. Even the action is stellar. Maleev you get that bread. 

ALRIGHT. That ends this issue. And we’re seeing what COULD be considered extreme System breakdown… Except this is not being written in a system sort of way. What we have is the Avengers acting as sort of Shoulder Angels that tell him what to do to be an Avenger and the three have conflicting personalities. And Bendis knows this because he WRITES for the Avengers. Famously so! So he’s given us Spider-Man, Captain America, and Wolverine, the three more famous characters in Marvel, who also have VERY conflicting personalities and views on how to be heroes. 

But again… You don’t need Wolverine’s rage here. MARC has enough rage. Marc has lost a LOT of people. Marc is more than capable of going berserker on his own. He’s no timid snowflake. Marc has done some… truly terrible things in the past. Even Moench wrote it that Marc has a most violent rage and is capable of carrying out the most heinous of deeds. 

And Steven is the one that would tell them to back off. Tell them to run. To keep strategic and protect Echo. Jake would be the one telling him to be careful. To watch his back. To stop making stupid moves that is putting them in danger. 

Jake has lost people too. Jake is usually the one that faces the grief. That feels the loss of friends and loved ones. 

This issue…This RUN should have been about System breakdown. The struggle of trying to give everyone what they want when everyone wants something different. About finding balance in how to live a shared life. In dealing with grief and trauma and danger. 

It could have been Marc losing Echo and raging out and forcing front away from the others. It could have been about him trying to hide his DID and failing because Jake is tired of masking and Steven wants to do things differently. 

It could have been about them fighting over how to gear up and Buck trying to figure out why they keep asking for such different things. Marc trying to explain things the way Marc always does (badly. Marc explains things badly. Marc is bad at things.) and making everyone around him worry. We could have seen Echo trying to figure out this relationship she’s suddenly getting in with what she doesn’t know is three men. About Marc struggling with suddenly experiencing more symptoms than he’s used to as the system breaks down. Time skips, waking up in different locations, trying to wave away weird things and being in Denial. We certainly saw a lot of that in Moench’s run as the system became aware of itself! Now the system is aware and STRUGGLING. 

I’m forever going to be bitter over how good this comic COULD have been. 

ANYWAYS. I’m going to break it into anther part here because I’m almost out of pic space and I don’t want to cut the last three issues up worse than I need to. 

PART THREE HERE

[sentientgopro]

I've been thinking about representation again and the forms it can take and classifying them, and kinda just want to organise my thoughts here. Don't mind if I ramble for a bit, using a few examples.

From what I've seen so far, representation tends to take 3 main forms, and ALL OF THEM HAVE A PURPOSE.

Understated and insignificant, a slight mention

Meaningful and a fairly important part of the character

the character is an exaggeration of the thing they represent

So, first off, the "shallow" rep. Y'know, the kind people call "shoehorning" or whatever. This one can be a bit of a hot topic, and I feel like most people act like it's more of a problem than it actually is. However, in some cases it actually becomes very beneficial to the message the representation is trying to add.

For this one, I'm going to use Rainbow Six Siege as an example. Bear with me. For those who don't know about Rainbow Six, as in the original concept, not necessarily just the game, the idea is to have a global unit of the world's best soldiers, from as many different countries and backgrounds as possible, so that you always have a local expert on any situation and someone to provide a different view. The whole point of team Rainbow IS diversity, and always has been, but it more means diverse nationality.

However, Siege does add little tidbits of Sexual and gender diversity; a few gay characters, bi, trans, and Enby. However, this information is only mentioned briefly in the bios of the characters, regarded as a very insignificant detail. While this could come across as shallow representation, I think it really serves the game's message well. It does not matter who these people are or what their background is, they can do all the same cool operator shit as everyone else. There are trans people in the military, bis, enbies, and so on, and alot of people are against that, but Rainbow presents the message that it does not matter and they belong there.

Moving onto rep where it's a meaningful part of the character, or the media uses one to one metaphors to represent the identity (what I mean by one to one will make more sense later). This is where most "good rep" falls, and the example I'm using here, because it's one of the characters I know best, is Gwen Poole, AKA Gwenpool. Gwen's Aroace identity is still a fairly recent addition, with her having a several comic arc dedicated to learning about it. It would take far too long to delve into the deep details of Gwen's story and why she acts the way she does, but in short, she often tries to "put on a show", do things because she thinks shes supposed to in order to be interesting and relevant to avoid her comics being cancelled and fading into obscurity. In this comic arc, her appearances in Marvel's Love Unlimited series, she attempts to start an interesting romance to be interesting and stay relevant. She goes through attempt after attempt, trying different things, stopping on being gay/bi for a bit and seeing if that works, before things fall apart and she realises her identity. What I mean by a "one-to-one metaphor" here is how she forces things to happen to be an interesting character and because she feels like she's supposed to, which parallels how alot of Aspec people force themselves into relationships because they feel like it's normal and what they're meant to do.

And the third category, the exaggeration. This part is when "one to one" is going to make more sense. The exaggeration normally exists in a fantasy setting, where you can more clearly and outwardly display the complex inner workings of a person's mind. This is different to one-to-one where a character experiences those feelings as normal and just talks about them, as opposed to the media exaggerating and clearly displaying those feelings.

The example I'm gonna use for this is Jordan from Gen V, a spinoff of The Boys. (For those who don't know much about the boys and thinks its just that show edgy teens watch, its not. Theyre both very leftist shows, both in being supportive of marginalised groups and a larger criticism of capitalism and the right wing, especially with anti-immigration politics.)

Anyway, Jordan's power is to switch between being a man and woman in an instant, and having different powers depending on which they are. (For the purposes of this character, I am going to talk about gender as a binary, because that is how their power works.)

The show's target audience aren't exactly the kind of people who are going to pick up on nuanced ideas of gender identity, dysphoria, and such, so it isn't exactly subtle with that it's trying to say. Masc Jordan's power is being indestructable and immovable, and fem Jordan's power is some form of shockwave power, so their fight dynamic is attack as a girl and switch when they need to take a hit. I'm not gonna talk about the obvious implications of being a man to take hits and feel strong, it'd be a waste of time.

So that covers why they switch in fights, but which identity do they use out of fights?

The show makes 3 things clear: Jordan grew up as a boy before discovering their powers, and prefers being a girl and feels more confortable that way. So why do they ever present masc?

It's when they want to impress people, appear respectable/ traditional, appear strong and intimidating, or generally do not feel safe/comfortable, especially around their unsupportive parents. It's almost all based around internalized misogony.

So while the obvious interpretation to take about this character's identity is gender fluidity, I don't think that's the case, and this is where the exaggeration idea comes in. Jordan's power acts as an exaggeration of how they feel like they should present, as opposed to their actual identity. Having an instant and clear switch makes it easier for the audience to understand their feelings and comprehend what's going on identity wise. I believe Jordan's story much more closely resembles that of a trans woman, and the fluidity is just a way of showing their feelings.

I don't feel like I'm explaining this the best, but the exaggerated form of representation can make it clearer for the audience to understand emotions that are usually very subconscious and deep down. I recently cracked when I realised that most of the time, I was subconsciously viewing myself as more feminine and as a girl. I started questioning being NB or Fluid when I noticed sometimes I felt it was right to be more masc, but Jordan was there to exaggerate and clearly display those feelings to make them easier to interpret, and I realised I was in a similar situation and felt the same way.

So, in summary:

Subtle rep is designed to show that we're really all the same, and should be treated as equal.

One-to-one rep is designed to be directly relatable.

Exaggerated rep is designed to make it easier to interpret compex ideas and subconscious feelings to get a better understanding.

I hope this all makes sense, thanks if you read all the way to the end, I'd love to hear any thoughts you have.

[thelemoncoffee]

i keep trying to come up with ways to make saiouma opposites in not standard ways and i do alot of weird shit with this, but i think this one is definitely one of the more out there concepts.

so- my though was what if it looks like your standard Saiouma on the surface, but they have backgrounds opposite to what we normally give them?

like while Kokichi is known as a hooligan and petty criminal now, he use to have a track-record of pure innocence in his childhood. He was a teacher pet type kid and was seen as an angel to alot adults, and when he started DICE they were also initially just as pure and were all used as the "good kid examples". as they got older though they kinda grew sick of trying to be people pleasers and decided to be unabashedly themselves, which also included them dabbling in crimes they always wanted to try.

this cause the whole group- but especially Kokichi as their leader- to be seen as having been corrupted by the phantom thief comics they love and/or going through a rebellious phase they'll grow out of an a year or two. unfortunately DICE has no intent on stopping this anytime soon, they spent too much time repressing themselves as kids to get small hits of dopamine from praise and this is the freshest breath of air they've ever taken

Shuichi on the other hand- he lived with his parents much longer than he does in canon, and their horribly poor treatment of him growing up (see: verbal abuse, showing him off like a trophy, putting all too high expectation on him) turned him quite rebellious. his whole childhood he spent doing all he could to spite his parents who punished him for it, and in turn made him want to rebel more. it was like an endless spiral that ended up escalating till he pulled a stunt that landed his ass in cuffs as a young teen.

Shuichi's parents decided getting arrested was the last fucking straw and gave custody of him over to his uncle, who they hoped as a detective would know how to straighten him out. this turned out to be best for both parties because now that Shuichi was in the care of his uncle who actually cared for him and is no longer a liability to his parent's fame, he felt like he was able to relax and fall into a much calmer lifestyle. under his uncle's guidance he went from stealing, sneaking out, acting like a prick, and purposefully failing classes- to helping his uncle solve crimes, actually trying in school, and generally being much more pleasant to be around.

that was much longer than i intended- anywho the prompt i was trying to get to here was what if these two met and initially though ill of the other due to how they reminded themselves of their pasts, only to actually learn of each other's pasts and bond over how they both changed completely while trying to heal childhood trauma.

yeah-

[randomkduck]

I feel the need to explain my au a lil bit. Cause I have more ideas than brain (like independent of each other) that I also want to give a lil attention to like my loz story au thing, and another one for four swords that actually has a story and not just vibes.

Warning for a wall of text and also mentions of child abuse.

The "Four Separate Paths" au is an au that was partially based on a dream, partially based on a story I made based on four swords that just went full circle back to it. In the au, after the defeat of Vaati, when they normally would have re-merged under normal circumstances, they don't, and three out of the four of them argue about what to do next.

In the original draft of the au, Vio is kinda just, stuck in his own head thinking about what to do next. Barely listening to the argument as he tries to figure out where he could start in his path to getting them back into one Link again. In the comic I added her to help verbalize some of what Vio was thinking to more fluidly share it with the readers.

But the RBG boys have already kinda... made peace with this. They care less about remaining four people, and more about where they want to go and what they want to do next.

Green wants to go back to how things were, basically. Thinking that with all four of them it would be easier to defend the kingdom, and now that they know how to work as a team they would be even more effective than Link was alone (I realize now I kinda put Red and Green in trope version of themselves. I fking love the two of them and their characters... doesn't mean I always know what to do with them narratively ,Xb).

Red wants to focus on repairing the kingdom, and helping others around the kingdom learn to better defend themselves from the dangers of people like Vaati and Shadow.

Blue wants to travel and expand helping people to more than just hyrule (something I stated in the comic)

Vio ends up going with Blue when they all split ways because he knows that, once he figures out how to get them back to being one, Blue would be the hardest to track down. In Vio's mind this is just another challenge to overcome, and he thinks that- rather than being okay with staying split -the other three just don't think about how to "fix the problem", so now he has to do it.

Shadow's still alive in this au. He's just a part of their shadows more permanently. Not sure if I want him to be revealed to all of them or if I wanna stick with the funny idea I had of only Red knowing he's still around and the two of them bonding over Shadow filling Red in on what's going on with Blue and Vio over tea.

Blue and Vio travel for awhile, Blue slowly making a name for himself as a "wandering hero" as he does exactly what he set out to do by helping people. Anywhere from small shit like helping an old lady carry her groceries to bigger stuff like stopping burglars and bandits. Vio spends most of his time researching magic and stuff, hoping to understand why they stayed split even if he doesn't have access to hyrules magic books, but he helps with the bigger stuff even if he prefers staying to the background (good thing Blue purposefully makes it easy for him by making his personality 2x bigger).

Eventually an old man finds Blue and Vio while they're in between towns. He says he's been a world traveller his whole life and can tell them little tidbits of information and guide them on their adventures. Both are reasonably of a suspicious old man approaching them in the middle of nowhere as the sky darkened, Vio being like "this guy is clearly doesn't have good intentions, we should entertain him and then ditch him at the next town" and Blue is like "idk, maybe we should take him up on his offer, keep you enemies closer and all that, plus, free guide!" And so they let the old man stick around.

The old man turns out to be controlling af. Hiding behind the two of them at the first sign of danger, and then telling them off for having fun. He also starts telling people that mister "wandering hero" is his protege, and that he "taught the kid everything he knows."

It makes Blue and Vio really uncomfortable, but they put up with it because A) he's kinda useless in a fight so "isn't able to do any real damage", B) they do technically need a guide being that it's saved them a lot of problems, and C) Blue finds it funny to get back at him by immediately after the old man walks away turn to the person he lied to and tell them that he's "senile" and "confusing himself for grandma!" ... that sentence made sense, right?

Anyways.

At one point Blue comes across a family of boys that have been terrorizing a few towns for years. After him and Vio investigate more they learn the disturbing history of the family. The father is forcing his sons to do this stuff for his wealth, while the few daughters the man has are forced to clean their shitty-falling-apart-mansion until they get sick, and also being used to keep the brothers in line.

Blue doesn't want to kill these kids, especially after overhearing one of the younger kids complain about having to do all this stuff he knows is wrong only to be silenced by an older brother afraid of seeing his sibling get hurt for speaking out. So he figures out a plan to save the kids.

He kills the father, gets the ill daughters to a hospital and then fights the people of the three towns to keep the sons out away from the gallows. He does save the kids, but the older kids do still go to prison, though they do it willingly.

The old man, later in the day, has the gall to reprimand Blue and say he should have just ended the whole family because whether it was by force or not they were still guilty of doing some bad shit. Blue fights him on this, Vio stepping in when it starts to get violent. The old man leaves the inn in a huff, and the two don't see him for the rest of the night. Vio unable to sleep thanks to the sense of foreboding.

The next morning, when Blue goes to visit the kids to say goodbye before heading off to the next town wrapping up with the older kids, he finds the old man standing in front of the cell while two guards escort the boys there out of the cell. After being asked what's going on, the old man says "they're being hung for their crimes. Obviously." Which, y'know, sets off Blue, who tells him he's being monstrous.

The old man tells Blue that he's being stupid to let them live, and that his kindness "weakness" will get him killed one day. To prove his point he pulls out a charm Blue had never seen before from his pocket, and yeets Blue into the dark world, out of sight of the guards and kids to make sure the next part of his plan goes smoothly.

Vio sees it though, and he hides for a little while, trying to figure out what to do while he keeps an eye on the old man.

The younger kids are brought forward with the older kids, and the people of the three towns (who had been brought together for this) are confused about what's going on and why the kids are being put in line for the gallows despite the fact that they had agreed that- given the context -the punishments the kids received were acceptable?

The old man claims that the kids killed Blue, and holds up a blood stained blue tunic that Vio thought had been thrown away after the fight they had weeks ago. He doesn't understand how the people think an obviously dry bloodstain came from at least a night ago, but I digress. The old man spins a conspiracy story of the kids teaming up, the ones in prison telling the ones not in prison what to do. Thanks to his position as Blue's "mentor" they believe him.

Things are looking bad for the kids. Until Vio gets a really bad idea. He's standing relatively in the middle of the crowd, easy to miss, at least until he starts laughing like a maniac. He's surprised with himself for how much like evil giddy glee the forced laughter sounds like. "You think it was them that killed him?"

Vio goes on to tell the confused and startled crowd that he killed Blue, and that the old man may have been convincing, but trying to pin their act on those kids was cowardice.

Yup, "their" act. Vio's dragging the old man down with him.

The people get out of Vio's way as he walks over to the old man, looking much more confident then he feels. Vio smugly turns back to the crowd and stats spinning his own story. One where he's jealous of Blue's fame and tired of being in his shadow, a story more than a little inspired by Shadow himself. He claims the old man had helped him, then says the old man just wanted the kids out of the way to make it less messy to clean up themselves, but Vio was "bored of that idea", so changed their plans.

Long story short, the people of the towns chase to two out. The old man showing more of his true colours.

Turns out, old man knows a shit ton of magic, and can fight better than Vio and Blue thought.

The old man starts hunting Vio down, eventually catching up to him and sealing him away in a different place then Blue.

The Cabin had nothing in it. Just one fireplace parallel to the door, cabinets that stored an infinite amount of food in them, a sink to wash dishes and get drinking water from, and a stack of wood for the fire. There was one note: "Don't let the fire go out. EVER." The Cabin was surrounded by eternal night and eternal soft snowfall. There was no bed, no blankets, no chairs. Just him, food, a fire, and firewood.

Meanwhile Shadow is loosing his mind over this whole situation. Goes into the dark world to get to Red and tell him about this (because I imagine the dark world is like a dream world, and makes it easier to travel from one place to another if you know how to travel through it, because dream logic is applied everywhere) and bumps into Blue, who's like "great! Can you get me out of here????"

This is how Shadow discovers he actually can still become hylian-shaped in the real world, it just requires help from Zelda. Whom he gets help from Red to tell that there is a major problem tm.

It takes awhile to get Vio out again, because they have to track down the old man and (ahem) convince to tell them where Vio was.

And that's kind of where my ideas run out. I know... not the greatest ending. Mostly because its not an ending. But it's all I've got for now.

[i-have-one-braincell]

Sorry if you have already answered this, but what are your thoughts on the heroes? At the beginning and now. Have you changed your opinion on them?

Don’t worry bout it, I wasn’t asked this question😭.

My opinion of the team did somewhat change?? Maybe??

I enjoyed their personalities and how they were introduced and the dynamic with each other, especially of Ava making a bet with the boys that she would clean the restrooms, it was a cute moment to see. It always felt as if they were an actual friend group without Peter around and I sometimes saw Peter as the odd one out of the group (which could’ve been a good storyline imo).

I wish their fears from S1 Ep13 were given more focus in the season and actually saw signs of them with those fears. I kinda didn’t like how Danny was so calm about watching the team’s fears😭😭 I just hoped he gave more emotion watching them and him and Peter speaking with the team privately about their fears. It could’ve shown that they care for the group on a deeper level and shown more of Danny’s stubborn character of wanting to help the group as a peacemaker, a level of trust could’ve been shown between Peter and Danny on a personal level than just Iron Fist and Spider-Man, I wouldn’t have mind an episode of both of them helping the group as Peter and Danny.

I cared for the group in the beginning but often I saw them as background characters who didn’t seem to care for Peter that much, with the exception of Danny since he actually does show appreciation in Peter and wants him to succeed by giving advice.

When S2 came, they were basically the same as S1 and were pretty disrespectful towards Peter by attempting to start a party in the house without his acknowledgment. Whether they meant the party to be from the heart or not, it’s disrespectful to do that to a friend’s house who was kind enough to allow them to stay in the house and they were so easily forgiven after the house came down😭😭. They weren’t likeable at that episode.

I did enjoy their solo episodes but I like Ava’s episode the most, out of all of them, we recieved the most lore from her and having Peter relate to her and supporting her. We get to actually see more of her character unlike other episodes and saw the boys showing concern of her behavior.

I expected the same treatment to be given to the others but it sucked to be honest 😭. Sam’s episode wasn’t even about him, his family, why he behaves the way that he does, how he got his powers, it felt more like sponsoring the Guardians of the Galaxy than it being a solo episode of Sam.

Danny’s episode is mainly about Peter more than Danny. It could’ve shown a sense of determination in Danny of still participating in the race against Scorpion and hate having to rely on Peter to do the race for him as a sign of insecurity mentioned in S1 Ep13. It could’ve been another episode of both of them revealing their self doubt of themselves and learn from each other such as Peter did for Ava. (Also it could’ve been a cuter spideyfist moment for my heart).

Luke’s solo episode was alright. I don’t like the idea of his parents being SHIELD agents and how he got his powers but it was fine. I would’ve liked it if they gave Luke’s origin the same in the comics of being involved in a gang and being abandoned by his dad and brother after his mom died. It could’ve tied back to his fear in S1 Ep13 of the need to protect everyone and Peter finds it admirable and both can connect about it.

They were more likable in the second season but the next seasons, we never saw them that much anymore💀💀

Spider-Man left the Avengers for them and yet we don’t see them together the next 2 seasons until they became classmates in SHIELD Academy.

I cared immensely for them enough to the point of begging to see them appear again as a team so I was pretty disappointed.

Writing them now, I care heavily for them. I just wish we were given more moments of them as teenagers than as heroes in the show.

[perdrixforelle]

Yesterday I saw a comic saying that basically gen Z has a variety of hyper specific clothing styles for teens and young adults to express themselves in while millenials only had "emo" and I resented that so much for some reason? First of all it's completely false, it just so happens that emo was the most "online" style of alternative fashion and therefore the most documented imo. It also happens to be the style of later years millenials, who are the link between gen Z and millenials, thus cementing the "online" and most visible part of the trend. But please, I didn't go through all the phases I went through as a teen to be erased like that. I'm too lazy to find pics for each item of the list but off the top of my head, growing up in France I personally had these phases:

Y2K streetwear extremely influenced by hip hop and R&B with a touch of futurism in there like tinted frameless glasses and the like. This was almost always styled with a middle part for girls, and extremely flat, straightened hair. It's making a big comeback right now, mixed with elements of 80's fashion, and I love seeing it.

The whole Skater aesthetic with big Van's and Buffalo shoes, loose cargo pants, flannel shirts over t-shirts, lots of bracelets you'd never take off even in the shower. I exclusively wore bikini bottoms so that the bright color of them peeking out from my loose pants would match the rest of my outfits and it's a miracle I didn't get a yeast infection per week, somehow.

Goth, goth has always been there in all of it's iterations. There was a time when boneless corsets were so casually mainstream you could find them in many stores and you bet your ass I was getting my hands on as many as possible. I was the romantic goth with the long skirts and the corsets over mesh tops. We didn't have Hot Topic but we had Claire's, and it had a lot of goth stuff back in the days.

Punk, I would call it light punk or commercial punk, Avril Lavigne and the likes. It's kinda adjacent to the skater aesthetic but you would see a lot of tartan miniskirts over pants, and belts, and ties, and safety pins. I would DIY a lot of clothes by painting them too (with song lyrics), fun times.

Hippie: lots of "harem pants" and shawls wrapped around the waist and handmade jewelry with beads. Very music-festival-white-citizen-of-the-world cringe but hey, it was what it was. Now my siblings are 4 years younger than me and they experienced the Emo days. but never partook. They also lived through the weird "mini-adult" phase of fashion where everybody dressed super boring like jean T-shirt and ballerina flats, and were either carrying their books in their arms like they were in a teen movie, or only using longchamp bags (or fake ones) on the shoulder. Another regional variant I got, as I lived in Southern France, was the cagole (bimbo) look, but it's pretty specific to where I lived and is kinda timeless since I keep seeing women of all ages rocking it proudly: basically loud animal print, loud makeup, and fluorescent colors matching in at least two items of clothing/accessories. I cannot express how much it delights me when I seen an old woman at the beach dressed like Fran Fine enjoying her tan and not giving a fuck. It's amazing. Anyway, millenials of all background feel free to add to this post with your experience of alternative fashion as a teen.

[katzirra]

Spends over an hour talking to my buddy about comics once he finished Loki finally and sent me a meme to fucking talk shit on the poetry boys LMFAO

Casually writes a novel on comic blorbos.......

Jer brought up a really neat point and we kinda went off on like... both our experiences with Marvel comics and how they have a habit of shooting themselves in the foot with their fucking retcons and shit. Mostly like, in terms of it weirdly kinda... detracts from characters and maybe bits and pieces people related to? For me it was what drew me INTO dynamics of characters at times?

Now, I haven't touched a comic in almost 10 years so... anything that happened from the Marvel NOW! launch and forward is a mystery to me, and I'm ignorant on [to preface this long ass post...] Also my memory is spotty.

Also possibly spoilers for the new season if you haven't caught up on Loki :v so yaknow. IF YOU READ THIS AND CARE...

Jer and I were talking about the basis of the show really kinda became like how can we take this fan favorite character, let him have some emotional depth, maybe have some friends and do some fucky stuff with it. LETS GET WEIRD WITH IT??

It kinda harkens back to themes that made me ultimately fall in love with Deadpool comics, and reminds me of why I dropped reading his stuff too. I'll circle back to this lol.

Anyone who knows me, knows I'm a huge sucker for a found family, and I'm a bigger sucker for characters defeating fate or the narrative. I'm big on the best friend/possible romantic option of a character that sees what an absolute dumpster fire next to a textile factory someone is, and still thinks there's something good in there.

I find it funny how much I couldn't STAND the hype of Loki as a character as long as he's been in the MCU because my experience with him has always been comics/cartoons and him being a little HOO HOO HEE HEE gremlin of a bastard. Just HATED him. Excellent MCU costume designs though.

The movies he's just a little weasel of a backstabbing bastard, and I find him annoying. Like yes, I see there's emotional trauma in EVERYTHING that makes his background aside from his mother, and yes I get the narrative of him as a villain etc - but I don't feel compelled by it, personally. That's just me though - I'm FASCINATED by people that are civil minded stans and can argue for why he's fascinating. But also, how much of that is personal projection too?

When I was getting into comics, the Siege event was going on so Loki's face was everywhere in like...2010?? So many teeth... And he was KILLED, and they started doing the Kid Loki stuff and I read a little bit of that because two of my RP friends in the Avenger's group I was in - and it was neat! Then in like 2014 they started doing... what was it, Agent of Asgard? That was....something. I never read it but it was interesting to see them make a workaround for them to kinda...breathe new life into a character people were getting into again!

NEAT STUFF, THAT'S NEAT TO ME!! I LOVE A REVAMP LIKE THAT!! I like the Marvel theme of escaping your reputation. I love that theme. It's like what they did with Evan, the uh Kid Apocalypse. I adore the whole aftermath of Uncanny X-Force for that - Evan just...fucking destined to be Apocalypse and fucking he's so DETERMINED NOT TO BE, and to learn his powers etc. I'm pretty sure he became... Genesis? And died fighting... ;; big sigh... at least he proved his worth, right?

But Jer and I talking about all this kinda made me sad too because we were discussing sort of the way Marvel can take an unlikeable bastard, and with the right handling, they can get something REALLY interesting with it!!

When I first got into Deadpool like...2011 or something I did it because I was annoyed seeing him everywhere and thought 'Surely there's more to him than fart and ass jokes?' and I was right, thankfully.

But I'd also spend a lot of time slogging through a lot of shit, and seeing him kind of BECOME only fart and ass jokes... Like, the movies are fun and stuff, I guess but... I honestly can't stand them very much. But that's me, if people enjoy them? Okay, tight. But also like Daniel Way just, OOF.

Interesting parallel - kinda made it click in place WHY I think I've been enjoying the Loki show. Like, when I picked up Deadpool I SLOGGED through the Joe Kelly run, which is just Wade being a little self-depreciating soggy, abusive and shitheaded person really. Hiding behind his paper bag over his face, excusing his actions because shit sucks - like just kind of a shitty awful and exhausting person overall. WOE!!! A piece of shit! And I get some of the shit that happens to him outside the OBVIOUS is fucky - but I don't know, it was kinda relentless. I feel like even when life deals you all lemons, there's still something in there to tell storywise to curb just the ONSLAUGHT of oh wow poor me... Can you tell I don't enjoy this run of comics? LMAO

But as you get through that, you start to get side comics that kinda do a bit more to polish him up. He's a jerk, and he's sensitive to how fucked up his face looks, but he isn't a wet feral animal ALL the time? He's just rude. Really rude. Random. We start to grasp OOOH IT'S AN EMOTIONAL RESPONSE TO COVER SHIT WITH JOKES... man, I can relate to that haha HAHAHHA....

I got into reading Cable & Deadpool because my friend Johnly was HUGE into Xmen and it seemed inevitable to get into it... but it was well written and drawn and like... I'm married to it as my favorite comic. Those are my boys. Those are my besties. That's the comic ship I didn't ask for and I got it. That's the bromance/romance I go up to bat for. Any capacity - those are the BOYS. MY SONS.

It's my favorite trope; I've seen your worst, and I still think there's good in you. You just need someone in your corner.

FUCKING SCREAMS. Even still, in a non-shipping way that's my fucking duo DYNAMIC. You will sell me so often on ANYTHING with that.

When Cable and Deadpool came around, it rolled in after the Agent X comic, which gave us like a 'Clone' of Deadpool who had a WHOLE ENTOURAGE OF FRIENDS like a rag tag bunch of misfits who were a very unconventional FOUND FAMILY. Wade was still a fucking dick, a bastard a lot of times - but his friends saw value in him and stuck around still. Even ones he was recently a demon to, like...man.

And even more so; when Nate pulls the dick move of sacrificing himself, he had that support network of friends there for him to process that, because it hurts no matter how you see their relationship. That was his best friend. It hit hard.

It hits hard especially because Nate and him start out moral enemies. Wade hates him because he's holier than thou, and Nate hates him because he's a nuisance, he's a mercenary - there's a laundry list tbh. Untrustworthy. He's scum! The closer they keep rotating around one another - or into eachother even jfc - they start to tolerate one another, and start to talk more, and Nate starts to really talk about how Wade could do better and be better. Wade starts to see value in himself more, he's still sharp tongued with Nate, but he starts to also be a bit softer with him, joke around and sees value in HIM and what he's trying to accomplish with Providence and stuff. He sees the vision - but he also sees the danger of that vision in regards to Nate's LIFE.... So there's a lot of selfish shit on both sides of the fence that's interesting.

They don't always agree, but Wade starts to come around, and Nate does this thing where people will be like YO DEADPOOL BE CRAZY WHY YOU ROLLIN' WITH HIM? And he is in his corner to be like hey, that's my boy Wade like give him a chance? HE'S DIFFERENT NOW. But yaknow they also emotionally manipulate one another in weird ways. :)) SIGH.

GIVE AND TAKE I GUESS. But it's interesting to see the evolution of trust and openness?? They're best friends, you can't argue that.

AND YAKNOW...we were discussing the response to this actually!! In Loki it was interesting to see Mobius say shit like that to him [how he can BE BETTER, he can be whatever he wants to be!!] and he just kinda.... I don't know, he's a villain by definition and yet he's whipped 'round into this anti-hero kinda position that becomes curious. But he doesn't lash out when he's told this shit, because the fight has mostly left by that point. He doesn't know what to do with those words?? Like yeah, okay.

But, conversely, with Nate and Wade... Nate is very heavy handed with it, and Wade is INSANELY volatile with his emotions because of how his brain is always in flux. And...he gets to a point he starts lashing out about it, about how Nate is trying to change him and he's FINE AS HE IS, AND HE'S TIRED OF HIS SHIT. They lash out a lot, but Nate also is kind of a controlling shit. He wants to play god, where as yaknow... Mobius has ALL THE TIME IN THE WORLD FOR THE SHITHEAD TO UNDERSTAND IF HE DIDN'T WANNA LISTEN.

Honestly hilarious, the similarities...

But Jer and I were talking about how it's interesting to us that the show really focused on WHO is Loki without his magic. He's a con-man, he's a fast talker, he's a violent little feral cat. He doesn't know what trust and care is honestly, because even in his own family there were so many lies and hostility. So they pit him with this partner who has seen every trick and BULLSHIT THING he's ever said and done, and is like "Yeah yeah big scary God, wow. ANYWAY-" He is both fascinated, complimentary, and utterly flippant about Loki and that's interesting. We meet someone, a whole organization, that isn't phased by the existence of Gods.

It's interesting to see tunnel vision character exploration - small cast exploration - on characters that are deemed bad, but have a weird thing about them that doesn't necessarily mean they're REDEEMABLE, but that they have something that is inherently BROKEN in their past that can be nursed? Latent potential to be good.

They're not hardwired to be good guys, they can be good people, but it's harder and more exhaustive. But sometimes - it's nice.

But uh yeah - SO ANYWAY, moves down the line some more here -

WEIRD SIMILARITIES. But they're there and maybe that's what I liked about the show. You present me with a character I already don't like, you mock him and kinda kick him when he's down and then have this guy show up who is like... not really a fanboy but - HE KNOWS EVERYTHING. He doesn't appear phased at all the shit he can throw at him, and he plants the seed that he can be better.

And I love that the show is two seasons. It's short, it's sweet, it does a lot of really interesting things I'm obsessed with visually and narratively you can fiddle with. It has a very bittersweet ending, but it's not 100% sad for me. I love that they got this irredeemable broken bastard, and they gave him a win - and yet it's still, in Loki's nature, a loss. But he has all the time in the universe to figure things out. If he can ascend like that in just a few centuries - what's to say he can't free himself from his coffin of his own making.

We're given a consequential win, and I've already see fans making fix-its that are PHENOMENAL. My FAVORITE things to see and read for fanfic topics is people playing with the sandbox. I hate that people ALWAYS assume you know, sexual shit when you say you read fanfic - I am OBSESSED with people playing with the sandbox and fixing issues. Continuing the story. Developing insane head canons, coming up with the most INTERESTING INTRICATE IDEAS and still leaving me on a cliff hanger.

You've taken a bastard, redeemed him, and influenced CREATIVE MINDS to play with it in a positive way. I've seen most people express APPROVAL but sadness with the ending and that's I think the best thing to happen! It's how I still feel about the Mass Effect 3 ending :))

Conversely it all really highlighted my sadness of how with comics, we can so easily run a good idea into the ground, and how ya'know... you can see your character MAKE that 180 or you can see them do like a 320 and come out a little worse....

For Deadpool, C&DP ends on a VERY bitter note of Nate sacrificing himself, he is depressed about it, I think they have a big talk with him about it with the Agent X fam? My timeline is fucky with the 3 'ending' points of C&DP - full transparency lol. But... after this comic comes the numerous team ups - like him trying to find his place in the world, and then in like 2008 [which I'd been working towards, and was excited for because the art was really CRISP...] you hit Daniel Way.

Way's Deadpool introduces the ANNOYING yellow box and white box almost as if he was split personalities, where as it was really just like...thought boxes, just colored uniquely... As far as I've read, this has been retconned in recent comics. But it's the big staple in all things Deadpool - but.... Way's Deadpool is very disjointed, he's trying to date and marry death, he's suicidal because he wants to be with her forever, he is a lot of dick and fart jokes that just don't hit for me - he has funny moments but I can't think of a single serious moment I got emotional over?? You gotta give us reasons to connect with our character, or things that hit us to stick with us? I felt like I was just reading low punches a lot?

But it did this weird thing, that I'm trying to find any of the wikis talk about and coming up blank, but there's this point in the comics where in Way's... he basically gets hunted down by his whole support net? It's like a big thing? Like everyone hates him and shit? But somehow EVERY WRITER AFTER THIS ACTS LIKE THINGS WERE FINE~

Like they hunted this man for SPORT it was WEIRD. It was so.... weird?? Going through my own tag I didn't even blog about it... weird??

But I dunno, it left a bad taste in my mouth to like reduce Wade down to like... what they did. C&DP works really hard to kinda get people to see some value in Wade, and then Way's DP just kinda tears that structure down and all he has is Bob left whom he really is AWFUL AS HELL TO....

It's sad to me. The new comics started, and I left shortly after, in like...what...2012? I was really excited for the team, the writers and artists involved and he looked GNARLY but interesting and I loved the colors and - it was gonna be WEIRD and funny... but they kinda kept leaning into the like...

You know when you don't wanna talk to someone, or be seen by someone and you shield your face and walk the other way? I feel like we were back to that with Deadpool. Like it was EMBARRASSING to be seen with him, even though in the aftermath of C&DP we did all those team-ups and had some great cross overs and EVEN HAD A SPIDERMAN COMIC THAT WE SAW THEY COULD BE CIVIL [we all know I hate how Peter treats Wade and I have bad blood with those shippers still :)) never forgive, never forget! But boy howdy he was an ass to him WHICH IS FAIR BECAUSE MORAL DIFFERENCES...] but like?? We were back to HAHA WOW HE'S CRINGE... which is a bummer.

I dunno.

Jer just kinda really hit a nerve in my brain when he pointed out how the show kinda did a thing we don't see the pay off for as often as we should. Turning over a new leaf, and truly discovering what it means to do a selfless action?

And it just kinda reminded me how I love Wade being a SNARKY piece of shit, and how bad he is at trying to be a good person - he's just a weird little guy, he knows he's not a hero and he doesn't really try to be. He just tries to be real with people? But he IS a good ally, and he HAS the capacity to be loyal, and he -

Man like. ACTUALLY MY FAVORITE ARC? UNCANNY X-FORCE.

FUCKING ANGEL FROM XMEN HAS A SMALL TEAM AND THEY HAVE A JOB TO DO AND THEY HIRE FUCKING WADE TO COME WITH, AND EVERYONE IS ANNOYED BECAUSE HE'S ANNOYING and he's ya'know DEADPOOL.... and when they get to the fucking end of the mission and it's like hey, you gotta kill this kid Apocalypse? Fucking he DRAWS THE LINE. No women, no kids! He makes a STINK about it. Logan and Fantomex are like yo, what the FUCK you're being paid for this you bastard - and it's Angel or Betsy who points out that Wade never cashed any of the checks.

Like Wade half the time would go along on an Xmen mission just for the benefit of being INCLUDED honestly. Some of the writers use to really GET THAT. He use to hold them with a lot of reverence. And I feel like that was a big thing I was sad about with the movies was removing that kinda "WOOOOW IT'S THE GANG" vibes... he's just kinda... jaded? Hm. Huffs. ME TOO THOUGH LMAO.

Uncanny X-Force is so delightful... and even still too a lot of people...really don't paint him in a loyal light or care about his connections to people and it's sad. In the Messiah War arc like Cable specifically calls on Deadpool to have his back and fight with him while he's transporting baby Hope, and he gets so UPSET when he has to leave. It's not good bye~ and Wade is so sad because he thought they were a team again. AND I WANTED IT SO BADLY, I wanted him to have that stability he deserved, a friend. THE GUY WHO SAW WHAT HE WAS CAPABLE OF.

There's random good moments in random comics, and of course they meet again in a Deadpool & Cable comic, which is good and done by some of the older team. Idk. I wish...

I wish I could still read comics in confidence they wouldn't scrub whole segments of a character.

It's like a post Dazz reblogged the other day about how characters have less weight these days because we're scrubbing lime line events from them in desires to make them TIMELESS and it's detrimental because there's no proportional trauma or event to really add that weight now and then, ya'know?

Me talking for too long.

Loki ended in a way I was pleased with, and I was surprised to end up liking that incarnation of him, and being excited if they expand on him ever again - conversely if they don't wow, EMOTIONAL and amazing regardless. But, uh, they really uh... they really kinda coded that ending as eternal pining with those two. I didn't think much about it until a few weeks later someone posted something and it hit me sideways like a brick. How dare?

And I'm still mourning the fact there was a lot of hard work to get people to take Deadpool seriously as a character in universe, and to get him on teams, and they kinda took everything away from him, just to give him weird new things, only to take that away and rebuild him again. But at least he's FRIENDS with Cable I GUESS. But who knows the fuck is going on with him anymore. He's probably DEAD AGAIN... He sure died and came back wrong in my book :)

But I think that's just the thing with Marvel. You gotta pick your battles, and pick your story arcs to commit to. It's like when people are into a specific writer for Batman or something. SHRUGS.

Me casually being mad my friends can call my favorites, and why so easily and proceed to talk to me about it's narrative themes and character arcs so easily... I'm a predictable fucking pile of shit, I swear to god....

Me rereading this post: IS THIS ANYTHING? IT'S NOTHING. IT'S ALL NOTHING.

[karlmarxmaybe]

Good post but I have to disagree with the take that The Killing Joke says nothing about the real world.

To analyze the story, though, we must understand two underlying bits of liberal ideology that are present in all Batman stories:

The police is an organization dedicated to upholding justice.

There are two kinds of people: "normal" and "insane", the "insane" ones being inherently and unchangeably dangerous.

Both of these ideas are utter bullshit, ofc, but the story accepts them as true, so we must keep them in mind. Now,

The whole point The Joker is arguing in The Killing Joke is that it only takes one bad day to turn a "normal" person into a dangerous "insane" one like him. We, the audience, knowing Batman's origin story, understand that this lines up with Batman's life: he suffered a tragic event, his one bad day, and turned into someone who fits more into the "insane" category than into the "normal" one.

But crucially, this is not what the story is arguing. Alan Moore has this habit of having his stories overtly make a statement and then have the subtler details of the story prove that statement wrong and make the exact opposite statement (to the point where people think Watchmen is an edgy fascist violencefest and not an unflinching tragedy about what happens when actual human individuals, flawed as they are, are given superhuman power over others' lives, which feels extra impactful considering the background of the Cold War and its threat of nuclear war. When I read Watchmen, I was brought to tears about the state of imminent world war portrayed in it- an element of the story I rarely see commented on).

How does this manifest in The Killing Joke? Well, you have The Joker's sad sad backstory and him proclaiming loudly his One Bad Day Theory of Mental Illness, and you have the knowledge that Batman kinda matches that... but then you also have Jim Gordon.

Gordon is "normal" and an agent of the law. Within the ideology of the story, that makes him a beacon of justice. And knowing this, The Joker plays his Killing Joke on him (dear Mao comics are ridiculous): he subjects him to one bad day (through the fridging of Barbara Gordon, something I'll always shit on Alan Moore for, but which forced every subsequent writer to write a disabled character, so... mistakes into miracles I suppose, although I don't think the writing of Barbara Gordon post-becoming disabled has been great or even good). The idea is that this one bad day will turn Jim Gordon "insane" and thus dangerous like The Joker.

And it fails utterly. When Batman rescues Jim, he is understandably traumatized, but he tells Batman to go after The Joker, with the words "I want him brought in... And I want him brought in by the book!"

He is still a man of the law. He is still "normal". The Joker's argument is wrong! Not everyone who goes through one bad day turns into a violent murderer! And through this, we can reconsider the point that Batman and The Joker are so similar. Batman did go through one bad day and became "insane", but he doesn't murder people for fun, now does he?

The Joker is trying and failing to excuse his own actions. He's saying he had no choice but to became a violent murderer, and the story proves him wrong. And this is how the self-referential Batman story makes a point about the real world: that one's own trauma is no excuse for causing others harm.

So I don't think long-running franchises are inherently doomed to only talk about themselves. It's just that nostalgia sells, and management wants to just tell the same story over and over to keep the money flow consistent, and they don't want to alienate the fans, and creativity is a risk, and cheeky self-reference makes money, and ultimately making a statement is disencouraged because all art must be status quo propaganda.

Last thing: I hate Alan Moore and all his works, they're sexist, racist, fetishizing of lesbians and just the most White Anarchist garbage you've ever seen. They can all go rot in a hole, especially the shit of shittrordinary shitemen. Ok bye

i have a theory that any franchise that lasts long enough eventually becomes incestuous and ends up eating its own tail, thematically. stories in these franchises can only ever comment on themselves

i think a lot about what alan moore said about his work on the killing joke, about how hollow it is in hindsight since the theme really just boils down to "batman and the joker are kinda similar when you think about it", which i suppose is a pretty novel observation, certainly changes the way i read batman comics, but what is there in that insight for me as a human being living in the real world that i can apply to my actual life? not a whole lot. all it can do is reward emotional investment in the brand of batman. if you don't really give a shit about batman there's nothing there for you.

the disney era of star wars is especially bad about this. by and large they're really just about our relationship to star wars. even the last jedi, which tries to be a little more critical about it, still can't break out of the thematic black hole the franchise has become. andor is possibly the only exception to this, and i steadfastly believe that was a total fluke. don't get it twisted, andor is good despite its connection to star wars, not because of it, and if it were just an original tv show about resisting space fascism, it would probably be better for it (if less popular). we're all lowkey dreading the second season bc we know that no star wars property can resist devolving into a nostalgia wank fest forever

there's nothing inherently wrong with hollow entertainment, but i do think there's something grotesque about pumping the gdp of a small nation into an entertainment product that doesn't aspire to be anything more than an advertisement for itself

[shamelessrabbithole]

hey again!! i’m anon who asked about guys distancing themselves from each other.

so, let’s go back in time for a bit when the content was endless, and i mean season 11 of shameless. gallavich HOS episode in particular

i loved the bloopers and the kiss in the end was amazing!

but for a past few weeks the more i think about it, i’m kinda coming to a conclusion it might’ve been scripted? like, the whole thing, since we didn’t get to see something like this from other HOS episodes

i mean, they had some takes that would fit well into the scene too (when guys didn’t mess up the lines or started laughing), right?

regarding the kiss— i know they did unscripted kisses in the “main part” of the show, and, as i’ve said, i LOVED this one, but still :(

they used gallavich for promotion for season 11 a lot, maybe that was one of the “tactics”, since their episode can be counted as episode #0 in the whole season??

still a lot of overthinking :(

I don't think you're overthinking things. 😇 Often, when I look at their deleted scenes, I think to myself: why did they even script and film this if it didn't fit in with the rest of the storyline? For example, in season 10, when they had their "tamale" kiss, it was in keeping with the Mexican cartel coming after Mickey plot, which the show never pursued. In season 11, they had their "camouflage" kiss, which also didn't quite work because by the next morning, they were at each other's throats again, suggesting they'd never had that reconciliation scene in the kitchen. So, again, why even write any of this into the script let alone bother shooting it?

I think the answer is that those moments were always meant to go into the "deleted scenes" portion of the DVD to boost sales. I don't feel that for the sake of brevity, they were cut—they legit never belonged from the start. Similarly, with the HOS bloopers, I have wondered why they would script five or six takes of that scene using completely different jokes, each with their own unique punchline. It doesn't seem like something that's ordinarily done, considering it's hard enough to memorize lines. Imagine actors having to memorize five ways to do one scene using five different snippets of dialogue.

That said, when they kissed, each guy smiled beforehand as if he knew they were about to fuck with the crew. Because once Cam said, "only on Showtime," and Noel did his little eyebrow wiggle, the background laughter came, which sounded unplanned and spontaneous. So, maybe the kiss was scripted, but Cam's ad libbing was not? Or, it could just as easily have been a laugh track added to the end of the scene and not actually coming from the crew.

Come to think of it, if anyone ever gets the chance to meet him at an upcoming comic con, it would be a pretty good question to ask.

[elveneclipse]

Heyyyy guess what? dsmp!Taiyo_Trove lore. I wrote about him meeting Tommy and Tubbo!! This is canon to this au’s lore, unlike the comic which was dubiously canon. All set in Hypixel here, but the next lore post should be about them joining the SMP!! Anyways, the writing will all be below the cut!!

Making Friends in Bedwars

Taiyo sat by a tree, their demon tail wrapped around their body as they sketched in their notebook. He had just gotten out of a round of bedwars, and now was resting since his arm still hurt from blocking a sword to the face. Really, Hypixel needed to get some sort of face guards for those games. 

There was probably another round going, but it didn’t mind missing one game. Or a couple of games, even. He never managed to get into every game, nor did he care enough to. As long as he got enough coins from it to stick around in Hypixel, it didn’t matter how many games he played.

It stretched a bit, looking up at the sky. There was a leaderboard near the tree they were sitting at, for Bedwars. They didn’t tend to pay much attention to it, as it never really changed much. It always had the same people on it, though sometimes they’d switch places. Occasionally someone would retire, and then they left the board completely, but other than that, it didn’t ever change much. Always the same 100 people, never including him, to no one’s surprise. Taiyo had never spoken to any of them, nor did they care much to. All he knew of them was that they were on the leaderboard, nothing else.

Today, though, he noticed that something had changed. On the leaderboard were two new names, replacing two of the more familiar ones. One, called Tubbo_ in 50th, the other, a TommyInnit, in 49th. As far as they were aware, no one had retired recently, and even if someone had, why would those two jump up so quickly?

He didn’t know.

It was interesting, in Taiyo’s opinion at least, though he doubted it would matter to him much in the long run. After all, the two names would eventually fade into the background, just like all the other names on the leaderboard did. Maybe they’d watch the two for a little while, just out of curiosity, but he’d forget soon enough.

That was what it thought, anyways.

—

They sat alone in the waiting room, inspecting the wooden sword they’d been given to make sure it didn’t have any blemishes or weak spots. There wasn’t much he could do if there were, but at the very least he’d know to upgrade the sword as soon as possible.

The last game of Bedwars hadn’t quite finished yet when they joined the waiting room, meaning that they were probably the only person in the waiting rooms right now. Certainly the only one on its team for the moment.

After looking the sword over a couple of times, he was satisfied, and put it away in his inventory to sort through the rest of it.

As they were doing so, the door to the waiting room opened, and two people entered the room. Taiyo didn’t look up, but they figured that must mean the last round was over. 

“Are you sure about this, bossman? I mean, yeah, we’ve got a good streak going, but that last one was pretty close. Yellow was brutal, I mean, seriously, just brutal.” Said one of them.

“Yeah, they were, but no match for us! Big T, we’re practically unstoppable, don’t sweat it. ‘Sides, Chat wants us to play one more game, and I could use the Primes. We’ll take a break after if you want?” The other replied. Sounded like they were friends, then.

“Okay, if you say so,” said the first one.

Taiyo hummed, unsure if it should say something or not. He’d never heard chat or prime used like that before, and he was kinda curious. Though, now that he thought of it, they probably had everyone muted except for each other. Most players muted everyone in games, including themselves, at least in Hypixel. Taiyo couldn’t speak on other servers, as they’d never been to one apart from Hypixel, but that was what happened here. He didn’t mute, on the off chance he’d be teamed with someone else who wasn’t muted and they could then communicate faster, but usually that didn’t happen.

“Hey, you’re on our team, right?” The second one asked, apparently addressing him.

“Tommy, I think they’ve muted-” The other started.

“No, I can hear you both fine. Just uh.. Wasn’t sure if you’d be able to hear me,” Taiyo replied, still shuffling through the inventory. It was almost finished… “And, uh, yeah, I’m on this team!”

“Oh, sweet! I think this is the first time we’ve seen someone else who actually uses the voice chats today!” The one who was apparently called Tommy exclaimed.

Taiyo chuckled, “First time I’ve met someone who uses it in years,”

“Oh, huh! Is it not usually used?” Not-Tommy asked.

“No, not really… A shame, it’s pretty use-” Taiyo started, closing their inventory and looking at the two of them for the first time. 

Their name tags were the same as the ones from the leaderboard. TommyInnit and Tubbo_.

Tommy was a tall, blond teenager, with curly hair, blue eyes, and a red and white t-shirt. Tubbo was shorter, and had wavy brown hair and brown eyes, plus a green long sleeve. Both of them also had bandana’s - Tommy’s was green, and Tubbo’s was red.

“You’re the people from the leaderboard!” Taiyo exclaimed, more than a bit surprised. While they never cared all that much about it, they definitely did not expect to get teamed up with anyone from the leaderboard, let alone the two people that they’d noticed on it earlier.

“Wait, really? We’re on the leaderboard?” Tubbo questioned, sounding just as surprised.

“Holy shit, really? I mean, uh- of course we’re on the leaderboard, we’re the biggest men ever, right Tubbster?” Tommy said.

“I mean, sure, but we’ve only been playing together for a day-” Tubbo said.

“That might be why, actually,” Taiyo hummed, “People here don’t tend to work together very well, so if you two have been working together the whole time, you’d definitely have an advantage,”

“..It’s a team game, Trove. What do you mean people don’t work together most of the time?” Tommy asked him.

Taiyo snorted, “You haven’t been here long, have you? That’s… kinda just how Hypixel is. We’re not here to work together, we’re here to compete. Or, in my case, here to get enough coins to keep living in the server,”

“You don’t have a home server?” Tubbo questioned, frowning at him.

He shrugged, “I used to. It was weird, though- endless flat world, I mean completely flat. I could summon things to add to my inventory whenever I wanted, though, so it didn’t stay flat. I built a lot. Can’t figure out how to get back though, I think it got deleted somehow.”

“Oh, so you were a creative player? Pog! I’ve always wondered what it’d be like.. I always imagined it’d feel like being a god or some shit. Sucks it got deleted, though,” Tommy replied.

“I guess it was a bit like that,” It shrugged, before stretching, “Doesn’t matter much anymore, though, I’ve been living here for years, so I’m pretty much your average player now. Can do some shapeshifting, but that’s about it, and I’ve seen stranger hybrids.”

The three of them continued talking to each other, even after the fourth teammate entered the room. Unsurprisingly to Taiyo, they didn’t talk to the other three at all, which it didn’t really care about, though Tommy and Tubbo looked a bit bummed about it. 

While they didn’t have much in common with the other two as far as interests and backgrounds went, they still found himself enjoying talking to them. Tommy was a bit brash, but they were both kind and funny, and they made it really easy to talk to them. Maybe it was because they were trying to be as friendly as possible, since not a lot of people here were actually willing to talk. It could get lonely, sometimes. Or maybe it was because of their ‘home server,’ wherever that was.

Whatever the reason, Taiyo found himself taking a liking to the two boys quickly. 

Eventually, their conversation was ended by the game starting, which Taiyo was a bit annoyed by at first, though that quickly left when he realized how much fun the games were when they actually talked to their teammates. Not only was it less frustrating since they were able to communicate better, but it was also made enjoyable by the joking and playful banter that filled the air as they played. Most of the banter was between Tommy and Tubbo, as Taiyo wasn’t sure he was close enough to them for that, but it was still fun.

They also did better at the game, and Taiyo could see now how they were able to jump places so fast. Well, between that, and their apparent streak of 100 games in a row, which seemed a bit crazy to them, but they apparently found it fun, even if they were starting to get a bit sore and tired from it.

They ended up winning the game, which immediately filled the area with cheers from all three of them. Afterwards, the three of them went to hang out in the lobby for a while, to take a break from the games.

Taiyo didn’t remember having any friends before, but they were fairly sure that they’d made some new ones that day.