#like i am very sorry but rory as a character is here to serve amy's arc not the other way around

[gnougnouss]

Four hours ago I saw someone saying Amy is written misogynistically because her entire character is about Rory and I have yet to recover from the either absolute bad faith or utter lack of reading comprehension that I experienced second hand here

[nirah10]

[Heads up: Infinity War spoilers ahead! I’ll mark where the spoilers are so that you can skip those parts if you want]

From Abby,

Six thousand, eight hundred and twenty-six Americans have died while serving in Afghanistan and Iraq since 2001. My dad was one of them, he died in 2007 while serving in Iraq. About two hundred thousand civilians and eighty thousand fighters from Afghanistan and Iraq have also died. War is ugly, brutal and there will always be losers on both sides, no side and no man walks away unscratched from war.

Two of my brothers are currently serving overseas as well, they followed in our father’s footsteps. My twenty-five-year-old brother is currently on the ground in Iraq, where our dad died eleven years ago. Our other brother, who is twenty-three, is currently in Syria. I’m seventeen and still in high school but worry about them both every day.

Comic book superheroes annoy me. As a lot seem to glorify being a solider and the action and endurance that is needed for that kind of life- but don’t really show the other side of it.

They show the bravery and the battles and the superheroes walk about making sacrifice, but no one ever actually dies. Small side characters that don’t get more than a couple of minutes screen time, people killed in the first five minutes of the movie that the main character loves but the audience doesn’t have time to get attached to for character building purposes and villains die, but the death of central characters in these movies are very rare- despite a brutal enemy, the soldiers often being reckless, and very low odds, they always seem to get through out much damage.

Which I find problematic for several seasons.

Life is valuable. So, so valuable. But bad things do happen and people die. My dad died. He was brave and he died. My brothers joined up to the army, and they know they might die. Yet they did it anyway. One of my brothers will often write me letters, and sometimes he will describe to me what music he wants at his funeral if he died- there is a joking tone to the letter, but there is a deepness behind them as well. My other brother is less open with talking about it, they both have different coping mechanisms to cope with that anxiety.

War and violence is not light- there is always pain and death on other sides. Unlike the wars in the superhero movies, the death and pain is never just on one side. The sacrifices are real.

That’s what I find so troubling about the Marvel movies. They talk up the sacrifices, show bravery, take crazy risks but we never see the reality of those sacrifices. They are always insanely violent films, but despite all the heroes walking about sacrifice, they still always manage to walk away. Even in movies like Captain American: Civil War, all the Iron Man movies, the Superman movies and the other eighteen or so Marvel movies, no one really central to the story or the team really get hurt. And if they do die, there seems to be a ‘reset button’ to bring them back. I hate the re-set, bring them back to life button.

Maybe I just sound like a bitter teenager. But I really hope they don’t just re-set the whole Infinity War film series. I feel like they can’t just all walk away. 

[Spoilers begin here!]

A lot of my friends are critical of Avengers 3 and think they will let everyone come back, in Avengers 4, but I don’t think so though.

I’m guessing they will have to bring certain heroes, like Spiderman back, because he has another Spiderman movie coming up. But I don’t think it will be as easy as stealing the stones back and turning back the clock.

Film theory here:

They really built up the idea of an Iron Man/Spiderman father and son like relationship in the last three movies: Civil War, Homecoming and Avengers.

Iron Man has been active since 2008, has had three of his own films, three Avengers films and has appeared in about five other Marvel universe films.  

I think they might retire Iron Man in the next film, and they might have been why they have been pushing his bond with the fifteen year old Peter Parker so much. Most of the other Avengers are not really on speaking terms with Tony, but he has that loyal little kid.

I think Iron Man is going to scarifie himself to bring Spiderman back.

I’m sure Spidey is coming back, because of Homecoming 2. I don’t think it is going to be as easy as it is in other Marvel Films though. I think Iron Man, the most famous Avenger of all, who has had the most screen time out of all of them, might permanently die, and I think it will be tied into his relationship with Peter.

And it might not just be Tony. The young Avengers, like Black Panther, were killed off while the originals, like Captain American survived. I think they might do a swap in the next movie.

Marvel has been accused of having a ‘problem with death’ as they keep on binging people back. I think they know this and know everyone is expecting all the Avengers to come back. I think there will be real death and sacrifice in part 4 though, I don’t think they will just ‘re-set’ it like some of my friends do.

[Spoilers are done! ^_^]

What do you think will happen?

Any theories? 

Also, with the way you have talked about not liking Moffat’s re-set button, I have a feeling unlike Marvel you are not afraid to kill characters, and I am nervous but kinda excited (but mainly nervous), because I think you might be the type of kill of main characters as well as side characters like Dex (RIP).

 I always talk up a big game about wanting more central characters to be killed off, but I am really, really nervous as well. Because I have kind of fallen in love with some characters; Harry, Nista and Kel in particular. Just please don’t hurt my three babies. Those three will be okay right?

Also, this is my last year of high school and I started reading your story when I was in grade ten- wow how time passes. I love this series so much. I used to hate Kel and now I really kind of love him.

Dear Abby,

I’m so sorry to har about you dad. Thanks so much for sharing your experience with us.

I’m not a fan at all of how popular it is these days to just “un-do” death. I get it in some situations, especially sci-fis, where it makes sense but it seems like I see resurrections on TV now more than I see legitimate deaths. I think authors are robbing themselves by doing that as well as doing a disservice to their fans. By constantly bringing characters back, their decisions and the risks they take have no real value. Nothing is really a sacrifice and nothing is really a risk. The fear and grief associated with death is completely swept away because audiences are just thinking to themselves “they’ll be back”.

I believe in consequences. I believe in characters, hero or villain, being held accountable for the choices they make and for facing the consequences of the things that they do.

With the characters I have, there are obviously some resurrections that happen. The Time Lords can regenerate or heal others and Jack is immortal. Because of this, I sometimes use “death” as a way to cause a change or reveal information and, when I do so, I don’t try to present it as a real death. The characters expect the Time Lords to regenerate, everyone knows that Jack is immortal, and when Kel “died”, he was immediately healed (conveniently wiping out Harry’s ability to regenerate or heal again for a while). None of those were meant to be death scenes; they are scenes that are there to bring about change in either the characters or the plot. If I ever give you guys a scene in which a character dies and it isn’t immediately made clear that they’re coming back somehow, they’re dead. Declan is dead. He is not coming back. When the time comes for other characters, they’ll be dead too.

To me, the return-to-life thing started as a cool twist that could be used to bring a surprise happy ending but now it seems to be a cheat code for writers to have their characters do whatever they want, have a big dramatic scene, and then immediately erase the consequences. Most of the time, I see it as lazy rather than clever. The constant deaths of Amy and Rory meant that their final episode, in which Rory “died” three times and Amy “died” twice and their final “death” was really them just living their lives out away from the Doctor like normal people, didn’t stir any emotion in me whatsoever. Watching The Princess and the Frog made me cry so hard I had to use my inhaler and I still can’t talk about the ending without tearing up but I did not care in the slightest when Amy and Rory left the show.

I don’t think Marvel has been lazy so far. I think focusing on individual Marvel movies is missing the big picture. They’ve been setting up a very long story and there wasn’t a point in introducing heroes that died before the “finale” of that story. I do think (and hope) that there will be very real consequences for the characters by the time it’s done.

Thank you for sticking with me for so long and I’m so glad that you’re still enjoying the story. I’m also glad to hear that you’ve come to enjoy the characters so much, especially Kel!

I won’t tell you who lives and who dies but I would like to remind you that there are definitely things out there that are worse than death. “Alive at the end” doesn’t necessarily mean “Safe”.