#like batman is very much the establishment in this story but it's handled so weird... | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

emperorsfoot · 1 year ago

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Oh! You are the author of the fic I keep refreshing my marked for you page for instead of studying for an exam that can make my school longer!

I love omega Kon, and I absolutely adore your omega Kon. I think a lot of omegaverse have a tendency to feminize the omegas and your Kon and in general your omegas don't fall to that. I also feel like instinct/we-are-sentient-human-beings-we-can-think is apropriatly balanced in your fic.

Oh and I am so ready for the "We accidentally bonded" reveal. I think we are very close with Kon in the closet-nest now. I feel it is gonna be trigering to Clark. (Oh will Lex realize? How will he react? Why do I feel like he wanted to break the chain but the moment he perceived as the chain being established he went full berserk instead of trying to repair the relationship as much as he can. Does he actually care about Kon as his pup, or did I just get that because I am hungry for good dad Lex.)

And the Batman knew Clark had a pup and that he left the pup with Lex reveal. How will Clark react to one of his biggest and most well hidden insecurities being known by Bruce. Will he freak out? How will he react once he realizes that if Bruce knew, he didn't care-well, didn't care is the wrong word, that it didn't change how he felt about Clark?

Also the Kon wants to court Tim reveal. My god how will Tim, who has been keeping himself back(as much as he can) because Kon has an alpha, react to being said alpha. How will Kon, whom has been falling for both of Tim's identities even with both trying to keep themselves in check react to both his crushes starting to recipricate.

And then the reveal of Tim Drake is Robin. Will Kon be mortified (yes), will he realize both started acting more into him once Robin learned he liked Drake.

Or Tim is Robin can be revealed before Kon likes Drake. In that case would Kon think that every single drop of kindness he received from Drake, everything that made him have a crush, was because they were mated? Oh boy, you can get a whole 'nother series from that.

Man there are a lot of reveals I am so excited for! It is like identity porn×500.

I am also so excited in a fake-science way. I just love world building and science, I adore stories where 'magic' is seen as science and there is innovation and-(I cut 3 paragraphs of me rambling about how electricity is magic, from here. It ended with "WE HAVE MAGİC ROCKS(magnets)!!!!")

I am always interested in how people handle omegaverse, like whether they use some out there smell like vanillia or pinapple, softer smells like hay and chlor or just alpha/omega that is just slightly different for everyone which I think is more realistic and I have loved how you handled all of that. I kinda wanna hear more about the chemistry+biology behind the mating like

I am very excited-in the fake-science way-for the discussion about the potency of the bite(between Tim and Kon). Unless I imagined it, the amount of veins/longevity of the bite was longer then what that size of a bite waranted. I know it might just be something like the adrenalin of the fight but I dunno, I like "we aperantly are very compatible" stuff, I think that registers in my brain as soulmates in a biological sense even though that doesn't make sense.

And of course Kryptonians or any alien adds another level, weird alien biology is a good tag. And how you handled Kryptonians was also great, i just adored the difference between the nests.

(I have this multiverse Au where a more advenced "human" civilization created kryptonians+others as weapons and then got eredicted and the humanity on earth is like the left overs/exiled ones. And that's why Kryptonians have a fricking kill switch and are human looking. Now if I was creating a species as a wepon I would like to keep them from multiplying with my species and in an omegaverse setting turning which subgender triggers the mating cycle would be a great way)

Also would getting a tranquilizer agent, say one that is airborn, automatically dispensed into the room then get someone to seperate the pair work for the heat triggers rut/rut triggers heat situation. But I guess kryptonians and humans would need different doses/stuff and whoever is awake would fight against someone trying to take their mate away. Maybe an internal insuling pump like thing? I mean, if you do it like once every 6 years to just get a child a small surgery would be fine for me. Or maybe like one of those autometic tranq guns, in that case you can deliever different doses/shit as well. And I mean, either the needle would need kryptonite or they need to be under red sun lamps for a longish while but I think the second one would work if both sides are willing participents.

Having said that, there is also the fact that the mating "bite" between Tim and Kon triggered a kinda heat and rut and I think it would have turned into a real one if they spent it together. So like is that a one time/just got mated thing or like will the same thing happen every time they bite, if it is a mated thing can they like triger it again and again by just leting someone erase the mark and mating again or did they lose their chance (would the same heat triggers rut/rut triggers heat cycle happen). And how did Lex and Clark missed this in their research?

Oh and the reveal of Kon (probably)being able to have children, like, I think he internalized that he can't have children (that he can't give pups to his alpha) but nope, there is nothing wrong with him actually, he just took after his carrier. (I mean if I was him, a hybrid whom is not having a cycle like I think I am supposed to, I would assume I was infertile. Also holy fuck Lex, I know you wanted to keep how he was concieved from Kon but like talk to your child, like "Kryptonians don't get heats regularly, in Krypton a rut triggers a heat, so we triggered mine to have you" wouldn't even be a lie and I personally wouldn't assume rape from that and I am sure Kon never spoke about how he thought he was infertile to fucking Lex Luthor but sex ed my man, you have to give the speach before they ask for it, wtf?)

And also Kon's life is gonna change so bad man. Like, my guy was the heir to Lex corp, he is smart enough to be, clearly, and now? Man, there needs to be a way to get him Lex corp, like, Tim that would make a great courting gift. I just can't find a way, like, Lex probably haven't updated his will, so like... throw him permanantly in jail, like he raped an omega, force mated him, kidnaped said omega, force mated him again, kidnaped(?)his son and like That should be more them enough to throw him into jail right? Ugh, that's the one part I am not ready for.

At this point I just want fluffy nest cuddles man...

(Sorry I rambled A LOT. I am just so fricking excited, also wanna avoid studying for that exam, also english is not my first language, in general sorry)

😳

I am overwhelmed

Here. Have Clark cuddling Conner in the nest, drawn by me

#71kedi-yip #Ask #answered #renkonnairu #Conner kent #kon-el #clark kent #kal-el #timkon #superbat #fan fiction #fan art #my art #renkon draws #renkon's art

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bigskydreaming · 4 years ago

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Brain topic du jour is reflecting on the frankly weird as fuck pattern in Dick’s life where....he barely ever experiences losses one at a time. Most of the loss he’s experienced in his life is compounded by him losing multiple people and other elements of stability all at the exact same time.

1) When his parents died, in some continuities this is coupled with him losing his extended family of his aunt and cousin as well, with his uncle left comatose and on life support for years before he eventually died as well. Even in continuities without Richard, Karla and John, the loss of Dick’s parents is compounded by the additional loss of his circus family in the sense that he was taken away from them by the state and their constant reassuring presences in his life were no longer comforts he was able to rely on.

2) When Jason died, Dick didn’t just lose his brother, as the tragedy was compounded by Bruce’s reaction. I’ll never be able to gloss over the effects of NTT #55, personally, because I think its too key to Dick’s entire characterization and the specific direction his character took in the years that followed this, to like....disregard that Bruce however unintentionally, while lost in his own grief, added to Dick’s own sense of loss for Jason in probably the worst way possible. As by kicking Dick out and telling him to leave his keys, Dick - having no way to know or guess that they’d ever reconcile, just like he never actually went back to the circus being a regular presence for him - to Dick, this was in essence the equivalent of his childhood tragedy all over again. Losing not just one family member, but his whole family in one sweep, and all the comforts and stability offered by a home he was forced to leave. Even Dick’s contact with Alfred was minimal for awhile, because why would the guy who basically JUST saw history repeat itself and was like, well I know how THIS tends to play out.....why would he think that if Alfred felt forced to actually choose between his loyalties to Bruce and Dick respectively, that Alfred would pick Dick over the man he’d known and raised from childhood himself?

3) Titans Hunt. I know I harp on this one a lot, but you can’t deny that it fits the pattern. Dick didn’t just lose one friend and teammate.....he lost Joey, he lost a good four or five lesser known Titans who nevertheless were people he viewed as directly HIS responsibility to keep safe. With these tragedies compounded by the fact that though comics played out a lot more slowburn and extended stories over years back then, like.....the aftermath of Titans Hunt was still everpresent and directly died into Dick’s reactions and emotions during the Mirage storyline and everything that happened with the failed wedding and his breakup with Kory AND the fact that he was literally forced off the team he’d basically founded, by the government agency that took over the team and appointed Roy as its leader in his stead.

3) Graduation Day. The second time the Titans disbanded it was again not due to a singular loss, because Dick didn’t just lose Donna at this point, but also Lilith died in the exact same story and though Lilith is criminally underused, like, she’s also one of Dick’s oldest friends. She was literally the first Titan to join after the original five. This then led into the Outsiders era, where Dick was shown to still be reeling from the losses of this story for an extended period of time, and in a fun parallel to the Titans Hunt aftermath, Dick was also ousted from his leadership of THIS team by essentially a vote of no confidence by his teammates (and uh, Bruce too, literally).

4) The Blockbuster arc. Where Dick’s emotional state was due to a continued string of multiple losses. He lost his apartment building and almost every one of the neighbors he’d built a community out of, as we’d been shown him actively involving himself in their lives and vice versa for YEARS before this point. Then he lost his circus, his childhood home, burned to the ground and with dozens of deaths - both spectators and actual performers Dick had known and loved as a child. Then he lost his relationship with Barbara, his sense of self-security and autonomy to Tarantula, he lost another teen vigilante who died in his colors, the mantle HE’D created, when Stephanie was believed dead in War Games, and it all culminated in losing the city he’d invested himself in as his CHOSEN home, the place he dedicated himself to protecting, when Chemo blew it up.

Oh just for the record - my nonexistent passport to the magical kingdom of Narnia for a fic that raises the point when bringing up Tim’s losses in the Red Robin era, that like.....ALL of the above happened at literally the EXACT SAME TIME as all Tim’s referenced losses occurred. Obviously Steph meant more to Tim than Dick on a personal level, but I also included her largely as an anchor point to the timeline, to show how that death, and not long after that Jack Drake’s and then Superboy’s.... occurred right smack in the middle of one of the absolute WORST periods of Dick’s life. To be clear, I don’t intend this to suggest that no actually, Dick had it harder than Tim - nah.

No thank you. Hard pass. I hate that sort of thing even in support of my own faves over other characters. No, instead the thing I’d love to see explored more is just in light of the SPECIFIC angle fics take here - that Dick’s actions while Bruce was lost in time showed an obliviousness to everything Tim had lost lately - for literally ANYONE to bring up or introduce into the timeline here an awareness of everything Dick had lost AT THE EXACT SAME TIME PERIOD. To establish that actually, Dick didn’t just ‘not understand what it was like’ - rather, its more accurate to say that nobody in universe around this time ever shows an awareness of Dick’s own losses and says oh wait, that doesn’t track then.

Because obviously, with this stuff put in proper perspective, Dick understands VERY VERY WELL the exact thing we’re accusing him of not understanding by being oblivious to Tim’s losses that he’s not actually oblivious to because he tries to talk to Tim about them all the time, while meanwhile its everyone else who has absolutely mum to say about the fact that Dick’s emotional state is compromised to hell and back at this point, not JUST because of losing Bruce, but also because *gestures wildly* literally ALL OF THE ABOVE in the exact same time frame Tim’s extended losses happened in.

And okay I am going to indulge in slight tiny itty bitty pettiness and point out my ire that so many fics set during this time tend to recite listicles of Tim’s losses, with Steph, Kon and Jack Drake at the very top of said list....while paying no attention whatsoever to the fact that STEPH WAS LITERALLY BACK BY THE TIME THE RED ROBIN SERIES HAPPENED. She’s LITERALLY a person Dick sends to check up on Tim after Tim turns Dick away when he tries himself. How are you gonna stress the impact Steph’s loss has on Tim when you’re not even acknowledging STEPH’S RIGHT HERE IN THE EXACT SPECIFIC CANON STORY YOU’RE CITING??? I just. afhioskhflafhlafhklfahlfa.

And not to put too fine a point on it, but you know who ELSE was also back at the same time? CONNOR. Superboy LITERALLY was already back to life by the time the Red Robin series even began. Like, the issue where a resurrected Kon and Cassie (Wonder Girl) have a heart to heart about the fact that Tim and Cassie ‘connected’ during his absence and Connor stresses that this doesn’t bother him or make him feel negatively towards either of them at all, because hello, he was literally dead at the time, why would he mind that two of the people he loves most in the world sought comfort in each other? Yeah, that issue? Literally came out BEFORE Tim even became Red Robin.

I MEAN. I’m just saying, when people constantly take shots at Dick’s choices during this period because of how much Tim had lost before Bruce already, in order to shift focus away from the fact that Dick lost Bruce every bit as much as Tim did......and you repeatedly emphasize the SAME three names as the focal point of Tim’s losses while paying no acknowledgment whatsoever to everything Dick lost at the exact same time Tim lost these three.....it quickly becomes kiiiiiiinda relevant in my opinion THAT TWO OF THE THREE NAMES CONSTANTLY MENTIONED AS BEING TIM’S LOSSES ARE NO LONGER EVEN LOST BY THE TIME THE SUBJECT COMES UP. Again, I’m just saying! Pettily, mind you! I am aware of the pettiness, I just beg awareness of like *again gesticulates wildly at all of the above* ALL THAT!

LOL.

But I digress.

5) When Bruce was believed dead while he was lost in the timestream. Again, Dick didn’t just lose the father who had been the only parent in his life for almost TWICE as long as his first parents......this was coupled with the loss of numerous other sources of stability in Dick’s life. There’s the matter of his personal sense of identity and self-expression....Dick FOUGHT against becoming Batman, trying to handle Gotham in Bruce’s absence as Nightwing for as long as he could, because he knew being Batman was very much NOT going to be good for him. He put so much of himself into building his identity as Nightwing, establishing himself in that role, that self-image, that yes, I maintain it was an actual LOSS for Dick, to feel like he had no choice but to give that up and everything it meant to him and his own life, in order to essentially live Bruce’s life for him in his absence.

Because it wasn’t just being Batman that Dick was struggling with at this time....he also had to act as the patriarch to the Wayne family, essentially raise Bruce’s ten year old son, step into Bruce’s old role in Wayne Enterprises, all while getting no acknowledgment for any of this, for literally LIVING his father’s life instead of the life Dick had worked so hard to build for HIMSELF....because of course Dick’s actions and struggles couldn’t even be advertised beyond the family and close friends, because the whole point of him doing all this was so that nobody else even realized that Bruce wasn’t really there anymore. Dick didn’t just assume Bruce’s responsibilities. Dick assumed Bruce’s life, so thoroughly that most people didn’t even put together that Bruce was ‘dead,’ between Dick handling Bruce’s actual roles and responsibilities while Hush made public appearances as him.

Like, when you’re living someone else’s life so completely that nobody can tell they’re even gone....how on earth does that leave any time or space for you to have ANY kind of life of your OWN, y’know? Not to mention the fact that like in so many times previously....all this meant that Dick couldn’t even afford to let his grief for his own losses show, because he wasn’t supposed to be grieving any losses in the first place, that was the whole point of the con!

Additionally, couple this with the fact that throughout this time period, Dick didn’t have Tim to lean on at all, because it was never that Dick kicked Tim out or neglected him or didn’t care....he’d actively stressed how much he needed Tim, because the partner Tim was convinced Dick chose ‘over’ him - Dick was the first one to admit back then that he DIDN’T trust Damian yet, couldn’t afford to, because he was all too aware that Damian didn’t give a fuck about him yet and couldn’t be guaranteed to step in to have Dick’s back - because that required mutual trust that Dick literally just hadn’t had time to build yet. And add to THAT the fact that during this time, Jason was actively antagonizing the family and Dick in particular at every turn, trying to bring them all down and basically write over what all of them saw as Bruce’s legacy with Jason’s own version of what he thought that should look like.

Also also, take into account that unlike how often we see fanon depict Dick as just too stubborn or proud to ask for help, there’s the fact that he actually had very few avenues TO ask for help! As already established, he DID ask Tim for help. Not like Jason was an option at this time, and Dick’s friends weren’t actually just sitting waiting in the wings and groaning about the fact that Dick was trying to do all of this solo....nah, they kinda had their own problems, which Dick was all too aware of?

Like the fact that in the wake of Final Crisis, it wasn’t just Bruce that was believed lost. Many other key Leaguers like Martian Manhunter were dead or lost, with others struggling to fill the gaps left in their absence. Cry For Justice happened right after Final Crisis too....that story where Lian was murdered? So it wasn’t like Dick was remotely going to try leaning on Roy when Roy had just lost his freaking DAUGHTER and very much wasn’t handling it well (and not to overshadow Roy’s loss at ALL, but please let’s not act like Dick - who had literally been the person to put a baby Lian in Roy’s arms for the first time and had known that girl for pretty much her entire life - like, it shouldn’t be used to detract from Roy’s loss at all, but it shouldn’t have to, to just acknowledge that Lian’s loss right at this exact time was painful as fuck to Dick, who’d loved his niece like crazy.)

The pattern of compounding, concurrent losses in Dick’s life. I’m just saying. Its there.

And it extends into the New 52 as well, where Forever Evil came right on the heels of Dick losing his circus in THIS continuity to the Joker, just as a way to hurt him in Death of A Family. And with the aftermath of Forever Evil and Dick’s own literal death, being like....the complete loss of Dick’s entire life, even though he was revived quickly. That didn’t mean he got to live HIS life though, since Dick Grayson was believed dead and he was told had to remain so, so its like fuck whatever he actually wanted to do as he went about on the Spyral mission aka something that pinched his own sense of morality and personal agenda at every turn and was kinda the last thing a therapist would recommend for a trauma recovery period, lol. And like, for all the focus that was paid to how Dick’s family were hurt because they believed they’d lost him when he was actually alive, let’s not forget that for all intents and purposes, Dick DID lose his family in the wake of his resurrection because he was flat out told over and over that due to what ‘he’d LET happen to him’ he was an ACTIVE danger to them, and thus wasn’t allowed by Bruce to contact any of them or lean on them to any degree, until Bruce got amnesia and stopped blocking Dick’s pleas to return home by just not being there to pick up the secret phone line at all.

(And omg, the obliviousness that just EMANATES off the hot takes that Dick had a ‘choice’ in all this and he still CHOSE to do what Bruce told him....like. LOLOL, stop being pissy about me bringing up the term abuse apologism when its literal victim blaming to paint the guy who had to be beaten into ‘agreeing’ to the Spyral mission in the immediate wake of the trauma of DYING, all while his father vocally blamed him for his own suffering and the ‘threat’ he now posed to his family, keying directly into the guilt complex Bruce knows damn well is at the core of most of Dick’s motivations.....fucking please. There’s no choice in all that. That’s active emotional, mental and physical abuse aimed at directly manipulating Dick’s actions, delivered by the guy who knows Dick best in the world and whose approval - particularly when Dick is at absolute rock bottom aka Current Location - matters more to Dick than just about anything because his sense of self-worth has more in common with dog shit than actual dog shit does. Or something. Idk. That analogy got away from me. But like. You get it.)

BUT. I. DIE. GRESS. (I guess).

Aaaaaaanyway, so yeah! That repeating pattern throughout Dick’s life of ‘loss? What loss (singular)? My losses only come in groups, lolol, fuuuuuun’ - mmmm. Yeah. So that’s what’s on MY brain right now. Thoughts?

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moonlitceleste · 4 years ago

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Here’s one of my (many) Connerette ideas! I could’ve sworn I had already posted this, but I guess not.

Ladybug and Chat Noir defeated Hawkmoth when they were 15

Gabriel, Nathalie, and Lila went to jail

Ladybug and Chat’s identities were not revealed to one another

Ladybug found out Adrien’s, who was horrified

He told her to take the ring back because he didn’t want the burden of it anymore

He admitted that he had thought of betraying her to get his mother back, and if he kept the ring he might try

It was too painful, and the wound was still fresh, so he didn’t want to know her identity

Adrien needed space and time to think about Hawkmoth as well as re-evaluate his behavior towards Ladybug

Marinette needed to get away from the toxic relationships in her life and not allow herself to be held back because of them

The Justice League had known about Hawkmoth all along and came to an agreement when the villain first appeared that they would let Ladybug and Chat handle it

Batman had obviously figured out their identities already, and once the villain was defeated he approached Ladybug

He made an offer to have John Constantine and Diana Prince mentor her

Constantine because of his magical knowledge, and Diana because her mother had been a former Ladybug and it’d also benefit Marinette to learn combat from the Amazons

The Amazons could also teach her life lessons and how to stand up for herself, and Marinette could work on furthering her fashion design skills under Diana’s tutelage

She spends two-three years creating a name as MDC as well as training under them

She meets Zatanna through Constantine and they become good friends

Zatanna is 18 and already proficient at magic, so they work together for a bit

Anyways, the story starts after all this happens

Marinette has her life together and is searching for some of the very last missing Miraculous

You can choose whether or not her identity as MDC is still secret; it won’t make much of a difference

The YJ team is back together, either for a short mission or to just have fun and relax

Marinette is in some country searching for a Miraculous under the guise of MDC work for anyone who asks (not that anyone would, since the only friends she really has are Luka and Zatanna)

But despite not having a huge friend group like she did before, she’s content with the fact that she can really trust them

She hadn’t talked to Adrien in a while; she checked up on him briefly over the years but it was hard to establish a solid friendship again

She was thinking about telling him her identity though

But back to the story!

Marinette is wandering around, looking for both fashion inspiration and any clues as to where the Miraculous could be

Let’s just say it’s a swan miraculous—whatever animal it is doesn’t really pertain to the story

It’s warm outside, she’s dressed in a cute outfit: white tank top, pink plaid pleated skirt, white knee-high boots (or sneakers), a ponytail and looking like her best self

She quite literally bumps into the team

Marinette apologizes before noticing Zatanna

“Z!” she exclaims

They exchange la bise kisses and a hug

Cue the team looking all confused in the background

Zatanna treats Marinette like an old friend, which is weird because they think if she had any friends they’d know them

She asks what Marinette is doing there, to which she replies that she’s “looking for something lost. I think I know where it is, but I’m not sure yet.”

To any outsider it sounds like she’s talking about losing something, but Zatanna understands what she really means

She asks if there’s anything her and her friends could to to help

Marinette says no, but asks her to look out for a silver necklace with a small swan charm

At this point the team is curious, so they butt in and ask for introductions

Someone else from the team definitely flirts with Mari (I mean, how could they not? Someone had to.)

They all speak briefly before Marinette’s phone rings (it’s Uncle Jagged!!) and she has to go

But not before someone from YJ invites Marinette to meet up with them in a day or two so they can all “get to know each other better”

Cue her getting actual friendships and eventually mending the one with Adrien

I wouldn’t have instant attraction with Connerette; maybe just an “oh the other is objectively attractive” but not one of them actively pursuing the other from the start

Personality-wise, Conner is less broody and angsty than he is in YJ but not quite as bold as he is in ROTS

You can decide whether or not SuperMartian was ever a thing, but the less drama the better (plus I’ve heard that their relationship was kinda toxic, sooo)

It’s the snarkiness and personality that pulls Conner to Marinette

Everyone else realizes they like each other before they do

Slow burn, friends-to-lovers but not exactly

They’re friends but don’t start thinking of each other as anything more until something spurs them to

Conner realizes he likes her once he gets jealous

It’ll probably be Jason playfully flirting with Marinette

Like, they get introduced and hit it off so well

This is after three-four months of her knowing the YJ team

Conner gets a funny feeling when he sees her laughing with Jason

He’s snappy towards Jason for some reason, but he doesn’t know why

Platonic Jasonette + a heavy dose of flirty banter = a total BROTP + a jealous Conner

And boom

This could actually go the Jasonette route and be Conner’s POV with his hopeless pining

But again, drama-free route!!

Jason probably notices Conner getting jealous so he does something extreme since he just wants them to admit their feelings already

#maribat #connerette #jasonette #celestewrites

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oscopelabs · 4 years ago

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Christopher Nolan: The Man Who Wasn’t There by Daniel Carlson

So, we’ll start with the fact that all movies are make-believe. It’s a bunch of actors on a set, wearing costumes and standing with props picked out by hordes of people you’ll never see, under the guidance of a director, saying things that have been written down for them while doing their best to say these things so that it sounds like they’re just now thinking of them. We all know this—saying it feels incredibly stupid, like pointing out that water is wet—but it’s still worth noting. There is, for example, no such person as Luke Skywalker. Never has been, never will be. He was invented by a baby boomer from Modesto. He is not real.

And we know this, and that’s part of the fun. We know that Luke Skywalker isn’t real but is being portrayed by an actor (another boomer from the Bay Area, come to think of it), and that none of the things we’re seeing are real. But we give ourselves over to the collective fiction for the greater experience of becoming involved in a story. This is one of the most amazing things that we do as humans. We know—deep down, in our bones, without-a-doubt know—that the thing we’re watching is fiction, but we enter a state of suspended reality where we imagine the story to be real, and we allow ourselves to be moved by it. We’ve been doing this since we developed language. The people telling these stories know this and bring the same level of commitment and imagination and assurance that we do as viewers, too. The storyteller knows that the story isn’t real, but for lack of a better way to get a handle on it, it feels real. So, to continue with the example, we’re excited when Luke Skywalker blows up the Death Star because he helped the good guys win. For us viewers, in this state of mutually reinforced agreement, that “happened.” It’s not real, but it’s “real”—that is, it’s real within the established boundaries of the invented world that we’ve all agreed to sit and look at for a couple of hours. Every viewer knows this, and every filmmaker acts on it, too. Except:

Christopher Nolan does not do this.

There’s no one single owner or maker of any movie, and anyone who tells you different has their hand in your pocket. But there’s an argument to be made that when somebody both writes and directs the movie, it’s a bit easier to locate a sense of personhood in the final product. (This is all really rough math, too, and should not be used in court.) Christopher Nolan has directed 11 films to date, and while his style can be found in all of them, his self is more present in the ones where he had a hand in the shaping of the story—and crucially, not just that, but in the construction of the fictional world. Take away the superhero trilogy, the remake of a Norwegian thriller, the adaptation of a novel, and the historical drama, and Nolan’s directed five films that can reasonably be attributed to his own creative universe: Following (1998), Memento (2000), Inception (2010), Interstellar (2014), and Tenet (2020). These movies all involve themes that Nolan seems to enjoy working with no matter the source material, including identity, memory, and how easily reality can be called into question when two people refuse to concede that they had very different experiences of the same event. Basically, he makes movies about how perception shapes existence. How he does this, though, is unlike pretty much everybody else.

Take Inception. After a decade spent going from hotshot new talent to household name (thanks to directing the two highest-grossing Batman movies ever made, as well as the first superhero movie to earn an Oscar for acting), he had the credit line to make something big and flashy that was also weird and personal. So we got an action movie that, when first announced in the Hollywood trades, was described as being set within “the architecture of the mind.” Although this at first seemed to be a phrase that only a publicist could love, it turned out to be the best way to describe the film. This is a film, after all, about a group of elite agents who use special technology to enter someone’s subconscious dream-state and then manipulate that person’s memories and emotions. The second half of the film sees team leader Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) and the rest of the squad actually descend through multiple nested subconsciouses to achieve their goal, even as they’re chased every step of the way by representations of Mal (Marion Cotillard), Dom’s late wife, who committed suicide after spending too much time in another’s subconscious and lost the ability to discern whether she was really alive or still in the dream-world.

I say “representations” because that’s what they are: Mal is long dead, but Dom still feels enormous guilt over his complicity in her actions, and that guilt shows up looking like Mal, whose villainous actions (the representation’s actions, that is) are just more signs of Dom not being able to come to grips with his own past. It’s his own brain making these things up and attacking itself, and it chases his entire crew down three successive layers of dream worlds. You get caught up in the movie’s world as a viewer, and you go along because Nolan is pretty good at making exciting movies that feel like theme-park rides. You accept that Dom and everybody else refer to Mal as Mal and not, say, Dom. Dom even addresses her (“her”) when her projection shows up, speaking to her as if she’s a separate being with her own will and desires and not a puppet that he’s pretending not to know he’s controlling. It’s only later that you realize that the movie is in some ways just a big-budget rendition of what it would look like to really, really want to avoid therapy.

Which is what makes Nolan different from other filmmakers:

None of this is actually happening.

Again, yes, it’s happening in the sense that we see things on screen—explosions, chases, a fight scene in a rotating hallway that’s still some of the best practical-effects work in modern action movies—but within the universe of the film, none of what’s going on is taking place in the real world. It’s all unfolding in the subconsciouses of Dom’s teammates. In the movie’s real world, they’re all asleep on a luxury jet. They’re “doing” things that have an outcome on the plot, but Nolan sets more than half the movie inside dreams. It’s a movie about reality where we spend less time in reality than in fantasy. Half the movie is pretend.

For Nolan, filmmaking is about using a dazzling array of techniques to create a visual spectacle that distracts the viewer from the fact that the real and true story is happening somewhere else: in the fringes we can’t quite see, in the things we forget to remember, or even in the realm of pure speculation.

Memento arrived like (and with) a gunshot. It seemed to come out of nowhere and leave people struggling to describe it, and they usually wound up saying something like “it goes backward, but also forward at the same time, except some parts are actually really backward, like in reverse, so it’s maybe a circle?” Written by Christopher Nolan from an idea originally shared with him by his brother, Jonathan (who eventually turned it into a very different short story titled “Memento Mori”), the film follows a man named Leonard (Guy Pearce) who has anterograde amnesia and can’t form new memories, so every few minutes he sort of just resets and has to figure out where he is, what he’s doing there, and so on. He’s on the hunt for the man who attacked him and his wife, leaving his wife dead and Leonard in his present condition, which you can imagine does not make the gathering and synthesis of clues easy.

What’s more, Nolan puts the viewer in Leonard’s shoes by breaking the film’s linear timeline into two halves—call them A and B—and then alternating between them, with the added disorientation coming from the fact that one of those timeline halves plays out backward, with each successive scene showing what happened before the one you previously saw. So, if you numbered all the scenes in each timeline in chronological order, they’d look something like this when arranged in the final film: Scene A1, Scene B22, Scene A2, Scene B21, Scene A3, Scene B20, etc. You get why it messed with people’s heads.

As a result, we spend most of the movie pretty confused, just like Leonard, whose suppositions about what might or might not take place next begin to substitute for our own understanding of the film. It’s not until the end that we find out the shoe already dropped, and that Leonard killed the original attacker some time ago and has since been led on a series of goose chases by his cop friend, Teddy (Joe Pantoliano), who’s planting fake clues to get Leonard to take out other criminals. In other words, we realize that the story we thought was happening was pretend, and the real story was happening all around us, in the margins, memories, and imaginations of the characters. The most honest moment in the movie is the scene where Leonard hires a sex worker to wait several minutes in the bathroom while he gets in bed, then make a noise with the door to wake him, at which point his amnesia has kicked in again and he briefly thinks that the noise is being made by his wife. He’s wrong, of course, but this is the only time in the movie that we actually know he’s wrong. It’s the only time we truly know what’s real and what isn’t.

Yet you can’t talk about Memento without talking about Following, Nolan’s first feature. Although the film’s production was so extremely low-budget you’d think they were lying—the cast and crew all had day jobs and could only film on the weekends, so the thing took a year to make—Nolan’s willingness to dwell completely in a make-believe world that the viewer never knows about is already evident. It’s about a bored young writer who starts following strangers through the city for kicks, only for one of those strangers to catch him in the act and confront him. The stranger introduces himself as Cobb—I kindly submit here that it is not a coincidence that this is also Leonardo DiCaprio’s character’s name in Inception, but you already knew that—and reveals himself to be a burglar, spooked by the tail but willing to take on an apprentice. Cobb trains the writer to be a burglar, only for the situation to ultimately wind up implicating the writer himself in a complex blackmail plot. You see, the writer didn’t latch onto Cobb in a crowd; Cobb lured him in. The whole movie has been Cobb’s story all along, with the writer as a patsy who doesn’t understand the truth until the final frame. None of what we saw mattered, and everything that actually happened happened off-screen just before or just after we came in on a given scene. It’s like realizing the movie you’re watching turned out to be just deleted scenes from something else. You can’t say Nolan didn’t show his hand from the start.

That same general concept—that the movie we’re watching is actually the knock-on effect of a movie we’ll only glimpse, or maybe never even see—underpins Nolan’s latest movies, Interstellar and Tenet, too. Interstellar has some concepts that are iffy even for Nolan (it makes total sense for someone to do something for another out of love, but somewhat less sense that that love somehow reshapes the physical universe), but it’s still a big, bold approach to exploring how time and perception shape our actions. As the film follows its core group of astronauts while they search for potentially habitable new worlds, they encounter strange visions and experiences that turn out to be their handiwork from the future reflected back at them. Sure, it raises the paradoxical question of whether they had a first mission before this that failed, so now their future selves are intervening to make the second one (which feels like the first one to the astronauts the whole time) successful, and all sorts of other stuff that your sophomore-year roommate would like to talk with you about in great detail. But so much of what we see isn’t the stuff that happens, or that winds up being important. There’s the great scene where the astronauts land on a planet near a black hole, which is wreaking havoc on how time passes on the planet. A minor disaster delays their departure for the main ship still in orbit, but when the landing team returns, they find that more than 20 years have “passed” since they left, with the one remaining team member on the ship having spent more than two decades waiting for them to return. It’s a moment of genuine horror, and it underscores the fact that what we thought was the one true reality was just the perspective of a handful of characters we happened to follow for a few minutes. There were whole things happening that changed the plot and story and direction of everything that would follow, and we never saw them; we didn’t even know we’d missed them.

Tenet is, of course, the latest and most recursive exploration yet of Nolan’s obsession with showing us a story that turns out to be mostly fake. It is almost perversely hard to even begin to explain the film (Google “Tenet timeline infographic” and have fun). One way to think about it is to imagine if the two timeline halves from Memento somehow existed at the same time, with people moving both forward and backward through time while inhabiting the same location. Basically, some scientists figured out how to “invert” the basic entropy of objects, so that they exist backward: you hold out your hand and the ball on the ground leaps up into it, because you’ve dropped it in the future, so now you can pick it up, etc. … Look, it doesn’t get easier to understand.

The upshot is, though, that we spend the film following the Protagonist (that’s his name), a CIA agent played by John David Washington, as he’s tasked with tracking down the source of the inverted stuff to figure out what’s unfolding in the future and why it’s suddenly started to make itself known in the present. He gets marginally closer to understanding the truth by the end of the film, but because this is a Nolan film that is maybe more expressly about the nature of reality than anything he’s ever done, his journey doesn’t so much take him forward as it does in a large circle. Because, and stop me if you’ve heard this, the true story of Tenet is taking place outside the Protagonist’s actions and knowledge, alongside him but invisible, often steered by people who themselves are moving “backward” through time and thus have already met the Protagonist in the future and are old friends with him by the time he meets them in his youth. Even more brain-liquefying, some of these people have been working under the orders of the Protagonist himself—the future version, that is—because his past self has already achieved the victories that allowed him to send the future people backward through time to meet his younger self so they’d achieve the victories that allow him to etc., etc., etc.

With Tenet, Nolan didn’t just make a movie that challenged perception, like Memento, or that dwelt in fiction, like Inception. He made a movie that can only be understood (to whatever degree true understanding is possible) by rewatching the movie itself, over and over, as the multiple timelines and harrowingly complex bits of cause and effect come into some kind of focus. The whole movie itself isn’t happening, in a sense, but is just the ramifications of something else, the echoes of a shout whose origin we’re straining to pinpoint. It both is and isn’t.

Christopher Nolan is a talented director of action-driven suspense thrillers. He’s canny at controlling the audience’s emotions, and he knows how to put on a dazzling show. Plus he’s fantastic at picking when to deploy non-computer-generated effects for maximum impact. But you could say that about a lot of other directors, too. What sets Nolan apart from the rest, and what makes him a director to keep watching and returning to, is the teasing way his movies wind up being just deceptive enough to fool you into thinking that you know what’s going on, then just harsh enough to disabuse you of that notion. Looking at what seems to drive him, I don’t think Tenet is his best movie-movie, but it’s his most-Nolan movie. It’s almost a culmination of his continuing efforts to tell stories where what you see and what actually happens are two different things. It’s not that he makes puzzles to solve. There is no solving these movies. Rather, it’s that he sculpts these delicate artifacts that only let you see two dimensions at a time, never all three, no matter how you twist your head. Craning back and forth, you can almost see the whole thing, but not quite. Some part of it will always have to exist in your memory. And that’s where Christopher Nolan likes to be.

#chrisopher nolan #tenet #memento #following #following movie #christopher nolan film #inception #inception film #memento film #tenet film #interstellar #interstellar film #oscilloscope laboratories #musings #film writing #beastie boys

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wonderfulworldofmichaelford · 4 years ago

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Is It Really THAT Bad?

How many fucking times must I talk about this movie?

I feel like this movie doesn’t need an introduction. Everyone knows this film. Its reputation precedes it. It didn’t bomb and it’s not generally considered one of the worst films ever made (at least on the level of films like Robot Monster or The Cat in the Hat), but this movie is easily one of the most divisive films ever made. This film has generated enough arguments that, if we harnessed the energy of all the flame wars it has caused, we could probably power the entire world until the heat death of the universe.

With the impending release of Zach Snyder’s bloated redo of Justice League, I’ve decided to go back and ask myself of this film here… is it really that bad?

THE GOOD

Here comes the most uncontroversial opinion: the action scenes in this movie rock (or at least two of them do). The standouts are the titular showdown, which almost makes sitting through the rest of the movie worth it, and the epic warehouse fight Batman gets into, which is like something straight out of the Arkham games. It’s so good. And aside from that, a lot of the cinematography in the film is good. The film knows how to look good, though unfortunately it does end up being a lot of style with little substance.

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On the subject of Batman, I think Ben Affleck is a great and inspired choice. I certainly think he’s worthy of standing alongside Batmans like Clooney and Keaton, easily embodying both the Dark Knight and Billionaire Playboy aspects fairly well, though the writing does not always handle him quite as well as it should (we’ll get to that soon enough). Henry Cavill, while still a rather dour Superman, is as good as ever as Superman, and Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman was a great choice here, especially since she didn’t have control so that she could insert anti-Arab racism, like some DCEU movies.

Perhaps one of the movies most impressive feats is how, in an uncharacteristic moment of brevity, it manages to condense the backstory of Batman into the prologue, getting it out of the way and not making us sit through yet another Batman origin film. This is literally the only thing the movie has over the MCU; where that franchise just has the character Spider-Man inexplicably in existence without even a hint of his origins, they just get Batman’s tragic backstory out of the way so we can see him beating the crap out of people. If more superhero movies want to take this route and just condense the backstory into an opening montage like this, I’d be down for it.

THE BAD

I really could just say “most of the movie” but that’s such a cop out. Let’s actually look at the problems. Let’s work our way up through the things from least problematic to most, shall we?

The best place to start is what Zach Snyder did to Jimmy Olsen.

Jimmy Olsen is made into a CIA spook who is brutally killed early on, and yes, that was Jimmy Olsen. Snyder put him in to shock audiences with his senseless murder, and also because he felt the character had no place in his series. Does making Watchmen just turn people into joyless husks who like to horribly bastardize iconic characters? Jimmy Olsen is ultimately a small microcosm of the film, but he is the sum total of everything wring with the early DCEU. He is bleak, soulless, and shows a critical lack of understanding about the comics and why people enjoy them.

Now let’s move on to the more exciting problem to discuss: the villains. I don’t even think it’s worth wasting much time discussing what’s wrong with KGBeast. While it is kind of interesting they’d think to use the guy at all, the fact he never dons the costume and dies by the end of the film is unfathomably lame for a character named KGBeast.

Now, onto the main antagonist, and the most infamous part of the movie: Lex Luthor.

Lex Luthor is horribly, horribly miscast. Jesse Eisenberg is a great actor for sure, and he’s effective in movies like Now You See Me, The Social Network, and the Zombieland films. But here he is being asked to play one of the most diabolical cunning geniuses in comic book history, and rather than play him as such, he plays him like a cartoonish twit. This Lex is utterly unrecognizable as Superman’s greatest foe. Does anyone think Lex Luthor would send a jar of piss to someone as a joke before he blows them up? That’s more something the Joker would do on an off day. Lex is not cunning, not intimidating, and not diabolical in the slightest, and yet there are moments where Eisenberg’s acting chops shine through and Lex, for a moment, is almost engaging. Luthor really suffers the way Doctor Doom tends to in film adaptations: the filmmaker clearly doesn’t get why people like the villain, and decide to do some weird, unique take that will only cause to alienate fans.

But perhaps the worst of them all is Doomsday. Doomsday has exactly one claim to fame, and that’s killing Superman, so as soon as he shows up if you have even a passing awareness of the character you know how the movie is going to end, which robs the film of tension for its last battle. The fact he also appears with little buildup and doesn’t have any characterization doesn’t help; Doomsday is just the Big Gray CGI Blob that superhero movies try and pass off as a final boss for the heroes to fight. This has worked precisely once, in Iron Man. The Incredible Hulk and Venom did not make it work, and this film is nowhere close to being in the same ballpark as Venom.

By and far the biggest problem, though, is the movie’s incredible length and its very existence in the franchise at this point in time. This is an epic superhero crossover in which two of the biggest comic book characters of all time fight and then team up… And it is the second movie in a franchise. While they do a good job of establishing Batman rather quickly, Wonder Woman comes out of nowhere. And then at the end, Superman ‘dies.’ We have had one single movie prior to this to make a connection to the guy, and yet here he is getting a temporary comic book death with no buildup whatsoever that we know is going to be reversed sooner than later because the movie telegraphs this to us.

Imagine if, instead of building up the character over the course of a decade and putting him in all sorts of different stories, the MCU went right from Iron Man to Endgame. You go from a simpler, character-driven piece to a massive crossover where a hero dies right away, and it doesn’t give anyone time to care. Tony Stark had multiple films worth of characterization under his belt before they threw him in a crossover, let alone killed him, but Snyder expects you to give a damn about a Superman who just started his career in the previous movie of a franchise.

And the ass-numbing length of the movie is no justification. Even before the director’s cut came out this film was a slog, and the director’s cut really does nothing to earn its existence. All it does is add more runtime to an already tedious and bloated film, leading to the same exact ending and fixing none of the overarching narrative problems of the thing. The problem with any director’s cut is that ultimately the movie is still going to be Dawn of Justice, it’s still going to lead to extremely rushed character decisions, and it’s still going to be a mess. You’d have to redo half of the film to make this into a worthwhile and coherent narrative that’s actually worthy of being an entry in a superhero franchise.

And to top it all off, the movie spends far too much time foreshadowing for its own good. People criticized The Mummy for shoehorning in way too many shared universe elements right off the bat, and if that movie was bad for it, so is this one. The cameos from all the members of the Justice League, while striking, could be excised from the plot with little to no impact, and the Knightmare sequence is just excessive and weird.

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Is It Really THAT Bad?

The answer to this question has never been harder.

On the one hand, this film does have some merit. There is some good casting choices, good cinematography, good action… But then, on the other hand, the film is overly long, pretentious, has poor writing and dialogue, mishandles everyone aside from Superman, and is just incredibly unpleasant.

This film is in many ways the exact problem Christopher Nolan created with his Dark Knight trilogy. Nolan, by grounding the fanciful characters of comic books into a realistic setting, created a climate in which someone could suck any sort of joy or meaning out of comics. The success of his films meant that people would see dark, gritty realism as preferable to joyous, colorful escapism, and the negative effects of his films, however good you find them, are still felt today even as filmmakers are finally shaking off the grit. Dawn of Justice is the zenith of Nolan’s style of superhero film. There is nothing fun, joyful, or engaging to be found here; it is simply the characters you know and love forced into dark, miserable scenarios that ends in death and misery. Where’s the fun? Where’s the color? Where’s the wonder, the excitement, where is any of it? This film paints a bleak and miserable and hopeless picture of a world of superheroes. It really makes me think of this rather famous comic panel:

I absolutely hate this movie, but not because I think it’s bad. I hate it because it has enough good ideas where it should be the best thing ever, but it really isn’t. It’s a miserable slog of a film that does nothing to justify or earn its massive runtime whatsoever. It really does belong somewhere between 5 and 6 on IMDB, because I can almost see why people like it, but it just isn’t even remotely close to being how good its fan say it is. This is not a good superhero movie, and this is not how we should want superhero movies to be. There is a market for serious superhero fare of course, and there’s no reason that these films can’t engage with mature themes or anything, don’t get me wrong. But this is absolutely not the way to do it.

#Is it really that bad #IIRTB #Review #movie review #Batman v Superman #Dawn of Justice #Zach Snyder #Batman #Superman #DCEU

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superman86to99 · 4 years ago

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Superman #84 (December 1993)

Superman takes a short Paris vacation! Like, one day short. What's the worst that could happen?

Oh, man.

So, for the past few issues, we've been hearing about children being abducted in Metropolis. Now we see that they're being kept inside a giant toy house by some creepy bald man in Quasimodo clothes who seems to be obsessed with toys -- a "Man of Toys," if you will. Side note: no wonder the children haven't been found... all the articles about them are just gibberish! (See clip below.)

The kidnapper thinks that these kids' parents don't deserve them, and that they're much better off here, in an underground hideout with a man who threatens to starve them if they don't play with him. (And I do mean literally play, with action figures and stuff.) Meanwhile, as these children cry for help, Superman is having the time of his life. While helping move a stranded ship with some huge-ass chains, Superman spots a sunken galleon with a treasure chest inside and fantasizes about keeping the booty...

...before turning it over to the authorities anyway, the big boy scout. Then, he wakes up Lois at 6 AM and tells her they should go to Paris right now, which usually means your significant other is having a mental breakdown, but in this case they can actually do it. And so, after deciding that he deserves to use his powers for fun every once in a while, Superman and Lois drop everything and fly to France with super-speed for the rest of the day/issue.

Anyway: back to the child abduction! Cat Grant and her son Adam attend a Halloween party at Adam's school, but there's a disturbed weirdo in a hideous costume lurking among the crowd. Yes, I'm talking about Jimmy Olsen in his Turtle Boy suit.

Shortly after that, a guy in a dinosaur costume (see, all the creeps are dressed as reptiles) lures Adam out of the party with the promise of "superb video games." What child could resist that? Of course, that turns out to be the kidnapper and Adam ends up in his hideout along with the rest of the missing children and, worst of all, not a single "Lextendo" console.

The kidnapper gets angry at Adam when he refers to the toys at the hideout as "old-fashioned junk" (he was REALLY looking forward to those video games), and even angrier when Adam tries to free the other kids. Adam is brave and puts up a good fight, but...

And those were Adam Morgan's final words. "Uh-oh."

Next, we have a pretty harrowing scene of Detective Turpin letting Cat know Adam’s body was found, and Jimmy and Perry White taking her to the morgue to identify the body (most people probably wouldn't bring their former boss to something like that, but Perry sadly knows more than most about losing a kid). As for Lois and Clark, they were gone so long that the Daily Planet had time to print a headline about the murders. The issue ends when the lovebirds walk into the office smiling like two people who just spent the night fooling around in Paris... only to feel like jackasses when they find out what happened.

To be continued!

Character-Watch:

And that's it for little Adam Morgan who, unlike the also tragically diseased Jerry White, didn't even get any post-death appearances. Adam went from a little kid scared of Superman, to a huge brat, to a character who was approaching likeability as of last week. That's why I hate it when DC kills off young characters like Adam or Liam Harper: in long-form storytelling, children represent potential. Look at how much Wally West or Dick Grayson evolved over the years compared to their mentors! Sure, there's a huge probability that Adam would have ended up disappearing from comics for 25 years anyway, but who knows, maybe we'd now know him as Teen Gangbuster or something. GangbusTEEN.

This issue also represents a turning point for the kidnapper, who is never named or seen clearly in the story itself but I don't think I'm shocking anyone by spoiling the fact that he's Toyman (it's in the cover, for one thing). In his last two appearances before this storyline, Toyman helped Superman save some kids from Sleez and looked genuinely sad to learn about Superman's death, so this is a pretty dramatic change for the character. We'll find out why he went from big softy to child killer in Superman #85 (but don't get your hopes up).

Plotline-Watch:

The most disturbing part of the issue, all things considered, is still the part where Toyman climbs into a giant crib and hugs a huge stuffed bunny. Look at serial killer Tommy Pickles here:

Don Sparrow says: “Even with the upgrade, Toyman is still just a man in a suit, a common complaint about Superman’s rogues gallery.” Funny you should say that, because I JUST shared an old Wizard interview in our Twitter in which Dan Jurgens talks about how Doomsday came out of his frustration with the fact that most Superman villains are dudes in suits (plus other interesting tidbits from the era, like how it was actually Roger Stern’s idea to bring back Hank Henshaw, so check out that link!).

Don again: “The entire Superman storyline of this issue feels like filler. Diving for buried treasure and soaring off to Paris -- it all feels like wasted time next to the Adam storyline.” I have a theory that the entire ship sequence is there as an excuse to put Superman in those big chains and make that Spawn joke (which I didn’t get until now, since I’ve always read this issue in Spanish).

Superman says that pulling that big ship was "a little easier than expected" -- that's either another hint that there's something going on with Superman's powers since he came back, or a subtle dig at the state of American ship manufacturing.

Another adorable "window tap" scene for the books, and this is the sexiest one so far. Is it me or has Jurgens started copying more than just Teri Hatcher's hairdo from Lois & Clark? (For anyone who thinks Lois has gotten implants, I refer you to this clip.)

While in Paris, Lois asks Clark if he's ever wondered what would happen if his rocket had landed in other countries. Don: “Clark’s conversation with Lois sounds like a bunch of concepts for Elseworlds stories. We eventually would see a Russian Superman, and a British Superman, but not yet the French Superman. (Hire us, DC!)” Yep, got my French Superman pitch ready, Jim Lee. Or just let us do Russian Superman again, since Red Son wasn’t even the first time you published that idea.

Don once more: “Another thing that makes no sense about the ‘new’ Toyman is his resentment of technological toys—when in previous appearances he himself had deadly high-tech toys to vex Superman over the years.” I especially resent his hatred of video game consoles. Incidentally, I wonder what types of games are available for Adam’s beloved Lextendo. Star Lex 64? Mega Man Lex? Sonic the Hedgehog 3 & Knuckles & Lex?

No one is more upset at Lois and Clark for going AWOL than Whit. NO ONE. He's so furious that his usually grey mustache turned black.

Patreon-Watch:

As always, shout out to our patrons, Aaron, Murray Qualie, Chris “Ace” Hendrix, britneyspearsatemyshorts, Patrick D. Ryall, Samuel Doran, Bheki Latha, Mark Syp, Ryan Bush and Raphael Fischer! Last month’s exclusive Patreon article was about the recently unearthed sequel to Superman 64 for the PlayStation, featuring Metallo, Parasite, and Lois looking even hotter than in this issue:

Hot damn. Find out more at https://www.patreon.com/superman86to99!

And believe it or not, Don Sparrow has even more to say about this issue. Read his section after the jump:

Art-Watch (by @donsparrow):

I should start off my section with a big caveat: I flat out hate this issue. There were several weird decisions made in the post-Death-and-Return era (most of them along the same lines of making the Superman titles more grim-and-gritty), and this story was one of the worst of them. My theory is that, despite the praise and record-breaking sales of the Death and Return storyline, the Superman creative team felt pressure to have more extreme storylines, perhaps in response to the wildly successful Image books coming out at the time. Between this story, and the upcoming “Spilled Blood” storyline, the Super books take a hard—but temporary--turn into more violent and upsetting storytelling—even though these stories are by the same writers as the previous few years. While death has always been a part of comics, and Superman comics was no exception, there is a jarring glibness and unfeeling toward the way violence is handled in these pages that is quite different from the stories that preceded it. It’s made all the more jarring by the fact that well-established personalities suddenly veer wildly out of character, Toyman chief among them.

We start with the cover, and while it is technically well-drawn (by the familiar team of Jurgens and Breeding) it’s also a very upsetting visual. I think they should have gone with the pieta type pose with Adam and Superman, OR the scary badass bowie-knife Toyman (who apparently has a Cheshire cat smile now) but not both. But the cover is a good hint at the tonal dissonance of the comic within.

We open with a splash of the now-extreme 90s looking Toyman, with his serial killer shaved head and spooky cloak, ignoring the pleas of hungry kids he has locked up in a tiny jail cell for days at a time (if that sentence doesn’t ring alarm bells for how wrong this is for a Superman story, I don’t know what will). For much of the issue Toyman’s eyes are obscured by glare on his lenses, further de-humanizing a character who was once one of Superman’s more empathetic bad guys.

We cut to Superman tugboating a huge tanker with giant chains and it’s a cool visual (one repeated in the Batman V Superman film). It feels especially out of place to focus on, given how upsetting this issue is otherwise, but throughout the whole comic, Lois is drawn smoking hot, especially on the two page spread on pages 9-10.

The scenes depicting the actual murder, while still wildly out of place in a Superman comic, are well done, and give a real sense of darkness and menace, which I suppose is the intent. Perhaps my least favourite visual is the Big Bird stuffie, silently bearing witness to what’s about to occur.

The edges of the panels on get more slashy and off-kilter (to me, looking very much like the layouts more typically seen in Image comics of the day) and I suppose I appreciate the restraint of how little Dan Jurgens shows of the death of a child, showing only a bloody slash on a black background. This is still a pretty baroque image for a Superman comic, but certainly less violent than it could be, given what is happening.

Cat Grant’s silent horror is well staged, and powerful in its way. Lastly, Clark Kent bending in sorrow and regret is a powerful image.

While this issue is handled marginally better, and more maturely than other comics on the shelf at this time, I still believe it is one of the biggest mistakes of the era. Giving a long-established character an unceremonious death for shock value is gross on its own, but making it a child definitely crosses a line for me. Making it worse is that, while the Toyman is a criminal and a killer, he has shown in past issues (a similar kidnapping storyline involving Sleez) that he genuinely cares for the well-being of children. So for a long-time reader, this also felt like a betrayal of a long-established, fully developed character. Adding to the ugliness of this is that Adam dies heroically, trying to free the children who have been caged, unfed, for days, but even in that regard, he fails. The headline at the end of the issue confirms all the children are dead. Adam’s death did not buy the other kids enough time to get away. It was all for nothing. Had Adam died, but the other children lived, maybe this issue wouldn’t leave quite as bad a taste. [Max: It’s weird because it’s all told in a way where it’s told in a way where it would make sense, narratively and within the story universe, that the other kids survived, but then it’s almost casually revealed that nope, they died too. A scene of one of the kids relaying Adam’s heroism to Cat in a future issue would have gone a long way.]

Superman doesn’t come off well in these pages, either. It’s honestly the type of story they should just stay away from, because the more you think about all the calamity that is going on around the clock, the less defensible the whole Clark Kent persona becomes. Superman carving out time to romance his fiancée directly led to the preventable deaths of innocent children—how do you come back from that?

STRAY OBSERVATIONS:

I’m always looking for hints that perhaps Jimmy or Perry know Superman’s secret identity deep down, and Jimmy’s anger at Lois and Clark on their return to the Daily Planet offices would seem to give that theory some credence, as he’s as angry at them as if he knew Clark really were Superman. Either that, or he’s ticked that it fell to him, and none of them to escort Cat into the morgue. [Max: Has this issue finally converted you to the “Jimmy is terrible” side now, Don?]

I don’t think I’m the only one who disliked the new Toyman—SPOILERS BE HERE: years later, in Action Comics #865, Geoff Johns retconned this whole story, reverting Schott into the criminal who over-relates to kids, rather than the child-killer of this story. Apparently the infantile Schott, who speaks to “Mother” a la Norman Bates, is a robot so lifelike it fools even Superman, and the “Mother” he’s constantly replying to was the real Winslow Schott trying to recall the malfunctioning robot. [Max: That’s one Geoff Johns retcon I really didn’t mind, even if it felt kind of derivative of his similar “all the Brainiacs are robots made by the real Brainiac” reveal.]

#superman #dan jurgens #josef rubinstein #toyman #cat grant #adam morgan #dan turpin #whit #gangbusteen #super luthor fighter ii turbo championship edition

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highly-opinionated-ramblings · 5 years ago

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Batshipping masterpost

Sometimes asking yourself the question “what would it take for me to ship these two characters together?” helps you come up with really really good stories that you otherwise might never have thought of!

Very fun writing exercise. Do recommend.

ANYWAY. I like Batman, so I asked myself this question about him, and these were the results!

(Featuring: Catwoman, Riddler, Twoface, Poison Ivy, Harley Quinn, Azrael, Mr. Freeze, Clayface, Superman, Wonder Woman, Martian Manhunter, Flash, Green Lantern, Green Arrow, and Aquaman)

What would it take for me to ship Batman with that character? A few key ingredients:

If they are/were a villain, a redemption of sorts. A slow process of coming to terms and actively deciding “yeah, that’s not who I am anymore.”

A connection, a distinct moment where they’re able to talk to Batman as more than just an old enemy or a League ally. A spark that generates interest in developing the relationship further.

An establishment of explicit trust. This usually comes in the form of Bruce revealing his identity to the other and trusting them (maybe tentatively at first, but even so) not to give it away.

An introduction to the kids. I am one hundred percent positive that this is, for the vast majority, not a voluntary action on Batman’s part. But if you raise nine kids to be detectives, you can’t expect to keep secrets from them for long! And once they know you’ve been sleeping with that former villain, you’re going to have to justify that to them somehow.

Then the whole cycle starts again as the villain redeems themselves in the eyes of the kids and gains their trust and acceptance too. Good stuff.

Note: my interpretations of these characters are entirely my own and by no means do all of them line up with any sort of canon. I just sort of do whatever.

Also: some of the bullet points below address some of the mental health problems in the villains, so proceed at your own discretion.

Catwoman: I really like the Gotham tv show’s dynamic between Bruce and Selina, which is to say, they were childhood friends with an early attraction to one another, but had a falling out sometime around the very beginnings of Bruce actually becoming Batman. She spends a few years as a professional thief. He sends her to prison a few times. But eventually she settles down and opens up a casino or whatever, where she deals information under the table. Alfred and the kids know her these days as an ally rather than enemy. So it’s just a matter of her realizing that her attraction to Bruce is deeper than originally assumed, and that if she wants to be with him she has to really dedicate herself to that idea, and for him to realize that she’s being serious and that he needs to prioritize spending time with her over obsessing over his work.

Bruce takes his mask off dramatically, saying something along the lines of “it’s me, Selina” and she’s like “yeah I know.” “What?” “You do this thing where you pace back and forth and nod your head up and down when you’re thinking. Never known anyone else who did that but Bruce Wayne.” “...Oh.”

Childhood friends interpretation is also great because Alfred already knows her and likes her. And she has all these embarrassing stories about 14 year old Bruce to share, which means that even the most resistant of the kids warm up to her right away.

Riddler: the first line in his Arkham file is that he has an obsessive need for attention. And Bruce KNOWS that. But it takes years for it to occur to him, incredibly sleep-deprived and staring down one of Ed’s death traps that he really, really doesn’t want to deal with today....what would happen if he just, y’know, gives it to him? The attention that he wants? And the results are instantaneous. It’s like the floodgates are open and Ed just can’t stop talking. It starts out snide and derogatory, the same way he usually talks to Batman, but the longer it goes on the more it deteriorates into something oddly helpless and vulnerable. Bruce has been so used to cocky, swaggering Ed that it never really occurred to him that this was someone suffering, who needed help. So he sits down and does his best to convince Ed that he’s not going to take him in (how many times has he been sent to Arkham? And what good has it done him, really?) and they talk. He leaves out of necessity (bank robbery in progress, says Barbara’s voice in his ear) but he goes back the next day, and again after that. Ed gets attention from Bruce without having to resort to crime to get it. Bruce gets a break from head busting and an outlet for some of the stale energy inside his head. They tell each other riddles and play strategy games and get to know each other, for real this time.

Ed stops worrying so much about proving that he’s smarter than Batman. Instead he channels all that energy into uncovering Bruce’s secret identity. It’s just another one of their games. Bruce has kept that secret for a long time and he’s confident he can keep it up, but Ed’s always alert waiting for him to slip up, to leave a clue

Option 1 for how he finds out: he sets up an elaborate trap, making it seem like he’s in danger and the only way to save him is for Bruce to take his mask off, so he does. Ed is outraged. “REALLY? BRUCE WAYNE? FUCKING REALLY?” he yells, dropping all pretense of being in danger. The robots he made for this setup drop like puppets with cut strings. Bruce gets ready to Fight.

Option 2: Some other villain reveals Bruce’s identity before he gets the chance (Arkhamverse style). Ed is outraged. “HOW DARE YOU LET ANYONE ELSE BUT ME DO THAT” he yells while Bruce tries his best to ignore him and focus on calling the JL to fix the whole situation somehow

Option 3: Bruce just tells him. Ed is outraged. “I WAS SUPPOSED TO BE THE ONE TO FIGURE IT OUT YOU IDIOT”

The kids are Not Happy about Bruce dating Gotham’s Most Annoying Super Villain

Twoface: again I gotta go with the whole ‘they were friends when they were younger and Bruce had a raging crush on him’ setup. Cause that adds a whole layer to Bruce’s part of the story, watching Harvey become Twoface and assuming responsibility for locking him up every time he gets out. One day something happens in Gotham- string of murders or something, it’s not important really what it is. Bruce goes after the person responsible and his trail leads him to Harvey. So he busts into the safe house, intending to intimidate anything Harvey knows out of him, and then throw him back in Blackgate. “Ohohoho, noooooo, you got this all wrong,” Harvey says when he figures out what Batman’s getting at. “That motherfucker put a dozen of my men in the ground. This is personal. You want me to tell you what I know, you’re going to take me with you.” And Bruce agrees. Cause he knows Harvey’s got a certain moral code that he can be trusted to stick to, and it’s the most painless way of getting what he wants from him anyway. Working with Harvey is weird, though. He shoots a couple of goons going after Batman and gives him that lopsided smile, says “I’ve got your back,” and suddenly Bruce is like 20 again and Harvey is bringing him a coffee, smiling. During their chase they have a dramatic rooftop showdown with whoever it is they’re chasing. Bruce turns around just in time to see one of the thugs push Twoface over the edge. He gets caught up in the moment and practically screams, “Harvey!” Of course, he’s able to dramatically swoop in and save him, though it’s a pretty close call. When Harvey comes to he sits up and says quietly, “It’s been a long time since anyone’s called my name like that, did we have that kind of relationship?” and Bruce panics and tries to brush it off as his imagination, but Harvey shakes his head and says “once you’ve seen it, you can’t unsee it, man. It’s you under there, isn’t it, Bruce?” And it turns out that knowing Bruce’s real identity turned out to be exactly what Harvey needed. Cause he can identify some of the duality he feels about himself in Batman, now. They spend some more time together, talking some of that out, and it doesn’t take long for Bruce’s crush to return en force.

Poison Ivy: He lets her go. He knew she was at that scene, and she knows he saw her, but he lets her go, cause it wasn’t a big deal. No one died, relatively little property damage, and that jerk deserved it anyway. The next day there’s a potted plant sitting on GCPD’s doorstep and they call Batman thinking it might be dangerous, but it’s just a lovely specimen of a rare flower, which he knows is her way of saying thanks. (He doesn’t let the police know that, though. He just puts it in the back of the Batmobile and tells them it’s nothing he can’t handle). He takes it home with him and treats it well. And she knows it, can kind of sense it, distantly. They have a few more run ins over the course of the next few months and they take it easy on each other, having this sort of mutually unspoken agreement. Eventually something happens for her to need to talk to Batman, so she digs her roots in deep and finds that flower...in the garden at Wayne Manor. She leaves a message for Batman and they meet up and talk about whatever she needed. She doesn’t mention the Manor, so he asks about it. She just shrugs and mentions something about Bruce Wayne’s recent efforts in protecting the environment. “Maybe we’re not as different as I thought, after all.” They give each other more little presents from afar. One day she sees him hanging around (where she knows he knows she can see him), and drops by to talk. He offers her a ride home and ends up spending the night.

This one I think he owns up to before the kids can figure it out. Pam’s a good source of information, and if he was desperate he’d call her even with all of them watching. They’d all think he’d been bewitched, of course. It’d take a while to convince them all otherwise.

Harley Quinn: all it takes is for him to get his first glimpse of the real her and decide that Joker victims need to stick together and help other Joker victims. After the breakup and the subsequent recovery, she’s living free (albeit under Constant Surveillance) in Gotham, and he checks in every once in a while, just to make sure she’s doing ok and not reverting to her previous, Joker-driven, rocket-fueled bad habits. One day there’s an incident in her neighborhood- maybe someone was going after her and Bruce was there protecting her, or maybe it wasn’t related to her at all. Regardless, it’s her who finds him after the explosion and takes him home and gives him first aid. He’s groggy and panicky when he first wakes up in a strange place (not a hospital, not the cave) with an IV drip in his arm (he’s not in a hospital, where did that come from!). It gets worse when he realizes that his mask was blown right off his face in the blast. It gets SIGNIFICANTLY WORSE when Harley appears in his field of vision, waving around a tablet pulled up to Bruce Wayne’s wikipedia page, in full psychologist mode, ranting about how he’s been going about dealing with his childhood trauma All Wrong. But they talk, and she promises not to give his secret away. “What would I have to gain from that? You’d stop coming to visit me then!” It takes a while for the two of them to figure out exactly what’s going on between them but once they’re both sure the others’ intentions are good, they develop a good, strong relationship.

Bonus points if, at any point in the above time space, she walks up to him one day and hands him an unmarked usb drive. “What’s on this?” “My daughter.” “What.” “My daughter! Her location and everything about her.” “Is she...Joker’s?” “I dunno. Could have been him or any one of a number of other guys. Mistah J threw some really wild parties. *shrug* The only part that really matters to me is that she’s mine. And if anything ever happens to me, she’ll need someone to look out for her, y’know?” “And that’s me???” “Well, helping people in need is one of your compulsions, after all. Especially kids, or else you wouldn’t have so many of your own.”

I usually imagine Jason as one of the ones kind of sticking up for Batman, citing how crime has all but disappeared since he started sleeping with whatever particular villain and that who are they to police who Bruce shares his bed with anyway (BONUS bonus points if he’s just entering the early stages of coming to terms with his own bisexuality and never realized that Bruce was bi, too), but that wouldn’t be the case with Harley. He’d feel pretty hurt about that, I think. On the other hand: Dick has been around since Harley’s debut on the scene, and has always thought of her as relatively harmless and even respected her to a degree, as a fellow acrobat, so he’s cool with her dating Bruce

Azrael: His JL team goes on hiatus for a little while, so he calls Bruce up like “uhhh, I don’t really have much of anywhere else to go, so can I come back to Gotham for a while?” And Bruce tells him that they’re actually experiencing a pretty calm stretch for a change, but yeah, he can come if he wants. At first he’s excited because he’s never been invited to the actual, og Batcave, but there really IS nothing going on. He meets Alfred, who offers him tea. He meets Steph and Tim, out of masks, lounging on the couch playing Street Fighter. They assure him that if literally anything happens, one of their gajillion alert systems will let them know. He goes off in search of Bruce, finds him sitting at the kitchen table making his way through a veritable mountain of paperwork. Eventually he admits that he doesn’t really know what to do with himself in the downtime. “I usually try to use time like this to do things for Bruce Wayne, instead of for Batman,” Bruce explains. “You should do something for Michael Lane, while you have the chance.” “But...but...but I’ve been Azrael full-time for years now...” “Alright, well, what did you like to do before you were Azrael?” “UHH...” Before he can short-circuit too much trying to come up with an actual answer to that question, Bruce puts aside his paperwork and takes his arm. They get in the car and Bruce takes him to like a hobby shop or something. They buy model kits and a cookbook and some yarn (”one of the kids can teach you”), and he promises that one of these days they’ll clear some space on the lawn to play football. Michael hasn’t experienced this level of anyone caring for his well-being probably ever? and all he can do is stammer something about “is there anything I can do for Bruce Wayne in return?” “You can keep me company while I file all my paperwork, I guess.” So he sits at the table across from Bruce and builds his little ATAT model kit feeling happier than he has in a long time. Bruce can tell that a little more attention would do him good, so they spend some more time hanging out which leads to having some deep conversations and building up feelings for each other, it’s all very cute

Right at the beginning of Michael developing his crush on Bruce he realizes that something’s different, but doesn’t quite realize what it is, and his mind jumps to the worst case scenario right away. He locks himself in his room, calls Bruce at work, panicking, and says he thinks his St. Dumas brainwashed obsession with Bruce might be coming back. Bruce tells him to calm down, they’ll run some tests. All the tests come back negative, but Michael is visibly shaken, so Bruce offers for him to hang around Gotham a little longer so they can monitor him, which is what leads to his extended stay in Gotham

Mr. Freeze: One day something changes. One day the realization finally, finally clicks into place. There’s a huge floating JL base in the sky and aliens living on Earth and people coming back from the dead and healing from miraculous injuries and plagues all the time. If it was going to happen to him, it would have happened by now. It’s over. Nora’s not coming back. That day he laces up his boots and loads his gun and walks over to the little diner on the corner and wrecks it. Batman gets the call, and obviously he knows that something’s different, this isn’t Vic’s MO, but he goes anyway, of course. Vic blasts away at him with his freeze gun, wildly, recklessly, screaming and ranting the whole time. Bruce dodges out of view, and Vic transfers his aggressions to the nearest object in sight: a table. He blasts that thing in half, and then in half again, and keeps going until it’s nothing but splinters and he’s just standing there, gasping for breath. “Victor,” says Bruce from behind him, “tell me what’s wrong.” “Nora’s dead,” Vic mumbles under his breath. Bruce comes around to face him and Vic is looking at him with THE SADDEST puppy dog eyes he’s ever seen. (I know what you’re thinking right now. “Mr. Freeze can’t do puppy dog eyes.” You’re WRONG, I’m telling you) “That’s the first time I’ve ever said that out loud, I think... I d-don’t...I don’t know what to do…” and Bruce is like, darn, I can’t take this fool to jail. So he brings him back to his chilly lair instead and sits him down and talks him through it a little. Leaves him with a phone number to call if it gets real bad again, but makes the first call to check up on him later anyway. This one is a sloooow burn, it takes Vic MONTHS to get over Nora, couple weeks to realize he MIGHT? be developing feelings for Bruce, couple more weeks to wrestle with the guilt of that. Learning Bruce’s identity is the thing that really brings all of it to a head. Maybe there’s an attempt on Bruce Wayne’s life and later that day Batman shows up with the same pattern of lacerations on his cheek, or broken leg, or whatever. Vic’s not an idiot. He can put two and two together. When Bruce finally takes off the helmet in front of him, it’s a huge relief. To be able to say “I know what it’s like to lose people” and for Vic to know he’s not just talking about heroing. They get closer and closer from there. Their relationship is a weird one, with a lot of compromises to make, but they do the best they can.

The kids don’t particularly mind Bruce going out with Vic. He’s not so much a villain as he is just a guy who’s been dealt a bad hand in life and done the best he could with it. But having around makes the already-cool cave soooo much colder, which isn’t so fun.

Clayface: There hasn’t been an incident with Clayface in years. He’s older, little calmer, little more mature (I like the New 52 plotline of him joining Kate’s crime busting team, but this little scenario works even without that part thrown in). Still, when Bruce hears he’s back in town, he figures he should probably pay him a visit anyway. Just in case he’s planning something. But he goes to the address he was given, some apartment building in Kingston, opens the door, and finds Basil. Not Clayface, Basil Karlo, sitting in a chair by the window reading a paper. “Haven’t seen that face on you in a while,” he says, still unsure if it’s a trick or not. “Oh,” Basil shrugs, unsure if he should be worried about being tossed in jail again or not. “Well, it’s my face. The one I’m most familiar with, takes the least amount of concentration to keep up with. I did make some changes, though, see? Few gray hairs, few lines on my face. Do I look older?” “Yes. It’s a good look.” He keeps checking in with him, cause you can never be too careful, and then because he actually starts to enjoy Basil’s company. Their relationship is one of the more light-hearted ones on this list. They get wine drunk and make out on the roof of the apartment building, very giggly.

“If I learned anything at Arkham, it’s that there are some things that you know are wrong with you, but there are also things that are wrong with you that you aren’t even aware of, and that you couldn’t identify or fix even if you tried.” “One of the psychologists told you that?” “No. I shared a cell with Tetch for a few weeks. That dude is so much more messed up than you realize.”

Superman: Clark calls him up saying something about a mystery in Metropolis that has everyone stumped, and maybe the World’s Greatest Detective wouldn’t mind helping him out? So Bruce drops by to lend him a hand. The ‘mystery’ turns out to be a group of unfamiliar aliens who’re out to get Superman (I don’t care why. Maybe they’re holding some kind of grudge, maybe they’re bounty hunters, maybe they want to sell him off into space-gladiator slavery, whatever). These antagonistic aliens have been very careful in their preparations- they’ve done all the math, and come up with special weapons specifically designed to hit Superman hard enough to knock him out. But they didn’t plan on Batman being there with him, which throws them off just enough that Superman is able to chase them off successfully. In the midst of that fight, though, Bruce takes a hit. A hit calculated for Superman. It breaks several of his ribs and punctures a lung. Clark panics, scoops him up and flies him to the nearest hospital at record speeds. They’re able to stabilize him at Metropolis, and then they send him back to the Watchtower for further treatment. When he wakes up he’s pretty disoriented and confused, but Clark (who had been listening for a change in his breathing and heartbeat from a couple rooms away) comes rushing in, ushering him back to bed and promising to explain everything. Bruce is woozy and wonky enough from whatever drugs they gave him that he lays back down and lets Clark hold his hand protectively without argument. He listens to Clark’s explanation, mumbles something about calling Alfred, and promptly falls back asleep. Clark feels so guilty about his injury that he won’t leave his side for weeks, even following him back to Gotham once he’s well enough to leave the Watchtower.

“God, when will they finally just kiss already,” Jason says, taking cover with the rest of the family in the cave. “I know, right,” says Steph while Tim, Cass, and Duke (and Alfred) all nod in agreement. “SHUT UP,” yells Damian, having a hard time adapting to the idea of his dad and his best friend’s dad getting together

Any Superbat is good Superbat but I enjoy it best in the context of ‘they’re old enough by now to be embarrassed about how angsty and competitive they were when they first met, and they both have huge extended families, and the rest of the JL has been watching them dance around each other for YEARS, JUST KISS ALREADY DAMMIT’

Wonder Woman: I don’t usually imagine Bruce as a flustered kind of guy, but Wonder Woman is everything he wants to be when he grows up and he can’t help it. She’s so effortlessly cool, calm, and collected. And she’s a natural charmer, the public loves her. She always manages to come at things with a fresh perspective that has helped unstick his too-logical train of thought numerous times. She paid him a compliment once and he sat in the batmobile in the parking lot thinking about it for like twenty minutes. One day they get assigned to a League PR thing together that turns into an assassination attempt (surprising no one), but everything turns out ok. Minor damage to the surrounding buildings, a few people injured in the mass chaos, that’s all. She goes looking for him after returning from talking to the local cops, and finds him with a toddler girl on his hip, holding hands with her six yo sister, helping them look for their parents. And she just has to stop and marvel for a minute at how soft his voice is??? How the toddler isn’t even crying??? He bends down to hug the little girl bye after returning her to her fam and Diana almost has a heart attack. “I see that the gods have blessed you with an affinity for children of all ages,” she says. By the time he straightens back up he’s Batman again. “What do you mean by that?” “I can never get kids to warm up to me like that in situations like these...I always thought it was because I was just too big and imposing. How did you do it?” “Oh. Well. You know. *gestures vaguely* You just gotta give them what they want.” “And what is that?” “Security. A promise of safety from an adult that they can trust.” She doesn’t quite get it but she watches him, and talks to his sidekicks sometimes. It amazes her how much kindness and love are hidden under that mask of his. When he smiles from the heart he could melt glaciers. So she starts to press, just a little, just to see how he’ll respond. And once she figures out exactly how flustered he can get, too, it’s all downhill from there.

Martian Manhunter: This one is literally one of the sweetest, most pure relationship dynamics I think I’ve ever written, which really caught me by surprise! The way I think of it is like this: When they first meet, Bruce is really, really uncomfortable with the idea of having J’onn in his head, so J’onn tries to keep telecommunication with him to a minimum. So when Bruce gets his attention during like a meeting or something and subtly lets him know he needs to talk, J’onn knows it must be important. So he opens up a private channel and helps Bruce deal with whatever it is (I don’t know exactly what that would be, only that it’d be some kind of sensitive topic best kept between the two of them). And over the course of that, all those one-on-one mind convos, Bruce starts to get used to talking like that with J’onn. In return, while they’re working together, he helps J’onn get used to human physical contact. It starts with small things- handshakes, little pats on the shoulder- until J’onn is comfortable returning them. One day J’onn has a bad day and it’s Bruce that comes to find him, to comfort him. He doesn’t really say anything, just puts his arms around J’onn and holds him close. Most humans- and hell, even most Martians- wouldn’t have done that for him. What else was J’onn supposed to do but fall in love with him?

I really liked the scene in JL8 where J’onn was trying to, like, share a memory with Bruce or something, and instead he ended up unintentionally stumbling into some of Bruce’s trauma memories, which freaked both of them out pretty badly. I think that little scene would fit quite nicely into this scenario. Bonus, if it happens in the really early days of the League, it doubles as the moment when J’onn first learns Bruce’s secret identity.

Flash: It’s been a longtime headcanon of mine that Barry is very active in the Central City community, not just as Flash, but as himself, too. Namely, he spends a good deal of his free time volunteering with the local homeless shelter slash food bank. I mean, come on, just by the very nature of his powers, is it any surprise that he has a vested interest in ending hunger in his community? One day he stops Bruce in the hall in the Watchtower, and clumsily explains that he needs to ask a favor. The shelter has been looking to expand their operations for some time, but right at the last second one of their backers pulled out. They’re short 7k for the payment on the property they needed to make tomorrow, and Barry didn’t know where else to turn to get that much money that quickly. He promises to pay him back, somehow, eventually. Bruce cuts him a check right there for 10k, and tells him to consider it a gift. Later he even publicly endorses the program on social media, saying he thinks Gotham should implement something similar. Barry invites him down to see the building he paid for, so Bruce rolls up his sleeves and spends the day volunteering with him. It’s a chance for both of them to see a side of the other that they’ve never seen before. Bruce watches Barry shine like a ray of sunshine, bringing light and laughter to a room full of people at their very lowest. Barry watches Bruce inspire trust and confidence in complete strangers, like magic. Not to mention, that smile- Barry tries not to use his powers out in the open if he can avoid it, but he discreetly flashes over to stop a tray or something from falling, and of course it doesn’t escape Bruce’s notice. He grins at Barry from across the room and Barry’s heart fully stops for a second.

I like to think of Bruce as a little older than Barry. Just a little, just a few years. Just enough that Barry always feels like an inexperienced, incompetent baby in the face of The Batman

This one throws the kids for such a loop once they find out about it. “THIS is what you’re attracted to, Bruce? THIS???”

Green Lantern: what I know about Hal is that he’s sassy. And what I know about Bruce is that if anyone he doesn’t have the ability to tell to go to their room is sassy with him, he gets snippy. So he and Hal butt heads a lot. One day Hal is venting to Superman in like, an elevator or something about how Bruce just Doesn’t Get It, Clark, He Doesn’t Understand Me, and Clark says, “well, Hal, can you honestly say that you understand him, either?” And suggests that maybe he should spend some more time actually getting to know Bruce before passing judgement. Hal takes that to mean ‘maybe I should go to Gotham and spy on Batman for a day’. When he spots him doing his best to hide inconspicuously on a nearby rooftop, Bruce rolls his eyes and ignores him. Dick spots him too, though, and invites him to the cave in hopes that maybe they’ll be able to settle whatever their argument was about (Jason, Tim, and Steph break out the popcorn and get themselves front row seats for the Drama). But in the end, an up-close perspective was exactly what Hal needed to realize that there was more to Batman than had been meeting his eye. He watches Bruce juggle ten different comm feeds while giving a press conference AND directing his kids’ efforts in the field at the same time, and he earns a new respect for Bruce. He gets where he’s coming from now, and why he’s always so cautious all the time. The guy has a lot to lose. So he mans up and apologizes. Bruce accepts the apology graciously, says he realizes that they’re fundamentally different people but that he values Hal as a comrade and respects his prowess with the ring, and Hal is like, ‘ah. We Are Friends Now.’ He spends more of his time on Earth with Bruce, and along the way he trips and falls headlong into a debilitating crush on him. Like, a visibly obvious crush. Bruce finds it adorable.

Green Arrow: Bruce and Ollie get invited to the same billionaire shindig one day and neither of them can think of a good enough reason to not go. Ollie’s recovering from a bad ankle sprain, and Bruce hasn’t slept in days, so instead of socializing with anyone else there they just sit in the corner and hang out with each other. Midway through the event Bruce closes his eyes and does this forceful little sigh through his nose. Ollie knows him well enough by now to know that small outward signs indicate big amounts of internal emotions with Bruce, and this is about as frustrated as he’s ever seen him out of mask. Normally his act is impenetrable. “What,” he asks, imagination running full speed ahead thinking about what might have happened, “what’s wrong?” “Firefly just broke out of prison,” Bruce growls, reaching for a refill of whatever he’s drinking. “Wh- Wait, who?” “Pyromaniac, serial arsonist in Gotham.” “How exactly did you learn this?” (read: do you have some kind of spider sense I don’t know about?) Bruce just gestures to his microscopic earpiece. Ollie offers, probably against his better judgement, to take a trip to Gotham and help catch Firefly. Bruce, barely able to see straight at that point (bad combination of sleeplessness and alcohol), accepts. So Ollie gets the full treatment, a trip to the cave and tea from Alfred and a haranguing from the kids and a trip to Blackgate with Firefly, even. In return he offers to have Bruce over in Star City sometime. Ollie is usually a little on edge around Bruce, but then he starts to see the real him and finds out that he does, in fact have a sense of humor. They have goofy adventures together and it’s all very cute

Aquaman: Arthur is hotheaded and when he gets in a Mood, the sight of Bruce and his stupid unmovable face just makes him angrier. But once during a mission, when Arthur is busy working himself into a panic, not knowing what to do, it’s Bruce that snaps him out of it. Grabs him by the shoulders and demands that he get a hold of himself. And it’s enough of a shock that it actually works- Bruce tells Arthur the plan, and Arthur does it without argument. No one is more surprised when it works than he is. He is SHOOK. Eventually he swallows his pride enough to go up to Batman and admit, “I think I’m still too emotionally invested in this, can you help me?” Bruce agrees, of course. He does his best to explain how he always keeps his emotions in check, especially when lives are on the line. It occurs to Arthur to wonder what kind of toll that takes on a person. He decides that Bruce could probably use a little vacation of sorts, and invites him to spend a day with him in Atlantis. A day in the life of a king, if you will. Bruce rolls his eyes and agrees, just to play along, but he ends up really enjoying it. Yes, there are a dozen-odd irons in the fire waiting for him when he gets home, but this time he finds that he actually has the energy to deal with them for once. Which is a good enough excuse to go back and do it again, and spend more time with Arthur in the process.

Dami is usually super resistant to Bruce dating anyone, but he would be ok with Arthur, I think. Like, “you bagged a king? Ok, respect”

Extra notes:

I feel like a lot of my thoughts about Clayface and Martian Manhunter specifically could also apply to Killer Croc, too, in a way. I mean, he’s not EVIL. He’s just never really been treated like a person, and so he embraced his image as Killer Croc instead of continuing to face that rejection. But if anyone can look past his exterior and see the needs of the man within, Bruce could. Feels a little weird to think about but maybe there’s something there.

Polyshipping is GREAT may I interest you in some ot3s??? SuperWonderBat is one of the more obvious ones, and I love it (cause Diana gets to play with TWO flustered boys) but BatLanternFlash is also top tier. And then there’s the villains! RiddleBatCat is one of my favorites! Also TwoRiddleBat and BruHarlIvy. The possibilities are endless!

I considered adding Lex and Slade to this post, but in the end I left them off. Cause it’s hard for me to see those as anything but weird, inherently unhealthy relationships. They’d make great black ships though : o

When talking about Bruce dating someone else from the JL, there’s DOUBLE the kids to embarrass. Can you imagine you’re like, Roy Harper or something, somebody’s sidekick, and you walk in and find BATMAN in bed with your mentor???? WILD

This post really got away from me, haha. Thanks for reading! Hit me up if you ever need someone to talk about Batshipping with (especially rarepairs, I got you fam)!

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prettylittlebrownskingyal · 5 years ago

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Your commentary on titans 👌👌 give us the full review

My main problem with Titans is that there is (a.) no logical and solid justification for these characters and their actions and (b.) this may just be the film nerd in me— but there’s no emotional payoff.

What irks me more is that the cast is incredible. They’re likeable and capable of handling emotion and they can clearly deal with more than they’re given.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure from writers to showrunners to directors and crew— a lot of work and time and energy has been put into the production of this show. But these characters are so iconic and in my nitwit opinion, it’s almost painful to see their potential go to waste.

And I say potential because there are moments— mystical and magical, full of hope and wonder and rich comic goodness that make you want more. But they fall flat.

“Families can be fucked up.”

Titans is supposed to be about family. They literally end the last episode with the song “We are Family.” So why would these people— who supposedly view each other as found family— abandon each other at every given opportunity?

They gang up on Jason in the tower when only moments before they were all fired up about saving the kid from Dr. Light. Gar gets left behind by himself with an unconscious, cleary dangerous super clone. Donna and Dawn fully agree to let Dick rot in prison.

These actions do not reflect people who care for each other. Who want to protect and keep each other safe. Why would this be the core emotional catalyst for any development whatsoever when no actual families are portrayed?

Also, here are two established families featured this season and there were no attempts to have them act as foils for each other even though that would have made clear sense. The Wilsons and the Waynes. Two kids that share stoic father figures that are linked to their trauma. Rose and Jericho have no relationship. No communication. No reason to trust each other. Also, why does Rose immediately give up her life for her father?

Dick and Jason’s relationship had some moments that could have been great to both of their character developments. Dick is his best when he’s being a big brother to Gar and Rachel. Why not let him be the same for Jason?

Here are some things I’d do differently.

1.) No Conner storyline

Conner, Krypto and Eve’s episode (episode 6) was quite possibly the best of the season. It’s because a family dynamic is clearly established. (It’s a little weird, I’ll admit) But these characters rely on each other. They look out for each other. They care. (“You didn’t abandon me”// “Can I call you mom?”// “Hot dogs? Get it?”– i ate that shit up)

That being said, it also feels like Conner was just created so they’d have someone to save Jason from his fall.

The introduction of CADMUS as another antagonist when Slade is a major, overpowering one feels like too many things to juggle at once. If they’d held out, Conner and CADMUS would have been great as the main focal point for a whole season.

2.) More Jericho

Jericho was essentially the highlight of the season. I can’t tell if it was the way he was written or the way Chella portrayed him but that’s what Titans really needs.

humanity. kindness. friendship and family ties.

why couldn’t he have had more time with the Titans? why couldn’t he have a relationship with Rose?

I’d have let him explore his abilities more. His relationship with his mom, with Slade, with each of the Titans.

They needed to have actual bonding with him. Not just a shoddy backstory.

3.) Better treatment of Rose

Rose Wilson could have been so much more than just a plot point. More than an informant. All she did this season was eat cereal, say “i’m out” and then solve a major fight plot point in fifteen minutes. We needed more of her training, her relationships, her justifications to just pick and fall into a life of an assassin.

She and Jason had some decent moments of believable cheesy teen behaviour between them but not enough to cover the gaping hole in Jason’s storyline.

4.) Jason needs more emotional moments!!

Not going to lie, I wasn’t sure Curran Walters could do big emotional scenes or make me care as much as he did. But he did. He’s got the bratty, troubled Jason down but he needs to be more fleshed out.

Like Rose, he feels like a caricature of a troubled teen. Where’s his interaction with Bruce? His backstory? His impulsivity and need to prove himself to Dick should be established but it’s not.

That scene where he learns that Rose has been using them all along? That was better than most of what we’ve seen him do.

5.) Donna as a big sister// Donna’s relationship with loss

You’re telling me “older smarter prettier”// “you can crash at my place” Donna Troy who took care of Dick would not look at these kids and want to help? After all Diana’s taught her? WACK

Also Donna and Garth’s relationship? It felt forced. He literally said “I love you” and then died. C’mon man, really? At least give them a pre-established relationship.

6.) Kory?? what happened y’all?

She felt so underutilized this season. Anna Diop is a star. She delivers her performance so well. The moment she heals Conner, her rushing to save Rachel— she has this essence of kindness that fits so well with her strength and the potency of her powers.

She’s a gifted, royal powerhouse.

So why give her a runaround, stretched out storyline? Why make her kill someone she cared about?

7.) Hank and Jason?//Dawn, Donna and Kory?// Dick & Gar

The dynamic between these characters whether seen or hinted at could have literally carried full episodes. Why consistently break them apart? Or make them fight or ignore each other? Why not let them play into each other, learn from each other? INTERACT??

8.) Bruce// Dick’s version of Bruce

I like Iain Glen as an older version of Bruce Wayne. I like that he’s a bit quirky, snarky, an asshole and he says things like “no shit.” But he doesn’t serve much of a purpose and he feels like an instant solution in certain situations. Plus he has no interaction with Jason.

That being said, the use of him as Dick’s voice of reason/subconscious does hone in on the question that Dick keeps trying to run away from— “What would Batman do?” That works for his character. It works for his growth. Their dynamic is wonderful but ultimately, not necessary.

9.) Donna dying?

That WHOLE scene was so out of place. Why would that have happened after the climax of the story? As an extra source of angst?

Again, the Titans are separated by death. Again, a sense of a family is built up and torn down. No one should have to die for a real sense of familial bond to be established.

10.) Deathstroke’s character//takedown

He’s supposed to be the main antagonist and they all have beef with him. Rightfully, everyone should have gotten a chance in that battle. It happened way too quickly and was very anticlimactic for the old Titans.

Also, Slade killing one of their friends with one, single bullet to the chest literally does nothing for me. Especially since Aqualad is supposed to be a Titan. There’s no real conflict, no tangible establishment of hate. Where’s the torture? the real hurt?

11.) Gar, Dick and Hank and their repeated storylines

they all went through the same arcs again. Dick with his Batman struggle. Hank and his own darkness. Gar and his struggle with control and being controlled and experimented on.

This season should have been about Dick coming into his own as Nightwing. About Gar finally having some normalcy and a place that he feels safe in. He should have gotten some redemption as a hero. Hank (and i hate to say, i hope i don’t sound ridiculous but) should have gotten some resolution with Dawn. Either they’re in or out because the back and forth they do with each other is incredibly toxic and they’ve been established as smart enough to see that.

It wasn’t all bad though and I’ll probably end up doing a re-watch sometime. Since I’ve pretty much spouted asshole nonsense, here are some of the best moments:

The end of the first episode where they’re all standing around their cars and laughing? GOLD. More of that cheesy, established friendship.

Jericho hugging Dick, Dick being unsure how to deal with warmth and forgiveness. Everybody say thank you to Chella for improvising that.

Kory and Donna being detectives and arguing over jelly doughnuts? Yes, please! I love them together. How they clearly knew each other, how they worked well together to take out Shimmer.

Kory speaking Kryptonian. Anything that furthers her development brings me joy.

Conner saving Jason. That was pretty comic book like— I liked it.

All the scenes Krypto’s in.

Hank telling Dawn that he knows what Jason’s probably feeling. That was emotional and heartfelt. Also, Hank going “Atta boy” when they were on the phone with Slade. I’m really upset they couldn’t have a brotherly relationship because their characters are quite similar.

Gar, Jason and Rachel interacting like friends/teammates/siblings. Their dynamic works. I’d love to have seen the three of them take on a challenge together.

#ar.txt #asks #prettylilanons #ar watches Titans #i have more thoughts but i can't form them right now.#Anonymous #titans #dc’s titans

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recentanimenews · 5 years ago

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Licensing of the Monsters: How Pokémon Ignited An Anime Arms Race

"Hey, what do ya' got there? A rabbit?" Batman asks his mentor, staring at a video of Pikachu on a massive underground computer screen.

"It's a Pokémon," Bruce Wayne replies.

Five seconds later, Batman is shocked so hard by the tiny yellow creature that he ends up flying headfirst through another computer monitor (Using a clip from the "Blackout" episode of Batman Beyond, an episode that would've aired for the first time just days earlier.) It doesn't make much physical sense, but this bizarre 1999 crossover promo did establish two things: 1) Pokémon was coming to Kids' WB, and 2) Pokémon was important. So important that Batman actually took time away from obsessing over crime and vengeance to care about it.

Echoing a 1997 promo where the comedic Bugs Bunny let us in on the "secret" that the serious, dark Batman was coming to Kids' WB, it almost seems like a passing of the torch. Kids' WB, up until then, was a programming service chock full of classic Warner Bros. cartoon properties like Bugs, Daffy, Pinky, Brain, and various members of the Justice League — all animated Americana.

Pokémon wasn't a huge risk as the 4Kids Entertainment dub of the show had done well in broadcast syndication, they had plenty of episodes to work with (sometimes airing three in a row), and it was based on a game series that was already a worldwide smash hit.

But the show was ... different.

And it would end up changing cartoons as we knew them.

Part 1: Batman Jumps Ship

It's hard to think of a better scenario when it comes to appealing to kids than the one Fox Kids had with Batman: The Animated Series. Debuting in September 1992 and airing on weekdays just after school let out, it received immediate acclaim due to its moody, beautiful animation and storytelling that didn't talk down to anyone. Little kids could get into Batman throwing crooks around and adults could marvel at plots like the one where a former child actress with a medical condition that keeps her from aging takes her former co-stars hostage and ends up holding a gun, hallucinating, and sobbing into Batman's arms.

It did so well that Fox tried to air it on prime-time Sundays and though this was short-lived — turns out, Batman was no match for Ed Bradley on CBS's 60 Minutes — it solidified the show as "cool." This was a show that could hang with the big boys. You couldn't say the same of something like Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends.

And then, in 1997, it was gone. A five-year contract ran out and Batman leapt completely to Kids' WB, where a continuation of the show (the often even grimmer The New Batman Adventures) aired later that year. There, it joined Superman: The Animated Series in a one-two punch of programming called The New Batman/Superman Adventures. When it came to Kids' WB, competitors not only had to deal with the Merry Melodies crowd, they now had to face the World's Finest Heroes.

This, along with a departing Animaniacs, left Fox Kids with a gap in flagship programming. Sure it had various incarnations of the Power Rangers (which was still holding strong) and Spider-Man, but if you look back on 1998 programming, little of it would survive the year. Silver Surfer? Gone by May. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation? Out by December. Casper? Dead in October. By May of 1999, Warner Media would announce record ratings thanks to Pokémon, while its competitors, including the Disney-led ABC, Fox, and even Nickelodeon, would suffer losses in the Saturday morning area. Pokemon would have the best ever series premiere numbers for Kids' WB at the time.

A chunk of that has to do with 4Kids Entertainment's (or to be more specific, 4Kids Productions) handling of the show. Again, Pokémon was a proven concept. If you love monsters, adventure, and collecting things, you'll probably find something to enjoy in the franchise. But the dub was particularly strong. For years, dubbing was seen as an inherently laughable thing in America, full of exasperated voice actors trying desperately to convince you that they weren't portraying three different characters, and lips that didn't match the dialogue. Entire Japanese series were reduced to laughing stocks in the U.S. because why focus on the lovingly created miniatures and top-notch tokusatsu action in Godzilla if one of the actors sounds weird?

But while Pokémon wasn't the first great dub, it was a remarkably underrated one. Veronica Taylor's work as Ash Ketchum was relatable, funny, and consistent. And Racheal Lillis, Eric Stuart, and Maddie Blaustein's turns as Team Rocket's Jessie, James, and Meowth gave us villains that could've easily been the most repetitive parts of the show — you can only try to capture Pikachu so many times before you should logically find a second hobby — but instead were one of the most entertaining aspects.

Aside from some easily meme-able bits — Brock's drying pan and jelly donuts, for example — Pokemon became a seamless addition to the Kids' WB lineup and would end up giving many fans a lifelong love of anime. And it was great for 4Kids, too, as in 2000, they would be number one on Fortune's 100 Fastest-Growing Companies.

Fox Kids wanted an answer to this. And it would soon find one.

Well, two.

Part 2: Monsters Rule

Saban Entertainment was no stranger to Fox Kids. They'd been the one to adapt Toei's Super Sentai into The Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers for American and international audiences, creating an unexpected sensation that combined monsters and martial arts. And in 1999, they nabbed Digimon Adventure, a series about kids that gain "digital" monster partners when transported to a "digital world," which had begun airing earlier that year in Japan. Based on a fighting virtual pet that had already been around for a few years, Digimon was a natural fit for an anime series and also a natural fit for a climate that was desperately trying to find the next Pokémon.

Renamed Digimon: Digital Monsters, it premiered in August of 1999. Of course, accusations followed that it was a Pokémon rip-off, considering that they were both about befriending terrifying laser critters, but they offered fairly different things. While Pokémon was more episodic, Digimon gave viewers a more Dragon Ball Z-esque experience (they were both Toei productions, too) with the titular monsters evolving and gaining "power-ups" due to fighting increasingly powerful villains.

Almost two months later, Monster Rancher would join the Fox Kids lineup, airing on Saturdays at 8:30 AM after Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century (a Fox Kids lost relic if there ever was one). Together, Monster Rancher and Digimon would cover the programming block with monster action, sometimes airing twice each. Meanwhile, Pokémon would do the same for Kids' WB, and if you look at their Saturday morning schedules from 1999 and 2000, it appears they just shoved Pikachu in whenever possible.

Looking back on Monster Rancher is always odd, though, because it's so specifically trapped in the time period where it originated. The video games used metadata from readable discs to create new monsters for the player, meaning that as soon as people gained the ability to download or stream media online without having to travel to their local Circuit City, the game would look absolutely archaic in comparison to its peers.

Monster Rancher is a very fun show based on some very fun games, and the dynamic array of personalities and their particular squabbles in the core group actually reminds me a lot of One Piece. But even the show itself deals with reviving monsters on giant stone discs — a prehistoric-looking adaptation of a video game gimmick that would, a decade later, appear prehistoric itself.

The Monster War was waged across 2000 and 2001. And though it appears Pokémon was the clear winner — in 2020, it's the most popular franchise with the widest reach, even if Digimon does produce some stellar shows and movies — the ratings tell a different story. In the May sweeps of 2000, Pokémon (and Kids' WB) took the prize among kids 6-11, but in the end, Fox Kids would score a victory of a 3.1 rating to Kids' WB's 3.0 (the first sweeps win since 1997, the year that Batman left.)

Early the following year, Fox Kids would score again, narrowly beating Pokémon on Saturday morning in the same timeslot and even coming ahead of properties like X-Men. And what would propel this February 10th victory? The first appearance of BlackWarGreymon, the Shadow the Hedgehog to WarGreymon's Sonic.

However, Pokémon would still help create ratings records for Kids' WB, even though late 2000/early 2001 saw a slide that would often cede dominance to Nickelodeon. Jed Patrick, who was president of The WB at the time said: "I didn't think Pokémon would fall off as much as it did ... every fire cools down a little, but that doesn't mean it doesn't stay hot."

Even though, in retrospect, claims that "Pokemania" had died seem a little ridiculous — the latest games, Pokémon Sword and Shield, just became the highest-selling entries in seventeen years — big changes were ahead.

Part 3: It's Time To Duel ... Or Not

In early 2001, Joel Andryc, executive VP of kids' programming and development for Fox Kids, was looking for a "Digimon companion series to create an hour-long anime block." He felt they were too reliant on Digimon, as they were airing it three times in a single morning. Likely not coincidentally, that summer Fox Kids Fridays were dubbed "anime invasion," advertising Flint The Time Detective, Dinozaurs, Escaflowne, and Digimon. In one commercial, a single quote zips across the bottom of the screen: "Anime Rocks!" Nicole, TX

That it does, Nicole from Texas.

Meanwhile, 4Kids Entertainment would provide Kids' WB with another monster show: Yu-Gi-Oh! Known as Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters in Japan, this anime adaptation absconded from retelling the stories found in the early chapters of the manga — which were mostly devoted to Yugi running into jerks, only to have his Egyptian spirit "alter ego" deal karmic retribution on them — and instead focused on the parts that involved the cool monster fights. So basically the parts that were the most like Pokémon.

But how would this be received? In 2000, Canadian studio Nelvana had licensed the anime Cardcaptor Sakura and turned it simply into Cardcaptors — an extremely edited version that removed many important relationships and plotlines and tried to streamline the show into a pseudo-Pokémon story. It's gone down in history as one of the most questionable dubs ever, and never really made a splash on Kids' WB. So they wouldn't want a repeat of that.

But would kids be into a card game? The cards did summon monsters, but in Pokémon and Digimon, the monsters are just there, moving around and not relegated to a glorified checkers board arena. It turned out, yes, kids would be REALLY into that. Yu-Gi-Oh! debuted at number one in multiple demographics in September 2001, and would remain a steady part of its lineup for years to come.

And how did Fox Kids respond? Did the "anime invasion" work out? Well, sort of, but not in the way they were hoping.

In 2001, due to diminishing ratings and audiences, Fox Kids Worldwide (along with Fox Family Worldwide) were sold to The Walt Disney Company. By November 7th, they'd canceled their weekly afternoon blocks, and the next year, they'd end up selling their entire Saturday morning block to a company that had provided their rivals with the very same TV shows that aided in sinking them: 4Kids Entertainment. The final show to premiere on the original Fox Kids was Galidor: Defenders of the Outer Dimension, a live action series that stood beside Alienators: Evolution Continues (a cartoon sequel to the mediocre 2001 comedy Evolution) and the underrated Medabots as the block's last gasp.

Renamed FoxBox in late 2002 (and later 4KidsTV in 2005), the 4Kids run schedule would, over the years, include anime like Kirby! Right Back At Ya!, Ultimate Muscle, Fighting Foodons, Sonic X, Shaman King, and eventually, in 2004, the infamous One Piece dub. The first Saturday of the new FoxBox lineup would also outdo the previous Saturday's Fox Kids lineup. Disney would acquire the rights to Digimon and it showed up on ABC Family in late 2001 (eighteen years later, a reboot of the original series would air, which can be watched on Crunchyroll).

Eventually, in 2007, the Monster War would come full circle. 4Kids Entertainment announced they would be taking over the Kids' WB Saturday morning block entirely, renaming it the "CW4KIDS," as The CW had been born after UPN and The WB had ceased to be. Pokémon was long gone by this point, having been dropped by Kids' WB in 2006, and was now overseen by The Pokémon Company International on Cartoon Network.

"We wish Pokémon USA much success going forward," the CEO of 4Kids Entertainment said. Later sued over "illegal agreements" regarding the Yu-Gi-Oh! franchise, the company would eventually file for bankruptcy in 2016. Pokémon Journeys, the latest installment in the franchise, launches on Netflix on June 12th.

Daniel Dockery is a Senior Staff Writer for Crunchyroll. Follow him on Twitter!

Do you love writing? Do you love anime? If you have an idea for a features story, pitch it to Crunchyroll Features!

By: [email protected]

#Anime #News #Latest in Anime News by Crunchyroll!

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natsubeatsrock · 5 years ago

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Should our heroes kill?

So remember how I said that I'm glad that a problem detractors of Fairy Tail have is people being too forgiving? This is part of the reason why.

I can't think of a time I've seen people seriously complain that anyone didn't kill another character in Fairy Tail. Gray had to rush to catch Juvia in Phantom Lord, Erza could have killed Jellal back in Tower of Heaven, and fans are glad as their potential ships are still not unconfirmed by death. The closest thing I can think of is fans being mad that someone like Lisanna didn't die. However, not too many people are going out to say that any character should have killed any other.

That feels kind of weird.

Don't get me wrong. I like that Fairy Tail fans don't have the desire to see XYZ character get killed off for ABC reasons. That should be expected from the guy that says forgiveness is generally good. I'm glad that Natsu isn't expected to kill too many of his enemies or that people aren’t sad when he doesn't finish off someone like Jellal or Gajeel or whoever.

At the same time, this doesn't feel normal.

Like, I know of only one person who has encountered My Hero Academia that actually seems to like Mineta Minoru. Pretty much everyone else seems to either not like him or outright hate him. It's common to see him excluded from fan depictions of Class 1-A and be glad when bad things happen to him. I think it can get to be a bit much at times, but I see where it comes from.

And then people wish for his death. And I have to stop. Ignoring in-universe issues his death would cause for the school, I find it troubling that fans can talk so casually about killing a character in a universe who isn't a villain. I get that the dude's a huge pervert, but Himiko Toga kills people unapologetically and has an actual fanbase. Something feels off about fandom priorities.

And of course, there is the big one: Batman. For the uninitiated, Batman has one famous rule: he does not kill his enemies. While there have been characters he has killed in the past, these are exceptions to this rule. Generally speaking, Batman is not one to kill even the worst of enemies. Part of this is why Zack Snyder's depiction of the character in Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice is so contentious with fans, along with his insistence that Batman killing is within character. (among other stupid comments by him)

This all comes to a head in the famous story Under the Red Hood. Before the actual story starts, one of Batman's sidekicks, Jason Todd, was kidnapped, beaten, and presumably killed by the Joker. (Thanks to an IRL fan vote, of all things.) It is later revealed that he's back as the titular Red Hood and is mad that Batman didn't kill the Joker because of what happened to him. A lot of fans sympathize with Jason and believe it was wrong for Batman not to break his rule to avenge Jason Todd.

Though, I think that Batman's response to Jason's plea provides an important answer to this question. He admits that all he's wanted to kill the Joker, however, he refuses to allow himself to. Many interpret this to mean that he thinks he's strong for not killing the Joker. However, I interpret this to mean that he feels he's too weak to kill just the Joker.

And that is an important difference. Anyone who's even remotely aware of Batman knows that he should have no trouble killing the Joker if he actually wanted to. Some even argue he does exactly that at the end of the Killing Joke. The issue is whether or not he can draw the line at only killing the Joker. He could start by killing the Joker and end up becoming the very thing he's worked to destroy.

Thankfully, the troubles of this aren't lost on Batman. In The Dark Night Returns, he even comments on how doing that means that he’s murdered people. To put it in another way, Batman’s one rule doesn't exist because he thinks of himself as a hero. It's there to prevent himself from becoming a villain.

That is an important question to ask. Is it within a character's nature to kill another human being? When Deadpool pulls the trigger on the person responsible for his mutation, we know it to be within his nature. When Spiderman doesn't kill Uncle Ben's killer, we know that to be within his nature.

I don't know that people fully understand what they ask for when they say "someone should just kill a character". You're asking them to take the life of another person. From our perspective, these characters aren't real and have no technical agency. At the same time, the people in-series are real within their own universe.

Does it make sense for this character to take the life of any character? Would they be willing to make exceptions and kill a specific character for a specific reason? Is this the start of a change in their character or does it not affect them much?

Of course, there's a reason this comes after the talk about forgiveness. A lot of the same kinds of questions you'd ask regarding one character forgiving another are similar to if a character would kill another. Part of the reason is that the choice a character is often faced with is if they should kill a character for something they did or forgive them. Considering I've talked about the forgiveness angle, let's talk about the killing option.

I think that if you're going to set a character up to kill another character, go through with it. Don't set a character killing another and then fake us out by having them give the kind of weak version of forgiveness I talked about earlier. Have them die and get it over with.

If you want to have them change, set that up well in advance. Give them a reason not to want to kill them or to see them dead. (Note: there is a difference between the two.) Don't give them a cheap conversation about how "this isn't like you" or "you should do the right thing". Give the audience good reasons for why we should believe this specific hero shouldn't kill their specific target.

Rising of the Shield Hero somehow managed to do both in its anime adaptation (I've heard things are different in the original version). I don't love that Raphtalia was faced with a situation to kill and decided to not to go through with it. On the other hand, I appreciate that, when Naofumi had to make a similar decision, it was made under different situations. He decided to save the lives of his tormentors to help someone he actually cared about while coming up with a creative punishment for them instead.

That brings up a fun topic to end on. A lot of people argue that crimes against oppressors, whether they're abusers, ruling classes, or something similar, are justified if done by their those they're oppressing. This is something that I'd normally keep for the topic to come but it's worth talking about in the most extreme case possible - when it comes to killing them.

One of the most hotly debated points about Avatar: the Last Airbender has been its ending. It’s established early on that Aang has to defeat the Fire Lord to keep the world in balance. However, as the end draws near, it becomes clear that Aang has issues with how that may mean killing him. In the end, he is able to find a way to defeat the Fire Lord without having to shed blood. However, many fans think that he should have killed him and keeping him alive was a mistake. (In fairness, I was of this opinion until I saw the actual resolution of this conflict.)

At the same time, I’ve talked about Scar from Fullmetal Alchemist and his revenge quest. To be clear, I get why he went after State Alchemists but think his overall quest wasn’t good. I stand opposed to a lot of people who are very much willing to justify his entire quest, despite any and all drawbacks and in-series issues that his quest has. Mind you, this is one of the big reasons he starts the series out as an antagonist. In their mind, Scar killing the alchemists is a valid form of judgment and justice for their actions.

I bring these examples up to make an important point. Comeuppance comes in many different forms. Sometimes, it can mean getting one over the people who wouldn't think twice to help you. Other times, it can be making people hurt the same way they've made you hurt. I think that we do well to recognize that in our handling these types of dynamics, not everyone will agree with the conclusion your character makes in how they deal with abusers. Recognize that as you write these situations.

Or just don’t write abusers in fiction and let fans argue over ships, I don’t know.

To be continued...

#not fairy tail month: crisis on infinite fandoms #our heroes #this was a fun one #i edited this at like 1 in the morning #and am posting this during a meeting at 7pm #the mashima server finished up their pokemon tournament #i've gained an appreciation of time zones

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hellzyeahthewebwieldingavenger · 6 years ago

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ASM vol 5 #25/826 Story 1 Thoughts

Wow!

Now THIS is how you do a milestone issue...even though the milestone was last issue but whatever!

In some ways this issue reminded me of a lot of DC’s recent milestone issues for the Trinity. Wonder Woman’s 75th Anniversary special, Action Comics #1000, Detective Comics #1000.

By this I mean you have multiple artists contributing and the story feels like vignettes.

The difference though is that most of these vignettes are in fact part of the same story.

The downside of that is that it does make the main story ‘Opening Night’ feel somewhat disjointed because there are 3 or 4 endings. It could’ve been easily fixed by simply presenting the Syndicate pages and the Gleason pencilled pages as their own stories (which functionally they are) or at least as clearly labelled epilogues.

That’s a nitpick though because the main story over all was fantastic, no pu....actually pun very much intended. Why not Spencer likes his puns and meta jokes and there was plenty of the latter in this issue. Case in point Kindred’s jabs about continuity.

Let me get some minor negatives out of the way.

The changing artists really, really didn’t complement one another exempting Kev Walker and Ottley’s work. Ramos’ artwork wasn’t well integrated with the rest of the art at all, as was the case with his work in the Heist arc back in the earlier issues. Gleason’s work I will give a little more of a pass too because as presented it feels so much like it’s own separate story and has consistent art within those pages it’s not really a problem. But with Ramos and Ottley it’s very jarring.

Now it is the lesser evil because I’d rather have Ramos draw some pages and panels rather than the whole issue. Reserving him for, let’s face it, the less important B-plot of the main story whilst Ottley does the heavy lifting on the main story is a great compromise.

Other small complaints I have involve Mary Jane herself and her storyline.

For starters...Carlie Cooper is back. Now she isn’t used badly, it’s just...I hate that character. I don’t think many people have many positives to say about her and there is baggage associated with her. So if she is destined to become MJ’s go to buddy then that’s going to grind my gears (especially when we consider she let MJ risk her life by dating Otto in Superior, what a jerk!) and I’d infinitely prefer a wholesale new character or an old established character (Liz, Glory, Jill Stacy even?).

Buuuuuuuut on the flipside Carlie was better suited to being MJ’s sidekick in this story given she got involved in some of the action. Possibly even seeing her get zapped was Spencer putting in a piece of catharsis for the many fans he knows honestly hate this character.

Secondly we got MJ’s acting career. Now there are three little problems I have with it that might not even be problems. Let me explain.

a) MJ claims she lost her Secret Hospital job because of the nature of her life. I took that very much as an implication associated with her connection to Spider-Man. Problem is...she didn’t lose her job because of Spider-Man. Her role just happened to be cut back and eventually if I remember correctly she either quit following a deranged fan assaulting her or she was outright fired. Now in defence of her comment and of Spencer, the line doesn’t explicitly mention Peter or anything like that so it could easily be taken as her life being in general crazy regardless. Bear this in mind for something else I’m going to bring up

b) MJ claims she never liked being famous. That really struck me because of course MJ wanted to be famous from day 1. Now you could easily argue that when we first met MJ she was younger and had yet to experience fame, so now she feels differently. Buuuuuuut she was a model in her adulthood. She pursued acting as a soap star, and as a movie star and as a stage star and took a job at Stark industries and at various points was modelling during those jobs. Soooooooooo what gives? I mean....maybe you could say she hated aspects of being famous but the speech seems weird and inconsistent in and of itself even. I’m hoping I’m just missing something

c) MJ says she had trouble fitting in and then over did it in social situations. I dunno if that’s really true. It could be bad phrasing on Spencer’s part but really MJ always did fit in, her facade helped her to fit in, it was partially engineered to help her to do that. Is that what he means though?

d) MJ becoming a famous actress again gives me mixed feelings. Spider-Man is the everyman and whilst temporary fame that comes crashing down is one thing, if she is long term famous it kind of meddles with the everyman aspect of Spider-Man. An aspiring actress, even a low key soap star is different a more if you will ‘domestic’ form of fame. But that’s more a criticism of where this might lead so it could wind up being fine.

One final, final little problem I had was another example of worried where this MIGHT lead. In Kindred’s lair we see a wall depicting different Spider-Heroes and so now I’m facepalming that the climax to his storyline will be a huge crossover event affair that demands I read Miles and Gwen’s and Jessica Drew’s titles.

Again a nitpick at best, at worst something to worry about in the future not the present.

Everything else in the main story was beautiful.

MJ’s connection to acting is restored. Wonderful. It’s my preferred profession for her because it taps into Peter’s double life and her own history with her party girl facade.

The speech was well written and delivered and I liked the meta aspect of her giving it whilst disguised as a famous super hero wife!

Spencer continued to find a way to handle the old criticism lobbied against MJ/the marriage that it Mary Jane simply waited by a window (even though I think that’s fine sometimes) or just got stood up on dates all the time by having MJ have friends she can hang out with. This is one aspect where Carlie, because she is in on the secret, helps a lot I must admit.

Spencer also renders Mary Jane very well rounded.

Look I LOVE seeing instances where Mary Jane shines as cool, as bad ass and the like, but sometimes if handled poorly it can come off as idolizing her.

Spencer avoids this by giving MJ flaws.

She’s jealous of Melanie’s success which she sees as something that could have been her’s.* She has tiny doubts about Peter’s sincerity. She admits she struggles to fit in and feels uncomfortably exposed in the limelight.

But she’s also, brave, self-sacrificing, resourceful and, most importantly in this story, a good actress (apparently being able to impersonate Melanie’s voice...or maybe that’s something no one thought about because this is a non-audio medium).

The effect is to make Mary Jane truly the hero of the story, not just because she is ‘taking point’ in the main story but because she feels complex and nuanced, just as Peter is.

My quibbles above aside, Spencer really is a good Mary Jane writer and for Spider-Man that’s an important consideration for a writer (just as being a good Lois Lane writer or good Alfred writer is for Superman and Batman). He’s done her justice 99% of the time he’s written her and it says an awful lot about him and his priorities for this title that he’d give the lion’s share of a milestone issue over to her.

It also says a lot of his abilities to make good stories out of well...clean up duty.

Let’s be brutally honest here the majority of Spencer’s issues have revolved around stories really designed to fix things after BND and Slott’s run.

Back to Basics fixed Peter and MJ’s relationship and mostly reconstructed Peter’s character by having him own up to the diploma debacle and zero in on who the man was and who the spider was by literally separating the two.

The Heist reconstructed Peter and Felicia’s relationship and fleshed out why MJ and Peter were getting back together as quickly as they did.

Those poorly drawn Bachalo issues fixed Ned Leeds not being dead.

Hunted fixed Kraven not being dead and Shed and more stuff with Felicia

Now this issue has fixed MJ and Peter’s future’s to some extent. Peter is back at ESU and MJ is back to acting. Not only does she now have a Stark free job situation but it’s a job that’s her home away from home as I discussed a bit above.

The issue also does some clean up with Curt Connors, restoring the pre-Hunted status quo and by extension facilitating something else comfortingly familiar by having Connors teach Peter.**

Speaking of Connors, I can’t recall off the top of my head (having not eaten breakfast yet) if Connors had safehouses before now to keep him safe from his family. I know that has been the case in other stories, such as the Forever Young novel from a couple of years ago, but in the comics I can’t recall. If not then it’s a great thing for Spencer to integrate. If so it’s a great thing for Spencer to have remembered and gives Spider-Man a meaningful subplot to work with whilst Mary Jane takes the limelight in the main plot.

Now let’s move onto Mysterio. As I predicted last issue the doctor was Rinehart but I was mistaken in believing it was the real Rinehart. Spencer, and Mysterio, were so good at their jobs that I was successfully fooled into thinking Mysterio really had died last issue. The idea that Rinehart was really Mysterio and Mysterio was really someone else never occurred to me and was an ingenious twist.

But like all good mysteries it had clues right there for us to see as last issue signposted the disappearance of Mysterio’s former doctor, who we now know was tricked into becoming Mysterio so beck could escape. What sold it was the inner monologue of Rinehart talking about Beck as a separate person. This would’ve been a cheap trick under a lesser writer but Spencer justifies it by claiming Mysterio was method. Just brilliant. As was tying in MJ’s agent and new found fame to Mysterio and his film script.

We also get some more tantalizing tidbits about Kindred. He doesn’t like killing innocent people if he doesn’t have to. The idea of him being an established villain now looks much less likely. And did you notice that when we first see him in the issue...he’s sticking to the wall...surrounded by spiders...and later has them crawling out of his bandages...and is targeting other Spider people...hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm????????????????

That about does it for what I call the ‘main main story’, we move now onto what should’ve been epilogues.

There isn’t much to say about the Syndicate pages beyond they were good for what they were, they eloquently tie into the main story and set up the next arc.

Much more interesting are the Gleason pages, and not just because the art looks so nice and so much better than Ramos.

On the one hand I am wary of Spider-Man comics bringing in too much of the shared universe because it messes up a lot of the drama and stakes. But as a little side story meant to set up something else that’s fine and what a set up.

Spider-Man 2099 is back!

Now I feel like I should really catch up on his solo book. I kept buying it but stopped reading it around Civil War II!

I honestly have NO IDEA where this is going beyond thinking it might have something to do with Kindred’s interest in all the other spider people??????

Beyond all that...not much to say.

I’m not going to tell you that I recommend you pick this issue up because....c’mon...you know you already did...and loved it!

*Importantly, if Spencer intended it this way, MJ missed out on Melanie’s success because of something not connected to Spider-Man. I was worried the story was going in for this idea that being with Peter has cost Mary Jane a successful career, but in this issue, through Melaine we see that wasn’t the case.

MJ’s life led her to quit a role that was already being reduced but it wasn’t because of Spider-Man stuff at all.

This is not just refreshing and healthy for their relationship, it’s also realistic. Take that every bullshit AU about MJ being famous by not dating Spidey!

**By the way I was going to criticise Connors having both arms in human form but then I double checked issue #2 and that was the case there too. I keep forgetting that he has both arms now it’s just so weird to see.

#Spider-Man #mjwatsonedit #mj watson #Mary Jane Watson #Mary Jane Watson Parker #Peter Parker #Nick Spencer #Lizard #the Lizard #Curt Connors #patrick gleason #Ryan Ottley #Humberto Ramos #Spider-Man 2099 #Mysterio #quinten beck #Kindred

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arch-rhap · 6 years ago

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How I’d Relaunch the Marvel Comics Line Proposal

This is a post I’ve actually wanted to make for awhile. So for those who don’t know, I love comics and I am openly admitting to be more Marvel leaning as they got me into comic books to begin with. That said, I have my fair share of issues with them.

One of my biggest issues with Marvel is disorganization. Unlike DC, Marvel produces a lot of books but publishes them under the same banner, Marvel Comics. Because of this, we end up having all books compared at a similar level. Which isn’t very good.

Its hard having a newer book that’s trying to build an audience and storyline when its getting compared to more established series. For instance, its obvious Doctor Voodoo isn’t going to do the same numbers as Amazing Spider-Man. But then look at DC, you have the Banner of DC comics and the Banner of Vertigo comics. A book like Swamp Thing is going to have different numbers than Batman, but it doesn’t matter as they aren’t in the same line.

So why don’t we fix that by relaunching Marvel. Now relaunching doesn’t mean rebooting everything. Its still the same universe, we’re just reorganizing it. Time to get all this disorder under control. (Disclaimer: This was inspired by Professor Thorgi’s video Let’s Relaunch Marvel)

First, some ground rules of how this’ll be dived up. As I said before, by relaunching the comics I intend to make them more easily digestible. The first is cutting down of titles. So for the purposes of this post, we’re making sure each book has only 1 title. So one X-Men, one Avengers, etc.

Second, Banners. We wanna break up Marvel Comics into different lines. Thus we can grade their sales all on the same level. We should be comparing numbers done by titles like Iron Man and Captain America separately from numbers done by books like Champions or Kate Bishop: Hawkeye. So this post will be mainly about how I’d reorganize them with banners.

Third, anthologies. So one thing that I mentioned was the lack of being able to build an audience. There are plenty of good titles that have been cancelled due to low numbers. But these books do have audiences. So why not promote these books by combining audiences while also trying to really sell that this relaunch really is a drastic change and not, “marvel is doing another relaunch... Kay...” Now when we get the anthology portion of this post, I’ll elaborate more, but for now the idea of promoting books by combining audiences.

Anyways, lets dive into how I would relaunch Marvel.

Marvel Classic: The first of our banners is actually a revival of an old banner. See there once was a time when Marvel was split into 5 different imprints. One of which was Marvel Classic, for long-time Marvel characters like the Avengers and Fantastic Four (Though not Spider-man or the X-Men as they actually got their own lines). As such, we’re reviving it with a similar idea, Marvel Classic are the flagship books for long time, older generations of readers.

Examples of Titles that could be published are obvious:

Spider-Man

Avengers

Captain Marvel

Captain America

Iron Man

Black Panther

Fantastic Four

Hulk

X-Men

Marvel NOW: Our second banner (Yes I know Marvel Now was a past Marvel branding title, I just couldn’t think of something better for this banner’s name) will be the more modern titles. Books that are about more premier superheroes and a newer generation. As well as books that regained interest generated by the popularity of films.

Examples of titles for this line are:

Ms Marvel

Champions

Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Iron Heart

Runaways

Spider-Gwen

Ant-Man: Scott Lang

Guardians of the Galaxy.

Marvel MAX: Our third banner is a revival of another older line. Now MAX has a stigma of negativity to it as it was intended to be the Marvel version of Vertigo, mature stories for an older demographic. However, MAX had become a sort of anti-Vergito as they used brasen nudity and graphic violence to shock and pander. Well, now is the time to correct those mistakes. Bring back some of Marvel’s more mature and cult stories, as well as graphic stories told maturely.

Things like:

Nextwave: Agents of Hate

Jessica Jones

Howard the Duck

Old Man Logan

Werewolf by Night

Punisher

X-Statix

Marvel Knights: Our fourth banner is, once again, another revival of an old line. Marvel Knights was actually a creative bastion when Marvel needed one back in the day, with their Kevin Smith’s Daredevil, Christopher Priest’s Black Panther, Garth Ennis’ Punisher, and Paul Jenkins’ Inhumans. This time, they’re sort of an odd duck idea for a line. A group of books that don’t quite fit in others places. Capable of taking classic characters, but taking them in more mature directions. Though not as mature as MAX may. But this would be another creative freedom outlet. So almost a more experimental line, as well as be where limited series could run out of like The Skrulls or Neil Gaiman’s Miracleman.

Books for this would be like:

Daredevil

Inhumans

She-Hulk

Namor

Luke Cage and Iron Fist

Moon Knight

Man-Thing

Marvel Age: So for our fifth banner will be bringing back Marvel Age, books for all ages. Books that could be sold to kids at book fairs and will get them interested in the market. And when I say these are books that have an audience for kids, I don’t mean watered down content for children. I mean books that respect kids and give them something of substance. As well as can be enjoyed by any adult

Books like:

Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur

Squirrel Girl

Nova: Sam Alexander

Future Foundation/Power Pack

Spider-Ham

Kid Kaiju

Peni Parker (Closer based on the one from Into the Spider-verse movie and not the comic)

Marvel General Entertainment: So remember when I mentioned that marvel once split itself into 5 lines? Well, this was one of those imprints which handled licensed works like Transformers and G.I. Joe. And it would surprise you that they don’t actually have it anymore. Yeah, things like Star Wars are still published under the same banner as Iron Man. So, just keep them separate.

So this is really just where they should put titles like:

Star Wars

Conan the Barbarian

Now we are enter the Anthology portion of this post. As I said previously, a way to generate promotion is by packaging books together so that books with smaller audiences will be able to maintain title in a single book. With the option to buy trades of the individual titles. As well to help some of the lower selling titles to combine them with titles that could last individually, but would motivate someone to pick it up and attract new readers

Amazing Fantasy: Amazing Fantasy was actually the book that Spider-Man first appeared in. The idea as I said was to take titles with audiences and combine them. This anthologies audience will be for more premier characters that could fit into Marvel NOW, but aren’t able to maintain an individual title.

So this would comprised of the titles

Unstoppable Wasp

Gwenpool

Miss America

Hawkeye

Loki

Journey into Mystery: This anthology will be composed of the more weird aspects of the Marvel universe. The strange myths and super science.

This would be composed of the titles

Silver Surfer

Blue Marvel

Angela

Eternals

Weirdworld

Strange Tales: This will be where most the magic users will be compiled. Super natural stories and concepts.

These magical titles would be:

Doctor Strange

Wiccan

Hellstorm

Brother Voodoo

Mania

Tales of Suspense: Lastly in our anthologies it’ll be a compilation of darker, more street level characters

So that would mean titles like:

Blade

Black Widow

Elektra

Ghost Rider

Cloak and Dagger

Shang Chi

And that’s how I’d relaunch Marvel. I know it seems like much and its not like Marvel would ever do this. But this was something I’ve wanted to put out there and honestly I had fun making this. I do hope to at least see Marvel make some of these changes, but as of now, I’m not holding my breath. So I hope you all enjoy this, and I’ll be signing out.

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dcarevu · 6 years ago

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Batman TAS: Moon of the Wolf

“If it’s a fight you’re looking for, try starting one with me!”

Episode: 43 Robin: No Writer: Len Wein Director: Dick Sebast Animator: Akom Airdate: November 11, 1992 Grade: B

This is perhaps one of the more infamous episodes of Batman TAS, being grouped with episodes like I’ve Got Batman in My Basement on several “worst” lists I’ve seen. But I don’t know, I didn’t think it was that bad the first time I saw it, and I don’t think it’s that bad now. Not a classic episode by any means, but it held my and Char’s attention, giving us some excitement and a pretty cool-looking villain. I can’t speak for everyone, but I think the werewolf-factor may directly affect people’s opinions, even though we’ve seen very similar through Tybrus and Man-Bat. If we can accept a giant cat-like creature created in a laboratory and a human-sized bat that flies around and turns back into a human, why is a werewolf suddenly just too much to believe? Probably because of how the story presents all this, which we will get into in just a second, but I did want to drop the bomb that I like this one, and all the complaints I have are pretty light.

So when the title card drops, we get some weird electric guitar that sounds like no other music the series has played. Think along the lines of The Last Laugh with how foreign that hip hop felt at the time. But now we’re more than 40 episodes in, and we’re so used to the orchestral stuff. On top of the werewolf, a lot of people seem to have a problem with the instrument choice, and I think that the episode could have gotten around it if the electric guitar was slowly inducted, reaching its most intense during the climax. That would have given us a little time to get used to it. Even though I like it, it was jarring to hear right away, right after the theme song we get to see every time.

After the title card, we start out at the Gotham zoo. Umm.. Okay. We’re starting at the zoo again? For the second episode in a row? The zoo really isn’t that interesting of a Batman location in my opinion. If I were writing this show, that would be a last resort setting. Y’know, not only is this the second episode in a row to start at the zoo, but it’s also the second episode in a row that deals with a human-sized creature of the night like this. Was this because of the time of year? Were these originally both planned for an October release? They must have had animals on the brain. Anyway, at the zoo a security guard’s dog starts going a little crazy, and a werewolf pops out from the shrubbery. This werewolf is incredibly awesome-looking, with gross slobber, these glowing eyes, and a very high intimidation factor. The werewolf gives the guard a hard time, but then Batman arrives on the scene, kicking the thing away. Batman does not typically pop up this early without some setup, so jumping into this type of action was a nice change of pace, even if other aspects we have seen recently. Batman fights off the werewolf, but it eventually gets away of course, because we’re still early in the episode. Going back to the Batcave, Batman tells Alfred that he fought a mugger wearing a werewolf mask. Looking at the creature, it’s pretty evident that this is no costume (or at least, no costume that your average mugger would likely be able to afford to run around and get into fights in), but more importantly, I don’t know why Batman doesn’t just assume that the creature is what it is. Bringing up Tyger, Tiger again, he just fought a humanoid-animal. It’s already been established that this kind of thing can happen in this world. Let’s move on from this! Batman notices some wolf fur on his gloves, and he actually ends up testing it, revealing it to be legitimate wolf-fur. But Batman thinks that it could just be an incredibly expensive costume. Look, guys, superheroes get brain-farts too. “What if that guy wasn’t wearing a mask?” Oh, I don’t know, I guess it would be exactly like what you’ve already experienced!

We get to see the identity of the werewolf as it arrives at this little shanty, and it turns out to be some guy named Anthony Romulus. The person in charge of him, forcing him to do his bidding, is Dr Milo, someone we saw in Cat Scratch Fever. He was honestly the last villain I ever expected to see again, and had no memory of him showing up here. Um. Welcome back, Milo? Dr Milo is a smug son-of-a-gun, and is using Anthony to…well, I think he’s just using him for money, as far as I can tell, and for doing his errands and chores (like killing the security guard). I don’t know why he wanted the security guard dead, because the security guard had no idea who he was anyway, but maybe he’s just tying up loose ends. Anthony explains (after turning back into a human) that Batman got in the way of the mission, and Dr Milo arranges a plan to get rid of the caped crusader before trying to deal with anything else. The plan is for Anthony (who is a star-athlete with plenty of money) to announce that he’s doubling up on a donation to a charity if Batman receives the check. We get a little more chatter on this in another scene where Bruce Wayne is shown to be working out with Anthony at the gym. I found this part to be fairly unnecessary, but it was harmless enough. Funny, though, how some of these characters that we’ve never seen before are all of a sudden shown to know Bruce when it’s their episode to become the villain. I like how they handled Two-Face much more, establishing him before the tragic episode. Now knowing about the check, Batman shows up to Anthony’s and is knocked out with gas. Dr Milo takes his utility belt and chains him down in this open area, which is to act like an arena where he will be torn apart by Anthony’s wolf-form (I’d love to know why these criminals always take his belt before taking his mask, by the way). While Batman is still unconscious, we get some exposition on why Anthony is the creature that he is through flashback, and this flashback is a bit confusing. There is a moment where is fakes you out because the flashback Dr. Milo starts narrating, and then it goes back to the present Dr. Milo. This makes it a little harder to follow in one watch, but I think Char and I handled it okay. Anthony’s werewolf origin is okay, but I did find myself questioning a few things. Not necessarily the writers, but the characters. Like, Anthony, why were you so quick to drink that substance which would ultimately transform you? Dr Milo said it hadn’t been tested. It could have immediately killed you. And for what, some gold medals? This puts a bad taste in our mouths over this character because of his willingness to cheat to succeed. He has his face in cereal commercials, being exposed to tons of people around the country and acting as a role-model to many of them, but he’s a filthy, rotten cheater. I also have to question Dr Milo. His plan is insane. Tricking someone to drink a solution that turns them into a werewolf so you can then control them by dangling the antidote in front of their face, getting free work and cash from it? I mean, whatever works for you, but there’s gotta be something a bit more inconspicuous. Throughout this, it’s hard to tell who to cheer for, but I think that at this point, Anthony has learned his lesson. It’s obvious that he finds Dr Milo’s work reprehensible. Dr Milo has absolutely zero redeeming qualities.

Shout out to the director (the show does little Easter eggs like this all the time, keep your eye out!)

Anthony changes into the wolf once the moon comes out (Milo’s scientific explanations never explain how the hell this works) and attacks Milo, throwing him through the wall of the shanty. Damn! Batman, before being attacked, comes to and finds a pin on the ground, using it to pick the locks that are keeping him restrained. I hope Milo provided that on purpose, and for the sake of me liking this episode, that’s what I’m gonna imagine. Otherwise, that is just way too convenient (and allows the writer to dance around Batman actually finding a clever solution). Now free, Batman and Anthony have a fight which moves to a rooftop where they are visible to the Gotham police force, being led by Bullock. It’s a really intense battle, and I couldn’t help but get into it. Oh, I’m aware that this episode is all style and very little substance, but hey, if it works it works. Not every episode needs to make me question morality and life itself. Just give me some dumb action every now and then with an awesome soundtrack and spooky vibes. Unfortunately, the fight comes to a close when Anthony is struck by lightning, and falls into the water below. Pretty stupid way to close out.

Oh, a highlight that I forgot to mention is when Bullock is interrogating the zoo security guard about the missing timberwolves. He pushes the dude right up against the cage, and we can see their jaws snapping, clearly getting agitated by the ruckus. “I want the truth before I decide to feed ya to your furry friends here.” Apparently the term “furry friends” can sound intimidating as hell if it comes with a slick accent like Bullock’s. Not only does Bullock get this moment, but when Batman and Anthony are on top of the roof, Bullock yells at the officers to not fire, and to let Batman handle the situation. This may have been to avoid conflict considering that, well, it’s a scary god damn werewolf which could easily eat all of them if it wanted, but I also like to think that after 40-ish episodes, Bullock develops the tiniest hint of faith in Batman. He’ll probably always be the cocky, sleazy oaf that we’ve known from the start, but it’s nice to see a little bit of development from such an unlikely episode. And that’s not worth nothing.

Oddly, looking back, Batman was never clued in on the entire steroid-situation like we were. I don’t even know if Batman figured out the identity of the werewolf. What an odd feeling. I don’t want to call it an oversight on the writing side of things, but this must be the first time that Batman just didn’t solve the mystery. Huh. Maybe Dr Milo is right, then, and he’ll get away scot-free. Then again, Batman is pretty smart. There are sure to be all kinds of clues lurking within that shanty.

I know I complained a lot, but that’s mostly because the logic was certainly not all there. I don’t grade these episodes based on anything but my enjoyment-level, though, so…

Char’s grade: B

Next time: Day of the Samurai Full episode list here!

#dcau #dc animated universe #moon of the wolf #btas #batman tas #batman the animated series #werewolf #halloween #batman #wolfman

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