#my thoughts let me tell you them

[my-wife-doesnt-approve]

Sometimes you see something that is such an object, you cannot help but be stopped in your tracks by the mere knowledge of its existence. You, object d'art have changed me in ways I cannot articulate.

In any case, this is on eBay rn

[my-wife-doesnt-approve]

It's back! This post!!

@myclericalromance - I quote this fucking post All The Time now when I'm choosing to suffer for no reason and need to get knocked out of it. Cold? Pause what you're doing and get a sweater. Burnt the toast? Just get another slice it's fine.

This is rewiring my brain and I love it.

Ty!!

i went to a tiny counterserve diner once and accidentally poured sugar instead of salt all over my hashbrowns and was eating them sadly anyways. the waitress took them away and started making me another one and I tried to protest, but she just snorted and said "we're not catholic here". now every time i'm doing something painful out of obligation i think about how that is not repenting, this body is not a catholic establishment, there is no nobility in suffering.

[thinkingofmikey]

There's a dark pit in me. Sometimes, it feels like a black hole, like a force of nature that has intense gravity, threatening to swallow anything that comes close, thoughts, light, me. That I'll be trapped in its darkness, lost. That me, whatever me is, won't be able to escape, and I'll just be the darkness instead.

It feels empty, like a void, like a hole that goes down and on forever, bottomless. That no amount of throwing things in there will ever fill it up. Sometimes it feels like an echo, like thoughts get close to it and get distorted, bouncing back to me all different and wrong. It's the source of all those terrible fears, maybe it is fear, or loneliness. It's self-loathing and self-hated. Unkindness. It spawns every dark narrative whispered when things are too much or too hard: "you're not good enough" "you'll never be good enough". "No one will ever love you", "you are unlovable". "You have done terrible things" "you are unforgivable". "Even the people who should have loved you unconditionally beat you, neglected you, turned your own blood against you, cast you out". "You deserved it", "it was your fault". "I wouldn't hit you if you were a good girl".

The fear of the fear gives it gravity, turns it from a void to a black hole, the fear of getting close to it pulls you in against your will. Sitting quietly near it, feeling it hollow out my chest, push a lump into my throat and air from my lungs, makes it both overwhelming and manageable. Reminds me that it doesn't have gravity per say, that it won't pull me in.

Trying to avoid it distorts life, too. Takes energy and vitality away from living, just to try and put a railing around it. Trying to avoid it curves every path such that they always end up next to it, and usually when you least expect it. A stray thought and you're right next to it, with its echos in the dark, telling you what a piece of shit you still are.

In therapy today, I sat near it. Breathing. Not letting panic creep in. Sat near it and didn't try to push it away or lock it up somewhere. Sat near it, saying nothing, so there were no unkind echos. Sat near it, and felt the space get a little larger.

Trauma is exhausting, a constant battle under the surface, against yourself, against the dark. Most of the time, these days, I feel like I'm winning, like I have more resources and tools to cope, to be kind and effective, to not believe the echos.

But watching Good Omens has shaken some things loose, rattled them around. When Crowley says, "Unforgivable, that's what I am", the void screams, "me too! I, too, am unlovable! Cast out! My creators didn't care for me, either!" Trauma is lonely, at its core, isolating. Having a mirror held up to it has been good... but hard.

It looks like I have a lot of sitting next to a dark pit, not falling in, and just breathing, in my future.

[one-chaotic-neautral]

Arcane ships ranked, for fun

The main ships and some rarepairs I've found, I like pretty much everything in the first 4 rows. I probably missed some but idk what they are and I'm too lazy to add more rn.

feel free to add your thoughts or ships but again its just for funsies :)

[xxplastic-cubexx]

your comic of erik "kidnapping" charles is living rent free in my head... I can't stop thinking of a scenario where somebody didn't get the memo about the vacation/kidnapping thing they've got going on and bursts into erik's Evil LairTM of the week to rescue the poor professor only to be mentally scarred at finding him making out nasty style with magneto

i cant stress enough how fast i went to draw this as soon as i got the chance god help any new x-man to the team

[my-wife-doesnt-approve]

There are no words for how much I love this.

I listened to this album a thousand times on CD, it was one of the first CDs I ever got. I was probably about 11, definitely in jr high, so the album would have been 3 or 4 years old at that point. This is exactly right for it's 30 year celebration. Punk AF

Green Day “demastered” their 1994 album Dookie into 15 “obscure, obsolete, and inconvenient” formats, like wax cylinder, Fisher Price record, Teddy Ruxpin, and player piano roll. This is amazing.

[unclewaynemunson]

Alt version of this post bc too many people asked for both <3

It's Saturday night and, like almost every Saturday night, Eddie wishes he didn't have to be at some jock party. The flashing lights, the scent of cheap mixed drinks, the incredibly mediocre loud music... And worst of all, the fucking jocks. Everywhere.

'Eddie!'

He looks up to find Steve, with a dopey smile on his face, basically skipping towards him and throwing his arms around his neck. Oh. He didn't know Steve still went to parties like those. Hadn't seen him at any of them in a while. But as soon as he gets wrapped up in an enthusiastic full-body hug, he decides there's one jock, and one jock only, that he doesn't mind running into at those parties.

'Eddie, what're you doin' here?' There's an unfocused look in his eyes and he wobbles on his legs a little bit, grabbing tighter onto Eddie for support. The touch burns through Eddie's t-shirt and he tries to ignore the shiver running down his spine.

'I didn't know you liked parties!' Steve drops his voice, slurring: 'I thought you hated the jocks.'

Eddie can't help but smile. 'I hate all jocks but one, big boy,' he tells Steve. 'Not here to party, only to get some cash.' He rattles with the metal lunchbox in his hands to illustrate his point. 'Can you let me go now so I can get on with my business, pretty please?'

'Noooo,' Steve says with an exaggerated pout. 'I'm too happy you're here! Dance with me!'

Eddie chuckles. 'I don't think you're in any state to dance right now. Jesus, Stevie, I don't think I've ever seen you this wasted before. Thought you were planning to pick up a girl tonight?'

'I was,' Steve says, suddenly sounding oddly serious. 'But it doesn't matter. Just needed to forget. The rum helped, too.' He frowns. 'Til you showed up.'

'Forget what?' Eddie asks, trying to make sense of this drunken string of words.

Something happens; something that's been happening quite often lately. Steve's eyes flash downwards, just for a second, right to where Eddie's lips are.

Eddie's heartbeat involuntarily picks up speed.

'What did you need to forget, Steve?' Eddie asks again.

'Can't tell you,' Steve mumbles so softly that Eddie can barely make it out over the loud music. 'I don't wanna make you feel guilty. I'm not judging you, y'know. 'S fine.'

He abruptly lets go of Eddie and takes a step away from him, stumbling right into some girl who pushes him back with an annoyed scoff; if Eddie weren't still standing right behind him, he would've fallen on his ass for sure.

'Alright, you're not making any sense tonight, big boy, but I can't in good conscience let you stay here by yourself. How 'bout I'll drive you home?'

Eddie glances at his watch. If he hurries, he can probably still be back to do what he came here for before the good part of the party is over. He does kinda need the cash.

'Can't,' says Steve. 'Can't go home with you.' Something in his voice is breaking and suddenly there are tears in his eyes, and Eddie still doesn't understand what's wrong; he feels like he's overlooking something huge, something that should be obvious.

'Let's just go outside to talk, then?' he suggests.

'Can't. Dance with me, Eddie.'

But when Eddie starts gently tugging Steve towards the open door leading to the garden, Steve easily lets himself be led outside. He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath when the cool night air reaches his lungs, as if one gulp of fresh air will instantly make him sober up. But he's still swaying on his feet, making Eddie grab onto him tighter.

Eddie likes to think of himself as moderately strong, but unfortunately, hauling 180 pounds of muscled jock around is starting to take its toll on him. He spots a bench in a secluded corner of the garden and guides Steve towards it.

'This better?' he asks.

'Yeah,' Steve breathes out. Even now that they're both sitting down, Steve keeps clinging onto him. 'Look at the stars, Eddie.'

Eddie looks up at the scattering of lights twinkling far above them - but he can feel Steve's eyes still burning into his face.

When he directs his gaze back to the guy sitting next to him, Steve's face is even closer than before. The starlight is reflected in his hazy eyes, tiny specks of silver hidden in various shades of brown and black.

'I wish I could kiss you,' Steve whispers, looking at Eddie with nothing but admiration behind that glassy drunk gaze.

Eddie almost forgets to breathe. He knows that it seemed like he and Steve were headed exactly toward something like this for a while now, but he still can hardly believe that it is real. That Steve Harrington is really looking at him like he's just as precious as the stars in the sky above them.

He brings up a hand, gently caresses Steve's soft cheek.

'Maybe you don't have to wish,' he whispers back, unable to stop his eyes from flashing towards Steve's beautiful lips for a moment. 'Tomorrow. When you're not drunk anymore. If you still remember this.'

'No.' Steve shakes his head, so fiercely it makes his hair flap in all directions and his complexion at least two shades paler. 'Can't.'

'Why do you keep saying that, Steve?' Eddie asks softly.

'Cause.' For a moment Eddie thinks Steve is gonna grab his ass, but then... he randomly frees Eddie's handkerchief – the one with the skulls – from his back pocket.

'Cause of the Russians.'

Eddie can only stare at him in confusion.

'They tied me up,' Steve all but whispers. Eddie hates how small and broken his voice suddenly sounds.

He has always known – broadly speaking – about what happened to Steve and Robin miles beneath Starcourt last year. He's never actually heard Steve talk about the details, though. All he knows is that he and Robin were captured by Russian spies and somehow made it out alive. He could always see how difficult it was for Steve to talk about it whenever it came up, but he never wanted to pry. And now here they are, at some goddamn high school jock party of all places, and all of a sudden Steve willingly brings it up.

'I was with Robin,' Steve continues, still in that scared and broken voice. 'And they tied us to a chair. We couldn't move. And they – they hurt me. They hit me. 'Til I was bleeding all over. I thought I was gonna die. Robin thought I was dead.'

'Jesus Christ, Steve,' Eddie breathes out, tightening his grip around Steve's torso.

'So I can't,' Steve mumbles, holding up Eddie's handkerchief as if it's some kind of logical explanation for whatever it is he's trying to tell Eddie.

'Wh- What?'

'I know what it means, Eddie,' he says, as if he's even remotely making sense right now. 'You know John?'

'Who the hell is John?' Eddie only keeps finding himself more and more lost in this conversation.

'My cousin,' Steve says, like it's obvious, like he's ever talked about some cousin named John to Eddie before. 'The one in New York. He knows all about that shit, right? He sends me the good magazines sometimes when my parents aren't home. That's how I know.'

'Know what?'

Steve only waves around with that stupid handkerchief again.

'You're flagging, aren't ya? You like pain. Like BS... BM...'

Eddie feels his jaw drop.

'What the fuck are you talking about?' he asks. 'It's – this is a metal thing. It looks metal. I literally have no idea what you're – flagging?'

Now Steve's face finally mirrors the confusion Eddie has been feeling for the past ten minutes.

'Are you serious?' he asks, for one second showing more clarity in his eyes than Eddie has seen all evening.

Eddie nods.

'So it's not...' Steve stops himself, swallows, frowns. 'You're not into, like, hurting people and shit?'

And finally, it all clicks together in Eddie's mind: the repeated chorus of I can't, the story about the Russians, the goddamn handkerchief... Flagging. BDSM.

'Why the hell would I get off on hurting you, Steve?' is all he can get out of his mouth.

And Steve honest-to-Satan starts giggling; it sounds so relieved that Eddie kinda feels like giggling too, scary metal image be damned.

'I dunno, it's more common than you think,' Steve mumbles. 'I wouldn't judge you, alright? But I knew I could never give you that. No matter how much I like you. And then you'd get bored of me.'

'Oh, Steve,' Eddie whispers out. 'You don't need to worry 'bout that, I swear. For all I care, we can have the most vanilla sex in the world forever. Or never have sex at all. As long as it's with you... I'm good.' Eddie cringes as soon as the words leave his mouth: it sounds too cheesy, too sincere. He kinda hopes Steve will have forgotten this particular part of their conversation tomorrow morning.

But Steve doesn't look at him like he thinks it's stupid at all: his eyes are wide and he's smiling a soft smile.

'You sure? You won't get bored?'

Eddie chuckles. Now that he's being too goddamn cheesy anyway, he might as well double down on it. 'I can't imagine getting bored of getting to hold this body in a million fucking years. In any way you'll have me.'

Steve heaves out a relieved sigh before he buries his head against Eddie's chest.

'Can I bring you home, now?' Eddie asks.

There's a twinkle in Steve's eyes when he lifts his head again.

'Ooohhh... You wanna have the most vanilla sex in the world with me now?'

A chortle escapes Eddie's lungs.

'Um, maybe tomorrow, when you're not drunk off your ass,' he answers with a wink. 'For tonight, just lemme get you to bed, 'kay?'

'Okay, big boy,' Steve answers, and Eddie can't help but laugh before he presses a kiss against Steve's forehead.

[dizzybizz]

sleepy gill and gill with the bubbled evil cat

[yourlocalbug]

No one wants to be the one to bite the hand that feeds, but when that hand beats, well, someone will have to take that mantle.

I have so many feelings about syo and toko. More art and a closeup under cut

In love with these two and all the trauma they slog along with them. It's something about how syo's sole aim is to protect toko, and if that means taking the pain, taking the hate, and taking the jobs that need doing, then that is what syo will do. It's something about how toko hates syo, blames syo, hides syo. It's something about how syo accepts it because it's his job after all. I think they both need therapy.

Id like to think that when all is said and done syo gets to experience a life that isn't just brutal erm, "task management" (yk. murder.), and toko gets to live a life that's not just hiding in fear of yourself. They should both get to be happy, I think.

[wickjump]

im gonna start posting fanfic recs btw whenever i find good ones. both here and my (awfully barren) 18+ account. because there are so many good fics out there with so few hits and fewer kudos and sometimes no comments period and it SUCKS because i REALLY LIKE THEM A LOT.. and i hope that by linking them here and yelling at everyone to COMMENT DAMMIT they might actually do it

seriously though any comment means a lot. most people who read a fic don’t even give a kudos. even if the fic wasn’t top tier, if you didn’t dislike it, hand over some kudos!! and if you liked it, comment!!!! even if the comment is one singular heart emoji it will be appreciated. if the comment just says “great fic!” the author will be happy. your comment doesn’t have to be this long winded gushing or analysis.

so many authors quit writing or lose motivation because the comments are few and far in between or just sometimes nonexistent. trust me when i say authors don’t care about how long or cool or smart sounding your comment is i promise!!!

i hope that mmmaybe recommending fics and telling people to comment might help fics i really like get more support maybe. and i, points at you reading this, hope that you will listen!!!at least a little….at least sum kudos….

[forcedhesitation]

astarion origin playthrough worth it just for all the extra moments where he does the "sad wet cat" face

[justl-12]

Hey, I'm in love with your Lumiere and Nero arts, so if you're still open to requests can we have something for them both? :D

I made the mistake of listening to 'time will change you' by the crane wives, while drawing these two and now i cannot get them out my head

[thinkingofmikey]

Shut up. I'm not crying, you're crying.

Hanif Abdurraqib interviewed by Ruth Awad: Joy Is Not Promised to You

[necrotic-nephilim]

@sasheneskywalker i love when you enable me to ramble about things because oh my god do i have thoughts.

so recently, i made a post discussing the phenomena of DC x DP and DC x MLB crossovers and why they exist and part of that post was discussing how largely speaking, at least half, if not more of the Batfamily fandom doesn't read the comics. if they interact with canon DC material, it's adaptations that are their own sequestered universes and oftentimes not remotely comic accurate or seeking to be. the most obvious example is the Young Justice cartoon. i'm adding a cut to this post because it just got so long i'm so sorry.

a lot of times, when people are discussing the "why" of this oversaturation of fanon-only fandom, they blame Wayne Family Adventures. and i think, to a point, i agree WFA is responsible for a boom in this fandom. but as someone who's been in the fandom long before we had WFA, to me it's the other way around. WFA was DC's way of meeting the demand for this easy-to-get-into, easy-to-consume content about the Batfamily that predicates itself on the comics just enough to be vaguely the same characters, but has a more sitcom, slice-of-life sort of vibe so DC could profit off of this section of the fanbase that otherwise wasn't consuming its primary material. and well, it's definitely worked. not only that, but i have a weird theory that the decline in the MCU also led to the rise in the Batfamily fandom. when you consider the fan content that made the MCU popular within fandom, it's that 2012 "they all live in Avengers Tower and Thor is eating poptarts and Clint is in the vents and there are movie nights every Friday" sort of vibe. those were the fics that were a hallmark of the fandom. and as the MCU has strayed from well... quality content in general, but specifically well-thought-out crossover content where characters can have their own arcs but also exist in a wider story where they clearly care about each other, that fandom was sort of homeless. so where do you go, if you like a superhero found family where you can have villains for angst but also stick them all in one big family-like home for silly crack and have a plethora of options for gay ships? well. you go to the Batfamily. if you write a crack/fluff Batfamily genfic with silly vibes and low stakes instead of say, a fic about a very specific comic issue even if it's a popular comic, you're *going* to get more traction for the former. because the fanbase largely just isn't reading the comics.

and i feel... complicated about this. because on one hand, Don't Like Don't Read has been a tenet of my fandom experience. i'm very pro-fandom and that includes fandom content i don't like. and to an extent, i do think this sort of should apply to Batfamily fanon. i enjoy having my moments with other comic purists, giggling over exceptionally painful OOC headcanons or even facepalming in pain over some content but it is on me to not interact with that content. you don't make fandom a better place by being hostile to fans who engage with canon in ways you don't approve of. and frankly? we as comic readers are not going to get non-comic fans to read the comics by being asshats to them. no one is going to want to pick up any comic if we get a superiority complex about it. and also, i feel like we're all lying to ourselves a little bit insisting comics are so, so easy to get into. they're not. we can just all agree, they're really not. i've been single-handedly helping my sister get into comics, specifically Wonder Woman and no matter how simple i make it, i watch her get frustrated trying to understand what pre-Crisis and post-Crisis and New-52 and Flashpoint and all these things mean and what a retcon vs a reboot is and what a Crisis Event is and what the hell Diana's current backstory even *is*. sure, you can give someone a beginner list of comics to start with and slowly dip their toes in the water but sooner or later, *something* is going to confuse them. comics as a medium straight up aren't going to be everyone's cup of tea. and if someone *just* wants to read silly fluffy fanfiction about the Batfamily, i can't entirely begrudge them for not wanting to take the hours and hours out of their day to understand this medium. it's not an accessible medium to get into. "read this and this, but this run is out of print and this run wasn't collected in trades at all but also make sure you read that event in order and this is a good comic but the backstory in it is retconned and you *have* to read this it's so important but it's also really bad because the author kind of sucks" sounds. ridiculous for someone who like. just wants to read some stuff about Nightwing. sometimes, we all make reading comics sort of sound like a chore, not a hobby.

so my point is, i do extend some grace to Batfamily fanon for existing. i think my biggest gripe is, as i said in my other post, misuse of tags (if you're not creating content about comics, maybe you don't need the comics fandom tag on Ao3, just the all media types umbrella tag) and my far bigger gripe: when panels are taken out of context to support fanon only headcanons. if i could impart *anything* onto the Batfamily fandom as a comic fan it'd be this: if you haven't *read* the comic, don't spread the panel. if you don't even know what comic it's *from*, don't spread the panel. it's fine to use comic panels to discuss your headcanons, but so often i see someone spreading a comic panel from a comic they haven't read, and when asked where it's from, they can't source it. a silly example that comes to mind is a post going around, taking a panel where Dick, in his internal monologue goes "here comes the sun. do do do do." and the post is claiming it's from him getting buried alive. when that panel comes from Nightwing (1996) #140, and he gets buried alive in Nightwing (1996) #127, two completely different moments frankensteined together. if you're going to not read the comics, that's completely fine, but unless you're sure of the source and the context, panels shouldn't be spread around. i'm sick of this specifically happening to Red Robin (2009), with ppl claiming Tim has totally killed people because he blew up some of Ra's' bases, when those panels within context, make it clear he gave everyone time to escape. and in a later arc in that very comic, Tim grapples with the idea of murdering Captain Boomerang, and *specifically chooses not to*, because he doesn't agree with murder, even against the person who has hurt him the most. if you'd like to write fanfiction where Tim is pro-murder and has done some sketch things, i'm totally on board and would probably like to read it. but there's no need to pretend it's canon from a few panels you saw out of context.

beyond that, i think it's not *entirely* correct to say that fanon is harmless. whenever i see very WFA-positive posts, they often default to the argument that WFA is fun and silly, and comic fans are killjoys for not liking it. which. i think is complicated because the issue is, WFA and fanon don't exist in a vacuum. if you like WFA power to you, i don't think it's the worst thing ever, but i do think it's degrading to these characters because honestly? they feel incompetent in the webtoon. it's one thing if WFA was solely a slice-of-life sort of deal, just having silly episodes where Bruce is taking on a PTA mom or they're all fighting for the last cookie. but when WFA attempts to take on more serious plots with these characters, it *fundamentally* falls flat in understanding them. i get it, Bruce comforting Jason having a panic attack because a noise reminded him of the crowbar felt cute in a microcosm, but i'm so serious when i say that storyline destroyed how like. half of this fandom understands Jason Todd's relationship to his trauma. it doesn't understand how he reacts when he's triggered, what coping mechanisms he seeks out, and how he would handle Bruce comforting him. even if i can believe for a brief moment Jason *would* be triggered by something like that, him running and trying to hide and then getting a hug from Bruce to make it okay is just. painful. WFA needs everything to be wrapped up in a nice, neat little bow. so even when it starts to tackle interesting concepts, it makes them fall flat with its need to be soft, low stakes, hurt/comfort. there was a two-parter episode that dealt with the complicated mutual hatred/jealousy between Tim and Damian that *almost* really interested me because for once, it felt like the webtoon wanted to explore canon messy dynamics. but of course, it had to be fixed with one conversation and a hug. you don't mend the *years* of issues these characters have like that. WFA isn't in character because these characters are hyperbole cartoonified versions of themselves to fit within the medium and be a cute happy family.

because that right there, is the crux of it. the Batfamily fanon seeks to simplify the Batfamily and force them into a nuclear family. there are so many fantastic posts on here discussing how the nuclear family-ification of the Batfam is eroding decades worth of complex histories so i won't go too far into that. but what i will say is that there's this need, in the Batfamily fandom, for the Batfamily to exist as a unit. they are a *family*. (honestly i think calling it the Batfamily is a misnomer and has been for years but we're in too deep now.) they exist to each other first, and any teams or friends they have come secondary to this family unit. you can *specifically* see this demonstrated in what headcanons are becoming popular these days. i have an entire lengthy meta in my drafts about how i *loathe* the "the Batfamily meets the Justice League" genre of fanfic because it makes no *sense*. in order to have this genre of fic exist, you must operate under the assumption that no one in the League, or adjacent to the League, knows the Batfamily exists and are thus utterly shocked to discover Batman has kids. and to make *that* work, you have to strip *every single Batfamily member* of such important dynamics and friendships so you can lock them all in Gotham for their whole lives. Dick can't have the Titans, Tim can't have Young Justice, Duke & Cass can't have the Outsiders, Jason can't have the Outlaws, Damian can't have the Supersons, Babs can't have the Birds of Prey, and so on. because if they had these relationships, they would be known to the League. the Batfamily fandom doesn't care about this, it's just "silly fanfiction", it's not trying to be serious. but how can you say you like Dick Grayson as a character if you don't understand the Titans *are* his family? at some points of his life, moreso than the Batfamily even is. it is constantly repeated to us in most comics with Dick how much the Titans mean to him. he *needs* them to be who he is. the same extends to every other Batfamily member, most of which have been full League members at this point. but in fanon, that doesn't matter. the Batfamily are a sequestered unit first, and all of those side relationships are secondary and easy to toss away, if it makes your fanfic work better.

and because they have to be a unit first, you have these forced relationships that dump years of actual canon material for the sake of making them get along. the Batfamily fandom has its favorites and well. it's no secret it's usually the boys. Jason and Tim by *far* stand out as fandom faves so, their dynamic is a heavily explored one. it does matter that in canon they don't tend to get along and especially don't see each other as family. what matters is that you can push dynamics onto them. and so fanon gets all twisted up about which Robin Tim actually idolized as a kid (Dick) and what member of the Batfamily is pro-murder but still an older sibling figure to him and looks out for him (Helena, or if you want the dynamic of once tried to harm Tim but they've reconciled, Jean-Paul) in favor of who's the most popular. Dick, Jason, Tim, and Damian are always going to be the standouts for popularity, but it's specifically Jason and Tim who are getting fanonized the most. and that's because really, we don't have much canon content of Tim that *isn't* the comics. for Dick you've got Young Justice (tv), for Damian you've got the DCAMU, for Jason you've sort of got the Under The Red Hood movie, but Tim sort of lingers in this limbo. (yes, he's in Young Justce (tv) and Titans (live action) but in neither is he the main character nor given much depth) so, he gets a *lot* projected onto him and has become fanonized. and even with Jason's animated movies, you don't see him interact with Tim, so people build it from the ground up how they want to see it, disregarding of canon comics. i think it's what makes him so popular in the first place- he's malleable into whatever you want or need him to be.

and of course, the fanon ignores other characters in the Batfamily it doesn't know about. i feel like you could create a tier list of Batfamily characters by their popularity, going from the fandom main characters: Tim, Jason, Bruce, Alfred, Dick, Damian. to the underrated: Steph, Duke, Babs, Cass. to the forgotten about unless they're convenient for a story: Kate, the Foxes, Helena Wayne, Carrie, Selina, Harper Row, Maps, Minhkhoa Khan. to the absolutely unknown: Helena Bertinelli, Jean-Paul Valley, Onyx Adams, the Clovers, Julia Pennyworth. it's not lost on me that the ignored characters tend to be women and people of color. which is both a canon and fanon problem, DC will continue adding interesting characters to the Batfamily, play with them for a few years, then drop them to default to the "Batboys" again. and it's a vicious cycle of the fandom only caring about the "Batboys", and thus people entering the fandom via fanon osmosis won't have content about the other characters, therefore, they won't be interested in those characters enough to create it, and it's just this ouroboros consuming itself, no matter how much canon content we have of these other characters. and it's ridiculous just how large the Batfamily is becoming because of this, which is why i'm a pre-Flashpoint fan, because then the Batfamily was contained enough to actually feel like a family with every character having nuances relationships with each other, but i digress because those thoughts could be their own post.

and the thing about fanon is it doesn't exist in a vacuum. DC has started turning the comics to accommodate for what fans are asking for, because fans will beg and beg for content they're not going to consume. Tim Drake: Robin had Tim as a coffee drinker because that's the fanon accepted headcanon. and the resolution of the recent Gotham War arc was for Bruce to buy this new manor for everyone to move in and call him. nevermind that most of these characters have their own homes and have zero reason to be moving in with Bruce. Tim had his marina in Tim Drake: Robin, Dick has Bludhaven, Cass and Steph have their little side of town in Batgirls (2022), and so on. these characters are being forced together as a unit, as one big happy family living together, to appease what non-comic fans want and it's damaging comic relationships. Robin: Knight Terrors saw Jason and Tim team up and working together, which i've seen varying opinions on but i personally despised. their interactions made zero sense for any of their canon history, but it appeases them being this close sibling relationship that fanon acts like they are. also the fears they faced in their respective knight terrors didn't make sense for either character and *only* worked as a moment of bringing them together so they could reassure each other and have this weird dreamscape bonding moment. the canon is bending itself to the will of fanon rather than building on the pre-existing complex relationships. Tim barely even gets along with his most important team in Dark Crisis: Young Justice because it seems the only important relationships the Batfamily can have is with each other. and when we do see them outside of the Batfamily, it only seems to be to relive the glory days like with World's Finest: Teen Titans, instead of developing them as they currently exist. this isn't recent in the comics, it feels like you can trace it back to the New-52, but it does feel a *lot* worse over the recent years. WFA is fine when it exists in its own bubble, but the simple truth is, DC content never exists on its own. the adaptations will reflect back onto the comics. (the damage the Young Justice cartoon has done to some characters should honestly be studied) and so it does frustrate me a bit when fanon-only or adaptation-only fans act like we're being nothing but killjoys for being frustrated with this. since they don't read the comics, they don't see how the comics are suffering as a result of this.

people argue about what's out of character for the comics they don't even read. i'm sorry, but "bad dad Bruce" is consistently canon. that man is just kind of shitty. when you take someone who has the drive he has, who has this need for the Mission first, who needs a teenager in spandex next to him to keep him off the ledge, that guy is sort of going to be a shitty father figure. he just is. not on purpose or with malice, but when you compare him to any other dad in a big DC family, he sure takes the cake. it's why characters like Oliver Queen tend to *really* fucking hate Bruce for how he treats his kids. Bruce loves fiercely, but he doesn't do well with putting that love first. and his love is a controlling one, he is very particular about controlling how others in the Batfamily are "allowed" to operate. it's what drives the wedge between him and Dick, it's why Steph is never a true daughter to him. (besides the reason of her needing to be a love interest to Tim first, anyway-) i've never understood the massive outcry of people reacting to Bruce kinda being shitty in comics they're not reading. there are some moments that get ridiculously OOC with how cartoonishly evil he is (the whole Gotham War arc and that... complicated mess with Jason) but largely if you want sitcom loving nuclear father Bruce, you have to accept that is a fanon thing, not a canon one. the Batfamily being a nuclear family in *general* is fanon. most of the "Batkids" don't actually see Bruce in a particularly fatherly light and begging for moments where he calls them his kids or they call him dad outside of incredibly specific circumstances is just OOC.

it's getting harder and harder to exist peacefully in this fandom it feels like, if you don't comply to the standard fanon has set. i'm happy people are having fun with their blorbos, even if in ways i dislike, but that "harmless fandom fun" does ripple it's way back to canon, eventually. so i end up pretty tangled with my feelings because are fans at fault for DC making these poor decisions? probably not, but it certainly feels like an unfortunate cause-and-effect situation whether at the end of the day, nobody is happy. and of course, i know some fanon-only fans are striving to be more canon accurate and care about canon dynamics more than others, but for them it's always going to be an uphill battle with the above-mentioned out-of-context panels thrown around and ever-pervasive fanon overtaking anything that's truly seeking to be canon compliant. so really, it sometimes feels like we're all losing.

[darkmagenugget]

Speaks volumes about how my brain works when I can video call people, or see what they look like through selfies, and yet when mentally picturing them I still picture their avatars/how they represent themselves.

[thinkingofmikey]

As a mother, this is so true. My parents were garbage, and yet, I would have literally starved or died of exposure without them. We are made from the care of others, we repay this care to others.