#not sure which honestly

[lilyfoxonfire]

A little bit of a rant, but. And this is a Very Personal Take, so watch out for that.

The thing I wish more writers at DC got is that Jason's tragedy runs deeper than the Joker — but it also doesn't run deep enough that it ruined him from the start (which happens to be a particularly terrible train of thought in general.)

Jason Todd, as Robin, was a sweet kid. Jason Todd, as Robin, was angry, traumatized, sometimes vicious. Jason Todd, as Robin, loved school. Jason Todd, as Robin, hated criminals. He loved his father, and loved being Robin, and didn't quite respect Batman's mission, and had issues with his family. These things can coexist. They *should* coexist — because this coexistence is what makes the character interesting, when you look at him for more than five seconds.

It's all too easy to act as if Jason's leading tragedy — the key moment that defines his path — is the moment he dies to the Joker. This isn't *inaccurate*, per se; the events of his resurrection were indeed mostly influenced by the events leading to, and surrounding, his death. But dying to the Joker does not *constitute all that Jason is.* That's a thing writers keep falling into; this idea that everything about Jason Todd eventually and inevitably goes back to the Joker, and his murder. Both "Kill the Joker" and "Three Jokers" (ironic) approached the character from this angle, and I think that's a damn shame.

Then you'll see people who look deeper, and define the character by his background. Criminal abusive father, cocaine addict mother who eventually dies, a miserable half-life in the streets and slums of Gotham City, depending on petty crime not to starve to death. It's a terrible existence, and the scars it left on Jason's psyche are clear, but that alone does not constitute all that he is. I've heard the following take a few dozen times; "There was never any hope for Jason Todd." Even Batman himself, in some comics, says something to this effect.

There's two camps on this hill, of course. The first, more aggressive, is of the idea that Jason was "rotten from the start"; this isn't at all an uncommon take, both within fandoms and in real life when talking about certain polemic figures. We, as people, find some sick comfort in pointing to people who do things we dislike, fictional and otherwise, and declaring that their perceived evil is innate, like there's something off within their heads. We see this phenomena a lot more often with Superboy Prime, for example — but it's not quite uncommon with Jason Todd, in some circles.

I don't think I need to elaborate on why this is toxic, of course. Reducing these characters — and people irl, when applied in such cases — to circumstances of some innate evil self, a rotten soul or undiagnosed antisocial disorder or whatever, is to close your eyes to any context that might have led to what happened to them. You don't have to forgive someone for doing something, especially when that something is awful, but there is still room to seek to understand why what happened happened, so that one might attempt to stop it from happening again, or ruminate on its consequences.

Coming back to our given example, by saying Jason was "always rotten", these people choose to completely ignore every important (and trust me, they were incredibly important) factor in his life that led to his behaviour. Perhaps unsurprisingly, these are the people most likely to portray Robin!Jason as an arrogant asshole and nothing else.

The other camp is a bit more reasonable. "Jason Todd never had the chance to be more than what he was" is the prevalent thought they hold — from the streets as an orphan to the streets as a fighter, surrounded by violence at every turn. How could he ever have grown past the blood if new blood kept being spilled? It's a very humane take on the character, comparatively speaking, but I feel like it's also diminutive. Because this passive acceptance of an outcome is, in and of itself, a sentence to it. Which is to say — this, and the condemnation preferred by the first camp, are different only in the tone of their voices and the amount of empathy displayed. There's still an acceptance of the fact that this was 'always how things would play out', one way or the other. Like this was Fate.

This perception of the larger tragedy at hand as some sort of Destiny resulting from Jason's background and the tragedy he suffered is most notable in the recent interactive film "Death in the Family". Notice the similarities the many paths have to one another — of course, we know on a metaphysical level that this is in part due to budget limitations. But within the context of the movie, the narrative is that of the following; that those events, those horrors, would be Jason's inevitable destiny in every path his life could take where it crossed both Joker and The Batman.

And that, to me, is such a tragic misreading of what makes his tragedy *special*. Because any reading of Jason's tenures as Robin show a boy who does, indeed, have hope. We see this child be, well, a child — love and live and have issues a kid would have. We see him have problems with his family, sure, but also enjoy their presence, and get close to them. We've seen, recently, how he loved his father. How he and his brother patched things up. We've seen how he admired Barbara. To say that Jason's life would always end one way is to ignore the one true innate thing about him, and that was the arc of moving past one's trauma.

At his core, Jason was a heroic kid who had a lot of baggage. What made him different from Dick Grayson and Bruce Wayne was the nature of this baggage — he had no sole event to blame for it, no single tragedy before the Joker. Jason Todd's personal Vendetta was against Gotham City, in all the ways it was rotten. See how he lashed out when confronted with Felipe Garzonas and Gloria; *that* was Jason's target of rage and trauma, not any single event. Ironically, the thing Robin Jason and Red Hood Jason share is this; a rage against an immutable status quo, against the seemingly inherent futility in endlessly fighting to stop crime in the moment, never taking it further, always holding back. Rage against inevitability.

This is a child who could, and was close to, and was *expected to*, one day grow beyond himself. Perhaps it would always be outside of Batman's specific code. Perhaps not. But it was not Jason Todd's background that consigned him to a life of violence. Even at that point in time, at his lowest and within the worst interpretation of it, had it not been for the Joker, Jason would almost inevitably have moved beyond himself like Bruce eventually did, like Dick eventually did. Eventually, people change. That was a 15-year old boy lashing out, and given time, and support, every last piece of his story tells us he'd have healed.

Instead, he died a violent murder, betrayed by his mother, and was condemned to a cycle of violence that was almost custom-built to perpetuate every last worst part of himself. To make every last flaw of his shine. To stoke the flames of his rage and nothing else. And it happened because he died, and metaphysically because the author wanted something to try (and fail) to question Batman's methods once again.

That's the tragedy of Jason Todd — forever doomed to push boulders uphill. This is a character built for a world that can either change or be questioned — but his is a world that does neither, so he will only ever fall further down, further down indeed. And as he does, he'll keep pushing boulders, struggling, trying to go up. And he will fail. He can't ever recover because we, the world, won't let him.

Or we can just make him a magic ninja lol

(I actually like the All Caste stuff, ironically. Could've been done way better, but. Hey. Ducra questioned that boy's ideals without being a moralist jackass. I will take that.)

[swiggity-swexual-i-am-asexual]

We all know the semi-canonical ‘all the Robins know to hide/duck inside of Batman’s cape, even as adults’ thing.

We also know that Danny ‘is LITERALLY a ghost’ Fenton sucks at remembering his own intangibility while ALSO forgetting to look ahead of him.

All I’m saying is, Danny Fenton (or Phantom, if you’d really like) would absolutely SLAM into Batman on accident while running on roof tops and Bruce ‘Brooding Instinct’ Wayne doesn’t even think twice about letting the kid hide and scanning around for danger before there’s a record scratch of ‘wait who tf is this?’ kicks in.

[cephalopod-celabrator]

I like these polls and this concept even though it's been done so

[some-internet-stranger]

Echoes of wisdom with a sword!!🗡️🗡️🗡️🗡️🗡️

[deathricedrawn]

i'm ready to try

[uncanny-tranny]

It's honestly frustrating that I've seen non-Russian queer people almost bragging about how they would be illegal in Russia, labeled an extremist or terrorist. Russian queers are in danger, their government has made it clear where it stands, and it's made this effort for the better part of a decade (even longer, perhaps). This will kill people, don't mistake this for a quirky little proclamation from a government, akin to somebody saying the sky is pink. Russian queer people were already expressing their fear, and the least we can do now is express our love for them, and advocate with them.

Russian queer people, I love you. I love you all so much. I am so sorry, I cannot begin to express the grief that I feel, and I hope that you are safe. Words cannot encapsulate how I feel as a non-Russian, and I cannot hope to comprehend how it feels to actually be in this situation.

[b1ttersweet-dreams]

where the line between me and you blurs

[tawnysoup]

Transitional phase

[egophiliac]

I have never been more concerned for a JP update from your art than I am seeing a Cheka knowing the context of Leona’s dream.

My bois ok right?????? My sweet nephews ok right??????

well

uhhhh

I'm sure the real one is fine :)

[lystacre]

They deserve some domestic fluff after S7

[mohntilyet]

illario + lucanis growing up together means a lot for obvious reasons ofc like the fact they did not have to go through the dellamorte villa torment nexus alone really helps. immediately from the moment they are taken to that house, lucanis has had something to protect and love. the snark and jokes that they share in wigmaker job finally having a chance to shine outside of the only person lucanis is socialised with and he learns that wow, he's actually likable. because up until this point everyone around him calls him a demon and is freaked out by him but ofc the veilguard only know him as lucanis "he banished harding from the kitchen" dellamorte. sure he's a big bad crow assassin but his reputation simply does not carry that much weight with people who are just equally deranged (maybe a de riva rook but that's also a little different) . and then he's able to share and extend that love with his new friends, and able to try being something that he's not had the chance to before, and his goodness is actively encouraged rather than being an unfortunate sidequest that is tolerated. and i fondly think also of how much of that humor is copied and mirrored off illario ("shoulders....... feeling tight...... need a ..... MASSAGE!") and it's his best experiences with illario that turned him into the man he is. wish the game explored this just a little more because the betrayal would have been made a lot more intense if they had just bothered to show any of illario's redeeming qualities. he has them!!!!! nobody is just born a traitor. you have to love someone before they can become that.

[chaotic-carnifex]

No hold on I'm gonna make an extra post about this:

I wouldn't choose to be alloromantic

If I were given the choice to either remain aro or become alloro again, I would choose aromanticism.

And I think a lot of people need to hear that.

[epitome-of-an-openbook]

one of the greatest/funniest things about being a mdtb shipper is that you simply cannot explain it to a random passerby.

Like okay so there is this very popular show, called Naruto about a little ninja/shinobi guy who is shunned by his entire village for reasons yet to be revealed but despite this wants to prove himself to them and become their super ninja leader president or Hokage, the show follows him, a girl he has a crush on, a traumatized boy with special magic eyes, and their chronically late sensei. This show is in two parts and has 720 total episodes, many of which are filler - so as for the ship: you meet Tobirama first... sort of, for like a couple of minutes in episode 69 and then don't see him again for another 521 episodes, as for Madara well we don't actually meet him until episode 322 of the second part (so 542 episodes in), the two of them do not appear on screen at the same time until episode 367 of part 2 (so 587 episodes in), which notably takes place in a flashback because - surprise every time we have seen either of them up to this point (which mind you is barely at all) they have actually been dead/reanimated corpses. Including both flashbacks and reanimation they talk to each other maybe a total of three times (and that is definitely a generous guess). Madara for sure most definitely hates Tobirama because Tobirama killed Madara's last living brother back when they were both alive and fighting on opposite sides of a war between their two clans. Madara is very unpersonable and only ever had one friend, that friend is Tobirama's older brother - his most displayed character trait is that he is very very strong, with a LOT of chakra and loves a good fight - also he is another person with super special magic eyes. Tobirama is also seemingly pretty unpersonable, and his biggest character trait is that he has the mind of a jurassic park scientist which he uses to create many questionable or chakra intensive jutsus (including the one that reanimated the both of them), he is also implied to be one of the greatest sensors of all time and appears to hold a big grudge against Madara's clan. so anywa-

oh? what? why do I ship it? Well one day i was reading Naruto fics and stumbled across a Mdtb fic and it was such a masterpiece that I kept reading more and more bc the mdtb fic game is honestly S tier.

[magicpiano]

DCxDP AU: The Ultimate Enemy + The Flash

One of the speedsters (doesn't matter which really) is one of the few survivors of the apocalypse and he just figured out who Phantom is. He can save the world, all he has to do is go back in time and kill Danny Fenton.

Which seems like a great idea, right up to the point where he finds Danny and realizes he is just a 14 year old kid......

[korkorali]

The Misogyny of It All

So a lot of Della Duck Discourse is rehashed all the time, points are made again and again, but one thing that I almost never see people defend -and conversely, see people attack all the time- is The Line.

You know what I'm talking about. The Line from Glomtales.

"Your plans, your schemes, they only lead to bad things for your family. If you want to be a part of this family, you've gotta stop."

That one.

Now, what exactly Della was trying to get across with that line is a whole other can of worms that deserves its own post (basically she -and also the writers- horribly failed her Speech check).

What we're going over here is how that mimics a certain line from the last season, said by a parental figure to a child, that gets so much less flack. That, in fact, often gets paraded around as 'an interesting twist on a character.'

"You are not family!"

I have never seen people attack this line with the same amount of vitriol as they attack Della's, which is funny when they're the exact same line.

Actually, not even that- Scrooge's is worse.

It's more direct, it's literally yelled at Webby, it doesn't even attempt to address the issue Scrooge had (Webby blaming him for what happened to Della) and instead just straight-up attacks her as a person.

Now, to be fully honest- I like this line! I do genuinely think it's an interesting route for Scrooge to take, and is quite realistic to the grumpy old bastard. It's just funny that nobody ever comes to Webby's defense the same way they do for Louie.

Because the thing is- between Webby and Louie, one of these two has genuine, canonical issues with feeling like they're not a part of the family, like they're an outsider amongst those they love the most, like they don't belong.

And it's not Louie.

It is a consistent part of Webby's characterization that she feels like she doesn't belong. This gets touched on in all three seasons (and honestly, it could be argued that it gets worse after this moment).

Conversely, that just is not a part of Louie's canonical characterization. Even in the first episode of season 2, the one where Louie gets the closest to an 'I don't belong in this family' moment, it's less 'I don't belong here' and more 'fuck me I am terrible at adventuring'. And! It gets resolved in that episode!

(Of course, there is absolutely something to be said for how it's resolved- specifically by Scrooge encouraging him to be a scheming little bastard, which then thusly becomes the thing that threatens his family the most. Which would, logically, be a pretty big blow to his self-esteem. This isn't what I'm here to discuss right now but it is genuinely interesting.)

Louie never really shows an issue with feeling like he doesn't belong in his family. He shows a disconnect with his family at times, but in canon that never really evolves into a full-blown feeling of displacement. It does get close in Glomtales, but never quite reaches it.

So it's 'interesting' (read: not interesting) that Scrooge's fuckup here gets brushed away pretty easily. A lot of the time the line just straight-up isn't addressed, and when it is, often times it's about how "Oh he apologized to Webby offscreen, obviously."

Which.

Not he did not.

I mean, let me be clear: I don't mind it when that's the answer. It works for me to just brush it away if it's not meant to be the focus...

But Scrooge almost certainly didn't apologize for it.

As 'New Gods on the Block!' Showed us, Scrooge is downright awful at realizing when his actions have hurt people.

More likely than not, Scrooge would just assume that everything is fine and would avoid bringing it up at all costs because he'd feel awkward about it. Because he is, very importantly, not good at talking about things he doesn't want to talk about.

So why is it that Louie is always the one feeling like he doesn't belong? Why is it Della who is always a terrible parent for what she's said? Why are Webby's feelings of disconnect never really given the same gravity as Louie's? Why is Scrooge's blunder let off the hook super easily?

It just feels silly to me.

And, well.

Kinda like the fact that, since Scrooge is a guy and Webby's a girl, and Della is a woman and Louie's a boy, has something to do with it.

I'll happily give the benefit of the doubt and assume it's not deliberate, but quite frankly it is a double standard.

I think that people would be less upset with the Della Duck Discourse if Scrooge was held in a similarly critical position over what he's said and done. If it was acknowledged that Della isn't uniquely awful in what she says and does, and that a lot of the others have fucked up in extremely similar ways.

(I mean for fuck's sake, everybody goes on and on about how Della left her kids for ten years -which, for the record, wasn't what she wanted to do- but nobody ever criticizes Donald for taking the kids away from their family and never talking to them about Della- which is something he actively and deliberately chose to do)

TL;DR: The fact that Della gets intensely criticized for what she's said and done, but Donald and Scrooge are conversely celebrated as 'interesting' and 'complex' for what they've said and done, even when it brings harm to the kids, is a blatant double-standard. And if you don't think that this double-standard is bad or wrong for existing (or even that it Doesn't Actually Exist), instead of immediately claiming that it's a non-issue, maybe try to look inward and figure out why you really think that is.

[fjordfolk]

this is absolutely not professional advice but there's something about trust and handling and cooperative care that just boils down to whether your dog knows you have their best interest in mind. it's not just trusting your bond or them being calm or whatever, it's about experience. the time your dog gets a bone or a stick or a pez dispenser stuck between their teeth ideally shouldn't be the first time you poke your fingers in their mouth and they shouldn't be running away from you thinking you're trying to take it from them. there's something about your dog knowing not to freak out because parts of this experience is not new to them, and it's going to be fine.