#personally i think its jimmy bc hes doomed by the narrative

[daisybell-on-a-carousel]

hiii I'm wondering, what issues do you have with Countdown, if you don't mind me asking?

Ooh i dont mind at all! I love talking! And potentially hearing more perspectives

Pleasee note that ive been reading all the Jason comics in order of release (started at flying todds jaybin currently at rhato), I've only read countdown once, my memory issues are a bitch, and everything is subject to change for forever 👍

I'm like, basing this whole ramble off my memory of events, and no rereading means no potential updating of feelings on it

To start on positives, I love many concepts and characters it brings to the table and all the different earths traveling they do, I think Donna, Jason, and Kyle are a fun trio as well, and their adventures are delightful. The different earths are all very interesting and i dearly wish we got to have more focus on them. I may not like it being so long but ehhh I've considered rereading it on occasion. The issues counting down are also a fun gimmick as well.

One of my problems is the like. Main story. It feels pretty messy just to like, read though. The extra issues onto the main 52 don't help. Not being familiar with that many dc characters in general doesn't help (was more of a marvel kid). Don't really remember how many character stories we were following in there anymore, it just felt like alot and I genuinely can't remember where half of them led

I ALSO. Skimmed it a bit. Especially later. That's on me. But to be fair to me it's 50 issues and I just don't think I'm big on long comic stories like that. in general. So it was always doomed to fail in the test of my personal opinion

(My favorite crossover comic so far has been legends, just to hammer that above point in)

I dont like the ending where they all hang out in a bunker on the good earth and the virus they have is spreading to just. kill that entire world. And they just go home after that. That's like, that felt weird. I'm just not big on heros accidentally slowly killing an entire universe. That just like. Hhhhng. Um. You know when the stakes get so big and bad they just kinda suck? If that's what I mean??

While I do like looking into Superboy Prime and Jason's resurrection. Don't like his dialogue here. Don't know if that's normal for him or not though

I felt a teensy bit validated when I looked it up after reading and saw many others not liking it I fear

But ignoring at all that. (Because while important to acknowledge when talking about my problems with it, most of what I just had to say is unfair to it)

My knowledge is on Jason. Let's focus on Jason

Jason just kinda. Sucks? He sucks in this. Do not get me wrong Jason is absolutely allowed to be an asshole, I won't ignore those edges. But he was more like,,, a generic asshole? He didn't feel like Jason to me, just more like, a template character or something. There are fun interactions and moments he has but just. Bwah. And it feels like a very strange turn too because for the first few issues I was actually really enjoying the Jason here. I'm not sure what happened

(Fun fact this is the first comic I felt showed Jason as angry. Actual "wow that guy is angry". the angry i was expecting when i started reading him. It was when Dick and Tim interrogated him, I actually think about this moment alot in some of my vague rambling thoughts on Jason, his anger, and how the controlled narrative after his death effects how people expect him to react and thus treat him. Its neat. I thought his interaction with Jimmy was fun and it's a neat contrast bc Jimmy and Dick n Tim were asking the same questions. I enjoyed the early issues of countdown alot, which I think made it have a harder fall for me)

But back to the bad. He's also. Consistently looking down on female heros? Excluding Donna but like. I can't remember it all exactly. but I do remember, that I felt very very very nervous when they said they were going to the genderswap dimension next (he didn't say anything here tho, actually)

Jason also just sorta,, very consistently gets beat up and knocked down? Felt very 'wow look at this guy he sucks don't you think he sucks. Do you want to see him get beat up constantly and not win any fight.' And there's no payoff to this at all. Nothing changes, nothing gets better, he immediately throws the red robin costume in the trash and we never talk about any of this ever again. He's just sorta an asshole punching bag the whole time and it's not something I enjoy. He gets into fights and gets put down and no one likes him. He doesn't even get to have fun while he's here, iirc he's basically just miserable and trying to get this over with the whole time. Kinda distantly wanted him to not leave the victorian era gotham, just a little bit, just a tad, to be real

And there's just a bit of whiplash to his whole character. We go from silly and carefully planning and competent to. Gestures vaguely. There is NO DOUBT very fun analysis about Jason you could do with this and the whiplash. But its not something I personally want to do with countdown

[septembersghost]

my brain keeps circling that light blue boxing ring and the low points of each of these scenes - jimmy thinking about quitting the law, jimmy getting knocked to the ground by howard in the midst of he and kim elaborately scamming him, a cardboard saul goodman (a person who is never whole or real) floating in the gaudy pool of an abandoned house. the whites' pool had an interesting significance and sense of erosion in brba, and while blue in bcs is often associated with the more moral/legal side of the narrative, there are also times when the pale glow of it in water (like the fish tank) or reflections seems to hearken a little to a certain substance we know well, that will contribute so much destruction and doom

"guess I got what I deserve/kept you waiting there, too long my love/all that time, without a word/didn't know you'd think, that I'd forget, or I'd regret/the special love I have for you, my baby blue..." can essentially take on a life of its own here, its own meaning, depending on how you look at it. addiction to the scam, failed pursuit of the upstanding side of justice, love for kim. or maybe they told us all along in a different way - my echo, my shadow, and me

[septembersghost]

Why do you like the character of Jimmy Mcgill so much, what makes him such a good interesting protagonist to follow? Do you love Walter White as much as Jimmy ?

By the way, I love your blog, your analyses! Long live Kim Wexler and Mcwexler! ❤

if anything suggests i have any love whatsoever for walter white, i have been doing my job here entirely incorrectly adljkgfkjhgh

walt is a great character - monstrously compelling, brilliantly acted (bryan was lauded for a reason!), and while i definitely have discussed his evolution (or devolution, as it were) and the fact that at times i still find tattered remnants of sympathy for him and tragic fallibility from him, i'd also push him off a cliff without hesitation. i posted a tweet a while back that said something like, "breaking bad is full of characters i love to watch, better call saul is full of characters i love," and that (with the exclusion of jesse) sums it up fairly succinctly for me, and is why - as a character person first and foremost - i'm far more emotionally attached to bcs. i think breaking bad is ultimately narratively stronger (i didn't expect to say this), but better call saul made me love and care about its players so deeply that it's the best at character study. (obviously these are completely subjective opinions, and in many ways the shows are quite different and difficult to compare because their strengths and highlights play for varying reasons!)

jimmy, on the other hand...there are things that maybe should've turned me on jimmy (scamming, lying), but they just. didn't. part of me wonders if it's my affinity and empathy for kim coming through since kim loves him, and because of how i feel regarding their story and aching romance together, but even beyond that, in jimmy's better qualities, in his relationship with his brother, in the way he does try, but is so doomed in his story before it even begins...his character and shifting identity and place in his narrative universe is gripping and sympathetic to me. such a huge part of it is bob's performance - someone else probably would've played him sleazier or more arrogant, but bob managed to take him from the garish comic relief in brba to a man struggling inwardly with his sense of self, with his worth, with his darker impulses vs. his innate affability, someone who has such heart and pathos that it's devastating and horrible watching him erode. the fact that he's capable not only of humor but also of kindness and vulnerability, and yet opposite that weaponizes his likability and his intelligence and his trauma to harmful effect, the way the narrative convinced us to root for him and want better for him even though we knew where he was headed, it works in such a powerful way. a very human way. i feel like we got to know jimmy in a much more intimate sense - there's a wall between us and walt from the beginning, often a violent one, but jimmy in his crummy little nail salon office feels accessible. jimmy pining for love and acceptance feels more tangible than power hunger. jimmy lashing out and curling into himself hurts, jimmy making decisions to reclaim his name and find some piece of himself (or peace in himself) and a delicate reconnection with the woman he loves, his one person in the world, infused with such loss and melancholy, is bittersweet and haunting.

walt is always on a collision course with death, but it's as though jimmy is always on a collision course with life, with choosing how, even after harm and self-loathing and tragedy, one continues to seek to live. there's an irrepressible spirit in jimmy somehow. in kim too. a flickering flame in darkness. it isn't much, but it's something eternal in spite of the odds.

i'm not explaining this well, but idk! i just feel such an enormous amount of love and sorrow for him. and he's my pathetic bestie

thank you so much, lovely, i am very happy you're here. 💗 kim wexler for life!!! mcwexler in love forever and ever!!!!!!