#marvel: “but 'man up' is enough to deal with the trauma of a victim and survivor of abuse and slavery isn't it?”

[buckydeservesthebest]

Oh God... this scene...

Bucky suffers from depersonalization disorder as a result of the already severe C-PTSD, exposing himself to the same experience that caused that C-PTSD originally is terribly damaging to his psyche! I can't even imagine the level of trauma so profound that he must have experienced at that time! And the fact that this was never once mentioned... makes it clear that Bucky's mental health is not important at all to marvel.... all they've done with that is make it seem like Bucky just swallows that pain and gets over it, just like that... A vile "man up"...

But again, the situation is barely saved by Seb's excellent performance, because if we look closely, as the fight scene flows, you can see that the outline of Bucky's eyes and his nose start to turn red... and you can see a slight layer of tears in his eyes at the end...

Not only that, throughout that scene Bucky grimaces with effort all the time, and it's not effort for the physical act of fighting those mercenaries, because as a super soldier he's dozens of times stronger than them... the grimaces are of effort and pain for having to pretend he's the Winter Soldier, for all that trauma he's living and swallowing without expressing his suffering even for a moment...

From the look Bucky gave Zemo immediately after he gave him the order to attack, I'm pretty sure that part of the plan is something Zemo didn't tell him before he agreed to impersonate the Winter Soldier.... Zemo forced Bucky into a situation where he had no choice but to fight and make it look as realistic as possible, because otherwise everyone would be put in a scenario where someone might actually get killed. And yet Bucky restrained himself enough by always using non-lethal strikes.

I'm sure it was the need to stay in character at all costs that kept Bucky from shedding a tear...

This... this is an undeniable expression of absolute sadness and restrained tears... and it tear my soul apart... 😭😭😭😭😭😭💔💔💔💔

BUCKY BARNES’ HOTTEST MOMENTS

7. 83/161 votes | Bucky pretending to be the Winter Soldier in Madripoor in Power Broker [prev]

[sofsstucky]

Maybe I should write a separate post, but I'm lazy so I'm just going to add my two cents to what this article already so well puts in words. I didn't like FATWS. Didn't hate it either, it's entertaining and goes into some important issues, but when it comes to Bucky, the character I admittedly have an emotional attachment to, it went the very opposite way of what I would have liked, of what I would have felt did him justice. Maybe it's just me, maybe I have a biased understanding of why Bucky Barnes became far more popular than Marvel ever anticipated, but I think it had a lot to do with his vulnerability, his trauma, the tragedy of his story and strength of his character. You know, like when, after years of being used and abused, on the run, falsely accused, he willingly, without a hint of doubt or rebellion, goes back in the ice, puts his life on hold for fear of being once again used as a weapon, stripped of his own will and turned into something he definitely doesn't want to be. Maybe I'm wrong and his popularity is mostly due to how good Seb looks in tight black leather.

I know fandoms have a tendency to develop their own tropes, hcs and shared truths that usually don't exactly align with what canon and its tptb have in mind. Fandom piled up torture, abuse and then sorrow and regret upon Bucky, but there were already hints that tptb had a far "lighter" take on his backstory and how willing a participant he'd been in it. And that was exactly the route taken in FATWS! No longer a victim, no longer a deeply good man in the most horrible, dehumanizing situation, but a somewhat willing participant who was just a bit misguided on what he and HYDRA were doing; like a soldier who chose the “wrong” side because of propaganda and comes to realize s/he wasn’t exactly told the whole truth. This obviously, completely contradicts what we got in previous films where it was clear enough he had no saying whatsoever in the matter, the mind wiping and conditioning were so strong he had no choice but to become the Soldier and obey. But of course, real men (and even more so super heroes) don’t do trauma, they shrug it off like it’s nothing and Marvel made sure, once again, not to deal with it in a serious manner, dismissing it almost entirely and, in the process, villainizing Bucky (Stan Lee, who told Seb “Remember, Bucky is one of the good guys!” must be turning in his grave). This Bucky not only is perfectly fine with all the violence inherent to making his amends, but has to be reminded by the psychologist that killing is a no no, implying that he’s perfectly fine with it. Such a stark contrast to the deeply distraught man we see in Wakanda when T’Challa shows him the new arm and he wearily asks “Where’s the fight?” or CW Bucky who just wants to be left alone and tries to escape instead of fighting and actually proclaims that “I’m not gonna kill them”.

Marvel lost such a good opportunity to deeply humanize one of their characters and showed once again how little they understand or, above all, want to understand, about psychology, trauma and, basically, just being human in general. More than pain or anguish, what most victims of no matter what sort of abuse feel is worst is powerlessness, the feeling of not being able to save themselves or those they care about, and that tends to linger long after they’re safe enough. But of course, if Bucky wasn’t that traumatized, Marvel didn’t need to go there, didn’t need to address how deeply stressful it would be for him to pretend to be the Soldier. Yet, the scene was even played for laughs, without the slightest protest or sign of discomfort from Bucky.

FATWS’ story could have been exactly the same changing only the motivation and overall attitude. That the world still distrusted Bucky Barnes and wasn’t willing to forgive and accept him as a good man, it makes sense, but what would have been truly interesting was the journey of Bucky Barnes accepting and forgiving himself. That’s not what we got and there’s a huge difference between an angry man who seems to be making amends because he’s forced to as part of a pardon and one who’s struggling with his own past, his own deeds that weren’t exactly his own but were nevertheless performed by his body. For me, it would have made so much more sense and would have been so much more satisfying if Bucky had realized there was a way to minimize what he had been forced to do and, despite the weariness, the disgust he came to feel for that sort of activity, had decided on his own to make amends as a way to atone. In fixing the world a little bit, in making it a little better maybe he could eventually find a way to, not entirely forgive, but at least ease his guilt and live with himself, his past, his trauma and the feelings of powerlessness that certainly came with it. In that process, he could slowly become the hero he’s supposed to turn into.

Overall, I think Marvel’s approach to therapy wasn’t just in-world terrible, it’s a dangerous depiction that may actually harm young or vulnerable people in the real world. For a time, some claimed it was an accurate depiction of how it worked in the Military and I’d have been perfectly fine if that was indeed what they were trying to do, pointing out how veterans have to struggle with lack of proper support. Pretty sure now it wasn’t the case and I’m afraid some people may think that was appropriate in any way. It wasn’t, that’s not how therapy and a client’s relationship with a therapist should work. There’s a huge difference between being challenged in a friendly, caring way and being bullied like that. So, if you need help, be careful, you should not feel threatened, that’s not how it should work. In-world, I was particularly upset that she chastised Bucky for not being more outgoing with people, having more contacts on his phone, etc. To me it felt particularly cruel and proof of how little she truly knew about his background, how he had no family left, how he’d been in hiding for so long, how much he probably was suspicious of people he doesn’t know given how they could turn out to be HYDRA… Instead of gently nudging him into being more trusting, into learning how to function in the civil world, she chooses to bully him. Tough love is only one of two things, either you’re really not trying hard enough to reach and connect with the other person or you tried and failed. It’s always a failure either way.

[yellowocaballero]

I know next to nothing abt utena but I. I kinda am extremely curious abt the utena vs mcu comparative analysis? if you feel like sharing lmao absolutely no worries if not

I love all of you because I will post obviously bait and someone will always indulge me in asking about it. NO I don’t want to unprompted just start rambling about my opinions, YES I will share them though. I will make this as short as possible because I can talk about Utena all day. I will add a disclaimer that I don’t super like the MCU so I’m very sorry to any MCU fans, Winter Soldier was good. Slight, vague spoilers for Utena ahead. 

TL;DR: MCU is constantly selling feminism in the form of palatable #bossbabes and Strong Female Characters, while Utena’s form of feminism is a more systematic and nuanced interview of how the patriarchy limits, exploits, and controls women. It posits that a woman CANNOT be a #bossbabe while she’s within that system, and only by leaving it can she find independence and identity. MCU is sponsored by the Air Force.

So for the uninitiated, Utena is a magical girl anime that I’ve been jokingly calling Evangelion: For Her. It deconstructs magical girl anime and fairy tales, and critically examines Japanese society, the patriarchy, heteronormative culture, and IN MY OPINION boarding schools. It deals with themes of trauma, toxic relationships, toxic masculinity, gender non-conformity, queerness, abuse, maturity, coming of age, gender roles, memory, and narrative. 

I’ve joked recently that Tumblr would find Utena problematic if it actually talked about the show beyond the killer aesthetic and sword lesbians. Every female character in it is obsessed with men. Most of them are in abusive, or at least toxic, relationships. It has several gender nonconforming, queer women, who view gender nonconformity as adopting the role of a man in society and thereby idealizing/controlling/abusing women, as men do. Every character is a hugely complicated person who hurts others. Men control women and women are either subservient and controlled by men, or they use their position of assumed subservience to manipulate men, or they attempt to regain power by taking the role of men. 

On the flip side. Utena demonstrates how every character is turned into this through the rigid and restrictive nature of (it’s Japanese, so Japanese, although it’s broadly applicable) society. Women who do not fit into these pre-set molds are punished and ostracized. Young boys are groomed by older men in order to fit these abusive molds, and otherwise well meaning men hurt women because they are not taught how to interact with women in healthy ways. The show is basically about how society takes the genuine need for love, intimacy, and human connection among children and beats them into societally accepted molds that keep power in the hands of powerful men. The patriarchy is ultimately a tool of powerful men that abuses and controls both men and women. Ever hear of no ethical consumption under capitalism? Try no ethical love under the patriarchy! 

So, no, Utena doesn’t really have a lot of ‘strong female characters’. But that’s really kind of the point - how can a woman be strong in this system? When a woman tries to gain strength, does she just try to imitate masculine values that we’re brainwashed into perceiving as strength? Is masculinity healthy? Can Utena really be gnc, or will a gnc woman never be accepted as a man by a society that profits off the victimization of women?

I’m not asking the MCU to analyze all of this, because they’re blockbuster movies and I don’t want or need them to get #deep. However, superhero movies will never look at the systematic and societal structures that build heroes and villains so long as the nature of superheroes inherently hinges upon the ‘Great Man’ system (basically an obsession with heroes and salvation through singular men instead of communities and movements). The MCU Spider-Man movies were so frustrating about this: it goes through the effort of saying that capitalism and injustice created the Vulture, but all that does is make a sympathetic villain - it never goes so far as to say that Peter is being fed into this system (by Tony Stark) like meat into a meat grinder that continues to prioritize the special over the collective. I don’t even need to get into Far From Home. The MCU constantly acknowledges these injustices (the way it acknowledges that the Air Force in Captain Marvel is sexist and racist) but it twists around that acknowledgement into assertion that superheroes and good guys CAN exist in this unjust system, and that they can utilize the power of this unjust system in order to provide salvation. Utena has Japanese Buddhist roots over this Christian ideal of the saviour/messiah: it encourages saving ourselves, and says that we cannot be saved by others, only aided and guided in that journey. 

Captain Marvel cannot be a ‘feminist’ film, no matter how much it celebrates Carol for embracing her individuality and autonomy in a discriminatory system, so long as Carol remains within that system. In contrast, the only way that Utena was able to live in gay happiness with Anthy was by rejecting the patriarchy, structure, and society completely. Carol is a shining, premier, ‘ideal’ example of a woman in the Air Force - tough and independent yet obedient and responsible to her system. Utena is also masc and gnc, but it actually explores how performing that masculinity isn’t a repudiation of the system, it’s just striving to attain status as the oppressor instead of the oppressed (absolutely crucial note that Utena doesn’t strive to be a man, she strives for masculinity). The #girlbosses in Black Panther are characterized by their complete and total loyalty and lack of ambition to authoritarian male figures and autocratic systems (Black Panther is really good and I like it a lot, this isn’t a criticism). Judi in Utena is also completely obedient and loyal to the male-dominated structure of the Student Council, but it’s shown as preventing her from accepting her lesbianism and pursing her desires. Black Widow, #girlboss extraordinaire, is devalued as a woman through her infertility and this is completely played straight and uncritically in a move that’s stunningly 1970s. Nanami in Utena (metaphorically) is confronted with her perceived lack of suitability for maternal life - and how the reason why she’s desperate for this is because it’s the promised unconditional love she never received. This isn’t even getting into the men - Tony Stark using tools of war to end war, which is an oxymoron. Peter Parker’s divorce from his working class roots into mindless imitation of authoritarian paternal figures and him literally being handed the cutsey drone strikes. Women in the MCU are ‘cool’, women in Utena are complex, flawed, and nuanced. 

We know the MCU isn’t woke. I don’t want it to be woke. But it keeps on pretending to try and it’s frustrating me. It continually just gets enough there to make me think about it and give the shiny sheen of that feminism while refusing to engage meaningfully with what they’re doing. I’d rather they didn’t try at all, because they consistently raise the question (hey it’s fucked up that the working class is getting screwed over and the Vulture’s doing what he’s doing for a reason!) and then refuse to answer it authentically or genuinely (but he’s evil so we don’t gotta touch that). I’m not gonna use the word pandering, but...that #girlboss shot in Endgame, come on...

Utena meaningfully treats the women as women who Live In A Society, and how that fucks them up, and how the only way they can be free is if they realize there’s no wizard behind the curtain, recognize the injustices, and repudiate the game. MCU says that a woman can be liberated and strong if she achieves specialness and strength within the system - if she ‘wins’ the game. But women don’t win this game. That’s the point of the game. Because when women win, men perceive themselves as losing, and that’s unacceptable. Captain Marvel and the MCU is a consolation prize for what women are consistently denied: complex and flawed characterizations. 

I’m normally uninterested by #feminism but Utena gets it. Thanks for the ask! 

[astarryon]

Tame Your Demons

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Fem!Reader

Warnings: Violence, blood mention, implied assault, language, general criminal minds things

Summary: The deal you have with Spencer is simple. You call him to take care of the men looking to take advantage of innocents on the street, and he comes to ensure you don’t kill them before he gets the chance. Unfortunately for the both of you, though, things don’t always go according to plan.

A/N: This is my latest love letter to Spencer Reid and Criminal Minds! Part Two will be posted a little later this week, and will be for a slightly more mature audience, if y’all catch my drift. A big thank you to @reids-trauma​ for letting me run this fic by her, she’s literally half the reason it even saw the light of day. Enjoy!

Masterlist

––

You see him before he sees you.

It doesn’t hurt your feelings— it’s the norm, in any case, and it’s what typically happens each time you reach out to plan a rendezvous. Part of the agreement is that you get to set the location, and you’re always careful to pick places you’re comfortable enough to slip your way out of unnoticed in case he ever morals up and brings his team to corner you. To his credit, that hasn’t happened yet — though you’re not naive enough to give up on the idea that it ever will just yet — but never subscribing to uncertain chances was a lesson you’d learned a long time ago.

But you know you’re safe for tonight, at least. He wouldn’t be meandering around the bar for such a prolonged amount of time searching for you if there were rows of feds waiting to take you into custody as soon as you stepped foot out the door. It takes a full fifteen seconds before his wandering gaze finally touches on you, another three before the glint of recognition appears in his eyes, and by the time he’s straightening his spine and striding purposefully toward you, it’s been an entire minute. Damn. Someone was really starting to lose their touch.

“You’re late, Doc,” you simper, arching a brow as you knock back a hearty sip from your glass. “Didn’t your mommy ever tell you it’s rude to keep a lady waiting?”

“Couldn’t be helped,” Reid huffs, crossing his arms over one another as he tries — and fails — to sidle up to you in a casual manner. You note the way he avoids touching the bar at all costs, how he folds in on himself like an exceptionally uncomfortable piece of origami. And then, of course, there’s the suit, far too dressy for a place so casual as the lively little bar nestled in the far side of downtown Georgetown. Jesus, the only way he would look like even more of an off the clock fed would be if his badge were superglued to his palm. “Getting away from the others without raising suspicion on such short notice isn’t exactly the easiest thing to pull off.”

“Yeah, well,” you chuckle, taking another sip from your glass. You make eyes at him, pointedly and conspicuously allowing your gaze to rake his lanky, suit clad frame head to toe. He looks good in the outfit he’s picked, the dark black of his jacket drawing the eye to the maroon button down he wore beneath it, and you marvel at the way his chosen color palette sets off his skin in the dim light. If Reid notices your staring or cares, he makes no show of it. Your ogling doesn’t bother him, not like it used to — doesn’t even make him blush, to your admitted dismay, though you suppose that makes sense. Spencer Reid is nothing like the sweet, shy boy he used to be. He’s not so wide eyed and naive anymore, though you’d never expected that to last very long in the first place. Still — getting a rise out of him had always been your favorite part of your arrangement. If you don’t get to keep that going, these meetings are about to become significantly less fun. “That’s the deal, isn’t it? When I call, you come running.”

“That’s the deal,” he mutters, nonchalantly waving off the approaching bartender. “And I came running. So who is it?”

You jut your lip out into a pout, resting your elbows atop the bar before settling your chin against your palms, sparing only a moment’s thought for how low the neckline of your dress must be dipping with the switch in position before casting the worry out of your mind. Were any other man your company tonight, you might have felt more concern for your modesty, but Spencer Reid was far from being anything like most men, and, honestly, the day you caught him checking you out was the day you mentally marked another tally on your side of the metaphorical score board. “Why’s it always straight to business with you?”

“Because—“

“No ‘hello’,” you go on, skirt riding further up your thigh as you cross your legs over each other. Not even a spare glance. Damn. “No ‘how are you,’ no admission of your undying love for me. If you’re not careful, Spencer, you’re going to start hurting my feelings.”

“No offense,” Spencer retorts, sounding particularly unconcerned with whether his words actually offend you or not, “but your feelings aren’t exactly my top priority right now. Arresting whoever this man is before you take it upon yourself to brutalize him is.”

“Well he’d deserve it, if I did,” you tell him matter of factly, swirling the contents of your glass as you pretend to be more interested in that than the eye-catching man just beside you. “This one likes to take advantage of young girls in clubs who accept drinks from strangers because they don’t know any better and still think there are nice people left in the world. Sometimes he keeps track, like it’s a game, and tries to see how many he can assault in a night, and this most recent time three of them made it home all right, but the fourth one turned up in a dumpster. So, yeah, Spencer, you’ll have to forgive me for figuring that if he ends up in a back alley with a couple of bruises and a broken leg he probably got what was coming to him, but don’t insult me by implying that I don’t know how to keep a promise.”

“If broken legs and bruises were all you left men with it wouldn’t be such a problem,” comes Spencer’s dry remark. “Unfortunately for the both of us, you seem to have a particular affinity for leaving men in comas.”

An affinity with which Spencer was all too familiar, you knew — not because he’d fallen victim to your habit of enacting revenge for all those poor defenseless victims, but because he’d caught you in the act with someone else. Two years later and you still weren’t positive how he’d managed to track you down. Spencer had told you minimal things — that an acquaintance on the city’s police force had reached out for his advice on a mysterious case of incapacitated men turning up in dark alleys, rarely little more than a few minutes away from going brain dead. That he’d been surprised to realize you profiled as female, considering the amount of unadulterated rage your behavior presented. That he’d made the decision to do what he could to keep from turning you in provided you help him be able to do so with a clean conscience before he’d even found you standing over some man with a white-knuckled grip on a tire iron.

“Give me your word that you’ll contact me first,” he’d instructed, a shockingly small amount of hesitancy glinting in his irises. “Give me your word that from the moment you call me, I have twenty four hours to find you so I can take care of all those awful men the right way. If I don’t make it in that time frame, they’re fair game, but if I find out that you laid a finger on them before you called me, I’ll personally see to it that you do time for every single man you’ve hospitalized. Can you agree to that?”

And you had. Partly because you had no interest in spending any prolonged amount of time behind bars, and partly because the odd sense of emotional recognition he’d gazed upon you with had been so unlike anything you’d ever been met with from another human being that you were essentially startled into instant complacency.

“He’s in the bathroom,” you sigh, downing the rest of your drink and flagging the bartender down for another. More for show than anything else, though you know the theatrics aren’t strictly necessary. Your drink of choice while out with company is much more coke than it is rum, and after two years there isn’t any doubt in your mind that Spencer is aware of that. “Has been for a while now, as a matter of fact, because he’s pompous and arrogant and wants to make sure the bait is set right for the barely legal girl he’s meeting here tonight.”

“Don’t suppose you want to share with the class the barely legal method you used to figure that one out?” Spencer deadpans, plucking your new drink from the bar and draining a few healthy sips before you even have the chance to reach for it. That’s something he’s never done before, though you suppose his repulsion to germs wouldn’t factor in one way or the other since the drink was fresh. But Spencer never indulged in alcohol around you, and was always incredibly careful to keep his guard up during these meetings. Either he was playing a different angle tonight, or something in him had drastically shifted.

“Only if you want to share with the class why I’ve been tailing this guy for two and a half weeks while you dodged my phone calls,” you retort, never breaking eye contact as you grab the glass and tilt the rim to your mouth, in just the same place that Spencer’s had been. You think you see a vein in his neck pulse as you swallow, but you can’t be sure whether the lights are playing tricks on you, so you decide not to count it. “Not like you to leave an innocent man’s life in my hands.”

Spencer arches a brow, eyes narrowing as he searches your face for something you’re not sure about. “Not like you to wait to hear back from me before doing anything about it.” He pauses, then, and more to himself than to you mutters, “And I’ve never said they were innocent.”

“Guess you’re right,” you mutter, shrugging a shoulder and leaning back in your chair as you let your eyes scan around the restaurant. The man you’re looking for is still nowhere to be found, and with the way your nerves are beginning to fray beneath Spencer’s all too calm and collected scrutiny, it’s hard to get ahold of your imagination as it barrels toward the worst case. “He’s still not back.”

“He’s probably still in the bathroom,” Spencer offers, giving an unconcerned shrug of his own. “You said he was a primper.”

“It’s been almost twenty minutes,” you shoot back, fixing him with a harsh stare. Normally you’d bother to be a bit more vivacious when speaking to Spencer, even in spite of your own irritation, but the sinking feeling in your stomach is making it impossible to pay attention to niceties. “That’s never happened before. Something’s wrong.”

“I’m sure it’s nothing.” But even to you Spencer’s words sound hesitant, like he’s trying to convince rather than tell, and somehow his lack of confidence only serves to make your throat that much thicker. “He couldn’t have left already, you would’ve seen him.”

Yeah, you would have — provided you hadn’t allowed every ounce of your attention to be monopolized by Spencer. You’d been so preoccupied with trying to appeal to his attention, so hung up on matching him wit for wit and taunting and tempting him with bared flesh and sultry gazes that, truthfully, anything could have escaped your notice in the last couple of minutes. Anything. And if some poor girl ended up preyed upon, if she ended up beaten or assaulted or worse, it wouldn’t be as simple as blaming the monster taking advantage of her. You wouldn’t even be able to blame Spencer for distracting you. No— the only person you’d have to blame would be yourself.

“He’s gone,” you breathe, horror a jagged knife twisting in your stomach. Your hands shake so badly that Spencer has to uncurl your fingers from around your glass so he can set it gently down for you. “God, he’s— I let him get away. He’s gone.”

“Don’t work yourself up,” Spencer insists, and if you weren’t sure your panic was playing tricks on you, you’d have sworn you saw his hand reach out to comfort you, just as you saw apprehension tensing his expression. Of course the one thing it took to get a reaction out of him would be unbridled panic. “Listen to me, everything is fine.”

“Not for whatever girl he decided he liked enough to blow off his date for!” you hiss, and it’s a strain to keep your volume low enough not to attract the attention of any other patrons, but you manage. “We need to— Spencer, we have to stop him! He’s going to hurt somebody!”

“Okay,” Spencer tries to calm you, quickly moving to his feet. You can’t get a read on the way he’s looking at you, can’t tell if he’s taking you seriously or trying to decide if he should make a phone call to he nearest psychiatrist, but he seems to be picking up on the urgency of the situation, so you make the choice to let it go. “Let me go check the bathroom to see if he’s still here. If he’s not there, then we can start worrying.” He turns, taking three steps towards the bathroom before spinning on his heel and coming back to say, “Just— stay here, okay? Don’t move. I’ll be right back.”

And as you watch his back as he makes the trek towards the restroom, you think about doing what he tells you to. Truly, you do. Spencer could walk into that bathroom and find the man you’d been planning to turn over to his custody and come back with him in handcuffs, unable to help leveling a handsome smirk at you by way of a silent I told you so. You could be panicking for nothing.

But… if there was even the slightest chance that someone innocent could be in the worst kind of danger, was it really worth leaving their fate up to a coin toss?

You’re on your feet as soon as Spencer’s out of sight, beelining for the exit and dodging between other patrons until your legs have carried you out the door and immediately to the dimly lit corner of the block, lined with the closed shops and darkened alleys the man you were after would need to get away with the unspeakable acts he planned to commit. Even as you book it to stop what you know in your gut to be happening, you can’t help but to hope that Spencer had been right. Things would certainly be easier to stomach, were that the case.

But, as you’d somehow known with sickening clarity, the closer you draw to the dark alley gaping between the buildings down the street, the more prominent sounds of a struggle become. You heard a man’s voice — deep and angry and enough to set your hands shaking and your mind blazing with fury — and then, beneath that, the muffled, whimpered cries of a young woman, the sounds of which were so pitiful that you didn’t need to have laid an eye on her to know that she was already sobbing. After that, all thoughts of Spencer effectively flew out the window. Suddenly all there was in your mind’s eye was you, some poor innocent girl having the worst night of her life, and what you were going to do to ensure that nothing bad befell her or any other girl ever again.

“Hey!” you screech, running head first into the alley. “Get the fuck off of her!”

There isn’t any time to survey your surroundings, to take stock of the fact that the man you’d known would be out here was in the process of brutalizing a young woman — one who looked to be barely more than a teen, to your unadulterated horror — nor was there time to really assess what you were barreling toward. All you knew was that your body moved of its own volition, and it was much too late to think things through once you’d collided so forcefully with the assailant that you’d knocked him bodily to the ground. It was too late to second guess yourself now, to wonder whether it wouldn’t be smarter to wait for Spencer, who could actually, legally take care of this guy. The only thing that mattered now was getting justice for everyone who had been too incapacitated to stand up for themselves.

“What the fuck?” the man hisses from beneath you, but you’re already whipping around to get a look at the frightened girl staring down at you. Her eyes are rimmed red, tears trailing down her cheeks, and to your morbid relief, you note that she appears to have no more than an expression of horror on her face.

You’d made it in time, then. By the grace of some higher power, you’d made it in time.

“There’s an FBI agent in the bar down the street,” you bark at her, struggling against the brute strength of the man you were trying — and failing — to keep pinned down. “His name is Spencer Reid. Find him.”

And that was all you had to say before she was running off down the alley and out of sight, the mercy of her safety striking such a psychological chord that you were just distracted enough for the man beneath you to throw a punch that successfully manages to clip you on the jaw, causing stars to swim in your vision as a result.

“Who the fuck do you think you are?” he hisses, quickly pushing himself to his feet and leering over you with a sneer. It made sense that he was under the impression that he had the upper hand— were you anyone else, he likely would have, and you’d have been little more to him than a replacement for the target you’d just saved.

But you weren’t anyone else. You weren’t helpless, or defenseless, and you certainly weren’t about to let this lowlife get away with all of the things he thought he was. No — you were someone hellbent on making a lasting difference in the world, and if that had to start with this guy getting his head bashed in, then so be it. You were down a tire iron, but your rage was weapon enough.

You wait until he grabs at your shoulder, waiting for just the right moment as he fully extends his elbow before punching as hard as you can against it in the opposite direction, not pausing to hear the sickening crunch of his bone snapping before rolling to the side, jumping to your feet, and subsequently kicking out his knee with a high heel clad foot. His howls of pain are equivalent to music in your ears, but you don’t pause to revel in the sound before you continue on with enacting your justified persecution. In this moment, you aren’t yourself. You’re not sure who you are, as a matter of fact, but you know it isn’t someone willing to let this lowlife get away with the mass amounts of pain and terror he’s inflicted on so many innocents.

“You like that, baby?” you snarl, letting your foot fly against his unprotected ribcage over and over again between sentences. “Does that feel good? Hmm?”

“You—“ The man cuts himself off with a hacked cough, spluttering and moaning as blood trickles down his chin. You’re not sure if that’s because you’ve kicked him in the face without noticing or because you’ve done enough damage to have already caused internal bleeding, but you’re not overly focused on figuring it out. “You psychotic— bitch,” he spits, and the hatred he gazes up at you with is so potent that you can’t help the wicked grin that curls across your mouth in response.

“That’s right,” you murmur, hovering your foot over the center of his chest for just a moment before digging your heel into his sternum. The harder you press, the louder he roars, and the louder he roars, the more you’re inclined to ensure that his screams continue. It’s a vicious cycle, but one you’re much too fond of to let go. “I’m a crazy, psychotic bitch because I’m a woman who stands up for herself and other women, and because I won’t let shitbags like you take advantage of us. Do you even know how old that girl was?”

His face contorts in pain, hands flying to your ankle in an attempt to pry your foot off his chest, but with one arm out of commission and pain proving to be too much of a distraction, he doesn’t manage to make any significant progress in alleviating your attacks. “Fuck you,” he hisses, but even to your ears, the vulgar words sound weak and reedy.

“I’m sure you’d like to,” you shoot back, digging your heel in that much further. You wait until you see tears welling in the corners of his eyes before letting any of the pressure up, and when you’re sure he’s hurting too badly to try and pull a fast one on you, you step off his chest and kneel to the ground, straddling his torso before your hands snake up to form a necklace at his throat. “You’re not used to girls fighting back, are you? You’re not used to anyone putting up a fight, and because of that you think you can just take whatever you want. Is that right?”

His eyes bulge out of their sockets as you begin to squeeze, hissed obscenities caught in his throat with nowhere to go, and the more he claws at the manacles your hands form, the tighter you let your grip become. It’s power, what you feel as you reconcile with the fact that you’re now quite literally holding this man’s life in your hands, and for a moment, you forget everything else. That you were only in this situation because you’d set out to save someone, that you’d sent that very same someone to go and fetch Spencer to come resolve all of this, that you weren’t an angel of death enacting revenge upon those who rightfully deserved what was coming to them. All those things washed away in the night, in just the same way as the beginning rainfall washed the man’s blood onto the ground in runny pink ribbons. It was only you and him, now. Nothing else mattered.

“You know, it’s men like you,” you snarl, squeezing so tightly against his throat that your knuckles go white and your fingers stiff, “that make people afraid to walk home alone at night. To send their kids off to college, to let their little ones grow up and experience the world. Because there are always— always monsters like you just waiting to take advantage of us. And no one’s ever made you pay for that, before, have they? That’s why you’re still so cocky, and confident enough to pull this shit out in the open because you know you’ll get away with it.”

Distantly, in the back of your mind, you think you hear someone calling your name. It’s hard to say for certain; with how focused you are on enacting revenge, on making sure this lowlife feels every single ounce of pain he’s ever managed to inflict on another unsuspecting human, your senses aren’t left with much more of an attention span. Even if they had been, you wouldn’t have bothered using it. Your fury, burning your nerves like hellfire, proves such a strong beacon of desire that you have no choice but to indulge. It feels good, the way his breath catches beneath where the heel of your palm digs into his throat, and you can tell by the way his eyes are beginning to cloud that if you keep it up, if you press just a little harder, squeeze just a little more—

Warm, strong arms snake around your middle, forming an inescapable cage of iron trying to pry you off the man beneath you, and the primal snarl that rips from your throat in response is a clear threat, but it does nothing to deter them. Hyperfixated as you are on finishing the job and ensuring that the man on the ground never lives to breathe another day, you don’t have the attention to spare, but your subconscious takes in the sharp scent of cloves filling your nostrils, the soft brush of curls against your shoulder, the domineering grip shackling your wrist maintaining a surprising air of gentleness. Your name is hurriedly whispered into your ear once, twice, three times, and by the fourth round you realize they’re not whispers at all — they’re shouts.

“Let go of him,” Spencer barks, bruising your ribs with how harshly he yanks you backwards. “Listen to me, listen to me. Let go of him.”

“Get off me!” you hiss in pain, stars dancing across your vision as you feel a slight bend in one of your bones, throwing an elbow back in retaliation. It lands square on his chest, and though the resulting grunt of pain he gives is certainly satisfying, it isn’t worth the grip you lose on the man’s neck. Once you’re down by one hand, it isn’t at all difficult for Spencer to wrench the second one back, and before you know it you’re a good ten feet down the alley, kicking and screaming wildly against Spencer’s grip as the monster you’d nearly strangled to death sputtered his way back to life.

“Calm down,” Spencer snaps, voice deep and low in your ear as he adjusts his grip around your torso so that you’re more fully pressed agains his body. “You need to breathe, do you hear me? Snap out of it. She’s okay. You got here in time and she’s okay. She’s safe, and you’re safe. Calm down. Calm down.”

You want to tell Spencer that he’s wrong. That you can’t be safe, that no one can be, so long as the man groaning on the ground across the alley is allowed to keep breathing. That this man can’t be allowed to live another day, waiting for the next opportunity to take advantage of an unsuspecting stranger who didn’t know any better. That it would be better to put him down now than to wait around for him to fuck up all over again, to ruin someone else’s life.

So you do.

Or, you try to. But all that manages to leave your mouth is little more than bent sobs and broken screams.

“It’s okay,” Spencer goes on, “it’s alright. Everything’s alright.” He uses the grip he’s got on your arm to spin you around, muffling your sobs as he brings your head against his chest and keeps it there with a gentle hand rested against the back of your head. Your body’s shaking so badly against his that, with your eyes still closed, you’re certain you’re still struggling to free yourself from his grip. It isn’t until you feel your fingers — numb with cold and shock and adrenaline — curl into his jacket that you realize you’re holding onto him for dear life. “Just breathe. Just breathe. You’re okay.”

“He was going to—“ You cut yourself off with a choked sob, shaking your head profusely. “He was going to—“

“I know,” Spencer murmurs, “I know. You don’t have to explain, just breathe.”

You hate this — that he’s caught you in such a vulnerable position, that he’s bearing witness to the rapid decline of your mental state. You hate that this is what it took to finally get him to wrap his arms around you, to offer words of reassurance and certainty rather than fixing you with unimpressed looks and exasperated eye rolls. Most of all, though, you hate that he’s now seen you at your worst, and that, going forward, he’ll never quite be able to dissociate you from the monster you truly are.

You don’t know how long he holds you there, murmuring insistent reassurances into your ear as he holds you gently to his chest. For how at odds it is with every other interaction you’d had with him — those ones where he’d roll his eyes, wave you off, regard you as little more than a vapid, spoiled brat who was all too used to getting her way — it’s nearly impossible to reconcile how you’d grown used to being treated with how you were being treated now. And though it’s certainly the last thing your mind should be focussing on, though you really don’t have the mental capacity required to work through this on top of everything else, you can’t help but come to the realization that you’re actually quite fond of the change.

A voice from across the alley cuts through the careful atmosphere of misguided comfort Spencer has crafted for you, and though he won’t let you turn around — actually goes so far as to squeeze his arms more tightly around your middle so that you can’t — the very sound of the man’s voice sends you dangerously close to the edge of the precipice all over again. “Are you… the fed that bitch was talking about?” His voice is hoarse, and half his words come out in broken hacks. It’s childish in the most juvenile of ways, but you can’t help the twinge of satisfaction that sparks to life in your blood. “Arrest her! She tried to kill me!”

“Actually,” Spencer mutters darkly in response, “from where I’m standing and from what that high school senior told me, she was only trying to stop you from committing assault. If anyone here is getting arrested tonight, it’s you.”

“Are you— are you fucking serious?” The blatant shock shooting his cracked voice up two octaves might have been funny, were the situation that led to it not so horribly severe. “She broke my fucking leg!”

“Thing is,” Spencer shoots back, never even missing a beat, “they do a lot worse to rapists in prison. I’d know— I’ve seen it.” The way his voice drops as the words tumble from his mouth catches your attention, but you don’t have the time to properly contemplate asking why before he’s going on. “You ask me, she went a little too easy on you. Remember that when you finally get what’s coming to you.”

And then Spencer’s calmly leading you away, maintaining a gentle yet firm grip on your waist to keep you from trying to look back. Even if you could, you don’t imagine you’d be much inclined to. You have no remorse for what you’d nearly done, and, truthfully, you’d left men in far worse states in the past. You know that; Spencer does, too. Yet, even in spite of that, even in spite of the fact that this was the second night he’d born witness to you attempting to kill a man, his touch on your body remains soft, and he curls over you like a protective blanket.

“We can’t just leave him,” you find the strength to whisper once you’ve put a healthy amount of distance between you and the alley’s opening. The street lights grow brighter the closer the two of you get to the bar, and you’d never admit it out loud, but it makes you feel that much safer. “He’ll get away. You need to… you need to go back.”

“I called the police as soon as I went to go check the bathroom,��� Spencer tells you, leading you back into the safety of the bar. Suddenly surrounded by the sounds of raucous laughter and joyful whoops, it’s almost easy to forget what just occurred outside — almost. “They were on standby in case anything went wrong, but I had them hang back until I could get you out of there safely. They’re probably in the middle of cuffing him now.”

“And the girl?” you ask, so dazed that you don’t even protest or make any sort of snappy remark as Spencer gently helps you into a secluded corner booth. “She’s... you made sure she got home safe?”

“I called her a taxi and gave her my phone number,” Spencer answers, fixing you with as reassuring a stare as he can manage. “She’s going to give me a call in the morning about pressing charges. She was scared and a little banged up, but he didn’t... nothing happened. You stopped it before it could.”

You’re too weak to do anything with the knowledge but nod and sink down to the table, protectively covering your head with your arms as you squeeze your eyes shut and try to breathe. Dark thoughts, thoughts twisted in rage and a deeply intense need to protect, continue swirling through your mind, and if you’d thought catching your breath was impossible before, it’s effectively become something of an Olympic sport now, though the reasoning for why effectively evades your understanding. What you’d been through tonight, what you’d been ready to do to that man — if he could even be called a man — isn’t anything that’s never happened before. Hell, scum like that were the very reason you’d gotten caught up with Spencer in the first place.

But… something’s different now. You can tell by the way the oxygen rattles through your lungs, the way you can’t still your shaking fingers as they clatter against the tabletop. You don’t know what it is, where it’s come from, or how to stop it, but it’s there, and you can feel it.

Fingers softly brush up against one of your wrists, startling you so forcefully from your reverie that you can’t help the cry of shock that drops from your mouth as you yank your arm back with as much urgency as if you’d been burned. Seconds pass, then ten, then thirty, and even as your subconscious mind works double time to interpret the concerned light in Spencer’s eyes in response to his touch, you remain unable to fully come back to the present.

“You need to eat something,” he tells you, casting his eyes back down to the table. It’s a testament to how much time has passed that there are now two glasses of water covered in condensation that, up until this point, you’d not even been aware were present. “It’ll help with the shock.”

“I’m not going into shock,” you mutter, squeezing your hands together and resting them in front of you. Spencer catches sight, but if he has something to say about it he keeps it to himself. “And I’m not hungry. I just want to go home.”

“And I’ll take you there,” Spencer responds, metaphorically digging his feet in. “But you need to eat something first. And drink water.”

You roll your eyes, shakily moving to stand. “I’m not—“

“Sit down.” The hard glint in his eyes, sharp and metallic as a knife, makes it clear that he isn’t asking, and against your stubborn will, you immediately do as he commands. You want to think it’s simply because you’re too tired to fight back rather than too frightened or intimidated, but then, you can’t quite be sure. At least, not until Spencer leans across the table, insistently holding your gaze in something that you think might be a warning, and it’s only now that you realize he’s been holding back his frustration in favor of seeing to your needs, just as his composure begins to slip. “I told you to wait for me at the bar.”

“Yeah, you did,” you respond with a halfhearted roll of your eyes. “You should have known better.”

“No,” Spencer shoots back, “you should have listened to me. Instead you went and broke your word, all because you had something to prove to yourself.”

You can’t help but scoff in disbelief at Spencer’s implication, momentarily startled into genuine speechlessness. Those words hurt — so much so that you really weren’t inclined to admit that they did, lest Spencer think he have more power over you than you were actually willing to give him. So instead, you pushed back the hurt and leaned into the rage. It wasn’t healthy by any means, but at this point, you’d try just about anything to cut through the debilitating numbness medicating your senses at the moment.

“I didn’t break shit!” you hiss, repressing the urge to scream. “And if you really think I did what I did because I was thinking of myself, then you’re just as bad— no, scratch that, you’re… you’re even fucking worse than the rest of them!”

And you expect Spencer to launch some scathingly cruel insult back at you, one that cuts you deeper than you’d ever known words could be capable of, because Spencer’s a genius, after all, and he’s kept up with you enough over the years that he knows how to make an insult hurt if he wants it to. To your admitted surprise, though, he doesn’t open his mouth and hurl knives your way; he doesn’t even look at you like he wants to hurt you, in the way that you’re positive you’re looking at him. Instead, he only blinks down at you, carefully analyzing the expression on your face and the fury in your words before giving you any kind of response. It’s more than you deserve, really.

But Spencer’s soul has always struck you as kind.

“You could have gotten yourself hurt tonight,” he sighs, shaking his head in what you think could be disappointment. “You realize that, don’t you? That what you did was reckless and ridiculously stupid?”

You bark a harsh laugh in response to that, shaking your head as you go on squeezing your hands together. “In case you didn’t notice, I wasn’t the one in danger. Believe me, you didn’t have anything to worry about.”

“You said he’s escalated to killing girls after assaulting them,” Spencer presses, and it’s only as you minutely glance down at the table that you realize he’s curling his hands into fists of his own. “Did you ever stop to think that if he’d managed to overpower you, that could have happened to you too?

“Well it didn’t, did it?” you snap, searching for the power to quell your sudden annoyance. You know it’s misplaced; Spencer’s only doing his best to take care of you, without saying as much in so many words. You should be happier for it; after all, hadn’t you spent years attempting to get Spencer to consider you? To leave lasting impressions on his mind? To sneak your way into his late night, private, personal thoughts? Sure, on the surface it had all been more for show than anything else, but… even if he’d never known the truth, you certainly always did. “I’m fine. Okay? Fine. I’m not going into shock—“

“You’re certainly acting like you are.”

“— I’m not having a panic attack—“

“Again, you could have fooled me.”

“— and I’m not hungry! Okay? I’m not! I just want to go home!”

And it’s lucky that Spencer had the foresight to seat the both of you as far away from the general population of the bar as possible, lest any of the unsuspecting strangers hear the two of you squabbling over something so harrowing, but even if he hadn’t, you wouldn’t have cared enough to bother lowering your voice. All of these people, laughing, chatting, obliviously participating in their good times, and all the while an innocent girl had nearly been violated just a few buildings away out on the street. It wouldn’t have been their fault — really, the only person that should have been held accountable was hopefully being dragged to the police station at this very moment — but the fact that life could so casually go on while a child had to suffer the worst night of their life in silence just didn’t sit particularly well in your throat.

You inhale a deep breath, squeezing your eyes shut as you brace against the inky misery staining your senses. When you open them again, blinking through the stubborn tears trying to form in the brim of your eyes, you find Spencer carefully considering your face, and all you can do is hope he doesn’t notice the way your lip wobbles.

“I just want to go home,” you say again, hardly managing to get the words out in anything above a whisper. “Please, Spencer, just… I don’t… I can’t be here right now. Please just take me home.”

It’s hard to say what exactly takes the fight out of him. It could be the way you’ve said his name, softly, desperately, pleading in a manor which you’re certain he’s never heard from you before. But then, it could also be the tears welling in your eyes, far more conspicuous a sight than you’d have liked and one Spencer had only ever been confronted with once before. Whatever it is that’s done the trick, it prompts the softening of his gaze, along with the gentle downturn of the curve of his mouth. Just out of the corner of your eye, you think you see his fingers dancing hesitantly over the table top as they steadily migrate closer to yours, and though he doesn’t try to make contact with you this time, he manages to offer you an inexplicable amount of comfort as his fingers dance in a mirror image of the motions of yours.

“Okay,” Spencer concedes, frustration fading out of his expression to allow concern to take the lead. “If that’s what you need, then okay. But— just, put this on, at least.” Before you can interpret his meaning, he’s shrugging out of his jacket and pushing it across the table, and before you can protest, he’s pressing forward stubbornly. “It’s raining outside, you’re shaking, and that dress is gorgeous but it’s not going to stop you from catching hypothermia. Just wear it until we get to the car.”

He’s not leaving you a choice, judging by the glint in his eye that makes it clear he isn’t willing to hear any back talk on the subject. You consider doing so anyway — partly because you’re not sure you’re in the mood to take orders from Spencer, no matter how emotionally distressed you are, and partly because you’re afraid the weight of his jacket on your skin and the scent of his cologne in your nose would be just a bit too intimate for you to handle in this moment — but ultimately, you do as he asks, grabbing at the dark bundle of fabric and wrapping it around yourself like a blanket of protection.

It’s… warm. And it smells good, too. Embarrassing as it is, concentrating on further inhaling the scent of it — of him — is nearly enough to instantly cause your hands to cease their trembling.

“Let’s go,” Spencer murmurs, offering his hand as he stands from the table.

Wordlessly, you take it.

––

Part Two: Something of a Dangerous Game

[aion-rsa]

WandaVision: The Unanswered Questions From the Marvel Series

https://ift.tt/38r7iqE

This article contains WandaVision spoilers.

After two months and nine episodes, WandaVision came to a close. One of the more unique projects to come out of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the show mixed mystery and horror with sitcom pastiche and understandings of grief under the superhero umbrella. The first step in both Phase 4 and Disney+’s Marvel lineup came out a success and built towards future projects.

Then again, its mysterious nature worked against it at times. Figuring out answers on a weekly basis meant trying to stay one step ahead of the show and sometimes it got viewers going in the wrong direction. There was no Mephisto or X-Men or Fantastic Four. On one hand, you can say that people are getting angry about stuff that they were never promised, but there is a feeling that when combing over the details of the show, they did cause us to ask some questions that never quite had a satisfying answer.

After all, even Agnes’ joke story about being out of town due to her mother-in-law visiting proved to be an important detail down the line.

As we sit back and wait for Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness to pick up where our power couple left off, here are some lingering questions we’re left with from WandaVision.

What happened to the beekeeper?

The beekeeper was the first truly haunting moment of the series. Sure, “Stop it!” and the exploding radio were creepy in their own ways, but the idea of Wanda and Vision walking outside at night to find a lone beekeeper sneaking out of the sewer and quietly looking at them was outright nightmare fuel. It was a major instance of wondering what in God’s name was going on, and that’s even before Wanda simply noped out, hit rewind, and retconned the scene from happening.

We later discover that the beekeeper is SWORD Agent Franklin and his appearance is just Wanda’s reality making sense of a man in a hazmat suit. We see him crawling out of the sewer from his point of view, but then…nothing.

While the reveal of his identity doesn’t lead us to AIM henchmen or Swarm (star of Broadway’s Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark), it does explain the nature of Wanda’s neighborhood. That still makes it weird that we never hear from him again.

Or do we? While it’s never made explicit on the show itself, supposedly the guy playing the ice cream man in the episode 5 intro is the same actor as Agent Franklin. Perhaps the beekeeper didn’t die, but was just assimilated into a happier role.

Who was in Witness Protection?

FBI Agent James Woo gets the story rolling by coming to Westview in search of someone in witness protection. The complete lack of anyone having any information or even memory of this person is what gets SWORD involved and Monica Rambeau sucked into Westview. In the end, the identity is just not important.

But it feels like it should be, right? Having Woo go from coast to coast to follow up on this person seems pretty major. You would think it would have come up here or there, but nope. If anything, I guess it just goes to show that Jimmy Woo is a true professional for keeping his trap shut.

Who is the aerospace engineer?

I can understand that throwing Evan Peters’ Quicksilver at us was a good way to distract us from everything Agnes was doing, but the aerospace engineer? Come on! That was definitely more deliberate than the witness protection and they know it.

Monica brings up a friend who is smart enough to get her to break into the Hex all over again. All that’s missing is a smile and wink to the camera. The writers gave us something so blatant that it would be ridiculous NOT to speculate who she was talking about. This had to be an important cameo leading to something major down the line. Would we get Reed Richards? Blue Marvel? Beast? Dr. Nemesis? NFL Superpro?

Even when Monica’s dream vehicle didn’t do the job, it was still believed that this aerospace engineer would still get a dramatic shout-out down the line or a post-credits scene. Nope. At most, this throwaway friend is like that scene in Thor when Erik Selvig was talking up his gamma scientist friend who went missing because of SHIELD.

What did the commercials really mean?

It isn’t hard to figure out that the commercials were based on Wanda’s trauma: the bomb that killed her parents, her time with Hydra, the events of Captain America: Civil War, and her inability to deal with her grief in a meaningful way that didn’t involve torturing and enslaving innocent people. While it isn’t really important to see how the sausage is made, I’m left wondering what the commercials actually were.

From the fourth episode, we do know that the commercials were part of the transmissions. Darcy was able to see the one for the watch, but was focused on something else. Otherwise, I’m sure she would have been wondering about the inclusion of the HYDRA logo. The way everyone in the SWORD collaboration just glossed over the commercials is rather weird.

One of the popular theories was that the man and woman featured in all the live-action commercials were going to be revealed as Wanda and Pietro’s parents. That turned out not to be true, so…were they also Westview citizens? That would be disturbing because to make sense of the commercial narratives and the sitcom narratives, that family would have to be forcefully separated from the rest of the town.

Did Agatha magic up the stop-motion commercial for Yo-Magic? Because that was about her too much to be something Wanda’s psyche came up with.

Is there more to “Fake Pietro” Ralph Bohner?

“Fietro” was the big red herring of the series. After all that wondering of whether he was the first true step in bringing mutants into the MCU or if he was literal Satan in disguise, we discovered he was Agnes’ hypnotized “husband” whose payoff was nothing more than a dick joke.

Then again, he was already called Peter in the Fox universe, so it’s not such a hard stretch to make him a Bohner.

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Monica’s ability to see energy in its various forms allowed her to figure out that Agatha was controlling Ralph with a mystical necklace. Once she tore it off, Ralph immediately gave up and that was the last we saw of him. But what does that mean in terms of his powers?

I imagine Agatha gave him the speed powers so he could play the part of Pietro in order to get intel on Wanda’s magic. Just because she no longer controls him, does that mean he’s physically back to normal as well? Because, hey, he might not be the Quicksilver from the X-Men universe, but he could totally play the role of Quicksilver if Marvel ends up doing a cinematic version of the Thunderbolts or Dark Avengers.

Where did White Vision go?

Vision’s Soul fought Vision’s Body and after we got enough lasers and explosions, the two talked out their differences. Hex Vision convinced his pasty counterpart to stand down and did him the favor of unlocking his dormant memories (that he asked permission was such a nice touch). White Vision recalled everything from the moment of his creation to Thanos pulling out the Mind Stone. Accepting who he is, White Vision flew off and was never referenced again.

I supposed the real question to ask is when will we see him next? Obviously, he has a lot to think about. He’s an emotional husk with lots of data to work through. Does he love Wanda in this form? Can he still love Wanda in this form, knowing what she’s become? As someone who was pro-government oversight, how will it affect him knowing that the government outright betrayed his wishes and memory? Where does someone like White Vision go from here?

Maybe we’ll see him in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. Perhaps, when a new Avengers movie finally happens, Vision will show himself again. Or if they go in the direction of Young Avengers, he could be the wise father to the sons he’s never met.

It would be pretty wild if White Vision relearned how to convey emotions by watching Simon Williams movies.

What are the twins, exactly?

“FOR THE CHILDREN!” is what the neighbors echoed like a brainwashed cult, culminating in Wanda’s very unusual pregnancy. It could have been Wanda’s subconscious telling her to have kids. It could have been Agatha testing out her ability to create life from nothing. It also may have been the children themselves.

We never did fully get a grasp on what Billy and Tommy were. Wanda had a very unnatural birth and, outside of being able to age themselves a couple times, the boys seemed fairly down to earth and good-natured, while also still capable of questioning Wanda’s reality. There was nothing ominous about them outside of the weird nature of their very existence.

When Wanda relaxed the Hex, they started to disappear. When she ended the Hex completely, they once again vanished. Simply saying that they were two kids Wanda conjured up out of thin air would have been an acceptable answer.

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Instead, when Wanda fully accepted what her reality was and that it had to end, she thanked her children for “choosing” her to be their mother. She was able to explain what Vision was in the grand scheme of things, but she remained silent when it came to those kids. They were an outside force that sought her out. That’s what her final conversation certainly implies.

The post-credits scene had her studying the Darkhold while being alerted to Billy and Tommy screaming for help. They still exist, in some form, somewhere. Their true nature probably won’t be better explained until the Doctor Strange sequel.

Speculation on this one is a pain in the ass because even the comics explanation is a whirlwind of confusion.

What really happened to Agatha Harkness?

Wanda doesn’t kill Agatha, but does punish her by forcing her to be stuck in the living Hell of portraying Agnes the nosey neighbor. It’s a harsh punishment, but her intent doesn’t jibe with Agatha’s post-Hex status. People know about her. Even if the last few in-universe episodes of WandaVision weren’t on the SWORD airwaves, she was still playing the role of final boss and having magic fights in the sky. The people of Westview saw that.

Wouldn’t this mean that she can’t just go back to her “nosy neighbor” role and that she’s likely destined for a cell? She’ll be lucky if the government isn’t doing experiments on her, which is extra messed up when you imagine her acting like Ned Flanders.

At least she’ll be kept subdued for when the Scarlet Witch needs her. Or maybe she too will join whatever Thunderbolts/Dark Avengers team we may see down the line.

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

Just give us more Kathryn Hahn, damn it!

The post WandaVision: The Unanswered Questions From the Marvel Series appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[iwillbeinmynest]

Hold On Loosely - Biker!Steve x Reader(f)   Chapter 18

Authors Notes:  If you’d like to be tagged please send me an ask. I keep better track of tags that way.

Word Count: 1.3k

Special Thanks: Here’s to @itsanerdlife for fueling my Biker obsession and being my Beta for this whole thing. To my girl over at @girl-next-door-writes who also beta’ed for me. And an extra shout out to @bettercallsabs for this beautiful graphic. She is amazing and y’all need to check her out!!

Notes/Warnings: (My notes and warnings are for the story as a whole. Some notes and Warnings will not apply to every chapter.) smoking (I do not support smoking. keep your lungs clean y’all.) drinking, (be of age, don’t be stupid) minor violence, backstabbing, attempted murder, anxiety, stress, mentions of death, car accident, trauma, …I think that’s it. let me know if I’ve missed something.

Master List

Sam followed Steve out the front door with Mandie in tow. She huffed and pretended to cry but no one cared to listen.

 When Steve stepped out the front door he was surprised to see at least three dozen men hanging around Y/N's driveway and street. He jogged down the steps when He saw Frank and called out to him.

 "Where is-" Steve paused when he got closer. "What happened to your face?"

 Frank smirked. "Your old lady's got a mean fist. Caught me in the jaw."

 Steve grinned, proud. "Where is she?"

 Frank jerked his head back behind him.

 He looked over Frank's shoulder to see two bikers move towards the house. Behind them stood Y/N talking with Clint, who rubbed her back before saying something that made her smile.

 She looked to the ground and her smile faded. Then, she looked up towards her door and saw Steve. She ran to him, weaving between bikers but never losing eye contact.

 "Steve!" 

 He met her halfway and took her into a tight hug. "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry." He muttered into her hair. He lifted her face and kissed her long and hard, ignoring all the whoops and whistles from the other bikers.

 She pulled back and hugged him again. "Did it work?"

 Steve sighed. He'd never been so relieved. "Unfortunately, yeah." He suddenly felt the weight of the guilt he'd been carrying all night. "Listen, I'm so sorry but Mandie...she climbed all over me and kissed me. I froze and didn't know what to do. I needed her to-"

 Y/N shook her head. "I'm not mad at you. It's fine. I knew what could happen when Nat planned it out. She's crazy, I knew she'd try something."

 "I'm so sorry, Y/N."

 Y/N gave him her best smile. "Let's deal with her. I want her gone, now." 

 Steve nodded and wrapped a hand around her back, leading her to Mandie. He wasn't sure how this next part was going to go and he'd be lying if he said he wasn't worried about it. He nodded to an older man who'd been keeping an eye on him since he walked out of the house. That man made his way over to him and Y/N.

 Mandie was practically seething. "You set me up?" She spit her words at Y/N. 

 "All I did was finally prove how terrible of a person you are." Y/N was trying to keep her cool but it had been a long night and her resolve wasn't going to last much longer.

 "Me?!" Mandie jerked in Sam's grasp but he held tight. "You're the terrible person! Manipulating Steve to think you're some sweet, sad, little widow. Be honest with yourself. You love playing the victim. You've been doing it since Danny died!" Mandie groaned and rolled her eyes. "Do you know how annoying it was to listen to you whine about Danny? I wanted to kill myself!"

 Y/N crossed her arms but stayed silent. She felt Steve's thumb moving up and down on her back. A silent reminder that he was there. 

 Mandie was on a tirade. She took a breath and kept on. "And then you think you have the guts to live with bikers? You can't handle them! You aren't woman enough. You've got to be able to do anything they tell you, no matter who's saying it." 

 The implication she was making, made a chill run down Y/N's spine. Steve wasn't like that. In fact none of the Rebel Brotherhood treated women like that.

 Mandie nodded and gave a wicked grin. "Yeah. that's exactly what I'm talking about. can you handle being passed around, Y/N?"

 Sam shifted his weight. "Can we hand her off now? I’ve never hit a woman, Steve but I don't know how much more of her I can handle."

 Before Steve had a chance to respond, Mandie spit in Sam's face and cursed at him. 

 A rough hand grabbed Mandie's arm. "That's enough, Amanda." His deep voice made her freeze.

 "Daddy?" Mandie's voice seemed to soften and she practically shrunk away under his glare.

 "Not another word." He growled. He nodded at one of the men behind him who escorted her to a bike with a lime green skull on it.

 The older man took Steve's hand in a firm shake. "Harvey Jud. I'm sorry for the problems my daughter has caused you. She's…" he shook his head embarrassed. "I don't even know what."

 "What will you do with her?" Y/N asked. She didn't realize it was out of turn until she saw Steve and Sam shift uncomfortably. 

 Harvey looked back at a trembling Mandie. "We'll take her back home and keep tabs on her. She won't be back here ever again. I give you my word on that. I'm sorry for how she treated you, Miss."

 Y/N nodded, choosing to keep quiet, now.

 Bucky, Nat and Clint walked up on the conversation with Quill in tow. He was groaning as he walked hunched over and bleeding from the beating he'd gotten.

 "I believe this belongs to you." Bucky said with a nod of respect.

 "Not for long." Harvey grumbled. Another nod and two other men hauled Peter away and tossed him in the bed of a truck. 

 Harvey turned back to Bucky. "I appreciate your understanding about all of this and for not holding it to my club."

 Bucky nodded. "My old man vouched for you years ago and dead or not I still believe his word. This wasn't club behavior and I'd rather us remain allies."

 "Agreed." 

 The men shared a solemn look for a moment.

 "Well," Harvey straightened. "I'll leave your town to settle and take my mess back north. Give Stark my regards."

 "I will." Bucky said as he put an arm around Nat.

 All of the Rebel Brotherhood stood on the front lawn and watched The Four Horsemen ride off. Once they were out of site, everyone seemed to breathe easier.

 "Steve," Y/N looked at him with furrowed brows. "I thought Peter was with the Miami Devils. Why are the Four Horsemen taking him?"

 "Apparently," Frank jumped in. "He just got his kutte with the Devils. He didn't tell them he was on the run from the Horsemen."

 "Wow." She shook her head. 

 "It's all over, baby. You're safe now. You've got three clubs who know who you are now. You are beyond protected." Steve gave a small smile.

 Y/N left Steve to go over and hug Nat. "I can't thank you enough for what you did for me."

 "I'd do it again in a heartbeat." She hugged her back. 

 Bucky put a hand on Y/N's shoulder. "Are you okay? I hope this hasn't scared you off."

 "Other than Frank giving me a heart attack," She grinned at him. "I'm fine."

 Frank rubbed his bruised jaw. "I said sorry."

 Steve hugged her from behind. "I'm proud of you for punching him, though."

 "You punched him?" Bucky looked shocked. He grabbed her hand and chuckled at her bruised knuckles.

 "And she threw a knife at me!" Frank added, slightly offended.

 "Yeah, but she missed." Sam smiled.

 "Only 'cause it was dark." Y/N smirked.  Everyone laughed, even Frank. 

  Steve leaned down and kissed her neck. "So hot."

 Y/N laughed and turned to face him. "I love you."

 He kissed her with his hands tangled in her hair. "I love you, too."

 Y/N pushed him back to look at him for no reason other than to memorize him more. "Can we go inside now?" She said quietly.

 Steve looked up at his club. "Y'all get outta here. My old lady wants some peace and quiet."

 Everyone chuckled but made their way to the bikes and said their good-nights.

*********

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[adventures-in-a-world-of-fiction]

Skip-to-the-end character development

One thing that annoys me about Endgame is the way it handles character development. If you look back at the older MCU films (or the recent, good ones) then characters grow and change.

- Iron Man was all about Tony's personal journey. He started out cocky and irresponsible. He realised the consequences of his past actions and changes the direction of his company as well as creating a way for him to directly intervene to help the people he had put in danger. The Tony Stark standing up at the end and honestly admitting to being Iron Man is not the same Tony Stark who was shrugging off a stage appearance he'd promised his friend he would be at.

- Captain America: The First Avenger is about Steve striving to be allowed to fight, being forced into a caricature of being a hero, and then becoming more than the costume. The character growth isn't as pronounced as Iron Man, but it's there.

- Thor is basically a movie about Thor learning to be a better person and a better leader. He was kicked out for being unworthy and learned (over a ridiculously short span of time - seriously, this story would have felt more honest if he had spent a few weeks on Earth not a few days) to be worthy again.

- Winter Soldier has Steve start off purposeless, not sure what makes him happy, not sure what he wants to do with his life. At the end, he knows his purpose and he will fight anyone who stands in his way.

- Even Iron Man 3 has Tony learning that what makes him special and what makes him Iron Man has never been the suit.

In terms of the recent, good ones:

- Black Panther has T'Challa learning about his father's mistakes and deciding to correct them, growing out of his father's shadow.

- Captain Marvel is all about Carol's growth. She learns who she really is and stops defining herself in terms of limitations set by other people. She starts off desperate to prove herself and by the end knows that she has nothing to prove.

- Thor Ragnarok has Thor learning that his power isn't defined by his hammer and shows Loki moving from doing everything for personal gain to risking everything to save Thor and his people.

In all these films, people change and grow. That's character development. We see it unfold on the screen. Character development isn't essential for a film to be good, but it sure as hell helps.

So what about the character development in Endgame? Why did that annoy me so much? Because it all happens off-screen. Characters change dramatically - but it all happens during that five year time skip. The world has changed and people change too, but we don't get to see any of it. It's a skip-to-the-end approach to character development.

- Bruce in Infinity War is at war with himself, the two sides of his personality in conflict. In Endgame, he's merged them, getting the best of the strength and the brains. But how? How did he manage to get the two sides to communicate? How did that progress, because it presumably took time and effort. I would have liked to see that.

- Hawkeye's fall into darkness would have made a fascinating movie. He is a happy family man who watches his family disappear before his eyes. How did he cope immediately after? What made him decide to kill his first victim? How did he start on his vendetta against the evil criminals who were spared by Thanos' randomness? There is so much in there that could have been a really interesting story. Instead, we get one fight scene to show that he's dark now. This could have been an opportunity to learn about his past too, what he was doing before SHIELD recruited him. So many questions that the MCU never even asked could have been answered.

- Thor's slide into depression and despair could have been poignant and meaningful. We could have seen his emotional journey, instead of it being treated as a hugely offensive and unfunny fat joke.

- Tony finds peace. After all the trauma he's suffered, he manages to settle into a life of quiet domesticity. I can understand why this wouldn't make the cut of a big, action film, but some character moments of him adjusting would have been nice to see. The fact that he's willing to look past all his dad's lousy parenting rings false, but it could have been the result of interesting growth as he experiences parenthood himself. But it just feels grating because we don't see any of that. We could have seen him come to understand how difficult being a parent is and see why his dad left the raising of him to other people. We could see him trying to be a better father than Howard but in the process learning more about why his dad was so distant, or recalling moments when his dad did actually so kindness, so that when he says that all he remembers is the good stuff, it doesn't feel so out of nowhere.

- Even Steve and Nat show changes. It would have been interesting to see Steve try to take on Sam's role as a counselor, to see why he decided to do that. We could have seen Nat realising that Fury is gone and stepping up to try and fill his shoes, struggling with the responsibility but desperate to try.

- We could have see Okoye dealing with the fact that the king and Shuri are both dead, having to assume a mantel of leadership beyond that of a warrior.

Instead, we get nothing. The characters are one way at the start of the film and another way after the time jump. This particular movie is the most blatant example of character development that happens off-screen, but there have been other examples of characters having all their development between movies. Bucky is the perfect example of this. At the end of Winter Soldier, he pulls Steve out of the river and is seen in the post-credits clip looking at his memorial in the museum. Jump to Civil War and he's living on his own, in hiding, stable enough to go out and buy supplies for himself like a regular member of society, and he's regained enough of his memories to know who Steve is and what they mean to each other. At the end of Civil War, he goes into the ice because he doesn't doesn't trust his own mind, but by the Black Panther post-credits scene, he's awake and living peacefully and being teased by kids.

All his healing and recovery of his autonomy happens in those moments between films. If you follow me on AO3, you know I love Winter Soldier recovery fics, because there is so much interesting potential in how someone comes back from that trauma, how someone can learn to be a person again after being treated as an asset. It's a fascinating concept that is at the core of Bucky as a character - and the movies just skip over it. He's well enough now for Steve to abandon him and go back into the past. How did he get well enough? Who cares?

Me! I care!

Marvel seem to think that they can ignore all the interesting character development in favour of more quips and battle scenes.

I know Endgame was already a long movie, but think about what it could have been like to have a film in between IW and E. We could have had Avengers: Aftermath dealing with the immediate fallout. We could have had the first part of the movie with the death of Thanos, and then had the rest of the film be about them dealing, with some growing from it (Tony and Bruce), some barely holding themselves together (Steve and Nat), and some falling into despair (Clint and Thor). There would have been time to actually give Carol some semblance of personality too. The film could end with the Avengers scattered, and Steve going through Scott's things for some reason, activating the machine to bring Scott out of the quantum realm (because the rat is just a stupid deus ex machina if they weren't going to have it turn out to be an actual deus i.e. Loki). The very final part of the film could be Scott thinking that the quantum realm could be the answer, giving them hope for the next part.

I just think that by missing that middle chunk out, the whole thing feels hollow and empty and cheapens the payoff. Yes, we can fill the gap with fanfic, but you shouldn't end up with the situation where fanfic is having to do the entire legwork of the character building because the canon just couldn't be bothered with that.

Explosions and big battles are all well and good, but you've got to care about the characters for those big action scenes to matter, and people care about the characters because of character development. At least that's how I think it ought to work.

[blancheludis]

@whumptober2019 Day 2: Explosion

Fandom: MCU, Spider-Man Characters: Peter Parker, Ned Leeds, Tony Stark Tags: Explosion, Whump, Hurt Peter, Hurt Ned, Family, Guilt Words: 3.383

Summary: Peter has a headache that does not want to go away. Less an ache, really, than a feeling. Like something is just waiting for him to lose focus so it can stab him in the back. He is being silly, he just did not sleep. End of story. (Then, of course, someone tries to blow him up.) 

---

Peter should have called in sick. He is saying that now in the safety of his mind, while he is navigating the halls of the school on shaky legs. As if he would have ever done the smart thing and admitted defeat when it is his own fault that he is aching all over. Maybe that will teach him not to meddle in things bigger than him and engage the kind of bad guys in fights that are definitely out of his league. He does not think so, but considering how he feels, he has hopes not to make the same mistake twice.

“Are you sure you’re all right?” Ned asks from his side, frowning when Peter immediately tries to straighten. “You don’t look –”

“Ned, I’m fine,” Peter cuts him off. “I promise. It was a long night.”

At least half of that is true. It was a long night. Long enough that he barely remembers how he made it home, or how he managed to sneak in through his window without alerting May.

“You’re limping,” Ned points out.

Looking at his feet, Peter realizes Ned is right. He already knew he had twisted his ankle the night before, but he is usually better at masking it.

“Give it a few hours,” Peter replies, more cheerful than he feels. He skipped breakfast in favour of spending more time in bed. Only now that is making him feel even worse.

“This is seriously awesome,” Ned says with that special enthusiasm he reserves for everything that separates Spider-Man from a baseline human. Then he grows serious again. “But perhaps you should go home.”

Peter shakes his head immediately. “I can’t.”

He was not supposed to go out last night. Karen has been sworn to secrecy, although she has only agreed reluctantly, considering that last night was a really close call and Peter is by no means sure he will not still be limping tonight. If he goes home early, the school will call May, and May will have questions Peter does not wants to answer. And if she thinks Peter is keeping things from him, she will call Mr. Stark, and Mr. Stark is not in the habit of taking no for an answer.

Also, Peter is almost out of web fluid. He was going to make more in Mr. Stark’s workshop, but he will have to avoid that until most of his wounds have healed. Karen might be willing to give him the benefit of the doubt sometimes, but FRIDAY will snitch him out to Mr. Stark the moment he steps into the foyer. He will have to use the school lab for now.

It is not a big deal. He has done so for long enough. He is just really not feeling well. His body is stitching itself back together. The bruises are pulsing, his broken ribs are itching. All of that is all right, but he has a headache that does not want to go away. Less an ache, really, than a feeling. Like something is just waiting for him to lose focus so it can stab him in the back.

He is being silly, he just did not sleep. End of story.

“You can take a nap in Physics. I’ll take notes for you. Although it’s not like you need them.” Ned has been talking for a while as Peter’s thoughts drifted off, but it appears as if Ned has decided to trust Peter for now.

Peter has done a lot of dumb and dangerous things in his life. He has been ungrateful and secretive. He does not like to see reason even in the face of overwhelming evidence that someone else might know what is good for him. Yet, Ned has never left him hanging.

“Thanks, man,” Peter says, bumping Ned’s shoulder with his own. He immediately has to swallow a whelp. He is sore all over.

Ned sighs, not happy but making due. “Just take care of yourself.”

Instead of making a promise he cannot possibly keep, Peter mutters something about his locker and limps off before Ned can stop him. He ignores the way his chest hurts, knowing it is not just because of his ribs.

The day appears to drag on endlessly. Peter does sleep through Physics and feels somewhat refreshed afterwards, but this is not something a short nap can fix.

After school is over, a few precious vials of new web fluid in his back, Peter and Ned are walking to the bus stop together. Peter is feeling much lighter now that his bed is getting closer with each step.

“So I thought we could have a Star Wars marathon this weekend,” Ned says, as enthusiastic as ever, making up for Peter simply shuffling on next to him. “My parents won’t be home, but I know they’ll leave me pizza money. It’ll be awesome.”

An entire weekend with Ned would be. Ever since Peter became Spider-Man, they are not nearly spending enough time together anymore, although it has gotten better since the secret is out.

“I’m busy with my internship on Friday,” Peter says, even though he will have to see how much of his body has fixed itself until then.

Ned knows that his ‘internship’ is mostly him working on secret projects with Mr. Stark himself, but Peter is always paranoid when they are out in the open.

“That leaves all of Saturday and Sunday.”

Which Peter often uses for patrol, but Peter will not mind sitting out a couple of days. He needs a break, and time with Ned always makes him feel better.

“I’d love to,” Peter says. Then he grins and stares Ned squarely in the face. “We’ll start with the prequels?”

The look of betrayal on Ned’s face is enough to make Peter burst out laughing. It hurts his ribs but is nonetheless the best he has felt all day. Of course, that is when they have to be interrupted.

“Hey, kid,” someone calls from behind them. It is an unfamiliar voice, slightly mocking. It has Peter’s hackles rising.

When Peter turns around, he sees a man with a scarf pulled over his nose and a hood drawn deep into his face. He has the feeling he is missing something. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees something thrown at them from ahead. Peter’s senses scream.

“Pet-” Ned says, but at that point, Peter is already moving.

He is glancing at the object at their feet, which is looking innocently enough but blinks ominously. Not wasting any time, Peter grabs Ned’s arms and pushes forward, forcing them both into the mouth of an alleyway. They have not gotten far when the air around them is torn apart and Peter is at once blinded and deafened when something blows up.

A bomb, Peter’s mind pops up helpfully. His second thought is Ned. The blast pulls them apart no matter that Peter is trying to hold on. He scrambles for control but is thrown against something hard, feels his healing ribs groan under the pressure. The back of his head collides with the wall and he shuts his eyes against the pain, not knowing where is up and down, unable to make sense of anything that has happened.

He is Peter Parker. He was walking home with his best friend. Nobody has a reason to attack him. Nobody could know to attack him. Except perhaps – the men from last night. The weapons deal Peter stumbled onto, the base he followed them back to and was subsequently jumped at in.

He did not win that fight by any means, but he got out. With how little he was himself last night, could he have noticed someone following him or slipping him a tracker? But that would mean –

Peter forces his eyes to open. His world has turned into a field of grey. Dust and soot are whirling in the air, pieces of wood and molten plastic are strewn on the ground before him. He cannot hear anything over the ringing in his ears, and his vision is hindered by the black creeping up from the edges.

Ned, he thinks and pushes himself upright despite the pain. His entire body feels aflame like he was torn apart and stitched back together wrong. He reaches automatically back for his suit, but his backpack must have been blown away by the force of the blast. His web slingers too are gone since he wanted to refill them first as soon as he got home. Peter only has himself. That has to be enough for now.

The first steps he takes are wobbly. It feels like the earth is shaking underneath him, but he puts one foot in front of the other. He still does not see very well. There is no immediate movement he can detect, which means they might not be attacked any further. It also means that Ned could be –

“Stop stalling, Parker,” he says, but does not hear it beyond an increase of the ringing in his head. He hopes he is not going to go deaf.

Steadying himself against a bent trash container, Peter looks around, trying to get a better sense of the situation. There is still nobody coming towards him. But there, a few feet away from him, half-buried under pieces of a fence, lies a shape.

“Ned,” Peter calls, feeling his throat protest against the strain. Then he is moving, faster than he would have thought possible with all the pain he is in.

It is Ned, looking comically small covered in soot. He is not moving. A shock travels through Peter as he lets himself fall to the ground next to Ned.

“No, no, no,” he mutters, still not able to hear much beyond the ringing and his own panicked thoughts. “Don’t do that to me.”

He reaches for Ned’s shoulders, trying to remember what the first aid training Mr. Stark made him go through said about explosions. All he can remember, about all kinds of trauma, is to never move the victim too much in case of spinal fractures to avoid making things worse.

Ned is lying face down, though, and Peter needs to know whether he is breathing. The alternative would be – Allowing himself no second thoughts, Peter pushes at Ned’s body, turns him onto his back. Ned does not move, does not give any sign that he notices what is happening.

Holding his breath, Peter reaches out to feel for a pulse. Distantly, he sees that there is blood on his own hands, leaving a glistening crimson trail on Ned’s pale skin.

There, fluttering and barely palpable, is Ned’s pulse. A sob escapes Peter’s throat and he feels it with every fibre of his being. He does not think he could have lived with himself if he had gotten his best friend killed.

They need an ambulance. Ned needs a hospital, and Peter does not feel so good himself, although the pain has lessened immensely now that he knows Ned is alive. Just as importantly, he needs to talk to Mr. Stark, needs to inform him about the attack, about someone possibly knowing his identity. He needs to keep Ned safe until help arrives.

His watch. Help is within reach. Fighting against the dizziness, Peter rearranges his body so that he is shielding Ned from everything that might be coming for them and keeps his eyes on the mouth of the alley, still expecting the man and any possible accomplices to appear.

With shaking fingers, Peter reaches for the watch. It has a large crack down its display, which tells him that he is lucky to still be standing at all because it is meant to withstand large amounts of force. It is still working, though, to Peter’s great relief.

“Karen,” he gasps as soon as the interface is activated. He does hear his own voice now, although it is nothing more than a distant rumble. “We need help. Ned is hurt. There was an explosion.”

He cannot make out her answer, but the display blinks in what he hopes is an affirmative. Then, there is nothing more to do than to stand guard, and to hope he does not black out until help is here.

He makes it until the distorted sound of sirens pierces his muffled hearing. With a sigh, he lets go.

 ---

When Peter comes to, it is to the sterile white of a hospital room and the incessant beeping of a heart monitor. His first thought, before he even fully remembers what has happened, is relief at having gotten his hearing back.

Then he shoots upright, his mind filled with the memory of the man following them on their way home after school, the explosion, Ned. Wild-eyed, he looks around in the room, eyes jumping from his chart to the monitors at his side and finally to the bed a few feet away from his own, and the familiar shape inside it.

“Ned,” Peter breathes, staring until he catches the regular rising and falling of Ned’s ribcage, and hears the beeping of the second heart monitor. Ned is breathing on his own, is not in intensive care, looks like he could wake any second. Something unknots inside Peter’s chest, although the guilt he carries only intensifies.

When he moves his legs, intent on getting over to his friend because he still does not fully trust his eyes, he notices a red post-it note pinned to his blanket. He recognized the scrawl immediately, soothing even more of his worries.

I would have gotten you a private room, but I thought you’d appreciate seeing your friend once you wake up. I took care of your problem. Call me when you are awake. Don’t do something this stupid ever again. -T.S.

Mr. Stark knows. He must have come, must have gotten them to the hospital. With the problem, Peter is sure, he means the men Peter angered and who followed him home. He is in Mr. Stark’s debt again, but for now, he does not have it in him to feel guilty for that too. Ned is alive. That is all that matters.

Taking care with his IV line and the monitor as to not alert the medical staff, Peter makes his way over to Ned’s bed. He is still somewhat dizzy, but he is already doing so much better.

“Ned,” he calls quietly when he makes it over, lowering himself onto the edge of the mattress because he is sure his legs will not carry him for much longer.

He should not try to wake Ned up but he cannot help himself. Ned’s hand lies on the blanket, a bandage travelling up until it disappears under the sleeve of the hospital gown. With utmost care, Peter picks up Ned’s hand and takes it between both of his.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers. “I should have noticed we were being followed. If had listened to you and gone home early, you would have never been in danger. I’m –”

Supposed to be better, lies on Peter’s tongue, but he never manages to say it because, in that moment, Ned’s fingers twitch. It does not feel like a coordinated motion but not like a creation of sleep either.

“Ned?” Peter asks, leaning forward to not miss any possible change.

Ned mumbles something inaudible, his muscles tensing the way they do when someone wakes up from a deep slumber. Peter finds himself holding his breath until Ned’s eyes open briefly, blinking against the blinding white of the room.  

“Ned, you’re awake.” Peter exhales with a sigh, so unbelievably relieved. “I’m so, so sorry. I should have known what was happening. I should have never put you in danger. I’m –”

“Peter,” Ned says, interrupting his rumbling. His voice is weak, barely audible against the beeping of the monitors and the thundering of Peter’s heart

He closes his eyes again, causing Peter to shift forward, clinging to Ned’s hand, afraid of his friend going somewhere he cannot follow.

“Don’t go back to sleep,” Peter pleads. He does not want to be left alone with his thoughts and his guilt that is now surging. “How are you feeling? Should I get a doctor?”

Ned blinks, but it is obvious he does it mostly for Peter’s benefit. It might not even be good to keep him awake, but in movies, everybody is always afraid of wounded people falling asleep. Of course, Ned should be out of immediate danger if he is here with Peter, in a regular looking hospital room.

“’M fine,” Ned says. It comes out slurred, but his lips twitch into something that might be an encouraging smile.

Peter feels only worse that Ned is still trying to cheer him up, despite Peter being the reason he even is in this situation. “I’m so sorry,” he says again, feeling like he is going to repeat these words a hundred more times if he is allowed to.

Squeezing Peter’s hands back, Ned appears to come more awake, groaning a bit when the pain hits.

“You should be,” he says, although still with that half-smile and without heat. “The last thing I heard was you telling me you wanted to watch the Star Wars prequels. That hurt more than the –” Ned’s speech has become livelier the more he said, but now he cuts himself off and takes the time to look down at himself and then at Peter. “Was there an explosion?”

Peter almost sobs with relief. He does not know anything about medical care, but this alone makes him believe that Ned will be all right. He has not gotten his best friend killed.

“It won’t happen again,” Peter promises because he will do his best to keep his friends safe from now on.

Ned’s eyes widen as if realization is only just hitting now. “You saved me from an explosion?”

Pressure on Peter’s throat makes it hard to swallow, let alone form words. He cannot let Ned think that he is not at fault here.

“I was the reason there was an explosion,” Peter says, his voice thick with pent-up emotions.

Ned raises his head to better look at Peter, trailing his visible skin just like Peter has done with him earlier, cataloguing bruises. “Are you all right?” he then asks and means it.

Years of friendship and Ned still manages to take Peter by surprise, never reacting the way he is supposed to, never pushing Peter away even if it would be healthier to do so.

“Ned, I –” Peter tries to argue because he is not a hero in this, perhaps not ever, despite his best attempts.

“You got me out,” Ned cuts him off, sharp despite the way his lids are drooping. It is too soon for them to have a conversation like this, no matter that Peter wants to shower his best friend with apologies. “I know you’ll try to blame yourself. I think I won’t be able to stay awake through it.”

It must be the pain medication or simply the fact that Ned’s body needs sleep to heal. Much more so than Peter’s, which still feels like he has been through that explosion but that lets him walk around already.

“You need to rest,” Peter says, feeling selfish for having woken Ned and then keeping him awake.

“You too,” Ned mumbles, but he is already drifting off again. “Tell me everything later.”

Despite himself, Peter smiles. How does he deserve such a loyal friend? “I will.”

Peter watches as Ned falls back asleep, searches his face for signs of distress or pain. He knows the guilt will not go anywhere anytime soon, but he can have this for now. He can rest knowing that Ned will be fine.

Struggling to his feet, Peter gets back to his own feet. He is still tired too, and his entire body aches. Sleep sounds like the right idea. First, though, he needs to call Mr. Stark and explain what happened. Mostly, he needs to thank him for getting Ned and him out. For keeping an eye out for Peter, always.

He has never been gladder that he got to meet his hero. Perhaps that means that not all hope is lost where Peter is concerned.

[flyswhumpcenter]

Bad Things Happen Bingo! The event where you send me I give myself self-indulgent requests according to this marvelous card!

I didn’t expect to write for Arc-V this soon again but 1. it’s been really fun 2. Shun is my new victim it’s official 3. it actually dawned on me with, finally, a solution to this prompt that has bothered me for a while.

It’s also way longer than I expected it to be. Like, holy shit, I think it’s the longest fic I’ve written fot BTHB yet? I guess sibling love really motivates me, because that’s all this fic is about: siblings protecting each other.

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Birds of a Feather, Fall Together

Summary: In the ruins of Heartland City are Ruri, her brother, and the man who has taken her brother hostage. And it's all up to Ruri, who was on the search for a sibling that was very much late to come back to their camp, to solve the issue of what she'll need to sacrifice to the hands of the enemy: her companions, her brother, or herself. Shun, however, couldn't disagree more with these options.

Fandom: Yu-Gi-Oh! Arc-V Relationships: Ruri & Shun (siblings, platonic)

Wordcount: 4.5K words

Event hosted by @badthingshappenbingo

AO3 version available here.

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Throughout the deserted ruins of what once was the colourful and lively Heartland City, now shadow of what it had once been drowning in its own silence, resonated panicked footsteps and a seeking voice. A lone girl only armed with a disk attached to her arm was in search of someone, strolling through the debris, walking over shattered glass, her pink eyes focused on not getting caught by anyone, not to get spotted by malevolent eyes.

What was left of the once peaceful streets was devoid of anyone, resident or invader, good or bad (albeit the concept was somewhat outdated, she had found out). The quietness was eerie to her, but she pressed on, hearing only her breathing, the sound of her brave but cautious footsteps, and her surroundings for any possible enemy. There was no sense of security to be had, only a sense of danger trying to sneak up on her.

 Ruri had lived through the Invasion long enough to know what she needed to be careful about, what she wouldn’t be forgiven for would she commit it. Obelisk Force soldiers could be everywhere, at any time, to enjoy carding her by ganging up on her and summoning a terrible beast to remind herself of the trauma of the war her people hadn’t asked for. Trusting people was essential but shouldn’t have been abused: survival required to work together, but to also think for oneself.

To be honest, Ruri hated having to be selfish about something as basic as being human; but that was what her brother had taught her so she could make it out of the Invasion alive, or at least survive long enough to see things getting better, acting through one duel at a time.

 She regretted having gone to search on her own. At least, being with someone else like Sayaka or Allen would have given her a sense of security, even if that sentiment was fake or artificial. However, she had felt like they’d need to be as stealthy as possible, in a time where the enemy could be everywhere and attack at any time with a force a thousand times stronger than they could have ever hoped to get. But she was a tough girl, she could do that on her own without endangering anyone other than her; so she shook her head and tried to stop her shivers, to ignore the cold wind blowing through her hair and the cold sweats going down her back.

 She had one objective, only one: finding her brother again. He had gone to recover resources for the camp a couple of hours before yet had been way too late coming back for it not to be suspicious. At best, he had gotten into troubles with the weight of the resources and was on his way to get backup. At worse, he’d be… He’d have left them without any hope to return. With the deepest desire not to see her beloved sibling carded and discarded on the floor next to some debris or to see him in any distorted shape, Ruri pressed on, fearful steps getting increasingly more determined, fasting the pace as long as nobody showed up in her fields of view or hearing.

 The streets had become strangers to her before growing familiar again: it was how humans were getting used to misery, violence and hiding in a hole not to be imprisoned, tortured or meeting their end in cruel, blood-tainted hands. In this world where the strongest ruled, she couldn’t have any high hope for her brother to be fine when she’d eventually find him, if she was going to find him at all. Yet, she found herself praying, perhaps uselessly, that he was going to be in one piece and okay by the time they’d reunite. She needed to bring him back to the base, if just for his own safety.

Truly, it was in those moments that Ruri would have appreciated that Shun was less of a natural loner, “I’m going to protect everyone by putting myself on the line” type of person. At least, they’d have convinced him not to look for stuff on his own.

 Suspicious noises picked Ruri’s attention, then interest. Her curiosity had never let her down, even since the Invasion had taken place. After spending a dozen or so of minutes hanging around the desolated ruins of Heartland in complete silence aside from her shoes crunching shattered glass and rummaging through stone, she was bound to be intrigued by suddenly hearing any human noise. Making sure to be stealthy, she glided along the walls, avoided all possible noise from stepping on potential sources of betrayal, and eventually arrived in the spot where the noise came from.

And then she almost screamed.

 Squinting her eyes from behind the wall, the first thing that bestowed Ruri’s eyes was the unforgettable image of an Obelisk Force soldier surrounded by what looked like two gallons of water and with a smashed Duel Disk attached to his wrist, locking her brother in his arms, the blade of a knife on the latter’s throat, close enough from where she was for her to think he was about to be throttled on the spot. Distant yells reached her ears, “stop moving around, brat”, “if you don’t calm down, I won’t hesitate”. No offer to surrender. Her brother’s feet desperately trying to get out of there until the knife was placed right under his chin.

Before she knew it, Ruri had sidestepped to see more, to guess if she should run away and risk getting spotted to get some help or if she could deal with it on her own and free Shun from the lock on his neck. There was no time to go get aid from Kaito or Yuto, if they were back from their mission that was: her brother was about to have his throat slashed if someone didn’t do anything.

 When Ruri finally looked back at the scene, the soldier was looking right into her eyes, having obviously spotted her. Gulping, she approached, careful of the hand holding the knife, making sure to look strong or even menacing as she did so. She was going to save her brother from the imminent danger, after all she had to be strong, in these dire times, and she wouldn’t hesitate to duel the man who had dared lie a hand on her brother.

Oh, wait. His disk had been smashed, presumably by Shun himself. She’d have to settle that in other ways, something not uncommon to her.

 “Stop in your tracks!”

The yell of the soldier made her do just as he ordered, if not just by surprise. Despite her absolute want to save her sibling, Ruri had to admit she was at a disadvantage: no real weapon aside from a Duel Disk that’d take too long to use compared to the time required to slash someone’s body with a blade of any sort and no way to pressure the man into surrendering his hostage.

 “Ruri!” Shun’s screaming, yet audibly strained, voice made itself heard against the cold of the blade. “Ruri, get out of here, go away, right now!”

“But, brother! I can’t give up on you like that!”

Her response didn’t seem to please him in the slightest, as he was about to respond to her with an enforced frown on his face, but the knife got even closer to his throat.

“If you don’t fuckin’ shut it, I’m killing you on the spot.”

 Her brother grudgingly accepted to stay quiet, as she could see from the frown still present yet his voice disappearing entirely from the air. This was messed up and, if she wasn’t trying to save one of the people dearest to her, she’d have perhaps shed a tear; but this was, as Shun would have said himself, a battlefield where crying didn’t matter and didn’t improve things, where it was to kill or be killed. A reality she clearly hated, a reality that she had to face every day, a reality that was threatening them both yet again.

The fire inside of her, however, didn’t stop burning. She felt a rush of adrenaline coursing through her body, making her limbs tense up and her mind get sharper, like the predator about to jump on its victim, yet she wasn’t the predator there: she was more like the prey waiting for its hunter to go away. If she had to defy odds to get her brother back, she would: Resistance members stuck together and, like two birds of the same feathers, siblings helped each other out. It was her time to help Shun out of a dangerous situation.

 “Ruri, huh…” The soldier mused to himself for a moment, before a smile creeped on his face. “So you two know each other, right?”

She didn’t respond. That was an obvious trap and she wouldn’t step in it.

“Oh well. What about we make a little deal, you and I?”

That was already more interesting and less one-sided, but she had to remain focused and suspicious. You could never trust the Obelisk Force, Shun and Yuto had reminded them all numerous times before, and she had seen that from her own two eyes. There was no backing down, but there was also no suspension of disbelief.

“You give out the location of your precious, fellow members, and he shall be free. What about that?”

 Shun angered right in front of her, pupils retracting and fists balling up. His arms were oddly free, but a slash of a knife could be quicker than any punch or kick.

“Don’t listen to that offer, it’s a scam! Protec-”

He was interrupted by a cut on his right cheek, his frown deepening with a little grunt, to which she had to keep in a yelp of horror.

“I told you to shut the fuck up, didn’t I?! Next time you open it up, it’s your throat I’m gonna cut!”

 Her brother went back to being silent, red trickling down his face and to his neck in thin flows. Ruri was left wondering what to do: giving their position was obviously a no-go, she would have never betrayed her companions for anything, but what else could she do that wouldn’t risk her life or his? If she approached even further, Shun could die a moment later. She had no other bargaining chip than what she couldn’t give up for anything. Even her moral horizon, her last resort, was doomed to fail: activating the carding function on her disk would also card Shun in the process, making the entire ordeal utterly pointless, if not counterproductive, and she’d lose someone close to her yet again. There was no way out of this…

 “Wait, miss.”

This got Ruri’s attention back to the soldier, rather than her own thoughts and a plan of action she couldn’t find.

“What about I give you another proposition?”

“What is it, this time? I won’t ever give up on my comrades.”

She tensed up without fully realizing it, anxiety getting to her to the point of making her nauseous and dizzy, even though she had no time to breathe when such a climax had been reached.

“You come with me, and I let him go.”

 Ruri couldn’t know what the soldier had in mind when proposing that deal to her. Did she hold any special value, more than Shun did? Was this a trap all over again? It could have very well been such. She had to exert the utmost caution as she went through with the deal, thinking it over and over. Was she ready to bet for her brother to bail her out of there once he’d be freed? Was she ready to trust a pure stranger, a dangerous one of that, with such a thing?

As the answer kept getting more and more uncertain in her mind, she noticed Shun talk to her through lip movements, something they had learnt together to communicate more easily between themselves. “Don’t you dare do that,” he told her with cold irises and blood still trickling from the fresh cut. He didn’t wince, didn’t let the sting show, just continued speaking to her in a silent voice, “don’t you dare, Ruri”.

 “You’re sure you’ll really let him go?”

“What more do you need as a proof?”

She made a step forward, judging his reaction, hoping she was jeopardizing the already-tense situation. The soldier, much to her surprise, actually took the blade further from Shun’s neck, but that wasn’t without the latter reacting with far less appreciation, continuing with the silent scolds, “don’t do that, Ruri, don’t do that”. She couldn’t let her lips move, otherwise she’d betray her cover and ruin her attempts. This was her, no, their only chance. She couldn’t mess it up.

“So, you’ve decided? You against him?”

She didn’t respond, attempting not to show the slightest indication as to the contents of her hand, yet still got close enough to him to be in range to do something. Responding would betray either her true intentions or her brother; she simply couldn’t take that risk. She was already bluffing as is, having to bear her heart threatening to pulverise her ribcage from the inside and the slight wave of nausea covering the insides of her throat. There was no need to put everything at risk for what could be nothing.

 But she had forgotten Shun had a mind on his own, a mind that was definitely bent on protecting others and acting on his own.

 Events and twists unfolded at a speed so intense that she was barely able to keep up. Her brother grabbed the soldier’s armed wrist with his own hand, trying to make him discard it on the floor by violently shaking it, somewhat arriving to accomplish that until, before both sibling could realize that was happening, someone had been stabbed, blood pouring from an abdominal wound. Due to the similar size of the two men in front of her, she was unable to guess whose blood it was, who had been injured; but things were happening much too quickly for her to guess that with exactitude. Instead, the soldier kicked her brother in the stomach, making him drop to his knees, the knife falling onto the ground with a droplet of red jumping as it did so, splatters on the dirty ground, and a flash of light blinded her.

 When her eyes opened again, the only things left for her to see were the discarded knife and her brother, exhaling a shuddering breath, on his knees but almost falling from that poor balance, a hand on the ground, and a card right next to him.

 Feeling a terror rising that she didn’t quite understand, Ruri rushed to her brother’s side, kneeling right next to him. The card was what she had thought it to be: Shun had carded someone, presumably in self-defence. Considering how strong he was in hand-to-hand combat, her fear grew wider, until she noticed a hand on his left side, clutching his coat, crimson dripping between his fingers. Pearls of sweats were appearing on his face, his breath seeming even more fragile as heard from up-close.

 “B-brother, you’re bleeding…!” she exhaled, half in a cry and half in a whisper. “Let me check it…”

“I’ll… I’ll be fine, Ruri. Let’s head back to the base…”

“You got stabbed, didn’t you?! You’re not fine, Shun, let me check your injury at least!”

He put his hand away from the wound, revealing a dark red, almost maroon, stain quickly expanding.

“Oh my, it’s terrible… We need to bring you back as soon as possible to the camp…”

He rose to his feet before she did, but he quickly started swaying on his, prompting her to prop his arm on her shoulders. She had seen him do it many times for Yuto and the opposite way around, she could completely manage this. Her brother had always been a featherweight, a glass cannon of sorts: she tried to make sure he didn’t get in too rough of a shape, but it was getting exponentially harder with time going and especially as the Invasion was taking place. Yet, she’d do her possible, all that she could, and that started with bringing him back to their base.

 Then she remembered something important.

“Wait, Shun.”

“What is it?”

He attempted to have a sharp tone, but it only came off as snappy.

“It’d be better if we stopped the bleeding… Could you sit down for a minute? I’m going to apply pressure on the wound.”

 He gave her a weird look, skewed even, before giving in and sitting down on a patch of debris. Ruri had taken some basic first-response lessons back before the city had been destroyed, and only improved on them afterwards, making her hands move almost on their own: she opened her brother’s coat, removed a piece of fabric she had around her waist, and applied pressure on it with all the force she could gather in her arms. Would she not have had an iron determination to save him, she’d have let herself tremble. However, in times where she was needed, she couldn’t falter, so she pressed on.

Unfortunately, Ruri had to admit something else: the wound was deep and, as such, bleeding profusely. She couldn’t stop what she now knew to be a haemorrhage, even if with her best efforts she had slowed down the flow, getting herself drenched in red.

“Can you please hold it on there for me, brother…? I wish I could do more, but that’ll have to do for now. Let’s go, okay?”

Without a vocal reply, he did as she had told him to: he put his hand over the piece of fabric, itself on the wound, and they got up, his arm still on her shoulders, walking slowly but surely towards the base.

 Because she was aware of how dimmed down Shun’s reflexes had to have been by this point, trying not to count by herself the volume of blood he had already lost, Ruri had to be sharper than ever. Her ears were focused on the potential unusual sounds that could have greeted them, her eyes were focused on her brother’s vitals, her touch felt feverish under the weight of having to care for the two of them. The streets were deserted, but that was far from meaning they were safe for anyone: an Obelisk Force soldier could have found his colleague carded and have been on the hunt for them. She had to make sure they weren’t attacked and, if they were, that they could defend themselves and get out of there.

 To be fair, she didn���t exactly remember the time she had spent walking from their base to the spot where she had found Shun taken hostage. She’d have estimated it to be around a dozen of minutes, perhaps less, perhaps more. There hardly was a way to know what time it was when exploring the wastelands, she hadn’t even thought of checking if she could check what time it was at any point.

That, sadly, didn’t prevent her from having this atrocious feeling of being slow. Their walking speed was usual fast because they were used to the ruins, but with his condition at that moment, she could have only expected to slogging through the streets. Yet, the slower they got, the harder it was for him to push himself on his two feet despite not having both her arms as support, the more anxious she got: would they make it to somewhere safe in time? They were both struggling, silent as tombs, because nobody spoke in the wastelands.

 The moment her eyes spotted a familiar camp, Ruri felt like she could have jumped out of joy. They had made it there and, judging by the fact Shun could still support himself and walk, they’d make it in time. He’d, most likely, still be alive tomorrow: but things weren’t set in stone yet. As such, she tried picking up the pace, but she kept hearing pained grunts and pants from him, sweat blistering on his face, his cut having finally stop bleeding, breathing heavily. She had no time to lose: she needed to make it to their camp as soon as possible.

Relief washed over her again when other members of the Resistance noticed them arriving and took things into their hands, but not before she almost fell, brought down by the collapse of her barely conscious brother. Relief and concern fought for dominance over her mind: on one hand, help was arriving with men and their gurney approaching them quickly, but on the other, Shun seemed miserable and on the brink of death. It could have gone either way, at that point, so she just helped them get him on the gurney and watched them run to the medic’s tent, slowly trailing behind them.

 Ruri believed herself to be someone with patience, usually and most of the time. She was hard to truly anger, albeit she was prone to being upset for someone else. The Invasion had made her a bit more apathic than before, but she remained more optimistic than most of the camp: they could see the end of the dark times if they stuck together.

While she was a firm believer of that and the virtue of being patient, she also had a sense of urgency running through her Kurosaki blood, the one she shared with her brother. Because of it, she wanted to stampede through time and not have to wait for any verdict, for any piece of news concerning his condition, if it was bettering or worsening, if he was even going to see the light of the dark days again. She couldn’t stand to lose him, after having lost most of the people she knew to Fusion’s forces. He had to make it out of there alive, for himself, for Yuto, for the others, for her.

 She started trying to find different ways to pass time. She entered and exited the tent, paced outside, observed the people around and tried to guess what they were doing with their days, went through her deck, shuffled it, looked through it again to see if she had missed details on the illustrations, then put it back into her disk before going back to pacing outside the tent. They were few enough for information to communicate quickly: most people walking past her gave her sympathetic looks, the kind you’d give to the grieving.

Exhausted by the fears nabbing at her mind, her clothes now tainted with patches of maroons and browns, she eventually resorted to sitting in the part of tent akin to the waiting room of a hospital. It wasn’t comfortable to sit on the ground or a makeshift chair as long, slow minutes passed by, people going and out, yet no feedback on her brother ever came up. In her head started flashing horrific scenarios of how he had been dead on arrival and they just didn’t know how to tell her so without having her break down in tears and drown in her own grief, listing all the reasons she could think of for his early demise. Blood loss, internal haemorrhage, shock, sceptic shock, organ failure, critical medical error, lack of supplies leading to the impossibility to treat the case.

Perhaps she had been too late. Perhaps she had been too slow and, because of her, he was dead. Maybe that, if she had given herself up to the soldier, he’d have been fine and alive… Maybe that’d have given him enough time and distraction to disarm the soldier and they’d have run far away from there, perhaps using one of Raidraptors to escape the vicinity. No, instead, she had been a dumb girl and had let him get stabbed because she hadn’t been able to stop him from going through with a dangerous and desperate plan! She only had herself to blame, and yet she could never apologize to him, and it made all matters worse, and…

 Ruri?

A gentle voice called out her name, making her snap back to reality. In her daze, she didn’t really recognize who it was, but it was a woman in her twenties or thirties, dressed in white, splatters of red covering her. She had a soft smile on her face, soft eyes looking into hers, who must have been red from all the crying she had done while waiting.

“Y-yes?” She rose on her feet, feeling a vertigo settle for a great total of three seconds. “D-do you have anything on my brother’s whereabouts?!”

“I won’t lie to you, Ruri, he was in a rough shape when he arrived there. He had already lost a lot of blood and was slowly slipping into shock,” (the knot in her throat kept strengthening: that was it, he was dead), “but I’m happy to tell you that Shun’s pulled through it.”

Tears formed in her eyes again, untamed, a whole other kind of tears that didn’t make her eyes sting.

“It’s going to take a while for him to fully recover, but he’s going to be fine, eventually.”

“C-can I see him now?”

Another smile.

“Of course. If you may follow me.”

 The medic’s tent was one of the only large ones of the camp, mostly because it had been sewn together from other tents that had been rendered unusable by assaults and the weather. Yet, it still remained somewhat small, which made it so the walk to wherever her brother was now felt short and to-the-point. To be fair, she didn’t care about what it looked like, as long as it felt as safe as possible and as long as she could see him alive and breathing… It’d be fine, all fine.

No bed nor IV to be seen in the makeshift recovery room, but calm breathing. The woman whose name she still couldn’t remember (the knot in her throat and the emotion, perhaps) had told her to warn her in case something was wrong before leaving her alone in the little space now dedicated to her sibling.

 Sitting beside the sleeping-bag-turned-impromptu-hospital-bed, Ruri was observing her brother with little fear and a foreign kind of comfort in her stomach, replacing the pit and the burning acid having churned inside for what had felt like hours. Compared to their previous endeavour, he looked peaceful, as if he had been merely asleep, even if the cloth bandage on his cheek said otherwise, although the unnatural paleness of his face still stung her to see. It couldn’t be avoided until he’d have recovered, she supposed, so she simply held one of his hand and silently rejoiced: they’d see another day together and, one day, journey to the end of the night to see the light of day and healing.

[themyskira]

The Life of Captain Marvel - issue #1

So here we are. Issue #1 of The Life of Captain Marvel, the miniseries that was touted as a bold new origin story that would change everything we thought we knew about Carol Danvers.

And it starts strong by exploiting family violence, trauma, mental illness and traumatic brain injury for melodramatic effect, with no intention of dealing with any of these complex themes in any depth or sensitivity.

For all that, infuriatingly little actually happens in this first issue. No exaggeration, the issue actually includes a stretch of nine months wherein Carol essentially does nothing except mope and grow her hair out. The dang plot doesn’t even arrive until the final seven pages.

Content warning: This issue begins with a flashback to Joe Danvers verbally abusing and hitting his kids. I haven’t included any images, but I talk at some length about Margaret Stohl’s abysmal handling of themes of abuse and family violence. Just a heads up.

The story opens on a flashback to an idyllic childhood holiday in Harpswell, Maine. There’s a montage of Carol and her brothers flying kites, wrestling each other, splashing in the water and stuffing their faces with candy, while adult Carol muses that she used to think her family was perfect.

Then the flashback takes a turn. One of Carol’s brothers rips the kite from her hand, tearing it. Their father, Joe, descends on the boys in a rage and begins verbally abusing and physically beating them as Carol looks on, because — surprise! — it’s Traumatic Past Retcon time!

Goodbye Joe Danvers, well-meaning but hard-headed dad who’s never understood his daughter and whose approval always seems to be out of reach. Hello Joe Danvers v. 2.0, scary unpredictable drunk who hit his kids and terrorised his entire family. Aren’t comics fun?

The flashbacks are interspersed with shots of Carol in the present day, where she’s battling supervillains Tanalth and Moonstone. As the flashback progresses, present-day Carol lashes out violently, alarming friends and foes alike.

“That’s why fighting’s easier than remembering. I tell myself that if I’m strong enough… I’ll beat the memories down so hard they’ll never come back.”

What’s strange to me about this page is the way it deliberately draws a parallel between Joe, snarling and raising his fist to strike his powerless young children, and Carol, snarling and raising her fist to strike down a powerful villain. By implication, it places Carol in the role of abuser, indicating an intergenerational cycle of violence.

Which of course is never explored or discussed beyond this, because Stohl doesn’t want to actually talk about the lasting impacts and terrible toll of family violence, she just wants to exploit it for THE DRAMAS.

As Joe whales on his sons, kid!Carol tries to run to their defence, only to be held back by mother Marie, who tells her, “You’ll just make it worse. Now’s not the time.”

We will be told numerous times over the course of this book what an incredible, loving mother Marie Danvers is, and how she’s prepared to sacrifice everything for Carol. Her actions, though? Her actions consistently portray a woman whose number one interest is in not creating more work or emotional angst for herself, even when it means hanging Carol out to dry.

This is not to say that Marie isn’t a victim as well in this scenario: though she never fears for her life or safety (she could pummel Joe into the ground without breaking a sweat), it could well be that constant gaslighting and emotional abuse have left her feeling unable to oppose her husband in anything.

It could well be, but that is nuance that Stohl is not interested in exploring, and all we get throughout this miniseries is Marie making excuses for Joe’s abusive behaviour and prioritising her own comfort over Carol’s emotional wellbeing and safety.

So anyway, flashback!Marie says “Now’s not the time”, and in the present day Carol shrieks “WHEN - IS - THE TIME?!” while damn near beating Moonstone into a pulp.

The other Avengers are disturbed by this.

Iron Man: Hey, Carol? Could you maybe leave a little something on the plate for… you know… bad guy jail? Black Panther: Would you call that rage… disproportionate?

hellooooo unfortunate paternalistic implications. A female superhero has a hysterical outburst on the battlefield, while her almost exclusively male colleagues look on in bewilderment. (‘This is why women can’t be superheroes, they’re too emotional!!!’)

Cap and T’Challa have to physically pull Carol off Moonstone, as Carol begins to hyperventilate.

Adding to our list of things that this series has zero interest in exploring:

What it’s like to experience a panic attack or traumatic flashback

What it’s like to live with an anxiety disorder

What it’s like to live with trauma

The Carol of this story is not a woman living with trauma and mental illness, she is a woman who swoons hysterically whenever the narrative starts drag a bit. Her panic attacks are purely a plot device used to ratchet up the dramatic tension at convenient moments, and it’s some of the most insensitive handling of mental illness I’ve seen in comics for a while.

Next comes the obligatory scene of Carol getting a full medical in Tony’s lab, only for Tony to throw his hands up and declare, ‘welp, there’s nothing physically wrong with you, are you sure there’s not something else going on????’. Because apparently neither Tony — who has personal experience with trauma — nor Steve — who lived through a FUCKING WAR — know PTSD when it’s punching them (well, Tanalth and Moonstone) in the face.

I mean REALLY.

Tony: Look, the breathing thing is probably some kinda nervous tic.

hi, hello, person with an anxiety disorder here, please do not tell somebody having a full-blown panic attack that it’s just a ‘nervous tic’, you absolute insensitive fuckstick.

Carol: [sigh] It’s… Father’s Day. Not my favourite day of the year, you know?

waitwaitwait, so CAROL recognised that she’d triggered and experienced a traumatic flashback, but for some reason decided to play dumb about it until she’d after she’d had a pointless medical examination??

Tony tells Carol she needs to get herself sorted out or else somebody is going to get hurt, so she goes to visit her mother and younger brother Joe Junior at the family’s holiday home in Maine.

Carol flies into town past a sign that reads, “Harpswell Sound / Summer Home of Captain Marvel” Carol: [narration] Oh, brother.

‘Oh, brother’ is right. I guess at least it isn’t as embarrassing as the time Stohl introduced a D-grade Captain Marvel TV series.

“Sugar’s Donuts / Official Donut of Captain Marvel”

hoookay yep that’s a bit much now.

At the donut shop, Carol runs into childhood friend Louis Lee, who’s grown into a Designated Love Interest with an obnoxious phonetically-spelled accent

“Better keep that to yah self, Ms. Danvers. Wouldn’t wantitah get out that yah cheatin’ on us…”

I despise him already.

Carol goes up to the house and hangs out with her mother and brother. Over dinner, Marie and JJ ask her why she’s dropped by so suddenly. Carol evades and JJ blows up at her because apparently he’s been holding in some anger about how he feels she abandoned the family and didn’t even bother to come home when their dad was terminally ill. (Which, hey, here’s another potentially rich thread to explore — PITY IT NEVER COMES UP BETWEEN THEM EVER AGAIN.)

Carol shoots back that he knows full well she was avoiding home because of their abusive father, only to be interrupted by the door slamming as their mother walks out.

…eeeeeexcept apparently that was an art mistake, because the very next page is Carol chasing after her brother, the one who actually stormed out. She finds him at their father’s grave, drinking booze.

He offers his recovering alcoholic sister the bottle, and when she lightly turns it down he gripes that she’d always thought she was better than everybody else and she should feel free to piss off any time now. Then he gets into his car and Carol lets him drive home drunk like the responsible person she is.

“Part of me knew I should go after Joe Jr. I mean, nobody in my family was any good with a bottle.”

WHAT IN THE HELL, CAROL.

But nah, see, she has more important things to do, like scream at her dead father and desecrate his headstone, because that’s sure not going to upset her family further, nope.

Her little tantrum is interrupted by the sound of tyres screeching and a car plunging off a bridge because YOU FUCKING MORON you stood there and watched your brother stagger drunk into his car and made the conscious decision that ‘nah, I’m gonna let this one play out’.

and ohohohohoho how ~poetic~! He crashed right through the ‘Summer Home of Captain Marvel’

god I hate everything in this comic.

JJ is rushed to hospital, where he is diagnosed with a traumatic brain injury, leaving him in a catatonic state.

And of course, Stohl’s Carol makes it all about her-fucking-self.

“In an instant, everything changes. You ruin someone’s life… it ruins yours right back. You’d give everything to have gone after him… and acted like the hero you’re supposed to be.”

Yes, JJ is in a coma with a traumatic brain injury, but let’s talk about how his near-fatal car accident ruined Carol’s life.

Anyway— NINE MONTHS LATER.

No, really.

We just skip over nine months.

Wherein apparently Carol has been doing nothing but poor-me-ing over her brother’s hospital bed.

Like.

She gave up her entire life and career.

Stopped saving the world.

Stopped interacting with everybody.

Just sat by JJ’s hospital bed looking melancholy and growing her hair out so that comic bros would stop complaining that she looked like a lesbian.

Tony tries texting her and she turns off her phone. So he appears beside her in an explosion of pixels.

which-- how?!?

There’s no visible technology at work here, nothing to indicate what’s projecting his image or enabling the two of them to communicate. Tony might as well be speaking to Carol via magic, for all we can tell.

Christ, it’s a superhero comic, it’s not like you have to work that hard to sell it to the reader. Two lines of dialogue: ‘What the actual hell, Tony?’ ‘Well, you wouldn’t return my calls, so I [insert technobabble here].’ That’s all you need. How lazy can you get?

Tony asks her to come back to the Avengers — we miss you, we need you, this isn’t good for you, etc. — and Carol’s like, ‘nah, I’m too busy wallowing in self-pity’.

And yes, like Carol’s PTSD and panic attacks, like the family violence, JJ’s brain injury exists solely here as a plot device. It’s not a disability he lives with or a trauma he survives, it’s a vehicle to bring melodrama to Carol’s story and a weakly-fabricated excuse for Carol to stay with the family and discover what she’s about to discover.

Because now it’s time to bring the still-catatonic JJ back home. And since the downstairs living room is more accessible than his upstairs bedroom, he’ll be taking the couch, where Carol has been crashing.

Yes, even though Carol has her own childhood bedroom in this house — we see it next issue — she has been couch-surfing for nine months.  But now that somebody else has claimed her spot, she’s got to move into… JJ’s bedroom.

So she goes up the room and rather rudely starts going through her catatonic brother’s wardrobe and pulling his clothes out to make room for her own shit. Again, I cannot stress enough that she had her own bedroom in this house. She’s just… weirdly choosing to impose on everybody else.

In the wardrobe, Carol finds a box belonging to her dead father. The box contains a love letter, in Joe’s handwriting, addressed to a woman who is not his wife — along with what is obviously a piece of alien technology.

This is a comic with a goddamn identity crisis. It keeps tossing out plot hooks, only to abandon them pages later in favour of the next shiny idea.

It begins by announcing, ‘This is a story about Carol returning home and confronting her childhood trauma.’ Then it abruptly swerves: ‘wait, scratch that, this is a story about Carol struggling to hold her fractured family together after her brother is hurt in an accident she had the power to prevent’, and then, ‘hold up hold up what we meant to say was, this is a story about Carol discovering a hidden truth about her family and parentage’.

It’s like Stohl doesn’t know editing exists. Because spoiler alert: this story is not about either of those first two things. The first fifteen pages of this issue are a dead fucking weight. They do not need to be there, and in fact a lot of problems could have been solved by cutting them.

Carol decides to spend some time with her family because she’s working through some personal shit, and discovers a letter hinting that her late father was leading a double life. That’s it; that’s the story.

All these convoluted logistics around who gets the couch and who gets the bedroom? Not necessary. Again, Carol has a bedroom in this house. Since she’s not around much, it makes sense that Marie might be using it as a general storage space. So: Carol is staying in her old room and has to shift a few boxes to make space. In the process, her dad’s shoebox gets knocked loose from whatever nook it was stuffed into. THERE. EASY. DONE. PLOT UNLOCKED.

Like, the car accident actually makes it harder to get Carol to that point. The only reason I can see for it being there at all is to force the passage of time so that Carol can grow her hair out and dudebros can stop complaining that she’s unattractive. Because I guess it just never occurred to anybody that they could draw her with long hair to start with?

But ‘oh no, the aliens and the superpowers I can accept, but in the last comic I read Carol had short hair and I AM SORRY BUT there is NO WAY human hair grows that fast, this is BEYOND THE PALE’.

Oh, and can we talk about how Carol’s response to finding OBVIOUS ALIEN TECHNOLOGY is to go, ‘huh, I wonder what this is, let’s see if I can open it by smashing it repeatedly with a hammer’??

Carol: Huh. Let’s see if we can open it. [starts bashing the device wildly] Gah! Why — won’t — you— Marie: [off-panel] Carol! Can you help me with Joe’s tube? Carol: [wandering off as the device activates] Coming, Ma!

And then IMMEDIATELY GETS DISTRACTED AND WANDERS THE FUCK OFF, failing to notice that the OBVIOUS ALIEN DEVICE has suddenly activated and is now beeping ominously????

So while Carol blunders around obliviously, the obvious alien device sends a signal to a galaxy far far away, which in turn activates what is seriously and embarrassingly called a Kree Kleaner. A small spherical vessel orbiting a distant planet lights up and begin speeding towards Earth, while inside some kind of Kree cyborg gestates and grows to maturity at a rapid rate.

Meanwhile Carol sits by the sea with Digital Tony and mopes that “I knew my family wasn’t perfect… but I thought love was”.

you.

you fucking.

Look, I recognise that trauma is complicated and that family shit is even more so.  I know people process and cope with things in different ways and at different speeds. And for Carol to suddenly discover that, on top of all the grief he was causing at home, her father was leading some kind of secret life with another women, must surely feel fucking horrible and bring up a lot of deeply painful memories.

But her reaction doesn’t gel with everything Stohl has told us about Carol’s relationship with her father.

We’ve been told that Joseph Danvers was a physically and verbally abusive alcoholic who terrorised his family to the point where, to this day, Carol struggles with PTSD and anxiety attacks. We’ve been told that Carol thinks of him as a mean, violent drunk who even in death haunts her family. She doesn’t understand why her mother stayed with him or why her brother still defends him, when all he ever did was make all of them feel small and powerless.

The idea that Carol would think all of this and yet still be totally blindsided to learn that Joe and Marie’s marriage was not a true-love-fairytale-romance is utterly, outrageously laughable.

Stohl presents the letter as bombshell that overturns everything Carol thought she knew about her family, indicating that Joe was leading a secret life she never knew about. It’s not. All it is is a confirmation of everything we’re told Carol already thinks about her father: that he was a cruel, self-absorbed bastard who treated his family like crap. You know what is a fucking bombshell?

The fact that Joe Danvers apparently had personal access to OBVIOUS ALIEN TECHNOLOGY.

AND AS FOR THIS LINE.

“And like they say, families were made to be broken.”

literally nobody says this.

I even checked, just to be fair to this comic, on the off-chance that it was in fact a thing.

One of the six search results is somebody on instagram quoting this comic. The other five are all related to the title of a single playlist on 8tracks.

But hey, like they say, Margaret Stohl is a fucking hack.

[dccomicsnews]

Fun. No matter genre or style, comics should always be fun. Unfortunately, sometimes, comics fail on this point either through content or execution. While it’s true that “fun” may be a quickly moving target for audiences generation to generation, it shouldn’t be too hard to point out comics that miss this. Even the most progressive and innovative comics have a “fun” quotient. Currently, DC Comics seems to be struggling with this notion in a significant segment of their line. However, there are some titles which have no problem exuding “fun!” It’s telling that the company that would be known as DC launched their first title in 1935, New Fun: The Big Comic Magazine. It’s even more telling, that this title evolved into More Fun Comics. From the very beginning, there’s been a notion of “fun.”

It may be easy to say that the element of “fun” is elusive and subjective. However, there are some classic titles that due to mature themes may seem to contradict this notion. Let’s look at Watchmen. While this comic is full of mature elements, it never eliminates the aspect of fun. The use of the Charlton Comics characters as analogs is an instant indicator of “fun.” It’s clear that Alan Moore is tying in to the history of comics, not only Charlton’s history, but the very history of comics as his backstory evokes the Golden Age of DC’s history. While Nite Owl, Silk Spectre and the rest are more or less original creations, it’s clear that they echo characters like the Golden Age Flash, Green Lantern and Atom that were in use in the DC Universe at the time. Any contemporary reader would be aware of this. It’s not hard to imagine that reader understanding that Moore was creating a sort of synergy with the legacies in the DC Universe.  While not an analog for the Justice Society of America, the Minutemen are that world’s first team of mystery men like the JSA in the traditional DC Universe. Evoking legacy is one of the primal elements of comic book “fun.” This is what made the reintroduction of the Justice Society of America in Justice League of America #21 and #22 such a hit in 1963.

  If something as highly acclaimed and serious as Watchmen can contain “fun,” what’s going on with today’s books? There’s no shortage of fun in the current Hawkman, and The Terrifics as well as the recent Plastic Man mini-series. However, the Heroes in Crisis mini-series/event is anything but fun. Issue #1 was essentially a bloodbath with 1/2 the issue devoted to Harley Quinn stabbing Booster Gold, repeatedly and unrelentingly.  There’s no fun here.  The tone is somber and the action mired in gratuitous violence.  The basic premise of the series is that sometimes super-heroes need some mental and emotional counseling.  At Sanctuary, the heroes hope to receive that assistance, but there’s a mass murder at the facility that takes the lives of some fan favorite characters, Wally West and Roy Harper.  The premise is about as far from fun as could be imagined.  While it has the potential to be a truly moving story, so far it has felt more like spectacle with little substance.  It would’ve been much more effective to have created an emotional connection with the victims before dispatching them.

Even a moment that could be perceived as fun in issue #2, when Harley Quinn takes out the Trinity, feels awkward and incongruous. Perhaps, one needs to be a full on Harley fanatic to appreciate this moment. To the average reader, it feels incredibly bizarre and absurd considering the accepted portrayal of Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman. Perhaps, there is more going on, but on the surface, it appears to be quite ridiculous considering Harley Quinn’s power set. In the end, it feels out of place and damning of the Trinity. It’s hard to smile with such an indictment of DC’s big three.

The fallout from Heroes in Crisis naturally extends over to Titans.  The team has lost Roy Harper and Wally West, Arsenal and the Flash respectively to the events at Sanctuary.  Additionally, Donna Troy seems to be struggling with alcohol.  And, to add insult to injury (pun intended), Nightwing their leader suffered a gunshot to the head in Batman #55 that has left him with amnesia.  He only remembers his life before his parents were killed.  Dick Grayson has no memory of his life as the original Robin or Nightwing, nor of Bruce Wayne as his adoptive father.  This whole storyline plays like an attempt to remold Dick Grayson’s personality and affect a name change to “Ric” in order the pacify the perpetually immature that can’t handle the traditional nickname for Richard, Dick.  All this trauma leaves very little fun in the Titans book, which is 180 degree turn from where it started out with the pre-Rebirth mini-series, Titans Hunt, and the first story arcs during the Rebirth branding of the DC line.  These stories relied on the nostalgia for the return of the original Teen Titans to the history of the DC Universe and featured friends rediscovering friendships.  Nostalgia is a major fun factor, as is friends reconnecting, either in real life or between beloved fictional characters.

   Looking at the recent Plastic Man mini-series by Gail Simone and Adriana Melo, it’s not hard to see the fun in it. While the character may lend itself to something more humorous, there’s a fun in exploring Plas’s character. Addressing Pado Swakatoon’s identity issues is just as serious as what Tom King is attempting in Heroes in Crisis. The difference seems to be that Simone and Melo find an element of fun embedded in the themes. King appears to have lost this in his Batman run as well. His lead up to the “non-wedding” included some great character moments and “fun”, most significantly the double date with Lois and Clark at the carnival. However, with Batman #50, the “non-wedding” issue, was a great disappointment. Weddings are generally considered to be fun events, even if just in the moment. However, Bruce and Selina never got that far. There’s nothing fun about a wedding that doesn’t happen. Ask any guest….

Let’s look at Hawkman and The Terrifics, two DC Comics series that both exude “fun.” Hawkman not only presents an interesting plot, but builds on the main character, Carter Hall. There’s a lot going on with this character as his history is explored and yet not destroyed. Robert Venditti has managed to build on Hawkman’s past in an interesting way which doesn’t eliminate any aspect of his history. Instead, it embraces it. This is a real triumph! It exudes “fun.” It doesn’t necessarily require previous knowledge and it doesn’t eliminate ANYTHING that’s come before.

The Terrifics channels the fun and themes that the Fantastic Four originally produced back in 1961 for Marvel Comics. It’s no secret that The Terrifics draws on the chemistry of the Fantastic Four, but more importantly it manages to remain “fun” utilizing the unique personalities of Plastic Man and Metamorpho contrasted against the Mr. Fantastic intellectual analog, Mr. Terrific.

It’s prescient to look at Marvel’s The Immortal Hulk, a series which is not only doing well and receiving positive response, but also serious, somewhat scary and definitely mature. Despite all of these attributes going against it, this series manages to remain “fun.” It is able to channel the original horror element of the basic concept while maintaining a modern sensibility. There is no doubt, however, that Immortal Hulk is fun. Most recently issue #8 has featured a dismembered Hulk still able to provide succor for Bruce Banner. Perhaps, it is the relationship between the two that remains most salient element in the book.

Maybe, the most damning titles in DC’s stable are the Superman books by Brian Michael Bendis. What should be fun is not, and what’s left is sometimes boring and mostly depressing. The Rogol Zaar storyline is progressing too slowly and quite underwhelmingly while the Lois Lane subplot in Action Comics feels completely wrong. The solicits for February’s comics seem to project a future for Jon Kent (Lois and Clark’s son) that has robbed the reader of Jon’s growth and development. Bendis seems to be robbing the reader of understanding how Jon matures and grows, as well as robbing Lois and Clark of raising their child. Not only is this not fun, it is disturbing. If you haven’t dropped Bendis’ Superman books, go ahead and do it now so there may be a chance of salvaging the Kent family. “Fun” is watching the Kent’s raising their son. Depriving them of this opportunity shows a complete lack of respect for the characters, and an agenda of spectacle over character development. There’s enough inherent conflict and story ideas in raising a child with superpowers that Bendis’s contrived plot are not only unnecessary, but uninteresting and depressing- the opposite of “fun.”  Not mention, a status quo that absolutely no one asked for.  There’s an ominous cloud hanging over Superman’s head as Bendis seems to be purposely breaking down the Man of Steel instead of writing legitimately interesting character development.  A mopey, sad Superman is just depressing, and it doesn’t feel genuine when the conflict is so clearly contrived.

It’s not as if there is just one title or character that seems to be suffering from a lack of fun.  The widely reaching Heroes in Crisis event sort of permeates the tenor of the DC Universe.  Interestingly, this atmosphere isn’t isolated in the books that are dealing with the repercussions of Heroes in Crisis directly.  Superman and Nightwing both have some very somber elements that tinge the overall tone of their current storylines and suck the fun out of the drama.  At some point, if the comics you are reading aren’t fun and enjoyable you should drop them. Superman, Action, Titans, Heroes in Crisis, maybe Batman…. Send a message, read what you like…buy what you want to read…don’t be afraid of change….

Editorial: Comics Should Be Fun Fun. No matter genre or style, comics should always be fun. Unfortunately, sometimes, comics fail on this point either through content or execution.

[annarosewriting]

Why The Hell Do You Like Bucky Barnes So Much?

We’re good friends at this point, we’ve had a few laughs, shed a few tears, I think it’s time to talk about what’s really important and that is Bucky Barnes. 

You’re probably all aware of the fact that Bucky Barnes is my pride and joy. What you’re probably still confused about (other than everything about me) is why.

He’s a secondary character! He’s said a total of maybe 50 words in all four movies he’s been in! He killed Tony Stark’s parents! His eyeliner skills leave something to be desired! Anna, why is this the one character that you’ve laid your loyalties down for? 

Because Bucky is the sad, tired boy of my dreams.  

Just kidding, it goes deeper than that. 

The Oscar-Nominated Film, Captain America: The Winter Soldier (CA:TWS) is The Best Marvel movie in my own professional opinion. Marvel could not have chosen a better movie to introduce their Second Phase. The Second Phase of Marvel movies focused less on origin story and more on character development and growth. And CA:TWS gives us a chance to strip away the “Star-Spangled Man with a Plan” facade and to see Steve for what he really is. A good man who wants to do right. 

CA:TWS changed the entire tone of the MCU as well. It humanized the Avengers, let us see the friendships that had formed between them. We got to experience the inside jokes, the day-to-day minutia that we don’t get to see when they’re busy saving the world. It was so different than anything Marvel had done up to this point that I wanted the Russo Brothers to be in charge of every Marvel movie for forever. 

And then I saw Infinity War and I took that that wish right back. The Russo Brothers will be receiving my therapist bills for the emotional damage they caused to my person after having to see my favs turn to dust in front of my own TWO SEEING EYES. 

But I digress, we have other things to talk about. For those of you who haven’t seen CA:TWS, go watch it right now and don’t come back until you’ve finished it. But for a quick recap, CA:TWS is about how someone is trying to take out Directory Fury and dismantle SHIELD. It’s up to Steve and Friends to figure out who’s behind this and take them down. 

In one of the biggest plot twists of all time, it turns out that the individual behind all of this is, SPOILER, Bucky Barnes. Captain America’s BFF. We got a bit of Bucky in the first Captain America movie, enough to know that Bucky went to science fairs for fun and that Steve would cross into Nazi occupied territory for him. (Which, honestly? Same.) 

People liked Bucky in the first movie, I was a big fan from the moment I saw him in that goddamn uniform, but it wasn’t anything like this. TWS was everywhere. My social media feed was consumed with pictures, fanart, and gifs about TWS.

And it just didn’t make sense! Bucky’s not Bucky in this movie! He’s a highly trained assassin! He’s dangerous! He’s got a sick metal arm! He’s armed to the teeth and only cares about killing! He’s got the best smoky eye I’ve ever seen! It’s wild! 

So why was I (and lots of other women) tagging our posts with TWS with tags like “my poor sweet bby”? 

It’s because after Bucky failed to take out Steve, Hydra’s briefing him. Alexander Pierce is slapping him around and yelling. After a few minutes of this they force Bucky back into submission and wipe his memory. 

They’ve been doing this to Bucky since they captured him in the 40′s. Bucky hasn’t had any autonomy over his body, his mind and essentially himself for the last 70 odd years. 

So did women just feel sympathetic because of our “mothering tendencies”? Nah. We were sympathetic because we related to him. 

We know what it’s like to not have agency over our bodies. What it’s like to be told what to do by men in power and not have a choice. What it’s like to have our minds and memories tampered with. 

We knew this pain, not to the same level Bucky has experienced it, but to a certain degree, we recognized it. We understood it and we wanted to treat it like how we treated our own pain. 

So we gave Bucky the care and love he deserved. Whether it was through art, (I’ve seen so many drawings of Bucky in a blanket and drinking tea) writing, (the amount of stories of Steve and Bucky having the heartfelt reunion they deserve warms my cold dead heart) or, if you’re me, you just yell at anyone who listens how Bucky deserves a NAP FOR GODS SAKE. But there was all of this and more as we tried to give this victim the recovery he deserves. 

Here’s the thing, it’s hard for me to explain in a non-heartbreaking way why I love Bucky as much as I do but I’ll do my best. 

To me, Bucky represents hope. Hope that I can come out of the other side of the trauma I’ve experienced with loyal friends, soft luscious hair and all of Wakanda backing me up. 

I’ve had to deal with my own emotional trauma, I’ve had to rebuild my life from the ground up. I’ve had to grapple with some regrettable actions from my past and learn how to forgive myself for those actions. Granted, these actions are more me having been an asshole and not so much MURDERING people but still, we’re working with what we’ve got. 

I sympathize with Bucky’s story and how he works so hard to overcome his past. I mean, I wish I didn’t relate to him in the “oh we both have pretty rough mental trauma’s we’re trying to come to terms with and deal with” and that we related more in the “we both have long beautiful hair and Steve Rogers would start a civil war for us” but again, we’re just working with what we have. 

It makes me hopeful when I see Bucky get the chance to grow, to get a second chance, to have friends like Sam and Steve, to have Shuri help him and to probably show him Vine compilation videos, to have T’Challa recognize that he’s a victim not a villain (AS IT SHOULD ALWAYS BE). 

Bucky helped me realize that your past does not define you, it shapes you, but it’s what you do moving forward that really counts. 

So next time someone asks why I like Bucky so much, instead of giving them the thoughtful, emotional answer I gave you, I think I’ll just look them dead in the eye, say “who the hell is Bucky” and then disappear in a cloud of smoke. It’s what Bucky would want. 

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Black Panther review

I remember a while back, people were wanting Idris Elba to play James Bond. This stirred up some of the most stupid discourse I have ever seen in my life, but Elba took things in stride and denied being considered for the iconic role. But for me, I had to wonder… what would a black James Bond movie be like?  Considering my love for blaxploitation films and my strong belief in Elba’s acting talent, I could only imagine what a black James Bond film would be like (hopefully better than Live and Let Die).

Apparently someone else – Ryan Coogler, to be precise – wondered the same thing, and so decided to make Black Panther, a Marvel movie that is truly a marvel. Quite frankly, we NEEDED a film like this in the world.

The plot picks up a week after the events of Civil War. T’Challa is set to become the king of Wakanda after his father’s death; soon after he is crowned, an old nemesis of his father pops back onto the radar: Ulysses Klaue, a thieving bastard of a man who steals Wakanda’s greatest resource, vibranium. While tracking him down, things get ever more tangled when CIA agent Everett Ross appears on the scene, and THEN things get even more complicated when a mysterious man known as Erik “Killmonger” Stevens shows up. This is one twisted web of political intrigue, one that could change Wakanda forever; can T’Challa cut through this mess and push Wakanda to a brighter future?

Be warned - there’s gonna be some SPOILERS below:

This might be one of Marvel’s most impressive film in the visual and audio department; Wakanda is such a gorgeous country to look at, what with all of its advanced tech. There are some issues – some CGI rhinos that appear are just really, really bad, and some of the fight scenes overuse CGI on the Panther suits (though the latter isn’t really too bad) – but overall this is a damn good looking movie. The soundtrack is just absolutely perfect and atmospheric, and kinda reminded me of The Lion King, amusingly enough. I was more just impressed that I actually gave a shit about the score of a Marvel film, because the scores tend to be very forgettable.

Now the best part of this film is most definitely the amazing cast of characters. We have Nakia, played by Lupita Nyong’o, T’Challa’s former lover and a badass spy who really pushes for Wakanda to get involved more in helping others; we have Shuri, played by Letitia Wright, T’Challa’s badass tech savvy smartass sister, who gets some of the funniest lines (and DOES quote an outdated meme, though in her defense, it was timely for the movie’s time period and also she follows it up with an actual funny joke); we have Okoye, played by Danai Gurira, the badass warrior woman who is head of the Dora Milaje and takes shit from a grand total of zero people; we have Everett Ross, the CIA agent played by Martin Freeman, who is kinda the ‘outsider perspective’ on Wakanda and reacts how anyone likely would in his situation; and rounding out the major supporting cast is M’Baku, the hilarious and badass leader of the isolated Jabari tribe, who is one of the biggest trolls in the MCU as well as a truly effective combatant. Each and every one of these characters is incredibly enjoyable, fun, and likable in their own way, making this perhaps the strongest supporting cast in the entire MCU.

Then we have T’Challa himself. He is an absolutely excellent hero, building off his grand entrance to the franchise in Civil War. He’s cool, he’s honorable, he has some interesting conflict going on due to his duties as king and then later after he finds out the truth about his father… though all that being said, I DO feel a few things with him here and there were either rushed or could have been delved into a bit more. But make no mistake, this is pretty minor, and he’s easily one of my favorite leads in the MCU.

And now on to the REAL stars of the show, the villains! Let’s start with Klaue, played by the always-appreciated Andy Serkis in his second villainous role in a Disney movie as of late… and much like Snoke, Klaue gets wasted towards the midpoint of the film. HOWEVER! Unlike Snoke, who gets very little to do before he gets killed, Klaue is in several scenes showing off what an effective villain he is. That cuttlefish scene in Age of Ultron? Oh, that was just a small taste of the utter brilliance Serkis brings here. Klaue is delightfully ridiculous, giggling and laughing even as he’s blowing the shit out of his enemies. He’s hilarious, he’s enjoyable, and he is absolutely memorable; as far as side villains go, he’s like Taserface on steroids, and I LOVED Taserface, so imagine how much I love Klaue. Leave it to Andy Serkis to give such an animated performance in one of the few films where he isn’t actually animated. The fact Klaue dies stings a lot less when he’s this much fun, though I am sad because he would have made such a GREAT antagonist for future films… though if they can work out a deal with Sony, Kraven could be a suitable replacement.

And then we have Erik Killmonger, played by Michael B. Jordan. Remember F4ntastic? Remember how awful he was as the Human Torch? If you weren’t convinced the man could truly pull off a comic book movie, well, he’s gonna make you eat those words. He doesn’t just make up for his less-than-stellar turn as Johnny Storm with his performance here; he makes up for that whole damn shitty movie that he was only a small part of. Killmonger is a villain you can actually understand, one where you can really see where he was coming from, one that has a plan that you can almost see yourself agreeing with. At the end of the day, Killmonger is a victim of Wakanda’s secrecy and isolationist nature; the killing of his father and abandonment by his uncle is what drives him to villainy, and he wishes to use Wakanda’s tech to arm the oppressed all across the world so they can rise up and crush their oppressors. It’s almost a noble goal, but at the same time, it’s pretty bloodthirsty and cruel, and he really couldn’t give a shit how many innocent lives are destroyed so that he can rule a Wakandan empire the sun never sets on. He’s truly an anti-villain for the ages, and I am going to give him the greatest honor I can think of by comparing him favorably to Senator Armstrong of Metal Gear Rising fame. Their goals are similar for one, as they desire to make their countries truly great at the cost of innocent lives, but most importantly… they have NANITES/NANOMACHINES, SON! THEY HARDEN IN RESPONSE TO PHYSICAL TRAUMA! Killmonger is easily top 5 villains in the whole MCU, and continues the trend that began in 2017 of giving Marvel villains excellent characterization. He can sit at the Big Bad Boys Table with Ego, Toomes, Hela, Red Skull, Loki, and Stane. Good work Killmonger.

There have been some criticisms of this film and of Wakanda that are just… really fucking stupid. One I see come up a lot is how Wakanda is such a big, bad nation for being so isolationist and not helping others. This is literally a fucking plot point in the movie. This is a big part of what the plot revolves around. Hell, Nakia pretty much demands T’Challa start helping the world with Wakanda’s tech, like this is not subtext, the isolationist nature isn’t played off as a good thing and Wakanda’s unwillingness to help others and their secretive nature is what fuel’s the villains agenda, so using this as some criticism of Wakanda to bash it is… fucking idiotic. Then there was this one post I saw floating around with a bunch of dweebs saying how T’Challa had to weaken himself to be able to beat Killmonger… no? Not at all? If they’re referring to the final fight, he weakened the both of them. They both had the same level of power, he just took their suits out of the equation, he never technically had an upper hand there. And if they were referring to the fight earlier in the film… it’s ritual combat. Seriously, I think a lot of the criticisms of this film just want to paint Wakanda and T’Challa as Mary Sues for some… fucking stupid reason. The only way you could believe that is if you didn’t actually watch the damn film. I really didn’t want to address these dumb criticisms, but frankly, I had them in mind the whole time while watching the film and rolled my eyes hard when they were blatantly disproven by text, not subtext, not subtle easy-to-miss lines, TEXT. RIGHT IN YOUR FUCKING FACE TEXT.

But let’s not end this all on a negative note. One of my absolute favorite moments was not your typical superhero moments, but a part at the end, where T’Challa has decided to open an outreach center, and he and Shuri show off a Wakandan ship to a basketball court filled with young black kids who are immediately awestruck by the ship. One of them comes up to T’Challa and looks at him like he’s the coolest thing in the world, and god, I just know there are hundreds of thousands of little black girls and boys out there watching this movie and seeing a black hero kick ass and just be goddamn cool. We all know Blade came first, but I don’t think that makes Black Panther any less important or necessary; representation is always a good thing when it’s done well, and boy is this done well. This is giving black kids heroes and heroines they can really look up to and admire and see themselves in, and frankly, that just makes me happy.

This is a damn good movie, one of Marvel’s best. It’s fun, it’s exciting, and it really does give off a James Bond vibe, if James Bond was crossed with The Lion King. I definitely recommend this if you’re a fan of Marvel movies, I recommend this if you’re looking for a more serious comic book movie, I just flat out recommend this movie. It’s a damn good film, and I hope that Marvel keeps making more films like this. So many action-comedies with a white male lead… it’s nice to get a more serious action-thriller with a black lead. Variety is the spice of life, and this movie here is just the kind of spice I like.

T’Challa is the king of Wakanda, and as a great man once said: “Hail to the king, baby.”

[daresplaining]

Jessica Jones Season 2 Trailer #2 Analysis

    We are rapidly closing in on March 8th and the long-awaited release of Jessica Jones Season 2! Netflix released yet another trailer today, which-- though more of an overview of Season 1 than anything-- still has us extra hyped. We’ll save our thoughts on that. For now, here’s our analysis of the second trailer!

    This trailer confirms what we’d been suspecting and hoping for-- Season 2 will be looking backward, delving into the mystery of Jessica’s origin story and the organization IGH that was introduced in Season 1. We also know that it will be stepping away from the comics and into largely uncharted territory. 616 Jessica got her powers from a canister of radioactive materials. Her situation in the show appears far more sinister. We know her origin is connected to Will Simpson’s, and possibly Kilgrave’s and Luke’s. If we were in charge, we would also connect it to Matt’s, and pull Danny in via an association with Rand Enterprises. But that’s just us. For now, we’re really excited to see how far the conspiracy stretches. 

    Appropriately enough, the trailer starts with a gruesome flashback to the accident that kill Jessica’s parents and brother. Clearly, this is trauma she’s still dealing with, underneath her newer Kilgrave-related pain. It also looks like a much more violent accident than was apparent from the flashbacks in Season 1, which is a interesting discrepancy... 

    A minor detail: Jessica’s origin accident was processed by Metro-General. This may not be significant, but it’s still intriguing, since the accident clearly didn’t happen in Manhattan.

    This is a nice interaction between Jessica and what looks to be the son of her new romantic interest. We love her tiny flattered smile-- an important reminder that some part of her does still want to be seen as a hero.  

    We love Jessica chilling in high places. 

    This trailer introduces several new characters-- one of them being professional competition. Our best guess is that he is a character unique to the MCU. His voiceover comments in this trailer suggest that he knows about Jessica’s powers (which isn’t surprising-- they were probably well publicized after her final battle with Kilgrave and the events of The Defenders, and we know she’ll be using them on him.) But could he also be connected to the mystery of her backstory?

    Look, it’s the bullet holes from The Defenders! This is a nice bit of continuity.

    In the amorphous world of superhero media timelines, it’s always refreshing to get exact time measurements. 

    Awww... Two points: 1. This is likely the same amusement park that Jessica will be visiting this season. (Nothing good ever happens at amusement parks. Nothing.) 2. Where is this photo? It doesn’t seem like something adult Jessica would keep on display, and Trish’s mother probably wouldn’t have it in her house. Is this from a flashback to Jessica’s childhood home? From Kilgrave’s modern recreation of it? From somewhere even more sinister?

    Oh no, tiny Jessica!

    Jessica and Trish wander into this creepy building...

...where Jessica gets jumped by a figure with short bushy hair...

    ...who might be this person. The subtitles on Netflix refer to her as “Dr. Hansen”. Obviously, our first thought was Maya Hansen-- the scientist who co-created Extremis-- but she already appeared in the MCU in Iron Man 3. Maybe this is a relative? It seems unlikely, but it’s a possibility worth considering. In any case, whether or not she has some basis in the comics, she clearly took part in whatever was done to Jessica.   

    We also now know that it’s Dr. Hansen who Jessica throws against the wall in the bar. Ouch.

    There has been so much resurrection in these shows, from the Hand and Harold Meachum to Frank Castle. The automatic reaction is to search for connections. But we’re positive that the Hand will not be cropping up in Jessica Jones, and while we were once convinced that Frank was connected to IGH, we’re not so sure anymore, given how isolated The Punisher was from the rest of the shows. This may be something new-- or at least, further development of something we haven’t seen much of yet.  

    Here we have a guy in what might be an ambulance, with their arm ripped off. This trailer introduces the specter of another IGH victim, who is implied to be out-of-control and dangerous. There were unsubstantiated rumors early in the season’s production that Typhoid Mary might be making her MCU debut in this show. While she’s traditionally a Daredevil character, we think this would be the perfect platform for her introduction, so we would love for this rumor to be true. For the moment, color us intrigued about this mystery threat. 

    We see other bits of what might be this same scene/event throughout the trailer: 

    Same guy, same ambulance? It’s also worth nothing that, since this is a stunt double, we can’t be 100% sure that this is Jessica...

    (“Ugh. Not again.”)

    And whether or not she was responsible for the actual murder (unlikely), she seems to get arrested for it. We see her in an interrogation room elsewhere in the trailer, which may also be connected.

    HELL YEAH! Of course, with Trish we are perpetually anticipating her big Hellcat origin. We don’t expect them to reveal that in a trailer (and frankly, we’d be disappointed if they did), but we’re super excited to see her kicking butt regardless.

    Obviously, Jessica is not the only one suffering from the events of Season 1. We’re eager to revisit Jeryn’s personal life in this show. Though her career is going some interesting places, and she puts on a professional, collected appearance in public situations, there is a lot she has to be working through right now.  

    To start, it looks like she has a new mystery girlfriend! We’re a little nervous about this, given Jeryn’s not-so-stellar treatment of her previous partners. But that may very well change after the nightmare of last season. 

    We talked about this clip in our analysis of the previous trailer, but here we’re interested in the voice-over, since “it takes a monster to stop a monster” has a whole bunch of fascinating implications. The language used frames this new unnamed threat as a counterpart to Jessica-- someone exactly like her, but gone horribly wrong. We’re sure, knowing this show, that this idea will be confronted and challenged, as will the notion of Jessica also being a “monster”. Her self-esteem is already shaky, and she has seen herself as a bad person since the Kilgrave incident, if not longer. Where will this revelation about her “monstrous” past take her self-image and her journey of psychological healing? There is a long literary history of explorations of “monstrousness” in female characters, and we’re very excited to see how the idea is handled in relation to Jessica and her sinister counterpart(s?).

    Nooooo, Malcolm! No idea what’s going on here, but we’re already upset.

    It does seem that Trish will be wielding a pistol this season. She also had a gun last season-- the tiny one Simpson gave her-- but she seems to have upgraded. 

    This seems highly unsanitary. 

    Jessica’s new boyfriend is another character who likely doesn’t come from the comics. At least, we can’t figure out who he might be if he does. IMBd, unofficial source that it is, tells us his name is Oscar-- and it’s worth nothing that around the time Marvel was publishing the original Patsy Walker comics, it also had a series about a character named Oscar. That would be an extremely obscure reference, but not out of the question.   

    And of course, the big shocker at the end. We’re sure that Kilgrave’s presence in this season will be relegated to vivid flashbacks and hallucinations. Bringing him back to life, for us, would sap all of the power from Jessica’s victory, thus weakening the entirety of Season 1. But we’ll have to wait and see... 

     Only two-ish weeks to go!

[49scribes]

Memories of the 2nd

Seven years old, on only your first Name as Bookman’s successor, and already your ever-growing perceptions of the world have been tainted a little blacker by the reality of war.

Your first Name then is Jona, which is ironic, because it brings to mind that one popular Christian story that people are so fond of repeating, and just like in that story, this is one massive whale of a world to be swallowed by.

You almost wonder at times if this was deliberate, some sort of sick joke on Bookman’s part, but the thought is likely as ludicrous as it is entirely false, and ultimately shaken away. Though in hindsight, you and him know the full cruelty displayed in each conflict, beforehand, there’s no telling how ugly it will get.

Regardless, you are now Jona, who, at seven years of age, has witnessed your very first war, seen your very first bloody battle, played your part in the very first of many medical tents you will volunteer in, and feinted at the sight of the very first, yet never the last, violent post-war suicide of a broken soldier.

Its unlike the old man to show such concern, but Bookman does take the time to talk with you, to make certain everything is alright, and to put to detached, textbook explanation of everything that happened and why.

You listen with keen, yet passive, attention.

At least… that’s how you attempt to appear. In reality, you are numbed to the deepest core with shock, your mind like a strainer, every word passing through like water between the cracks, leaving behind only the faintest drops of recollection.

It doesn’t escape Bookman’s eyes, and he’s quick to snap your attention back properly.

You have the sense to look ashamed. He has the sense not to scold you.

Instead, he acknowledges: It is a trauma. There is nothing invalid about it, but it is a matter to deal with none the less, and he has a few tricks on how to do so. Such tricks will not come immediately, but they will establish firmly with time and practice.

He invites you to sit with him, somewhere quiet. Undisturbed. You sit cross-legged, first without thought, but Bookman does as well, and he tells you to sit up straight. He shows you how to fold your hands, to close your eyes, to keep yourself postured upright instead of slumped.

Its meditation, a tool for the mind, simple enough anyone can do, but wholly and irreplaceably important. He shows you deep breathing, and focusing on all senses besides sight, and while you find yourself noticing the faintest sounds of birds and the wind with a new appreciation, he starts going into the battle and its aftermath.

Every detail. Every sight. Every smell. Every taste. Every sound. The man you saw gutted in the field. The man having a shattered limb cut away. The man who shot himself in the face.

Everything you don’t want to remember, he talks about in vivid, casual detail.

He tells you not to shut it out.

Focus on it all. Keep it sharp in your mind. Don’t let a single detail slip through and become forgotten.

Its hard.

Bookman knows its hard.

But you do as he says, even as tears flow unchecked down your face. Even as breathing comes in short gasps and hiccups. Even when a whine or whimper passes your lips, and you fidget where you sit because you don’t want to remember it.

Bookman is patient with you. Its a rare instance, but one you never forget. You’re only seven, he tells you outright, and your mind isn’t used to it yet. Its only natural that what you feel at everything is fear, but fear can be mastered. What’s more, being the age that you are, your mind is more easily and quickly adaptive, the adjustment easier to make than if you were older.

In short, you will learn to accept your role much more easily than someone older and more set in their ways.

Then, after all of this, he teaches you compartmentalization.

A Name for a bookman’s heir is not merely a matter of something to go by. A Name is an alias; an identity, but for you it is also another tool. A separation of experience and Self, and you, in a way, are two identities.

You are Junior, and you are also Jona, and you must figure out where the balance between those two lies. That balance, therein, is who will experience and store what.

Junior is permanent – or as permanent as any name will be, for one day too you will also cast that aside to become just Bookman – while Jona is temporary.

Junior exists to store what is most important. Junior is the core of all Names, and it is Junior who dictates who and what each Name will be. Junior must always – always – remain unmoved by what is in front of him, to be able to look at anything without flinching.

Each Name must follow certain rules set therein by Junior, but each Name will be different, created with different traits, and bears the brunt of all things shed as unimportant.

It is the Name which acts and reacts, in a manner appropriate to both the task at hand and satisfying the requirements of human interaction, and it is Junior who watches and evaluates but never becomes involved.

In a sense, Junior is the puppet master. The core who will always remain. The Names are only the puppets then, putting on a performance, and when that performance comes to its end, it becomes Junior’s job then to cut the strings for good, again, and again, and again.

Explained that way, it becomes easy to understand the expectations. A puppet without its strings never rises again, but the stage is still set for another to take its place.

Bookman spends hours talking you through each raw experience, unwavering through every one of your tears, shaky breaths, shifts of discomfort, but with each one, these reactions become fewer and fewer.

They are things which merely are.

Things which cannot be changed.

Things you will see time and again.

Things that you should never, as an heir to Bookman, look away from, and next time, you will be a little more prepared.

There comes a point when calm returns, when there’s a kind of detached peace as you envision these things, mentally sort them and tuck them away, and let them go.

Once Bookman is convinced you will be fine, he quietly gets up, and leaves, and you continue to meditate on everything until tiredness leads you to rest. Unsurprisingly, the sights haunt your dreams as nightmares.

The days following mark the end of this war, which you and Bookman arrived upon the tail end of. Though in meditation, detachment from the reality is easy, its less so in the waking hours when you help Bookman retrieve re-tellings from recovering and dying soldiers, though none of it is half as bad as the sight of them before they were treated.

There are moments – moments of youthful naivete – that you want to offer comfort in some form or other. Bookman allows it at the time, but only because such shows of childish compassion make gathering accounts easier. Later, he tells you not to get emotionally invested.

Don’t let feelings reach you, because once you do, that bias taints the records you are to gather. Its easy to feel drawn in by the plight of the wounded, to pity them as victims, but one must never forget that they too can be monsters on the battlefield, as much as anyone who tried to take their lives as well.

You spend much of these days off on your own, meditating, reflecting on all that you’ve seen, heard, and felt, and all that Bookman is trying to teach you. Bookman leaves you alone to your thoughts, but never unwatched.

Its not long before you and Bookman set off again, and in that moment that you do, you are no longer Jona, but merely Junior Bookman again. There’s hardly a difference, at the time. Nothing feels different between the two, and you wonder at the time if it should be.

Being two different people should mean that something changes, shouldn’t it?

But, looking back on it later, it will be evident that there was a change.

Reality and war is cruel, and without exception, takes no prisoners, if only in a figurative sense, because who one was going in is not who they are coming out, even as a simple observer on the sidelines.

Ultimately, Jona may not have been much of a Name at all, but Junior had certainly started to harden and become set in stone.

Though you were technically Junior for a year before that, you were so in namesake only, still not having begun your transition from when you used to be Sage Rookwood, the boy who came before the bookman, until that first look at a true battlefield.

Its thus that Jona may as well not have been a Name at all. Only in dawning your next name – Cole – a little more than a month later, that you first begin to make proper use of your Names.

You and Bookman walk for a long ways, following the long, ever ongoing trail of a railroad.

It would not be your first time seeing a train, though that first encounter had been something enticing and wonderful and you ate up every specific on how a train engine worked with the utmost fascination for modern technology. There were even a handful of instances where you rode on a train, unable to help but marvel at the passing scenery, the feel of the wheels rumbling underfoot, or the breeze coming in through an open window.

This instance is less than joyous.

You follow the railroad for days, watching with interest whenever a steam engine chugs by, until you and Bookman are somewhere deep, deep in the wilds, mountains and conifers surrounding you and your path as far as the eye can see, no civilization anywhere within sight. As the railroad twists through the trees like a snake, it disappears into a tunnel through the mountains, and waiting at the mouth of it is a halted train.

Though you never quite forget the sight of a battlefield, a month and a half is long enough for such remembrance to begin settling, no longer a constant on your mind, intruding every thought throughout every day in every moment. Especially with the mental exercises Bookman has been guiding you through.

As such, though nowhere near as shocking as that very first encounter, its jarring when the first sight you come to see is piles of uniformed bodies being offloaded from military train cars.

You don’t look away, though you could, but the sight turns your stomach. Its not like that field stained red, nothing quite so revolting, but there are so many.

And this war, Bookman tells you, isn’t likely to end in a matter of days like the last. Jona was your very first rudimentary test as a Bookman’s apprentice, but this will be where the trials truly begin.

You are stopped on the crest of the hill where the railroad meanders for but a moment, before Bookman resumes progress and you follow close behind. As you approach closer, there are crates, wagons drawn by horses, and more, and more, and more corpses.

At first they’re offloaded from the trains in piles, tall as those offloading them, and then lined side-to-side in rows on canvas sheets laid out on the dirt just shy of the tree line. At first, you and Bookman are barely noticed as the living dig deep, long trenches for what you’ll soon come to recognize as a mass burial.

Ideally, Bookman tells you, these men would all be returned home, or at the very least, given a plot in a formalized cemetery which could be easily visited. Most will simply be dropped here, lucky if the graves are able to be dug deep enough wild animals don’t smell and dig up the bodies. Probably only those of affluent backgrounds or esteemed military recognition will make it back to be buried and mourned properly.

Many of them, even their personal belongings, and the clothes on their back if those are still in good enough shape to salvage and reuse, won’t make it back, or be buried with them, instead becoming property of their country.

Then, Bookman goes about properly introducing himself to a man he recognizes as someone in-charge, based upon his dress and mannerisms, and the way others go about addressing him.

He offers you and himself to aid in odd jobs, such as bringing food and water to the soldiers and animals, in exchange for continued observation. You spend most of the day carrying bowls, buckets, and pots to and from, fetching whatever needs be delivered from one hand to another.

As you do, you and Bookman gather recounted tellings from the soldiers, much as possible. As an old man and small child, its easy enough to gather stories, though sometimes its more difficult to gather the full details yourself, as many of the soldiers hold back on details due to your youth.

Its no big deal, you tell them. No big deal, because you’ve already seen a battlefield. Already seen gruesome sights. Still, they aren’t completely willing to tell all that they saw to a child, sending you away in a huff.

When the train finally loads up and moves, you and Bookman travel with it, all the way to the front lines. In that time, you especially draw attention and become well known aboard the train, seeing as you are the only person there younger than fifteen, unmistakable due to your striking orange hair and eyepatch.

Bookman receives a great deal of pressures and scolding that he’s taking you along towards a war zone, where children should never go, but the old man takes it in stride, never losing patience.

You, on the other hand, become both self-consciously anxious and a little bit insulted. Bookman knows what he’s doing, you know even then, and you don’t need strangers disbelieving what you can handle and underestimating you.

You can handle it. That’s why Bookman brings you.

Gramps, after all, is infinitely wise. You trust him completely.

Your bitterness doesn’t go entirely unnoticed, but the old man cautions you to not be upset by it. There will always be those who doubt, and they are better off ignored.

You take that to heart. No point in listening to those who don’t know you anyway, right?

Within only a couple of days, the train reaches its destination, and its only another day or two by wagon before reaching the war zone.

The conflict, though not in full swing when you arrive, is definitely active. You can feel the shift in the group arriving fresh as they draw near, tension filling the air thickly, reflected in every cautious or otherwise rigid movement. There’s no gun fire or explosions, but there’s a sense of waiting, of a trigger just waiting to be set off.

The only question is who will make the first move.

Dug into the hillside are trenches, creating a maze of corridors through dirt and held together primarily by planks of wood roughly nailed together. Crates, rope, weapons, and ammunition all line the corners in high concentration, and there’s a certain fidgety, almost mechanical way that everyone moves about the space.

Its strange, and disconcerting. Hardly anyone moves with a sense of normalcy. Certainly no one is relaxed, even those who appear unbothered, or perhaps even happy, to be here. The air is faintly sour, but try as you might, you can’t pinpoint where exactly its coming from.

Mainly, now, while things are quiet, you take the time to wander the trenches, to make a mental map of where everything is in your head. You get met with a lot of looks, suspicious glances. More than once, someone makes a show of how you shouldn’t be there, who let this brat in here? Three of those times end in being marched to the commanding officer posted there, only to have them be told you are supposed to be there and to leave you be.

By day’s end, you learn you’re not very fond of touch, rubbing your sore upper arm where more than one man grabbed and dragged you along.

You also learn one other thing, something you’ll be foolish enough to almost forget on a number of occasions in the future, but never fully.

A bout of curiosity as to the other side, the enemy waiting in their own camp set-up not far away, overheard off of the lips of restless soldiers, leads you to try and climb up the side of the trench and peek your head out.

You don’t make it very far, because someone grabs the back of your clothing and yanks you down into the earth. Admittedly, you yell in surprise.

The guy who pulled you down gives you a stern lecture, cautioning to never poke your head over the sight barrier. He demonstrates – with a stick and a head-sized ball of cloth – just why that is.

No more than three seconds pass before a clear shot ring out, and the ball of cloth explodes as a bullet passes straight through it.

Snipers.

Many a soldiers’ death can be accounted for by new recruits playing lookie-lou, and getting their heads blown clear off before they can even pick up a gun.

That could have too-easily been you.

You thank him fervently, grateful for his interference that before had you baffled and annoyed. Certainly, there will be moments later you grow too curious for your own good, but for the time, you take the lesson to heart and don’t try again.

Days go by where nothing happens. Its a waiting game, but eventually the storm has to break, and when it does, everything is much closer than it ever was the last time.

More often than not, you find yourself covering your ears, just to shut out the din of guns firing, explosions hitting far too close, dust showering down all around. There’s blood and injuries, but not a lot at first. Most of the dead and injured are because of bullet wounds, but not slashed to bits like the last war’s battle.

There’s a time when you just sit, head between your knees and palms over your ears, and stare into open eyes of a man with a bullet through his skull, blood slowly trickling down his face in a barely noticeable stream. The sight is far more forgiving, even perhaps a welcome distraction, than the noise raging all around you.

Screams of dismay and fear, baneful cries, the constant pop of guns, the distant BOOM of canons, and the muffled PFFFFFMMP of canon balls creating craters in the earth. There’s explosions. At one point, grenades and fire-bombs make it inside the trenches, sending people scattering, both willingly and in pieces.

You almost become one of the ones blown apart, but Bookman, staying near the entire time, is quick to move and pull you along.

The explosions manage to flush a number of the side you’re hiding with out into the fields, looking for new positions to take cover. In looking for a new refuge, entire rows of soldiers are mowed down and fall, only a small number making it to safety alive, though few unharmed. Others, you notice, play dead or try to crawl.

Those flushed out into the fields didn’t stand a chance. Out of the frying pan and into the fire, as the saying goes.

Those foolish or desperate enough to crawl, who draw attention with movement, are further shot down. What little cover the fields provide, old logs or decaying wood structures, become ripped apart by bullets piece by piece, until there’s nothing adequate left, and those still cowering are pinned down with nowhere to go.

They’re dead. Still breathing, but no chance to remain that way, you realize. Its tragic, and sick, and there’s a feeling of sympathetic dread deep in your gut. All the same, there’s nothing that can be done, Bookman tells you in hushed tones.

You nod, but you and him are alone in this realization, because against solid reason, several soldiers holed up in the semi-safety of the trenches leap out, and rush to rescue them, firing as they sprint.

Part of you, for just a flicker, wants to believe they’ll make it, like some sort of heroic survival tale you might hear too often, everyone sighing with relief at the happy ending.

This is not that ending.

Body’s snap and jolt with a peppering of bullets, slumping to the ground gracelessly. There are caterwauls of grief, of rage, from those still standing, still running, still staying back and covering their charge with open fire, but its all for nothing in the end.

Just a damn waste of life that didn’t have to end.

Pointless.

And as the fighting drags on – pointless – and the death count continues to rise – pointless – and officers threaten to shoot their own men should they retreat – pointless – a desperate, detached question enters your young, shaken mind.

What is this all for?

[punyhero]

░░░░░  ＳＩＴ ＤＯＷＮ ＫＩＤＤＯＳ!

                                                               it'ร ʀɑɳt t i ɱ ɛ ▓▓▓▓▓▓▓

««« bυt blαckfiรн, wнy diddyα cнσσรє тσ fσяgєт мcυ!ρєтєя? »»»

the short answer is simple: bc i’m a BORING grouchy ass.

the long answer is down below: it’s like i’m boring but i have reasons, ok.

hello my dear followers! as you may have noticed by the funny letters in the beginning, it’s time for your friendly neighbourhood rper talk a little bit about something that bugs the shit out of her, first of all, i’d like for you to take into consideration the fact that i’m boring. like, i’m fucking boring and i tend to look closely to little mistakes that may or may not destroy my whole cinematic experience. second, i want y’all to know that i’m adhd and spider-man is a part of my life - in some instance, i’m him. and i’ve researched a lot about how adhders can get interested in things - there is something named hyperfocus, when you think A LOT about something, and a common nomenclature is special interest. so, before you say ‘’but bfish, you’re overreacting....’’ remember that this hero is one of the reasons i got over many hard times in my life. remember that.

so let’s go, get your popcorn, your soda, your spider-man comic (or avengers dvd, idk what’s your preference) and let’s swing right into the queens borough that is my hyperactive and passionate mind.

i hated homecoming. nowadays, i can say that with all the words. i hated homecoming. but, no, i don’t hate tom holland - in fact, i love him and he is an angel. i also met him and laura harrier in may and he signed my copy of spidey! the problem in the movie is far from him - he is a talented and sweet boy that deserves the world. but, unfortunately, his peter was poorly written. before you all start calling this brazilian ass names, let me explain the reasons why i think it was terrible. 

i. 〈〈 the complete erasement of uncle ben. 〉〉

no, my friends, that doesn’t mean that i wanted to see uncle ben dying and tom crying just as andrew and tobey did. no i didn’t want that, just as much as i didn’t want a flashback in batman vs. superman showing the death of the waynes. but the fact is, when a fact is important, you can’t simply forget that. i’m not saying i wanted a flashback, but i wanted ben’s death to have consequences on peter &&. may’s lives. honestly, i doubt the wise man even said to his nephew the most famous words in the story of comic books: 〈〈 with great power, there must also come great responsibility. 〉〉 in this interview, screenwriters revealed that the motto would feature, but in a peculiar way.

‘‘At the end when Happy [Jon Favreau] is in the boy’s room in school we had him say, ‘Oh yeah, Tony wanted me to tell you, “With great power comes… something, I forgot,”‘” Goldstein tells Yahoo Movies. “It was a little too meta.”

literally, they’d make happy tell peter the most iconic quote in the history of comic books in the wc and who’d be quoted? or almost quoted? yeah, tony stark. the new uncle ben. we see in the movie that ben’s death has llittle effect on peter’s maturity - he is still dumb and selfish, he still fucks things up without thinking in the responsibilities. mcu!ben is not the ben we know. it’s funny how they undeveloped the character that showed up in civil war: in that point, i was certain that tom holland would be way better than tobey once was as peter, and better than andrew was as spider-man. but he wasn’t, and that was a major turn down. in civil war, we see him fighting against experienced people, using his powers and saying basically this in other words. what happened to this peter? to the peter that showed traits of adhd and autism, to the peter that knew that with great powers, came great responsibilites, to the peter that loved may and didn’t want her to suffer. what happened?

ii. 〈〈 dad stark is the worst concept ever, fite me. 〉〉

i don’t get why people fetishize this shit so much. let me get into details over here: in case you’ve never read the comics, tony stark made peter’s life a living hell. why? because he betrayed him. tony, who peter was trying to see as a new sort of father, betrayed his trust and made him fight and stand for ‘’team stark’’, even though parker thought that shit wouldn’t happen. what happened to aunt may was tony’s fault. he manipulated peter, and, when the later noticed what happened and tried to back down, tony was furious. furious because he lost his puppet. steve said that tony would do anything in his power to take peter down after he openly exposed stark’s intentions in tv.

why is this relationship so terribly adapted? because rdj has charisma. people love him, people buy his merch. tony stark in the cinema is not the tony stark of the comics, he is robert downey jr. in a fucking iron suit. nothing more, nothing less. and the public loves that. tony stark, canonically, was about to be peter’s ‘’father’’, but he couldn’t. because you can’t replace a father like that! even more after the trauma that peter went through, being the cause of ben’s death. peter tried to find a father in tony, but it was impossible: tony used him, trashed him, manipulated him as a puppet, made his family a target of villains. 

there were hints of this relationship in civil war - like when tony threatens to blackmail him to aunt may and kidnapps him to fight among grown and trained adults. after all of that, stark left peter bruised and hurted in his legal guardian’s footsteps. he was done with him. and somehow, the fans didn’t get it. they love to victimize their dear tony stark - they can only see through black & white, forgetting that stark is not a hero, nor a villain. he is more of an anti-hero, when parker is a hero. the fans drawn fanarts, said he was son to stony/pepperony (oh my god idk which one of those is the worse). and marvel liked that - they wanted fanservice, and the studio gave them this.

the father to peter parker is and will ever be benjamin parker, husband to may parker (née reilly). the good and wise man who tried his best to deal with his teenager nephew, his stubborn and tempestuous nephew. the stans will come at me and say that it doesn’t matter anymore, ben is dead and tony is alive. but imma pull a quentyn martell here and ask you a thing: what matters the most? men’s life or their deaths?

iii. 〈〈 peter parker is team cap, period. 〉〉

from the day ben parker died and on, peter learned a lot of things. the youth promissed to always use his powers when he can, to act with justice. otherwise, the fault would be his. peter loves captain america, he is his idol - not iron man. may parker, his aunt, grew up in a generation when the sentinel of liberty was a symbol of resistance against nazi intolerance - and she most certainly passed it to peter.

he and tony may share technology talent, but steve and peter share much more. they share an idea - the idea of freedom, justice and good-will. it’s more than money, it’s a matter of honor. in the comics, he switched sides when noticed tony’s real intentions, and, taking the point that he said that beautiful quote in civil war, it’s more than a consumated fact that peter parker would be a member of team cap if he had had a choice.

peter parker didn’t know what he was fighting for, plus his appearence in civil war was a mere fanservice. it didn’t fit well, he was 100% not needed there. the hypocrite stark took him to a fight that wasn’t his to fight among trained adults AND, if that wasn’t already enough, didn’t tell him what he was fighing for. ‘’something about making cap mad.’’, i love how they explicitly throw the fact that tony manipulated peter in our face, and yet people deny to acknowledge this. your favorite character made a dick move, it won’t hurt if you admit that, friend o’ mine.

iv. 〈〈 aunt may is fucking hot. do you see it? SHE IS FUCKING HOT! 〉〉

yes, aunt may is hot and different from the version we had in the comics. is that a problem to me? hell, no. she is aunt may, not grandmom may. she can be young without any issue. the problem is the big deal they made of it. in the first scenes of the movie, we’re introduced to a said-nice joke of tony stark where he talked about may being sexy in front of her nephew. people don’t really get how stupid that is, right?

there are two moments more where i wanted to shove a knife up my ass. mr. dalmar saying, in spanish, how hot the descendant of italians is (oh my god that was so creepy WHY ARE YOU THIS WAY WHY GOD PLEASE WHY), and peter answering in an unusual &&. cunning way, asking how his daughter was (in spanish, of course. sex appeal, friends.) this is sexist as fuck. and also that ‘’larb’’ scene, i’m not even gonna get started because it’s so terrible. oh, you truly see how cool it is for a woman to be harrassed by many men because she looks hot. yeah, cool.

can you guys believe that aunt may was supposed to have a boyfriend in this movie? exactly. nine months after ben died. nine months. may dated a guy (that actually was really old and died) in the comics 100 issues after that event, and got married 500 issues later, to j. jonah jameson’s father, jj. she didn’t get over the loss of her husband that easily. no one does, unless you deeply wanted the person to die. now answer me, may (without aunt, cuz she is too young to receive this kind of treatment. have you ever imagined a hot aunt? unbelievable. she is just may.), did you want the love of your life to die?

v. 〈〈 progressive, but not so. 〉〉

queens is a diverse borough. i’ve read tweets of actual people that live there saying how there was only one white kid in a class of many students, or on how many filipinxs, latinxs & blacks over there. that is a thing i liked in the movie! it’s not the 60′s anymore, there has got to be non-white people in midtown. flash as a latino was quite nice, and so was liz. two charismatic characters and actors that i loved so much.

but the problem envolves ned &&. michelle, mj, whoever she is, i don’t care. ned is an amalgama of betty brant’s husband and hoblgoblin, ned leeds and miles morales’s best friend, ganke. he is the comic relief of the movie - the one that praises the hero, that wants to be like him. a movie that says that breaks a lot of stereotypes made a fucking poc fat character that is nothing but a comic relief. we don’t feel any character depth in ned, we don’t know anything of his family, he lives basically in peter’s function, the white standard boy being served by the poc fat boy. you get how progressive that shit is?

and also i’m going to touch a delicate topic over here: michelle. i’m not going to get in the merit wether she is mary jane or not, but i know one thing: she is a badly written stereotype. she is everything white straight sexist man think we, geek feminist women, are. she seems like she doesn’t take a bath, is always angry and grouchy. she bullies peter and stalks him, and, shockingly, even though zendaya was in every single piece of marketing and promotional tour, she had nothing in the movie, but four fucking minutes of ‘’empowering’’ jokes for the female viewers to ‘’identify’’ with. 

wonder why that’s this way? homecoming had eight screenwriters (that will, unfortunately, return to homecoming 2), and guess what? all of them are white men that see female nerds as nothing but a comic relief, right? that see feminists as grumpy and dirty. and i’d bet 10 good reais (brazilian local money) that she is gonna go through an awesome transformation to show female empowerment and date the protagonist. 

the name of the movie is spider-man: homecoming, but could be spider-man: hypocrisy.

vi. 〈〈 'nuff said. 〉〉

well, that’s it. i felt like i needed to take it off my chest, you know. as a spider-man fan, a lot of things in homecoming bugged me, and i disliked the movie so much. please, i ask you not to attack me. people are allowed to have different views from yours, that is ok. 

the conclusion of all this rant is that: tobey is my peter, andrew is my spider-man and tom is my idol as an actor. only that. the five reasons above are why i won’t include this mcu mess into my verses.