#only you can prevent cgi capes

[onbearfeet]

Episode 2

This one was much easier on me, probably because it was so heavy on plot and world-building and because it established more stuff I already knew from the comics, so there weren'tmany surprises. Nobody has said DID yet, so I guess they're stretching that "mystery" out.

Harrow's plot doesn't make a huge amount of sense--wouldn't he have trouble recruiting people if he was sometimes executing some of them on their first encounter with the cult? I feel like you leave the murder for later, not drop randos in the street in front of your followers, but OK. And I guess he's self-righteous enough to think Ammit won't toast him. Sure. How does Harrow not show up on the security cameras?

I've seen Layla in fic, but have zero memory of her from the comics. She seems fine. I do wonder why she married Marc, but people do stupid things for love.

Did Gus starve while the lads were in Switzerland or wherever? Is that what happened to Gus? I remain confused.

Marc's accent is amusing. Reminds me a lot of my Jewish grandfather, and a bit of Bernie Sanders. I am once again asking you to punch that jackal in the face. Lol.

Marc's big scary history ... honestly didn't impress me much as an attempt to make him the "bad" alter. Steven is obviously not impartial, and it's not like the bad guys are a reliable source of information. The storage locker was more baffling than anything else. If sleep and mirrors are the ways the alters switch (not how it works, but okay, visual representation of psychological phenomena, I'll allow it), then why is there an Army cot in there? Surely Marc wouldn't want Steven to emerge in that space.

The one bit that made me tense up was Marc losing his shit and kicking Steven's reflection at the end. I still don't think he's being set up as the "bad" alter, but that was close to the line.

Side note: the CGI cape looks doofy. I rarely notice that kind of thing, but this looked like a video game during the fight/chase sequence and it was distracting. I know capes are hard to run/fight in while also looking cool, but I feel like a compromise could have been reached that wasn't "Arkham Moon Knight".

Okay, I think Episode 3 will happen.

Kat watches Moon Knight

Okay, so with the encouragement of several people on here and the emotional support of my roommate, I have finally (in February 2024) started watching Moon Knight, a show whose basic concept scares the shit out of me.

Context: I had an adopted older brother with DID. Note that I said "had". That's past tense because life treated him so appallingly poorly that he died (horribly, in prison) when I was 19. Part of that abuse was enabled by pop-culture depictions of DID in the 1980s and 90s that convinced everyone who knew about his condition (including the court system) that he was a walking time bomb.

One of my earliest memories is of my brother as a young adult, playing Super Mario Bros with my toddler self. Another is of him patiently teaching me how to make friends with a large dog. I never met any of his alters, afaik; I was small and cute and safe for him to be himself with, so he probably didn't need them around me. He was a profoundly gentle man when he was allowed, and it hurt like hell to see him turned into a monster in movies and on TV. I've turned off a lot of "psychological thrillers" in sorrow and disgust.

Ironically, I loved Moon Knight comics as a kid in the 90s, BEFORE he was retconned to have DID circa the mid-2000s. Because those comics came out right after my brother died in 2002 and leaned HARD into making people with DID seem like violently unstable monsters (for reference, see the cover of Moon Knight: God and Country), I stopped reading them around 2008, when I couldn't take being poked in the trauma by a comfort character anymore.

But I do love Werewolf By Night, and there's been a lot of good fic mashing Jack up with Moon Knight without dehumanizing anyone, and several people have encouraged me to try the show. So this post will be a place for my thoughts as I try to work my way through with my Essential Editions in one hand and my memories of my brother in the other. I'll add to it as I watch.

If this entertains the Moon Knight fandom or provides useful fic reference, so be it. Just don't be jerks on my post.

Also, anyone who chooses to be shitty about my brother will be eaten by bears. I don't make the rules.

Episode 1

Okay, we open with Steven as our POV character, and he's...convinced he's a sleepwalker. All right, not terrible. Steven is now a bumbling nerd, which is probably an improvement; good luck making a billionaire playboy sympathetic in the 2020s. Jake would be the logical everyman POV from the comics, but I understand from fic that he's got a different role now. I'm confused about the accent, but it's only episode 1, and Steven clearly doesn't yet know who Khonshu is, or that Marc exists, so obviously there's a ways to go here. (Is Marc ... undercover inside Steven? Ugh, this is a trope I have seen and do not like.)

Did Marc kill Steven's fish? Did Khonshu kill Steven's fish? I'm baffled by the fish. Which is a nice break from the larger anxiety. I'm gonna try to worry more about the fish.

The bits with Steven losing time and finding himself in odd situations were distressingly close to the old tropes, but both of those happened to my brother, so I'm not going to bitch about them quite yet. I want to be as fair as I can.

Oh, hey, I recognize Harrow from the comics. What up, dude. How's the cult biz treating you?

The end of the episode, with the jackal thing chasing Steven into the bathroom, came RIGHT up to the line for me. I realized that what I was most afraid of was that the story would assign "good" and "bad" labels to the alters--make Steven the sweet, innocent one and Marc (or maybe Jake, I guess) the monstrous killer. The early flashes of Steven covered in blood didn't really help allay that anxiety. And now Marc is demanding that Steven let him have control in a pretty threatening manner. But so far, it seems like the contrast between Marc and Steven is one of competence--Marc is better at fighting and Steven is better at ... panicking? Unclear. At least Oscar Isaac is playing the protagonist, so his character(s) might remain sympathetic. Nobody has been monsterized quite yet.

I finished the episode with every muscle in my body locked up, waiting for the emotional punch in the face. But I did finish it, and I think I'm gonna try episode two.

[thisguyatthemovies]

It’s no joke

Title: “Joker”

Release date: Oct. 3, 2019

Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Robert De Niro, Zazie Beetz, Bill Camp, Frances Conroy, Brett Cullen, Glenn Fleshler, Douglas Hodge, Marc Maron, Josh Paris, Shea Whigham, Bryan Callen, Sharon Washington, Leigh Gill

Directed by: Todd Phillips

Run time: 2 hours, 2 minutes

Rated: R

What it’s about: In this origin story of “Batman” supervillain The Joker, Arthur Fleck, a middle-aged Gotham City resident with a plethora of mental health issues, becomes increasingly unstable and violent while unwittingly become a symbol for anarchists.  

How I saw it: So many adjectives, so many questions.

Let’s start with the descriptors. “Joker” is bleak, unsettling, troubling, violent, depressing, edgy, gritty, enigmatic and entertaining, though in an uncomfortable way. Todd Phillips’ origin story of Batman’s most notable villain is, in short, not exactly a super happy fun time. It also is a bit of a mess of troubling images and mixed messages, which means you’ll likely be regurgitating it in your brain for days to come. It begs many questions, not the least of which is, “Is this a movie I should like?”

The much hyped and criticized “Joker” is the story of Arthur Fleck, played by Joaquin Phoenix, who somehow has raised his game to another level. Fleck is a middle-aged man who lives with his ailing mother in early 1980s Gotham City (New York). Fleck works for a clown service and aspires to be a stand-up comedian. He also has serious mental health issues, including a condition that makes him uncontrollably laugh out loud.

The setting is important here. It is modeled after – in scenery, lighting, color – the New York in two Martin Scorsese films “Joker” has been most frequently compared to, “Taxi Driver” and “The King of Comedy.” Both star Robert De Niro, who has a key role here as TV talk show host Murray Franklin. Gotham City is enduring a garbage collectors’ strike and being overrun by rats. Millionaire Thomas Wayne, who we all know as the father of Bruce Wayne/Batman, is running for mayor. The city is struggling financially, and Fleck’s therapy and medications are the victims of budget cuts.

It’s all downhill from here for Fleck, who was starting in a pretty low place anyway. He is beaten in streets while working and eventually loses his job for having a handgun while performing for kids. While riding a subway dressed as a clown, he laughs uncontrollably as three young businessmen harass a young woman. They confront him, and Fleck shoots them to death. The crime makes headlines (media reports are prevalent throughout the film), but Fleck is not captured. And though it was not his intention, the crime makes him an anti-hero among Gotham City’s working class, who participate in protests while dressed as clowns. Fleck’s mental state continues to deteriorate, and he becomes more and more violent as he endures one setback after another. Eventually he embraces his status as a symbol for the angry and oppressed, and The Joker is born.

Phoenix’s performance is remarkable even by his standards. He is almost unrecognizably emaciated here, all arms and legs as he runs through the streets and occasionally performs odd dance moves. The weight loss shows most in his face, which just sort of hangs there waiting to be contorted depending on Fleck’s mood, and when he is shirtless, he doesn’t have enough meat on him to cover his ribs. Phoenix is wonderfully uneasy to watch. He is playing a man who knows he has issues and is looking for something, anything to turn out right but seems to resign himself to remaining in a downward spiral. Phoenix is flat out scary, especially during tight shots, even when he isn’t being a psychopathic killer. He is clearly the best thing about “Joker,” and the rest of the cast, except De Niro, largely gets left behind through no fault of their own.

“Joker” has its share of memorable scenes, the best of which is its most violent and darkly funny. Two of his former co-workers stop by his apartment after the death of Fleck’s mother, and Fleck has a bone to pick with one of them, a fellow clown who convinced him he needed a gun. After much blood is shed, his other former co-worker, Gary (Leigh Gill), who oversees the clowns and is a man with dwarfism, apologetically tries to leave the apartment but needs Fleck’s help to do so. Perhaps disturbingly, this provides the most laugh-out-loud moment of a film that contains few funny moments.

While Phoenix lives up to the pre-release hype, it’s not clear if the rest of the film does. Except Gary and a neighbor of Fleck, no one – not random people on the bus, not Fleck’s mother, not even his state-assigned therapist – is a nice person. “Joker” lacks the moral compass of, say, Frances McDormand’s Marge Gunderson in “Fargo.” Its most pleasant scenes, as it turns out, are strictly a figment of Fleck’s psychosis. When Fleck appears on Franklin’s talk show, confesses to the shootings and then makes a speech about how he was driven to violence because everyone in the world is terrible, Franklin reminds him that not all people are bad. But those words are hollow coming from Franklin, who invited Fleck to his show just to mock him.

Part of the confusion, at least after one viewing (this seems like the kind of film that might get better with multiple viewings), is what “Joker” is supposed to be. It presents a familiar comic book character, and though a mostly original story meant to be a standalone, it links itself to the Batman universe, including in a delicious twist that seems to resolve itself but leaves enough ambiguity to produce some doubt. Viewed strictly as a comic book origin story, it is great.

But Phillips has stated that the intent was for “Joker” to be a serious movie, one with Oscar aspirations (and one that was screened at many of the big festivals), and the gritty, realistic setting (no capes, magic sledgehammers or CGI cityscapes here), ties to real-life events and Phoenix’s performance help him accomplish that. However, Phillips has been outspoken about the backlash against the film, most notably those who see it as glamorizing violence (including gun violence) and having the potential to inspire copycats among “incels” in the real world. Movies aren’t released in a vacuum, and “Joker” was hitting the festival circuit about the time of several mass shootings. Much of the criticism against “Joker” is politically motivated in nature, but Phillips’ film, because of its tone and subject matter, can be interpreted as highly political. Thomas Wayne is a wealthy, powerful and crass man not unlike a certain president, but when he calls Gotham City’s ordinary people “clowns” and then talks about how they need him to help them, it sounds a lot like Hillary Clinton’s “deplorables” episode. “Joker” doesn’t exactly glorify Fleck’s rise to public anarchist, but it does not condemn it, either. If “Joker” is being criticized on political grounds, the fact that it is tied to a comic book character is not a viable defense against that criticism. Serious criticism goes with the territory of a film that aims to be taken seriously.

About those questions. Among them: What was the point here? Comic book origin story or statement about an uncaring real-life society? That everyone is terrible, and that could drive someone to insanity and violence? That a more caring (and better funded) government could prevent people with mental health issues from someday trying to overthrow that same government? That the human psyche can withstand only so many setbacks before a beast is unleashed? That it is OK to fight back against the right people? That a terrible world creates terrible people? Or is the world terrible because people are terrible? That our society and the media are fascinated by deranged killers? That everyone is perverse at the core, and that perversion is why we like watching someone go way off the rails?

“Joker” is an enigmatic, chaotic, twisted movie. Perhaps that is the entire point.

My score: 80 out of 100

Should you see it? Yes, if you like being made to feel uncomfortable in a theater but see a great actor at the top of his game.

[drunkportuguese]

the one anon about Sam Wilson wearing Cap. America's clothes: Oh... Sorry for not explaining better, but Sam wearing Cap. America's battle uniforms/battle suits. The one battle suit from Civil War, or from Endgame, or the one with the star ripped out in Infinity War. Just something i've been thinking because of stuff that happened at the end of Endgame, not based on something you posted.

Thank you so much for clarifying! I’m going to go on a little bit of a big rant, but it’s like, my first time writing like this, so please be patient :D I have also not read the comics so all of this is speculation!

Sam wearing Steve’s uniforms is something that doesn’t quite sit right with me. While I believe that the CA mantle is not something that should become the hero’s personality, I do think that it’d be cool to see some changes based on the person who’s wearing it. Sam picking up Steve’s used uniforms and not altering anything would be pretty lame and ilogical imo

I follow a few tumblrs that do read the comics and so I see comics’ Sam!cap once in a while, and I love the way the uniform was tailored to him!

^This looks really good to me! There are a few obvious flaws that I’ll talk about later, but regardless, it’s different enough that everyone knows that that’s the incredible Sam Wilson, but also recognizable enough that you can tell perfectly that he’s Captain America, what with the Puerto Rican flag n’ all (I joke).

However, I’d love love love to see Sam wearing the famous stealth uniform:

Like, this one is a godsend and I really love it (just like the rest of the world lmao). I think it’d really look good on Sam!

But that’s really the only original suit that Sam could wear without making changes to it and still look normal and logical:

Unless Sam’s wings are like those of an owl, he’d make noise flying, as well as that most stealth missions involve going inside buildings, so stealth would have to be on the ground and in closed spaces for most of the time.

Thus, Sam wouldn’t fly a lot in these situations, only using the wings as extra punching-“hands” or a full body shield.

Because of 1) and 2), the original uniform’s build makes sense to me, as the suit doesn’t need to be aerodynamic - flying would not be the focus of these types of missions, and I think Shield would rather the suit was focused on protection and noise reduction than being aerodynamic.

Sam’s fighting style is more airborne than Steve’s, so the other uniforms don’t really fit this different fighting style.

To show you what I mean, let’s take off (hah) from the MCU and dive (hah x2) into the DCU, into the last Aquaman movie. This is what I didn’t like about the movie:

(beware as the picture under this sentence is an edit, but is also a faithful representation of the real suit - i couldn’t find a good quality picture of it besides this one)

Here’s the deal: Nothing in these suits screams hydrodynamic to me.

Mera’s skintight suit might look the most hydrodynamic of all, but that was not the intention they had when making her wear that. They wanted her to have a skintight suit because she’s a woman and thus needs to look sexy. I hate this trope in superheroes’ suits (yes, even in Aquaman’s own skintight suit), but I digress.

Mera’s suit has an egregious neckline. Who the fuck designed this? She’s gonna be swimming superman-style at breakneck speeds and your first thought is to put an enormous boob window where water will 100% make it into the suit through the middle of her boobs?! During the entire movie I was waiting to see her puff-up like a pufferfish from all the water intake the suit must’ve had.

Mera wears heels, which is ridiculous for a society that doesn’t even really walk!

But King Orm’s suits are the worst to me. The first one might not be that bad, but why does he look like a medieval knight/gladiator?

But the third picture… is the absolute fucking worst.

Why does he have a cape? That shit’s gonna float around him and strangle him someday, and I’m gonna be on the sidelines watching and laughing with Edna Mode.

The whole suit looks clunky and heavy, and it might be made of scales but that still doesn’t look oceanic to me. Looks more like someone took Jon Snow’s suit and changed the colors to fit an ocean environment.

All of this is to show you that:

I’m way too picky about superhero suits;

When I rant, I go for the long haul;

These suits are not adapted to their environment, and that’s their biggest flaw.

Steve’s suits are not made to go airborne, and that make sense, because Steve doesn’t fly. Steve’s suits are adapted to ground fighting.

But Sam does fly, and I’d hate to see Sam’s CA suits become the Mera/King Orm of the MCU, where they make them look borderline military-like and too superhero-y, and Sam stops looking like his suits were made to fit an airborne environment and more like they just look cool and that’s it.

So let’s look at skydiving suits:

Notice the full helmet and the how these clothes are baggy but still tight to the body? These suits also have a full-body harness, to make sure no part of the body is under too much strain when you open the parachute and the speed you are travelling at drastically decreases. Would the harness be just for the shoulders, like a backpack, I don’t know - you might dislocate something!

Now let’s look at Sam’s suit:

I’d appreciate if he had some sort of protection for his mouth and nose. Sam’s fights can make him need to do a lot of quick ascends and tight turns and he can very easily have the breath knocked out of him with a rogue gust of wind.

The breastplate/belly-plate(?) looks a little too solid to me, thought, and this is a man that literally performs falcon takedowns, where he needs to curl up quickly:

I’d say with all the technology available in the MCU, now especially with Shuri’s help, they’d be able to make a more flexible but protective suit for Sam, and that’s what I’d like to see when he debuts as CA.

But other than that, it actually looks like a good compromise between being aerodynamic and protective.

It looks protective enough if we ignore the exposed skin around his elbows (I’d be terrified if I had exposed joints – one well-placed stab or slash and my arm would be gone).

His pants look comfortable and not too tight, which prevents getting a wedgie mid-fight and allows the body to move freely.

It has the full-body harness like the suits we saw earlier, but it could use some work. Parachuting means you will have maybe one time where your body will experience a drastic decrease in speed, but Sam will increase and decrease speed very quickly and many times during fights and pursuits. He needs a sturdy body harness with more belts than the parachuters’ so the strain is even more distributed throughout the body, to prevent his groin and shoulders from getting crazy amounts of stress. He is human, after all, and the human body has limits.

Let’s look at the comics again:

This might look a little ridiculous with all the muscle definition, but apart from the exposed boot laces and maybe too tight clothes, it looks pretty fit for high speed flying, acrobatics, and fighting.

Note especially how the suit wraps around his face. The only problem I see there is that it should have a mask to, again, protect his mouth and nose. That flap under his chin could get a little loose with use, and one day Sam gets uncomfortable air flowing into his suit – which, needless to say, a split-second distraction like that in superhero fights can be disastrous.

There’s also very little exposed skin: I’d argue that a Captain America-style helmet would help a lot to protect his head but still being aerodynamic, to keep him flying as fast as he can.

 So, basically:

Sam’s MCU original suit already looks pretty good. He could use having less exposed skin, more flexible materials, and a Captain America-style helmet, which can all be achieved by combining his original suit with the CA standard suit. CA’s suit aesthetic is especially good, because you can segment the breastplate into two pieces, the blue top, and the red/white bottom, making it more foldable and flexible without compromising the classical CA look.

His suit also needs a Winter Soldier-style mask, but while it’s such a big deal for flying, I still don’t think it’s going to be implemented, because then Sam would become so covered-up that Marvel could be tempted to cgi his entire suit like they did with Iron Man, and I really don’t want to see that. We all know that, with a few exceptions (like James Cameron’s Avatar), cgi does not age well.

 -.;.-

I hope at least 10% of this rant makes sense lmao. Also, I know these are superhero movies that definitively don’t need to have all this thought put into them but hey, I like to speculate and complain about shit lol

I’m nowhere near an expert at whatever the fuck I’m talking about in this post, but I tried my best! This deviated into a bit of a different topic, so I’m not sure this is what you wanted, but I wanted to talk about this anyway :s Thank you for the ask!

[aion-rsa]

The Many Crossovers of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

http://bit.ly/2Xzhucg

There have been so many different incarnations of the Heroes in a Half Shell and between them, they've seemingly met just about everyone!

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Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles has covered a lot of ground in the past 35 years. There are so many different takes on "four reptiles in eye masks who fight crime with ninjitsu" that it's honestly hard to keep count of all the different continuities. From the gritty Frank Miller homages of the earliest comics to goofball cartoon characters to CGI hunchbacks in the latest two movies, there have been a wide range of interpretations.

Like all popular properties, the Ninja Turtles have done their share of crossovers. They've met all kinds of characters and rubbed elbows with so many different franchises. They've fought alongside everyone from Archie to Batman to Alf. You can basically plug and play them into any situation at this point.

Starting, fittingly enough, in the Mirage days, the Turtles' first crossover came in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #8. Turtle creators Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird teamed together with Dave Sim and Gerhard to do a story where the foursome met up with Sim's magnum opus character Cerebus. Otherwise known as the star of "that once-beloved barbarian aardvark comic that went off the rails once Sim grew to hate women."

Watch Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on Amazon

In the story, we're introduced to Renet, a time-travel witch with no pants who acts as an apprentice to a strict master, who she's deathly afraid of. After screwing up, she steals a magic scepter and hides out in 1986 New York City, immediately coming into contact with the Turtles. Escaping her master once again, she brings all of them to 1406, where they run afoul of Cerebus the Aardvark. The three parties reluctantly team up with the easily-disgruntled Cerebus annoyed by the mere presence of the Turtles while the Turtles are constantly annoyed by Renet's never-ending, airheaded attitude. A year after this issue, the Turtles and Cerebus – once again depicted by Eastman, Laird, and Sim – would briefly meet up in the pages of Miami Mice #4, where Cerebus again wanted to distance himself from the four.

Also in 1986, the memorable Donatello Micro-Series issue (the one where he teamed up with Jack Kirby) ended with a pin-up by Stan Sakai, depicting the Turtles surrounding his own anthromorphic swordsman creation Miyamoto Usagi from the comic Usagi Yojimbo. 1987 brought us a comic called Turtle Soup, where various comic creators would do short stories featuring the Ninja Turtles. Sakai got to write a storyline where due to some magical residue brought on from his adventure with Renet, Leonardo is sent spiraling through time and ends up in an adventure with Usagi. The two are attacked by the same pack of enemies and cut them down until they are the only ones left. They turn their attentions to each other and are about to go at it, but Leonardo returns to the present, causing Usagi to run through nothing and crash into a tree.

read more: The Original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Movie is Still Amazing

That began a lengthy relationship between the two properties. Miyamoto Usagi became the Alien to the Ninja Turtles' Predator. In the Mirage comics, Leonardo made several more trips into Usagi's time and eventually brought his brothers with him. Usagi got his own action figure as part of Playmates' Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles line, showed up in a couple video games, and two of the animated series. In the '80s cartoon he was named Usagi Yojimbo, I suppose for simplicity's sake, where he was stranded on Earth after being pulled in from an alternate reality. He starred in two episodes.

The 4Kids cartoon had him show up more often, also from an alternate reality, though they played up his relationship with Leonardo more than the '80s cartoon. When they did the Flash Forward part of the series where the Turtles were in the future, they intended to introduce his comic book descendant Space Usagi, but that never came to be.

One of the more entertaining crossovers came in the form of Flaming Carrot Comics #25 to #27 by Bob Burden, where Raphael gets stricken with amnesia and ends up becoming the sidekick to mentally-lacking superhero the Flaming Carrot. Raphael ends up wearing a sack on his head and a cape that says "BREAD" on it, calling himself the Night Avenger. Instead, the authorities call him Bread Boy. The two of them, later joined by the rest of the Turtles and Mysterymen member Screwball, work together to prevent a group of evil umpires from using the disembodied head of Frankenstein's Monster to steal the Empire State Building. It was very, very weird.

read more: The Weirdest Classic Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Episodes Ever

The two parties would meet up again a few years later in a four-issue Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles/Flaming Carrot crossover with Jim Lawson on art, where a military team has gone missing after investigating a mysterious island. The government brings in the Turtles to investigate, while at the same time, the Mysterymen start their own investigation. The two sides collide, befriend each other, and then fight fire ghosts, a werewolf, and other ridiculous things. Meanwhile, the Flaming Carrot tries selling lemonade. He isn't successful.

Across the '90s, the Ninja Turtles crossed paths a couple times with Erik Larsen's Savage Dragon. Drawn by Michael Dooney, 1993's Savage Dragon/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles has Dragon visit New York City to investigate some animated gargoyles abducting the elderly. While friendly with the Turtles, he has a running gag of never being able to tell them apart, suggesting that they get initials on their belt buckles. Even then, in a later crossover, he refers to Raphael as "Rembrandt."

Image Comics took in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise in the mid-90s, so they became integrated with the universe more. Turtles showing up in Savage Dragon's comics – which happened quite a bit – was no longer all that special anymore. Raphael even made a quick appearance fighting a Martian in an alley in Mars Attacks Image.

read more: The Real Life Stories Behind Martial Arts Movie Legends

The most amusing appearance during this time was Gen 13 #13B, where Grunge goes on a journey that causes him to run into all sorts of indie comic characters like Bone, Madman, Savage Dragon, etc. His brief meeting with the Ninja Turtles has a bit of a meta thing going on where Grunge asking, "What happened to you guys?" is less about how they got in a life-and-death predicament and more about how they lost their overwhelming popularity.

Otherwise, the Mirage-era Ninja Turtles made a couple other less-notable crossover appearances. In 1991, they appeared in The Last of the Viking Heroes Meet the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles by Michael Thibodeaux, which again brought time travel into the fray. In 1996, we got Creed/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles by Trent Kaniuga, where they got tangled up in a plot with a young boy named Creed and a mystical, green crystal. While the Ninja Turtles had nothing to do with it, one of their supporting characters starred in the two-part Gizmo and the Fugitoid comic by Laird and Michael Dooney.

During the early '90s, the Ninja Turtles also appeared in a more family-friendly comic run under the Archie Comics banner. Naturally, this gave us Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Meet Archie by Ryan Brown and Dean Clarrain. Around that time in the Archie Turtles series, the four are brought to various realities by Cudley the Cowlick, a giant, cosmic, talking cow head. Because comics are weird. He drops them off in Riverdale for twelve hours. Archie and Betty see them and freak out over what they figured to be an alien invasion, yet nobody believes them. The four disguise themselves and even check out a Josie and the Pussycats concert incognito, but reveal their true identities when Veronica gets kidnapped by some criminals intending to get a hefty ransom. It isn't nearly as good as Archie Meets the Punisher, but it's fine for what it is.

read more: The Comic Book Roots of the First TMNT Movie

In terms of properties with far less staying power, there was also Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Meet the Conservation Corps by Paul Castiglia and Dan Nakrosis. This was actually used to springboard the short-lived comic where an alien crash-lands onto Earth and uses some special tech to turn random animals into mutants for the sake of protecting the Earth from pollution. It was just as hokey as you'd expect, though the villain design wasn't bad. Oily Bird is a giant, oil-covered duck, the only survivor of an oil tanker spill that killed his family. The mix of oil and toxic waste turned him into an insane monster out to overrun the entire planet with pollution. So, I mean, the comic has that going for it. Looking at covers for the Conservation Corps series, he later became a cyborg. So it has that going for it too.

Also under the Archie banner, the Turtles made a quick guest appearance in Sonic the Hedgehog #10, back when that series was young and intentionally silly. Sonic was busy running through an underground labyrinth and when in a sewer, the four Turtles ran by, admitting out loud that they were basically lost. Not only in the wrong sewer, but in the wrong comic as well.

Nearly twenty years later, Sonic's evil double (no, the other one) Scourge ended up in prison with Bebop and Rocksteady in Sonic Universe #29, though that's more of an Easter egg thing than an official crossover.

Speaking of criminal acts, the '80s animated series led to Michelangelo showing up in the all-so-memorable Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue, the anti-drug cartoon about a teenager who gets into marijuana. After he's seen stealing money from his little sister, a bunch of cartoon characters come to life to spend a half hour lecturing him that drugs are bad and smoking weed will make you look like a zombie and kill you. Alongside Michelangelo are Alvin and the Chipmunks, Garfield, Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, the Muppet Babies, Winnie the Pooh, Slimer, the Smurfs, Alf, Huey, Dewey, and Louie. That's a of properties that got transformed into lousy CGI movies over the last few years...

read more - The Essential Episodes of X-Men: The Animated Series

Oh, God. We're due for a CGI Alf reboot, aren't we?

Regardless, as someone who was 8 when that cartoon came out, us kids only gave a damn about Michelangelo showing up. Dude didn't even get to appear on the VHS cover.

It wasn't Garfield's only meeting with Michelangelo. The winter 1992 edition of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Magazine had a one-page comic written by Garfield creator Jim Davis with Gary Barker and Larry Fentz on art and Laird himself doing the inking. The gag here is that Garfield tries disguising himself as the fifth Ninja Turtle in order to get them to leave him alone with all their pizza. Instead, they choose to beat the holy hell out of him, which is rather messed up, all things considered.

read more: The Best Batman Beyond Episodes

He's just a normal cat with the ability to inner-monologue, guys.

In 1997, the Ninja Turtles returned to TV with the abysmal Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation. The live-action show introduced their female member Venus and lasted for a mere six months before cancellation. An episode of Power Rangers in Space called "Shell Shocked" brought the two parties together and while it should have been the best thing ever, it was outright terrible. The evil Astronema decided the best way to defeat the Power Rangers would be to summon the Ninja Turtles, brainwash them, and then make them betray the Rangers. Everyone was insufferable, nothing made any sense, and they only came to their senses by the weakest of all plot devices. It ended with the five Turtles surfing through space and me wanting to die.

The preview of the following episode mentioned Bulk being attacked by a claw and that had me more pumped than the previous 22 minutes.

One bit of strangeness is how the Turtles had a tendency to constantly crossover with Wild West C.O.W.-Boys of the Moo Mesa. Namely the fact that these multiple adventures happened well over a decade after the Moo Mesa cartoon's cancellation, and even then, it wasn't exactly the most memorable show to go back to. The mutant cows appeared sporadically through various issues of Mirage's Tales of the TMNT in a bunch of dimension-hopping storylines I'm not going to even begin to explain.

read more: The Essential Episodes of Tales From the Cryptkeeper

Around that time, when the 4Kids animated series did the Flash Forward season, the Turtles were thrown into a Danger Room-type simulation by the villain Viral where they're stuck having to face the cast of Moo Mesa in a barfight. Viral leaves them to die and returns later, insulted to see the Turtles playing cards with the likes of Moo Montana.

That 4Kids Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series lasted a good seven seasons. Once Nickelodeon bought the rights to everything Ninja Turtles and it was apparent that the 4Kids series was going to be cancelled, they went out in style with Turtles Forever. The animated movie was about the 2000s cartoon crossing over with the '80s cartoon in a plot where the badass Utrom Shredder takes over the '80s Technodrome and tries to use it to wipe out all reality.

There are a couple minor problems in there. The '80s Turtles are treated a little too much as jokes to the point that all four of them are practically Michelangelo. Due to union issues, the original voice actors couldn't come back, meaning we were cheated out of James Avery playing Shredder one last time. Still, it was a wonderful love letter to the various takes on the characters, especially in the final act, where they visited the black-and-white world of Turtle Prime, where they met the grim and gritty Mirage Turtles.

read more: The Craziest Episodes of the Beetlejuice Animated Series

Coincidentally, an episode of the Nickelodeon CGI animated series called "Wormquake" has shown that show's animated Turtles looking through alternate realities and seeing their '80s cartoon counterparts, with Michelangelo wondering why they look like dorks. The hour-long episode has them fight a giant worm and in the end, they get rid of it by sending it to one of the alternate realities. That gives us a quick scene of the '80s incarnations choosing to fight it, all while giving us back the original voice actors. Seriously, hearing Donatello yell, "Turtle Power!" gave me the warm fuzzies.

The Nickelodeon cartoon team and the '80s cartoon team would finally meet up in the season 4 episode "Trans Dimensional Turtles." It's essentially a half-hour remake of Turtles Forever (right down to the use of the Mirage universe in the third act) only using the current show and focusing on a team-up between '80s Krang and Kraang Subprime. Again, the original voice actors return and it leads to a funny moment where Rob Paulsen's '80s Raphael makes fun of the way Rob Paulsen's '10s Donatello talks.

That brings us to the current IDW comic series. IDW has a lot of licensed series under its belt and back in 2011, they introduced a soft crossover event called Infestation. The idea was that a zombie virus was spreading around on an inter-dimensional level. That meant it tied together all these different properties without actually having them meet up. The first series included Zombies vs. Robots, Star Trek, Transformers, Ghostbusters, and GI Joe. A year later, they did Infestation 2, which included Transformers, Dungeons and Dragons, GI Joe, 30 Days of Night, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Instead of zombies, the second series focused more on Lovecraftian nightmares. Over the course of two issues, the Turtles investigate some disturbances in the sewer and defeat an otherworldly squid, saving reality.

read more: Extreme Ghostbusters is Better Than You Remember

IDW used the same soft crossover concept more recently in X-Files: Conspiracy. The crossover involves X-Files characters the Lone Gunmen, whose quest to track down a maguffin leads them to various worlds. They deal with Ghostbusters, Transformers, the Crow, and – you guessed it – the Ninja Turtles. While the Turtle tie-in issue doesn't feature Mulder and Scully, it does have them fight vampires, so there's that.

In 2014, the IDW comic would do a four-issue crossover miniseries with Ghostbusters. Written by Erik Burnham and Tom Waltz with art by Dan Schoening, it revolves around Chi-You, the ever-powerful sibling of Kitsune and the Rat King (who is basically an immortal demigod in IDW continuity). The Turtles and April end up in the Ghostbusters' reality and work alongside Venkman and the rest.

It's a solid outing and one of the things that really works is how everyone matches up with their counterparts. You have the two brains, the two dorks, the two assholes, the redhead lady assistants, and...Leonardo and Winston. Yet the story makes them feel like kindred spirits in the way they act as the down-to-earth ones who have to put up with their partners' over-the-top personalities.

Also great is how even in a cross-dimensional team-up, there's still skepticism. Donatello refuses to believe in ghosts while Egon refuses to believe in aliens. Real glass houses.

This was followed up with a sequel where the ghost of TMNT villain Darius Dun has teamed up with Ghostbusters villains known as the Collectors. The plot has caused different Turtles/Buster pairings to dive through various realities and has led to some neat moments, like Peter using his psychology know-how to help Michelangelo work out his issues with his fall-out with Splinter or how Donatello and Egon discuss their recent experiences of dying and coming back to life. They also run into the ghost of the Turtles' mother and, naturally, Peter hits on her.

read more: The Scariest Real Ghostbusters Episodes

One world they visit during this is a society run by mutant animals where Harold, Danny, Bill, and Ernie are the Ghostbusturtles. Cute.

Recently, they have been having endless crossovers with the Dark Knight. The first of which is a trip to the DC Universe for Batman/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, a six-issue miniseries by James Tynion IV and Freddie E Williams II. It's fantastic.

They end up stranded in Gotham with the knowledge that the science that allows them to exist doesn't exactly hold up in the DC dimension. Their mutagen will gradually become inert, eventually turning them back to normal turtles.

After a run-in with Batman, the four talk about what the hell just happened. Donatello does some internet research, Michelangelo figures out the pros and cons of this dark avenger, Raphael considers him to be some psychopath, and Leonardo reflects on the fight and figures him out in his own way.

"I've never fought someone like him...Shredder, maybe...but it was different. He was testing us. Avoiding lethal blows...he wanted to figure us out. He was fighting like a detective. I've never seen anything like it."

We ultimately get a team-up of the Foot Clan and the League of Assassins, which makes all the sense in the world, and it gets over-the-top once they use mutagen on the inmates of Arkham Asylum. Snake Joker, Hyena Harley, Baboon Two-Face, Vulture Scarecrow, Elephant Bane, Penguin Penguin, and so on. But all the mutated Batman villains in Gotham are no match for Splinter wielding Harley's oversized cartoon mallet.

The same creative team would make two sequels. The second series focuses on Bane taking over New York City in the Turtles' universe while made even stronger from mutagen. It ends up taking the combined might of Batman, Splinter, and Shredder to take him down.

As of this writing, they're in the midst of a crossover story amazingly called "Crisis on a Half Shell," where the villain is Krang wearing the Anti-Monitor.

The current story also features a team-up in there between the Mirage Turtles and a classic, smiling, blue-clad Batman. Everything about this is fantastic.

Yet there are even more TMNT/Batman crossovers out there. Matthew K. Manning and Jon Sommariva did a five-issue miniseries called Batman/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures. This time it's the Turtles from the recent Nickelodeon show meeting up with Batman: The Animated Series.

read more - The Best Batman: The Animated Series Episodes

In it, Mad Hatter creates portals into the Ninja Turtles' universe and sends a handful of Arkham villains there to cause trouble. This includes a stretch of time where Joker takes over the Foot Clan and goes around wearing Shredder's helmet. On the other hand, Shredder is able to overcome Joker gas via pure willpower and hatred towards Splinter.

The comic even uses the crossover as an in-universe explanation for why Scarecrow changed up his look and became ultra-creepy for Adventures of Batman and Robin.

Inspired by these comic crossovers, an animated movie called Batman vs. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was released. The story is very much based on the first comic crossover with the mutant Arkham inmates and the team-up of Ra's al Ghul and Shredder, but the main difference is that they don't do the alternate universe gimmick. It plays it up like Batman and the Turtles have always existed in the same world but have been completely unaware of each other up to this point.

It's very much worth watching, especially for a spectacular Batman vs. Shredder fight early on. Shredder even enters the fight with the same slow-motion jump from the first Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie! I love it.

read more: The Essential Episodes of Justice League Unlimited

Despite all these Batman meet-ups, it still blew everyone away when NetherRealm Studios announced that all four Turtles would be playable in Injustice 2 as the final DLC release. Not only do they get to fight with the DC Universe (or a darker version of), but they also face the likes of Hellboy, Sub-Zero, and Raiden. Each Turtle has about a half hour's worth of dialogue with their opponents and there are tons of cute references in there. My favorite is a subtle Turtles in Time Easter egg where Michelangelo's skateboard has an apple-shaped sticker that says "BIG" and under it is a sticker saying "3AM."

Their ending has Harley Quinn reward them for their help by giving them a pizza laced with the same chemical used in the game's "super pills," which allows street-level characters to go toe-to-toe with Superman. After ingesting this, the Turtles go back to their home dimension and absolutely crush Krang and Shredder with little issue.

read more: The Strange History of The Legend of Zelda Animated Series

So yeah, that's quite the rolodex of aquaintances.

Throughout the years, Leo and the rest have met up with everyone from the Mysterymen to Baby Kermit the Frog. With so many incarnations out there, it's like nothing is off-limits when it comes to teaming up with the Ninja Turtles. It's weirder to realize the properties they haven't crossed paths with yet, like Spider-Man or Predator.

I mean, Michelangelo, Gandalf, Milhouse, and Shaquille O'Neal were Lego Master Builders that one time. That feels totally normal and makes perfect sense to me. It's just the kind of world we live in.

Gavin Jasper writes for Den of Geek and still can't believe we haven't had an official Turtles/Daredevil crossover yet. Read more of his articles here and follow him on Twitter @Gavin4L

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Gavin Jasper

Jun 24, 2019

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

from Books http://bit.ly/2WXYvE5

[tokupedia]

SPECIAL SAIKOU!: Superhero Showcase: Gatchaman Pt. 1: Introduction

“Sometimes we are one...sometimes we are five....the white shadow that slips through unseen ! Science Ninja Team GATCHAMAN!”

Tatsuo Yoshida had loved the concept of superheroes from the very beginning. As a young boy after the US occupied Japan at the end of WWII, he and his two brothers often interacted with American GIs. Some of them were polite and respectful to young Japanese kids and gave away their old comics they weren’t reading anymore to them so they would have something to enjoy.

While none of the Yoshida boys could understand the English text, there was a resonance of appreciation that transcended language in the artwork of the comics. Then again, seeing mighty beings with powers and abilities far beyond mortal man or skilled costumed athletes showing the best of humanity’s good nature resonates with humanity no matter what side of the map you are on. Their favorite of course was Superman, though given the design of the superheroes we are going to talk about, it wouldn’t surprise me if they had a love for the other half of the World’s Finest as well.

These costumes were bright and colorful, so the boys started drawing them and eventually became very good at it.

Superman is the one hero who inspires other ideas in many people, especially since he helped bring the superhero concept to the mainstream masses. This would follow Tatuso as he would again intertwine with the hero of his youth.

In 1959 or 1960 Tasuo was working in a manga studio and was asked to do a manga on Superman!

Yes, this was more or less a manga made to capitalize on the 1957 George Reeves TV show, which had been brought over to Japan in 1958.

While a few Japanese citizens saw US superheroes and scoffed them as propaganda, Tatsuo looked past that. He saw the very core of what made superheroes great, that they are willing to do the right thing and selflessly help others.

In 1962, after a good career in the manga industry, Tatsuo opened Tatsunoko Productions with the help of his brothers. After the first series about modern super spy ninjas and an Astro Boy clone called Space Ace in 1965 (no relation to the Don Bluth animated video game), Tatsunoko hit the really big time on TV in 1967. Debuting a high octane action show that would eventually make waves around the world....Mach GoGoGo! 

The series made it to American airwaves in the fall of that year as Speed Racer, which was one of several old school anime would set off a slow chain reaction that would later explode into our modern western otaku culture.

Then came one of the pillars that held it in place....

In 1969, its codemane was Production 21 and later it went by many names: Science Ninja Squad 5 and even Birdman until Tatsunoko presumably found out there was a Hanna-Barbera character with that name. Finally, the advertisers chose a name...Gatchaman, which premiered on October 1, 1972. The series was partially influenced not only by Shotaro Ishinomori’s Henshin Hero Boom from the popularity of Kamen Rider, but also the spark of love Tatsuo had for heroes like Superman.

The reason so many in the comics industry love Gatchaman such as Alex Ross is because out of all Japanese superheroes, this one takes the rawest form of its rooted American concept. One can simply observe the look of the original  costumes and see aspects of Adams, Giordano, Swan and many other Silver and Bronze Age artists in the aesthetic. The same can be said for the evolving costumes later on as they borrow elements of popular western media and comics of the specific period.

Now you have to be asking, what the heck is a “Gatcha”?

Gatcha, at least in one translation, is the Japanese onomatopoeia sound of machinery such as a loom. This is more or less a reference to the fact this superteam uses machines to stop evil in its tracks.

If you wanna know more on the process of this series coming to be, check out this page:

http://www.battleoftheplanets.info/whatwas.html

Overview

The Original Series (1972-1974)

The International Science Organization and the world are under attack by a terrorist organization known as Galactor, overseen by the evil Sosai X, who want to control Earth’s resources for themselves. Dr. Kōzaburō Nambu, who knew of Galactor’s schemes, deploys a special task force to deal with them: The Science Ninja Team...Gatchaman!

The Sequels (1978-1980)

Gatchaman II (1978-1979)

After the destruction of his army, Sosai X tried yet again to attack the Earth with the help of an abducted child mutated into an adult Commander named Gel Sadora. The Science Ninja Team head out again with new weapons, vehicles and a revived comrade to do battle with Galactor yet again!

Gatchaman Fighter aka Gatchaman F (1979-1980)

After seemingly being destroyed by the Gatchaman, Sosai X’s remains mutate and he revives into the more devious Sosai Z. He recruits the cruel European dictator Count Erun Egobossler to make his Galactor organization even deadlier than ever before. Their first attack completely obliterates the Gatchaman’s gear and ship from the last season and defeats them. The team manage to get rescued before they are killed by an engineer, who shows Dr. Nambu’s latest mechas and gear for the team. This season gets darker than previous one towards the end and features the death of Dr. Nambu.

If the energy charged sword called the Gatchafencer and the Gatchaspartan ship weren’t dead giveaways, this was when Star Wars was a pop culture cult phenomenon in Japan. Every studio tried to duplicate the George Lucas magic in one way or another or at least ride its coattails.

The OVAs (1994)

In the 90s, Tatsunoko tried to revive their old heroes with polished new looks and retooled the characters for a modern audience. The story for the most part is derived from various episodes of the first series, but mostly the first episode and a few plots from others.

Gatchaman ‘98 (Unmade)

Tatsunoko was going to revive their characters again full time in a new set of TV shows, including Gatchaman.

However, one of the main problems that prevented this was their poor choice of a starting show: A Mach GoGoGo reboot. While the classic show celebrated its 30th anniversary in 1997, times had changed in the anime landscape. A guy with a cool gadget-laden car racing around a track was a bit pedestrian in a realm of Kamehamehas, Dragon Slaves and Moon Healing Escalations. Going big and loud for spectacle or subliminally selling tons of toys/video games/merchandise was the norm in the 90s for anime.

The Mach GoGoGo show cost a lot to make as it used CGI in parts of its animation and it was cancelled over halfway through due to low ratings. Another roadblock (no pun intended) for Gatchaman reviving in the late 90s was no sponsor wanted to back it despite the shows legendary status in pop culture (Possibly due to the debacle investment in the new Mach GoGoGo.)

NTT (2000)

http://gatchaman.wikia.com/wiki/NTT_Gatchaman

The Gatchaman Team vanished for 3 years until NTT East approached Tatsunoko with a proposal for a set of internet service provider commercials starring SMAP and brand new animation and costumes of the science ninjas in action. 

The Imagi Disaster (2011 aborted animated film)

Already talked about this one:

http://tokupedia.tumblr.com/post/147082771026/special-saikou-examples-of-toku-projects-that

Live action film (2013)

This is the film that, at the very least, made the older, traditional version of the superheroes limp on life support. This movie did what many revisionists do to any beloved superhero, find faults in ideas where there are none and make beloved aspects disappear and be replaced by something near unrecognizable.

Gone were the bird motifs and chest emblems, no mecha aside from the God Phoenix, no Sosai X and no Galactor (unless you count the in-name only reference). What was added was unnecessary, the Gatchaman all had superpowers and weapons given by shiny McGuffin stones and something about a virus that creates energy shields.

They didn’t even get to be ninjas too much in this movie. The saddest part is the complete waste of Tori Matsuzaka and this could have worked as a tokusatsu given the show’s legacy in the form of Super Sentai.

Gatchaman Crowds (2013-2015)

Sometimes derided by a few older purists as “Gatchaman for Millennials” or “Facebook: The Anime”, this reboot series departed from capes and costumes for neon Tony Stark armor by way of Akihabara, new characters and notebook souls. Lots of newcomers gravitated towards this season and it was considered as the sleeper hit of 2013 and 2015. So despite critics, it acted as its own entity. Crowds was also was the first new, full fledged Gatchaman TV show in over 30 years.

The show’s core philosophical focus was to examine how the internet and social media have affected society in both positive and negative ways and in rare cases, the relevancy of superheroes in the digital age. The second season insight focused on how hive mentality and politics associated with it on the internet could have very bad consequences or be distorted even in cases where the intentions are originally noble. 

A creative sort of re-imagining, this series examined how our future could be shaped for good or for ill by digital media before finally taking a neutral perspective as that is the choice we humans will have to make for ourselves.

Good Morning Ninja Team Gatchaman

There was a morning comedy Flash animation series of shorts featuring the original Gatchaman, but it is not worth the time examining as its is just gag sketches with no action.

Battle of the Planets/G-Force/Eagle Riders (1978, 1986, 1996)

The various edited dubs of the original trio of shows, which served as a gateway series to about 2 or 3 generations worth of future anime fans in the west. The content in some cases was heavily edited or censored as most anime were known for doing at the time.

Due to the various companies who hold the rights to these adaptations, it is impossible at the moment for the original Japanese Gatchaman Trilogy to be completely on DVD or Blu-Ray. But Sandy Frank Productions did relinquish their rights to the first series to Funimation for a release..so there’s that.

Up next....The leader of the ninja flock!

[onbearfeet]

Episode 3

Even lighter on the trauma this time. Either I'm getting used to this, or the writers are laying off the DID tropes in favor of plot, which suits me fine. Marc and Steven arguing and switching quickly seems inaccurate, but I will take it because no one is monsterized. We have our first appearance of a third alter, which I assume is Jake since we're still one secret identity short of the character I read in the comics.

Apparently Steven's suit is not amazingly protective. The CGI cape didn't seem as egregious this time.

Finally heard Chicago vowels in Marc's accent.

Wait, isn't there software that calculates star positions however many centuries ago? Seems like a waste of your Khonshu, but okay.

We get a little more Layla, including that she is the daughter of an archeologist who was murdered. Sounds like Marlene. Except Layla is more competent and not a white lady. I am fine with both these things.

Tonight is a double feature, so on to Episode 4.

Kat watches Moon Knight

Okay, so with the encouragement of several people on here and the emotional support of my roommate, I have finally (in February 2024) started watching Moon Knight, a show whose basic concept scares the shit out of me.

Context: I had an adopted older brother with DID. Note that I said "had". That's past tense because life treated him so appallingly poorly that he died (horribly, in prison) when I was 19. Part of that abuse was enabled by pop-culture depictions of DID in the 1980s and 90s that convinced everyone who knew about his condition (including the court system) that he was a walking time bomb.

One of my earliest memories is of my brother as a young adult, playing Super Mario Bros with my toddler self. Another is of him patiently teaching me how to make friends with a large dog. I never met any of his alters, afaik; I was small and cute and safe for him to be himself with, so he probably didn't need them around me. He was a profoundly gentle man when he was allowed, and it hurt like hell to see him turned into a monster in movies and on TV. I've turned off a lot of "psychological thrillers" in sorrow and disgust.

Ironically, I loved Moon Knight comics as a kid in the 90s, BEFORE he was retconned to have DID circa the mid-2000s. Because those comics came out right after my brother died in 2002 and leaned HARD into making people with DID seem like violently unstable monsters (for reference, see the cover of Moon Knight: God and Country), I stopped reading them around 2008, when I couldn't take being poked in the trauma by a comfort character anymore.

But I do love Werewolf By Night, and there's been a lot of good fic mashing Jack up with Moon Knight without dehumanizing anyone, and several people have encouraged me to try the show. So this post will be a place for my thoughts as I try to work my way through with my Essential Editions in one hand and my memories of my brother in the other. I'll add to it as I watch.

If this entertains the Moon Knight fandom or provides useful fic reference, so be it. Just don't be jerks on my post.

Also, anyone who chooses to be shitty about my brother will be eaten by bears. I don't make the rules.

Episode 1

Okay, we open with Steven as our POV character, and he's...convinced he's a sleepwalker. All right, not terrible. Steven is now a bumbling nerd, which is probably an improvement; good luck making a billionaire playboy sympathetic in the 2020s. Jake would be the logical everyman POV from the comics, but I understand from fic that he's got a different role now. I'm confused about the accent, but it's only episode 1, and Steven clearly doesn't yet know who Khonshu is, or that Marc exists, so obviously there's a ways to go here. (Is Marc ... undercover inside Steven? Ugh, this is a trope I have seen and do not like.)

Did Marc kill Steven's fish? Did Khonshu kill Steven's fish? I'm baffled by the fish. Which is a nice break from the larger anxiety. I'm gonna try to worry more about the fish.

The bits with Steven losing time and finding himself in odd situations were distressingly close to the old tropes, but both of those happened to my brother, so I'm not going to bitch about them quite yet. I want to be as fair as I can.

Oh, hey, I recognize Harrow from the comics. What up, dude. How's the cult biz treating you?

The end of the episode, with the jackal thing chasing Steven into the bathroom, came RIGHT up to the line for me. I realized that what I was most afraid of was that the story would assign "good" and "bad" labels to the alters--make Steven the sweet, innocent one and Marc (or maybe Jake, I guess) the monstrous killer. The early flashes of Steven covered in blood didn't really help allay that anxiety. And now Marc is demanding that Steven let him have control in a pretty threatening manner. But so far, it seems like the contrast between Marc and Steven is one of competence--Marc is better at fighting and Steven is better at ... panicking? Unclear. At least Oscar Isaac is playing the protagonist, so his character(s) might remain sympathetic. Nobody has been monsterized quite yet.

I finished the episode with every muscle in my body locked up, waiting for the emotional punch in the face. But I did finish it, and I think I'm gonna try episode two.

[onbearfeet]

Episode 4

Steven actually tells Layla something she needs to know. Communication king.

This is a lot of romantic subplot for people who should be expecting a tomb full of murderers.

Yes, show, I too have seen Raiders. And Last Crusade. And The Mummy (1999).

As a nerd, I am mad about the Alexander thing. THE TOMB IS IN THE WRONG FUCKING PLACE AND SINCE WHEN CAN STEVEN DISTINGUISH ALEXANDER'S GREEK FROM PTOLEMAIC GREEK. AND WHY WOULD THE TOMB BE SO ELABORATE THE FUNERAL WAS A RUSH JOB AAAAAAAA oh good shooting.

Oh fuck. Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck. Ooooooookay, I'm glad I had a quilt and a werewolf for the "asylum" scene. I mean, the absolutely absurd fakeness of the place helped, but eeeeeeeeegh. I'm backed to locked muscles and a squished werewolf.

More next time. If the werewolf lives. I'm mad now and refuse to let a fucking Disney Plus show beat me.

Kat watches Moon Knight

Okay, so with the encouragement of several people on here and the emotional support of my roommate, I have finally (in February 2024) started watching Moon Knight, a show whose basic concept scares the shit out of me.

Context: I had an adopted older brother with DID. Note that I said "had". That's past tense because life treated him so appallingly poorly that he died (horribly, in prison) when I was 19. Part of that abuse was enabled by pop-culture depictions of DID in the 1980s and 90s that convinced everyone who knew about his condition (including the court system) that he was a walking time bomb.

One of my earliest memories is of my brother as a young adult, playing Super Mario Bros with my toddler self. Another is of him patiently teaching me how to make friends with a large dog. I never met any of his alters, afaik; I was small and cute and safe for him to be himself with, so he probably didn't need them around me. He was a profoundly gentle man when he was allowed, and it hurt like hell to see him turned into a monster in movies and on TV. I've turned off a lot of "psychological thrillers" in sorrow and disgust.

Ironically, I loved Moon Knight comics as a kid in the 90s, BEFORE he was retconned to have DID circa the mid-2000s. Because those comics came out right after my brother died in 2002 and leaned HARD into making people with DID seem like violently unstable monsters (for reference, see the cover of Moon Knight: God and Country), I stopped reading them around 2008, when I couldn't take being poked in the trauma by a comfort character anymore.

But I do love Werewolf By Night, and there's been a lot of good fic mashing Jack up with Moon Knight without dehumanizing anyone, and several people have encouraged me to try the show. So this post will be a place for my thoughts as I try to work my way through with my Essential Editions in one hand and my memories of my brother in the other. I'll add to it as I watch.

If this entertains the Moon Knight fandom or provides useful fic reference, so be it. Just don't be jerks on my post.

Also, anyone who chooses to be shitty about my brother will be eaten by bears. I don't make the rules.

Episode 1

Okay, we open with Steven as our POV character, and he's...convinced he's a sleepwalker. All right, not terrible. Steven is now a bumbling nerd, which is probably an improvement; good luck making a billionaire playboy sympathetic in the 2020s. Jake would be the logical everyman POV from the comics, but I understand from fic that he's got a different role now. I'm confused about the accent, but it's only episode 1, and Steven clearly doesn't yet know who Khonshu is, or that Marc exists, so obviously there's a ways to go here. (Is Marc ... undercover inside Steven? Ugh, this is a trope I have seen and do not like.)

Did Marc kill Steven's fish? Did Khonshu kill Steven's fish? I'm baffled by the fish. Which is a nice break from the larger anxiety. I'm gonna try to worry more about the fish.

The bits with Steven losing time and finding himself in odd situations were distressingly close to the old tropes, but both of those happened to my brother, so I'm not going to bitch about them quite yet. I want to be as fair as I can.

Oh, hey, I recognize Harrow from the comics. What up, dude. How's the cult biz treating you?

The end of the episode, with the jackal thing chasing Steven into the bathroom, came RIGHT up to the line for me. I realized that what I was most afraid of was that the story would assign "good" and "bad" labels to the alters--make Steven the sweet, innocent one and Marc (or maybe Jake, I guess) the monstrous killer. The early flashes of Steven covered in blood didn't really help allay that anxiety. And now Marc is demanding that Steven let him have control in a pretty threatening manner. But so far, it seems like the contrast between Marc and Steven is one of competence--Marc is better at fighting and Steven is better at ... panicking? Unclear. At least Oscar Isaac is playing the protagonist, so his character(s) might remain sympathetic. Nobody has been monsterized quite yet.

I finished the episode with every muscle in my body locked up, waiting for the emotional punch in the face. But I did finish it, and I think I'm gonna try episode two.

[onbearfeet]

Episode 5

*internal screaming*

*external whimpering*

*werewolf being squished*

Hey, guys, guess what! It's possible to tense all your muscles with anxiety in such a way as to fuck up at least half your back!

...yeah, I'm lying down now.

So, uh, hearing the name "Randall" was a whole-ass flashback, and not in the good way. I'd forgotten Randall Spector existed, but as a kid I read the '90s run where he was introduced and hooooooo boy. Weird to be asked to sympathize with a child version of, uh, that dude. Good call not nicknaming him Randy this time; I don't think Steven would have been able to keep a straight face.

Yes. Yes, I am avoiding talking about the upsetting thing. I will talk about it now because I commit to the bit, apparently even at the cost of mild self-harm, and if that isn't the story of my life ...

So. Um. Two things about my brother that caused this episode to poke me REAL HARD in the trauma. Thing one: DID is often set off by childhood abuse, as it was with Marc et al. In my brother's case, it was his biological parents beating the shit out of him, usually with an electrical cord, but sometimes with, yes, a belt. And like with Marc/Steven, the trigger to those beatings was usually an extremely normal child behavior like crying or making a mess. I was not present for these beatings; I wasn't born yet. But I saw the results, including some marks on my brother's arms and the fact that he was the largest man in just about any room and he still flinched when someone used a sharp voice.

Thing two: receiving the shittiest mental healthcare imaginable made my brother's life indescribably worse! In the United States, the largest single source of mental healthcare is the prison system (or rather systems--federalism). After Reagan shut down most institutional mental-health facilities (not that I am defending those--nightmare for another day), the US started shoving as many mentally ill people as it could into the carceral system, including my brother. And because the pay is shit and the working conditions are appalling, it is not a preferred working environment for therapists, so there's a lot of turnover. My brother got a new therapist every six months or so, and guess what the first step in his treatment was every time? Yeah, it was a case history. Apparently nobody shared notes, ever, so he had to relive his traumas over and over again every six months. For fifteen years. Until he died. That is, no shit, a major part of how Child Me came to understand the Christian concept of hell: as being forced to re-experience the worst things that ever happened to you, over and over, forever, possibly while someone pretends to "help" you but actually hurts you worse.

This episode was distressing to me.

I hung on by my fingernails because at least Steven and Marc are finally getting to understand one another a bit, and Steven isn't treating Marc like a monster 100% of the time anymore. Good job, boys. Bonus points for Steven pointing out that Khonshu had been manipulating Marc from the beginning, and for Steven getting to kick a little ass. Here's hoping Marc has to deal with some of his self-hatred in the next episode.

This was not a great episode to watch at the end of an otherwise emotionally taxing day (ironically, therapy kicked my ass). But I'm gonna finish. I'm pretty sure the guitar music at the end was connected to Jake, and after all this, I want to hear Oscar Isaac speak Spanish.

Werewolf requests an intermission, though. He's concerned I'll pull something important if I don't take better care of myself.

Oh, and he has a name now! Russell. Thanks to @abirdie for suggesting it.

Kat watches Moon Knight

Okay, so with the encouragement of several people on here and the emotional support of my roommate, I have finally (in February 2024) started watching Moon Knight, a show whose basic concept scares the shit out of me.

Context: I had an adopted older brother with DID. Note that I said "had". That's past tense because life treated him so appallingly poorly that he died (horribly, in prison) when I was 19. Part of that abuse was enabled by pop-culture depictions of DID in the 1980s and 90s that convinced everyone who knew about his condition (including the court system) that he was a walking time bomb.

One of my earliest memories is of my brother as a young adult, playing Super Mario Bros with my toddler self. Another is of him patiently teaching me how to make friends with a large dog. I never met any of his alters, afaik; I was small and cute and safe for him to be himself with, so he probably didn't need them around me. He was a profoundly gentle man when he was allowed, and it hurt like hell to see him turned into a monster in movies and on TV. I've turned off a lot of "psychological thrillers" in sorrow and disgust.

Ironically, I loved Moon Knight comics as a kid in the 90s, BEFORE he was retconned to have DID circa the mid-2000s. Because those comics came out right after my brother died in 2002 and leaned HARD into making people with DID seem like violently unstable monsters (for reference, see the cover of Moon Knight: God and Country), I stopped reading them around 2008, when I couldn't take being poked in the trauma by a comfort character anymore.

But I do love Werewolf By Night, and there's been a lot of good fic mashing Jack up with Moon Knight without dehumanizing anyone, and several people have encouraged me to try the show. So this post will be a place for my thoughts as I try to work my way through with my Essential Editions in one hand and my memories of my brother in the other. I'll add to it as I watch.

If this entertains the Moon Knight fandom or provides useful fic reference, so be it. Just don't be jerks on my post.

Also, anyone who chooses to be shitty about my brother will be eaten by bears. I don't make the rules.

Episode 1

Okay, we open with Steven as our POV character, and he's...convinced he's a sleepwalker. All right, not terrible. Steven is now a bumbling nerd, which is probably an improvement; good luck making a billionaire playboy sympathetic in the 2020s. Jake would be the logical everyman POV from the comics, but I understand from fic that he's got a different role now. I'm confused about the accent, but it's only episode 1, and Steven clearly doesn't yet know who Khonshu is, or that Marc exists, so obviously there's a ways to go here. (Is Marc ... undercover inside Steven? Ugh, this is a trope I have seen and do not like.)

Did Marc kill Steven's fish? Did Khonshu kill Steven's fish? I'm baffled by the fish. Which is a nice break from the larger anxiety. I'm gonna try to worry more about the fish.

The bits with Steven losing time and finding himself in odd situations were distressingly close to the old tropes, but both of those happened to my brother, so I'm not going to bitch about them quite yet. I want to be as fair as I can.

Oh, hey, I recognize Harrow from the comics. What up, dude. How's the cult biz treating you?

The end of the episode, with the jackal thing chasing Steven into the bathroom, came RIGHT up to the line for me. I realized that what I was most afraid of was that the story would assign "good" and "bad" labels to the alters--make Steven the sweet, innocent one and Marc (or maybe Jake, I guess) the monstrous killer. The early flashes of Steven covered in blood didn't really help allay that anxiety. And now Marc is demanding that Steven let him have control in a pretty threatening manner. But so far, it seems like the contrast between Marc and Steven is one of competence--Marc is better at fighting and Steven is better at ... panicking? Unclear. At least Oscar Isaac is playing the protagonist, so his character(s) might remain sympathetic. Nobody has been monsterized quite yet.

I finished the episode with every muscle in my body locked up, waiting for the emotional punch in the face. But I did finish it, and I think I'm gonna try episode two.

[onbearfeet]

Episode 6

Welp. We made it.

As predicted by multiple commenters, Ep 5 was the trauma-heavy one, and Ep 6 was lighter in comparison--mostly plot and a wee bit of character development. And also a CGI fight sequence I choose to describe as "Kaiju, but also Egyptomania".

Marc's reunion with Steven was well-done. Again, my big fear is DID being monsterized, and this was the opposite of that, so well and good. I would have added a line about Marc expecting to die when he gave the heart to Steven, but ehhhh. It's fine. Probably.

I'm not sure highlighting the difference between Khonshu and Ammit as a minor theological squabble was the right move, writing-wise, especially since the whole thing boils down to an argument about free will vs. destiny while 1) that is an argument that nobody really wins in contemporary media and 2) Moon Knight might be the single worst Marvel hero to involve in that discussion. Oh, well. Still rhetorically clearer than FATWS.

Layla's turn as an avatar was fun, although it did get me and roomie arguing about whether she was too similar to Wonder Woman. (I maintain that if Marc is Marvel Batman and Layla is Marvel Wonder Woman, that just makes their relationship WonderBat, which I enjoy immensely, so SHUSH.)

Marc's decision not to kill Harrow was ... interesting? Weird? I dunno, this kind of seemed like a valid use case for Marc VERY occasionally killing someone, what with the apocalypse and all. I get the reasoning behind Marc choosing not to kill anyone at the climax, but it fell a bit flat for me that his actual proposed solution was just...leaving?

Okay, Jake. Let's talk about Jake, because on the one hand, I did get to hear Oscar Isaac speak Spanish, and on the other, eek.

So one last bit of Kat's Dead Brother Lore (and please remember that if you are shitty about him, the bears will eat you): he had at least one alter that I never met but that was, by all accounts, a fucking nightmare. Nearly took my dad out with a carpet knife once. (I am not saying Dad didn't say or do something to deserve it, mind you. But in context, he could have just loomed over my brother by accident in the wrong moment. This alter was not a discerning soul.) According to my brother's best guess, this alter, whom I'll call S because fuck if I'm saying his name when I'm not even saying my bro's, came into being to absorb abuse from his biological parents and, eventually, to protect him and his younger bio-bro from said abuse. Everything I heard about S aligned with what I later experienced with one of MY biological siblings, sometimes referred to on here as my ex-brother. My ex-bro checks all the boxes for psychopathy and is the main reason I have PTSD. So with all that context, I'm prepared to call S a scary motherfucker.

And yes, S is why my brother died in prison. He did something horrifying. I will not elaborate beyond saying that nobody died, and that's probably why no one tried to death-penalty my brother.

Anyway. Jake.

Jake reminds me of S in some ways, although he's obviously much more organized, at least with Khonshu directing him. He's also, uh, MUCH more comfortable with lethal violence than S ever seemed to be. The people S hurt were usually people he perceived, rightly or wrongly, as threats. There were an awful lot of bodies in that hallway that I doubt could have been interpreted as threats to Marc or Steven.

That leads me to an interesting place, emotionally. Maybe it's because I'm used to thinking of my brother as a victim in many ways, but if Jake originated as a protector for Marc and Steven--someone who took the worst of the abuse at first and maybe did the worst of the violence later on--then his continued willingness to work for Khonshu might be another layer of self-victimization.

Put simply, Marc was willing to destroy himself for Steven. Is Jake doing the same for Marc? Perhaps making a private deal with Khonshu to let the other two go so easily? Does Jake see himself as an acceptable loss for his brothers' freedom? Has Khonshu manipulated Jake even more profoundly than he did Marc?

I dunno. I've seen fanfics writing Jake as a mysterious, "evil" alter, but there isn't enough in one scene to say whether the story itself is monsterizing Jake. I'd be interested to know if a fanfic writer has portrayed Jake as essentially Khonshu's latest victim. (Not sure I'd have the fortitude to read that, but I'd like to know if it exists.)

Okay. Not a perfect show, and it was a near thing getting through it, but I think I'm glad I did.

Oh, and now roomie wants to watch WBN and Daredevil with me because he's enjoying the comics facts, so that's fun.

That's all for now, folks. Russell the Emotional Support Werewolf thanks you for your attention.

Kat watches Moon Knight

Okay, so with the encouragement of several people on here and the emotional support of my roommate, I have finally (in February 2024) started watching Moon Knight, a show whose basic concept scares the shit out of me.

Context: I had an adopted older brother with DID. Note that I said "had". That's past tense because life treated him so appallingly poorly that he died (horribly, in prison) when I was 19. Part of that abuse was enabled by pop-culture depictions of DID in the 1980s and 90s that convinced everyone who knew about his condition (including the court system) that he was a walking time bomb.

One of my earliest memories is of my brother as a young adult, playing Super Mario Bros with my toddler self. Another is of him patiently teaching me how to make friends with a large dog. I never met any of his alters, afaik; I was small and cute and safe for him to be himself with, so he probably didn't need them around me. He was a profoundly gentle man when he was allowed, and it hurt like hell to see him turned into a monster in movies and on TV. I've turned off a lot of "psychological thrillers" in sorrow and disgust.

Ironically, I loved Moon Knight comics as a kid in the 90s, BEFORE he was retconned to have DID circa the mid-2000s. Because those comics came out right after my brother died in 2002 and leaned HARD into making people with DID seem like violently unstable monsters (for reference, see the cover of Moon Knight: God and Country), I stopped reading them around 2008, when I couldn't take being poked in the trauma by a comfort character anymore.

But I do love Werewolf By Night, and there's been a lot of good fic mashing Jack up with Moon Knight without dehumanizing anyone, and several people have encouraged me to try the show. So this post will be a place for my thoughts as I try to work my way through with my Essential Editions in one hand and my memories of my brother in the other. I'll add to it as I watch.

If this entertains the Moon Knight fandom or provides useful fic reference, so be it. Just don't be jerks on my post.

Also, anyone who chooses to be shitty about my brother will be eaten by bears. I don't make the rules.

Episode 1

Okay, we open with Steven as our POV character, and he's...convinced he's a sleepwalker. All right, not terrible. Steven is now a bumbling nerd, which is probably an improvement; good luck making a billionaire playboy sympathetic in the 2020s. Jake would be the logical everyman POV from the comics, but I understand from fic that he's got a different role now. I'm confused about the accent, but it's only episode 1, and Steven clearly doesn't yet know who Khonshu is, or that Marc exists, so obviously there's a ways to go here. (Is Marc ... undercover inside Steven? Ugh, this is a trope I have seen and do not like.)

Did Marc kill Steven's fish? Did Khonshu kill Steven's fish? I'm baffled by the fish. Which is a nice break from the larger anxiety. I'm gonna try to worry more about the fish.

The bits with Steven losing time and finding himself in odd situations were distressingly close to the old tropes, but both of those happened to my brother, so I'm not going to bitch about them quite yet. I want to be as fair as I can.

Oh, hey, I recognize Harrow from the comics. What up, dude. How's the cult biz treating you?

The end of the episode, with the jackal thing chasing Steven into the bathroom, came RIGHT up to the line for me. I realized that what I was most afraid of was that the story would assign "good" and "bad" labels to the alters--make Steven the sweet, innocent one and Marc (or maybe Jake, I guess) the monstrous killer. The early flashes of Steven covered in blood didn't really help allay that anxiety. And now Marc is demanding that Steven let him have control in a pretty threatening manner. But so far, it seems like the contrast between Marc and Steven is one of competence--Marc is better at fighting and Steven is better at ... panicking? Unclear. At least Oscar Isaac is playing the protagonist, so his character(s) might remain sympathetic. Nobody has been monsterized quite yet.

I finished the episode with every muscle in my body locked up, waiting for the emotional punch in the face. But I did finish it, and I think I'm gonna try episode two.