#no disrespect to caine but

[blackbatcass]

sometimes the ghost of kelley puckett (he is still alive) haunts me. does he know. does he even know. he’s so detached from the comics community and he’s such a private guy (I RESPECT THAT WHOLEHEARTEDLY) that i really and truly do not know if this man knows how much cassandra cain means to us. does he know batgirl 2000 is heralded as the bible of dc solo books, as a lot of people’s favorite comic ever written. does he know how much we love cass. how we write essays over her character and how amazing she is and how she changed our lives. does he know how adored his writing is. does he know he wrote the best comics character introduction of all time. does he even. know.

[annah-kitathryne]

It has come to my attention that some are not aware of the double bat teen titans elseworlds run. [Post Here] made by @saturnsickle

So I'm here to explain a bit to everyone.

When was the series?

From September 1st 2001 to March 1st 2005, an elseworlds Teen Titans run started.

The series was 43 issues plus a 2004 annual.

Line-Up

Yara Flor (Wondergirl)

Jackson Hyde (Aqualad)

Cassandra Cain (Batgirl)

Jason Todd (Robin)

Roy Harper (Arsenal)

It was a bit out of nowhere, seeing as the lineup featured two brand new characters, a newly established character, a then considered dead character, and a former teen titan turned titan.

Retrospect

In retrospect, this series can be seen as a world building series as well as a device to introduce more heroes within a similar age group and adding more younger heroes into the mix, bridging the gap between the titans of Dick Grayson and Donna Troy and the younger generation of young justice soon teen titans Tim Drake and Cassie Sandsmark.

This series also reintroduced Jason Todd to a reader base that had known him as dead at this point. Adding new characterization that would be later used in the Batman: Hush storyline and lead into the Batman: Under the Red Hood series.

Interestingly, we see that this series of Teen Titans ended the same month that Red Hood's identity was revealed to Batman in Batman #683.

That is no coincidence. Fans have long since known that the series ended when Jason Todd was introduced back into the main line story.

However, while well planned, this left the elseworld's Teen Titans run to end abruptly and feel incomplete in some places.

Features

Some features of this series were a phenomenal number one cover that would later inspire the cover art for World's Finest: Teen Titans #1, an interesting dynamic between Batgirl and Robin that wouldn't show in mainline stories until New 52, and Roy in another mentorship role that we had been starting to see become more prominent at the time.

The introductory arc in the story (issues 1 through 4), where we were introduced to the characters in their separate contexts and got to see them come together in a way that explained how they got to that point, instead of just showing us them together as a team. It was also interesting to see Joker used as an introductory villain instead of someone else. It really set up the idea of a larger world outside of Joker and the scale of threats that would continue to increase throughout the series.

One of my favorite subplot that continued throughout the series was the character and moral conflict between the two bat characters (Cass and Jason) and their views on Justice, superheroing, and the right way to go about it. Although Jason's characterization is not exactly the same as his pre-death in the family personality, it provided a good sense of transition that got us from PreDitF to the UtRH personality. Cass and Jason often found themselves at odds with each other throughout the series. Cass, who believed in redemption and was stark and steady in her belief that no one should die, contrasted Jason's harsher view on crime and how to handle it.

It was also nice to see Cass on a team of people similar to her age. Although we got to see her work on the Justice League: Elite team, the elseworld's teen titans run got to show her in a more light-hearted run where she got to learn to be herself. Mirroring her then running solo series, we got to see Cass start to form a life and connections outside of the suit, and meet people who tested her belief in the symbol, this time with her peers.

Her growing friendship with Yara was really fun to read even at its worst writing. I especially enjoyed issue 25 and 26, where the two of them teamed up with the elseworld's version of Starfire and Donna Troy in a timeless issue of powerful female heroes.

Some of the negative from the run was the forced upon romantic subplot from 27 to 36, where it took up too much space on the panels and caused unnecessary character drama in a style that hadn't been seen in the run up to that point.

By the time of issue 40, there were three issues to wrap up the plot of the story before the run would come to a close. The story structure was there, but it was rushed and needed a couple more issues to really dive into the plot. The team disbands after Jason Todd/Robin murders one of the lesser villians they were fighting and caused the team to split ways to deal with the events of the arc. It culottes perfectly into the reveal later that month in the main books.

There was a top heavy focus on the two bat characters, which left less room for the other's. That didn't mean that the others didn't have central arcs throughout the run. It is just meant by the proxy of having two bat characters. Their drama was brought up the most.

Arcs

Issues 1 through 4 Jason focused introductory

Issues 5 through 8 was a Yara focused arc

9 through 12 was a Roy centric arc

16 through 19 was a Cass centric arc

20 through 22 was a Jason centric arc

23 and 24 was a Jackson centric arc

25 and 26 was Cass and Yara

30 through 34 was another Roy centric arc

The annual plus 36 was a Jackson arc

37 and 38 was another Yara centric arc

40 through 43 was extremely focused in Jason with Cass as a close second.

Conclusions

It was a really interesting story to read, and it was fun to see what having Batgirl on a team does to the dynamics of a normally Robin only sort of line-uo. It's interesting that Jackson was the first of the two original characters to make the jump to mainline comics (2010) and Yara was later in 2021, having been the last of the team brought into the main timeline. It would be nice to see them come back together for a special crossover again, fill the niche group of fans that follow the limited fan material on this series.

[chernobylwaters]

Some of y'all have ZERO respect for the American South.

People have the nerve to say hurricane Helene's damage was deserved because "there was a warning to evacuate"

... and go where exactly? Does the average person have the means to spend 150 minimum a night at a hotel? The average cost to evacuate is between 1,500 and 5,000. Even then, can that many people evacuate and find a hotel or shelter that isn't full?

so now that a HUGE portion of the population is without power, most of the south can't prepare for the fact that another tropical storm is on the way to hit because they don't have power.

There are towns in North Carolina that are GONE. 600K people in Georgia don't have power, a good portion of the state is also flooded. Tennessee had bridges collapse, several states have had dams and leveys break. That's barely the tip of the iceberg.

To say "you were warned" when most people had no choice to stay and those lucky enough to evacuate came back to their homes being completely destroyed is heartless at best.

[thevioletscout]

PTOLEMAEA

I am the face of love's rage

------------------------------------------------------

A small comic about my Vestige, her being sacrificed by the Order of the Black Worm, and her escape from Coldharbour. Based off the song Ptolemaea by Ethel Cain.

(I used figurosity, in-game models, my own childhood photos, and my hand as the base.)

[a1nsl3yyy]

nothing haunts me more than what i did the night before my middle school graduation, when my friends and i were out to dinner at a chili’s.

[incorrectbatfam]

can you make a cass playlist??? she’s my fav !! I listened to your other playlists and am really looking forward to more (if you feel like doing them)

[adamshallperish]

the amount of people calling ethel cain "bitch" to her face on anon is insane to me. people like. come on. you're not her bestie, that's not like a term of endearment if it's from a stranger. also she's not going to fuck you!

[lesbianjudasiscariot]

tiktok has like ruined audience etiquette. like artists are people creating beautiful art and sharing their work with the world and yall are showing no respect for that. it is so disappointing to see.

[nonsensical-raw-material]

Does anyone else like annotating their Chumash? Or even your Siddur?

I know it can be a bit of a cultural taboos but I find it so beneficial to my studying plus it's so much fun! Like I don't see much from Christianity and think "man if only" but I gotta say the girly pop Bible annotations and journaling is kinda iconic.

I won't even lie my ADHD is crazy too like I know I always have my TaNaKh with me. But my study TaNaKhs, a journal, my Siddur, or anything else it comes to be a lot. Plus it saves me from blanking when my Rabbi inevitably asks "Do you have any questions or thoughts" of course I do! But man if I don't be forgetting. Now BOOM! Not only do I have all my questions. Theyre right by the scripture that spurred them.

I love crafting it's so much fun adding pages of notes and what not while I read my study TaNaKhs along side it. Or little additions about the Hebrew as I try to learn and get better. Plus it honestly keeps me more active in my TaNaKh it makes it more engaging to me.

I also like the idea of future generations being able to connect to me through seeing my thoughts and notes. It's also a great way to chronical my own religious learning for myself.

Do yall have anything specific you like to add to your books if you do?

[spiduhs]

you know…… “smoking that spiduhs pack” didnt work out for jsinthewrld too well huh?

[bananamilk2004]

does anyone else here want to fuck caine sloppy style

[boer-boxer]

idk why i made this

[moodindigov]

celia charity brightwell; my personal view on her words in s&p and her character.

okay tbh idk if this has ever been brought up before and tbf i havent looked into it yet because this thought just came so suddenly to me while i was reading ash and quill for like the eighteen billionth time, but can we talk about celia charity whatever her name is brightwell? like can we talk about her bond with her sons being literally non existent. (read more bcs i won’t make u scroll past this post for 2 seconds when u can scroll past it in like a quarter of that time.)

genuinely think about it, celia brightwell is ‘a dutiful mother but never a loving one’ and suddenly this all changes because she’s lost almost all her kids..like i get that we can’t see her inner thoughts or monologue from her or anything, and i understand that she may have been going through her own share of the struggle of fighting back trauma and getting enough strength to do this, but i personally cannot see jess truly forgiving her for what she’s done—or for that matter, what she hasn’t done that so deeply hurt him that in a&q when asked for his mother’s jewels by thomas, jess promptly responds that he’s ‘lucky to have a thief for a friend.’ and when wolfe overhears his schemes with khalila and dario and shows jess that if we would’ve just asked celia charity whats-her-name for the jewels, she would’ve gladly given them over, he has this reaction of just pure anguish and fury; how can wolfe be so sure? how could wolfe understand what he went through, and even more so, how can he just talk about his mother as if she ever truly loved him, cared for him as a mother should, when throughout his eighteen years of living and struggling to keep himself above water from the storm that callum’s made of his life, she’s simply been an entity in his life. there but not present in his life, a shadow. something not physically attainable to hold and ground himself to a reality - and it’s that real sort of reaction from jess who’s just at this point completely given up on the hope of receiving motherly love from this enigma in his life, knowing he probably should give up hope that she’d treat him with any sort of actual care because he knows he’d just be disappointed with the outcome, and yet still holding onto that fragile piece that maybe she could. i personally feel like the end of sword and pen where jess just automatically declares his love for her is so inaccurate and imo so rushed i feel to get a sort of happy ending for the brightwell family. and like i said earlier, we don’t know at all what celia was going through and i understand it would’ve taken time for her to build up the courage to stand up to callum herself, but its so sporadic in the end, so- abrupt, that it seems not really fleshed out enough to truly be something anyone would consider forgiving in the moment, but we’ll give jess benefit of the doubt. he’s still freshly grieving morgan and his twin (i should probably write something ab that too) so maybe his reaction to just immediately cling onto a semblance of love someone from his blood family could offer was more instinctual, more him trying to grasp that feeling that no one in his family could’ve given him up until that point. but even then, even when charity couldn’t stand up to callum and his cruel ways and couldn’t get herself out from under his boot, it didn’t leave her unable to bond with her sons. it didn’t suddenly stop her from getting the chance to at least try and protect them from what she knew was going on, what they were going through. and at the beginning of the series i just assumed she rarely even cared for them, because remember callum only married her for money and power and probably some other toxic and self-centered desire i can’t think of, but when it’s revealed she does care for them, it makes it even more confusing. did she not talk to them in hopes of them just never bonding so she could, at least maybe for a small time, ignore the mistake she’d made of marrying callum and the consequences that came with it, and suddenly when she’s ready to acknowledge those consequences, she comes to jess’ aid? was it for some desire that maybe she could protect them? i just dont get it.

[veggieharumaki]

it most definitely has been said before but I’ll say it again: ethel cain is my taylor swift

[giantkillerjack]

The exception is Harley, who loves this new violent unhinged Robin best. She saw that 12-year-old boy smash Riddler's nose in, and was immediately like good news I'm your aunt now and also your new godmother; I got you this bowie knife as an early Christmas present.

It is unclear at first whether she is aware this is a different Robin or if she just thinks that Robin has suddenly gotten fun and cool.

Harley discovers Batman's secret identity because she's trying to find out when her new nephew's birthday is. No one even realizes they've had a security breach until months later when Jason gets a set of robin-colored daggers from her on his actual birthday. She doesn't reveal what she found to the public though. She has to look after her godson, after all.

Dick, age 21, comes back home to Gotham and is confounded by the fact that Harley Quinn is now saying she's his aunt.

He gets a bedazzled gun for Christmas because he's "all grown up now!" He doesn't use it, but he knows enough to say thank you.

Harley kills Joker the week after Jason dies.

When Tim first encounters Harley, he is scared but ready for a fight, and he is very confused when she picks him up into a hug and asks her new nephew what he wants for Christmas or whatever holiday bats celebrate (he doesn't answer so he gets a knife).

Harley is also one of the first people in Gotham that Damien actually opens up to. Thanks, probably, in no small part to her being a lot less judgmental about his more violent tendencies.

She and Cassandra practice dance together.

She and Dick show off their gymnastics from time to time to stay in practice.

Harley helps Duke with his homework, and then she has Ivy destroy the school's entire football field after finding out the kids on the team were bullying Duke. Duke (horrified even though no one got hurt) politely asks her to check in with him first before doing that again.

Ivy, in turn, is surprised to find that if she wants to marry Harley, she has to adopt basically the entire batfamily.

Alfred quietly begins setting the table for two more places on holidays. He is the only person Harley consistently listens to.

Bruce just wishes she would stop giving his children knives.

Years later, Red Hood can be seen wielding a sparkling fire-engine-red gun that says "Love, Auntie Harley" on it.

In my opinion dick was everyone’s fav robin because after that they got more and more unhinged

Jason: *punches the penguin in the throat*

Penguin: THE OTHER ONE WAS NEVER THIS MEAN HE JUST ROUNDHOUSE KICKED ME LIKE A REGULAR PERSON

[stonerzelda]

would it be in bad taste to just throw together an Ethel Cain halloween costume LOL