#pro john walker

[captainwidowspring]

On Nico's Ability to Defend Himself

An often-overlooked aspect of Nico's death scene in TFATWS is that there was literally nothing preventing him from thwarting John's attempt to kill him, and keeping it from being a death scene; he just didn't so that there would be a reason for the Captain America title to be stripped from John and given back to Sam. I feel like a major reason why a lot of people don't pick up on this fact, and instead perceive Nico to be defenseless (aside, of course, from the shamelessly manipulative framing) is that in the Siberia incident, the incident Nico's death scene is frequently compared to, Tony, after he lost the upper hand, didn't really get a chance to do much before Steve disabled his suit. It thus didn't stick out too badly when Nico also didn't do much before John attacked him with the shield, even though there was a lot more he could have done. Therefore, let's examine the two situations to see how they are different.

This is how the shield incident played out in Siberia. Near the end of the battle, Tony had managed to gain the upper hand and inflict serious damage on Steve. After Steve refused to stop defending Bucky, Tony prepared to straight up blow Steve out of the bunker and down the mountain: but right before he got the repulsor shot off, Bucky grabbed his leg. Irritated, Tony turned and kicked Bucky in the head with his metal boot. Then, before Tony had the chance to do anything else, Steve grabbed Tony and hoisted him into the air; Tony tried to use the jet packs on his boots to get out of the situation, but too much damage had been inflicted on them at that point for them to be of use, and Steve threw him to the ground. Steve then immediately rushed on top of Tony and punched his face mask three times out of sheer fury, after which he broke the helmet by hitting it twice more with his shield and then tore it off. He subsequently raised the shield, which caused Tony to frantically raise his arms to cover his face, and this allowed Steve to have a clear shot at the arc reactor, which he brought his shield down on and broke.

Now, considering how thoroughly biased Civil War is against Steve, and how much it sought to act like he was the one in the wrong—even though the entire Siberia fight was literally just Tony having a temper tantrum and Steve and Bucky trying to survive it—the creative team certainly wouldn't have minded if Tony had cried out in fear like Nico did, as it would be quite useful for the propaganda efforts. Therefore, there is clearly some reason why he didn't.

And it appears that there are two main reasons for this. The first reason seems to be that everything simply happened too fast. Indeed, the entire incident, from Tony preparing to shoot Steve to Steve disabling the arc reactor, took place in the span of about fifteen seconds. And Tony totally wasn't expecting Steve to grab him; presumably, he assumed that Steve was injured enough that taking his attention off him for a few seconds in order to kick his friend in the head wasn't a big deal. He underestimated the strength that poured into Steve's limbs when he saw Tony so callously abusing Bucky, as well as the fact that Steve is a supersoldier, so he can move really fast when he wants to.

So there was the element of surprise, and there was also the fact that Tony probably would have been a little stunned, both from the impact of being thrown to the ground, and from being hit in the head multiple times. It must, of course, be remembered that Tony was wearing a full-body metal suit, so no actual harm was inflicted upon him, but Steve is a supersoldier, so even with the layer of protection the impacts would certainly have been felt. These factors combined to produce the effect that, when Steve raised his shield, rather than take the time to yell anything, Tony simply prepared himself to face what was about to happen, which he thought would be Steve attempting to end him. But fortunately for him, he was wrong. Steve wasn't trying to kill Tony; Bucky was still alive, so Steve was able to contain his fury enough to refrain from a killing blow, and he hit the arc reactor instead.

Now, let's look at how Nico's death scene played out. After John pursued Nico for a bit, and managed to fend off a concrete trash can that Nico threw at him, he was able to hit Nico with the shield as Nico ran into a square. This forced Nico to stop to keep his balance, which allowed John to hit him again, and this finally knocked him over. Nico then tried to get back up twice; the first time John hit him with the shield again to keep him down, and the second time he put his foot on Nico's chest to pin him to the ground and stop his escape attempts. Then, since he couldn't try to get away anymore, Nico waved his hands and nervously insisted, "It wasn't me." He said this because, given the role he played in Lemar's death, he was well aware of why John might be mad at him specifically, for more than just being a friend of Karli. John, for his part, had been preparing to interrogate Nico about Karli's whereabouts, but this clear falsehood evidently filled him with rage, and he raised his shield in a fury. Rather than make an effort to block the imminent attack, Nico simply repeated, louder, "It wasn't me!" even though it was clear that John was not about to accept his garbage. And then, of course, since Nico wasn't about to actually do anything, the beating with the shield commenced.

Nico just lay there and was obediently killed, even though there was literally nothing stopping him from simply catching the shield and keeping it off his chest. His arms and hands were not at all restrained—indeed, he was waving them around—and unlike John, who had acquired a gash on his head, Nico was completely uninjured, so there wouldn't have been any pain distracting him either. And as we saw earlier, Nico is just as strong as John—he was able to restrain John so effectively that Karli would have been able to easily stab John if Lemar hadn't stopped her—and his evident fear would likely have given him enough strength to cancel out John's rage. So he would certainly have been able to keep the shield off his chest until Sam and Bucky, who appeared shortly afterwards, could save him if they wanted to.

Indeed, Nico didn't save himself even though, as evidenced by the fact that he did actually have a chance to cry out, he was dealing with a much less challenging situation than Tony was. For one thing, John bringing down the shield on Nico's chest was not at all a surprise. After John had pinned Nico to the ground, Nico had time to say, "It wasn't me" before John made any sort of move: and after John registered what Nico had said, he shifted his shield, which had been on his arm, into a two-handed grip, and then raised it. Nico clearly saw this coming; indeed, this is what caused him to shout "It wasn't me" a second time. And John's intentions at that point were obvious, so it's not like what happened with Tony where Tony thought that Steve was going to do one thing but he did another; it was pretty clear where John's shield was going, and this would have been plenty apparent to Nico since terror tends to make time slow down. So he had ample time to catch it.

Additionally, Nico would not have been stunned in the way that Tony was. Tony was slammed to the ground and then received five forceful rapid-fire close-range blows to the head, which is several hard impacts in a short span of time. Nico, by contrast, was hit once with the shield, then was knocked by John to the ground. This was a much shorter distance to fall than the overhead bench-press position that Tony was thrown from, and there were even stairs to break Nico's fall. Thereafter, Nico was hit with the shield again—and he hadn't gotten very far up, so he didn't fall very far back down—and then John thwarted Nico's final attempt to get up by pushing him down with his foot. In addition to the fact that the push was much gentler than getting hit with the shield again would have been, as before Nico hadn't gotten very far up, so he wouldn't have hit the ground that hard.

Therefore, in contrast to Tony, who received six sharp blows pretty much back to back, Nico received three fairly spread out blows—after the first hit with the shield, John had to close the distance between them and wind up again before hitting him a second time to knock him over, and then Nico fell to the ground and started to get back up before he was hit a third time—as well as a kind of shove. Nico thus did not receive nearly as harsh a pummeling as Tony did. And on top of that, he is a supersoldier: so even if his treatment had been rougher, Nico would have a much higher tolerance for pummeling than normal human Tony would.

Hence, Nico would not only have had plenty of time to see what John was doing, but he also would not have had to contend with the disorientation that Tony experienced. There is no excuse for why his only reaction to John's attack was yelling.

And here's what makes the fact that Nico didn't try to defend himself even more ridiculous. Even though Steve's attack was much more rapid, forceful, and unpredictable than John's was, Tony STILL did the logical thing and was ready to try to catch Steve's shield. Indeed, you can actually see a bit of strategy in his response to Steve raising the shield. Tony knew he wasn't strong enough to entirely keep the shield off his face since his suit was failing, so rather than try to stop it from hitting him, he was instead planning to try to grab the shield during its descent in order to slow it down and cushion the blow. As Steve brings the shield down, you can even see Tony open his fingers as he expects to encounter the shield. Nico did not do anything of the sort, he just aimlessly shouted as he passively lay there and waited for John to kill him. But come on! If Tony, who was just a normal human encased in a suit of rapidly failing metal, and who had been completely taken by surprise with a harsh walloping, could make an attempt to stop Steve from killing him (even though, as it turned out, he didn't need to), then Nico, who was a supersoldier, and who had received far less of a thrashing, could definitely have tried (and succeeded) to stop John from killing him. Especially since, unlike Tony, he actually would have been able to completely stop the shield from hitting him.

There is another difference between the two situations that is very interesting, however. Tony, for his part, was well aware that he was acting dishonorably. For instance, a little after Tony began his assault, when Bucky was trying to run away and Tony was intent on pursuit, Steve stood in front of him and said, "It wasn't him, Tony. Hydra had control of his mind." But Tony already knew this, so he simply responded "Move," in a way that clearly indicated that he didn't care and didn't want to hear it. And a short time later, when Tony prevented Bucky from escaping, Steve tried again to get through to him and said, "This isn't gonna change what happened," but Tony replied, "I don't care, he killed my mom." Tony knew that Bucky wasn't to blame for his parents' deaths, and that killing him would not help anything: but since he was angry with Steve for refusing to accept the Accords and all their rights-violations, he saw the revelation as an excuse to attack both Bucky because he knew it would hurt Steve, and Steve himself because Tony knew that Steve would not just stand by while Bucky was being assaulted. He ignored Steve's attempts to reason with him because he figured that he had enough power to be able to do whatever he wanted, and he also correctly guessed that Steve and Bucky would continuously hold back against him, even though they shouldn't have. And because of these things, before Bucky's intervention, Tony had been about to do something that could have quite possibly ended Steve's life. So when Steve regained the upper hand and Tony was at his mercy, Tony was aware that he had no right to ask Steve to spare him, because when he had been in Steve's position, he had been ready to potentially end Steve's life without a second thought. Therefore, he said nothing; his only response was to see if he had enough strength left to hold off Steve.

So Tony, in the face of Steve's attack, didn't yell anything because he knew that what he had done was indefensible: and it is due in part to this modicum of contrition that Steve was able to contain his rage enough to spare him. Nico, meanwhile, had been doing something similarly heinous. He had been actively engaged in trying to kill John because John was Captain America, and when Lemar frustrated the attempt on John's life, Nico was also the reason why John was unable to protect Lemar from Karli's subsequent death-blow. And just like Tony, Nico had been relying on his strength to protect him from repercussions. So what he had done was just as indefensible as what Tony did: but instead of taking the smallest bit of ownership of this, he tried to completely absolve himself of responsibility for what had happened, and this resulted in his downfall. For while John had clearly been intending to just interrogate Nico, the fact that the person who had held him helpless while his best friend was murdered was trying to act like he was not at all responsible for what had happened caused him to lose it, and this resulted in the shield incident. Now, Nico definitely should have made it clear that he was surrendering if he intended to, and even apologized if he genuinely regretted what had happened to Lemar: and again, when the attack did happen he could have easily fended it off. But if he had simply recognized the fact that he was not worthy of John's mercy since he had not been prepared to show mercy to John, and remained silent like Tony did, the shield-attack would never have happened in the first place.

But in any case, as mentioned above, Nico didn't try to defend himself because John needed to kill him, so that the show would have an excuse to take the Captain America mantle from John and give it back to Sam without it seeming too dubious. (Though considering that the incident ended up resulting in Sam and Bucky attacking John for the shield a very short time after he literally lost his best friend, the show completely failed at that.) Not to mention, if Nico had put up a fight, this would have highlighted how much he was still capable of threatening John, and put lie to the show's attempt to act like he was helpless. Particularly since, again, if he had tried to save himself there is no reason why he would not have been successful.

Now, it is important to also remember that Nico was definitely not surrendering, the other widespread misconception about his death scene. He kept trying to fight John until he literally couldn't—he threw a concrete trash can at John while he was running away, and tried to get back up twice after John initially knocked him over, which is not something someone who wanted to surrender would do—and then after John had him pinned, all he did was try to disingenuously absolve himself of responsibility for Lemar's death, rather than trying to apologize or making it clear that he was surrendering. But on top of the fact that Nico wasn't trying to surrender, and refused to own up to what he had done, he was perfectly capable of surviving John's attack when it happened. These things make his death scene, as well as the subsequent reaction to it, completely ridiculous and utterly nonsensical.

[be1nlaus1]

I like them himbos 🙏🏻 art by me

[breckstonevailskier]

Honestly, if anyone was out of line here, it's the Dora Milaje for trying to kill Walker and Lemar because Walker touched one of them.

[variant-nightwing16]

John, reading from the QnA box: “what that mouth do” complain, that’s what it do.

Lemar: *wheezing his lungs out*

Bucky: help-

Sam: someone actually asked that?

John: yea, probably some white dude who has too much audacity.

Sam: HA!

[johnmihombre]

When John met Olivia this tried to make her laugh to like him but she just thought it was weird Zero evidence but no doubt

( happy 33rd birthday to gabrielle byndloss )

[gyrovagus-bibliophile]

Has he commited atrocities? Yep

Do I give a flying fuck? Yep, make's his character interesting

Does he have an awesome, nice side to himself? Yep

Do I care? Yep, cause i love him

I still see posts where John is attributed a variety of sins, come up with all sorts of nonsense (racist, sexist, homophobic 🤦🏻‍♀️where did they see all this) and other fantasies.

And who he really is, just the facts.

he's a loving husband💜

he's a loyal friend

He's really friendly

[captainwidowspring]

🤨🤨🤨

I definitely agree, it really is wild that some people actually think that Nico was some meek innocent victim, or that John's reaction was unreasonable. I guess it's a testament to how effective the show's anti-John-Walker propaganda is, for it is hard to see how else so many people could become convinced of such a clear untruth. Indeed, it's similar to how in Civil War, another propaganda-heavy film, some people actually think Steve was the one who attacked Tony in Siberia, despite the fact that Tony was the sole aggressor. And heck, the efficacy of the anti-John-Walker propaganda is further demonstrated shortly after Nico's death; many people think for some reason that John started the fight for the shield, when it was clearly Bucky, and John literally said "You don't want to do this," when it became clear a fight was imminent. Propaganda is really no joke.

Perhaps the most frustrating thing about people acting like Nico was an innocent victim is the fact that he is particularly guilty. From the way many people talk about Nico, one would think he was a random civilian—indeed, the person cited above actually implies that he was a "defenseless noncombatant"—but he was literally a hostile enemy attacker. Now, @captainpikeachu nicely explained why all the Flagsmashers are blameworthy: "if a group of people lured you and your loved ones to a location just so they could kill you and instead got your loved ones killed, does it really matter who physically did the killing when they’re all there to help?" But Nico was much more involved in what happened than most of the other Flagsmashers were.

First of all, Nico played a very active role in the attempted murder of John. Minutes before the tables were turned, Nico had caught John and held him helpless specifically so that Karli could stab him to death. Nico knew full well what he was doing, and he did it deliberately. So it's not like Nico was just standing around chilling, he was actively trying to cause harm.

And this supposed innocent victim very nearly succeeded in taking John's life. It's a really good thing that John ended up deciding to take the serum—he had been agonizing over whether to do it—because this allowed him to confront the Flagsmashers on a somewhat more even playing field. Otherwise, Nico would have been able to murder John himself; he wouldn't have even needed Karli's help. It was only because John was able to so effectively fight back that Nico had to focus his attention on subduing John instead of being able to immediately go for the kill.

And indeed, the fact that the serum helped make it possible for John to hold out against the Flagsmashers for so long is the only reason that Lemar was able to rescue him, as Lemar saved John at literally the last possible second. It really looked for a moment there like John was a goner; that is why Karli got so mad when she was thwarted. If Lemar had been any slower, or John had been imperiled any sooner, Lemar wouldn't have reached John in time: and John's blood would then have been on Nico's hands, probably literally as well as figuratively. So the serum is a major reason why Nico's attempt to get John killed was unsuccessful, but even with that and the presence of Sam and Bucky, John barely survived the attempt on his life.

And second of all, Nico is also directly responsible for Lemar's death. Many people take Nico's cry of "It wasn't me!" at face value, and accept it as the truth, but it is quite thoroughly false. Nico might not have been the one to strike the killing blow against Lemar, but the fact remains that Lemar would not have been murdered without Nico's contributions. Indeed, Nico's attack on John is the reason why the murder attempt bore any fruit at all, because John had been doing a pretty good job of frustrating the Flagsmashers' assassination attempts before Nico assaulted him. But Nico's assault made John vulnerable, and was instrumental in creating the situation that got Lemar killed: for this was the reason that Lemar was forced to throw himself in harm's way, as well as the reason why John was unable to defend Lemar from Karli's subsequent wrath.

It would have been pretty clear that Nico was culpable in John's murder if Karli had successfully killed him, so it is unclear why people cannot see that Nico is culpable in Lemar's murder simply because the victim changed. While the person who ended up dead wasn't the one Nico had been aiming for, the death still happened as a direct result of his actions.

Thus, it's quite frustrating when people try to demonize John for what he did while absolving Nico, completely ignoring the fact that minutes before the incident Nico had been quite determinedly trying to kill John, and was only narrowly kept from succeeding. And those efforts directly led to Lemar getting killed, which is why Nico's claim of innocence would have been particularly galling. Nico simply received a taste of his own medicine.

So, unsurprisingly, that take which adopts the usual tired view that John is a villain while Nico is innocent is quite thoroughly untrue. For not only was Nico neither defenseless nor surrendering, but also, John did actually have jurisdiction in the situation.

First of all, Nico was far from defenseless. It's really quite maddening when people act like Nico was powerless just because he didn't have a weapon on him, for this is not even close to the case. Again, minutes before, Nico had been able to render John completely helpless—which he accomplished without the aid of any sort of weapon—and Lemar had just been killed, also without a weapon. A video nicely summarized why Nico was not defenseless:

"[W]hy do people act like this is Walker killing someone who’s unarmed?. . .We all saw what Steve and Bucky can do throughout the MCU. They can smash through walls, rip doors off their hinges, hold a helicopter in place, throw people around like ragdolls, and as we saw with Lemar’s death, can literally kill people with a single punch. How can you possibly claim that someone is unarmed when [they can do these things]? What’s to stop [Nico] from breaking out when he has the chance to do so, and continuing to help Karli? Which is exactly what he would do, because as we’ve already discussed, he is surrendering [not really but I'll get to that] because he has literally no other choice, not because he stopped because he felt guilty."

In fact, come to think of it, there is absolutely no reason why Nico could not have just grabbed onto John's shield and held it, instead of simply lying there and getting killed. As we saw, he's just as strong as John, so he would certainly have the strength to keep the shield off his chest: and there was nothing to prevent him from doing this, as he was completely uninjured (unlike John) and his arms and hands were not restricted at all. But of course, if Nico had put up such resistance to John, the show would have a much harder time demonizing John and acting like Nico was harmless. Therefore, they got around this by not showing Nico during the incident.

Not only was Nico not helpless, however, getting mad at John for killing an adversary that he had a momentary advantage over is quite hypocritical, for Sam did something similar earlier in the show. In the middle of the fight at the beginning, Sam blew up a helicopter that still had several unconscious bad guys in it. These people actually were defenseless, as they were out cold, and they no longer posed an immediate threat to Sam. So anyone who is angry at John should be angry at Sam too. But the people who bash John rarely bring this up: for because heroic music was playing, and because the bad guys were unconscious and so unable to scream or beg Sam to spare them, Sam killing enemies who were temporarily disabled is not seen as a bad thing. It's only a problem when John does it, apparently. Such blatant double standards really help demonstrate how influential framing can be.

Second of all, not only was Nico not helpless, but he was also not surrendering. For one thing, while Nico was running, he paused to hurl a concrete trash can at John: so it's not even like he was just fleeing, he was still attacking John as he ran. For another, when John managed to knock Nico over—which took several tries—Nico attempted to get back up not once but twice: once after John initially knocked him over, and then a second time which prompted John to put his foot on Nico's chest in order to keep him down. If Nico was actually interested in surrendering, he would have stayed down the first time, as repeatedly getting back up strongly indicates a desire to keep fighting.

And for yet another, Nico yelling "It wasn't me!" is not in any way indicative of surrender (nor is it even true). That was not an attempt to yield, it was an attempt to convince John that he was attacking the wrong person. (Even though he wasn't, for again, Nico was heavily involved in the attempt on John's life that ended up taking Lemar's, and was in fact the reason it was even possible; he is just as responsible for what happened as Karli.) The only thing that could possibly be considered an effort to surrender is Nico having his hands up: but since prior to that point he staunchly refused to stop fighting—throwing the trash can at John and not staying down—and the words he spoke as he made the gesture were trying to divert John's attention rather than actually surrendering, having his hands up was not enough to cancel out the all the other indications that he didn't want to surrender, especially since it wasn't even clear whether he was trying to surrender or just gesticulating. That is why people who want to surrender often put their hands behind their head, to avoid confusion. Considering how stubbornly Nico was fighting before, if he was yielding he needed to make that abundantly clear, and he didn't, not even close.

Third of all, John did actually have jurisdiction in the scenario; he was literally on a government-sanctioned mission to deal with the Flagsmashers. Handling the Flagsmashers was actually his responsibility, and the reason why he was fighting them in the first place. Indeed, it's not even like the government was mad at John for killing Nico, as that meant one less Flagsmasher for them to deal with; they were mad at him for giving them bad press. That is why they chose to give John an other than honorable discharge, for this meant that they would not have to go through the trial that would be required if they gave him a dishonorable discharge, and risk having unfavorable information come out. Thus, John got no chance to stand up for himself, and instead got quickly swept under the rug. Now, John tried to point out the injustice of the situation—"I only ever did what you asked of me, what you told me to be and trained me to do, and I did it. And I did it well," he said—but of course, the show wasn't done demonizing him, so it just ignored him and cut him off so that he would not get in the way of the attempt to discredit him. But in any case, saying that John didn't have jurisdiction in that scenario is completely untrue, because he absolutely did. Sam and Bucky were the ones who didn't have jurisdiction, and in fact they should have been wanted criminals for breaking Zemo out.

So yeah. The rebuttal to the ridiculous framing of Nico's demise that is shown above is quite accurate. John did not kill "a defenseless guy who was surrendering"; John killed a supersoldier who had just willingly and knowingly attempted to murder him (and succeeded but with the wrong person), and who showed no remorse for what he did, just panic that he didn't have the upper hand anymore. It really is insane how completely the propaganda has twisted many people's views of the situation.

[breckstonevailskier]

A great video essay showing that really, John Walker’s actions weren’t all that bad. He’s just the victim of unfavorable narrative framing.

[captainwidowspring]

Wow, this is an amazing analysis! There is much to recommend it. You bring up many good points, make numerous astute observations, and point out several instances of double standards the show had. Here are some further comments I have.

Thank you for bringing up the fact that John called Bucky an asset because he had to provide an objective reason for the police to release him, and appealing to the police with Bucky's humanity would not have accomplished this. Considering that he never called Bucky that to his face and never treated him like one, it's pretty clear that he didn't actually see Bucky that way.

Thank you for pointing out that John was covering for Sam and Bucky when he didn't answer the prison guard. It's also worth noting here that if John had been the one to break Zemo out, he would have been thoroughly demonized for it.

Your point about Sam being like "Why did you let them come in?" to Bucky is something I hadn't noticed. And it actually explains why Bucky suddenly moved to hold Lemar back instead of helping John with Karli. But it's worth noting that, if Bucky had actually helped John with Karli instead of doing that, they could have arrested her then and there, without much of a fight.

Sam saying he had Karli is actually untrue, as Karli was showing no signs of being swayed by him even before John showed up; she even blamed Sam for something she said. And again, if Bucky had just helped John they would have been able to arrest her.

I like how you pointed out the Dora Milaje's harmful attitude.

However, that fight was not a "three way pissing contest". It was caused completely by the Dora Milaje. John touched one of them in a friendly way, then they started brutally attacking him (and Lemar, who hadn't done anything), and then when Sam and Bucky finally stepped in to try to stop them, they started brutally attacking them too.

And I must disagree with the assertion that the Dora Milaje clearly weren't fighting to kill. While they didn't end up killing anyone, there were several strikes which, had they landed, would have been fatal. And John and Lemar both would have been killed had Sam and Bucky not reluctantly decided to help them. Sam stopped a spear that was aimed at Lemar's ribs after he had been knocked down, and Bucky stopped a spear that had been aimed at John's eye. (This is why both of them ended up getting attacked, even though they didn't want to fight any more than John and Lemar did, and Bucky even specifically said, "Let's talk about this!") Seriously, the Dora Milaje were completely in the wrong in that scene, and it should have been framed as such.

To be fair to Bucky, he didn't care about Yori's son because he had been thoroughly programmed by Hydra, otherwise he would have. And I actually think that John was about to interrogate Nico, but then lost it when Nico yelled "It wasn't me!", as he makes no move to attack Nico until after he says that. And it would be pretty infuriating if someone who just played a major role in the death of your best friend then claimed that they didn't.

Wanda attacking the rest of the Avengers had nothing to do with her hatred of Tony, it was because Hydra had brainwashed the Sokovians into thinking the Avengers were bad.

Wanda also didn't mind control the Hulk into attacking Johannesburg. She had no way of knowing that would happen, and in any case making the Hulk attack Johannesburg would be a ridiculous plan to have for many reasons. (If she had been mind controlling him, it would have made a lot more sense for her to make him attack the other Avengers.) What happened was that Wanda tried to incapacitate Bruce the way she had incapacitated everyone else, but then he hulked out and ran off instead. (And the fact that she had been hit in the head with Clint's stun arrow minutes before giving Bruce the vision might have played a role in this.) Honestly, the one most responsible for the civilian casualties in Johannesburg is Tony, as he chose to fight the Hulk in the city instead of trying to lure him to a less populated area, and was needlessly reckless multiple times.

I think it's definitely exceedingly interesting that Lemar was killed in a bloodless way.

Nico is partly responsible for Lemar's death, as he is the reason that Lemar had to save John in the first place, as well as the reason that John was unable to defend Lemar from Karli. Saying that he didn't kill Lemar is really just a matter of semantics, as objectively he did play a part in the murder. And since Nico was the one holding John helpless while Lemar was killed, in John's mind he is probably just as responsible for the murder as Karli, if not more.

While John was certainly pretty wild throughout the fight for the shield, he actually doesn't really try to kill Sam and Bucky. There are only two strikes he makes in the whole fight that might have proved fatal: one that Sam rolled out of the way of shortly after Bucky got electrocuted, and then of course the one that was evocative of what had just happened with Nico. Otherwise, he was just trying to fend them off. It is a testament to John's sheer self-control that despite everything he had to deal with during the fight he only lost it twice.

(And it's not like Sam and Bucky were particularly holding back either. At one point Bucky threw a punch that was hard enough to break a metal pole, and both he and Sam ended up breaking John's arm.)

Thank you for pointing out that Sam wouldn't attack Karli even when she was literally pointing a gun at him, but then he attacked John just because John didn't want to give up the shield.

Steve wasn't lying by omission, he genuinely didn't know that Bucky had killed Tony's parents. All he had to work with on the matter was a vague insinuation that wasn't particularly highlighted, from a source who admitted that he had only been talking with them to stall them. And Steve probably completely forgot about it considering all the drama that subsequently transpired. (Even if he did know, however, not telling Tony would be the right move, for the same reason why John didn't admit that one of Lemar's murderers was still at large.) But even though Steve truly didn't know, the assertion that no one blames him for it is not true, he is demonized plenty for it.

Steve would have done what he did whether or not he heard the quote from Peggy. He had already decided to oppose the Accords at that point, so the quote was basically just a reiteration of his stance. It's a small thing, but considering that Marvel has lately been trying to make his character completely revolve around her, I had to point that out.

Sam talking about the difficulties of being a black Captain America is just ridiculous, as he has no reason to think this will be the case. There was no great backlash when Rhodey was made into the Iron Patriot and given the job of personally protecting the President, after all, and Rhodey was even wearing an Iron Patriot suit in Endgame. (Plus, it's not like there aren't people who would have hated Steve and/or John for being a white Captain America.)

There is also no reason to think that John would never have thought about race, since again plenty of people would have hated him for being a white Captain America, and his best friend was a black man.

So yeah. These are the things I wanted to add. Overall, it was a really great analysis, and very refreshing to see.

John Walker: a study in story framing, character archetype, established canon details, and audience manipulation

There’s been a ton of discourse surrounding the character of John Walker, everyone has a lot of opinions. But having read many articles, posts, tweets, and watched reaction channels and video essays, I have found a common theme among them: a fundamental misunderstanding of the character due to the story framing.

In fact, the character of John Walker that exists in fandom discussions is more of a projection of what people think he is and what people want him to stand in for rather than the actual canonically established character that exists in the story of The Falcon and The Winter Soldier. This is why I have decided to write this post along with an episode-by-episode breakdown, because I think John Walker the character has been completely eclipsed by John Walker the symbol, lost underneath the iconography that he’s been associated with and not really given a fair look as an individual person.

I should make it clear upfront; it is not my intention with this to tell people how they should feel about a character. Whether you agree with my points or not doesn’t really matter. My hope is that this at the very least provides you with a different perspective on the character and his motivations. Maybe have you consider him in a new way.

So, let’s start from the beginning.

——————————–

EPISODE 1

Story framing is important, it effects our perspective as an audience, and it is deliberately controlled by the writers and filmmakers to manipulate certain emotions and impressions out of us. The Falcon and The Winter Soldier expertly does this from the very beginning by framing John Walker immediately as someone whom we should not want.

Because the music is mournful and ominous despite the celebratory occasion shown on TV.

Because Sarah is upset.

Because Sam has his fists clenched and is unhappy and suspicious, and then closes his eyes in upset.

Because when dialogues like this is delivered, the show is purposefully playing into real life iconography and feelings that already raises our hackles.

Because Sam retired the shield and the hero position, so when someone else seemingly carelessly and casually steps in waving like a propaganda piece with a gun on his hip, and a grey flag symbol that looks so close to the thin blue line flag used by cops, there is something unsettling to us even if we didn’t consciously pick up on it, we just know that it goes against what we want and what our main protagonist wants. 

Because this strange person in a Cap costume winking looks like a jerk. We didn’t ask for this. 

As it’s always said, first impressions are important. How someone first perceives you decides how someone might judge anything that you do. If someone thinks you’re an arrogant jerk, then anything you do will be colored by that impression and they will never think well of your intentions. But if their first impression of you is kind and caring, then any mistakes you made is automatically given leeway because your intentions would be well considered. And in one fell swoop, the show firmly planted into the minds of every single person watching that John Walker is an arrogant jerk espousing propaganda no one wants and everything he does is automatically suspect and questionable. 

In fact, they even go the extra step to make that very clear by how the cast credits is used. Notice the difference between the image of Walker in Episode 1 and Episode 2-6?

The red mark over his eyes, blocking him from us, not only feels foreboding, it feels as if it’s warning us. 

So, when I say that John Walker was from the beginning set up to fail, it’s because he was, the story intended for it to be. We have to hate, question, suspect, and think the worst of Walker in order for Sam’s eventual reclaiming of the shield to mean anything or have that emotional catharsis. Because nobody wants to see Sam take the shield from a nice dude, it would be bittersweet or even mean, but if the story tells us that this guy is someone we can dislike or hate right off the bat because there is something vaguely “bad” about him, then we would root for Sam to take that shield.

There is a reason we don’t get Walker’s perspective at all in his introduction. He’s just this stranger we’ve been programmed as an audience to hate. We are not treated to Walker waiting to go outside and feeling nervous, or Walker doubting himself or perhaps even not wanting to take up the shield at first when it was given to him. The purposeful lack of his perspective is done so we only feel the weight of emotions from the Wilsons being upset, because we must relate to the protagonists.

Walker is not the hero of this story, he’s not the protagonist of this story, if he was, then the story would have framed his unveiling as Captain America in a completely different way, and we would have been treated to a sympathetic look at what he was feeling about taking on the shield, we would have had an inside look at his mindset before he walked out there and looked into that camera and winked. But because we the audience lack that important context that was deliberately kept away from us, our views on Walker formed and solidified without it, and then we all stewed on those feelings for a whole week. 

By the time Episode 2 rolled around to open with Walker’s perspective, the damage was already done, it was too late, because people had already made up their mind about what kind of a person he was, and even those who might have given him a chance was just waiting for the other shoe to drop. 

The show had very clearly made sure that John Walker was always going to have an uphill battle in the eyes of the fans, however fairly or unfairly. And that deliberate and purposeful removal of his perspective and context would be the key to how the character will be misread. Because the reality is, Walker hasn’t even done anything wrong yet and people have already made assumptions just because of one wink, just because of his mere presence. There was no objective consideration that Walker winked because he understood having to put on a cheerful public facade, no consideration that he could have been told to play along nicely for the cameras and directed to look there and wink, no consideration that he didn’t ask for this job but was ordered to do so and is as much a “victim” of the government as Sam. Because the show had already used every trick in the book to make us feel bad and ominous about his presence, the audience would automatically assume the worst.

CLICK THIS LINK TO CONTINUE TO EPISODE TWO AND THE REST OF THIS 219 PAGES AND OVER 28K WORDS ANALYSIS

[variant-nightwing16]

U.S Agent aka John Walker! :D!

[ex0rin]

+bonus feral super soldiers:

[gyrovagus-bibliophile]

This is... this is so reasonable omg

Hot take: I unapologetically like John Walker, like, not even in a “he is morally gray and interesting” kind of way. He was brave and had good intentions, he just wasn’t as quick to search for peaceful solutions and had several realistic flaws such as being insecure, ambitious and quick to follow orders for the establishment. Most people (on tumblr) just hate him because he is white so he must be evil or symbolically represent male white priviledge or something, because he didn´t romanticize terrorism as the writers made Sam start doing, and because he “unfairly” got the shield (The shield the dumb ass writers made Sam DECIDE to give up so they could have that sweet drama? THAT shield?). People say that Steve Rogers would have never done what John did, not even after his literal best friend was killed in front of his eyes, ehem… did we even watch the same movies? Did everyone just forget about that scene in Civil War after Tony tried to kill Bucky?

His reasons for murdering that terrorist  guy that took part in the killing of his best friend and for wanting to apprehend a potentially dangerous group were waay more understandable than any of Karli’s actions AFTER she started killing innocent people “to send a message” while still claiming to have the moral highground instead of, you know, keep stealing and distributing food and medicines like they were exclusively doing at the beginning or something.

I get that it sucks the writers made the flag smashers the villians (I hate what they did with the good hearted and idealistic Sharon Carter as well), I myself would have prefered if Karli had been writen as an anti-hero or even new hero who teams up with Sam and Bucky, maybe the flag smashers could have been divided into different factions, some more extremist than others, and a government guy could have been the real or worst villain, but that sadly didn’t happen. The moment they wrote her blowing up that building full of unarmed people though, she was a self-righteous murderer just like Zemo, which would have been fine if that was the point of her character.

 I was very irritated by the way the show writers, via Sam, tried to minimize her actions and make us feel sorry for her, dehumanizing the people she had killed in the process. We barely ever see her victims, they are mostly faceless entities who don´t matter in comparison to “poor well intentioned baby Karli”.

 If the writers wanted to send the audience a message about “doing better” for refugees they could have done so by making the flag smashers the heroes that have been unjustly framed for the terrorist attacks (Which would have been an AMAZING plot twist), or writing them to be more complicated by making most of its members stand against the extemism of certain factions of the group, or by showing the good things they do, making them fight armed guards only. They should NOT have made terrorism seem “cool” and “trendy”, the deaths of civilians “necessary”, and the terrorists the “real” victims of… *gasp* being called… terrorists! The poor babies, noo, so offensive! The correct term is freedom fighters, nooo! 

Needless to say, the woobification of the poor baby terrorists didn’t work for me and I wasn’t exactly horrified by Karli´s death or impressed by Sam´s corny victim blaming speech where he doesn´t actually give any practical ideas on how to solve the refugee crisis caused by the snap but sure does love to say the government officials all, indiscriminately (Maybe AOCortez or someone was there? I mean, idk), deserved to feel powerless as hostages because that, apparently, will make them sympathize with the people that made them fear for their lives instead of, I don´t know, seeing them as way too unreasonable to negociate with??

Now, I would have preferred for John Walker´s actor to play Lemar and viceversa, because I get that black characters get killed to motivate white characters far too often, so it would have been nicer to see it done the other way around for once. For John Walker to be the new flawed yet good hearted war veteran who has to redeem himself after making a huge mistake born out of pain for the loss of his friend, someone who has to develop and learn different tactics other than violence in order to defend people, someone who has to learn to question the status quo… and he just happens to be black like Sam. Their rivalry would not be even implicitly about race, but exclusively about differences in methods and about who gets the Captain America legacy. We could still have Bucky hating on him, the funny rivalry moments, no changes.

But sadly the writers needed a character to represent the white that didn’t deserve Sam’s shield but only got it for his race, or for looking similar to Steve, which is an important theme, but one that was perfectly explored already with the plotline about the original black supersoldier who was erased from history, and one that didn´t work for me because they made Sam give up the shield willingly BEFORE it was given to John, a war hero, so all I am getting is that simply being chosen for something important and accepting it because you think you can do the job, wanting justice for a friend, and not trusting terrorists to change their murderous ways is what made John “less than” Sam and Bucky.

I guess what I am trying to say is that John doesn´t deserve half the hate he gets and maybe if the writers had changed his race from the comic books then his character would have suffered less from being placed into a specific “personification of white male priviledge” box here on tumblr. No offence to the actor though, he was great.

[captainwidowspring]

Those were some amazing points you made about Walker being needlessly framed as a bad guy by The Falcon and The Winter Soldier's narrative. It definitely is not unlike Wanda and other members of Team Cap being vilified in Civil War. Morally speaking, I'd say the whole act of Walker bludgeoning Nico is similar to Cap using the shield to disable Tony's suit, right down to the fact that they were using force against someone who still very much posed an active threat (Tony being just a bit more obvious an active threat given how he was actively trying to murder Bucky).

Thank you!

You are definitely right that John using the shield on Nico and Steve using the shield on Tony are both similar in that the shield was being used to subdue an active threat. And funnily enough, another similarity between those two moments is that the shots of Steve and John bringing the shield down on someone below them both served the same purpose: they were both intended to turn the audience against the shield-bearer even though the shield-bearer was not acting unreasonably. This was done by playing up the apparent helplessness of the person who the shield was being used on, despite the fact that both people had come very close to killing their respective shield-bearer, and were still a significant danger to them at the time of the shield's use. Though obviously this manipulation was done with more intensity in John's case, and so was more successful.

Now, due to the fact that Steve and John used the shield in such a similar way, people love to compare the Siberia fight and Nico's death scene: and all too often, people who like Steve but hate John will point to Siberia as an example of why John is not as good a Captain America as Steve. However, the problem with this is that while the actions taken by Steve and John are similar, the circumstances surrounding them are not. Despite the surface-level similarities of the two situations, there are also major differences, so comparing them is really not fair. There are two main reasons why the situations are not directly comparable.

(1) Tony hadn't killed Bucky. He may have blasted Bucky's arm off and then kicked him in the head, but Bucky was still alive, and could recover from this. Thus, while Steve was certainly very angry, he was not filled with the blinding rage and anguish that Bucky's death would have caused.

And we saw how clearly furious Steve was at Tony just injuring Bucky, how it gave him great strength despite his exhaustion and serious injuries: so it's like, if Tony had actually managed to kill Bucky, would Steve have been able to stop at just disabling the suit? If Tony had murdered Bucky and robbed Steve of his best friend, of his longest-running relationship, of the person who had been a heimat (home-place) for as long as he could remember, of the last remaining person who knew Steve before he became Captain America, of the last remaining person who had been with him in the 1940s, after he had literally just gotten all of this back—all while Tony knew full well that Bucky was not to blame for the supposed reason that he had been trying to murder him—would Steve really have been able to control himself enough to spare Tony?

Meanwhile, John had just lost Lemar; Lemar who was his friend who fought beside him, who he trusted with his life, who he probably couldn't imagine his life without, who was one of the few people with whom he could just be John and not Captain America. Unlike Bucky, Lemar wasn't just badly injured, he was completely dead. And Nico might not have been the one to strike the killing blow against Lemar, but he played an active role in the murder, as he is the reason that Lemar had to save John in the first place, and he prevented John from being able to defend Lemar from Karli. So he was definitely not innocent.

Then to add insult to injury, Nico yelled at John, "It wasn't me!" even though he played a major role in Lemar's murder. And Nico being the one to say that would have been particularly insulting to John because he is the one who prevented John from being able to do anything other than watch while Lemar was killed. This is what causes John to lose it and kill him, as if you watch the scene it's clear that John made no move to harm Nico until after he said that. It would be like if Tony killed Bucky and then had the audacity to say, "I didn't mean to!" even though such a claim would be demonstrably not true.

Thus, Steve when he got the upper hand over Tony was not forced to deal with as much emotion as John had to when he got the upper hand over Nico. Tony had merely injured Bucky, not played a part in his murder like Nico had with Lemar, and Tony also did not go on to say something that would salt Steve's wounds, the way Nico did to John when he sought to minimize his role in the incident. So Steve already had a huge advantage over John in that respect.

(2) There was also the fact that Tony is just a normal human. This meant that all Steve had to do was disable the Iron Man suit in order to decisively end the fight. That was obviously not the case for Nico, as since he was a supersoldier, he was just as strong as John and could not so easily be rendered harmless. Indeed, people often seem to conveniently forget that just a few minutes before Nico had been holding John completely helpless, and would have been complicit in his murder had Lemar not stepped in, so Nico was by no means outmatched by John. Perhaps John could have tried to knock Nico out, but if the helicarrier battle in The Winter Soldier is anything to go by, supersoldiers don't remain unconscious for very long. So unlike Tony after his suit had been disabled, even though John had Nico on the ground, Nico was still very much capable of threatening John, and hard to safely neutralize. Despite John's advantageous position, there was no easy way for him to quickly and decisively subdue Nico. And indeed, if Tony was a supersoldier and so disabling the suit did not remove the threat he posed, Siberia would have been a very different story.

What also gave Steve an advantage in the situation was the fact that Tony was wearing a metal suit. This way, Steve had ample opportunity take out his anger on the armor without hurting Tony. Indeed, while Tony and Friday were discussing Steve's fight pattern, Steve appeared to be blindly pummeling Tony rather than actually trying to defeat him. And after Tony kicked Bucky in the head, Steve furiously punched Tony's armor three times before he used his shield to disable it. Considering that his goals at that point were to take off Tony's helmet and break the arc reactor, neither of which could be effectively accomplished by punches, this appears to be a calculated effort by him to release enough of his built-up fury that he could restrain himself enough to spare Tony.

However, there was obviously no equivalent conveniently available way that John could harmlessly take out his rage toward Nico. And it's definitely worth wondering whether Steve would have been able to control his anger as well as he did had he not gotten the chance to let some of it out first.

Therefore, Steve had much less to deal with than John did, as well as a safe way to release some of his anger. This is why trying to use Siberia as an example of why Steve is better than John is disingenuous, because Steve was dealing with much kinder circumstances.

The following would be a much more directly comparable situation. At the beginning of the Siberia fight, when Tony tries to missile Bucky in the face and Bucky turns it aside, the redirected missile causes a section of the building to collapse. Now, a few moments before this, Tony had produced some ankle-cuffs from his suit and put them on Steve. Steve managed to get out of them, though, which was very lucky because he had been in the section of the building that was collapsing.

However, imagine that Steve hadn't in fact been able to get out of the cuffs, and so had been crushed to death by the falling debris. Now, imagine that shortly after this, Bucky managed to get into a position where he had the upper hand over Tony (and for the sake of direct comparison, suppose that his suit was still somewhat functional, so he was still a threat). If Tony then panicked and yelled, "I didn't mean to!" and Bucky then lost it and killed him, would Bucky subsequently be demonized for it?

Honestly, probably, but there are plenty of people who would be able to forgive Bucky for being off-balance from his best friend's death, especially since it would be easy to see why Tony yelling what he did would have caused Bucky to lose it. It would also probably be easy for many people to see that Tony said "I didn't mean to!" because he was afraid of what Bucky would do to him, and not because he wanted to surrender, was actually remorseful about Steve's death, or had even lost his desire to kill Bucky. In addition, while people might be able to extend sympathy toward Tony due to the fact that he most likely didn’t actually mean to kill Steve, this would not obscure his responsibility for Steve’s death. While he might not have intentionally or directly killed Steve, he would still be responsible for the fact that he had been trying to kill Bucky, and this would undermine the sincerity of his claim because he had been aiming to kill, it was just that the wrong person ended up dead.

It is therefore quite frustrating that many people cannot extend the same compassion to John, when that is pretty much the situation he was in. He was just as off-balance as Bucky would have been after his best friend's death—while subsequently being further unbalanced by an insulting half-truth that his adversary uttered—and Nico was just as guilty as Tony would have been. While Nico saying “It wasn’t me!” might have been true in that he wasn’t the one who personally ended Lemar’s life, it was still the case that his attempt to murder John directly contributed to Lemar’s death. And it is clear that Nico was only upset because the person who ended up being killed was not the one he had intended—he would have been quite fine with it if John had perished—and the person he had actually been aiming for had regained the ability to fight back.

And Nico yelling, “It wasn’t me!” was no more an attempt to surrender than Tony’s words would have been. It was just him trying to absolve himself of responsibility for the situation he had helped cause. And his lack of intention to surrender is further demonstrated by the fact that he tries to get back up multiple times. The second time John hits Nico with the shield, he falls over. Nico then tries to get back up, so John hits him with the shield again. He tries to get back up yet again, so finally John puts his foot on Nico's chest to keep him down. It is only then that Nico yells, "It wasn't me!" This is not the behavior of someone who is interested in surrendering, this is the behavior of someone who is terrified that they don't have the upper hand anymore. If Nico had wanted to surrender, he would have stayed down the first time.

If we're looking for an analogous scenario that involves Steve, though, a much more closely comparable situation would be to see how he reacted after he thought Bucky had been killed. And even just a surface-level look at the situations reveals the fandom's hypocrisy. When, after Bucky had supposedly been killed by a member of the terrorist organization he and Steve were fighting, Steve vowed not to stop "until all of Hydra is dead or captured", people had no problem with it, even though only the one Hydra agent was involved in Bucky's apparent death. So Steve doubtlessly killed plenty of Hydra agents who were not even present at Bucky's fall to avenge him, but this was not seen as troublesome. Yet, after Lemar is killed by a member of the terrorist organization he and John were fighting, when John kills one Flagsmasher, who played an active role in Lemar's murder, minutes after he had been forced to watch the murder while being restrained by that same person, he is suddenly completely evil?

In fact, reflecting on Bucky's fall further reveals the fandom hypocrisy, for the Hydra agent is exactly as responsible for Bucky's death as Nico is for Lemar's death. After all, all the Hydra agent did was knock Bucky from the train, which Bucky initially survived because he managed to grab a handlebar. His "death" came when the handlebar gave out before Steve was able to grab him, which is not at all the Hydra agent's fault.

However, if Steve was subsequently shown killing that Hydra agent, even if the Hydra agent tried to deflect the blame and cried out, "I didn't mean for that to happen! I was just following orders!" it is not likely that people would then be all like "Steve is such a monster!!! He killed someone who is not entirely responsible for Bucky's death!!!!!" For while the Hydra agent might not have been the only one responsible for Bucky's "death", he clearly played a major role, and had still been previously been trying to kill Steve.

Indeed, it is pretty obvious how ridiculous trying to defend the Hydra agent would be, so it's baffling that people cannot see how ridiculous it is to try to apply that same argument to Nico. Just as Bucky's fall from the train could not have happened without the Hydra agent, Lemar's murder could not have happened without Nico's contributions. And just like the Hydra agent was previously trying to kill Steve, Nico had previously been engaged in trying to kill John.

Of course, people's lack of willingness to forgive John might be partly caused by the fact that The Falcon and the Winter Soldier was hating on John from the beginning, while neither The First Avenger nor The Winter Soldier (nor The Avengers (2012) or Age of Ultron) extensively hated on Steve. This way, even though there was significant hatred directed toward Steve in Civil War, it was somewhat tempered by the previously balanced portrayals. John unfortunately had no such advantage.

Thus, while it is not hard to see why people are tempted to compare the Siberia scene to Nico's death scene, acting like one is worse than the other is misleading, for they are too different to provide an accurate comparison. More comparable examples can be thought up, and these are very revealing.

[billiewena]

FOUR YEARS SINCE NOV 5TH, 2020, as summed up by Supernatural

past recaps: year one / year two / year three / year four

full context and sources below:

various explanations + resources/sources/extra reading on this year's recap:

balls deep: misha collins says the quiet part out loud at Cross Roads 8 Supernatural Convention, saying "if the CW wasn't so homophobic dean and cas would've been balls deep for sure" at a con (x) (x) (x)

garthbenny canon: supernatural actors DJ Qualls (who played hunter-turned-werewolf Garth Fitzgerald) and Ty Olsson (who played the vampire Benny Lafitte) reveal they're married, delighting crack shippers like myself everywhere (x)

spn spooky picture book: official supernatural children's picture book is released, retconning things like john winchester as a happy father figure and castiel being their cowardly childhood friend who sorta hangs around (x) (x)

boop button: tumblr introduces a feature people enjoy for once for april fool's day and halloween and allows users to boop each other, spn bloggers re-awake like sleeper agents to use it in full force (x) (x)

bedlund speaks on destiel: former spn writer ben edlund goes on a tweet fest replying to fans, talking about destiel multiple times including this profound tweet (x)

clear text, not subtext: jensen speaks out again on the confession at Purcon 8, this time taking a more open stance on how the relationship was textual, his take on dean's feelings about cas's feelings, and how the scene with cas deserved a resolution (x)

bury your gays: famed author chuck tingle (known for his plethora of highly specific and delightfully inclusive, if strange, indie erotica novels) publishes his second mainstream horror novel, inspired by TV network studios' infamous history of censoring LGBT relationships and openly killing off queer characters. In a non-subtle nod to supernatural fans, the main character is named misha. (sidenote: did end up reading this and this book is actually really good commentary on the industry in general and really good, 10/10 recommend) (x) also someone got the book signed by misha, to further break the fourth wall (x)

tracker: jensen ackles begins starring in a CBS show where he is basically csoplaying dean winchester, with the show featuring many non-subtle spn references (i.e. him pretending to almost get in an impala before going to his truck, characters wearing spn necklaces, etc.) (x) (x) (x) (special shout-out to clarice @youre-only-gay-once for expertly tracking the tracker show and these easter eggs, highly recommend their tag for their show)

cw's walker cancelled: fans rejoiced upon hearing the cancellation news for jared's post-supernatural show, walker, a remake of "walker texas ranger." in addition to generally being a copaganda show for the notoriously racist texas rangers, jared's inspiration for the show's direction caused much concern. the actor himself said the show was inspired by the US border crisis, not by the immigrant families affected by the separation and internment, but instead wanting exploring the POV of the law enforcement agents working at the border and the moral dilemmas they had to face (x)

pro-destiel Wonder Woman: Lynda Carter (aka the iconic and beloved original actress for Wonder Woman, not the z*onist one) says she could "go for some Destiel" when promoting #GeeksandNerdsforHarrisWalz and Misha's involvement (x) the rest of the spn cast and original Showrunner Kripke were also a big part of this event

chili's backfire: the chain restaurant chili's drags destiel while interacting with 9-1-1 bucktommy shippers on twitter, immediately gets backfire. notably, their stock takes a dip the next day. coincidence? maybe so, maybe not (x) (x)

samgirl voting fraud: "who is the gayest spn character" tumblr poll surprisingly gets heated, with a blogger straight-up admitting they used a bot on the "castiel vs. sam" poll to rig the poll in sam's favor, which they apparently also did for w*ncest in another poll in the past, and posting a guide on how anyone could do the same. luckily democracy wins in this one instance and castiel prevails anyways, leading to an also contested "castiel vs. charlie bradbury" round (x) (x)

pink pony jarpad: jared is spotted at lesbian pop star chappell roan's set at a festival, un-likely place for him to be (x) also may have been one of the "boring" people called out by chappell? (x)

pro-kamala castiel: in a last-ditch effort to get out the vote, misha uses the power of castiel photo ops to campaign for harris-walz and even shouts-out destiel. I feel depressed writing this sentence, if you've made it this long in your read and you're in the states I hope you're doing alright! maybe by the time I wake up things will be a little different though. (x)

[novy2sirius]

dark numerology notes

• tw - suicide, murder, violence, accidents, guns

༚༅༚˳ often the numbers 7, 8, 11, 17, or 27 will be found in the birthdays of people who’ve committed suicide. it’s likely because people with 7/17/27 tend to struggle with feeling alone a lot, people with 8 energy have a ton of low lows and high highs all the time (constant ups and downs), and 11 is one of the most emotional numbers in numerology, so sometimes they struggle a lot emotionally more than others. i see 11 and 17 the most though

examples: kurt kobain (11 day and 27 life path), aubreigh wyatt born on the 17th, ava wood born on an 11 day (20 is the secret 11 because 0 is connected to 9 so 20=29 which reduces to 11), vincent van gogh (17 year), robin williams (8 life path)

༚༅༚˳ people with 11 energy should always stay away from guns at all costs. it never ends well. even if they or someone they know has a license for them it still is not good for them to be around any as they’re more likely to die from them

༚༅༚˳ the number 24 is common in birthdays of people who are extremely violent or murderers. this obviously does not apply to the people who aren’t sick in the head and super low vibrational though. the pro to this number though is that these people can be very wealthy

examples: ted bundy (day number), jeffrey dahmer (life path), john wayne gacy (day + year)

༚༅༚˳ people born under 19 energy may have gotten really ill when they were young and almost died (some do not make it). this isn’t a good energy to be born under in my opinion, but can be good for wealth and leadership though

༚༅༚˳ be cautious on 7, 9, or 11 days when driving a car because these numbers are the most common numerical indications of injuries or freak accidents. i wouldn’t do anything risky on these days either like riding a motorcycle, rollercoaster, go-cart plane, etc. i’d say 27 too since 2 doubles the energy it’s next to

example: paul walker died in a car crash on 11/30/2013 which adds to 11 (1+1+3+2+1+3=11)

༚༅༚˳ people who have prominent 4 energy in their birthday could have possibly been murdered in a past life which is why they’re obsessed with things like true crime in this life and make good criminal investigators

[breckstonevailskier]

Context does truly matter.

Dumbest TFATWS contradictions

"Steve would never use a gun" *Storms Hydra base literally guns blazing* "But they were Nazis" >And the Flagsmashers are terrorists, next. "Steve would never kill" *Tosses henchmen off Helicarrier* *Kicks dudes out of windows* *Throws grenades at henchmen* >You'd have to be willfully dumb to think a Supersoldier throwing a Vibranium shield at people's heads is not fatal >Kills way more guys in the first Avengers, but blood only now gets on the shield somehow >Hey, maybe Cap should have, as Sam put it, "tried listening to them..." "But he surrendered" *Throws water fountain at John* >Therefore, still an active combatant. *Didn't actually surrender, but instead diverted blame* >Which makes it a heat of the moment situation, rather than a cold blooded murder situation like antis are making it out to be. >All the bad guys Sam and Bucky killed, you've never ONCE seen them fear for their lives until it was John's turn to fight back. More manipulative bullshit. >Of course, it wasn't the right decision to do it in public, but to act as if it's completely irrational makes no sense. He's a soldier, wtf do you think John and Lemar were doing in Afghanistan? Or Steve Rogers in Germany? >It isn't bad that Steve killed bad guys, but with John, it's a problem because the ominous music, the leering, villainous camera angles, blood on the coveted shield, the shocked civilians (and Karli), made it so. "He was unarmed" >He was a Supersoldier- he IS a weapon >Also, how do you go from being a Supersoldier to being helpless? They're just like John, it's not like he unlocked some new level of power after Lemar died, they didn't even really have a reason to stop fighting, other than the show setting John up. Even MORE manipulative bullshit. >Zemo kills an unarmed guy, Sam and Bucky are like, "Don't do it again, bestie", but John, they're like "This isn't you, give up the shield. No one else has to die." "I'm a Black man carrying the stars and stripes. What don't I understand? Every time I pick this thing up, I know there are millions of people out there who are gonna hate me for it." *Iron Patriot: Ceases to exist apparently* Also, missed opportunity to make Bucky the voice of reason for John after losing his best friend and partner, seeing as Bucky and Steve could have been the perfect parallel for John and Lemar. But no, tag team the shit out of an emotionally compromised man while the show acts like it was the right thing to do. In Civil War, Zemo cautioned against putting Steve Rogers on a pedestal, he can kill or have his actions result in the deaths of any number of people but as long as his intent was good, he can do no wrong, because he's a hero. Sound familiar, antis? Not saying that killing bad guys is wrong, Steve and John are soldiers, a soldier kills, but what's important is that they kill the right people. Antis conveniently omit that understanding when it comes to John though... Think for yourselves, you're ignoring reasonable sequencing of events because you're too sprung on the Steve, Sam and Bucky crew to see the show is using cheap tactics to cover up sub par writing and avoidable contradictions. You'd have to be willfully obtuse to ignore that there are more good things to say about Walker than Sam or Bucky. Antis, tell me you can't comprehend characters with depth without telling me you can't comprehend characters with depth.

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