#my antiheroes

[f1cha0s]

My brand this year:

2023 opening credits

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

demanding a series in the same vein (heh, vein) as Dexter/Hannibal wherein a prolific serial killer plays cat & mouse with the police--except the serial killer in question is a preteen schoolgirl. this would make for compelling television due to the fact that middle school frequently causes girls to become deranged, and more media should reflect this

[hanavbara]

anti-hero 🌙✨  #TaylorSwift

[dazzlinhaze]

taylor, you'll be fine... 

[tolerateit]

Happy Birthday, Midnights / October 21, 2022

[havendance]

Requested by @averyho, here you go!

Robin III: Cry of the Huntress #1-6 — This is the big one and the beginning of theirrelationship

Showcase ‘94 #5, Robin #6, and Showcase ‘94 #6 — This is a three part crossover storyline

Helena and Tim have some brief interactions in Robin #17 as part of the War of the Dragons crossover (Detective Comics 685, Robin 17, Detective Comics 686)

She also pops in and out of Batman: Contagion, it’s sequel event Batman: Legacy in a vague teaming up with Batman & co way. I will specifically call out Batman: Shadow of the Bat #53 for having a like, two page Tim and Helena scene which is important. To me.

Detective Comics #703 — This one-shot has a Tim and Helena B-plot where they talk about how she stands

Robin #34 — Tim and Helena encounter each other as teacher and student

Robin Annual #6 — they team up and dress up as cowboys. Essential reading.

Everything after this is more scraps, sadly

They’re both in Batman: Outlaws, but I can’t say I recommend Batman: Outlaws any and also I don’t remember if they interacted much in it.

Tim plays a minor role in Batman/Huntress: Cry for Blood, vouching for Helena in issue #3 and shows up to bother her in issue #5. (Though honestly you should read Cry for Blood because it’s just good)

No wait, I lied. Read Joker: Last Laugh #5 and Robin #95 for the time that Huntress discovered Robin’s ‘dead’ body. (And you can also read Last Laugh #6 I guess if you want Dick beating the Joker to death, but there’s not really and Tim & Helena in it despite them both appearing)

Gotham Knights #38-40 — More scraps here, but there are some nice little bits and the storyline’s enjoyable enough. (even if it never gets followed up on ever… I’m not sore grumble grumble)

Batman/Superman #5 — There are a couple fun panels for them in here.

Yeah, sadly, I think that’s all I got.

[yannisdesk]

On Arcane & Antivillains

One thing I really enjoy about Arcane is how it handles antivillains.

For one, most of the characters (main ones) would actually fall into the category of antivillain at one point, or in the case of our two protagonists, become one. Arcane is arguably ripe with them.

An antivillain is essentially the opposite of an antihero. Simplified, antiheros do good things out of selfish or questionable motives, antivillains do things that are objectively bad or evil, but for noble reasons or for a greater cause. Another term for them is "sympathetic villain" however that term is too vague (there are villains out there who are sympathetic, but are none the less traditionally evil and therefore do not qualify as antivillains), and "antivillain" is a much better term mirror to "antihero." A common thread I've noticed among antivillain characters is some level of a Machiavellian approach to achieving their goals - the ends justify the means type of philosophy is something you'll always find characters that fit this category. At the very least, they dabble with it. In their eyes their actions are always justified because they're fighting for a good cause.

To put things into perspective, I'll use two examples. Harley Quinn shifts around, but she is frequently an antihero, take her depiction in both Suicide Squad movies. She does take down bad guys, however she's not doing so out of a sense of altruism, but to get a reduced prison sentence. Very cut-and-dry example of antiheroism.

On the flip side you have Magneto. Now from what I've seen (I've dabbled in the comics, but haven't dived in all the way) in the comics he gets very dark with the antihuman action. But in the Xmen movies, he definitely does some down right villainous stuff, but his intention remains the same - he wants mutants to live in a world free of bigotry and he's willing to do anything necessary to achieve that, including committing atrocities.

Now if this sounds very confusing to you and you swear you've heard these terms interchangeably or that you can think of several characters that are labeled as type A when they should be type B or vice versa, that's pretty normal. These aren't archetypical heroes and villains we're talking about, so it can be hard to categorize them, and honestly most characters in general will go back and forth or shift at one point or another, so all you need to know is that those definitions are the ones we're working with in this post.

Here are the characters from Arcane that I think suit this label, and others that I think will.

Disclaimer: this is not me hating on the characters. I love all of these characters for this layer to their character. This is not a "oh, look, this character is bad actually," post. If anything, consider it a celebration of their gray morality and how well its explored in the show.

Silco

Duh. Silco is objectively pretty evil. Setting up a drug empire that destroys your own people, getting in-cahoots with corrupt cops, killing kids, and aiding in destroying a young girl's mental health is multiple levels of foul. However, for him, all of this was part of an elaborate plan to liberate Zaun, which is being aggressively oppressed by Piltover. They were necessary sacrifices made to the cause, and worth it because it will bring forth better days for him and his people. Now obviously, a lot of his actions definitely have to do with his own ego, however the only time Zaun isn't prioritized is when it comes to Jinx, who is like a daughter to him, and even that realization comes to smack in the face late in his arc.

Sevika

I'd argue she's even more noble than most since she truly is rooted in the cause for Zaun. Not only is she willing to do some pretty bad things for the "greater-good", she's even willing to betray people who she views as unfit or incompetent. And what's even more telling is that she doesn't do this for power (which is arguably a part of Silco's prerogative). Sure, she's his #2, but he doesn't exactly show any favoritism. And Sevika seemingly isn't even trying to become the new leader of Zaun after Silco's death from the season 2 clips, but will support Jinx, despite the fact that she probably could dethrone her. She's no true blue hero, but she's not a megalomaniac either.

The Entire Council of Piltover (Minus Mel & Jayce)

As obnoxious as they are, none of them are mustache-twirling villains. As we see with characters like Sheriff Grayson (not a council member, but they share the same sentiment), they legitimately think they're protecting the city with their neglectful leadership and oppression of Zaunites. Yes, this includes Heimerdinger, who seemingly only started caring about Zaun once he was booted out of the council, so that places him firmly in antihero territory in my opinion.

Why did I exclude Mel and Jayce? Their plots are actually upward in terms of morality, especially Jayce who by the end is closer to being a traditional hero by prioritizing peace and progress over the status quo or war, and actively makes the first move of trying to right Piltover's wrongs. Mel's arc has also moved this direction as well, as she went from arguing that Jayce and Viktor should build Hextech weapons in case of war with the Zaunites, to fully embracing peace. You could argue that Mel wanting the weapons means she was at some point an antivillain, and I might agree, but as it stands, she's firmly in the clear.

So, why are the rest of the council still considered antivillains? Honestly, we just don't know much about their motivations to say. They ultimately did a good deed in voting for peace, but you know, one good deed doesn't wash-out the bad and vice versa. They're not even on thin ice for me, they're still fighting for the surface.

Marcus

Questioning your actions does not mean you can't be an antivillain, and Marcus is a good example of that. He's is kind of like Caitlyn if she were way less compassionate and very incompetent. Marcus does not think his actions are evil, according to show runners he only places Vi in Stillwater to protect her from Silco; he gets involved with Silco because he wants justice for the building explosion and it goes out of hand. That said, he also threw a child into a dangerous prison with no charges and with the intention of keeping her there for life, and worked with a kingpin who was actively antagonizing his own people while reaping benefits from an abusive system. So yeah, Marcus falls more into being an antivillain than full-blown villain, he's still firmly an antagonist though.

Ambessa

I know it's very popular in the fandom to call Ambessa a traditional bad-guy type of villain, but she is actually very nuanced. For one - she does not see her actions as evil, nor are her motivations behind doing them rooted in it. Ambessa, as she states in Mel's flashback, was raised in the Noxian way. Her grandfather literally made her search the dead bodies of the people they massacred when she was a youth, and she was indoctrinated to believe that this was in the best interest of her family and the Noxian people. By showing strength and ruthlessness, she's telling the rest of the world: "Stay away from House Medarda and Noxus." Hence, why Kino's death wrecks her, because she values herself over how effective she is at warding people off from messing with her family. Her main reason for getting involved with the war between Piltover and Zaun will 100% be because Mel's life was nearly lost due to Jinx's bomb, and this is coming straight off of her son's death mind you. So, while Ambessa may definitely be one of the most ruthless people on this list, she is not at Palpatine levels of evil yet, not by a long shot.

Jinx

You guys saw this coming, right? This barely needs an explanation. Jinx grew up in the Lanes, was a victim of Piltover's oppression multiple times throughout her youth, was willing to fight for their freedom as seen in episode 2, and in the end, that desire, along with her being adopted by Silco, manifested in her doing multiple acts of violence, including terrorism against Piltover, which frequently hurt people who weren't guilty of anything. (No, blowing up the building in episode 3 doesn't count as one of her evil deeds because it was an accident.) We understand completely why Jinx does what she does, even though it hurts to see her slip farther and farther into this mindset.

Vi

Way more subtle (for now) but I'd argue she's there come episodes 8 and 9. Hell, you could argue that her arc is about her sense of morality breaking down due to realizing how impossible the situation between Zaun and Piltover is, and embracing an "ends justifies the means" type mindset that Vander tried to sway her against back in episode 2. Wanting to stop a kingpin from using this new dangerous drug to destroy your city and sister? A noble cause, indeed. Not really caring that (or being passive over the fact that) children die in process because of their approximation to said bad guy? Yikes. [EDIT: Since we're on this topic: here's a link to where I explored this aspect of her character. I did this a while ago, but I thought it best to include it here too for added context). Now, I know what some of you are going to say - how is this any different from, say, Steve Rogers telling Wanda Maximoff that sometimes there's collateral damage when doing hero work? The difference is that Steve didn't argue that those people had it coming because they're associated with the bad guys/or in their way, which Vi does. That's some dangerous conviction right there, and we'll probably see that elaborated on in season 2 given that she's becoming an Enforcer which is a position that lends itself to abuse of power (and if it goes anyway like things do with her game counterpart, she will engage in police brutality and not see an issue with it, but given that Arcane's Vi is way more well, nuanced, than her game counterpart I don't think it will go on for long). While we're on the topic of Vi, according to her prison records, she had a notorious reputation while doing time to the point that I find it funny Silco didn't put 2-and-2 together that the girl with short pink hair beating the shit out of and attempting to murder all of his goons that went to Stillwater was possibly the same girl that wiped the floor with those same goons the night Vander died.

Potential Antivillains of Season 2:

These are characters that I predict will become antivillains at some point during season 2 based off of where their season 1 arc left and clues from season 2 teasers and clips. This is not me saying for sure this will happen, only a prediction. But if it does come true, I will gladly collect $5 per accurate plot point.

Viktor

Two words: glorious evolution.

We all love Viktor. We all love good-guy Viktor, and we will also more than likely love not-so-good-guy Viktor due to how complex that arc will be. If it will go anything like his game-lore (which I suspect it will) his noble intentions will never leave him, just simply evolve to include some less-than-heroic actions and justifications. He still wants to improve the undercity, and well, humanity overall, with hextech, motivated by the injustices he's been put through his own life and his illness, but he will go about it in some very unorthodox ways, and his arc in Arcane is about him confronting if he wants to "evolve" his morality for the sake of his ultimate goal, which is progress. Viktor would definitely agree with the sentiment expressed by Gloria Steinem (character depiction, not a real quote) in Mrs. America - "Revolutions are messy, people get left behind."

Caitlyn

I'm pretty sure she actually will become apart of the antivillain roster in season 2, but noting is for certain. Caitlyn is perhaps the saddest version of this there is, because we see where she starts out. She doesn't want to be like everyone else in her circle, she tries to break free and be better. She wants to do good by both Piltover and Zaun. She has hope, gentleness, and doesn't place herself above even those who occupy the lowest levels of Zaun. She puts herself, her status, and her life on the line to discover the truth, and comes out her time with Vi steadfast in wanting to help heal Zaun. She can be a little naive and ignorant, but she never does so with malicious or ill intent. She is the kindest person in Arcane.

But, given that her mother was killed in a terrorist attack set off by the new Head Zaunite in Charge, things will change. As we see, Caitlyn becomes a sheriff on the Enforcer squad, and now her goal is no longer to sow peace between Zaun and Piltover, it's to avenge her mother by assassinating Jinx. Of course, this will be due in part that Caitlyn thinks snuffing Jinx out will solve the problem, which will be ironic and hypocritical because she told Ekko that getting revenge on Silco won't solve anything in Zaun, but now that she's in the same predicament, the tables have turned and now diplomacy is off the table. She still has that hero-complex, as she lives by the lessons of Sheriff Grayson, but now it's with a twist. The idealistic Caitlyn who believed in giving peace a chance through reform is gone, and she now believes that there's little to no cost too great for her to achieve this, even if that (possibly - again season 2 hasn't come out yet, so we shall see) means hurting innocent Zaunites. And what's scary is that Caitlyn has the intelligence, dedication, talent, and efficiency to pull it off. Truthfully, I believe we won't just be getting Sheriff Caitlyn in season 2, but also Dictator Caitlyn.

[luxthestrange]

BNHA Incorrect quotes#27 Mcdonalds

It's Pretty obvious in the Todoroki household that lil' sho has a big crush on a certain green-haired freckled boy...but you and Fuyumi managed to get everyone in the house pressure shoot on telling them that he will come on his own...which he did-

Shoto: H-how do you ask someone out? Anti-Hero!Y/n: Well, first- Enji: Don't ask them, they asked me out in a McDonald's parking lot Touya: ...And you said yes?

Part 5 of:

[hyacinthsdiamonds]

I know we joke Lawrence Stroll is basically a bond villain, but my god, I have to take off my hat to him. Man joined this sport purely to support his son's career and dreams, and has seemingly just managed (not officially confirmed as yet) to nab the key to achieving those dreams in certified freaking car genius Adrian Newey, the man behind car designs that won 6 constructors' championships, 7 drivers championships, and earned 120 podiums to date for red bull alone. He's won 12 constructors' championships in total with 3 different Formula One teams (red bull, williams & mclaren). And now, he's apparently chasing Max too. I have to admire this man's sheer commitment, I now need him to win (sign newey & Max when the time comes) so badly now to see him rub the entire paddocks nose in it lmao.

[aingeal98]

It's about Bruce not being able to love himself and Cass coming along as the idealized version of what Bruce wishes Batman could be (Not to be confused with Dick as Nightwing which is the idealized version of what Batman could never be) and Bruce being so excited and delighted and willing to pour so much love and trust into Cass and then being hit in the face with the fact that all his own flaws still exist even in this "perfect" mini me, they're just more intense to compensate for the intensity of her heroism. You cannot be Batman without the survivors guilt, without the value of every human life no matter how extreme, without the hours of pushing yourself to ridiculous limits and self harming to make yourself a more effective weapon against evil. And he can either accept these as downsides that must exist for Batman to be perfect or he can try and steer Cass down a healthier path. He has to choose the person or the mission and it's one thing to make that choice for yourself and another thing to enable someone to dehumanize themselves to the same degree. He'd never want anyone else to be like him that's the whole point. But she's already there and she wants it more than anything and she views Batman as salvation instead of a curse so what's the right choice? What can he do to help? Perfect for a year or mediocre for a lifetime?

[readerconfused]

People with crushes on Luke are all "i can fix him" you guys are so cute, if Luke and i were a couple it would be "i would easily throw you off a cliff if necessary" or that audio "if you were my wife i would put poison in your coffee" "if you were my husband i would DRINK IT"

[rouge-the-bat]

shadows edge is my favorite kind of edge, but some people cant get it right. you cant make it a generic edge. it cant be half assed, and you certainly cant make it ironic. you cant hold back, you gotta put your whole pussy into making it early 2000s edge. you need the full undiluted essence of an emo anime character crying blood with one angel wing and one demon wing and linkin park lyrics around it.

[sisaloofafump]

Stephanie Brown my BELOVED. Suit is a mixture of like seven different ones.

[image ID: drawing of Stephanie Brown ominously walking through pink smoke saying "Heh, remember how you just called me a bad guy? You're about to find out exactly what that means." She has her hood up, Spoiler face mask on, breathing apparatus, and her general outfit is similar to the contemporary Batgirl one. End ID]

Dialogue, sketch, and other inspiration scene below

[Image ID 1: lineart of the drawing. It is full of crosshatching and was done on paper, then scanned in for later colouring.

Image ID 2: a panel from Batman: detective comics #946 with Stephanie in spoiler gear and an intimidating crouched pose saying "Sorry Batman, but this isn't how the world is supposed to be, and I think I'm the only one left who can fix it".

Image ID 3: a group of panels from Batgirls #5. Stephanie is posed reading to fight and facing a villain. She says "Heh, remember how you just called me a bad guy? You're about to find out exactly what that means."

End ID]

[miaiminnis]

i am the regret of a GOD

prints available at MiaMinArt on etsy

[fauvester]

nicktoonsunite's tigerghost haunting my brain

[avam-antihero]

oh second no way you are fatherless also..

high five?