#so it's not gonna be in chronological order i'm sorry

[ezrasimp]

DOS' Face Appreciation 9x01: The Best of Enemies

[folaireamh]

AAALRIGHT!!

[the-one-who-lambs]

uhh hello!! sorry if this is a tall order LOL but I wanna ask, do you have any narilamb fanfic recs? :D I already read yours and I really like bamsara’s and I’m waiting for epicaandk’s to update (that one is my fav ever <3) but idk what to read now lol

Tall order?? Naaaaah, I'm always happy to give recs. Oh boy, I'm gonna go in reverse chronological order.

If you've read all of my narilamb fics (have you seriously? I'm impressed, that's probably well over half the 150k+ I've written for this damn fandom. Also, to anyone seeing this from a reblog, my stuff is over at onethirdofimpossible!) then here we go!

You already mentioned it, but The Rehabilitation of Death is excellent so far! This one is by @bamsara who is new to the CotL fandom but apparently not new to fanfic writing; they have a really popular FNAF fic and I assume the well-deserved attention this fic's been getting is a byproduct of the popularity they've already gotten in other fandoms. :D Welcome, bamsara! Many of the fic writers in this fandom are friends with each other already, but we don't bite if you wanna say hi.

Feel No Evil and Language Barrier, both by @payasita. I always love how payasita portrays this duo (in both digital art and writing), with so much sass and repressed loneliness, knowing they're stuck together for eternity and making the best of it. (And maybe falling in love, depending on how dense Narinder keeps being.) What makes these come alive for me is how well thought out the setting is outside the Lamb and Narinder. The descriptions and weight of emotions really pop here.

LITERALLY ANYTHING written by pavi / @i-eat-deodorant. Depending on how spicy you want your fics to be he has even more here. Character analysis, diction, pacing, etc. are consistently 10/10. Top-quality banter between a sassy Lamb and tired old man Narinder. We constantly bounce ideas off each other and inspire each other a lot but I promise I'm not hyping him up just because he's my friend oh my god please just go bless your eyes.

It Was For You, O Death by blueberry-muffin-massacre (if they have a tumblr, let me know so I can tag!). An intriguing alternative ending to the final battle wherein the Lamb chooses a secret third option by refusing to give up the Red Crown and still observing Narinder as the God of Death. So many details are so well thought out and duality their relationship is nicely characterized-- both genuine care for each other and also quite unhealthy. A fine line treaded well!

Confessional by jusmove (again, lmk if they have a tumblr). Been a while since I've read it, but I love how the Lamb chips at Narinder's very carefully built emotional walls. Their personalities are very well fleshed out here, especially Narinder's cognitive dissonance at being able to process love.

Confession by @thewitchoftheweed. I didn't expect a part two to this one, but my god I was so thrilled when it did update. Narinder and Lamb with their unique and parallel loneliness and their fucked-up sense of everything. Their relationship is very rocky here, and I love how they navigate it: with tension and eventual, pained acceptance. Mind the rating.

Of Character Development and Being Dense by @calliecature. A short and sweet narilamb classic. They're both mutually pining and one of them is too emotionally repressed to realize it. Guess who.

Not An Offering, But a Gift by @checkplzjuliet. Small confession fic. I especially love how Narinder's descriptions twist the knife of his situation here, and how Lambert is a total foil for him! There are a lot of good things happening in such a short span, which is impressive.

Also, if you think you've read all my narilamb fics... I do have a secret one out there too. Just so you know.

Happy reading!

I'm already friends with many of the people here, but if any of the writers I've tagged have been kinda wanting to reach out for a while but feel a little anxious... Don't be. I've made my best friends in this fandom by literally just waiting for some of my readers to get over whatever assumption they have that I'm cool and say hi. Or being the more confident one first.

[cursedappendage]

Slay the Princess Narrator, Princess, Voices in Japanese

<<Vessel Names Part 1(Chapter I & II + Razor III & IV) <<Vessel Names Part 2(Chapter IIIs) Part 4(TLQ, TSM, Echo)>>

VOICES TIME BABY

Actually, I'm gonna go in chronological order of character mentions. So, we will start with:

The Narrator ナレーター(Nareetaa) [Narrator]

Simple and direct. There is a word for "narrator" that is of Japanese origin(語り手 lit. "Story hand" meaning narrator/storyteller), but the English word is the one more widely used. He also says "I" using the first-person pronoun 私(watashi), I'm assuming to indicate his "formal" attitude as, although men can use it, it's usually only in formal situations/you don't know someone well. He is of course referred to in third person with the kanji 彼(kare) meaning "he" or "him", but some voices like Contrarian and Smitten use katakana for him instead of kanji(カレ) for some different type of emphasis, I'm assuming.

Now in the Narrator's first lines, he tells you that there is a

Princess(or "The Princess" sometimes) プリンセス(Purinsesu) [Princess]

Like I mentioned in the "Princess and the Dragon" portion of last post, the Princess always referred to with the English word "Princess" rather than the Japanese word for princess.(She's also very often referred to with the pronoun 彼女(kanojo) meaning "she", of course). She tends to use the first person pronoun わたし(watashi), like the Narrator, although in her case it's written simply in hiragana, I assume to show less formality and more just how she refers to herself. 私/わたし is also used by women casually, in contrast to what I said in the Narrator section. She also tends to use あなた(anata, "you") for her 2nd person pronoun(formal/regular way to say "you").

The 1st and 2nd person pronouns the Princess uses also tends to change with each chapter:

The Spectre, Stranger(Chapter II), Damsel, Wild, Grey - 1st わたし(watashi, わたしたちwatashi-tachi when Stranger Princesses merge)・2nd あなた(anata)

Base Princess(Chapter I & Heart of TSM)*, The Nightmare, Moment of Clarity, Razor, Prisoner, Cage, Princess and the Dragon, Happily Ever After, Stranger(Heart of the Shifting Mound)- 1st 私(watashi, 私たちwatashi-tachi for Stranger)・2nd あなた

The Adversary, Eye of the Needle, Fury, Wraith - 1st 私・2nd お前(omae, can be seen as rude or more colloquial, for someone of equal/lower rank)

The Tower, Apotheosis- 1st 我(ware, not really actually used in real life, but gives a sense of profound, old, important-ness, typically used by king/god/godlike characters)・2nd お前(omae, though she also calls us 小鳥kotori "little bird")

The Beast - 1st アタシ(atashi, feminine, more casual form of watashi)・2nd オマエ(omae, she also calls us ヒヨコhiyoko "fledgling", all three of these words are written in katakana)

The Witch - 1st あたし(atashi)・2nd あんた(anta, colloquial/familiar form of anata, often considered rude, sometimes spiteful)

The Thorn - 1st あたし・2nd あなた(omg she uses the same 1st as the Witch but switches from "anta" back to "anata" omg y'all I'm cryingggg😭😭)

*Chapter I Princess tends to switch from あなた to お前 when antagonized(pre Tower, Adversary, Beast, Witch)

OK SORRY I KNOW THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE VOICES IM SO SORRY

Now let's start with the homie, the one who's always got your back

The Voice of the Hero 勇者の声(Yuusha no Koe) [Voice of the Hero]

Simple enough. Something to note is that there are two words for "hero" in Japanese, 英雄(eiyuu) and 勇者(yuusha). 英雄(eiyuu) is what you call a great person, someone respected for accomplishing something and leaving great impact on society. 勇者(yuusha) is moreso a brave person sent on a quest of adventure to defeat evil/protect others. The former emphasizes the impact and admiration of their achievements, while the latter emphasizes courage and bravery. Someone said something like "勇者 is someone on a journey to slay a dragon, 英雄 is someone who had already come back home from slaying a dragon". In the context of the Voice of the Hero, rather than someone with emphasis on the change he's made in the world, the emphasis is on his morals and good-intentioned actions. He uses ボク(boku) as his 1st person pronoun, which gives him a little bit of a "good boy" typa feel. Or at least some politeness. It's also noted that he uses katakana for boku instead of the kanji 僕(boku)(which, the Long Quiet himself actually uses out loud).

I'm doing the voices in the same order as their respective Chapter II Princesses in the first post(based off the "Memories" menu)

The Voice of the Stubborn 頑固者の声(Gankomono no Koe) [Voice of the Stubborn]

Yeah okay, this one's the same. 頑固者(Gankomono) means "stubborn person". He uses 俺(ore) as his 1st person pronoun, a very masculine pronoun, can be seen as rude in a formal setting, but is very typical and normal for casual men speech.

The Voice of the Broken 負け犬の声(Makeinu no Koe) [Voice of the Loser]

Now this one's insulting. 負け犬 (makeinu) means loser, failure, you get the picture. Made up of the words 負ける(makeru, to lose/to be defeated) and 犬(inu, dog). But it's very fitting I must say(Broken would totally bark for the Tower 100%). He uses the 1st person pronoun 僕(boku).

The Voice of the Cold 冷血漢の声(Reiketsukan no Koe) [Voice of the Cold-Blooded]

冷血漢(reiketsukan) mean "cold-blooded person" or "coldhearted person", or simply "heartless". 冷(rei) meaning cold and 血(chi) meaning blood. Same meaning as in English, someone who can kill a Princess with no hesitation. Like Stubborn, he uses 俺(ore). (He also tends to use quite blunt/rude ways to refer to the princess)

The Voice of the Paranoid 妄想狂の声(Mousoukyou no Koe) [Voice of the Delusional]

妄想(mousou) means delusion, while 狂(kyou) refers to lunatic, or insanity or mental abnormality. Now, delusional isn't exactly the same as paranoid, but the Paranoid can come off as delusional sometimes. Of course, anything we believe in the construct becomes real, so the Nightmare route is full of our real delusions. He is the intrusive thoughts part of our brain that manifests into reality. And in other routes, the Paranoid can come off as a bit insane(the Cage and Apotheosis especially make him seem more erratic). He also uses 俺(ore).

The Voice of the Cheated 野放図の声(Nohouzu no Koe) [Voice of the Unruly]

野放図(nohouzu) can mean wild, arrogant, unruly, but it can also mean unchecked, uncontrolled, unregulated. I put unruly as I thought it fits a title better, but in my head I think more like "unhinged". And I guess that kinda does fit the Cheated's personality, his main objective in the Razor is to win against her, and he's basically like "let's keep getting stabbed until there are enough of us to be better than her", definitely not sound of mind(he also has that comment when you take the blade of "let's make her hurt for what she's done to us"). He very much let's his emotions take the better of him, usually hating on the Princess and the bullshit of everything or spiting the Narrator. He's also, again, very unhinged(mentioning dropping the Cage's head and he says "I mean... we could...") His pronoun is also 俺(ore).

The Voice of the Hunted 獲物の声(Emono no Koe) [Voice of the Prey]

This one I don't have much to say, as it's pretty obvious why he's named that way. And it's pretty much the same as the English name. Like the Hero, he uses the pronoun ボク(boku), I think it's in katakana to mirror the Beast's pronouns.(He refers to her with kanji in 彼女(kanojo) but he does refer to her with katakana in アイツ(aitsu, something akin to "that guy" or "that person", when he say's "She's coming(アイツがくる！)")

The Voice of the Opportunist お調子者の声(Ochoushimono no Koe) [Voice of the Easily Elated]

お調子者(ochoushimono) refers to someone who get carried away easily, someone who does whatever they feel/want, someone who gets easily elated from praise and flattery. I think this is both a funny and accurate translation of the Opportunist. We know he definitely gets carried away easily. He says that second line in the game even(freeing the Thorn: "I can do whatever I want, and I believe with with my whole heart...").I can't really think of instances of him getting praised off the top of my head but he does seem to think it will work on other people. He very much goes with the mood, attempting to curry favor so he can make sudden rash decisions out of nowhere. He uses 僕(boku) which I think fits his suck up personality.

The Voice of the Contrarian あまのじゃくの声(Amanojaku no Koe) [Voice of the Contrarian]

Direct and simple translation again. あまのじゃく(amanojaku) refers to someone with a perverse personality, or someone who opposes other's opinions. Interestingly, あまのじゃく can also refer to an actual small demon in Japanese folklore. I just thought it reminded me of that one line from him "Time to get back to our old devilish ways". He also uses 俺(ore).

The Voice of the Skeptic 疑心暗鬼の声(Gishin'anki no Koe) [Voice of the Skeptic]

疑心暗鬼(gishin'anki) is an expression/abbreviation, it means something like "suspicion creates monsters from shadows", it's about how suspecting something can lead you to suspecting everything, and doubt and suspicion makes you jump at shadows. I think this makes some sense, as his hyper-focused perception of things makes him question everything around him. He notices small details that grow into things bigger and more important than they were before. Also 俺(ore).

The Voice of the Smitten 騎士の声(Kishi no Koe) [Voice of the Knight]

This one I find really funny. 騎士(kishi) refers to the medieval type of knight, known for their chivalry and honor, like ones in armor and usually on horseback(騎(ki) relating to horses). I think it makes perfect sense in the context of the Damsel, a knight come to rescue his beloved Princess, to free her from the confines of the cabin. I also think it works in the Thorn for similar reasons. But I think in most other routes it's hilariously out of context, like "damn, this knight guy kinda freaky calling this blade Princess gorgeous/calling this Princess with a dress of her own skin gorgeous" Like the Tower, he uses 我(ware) giving him that old medieval feel, and he addresses the Narrator with 貴君(kikun), meaning "you" used by men in letters addressing their equals/lowers, and he addresses the Princess with 貴女(can be pronounced anata or kijo), polite language used to refer to women in letters. I was planning on this being the last post but I dont think I can fit it all here sorryyyyyyy rest of the stuff will be next post

Edit: added pronouns of voices

<<Vessel Names Part 1(Chapter I & II + Razor III & IV) <<Vessel Names Part 2(Chapter IIIs) Part 4(TLQ, TSM, Echo)>>

[shepscapades]

IM SORRY??

SHEP SHEPSCAPADES DO YOU WANT ME DEAD???

I just fully looked at Jimmy's playlist. and. HELLO??

THIS IS IT. THIS IS THE END. IT WAS NICE KNOWING EVERYBODY.

(Im staring at the playlist. VERRY hard. Specifically numbers 1, 2, 4, 10, 14, & 15. Looking at it with the force of 1000 suns, actually. Observing with the intensity of someone who is gnawing at ths bars of their enclosure, in fact./silly)

I'M GONNA LAUGH LDFKJ;SOTIHJSL IM SO SORRY PRETTY MUCH ALL OF THE SONGS YOU LISTED ARE VILLAIN!SHERRIF SONGS I'M PRETTY SURE?? This is like, the only WIP playlist that isn't in chronological order, but just glancing at them from what you've listed, For the Wicked, Bullet, How I'd Kill, and Cannibal (sort of), are all for villain jimmy and his complicated relationships with people when he's in that headspace LKFJDFG NOT THAT THAT MAKES IT ANY BETTER. BUT yeah i'm. im still crazy about jimmy that hasn't changed <3

[froot-batty]

Gods worst friend group !

I'm excited to finally be able to talk about them. Venture down there if you beware

These guys are pretty entwined, so just like in the Twobat backstory, It'll just be one big thing. BIIIIIGGG thing, sorry

Viktor Fries was born in Denmark, an only child to two very loving parents. He'd always had a love for the cold, which grew into a love for winter, which grew into a love for cryogenics. His parents couldn't get him enough books or research papers written about the subject, so his eventual decision to pursue it in higher education came as no surprise. At the time, Gotham University and WayneTech were the leading institutions in cryogenic research, so Viktor packed his bags and ventured off to America.

Kirk Langstrom was born a sickly little baby at Gotham General. He was born with Chediak-Higashi syndrome, which not only caused his albinism, but made Kirk very prone to bacterial infections, especially when he was younger. It would also cause motor issues as Kirk aged, resulting in the need of mobility aids like canes or a wheelchair. As a child, Kirk was teased for his appearance, likened to a vampire - or, on one occasion, an albino bat another kid had found and presented to him. Instead of being offended, this moment was what kickstarted Kirk's love for bats, and eventual pursual of chiropterology.

And for Hugo Strange....well, no one really knows where he came from.

The three met when they were all in college, and they became friends almost instantly. They were three smart outcasts who had little to no real friends before this, so naturally they latched onto one another. Hugo a little more than the other two, but I'll get into that.

For the time they were in college, they were good for each other! But as most things go, they drifted a bit after college ended. Viktor by now had fallen in love with Nora and gotten his job at WayneTech, and Kirk had gotten the opportunity to take a research trip to study Bracken Cave (which is where he'd meet his eventual wife, Francine). This left Hugo mostly to his own devices, which he put towards his career at Arkham Asylum and eventually becoming the head of it.

When Kirk eventually returned from his trip, they reconnected with one another. Now here's where I'm gonna talk individually about what happened to Fuck These Guys Up.

Chronologically, Nora getting sick and Fries' accident is what happens first. When Nora started getting really sick, Viktor and her had no idea what it really was, only that it had the potential to kill her if they didn't find a treatment. Viktor's desperation to find it would eventually lead him to Hugo, who agreed to assist Viktor in his research. When Viktor and Nora mutually decided to freeze her to give Viktor more time, Hugo allowed them to build the machine that would freeze her in an abandoned room in the basement of Arkham (which Hugo was using for his own experiments).

Viktor panicked during the process of Nora freezing, and went to turn the machine off in the middle of it, not fully thinking through what he was doing. It caused the machine to malfunction and the chamber (with Nora in it) to explode outward, releasing everything that had been meant to cryogenically preserve Nora out into the room. The injuries and exposure to chemicals should have killed them both, but the temperatures (and medical assistance) managed to preserve the both of them, though it left Viktor as a living but slowly rotting corpse, who is both being killed by the cold and needs it to keep living in whatever state he's in now.

Hugo was actually the one to find the both of them. Though he had personally never cared for Nora, he followed the plan she and Viktor had laid out, making a new chamber to preserve her while he had a suit specially made for Viktor in order to keep him alive. With a tracker installed inside of it so Hugo could know where he was at any time.

This is probably a good time to cut and explain what's wrong with Hugo. He is...insanely devoted to both Kirk and Viktor. They were both his first friends and he loves them very much and he will Keep Them at Any Cost.

So after Viktor awoke, and realized that Nora had been preserved (even though part of him didn't want that anymore), Hugo instructed him to begin working on a cure for her. Hugo couldn't care less if she died he'd get Viktor to himself then, but Viktor had grown dangerously depressed after the accident and the thought of one day being reunited with a cured Nora was the only thing motivating him to stay alive.

Because Nora's chamber is in the basement of Arkham Asylum, Hugo has control of when and for how long Viktor can visit her. If he doesn't make sufficient progress on her cure, he isn't allowed in.

Now, onto Kirk. He had no idea that was all happening, as their contact with one another had been limited, even after reconnecting. One day, though, Kirk had mentioned his interest in changing his current study to focus on his condition, CHS, instead of his bats. Mostly because he was worried about progressing into the accelerated phase, as most people with CHS do. But Hugo suggested instead that he could figure out some sort of treatment for Kirk - and don't worry, you can just go back to your bats! I promise it'll work; in fact, it'll have you feeling like Batman!

So Kirk, suffering from chronic pain and various disabling motor issues, agreed happily. He visited Hugo's lab when the "treatment" was finished and received two injections in the neck, which turned into those two scars. When it didn't work after a couple of days, Kirk was disappointed, and was ready to tell Hugo that he needed to try something else when something...happened.

Kirk blacked out for a couple of hours and woke up shirtless, covered in blood in an empty alleyway. And, strangest of all, he wasn't in pain.

And this kept happening. Every couple of nights he would black out and return home bloody. He attempted to hide this from his wife, but something like that can't stay under wraps forever, so when she found out she urged him to talk to Hugo and figure out what the hell that "treatment" did.

So he did (rather angrily, of course). Hugo would explain that the treatment was actually an experimental chemical he'd developed to be able to turn humans into animals, specially developed for Kirk to turn "at will" instead of being stuck like that permanently. Because of Hugo choosing a vampire bat as the animal for the specific "treatment" developed for Kirk, he would need to feed on blood while in bat-form, thus the reason he was bloody every time he awoke from his blackouts.

There was only one bonus to the transformation. The concoction was, actually, a sort of cure. The bat form didn't have the same chronic pain or issues that Kirk's normal body did. But it came at the cost of being a mindless, bloodthirsty monster.

All he needed to do, Hugo said, was figure out how to become the bat instead of letting it take over, and then he'd practically be the perfect creature!

He would have to keep coming to Hugo for regular injections, though.

Kirk initially, obviously, refused - he wasn't a monster, and he didn't want to hurt anyone or anything just to help himself. But he kept thinking about it. And thinking about it. Could he really tame the bat, and live as something powerful and strong? Something he'd never been?

It weighed on his mind so much that he inevitably returned to Hugo, just to try it. What he didn't know at the time was that the injections were purposefully addictive, growing worse and worse the more he returns to take them.

Hugo Strange friend of the year everybody

[pixelxgore]

hers a billfold wip as a treat i changed his face bc i have free will

The art is to encourage you to read my silly little insanity (you should totally do it btw)

I'm dyslexic so sorry if anything is spelled grotesquely wrong lol autocorrect sometimes has no idea what i’m trying to spell

Starting with my head cannon because every thing will make more sense with it (or it wont that's entirely up to you) Imma try my best to make this enjoyable

So I head cannon both bill and ford as aspec this is important for the rest trust (I'm Aroace myself so some of my words are based of of experience ) being aroace doesn't mean you can't have a toxic one-sided relationship with a triangle

(most of this is pretty vanilla but I still wanna talk about it)

I believe it started of as a one-sided relationship on fords part (wow shocker) but it wasn't really love because he's ace it was more of infatuation (this stems from the fact he is a science boy and like ooo demon triangle thing) mistaken for love (I'm pretty sure this is common among aroace people or I just had an original experience) and maybe bill had just a little bit of the same feeling but instead of infatuation it was just pure obsession and when they had there little “tragic break up” and bill finally came to realize his obsession and it consumed him (idk i think that how abusive obsession is) and he realized he can’t live with out ford (i man he can but unhealthy obsession) and thus bills one sided relationship with ford where he just tries to get his puppet back but can’t figure out why he needs him so bad so he comes to the (subconscious) cuncultion there in love (because of course that’s the reasonable decision) and then you all know what comes after

I think bill has major will wood music vibes so I have nominated three songs of his for bill ford (cuz I'm genuinely going insane over them)

This is for fun and based off my head cannons

All of my discussions are made purely of the vibes the song gives me and how cool than animation in my head looks so take everything you know about these will wood songs and throw it out the window cuz none of that is relevant :3

i saw someone say “Will Wood songs can really be interpreted in different ways, and most of them seem like wisps of similar thought rather than a concrete narrative, so you're always a little bit right and wrong when you take a guess.” and i think you should keep that in mined

(I'm gonna embarrass myself so hard (⁄ ⁄•⁄ω⁄•⁄ ⁄) )

I'm not gonna elaborate much but just trust me ok I put it kind of in chronological order

fords one sided relationship with bill: ...well, better than the alternative

Ok so this one is the least perfect out of all of them cuz it only half what I want (obviously this song is a stretch but hear me out) It's mostly for the like the last half of the song (remember what I said about throwing out the meaning for get that i lied) this song about the struggle ls of growing up and is a heartfelt plea to be understood and accepted for who we are (which obviously ford was a wired kid) and this kinda ties into the one-sided infatuation because it also is about the romanticism of nostalgic love, and the pressure of society telling you to find someone and "settle down" as we get older (witch yk aroace can’t really do that) so he’s grasping at the fact that he is enamored with this demon he just summoned (because science) so he can come up with this narrative in his head of how he is in love and can finally fit at least one of the societal boxes (idk it sounds like something to me probly ooc but I'm having fun)

bills one sided relationship with ford: ¡Aikido!

obsession with someone and how people often use coping mechanisms such as drugs to help with their feelings of uncertainty and helplessness. (yes this is copied not fully of a site this is tumblr not an english assignment) it also explores the idea that love and obsession can often manifest in neurotic and even pathological behavior.(oooo oooo look i’m so smart like staring the apocalyps) i’m not this cool this whole thing started with the first like whit h is “I apologize for playing with your eyes But I’m obsessed with you” witch reminded me of how bill used for as a puppet and then yk fords whole world came crashing down (this one explained its self more i have to do less mental gymnastics) and he’s like im sooo sorry i can’t live with out you

there whole relationship from the deal to the end of bill: Misanthrapologist ("In case I make it,"

Outtake)

ok this one is the one that mostly made of vibes because the song is about an unhappy codependent relationship through metaphors of christianity, nihilism, outer space, and mozart (witch only really encompasses a portion of the relationship) the song stars with “I wanna meet your make Shake him by his ensanguined damask lapel Holler "Look what you've done Gave this planet a sun And made a man to wonder if he's more than the sum of his cells"” which makes me personally think of obviously the deal fore made with bill and how bill stroked his ego all the way through there partnership um you can see where i goes from here just go listen to the song

ok this one’s off topic and only for my imaginary animation but the line “So how could I stand a chance, let alone dance With the way you sweep me off these two left feet?” just like imagine this with me it’s bill (human probably cuz i don’t work with the triangle) and young ford in the minedskape thing and its bill dipping ford and when it goes down it switches to bill and fort in bills pyramid thing with ford chained up do you see the vision ok I’m done now (´°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥ω°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥｀)

[silverwhittlingknife]

hi Silver! o/ because that fanart made me wonder - would you happen to know when/where Dick's stuffed elephant plush Zitka turns up in the comics?

GREETINGS CAM <3333 THAT ART WAS SO CUTE

Yeah, I think your instincts are right - it's a truly adorable bit of transformative fandom, but I'm 95% percent sure it's not comics canon. Barbara has canon plushies, but I don't think anyone else does.

I got kinda invested in the investigation (it's hard to prove a negative!) and I ended up typing out an entire History of Elinore/Zitka, so, uh, if you're curious, meet me below the cut for:

Where does Elinore / Zitka - the animal - appear in comics?

Did Dick ever have a stuffed elephant toy in comics?

Where does Elinore / Zitka appear in comics?

We're gonna go in chronological order!

Dick's circus elephant friend was first created for practical reasons: in Batman 436, Marv Wolfman does a big expanded flashback to Dick's circus backstory as a way to subtly show us Tim before officially introducing him (so that we can have a technically-solvable mystery-of-Tim's-identity in LPoD). In this comic, there's an elephant named Elinore who loves Dick:

Aww. Such a cute elephant!

Batman 436 comes out in August 1989. New Titans 60 comes out a few months later, in November, and guess what? When Dick visits the circus, he is suddenly surprised by an unexpected blast from the past! It turns out that even though it's been years, Elinore still remembers him!

Here's the part where Elinore remembers Dick:

SUCH a cute elephant. I love her.

(Guess who else still remembers Dick even though it was so long ago. Guess which other character is about to be an unexpected blast from the past. Guess which character Elinore is directly paralleling guess guess guess sorry everything is about Dick and Tim in my mind but I can focus I swear)

Four years later, in 1993, Batman: The Animated Series retells Dick's origin story. They like and keep Wolfman's elephant, but they change her name to Zitka:

Wolfman doesn't return to the elephant beyond those two appearances, and a few years down the line, New Titans gets cancelled and Wolfman's not writing Dick anymore anyway. So the animal gets abandoned for a while, until Devin Grayson, a fan of both Wolfman and B:tAS, revives the Wolfman-era Titans team in JLA/Titans and then the ongoing series Titans 1999.

Grayson then brings back the elephant in a flashback to Dick's past in Titans 16 (Jun 2000), where she imports the B:tAS name. Sometimes I'm skeptical of TV-to-comics imports, but honestly, I endorse this one. You lose the alliteration, which is a shame, but IMO Zitka is a better elephant name than Elinore.

Here's Dick with the newly-christened Zitka in Titans 16:

Grayson also briefly references the elephant in Gotham Knights 20 and - in a final angsty callback - in Nightwing 88 (Feb 2004), where Zitka tries futilely to comfort Dick in the midst of his trauma conga line:

... And... honestly, I think that's it for comic appearances? The two Wolfman comics plus the three Grayson comics.

Both Wolfman and Grayson are writing multiple titles - Batman, New Titans, Titans, Gotham Knights, and Nightwing between the two of them, spanning a big chunk of Dick's post-Crisis canon - and both writers use the elephant for heartwarming moments of nostalgia, which means if you're doing a post-Crisis readthrough for Dick, Elinore/Zitka feels memorable. But I don't think she actually shows up that much.

For post-2011, I am not as well-informed - throwing this out to the dash? anyone know? - but I feel like Zitka the heartwarming symbol of Dick's heartwarming circus past is, uh, thematically very at odds with the Court of Owls evil!circus vibes, so my instinct is that this story element was almost certainly dropped in the reboot.

Did Dick ever have a stuffed elephant toy in comics?

In WFA, yes; in main comics continuity, no. Technically, I have not read every comic ever published, so I could be wrong!! But I don't think so.

Below, find my rambling reasoning on the tonal vibes of pre-Crisis, post-Crisis, and post-2011, and why this particular story element doesn't seem right to me for the first two.

Pre-Crisis (...okay, mostly the Silver Age): stuffed animal, yes or no?

tl;dr no, requires too much background knowledge on the part of the reader, plus the elephant wasn't a thing until later

Elinore doesn't get created until post-Crisis, but also just generally, pre-Crisis callbacks are more along the lines of this reference in Batman 129 (published in 1960), where, wow, Batman and Robin are hunting jewel thieves - and it turns out Robin recognized this strongman! BUT HOW?!

The comic goes on to recap Dick's entire origin story in flashback, on the assumption that you may not know it.

(BTW, if you'd like to know more about Haly's Circus throughout the years, nightwingology has a great post here summarizing a lot of fun plotlines and characters!)

Basically: Silver Age comics are very self-consciously episodic and kid-friendly; they're not generally gonna do overly-elaborate callbacks because they don't know what comics their kid readers may have randomly picked up or remember.

By the time of post-Crisis, comic books were being written for an adult audience buying from the direct market, i.e. readers who are collecting whole runs & don't need or want Dick's origin story to be recapped to us in full every time it's referenced. That's why in post-Crisis, we get stuff like "hey, neat, this particular soda brand is getting mentioned in several different books!!" or "in order to understand this story arc, buy SIXTEEN DIFFERENT COMICS in FIVE DIFFERENT RUNS and read them ALL ACCORDING TO A NUMBERED ORDER and also you better be following the individual plotlines and recognize these five minor characters who we don't bother to introduce!! Good luck!!" But the elaborate post-Crisis plotlines - and subtler worldbuilding like a stuffed animal callback to Dick's backstory - don't make a lot of story sense UNLESS you're imagining your readers as completionist adult fans.

So IMO a stuffed animal wouldn't be a pre-Crisis thing unless it was The Episodic Story Of the Week, and I don't think a stuffed animal is action-adventure-y enough for the fast-paced storytelling of the Silver Age. (Unless it, like, came to life and tried to eat you or something.)

Post-Crisis: stuffed animals, yes or no?

tl;dr: no, Dick's a manly tough guy, he's not gonna have a stuffed animal, that'd be lame, like something Tim might do

Part of the edgy grimdark adult vibes in 80s/90s comics is that some characters who used to be kinda silly & goofy & lighthearted - like Batman and Robin - get reimagined as Serious and Angsty and Edgy in a Tough Cool Manly Brooding Way. This massively affects characterization for Bruce, Dick, and Bruce and Dick's relationship.

(I obviously love this change & love the tense Bruce-and-Dick interactions, but plenty of fans of the earlier fluffy comics really disliked the edgy retcons of Miller / Wolfman / Starlin / et al.)

The upshot is that post-Crisis is a period when you could have a recurring reference like a stuffed elephant, but you wouldn't have a stuffed elephant, not for Dick. I think a toy like that would be too cutesy / childish / effeminate to give a male character in post-Crisis, unless you were poking fun at him.

Now, you could probably let Tim have a stuffed animal, because Tim is sometimes cool but also sometimes a tryhard loser who is faking being cool and not entirely pulling it off (see e.g. the Robin comic where he practices tough-guy faces in the mirror, or the Teen Titans comic where Conner discovers his cringy Enya CD, or when he's fanboying over Connor and it's awkward, etc etc.). A stuffed animal would be deeply embarrassing, and you'd have to be careful to compensate by having Tim do something cool afterward - but Tim's character concept allows for "he's kind of a loser sometimes."

But Dick isn't!! In post-Crisis, Dick's a tough / impressive / "cool guy" character, the kind of guy anyone would want to be, even in the flashbacks where he's Robin, and even in the stories where he's more lighthearted than angsty. It'd be kinda lame for Dick to have a stuffed elephant, so he wouldn't. I feel like Dick would be more likely to poke fun at it if someone had one, like when he's making fun of Wally for liking the Hardy Boys. Dick could have a Batman action figure, at most, and if he had one he would have it ironically.

Basically: in post-Crisis, a male character hugging a stuffed elephant feels more likely to be a punchline to me, not something poignant. (Even with Tim, Tim could have an embarrassing stuffed animal, but he couldn't hug it when sad - that's too far. Maybe Booster Gold might do this. Probably he wouldn't, but spiritually, he would. Sorry Booster ilu! <3)

Instead, Dick instinctively deals with his inner turmoil like the TORTURED ACTION HERO he is: by punching things and brooding and yelling and joining the mob and sleeping on rooftops and going on obsessive secret missions and acquiring Angsty Stubble!! Just like Batman!

(Technically I don't know if Bruce ever joined the mob but you know he would.)

Anyway as you know this is my favorite continuity and I am poking fun affectionately, but uh, yeah sdfsfdsfs. No stuffed animals.

Post-2011 / Infinite Frontier / Wayne Family Adventures: stuffed animals, yes or no?

tl;dr it's in WFA! Probably not anywhere else, but it could be.

Post-2011 stuff tends to be cutesier overall, most of all in the current Infinite Frontier era. So I don't feel like this would be tonally out-of-line with IF comics. Taylor tends to go for more meme-y references rather than fanfic references, though.

So the obvious best fit is WFA, which is aiming for a rough approximation of Silver Age family-friendly vibes - wholesome, episodic plots, Teaching Good Moral Lessons For The Youth, etc. - plus lots of Easter eggs for fanfic readers and some comic references.

And look, here we are:

Aww.

Whew - that's everything I could find!

Anyway as you can probably tell, I LOVE the elephant, so this was a very entertaining rabbit hole to go down, thank you <3

[verpineshatterrifle]

okay so your post abt alpha-17 and the other alpha arcs got me thinking (and im sorry for using you as sw google but in my mind you're Alpha Legends Lore mutual) who ARE the oldest clones? I feel like everything got... really confusing with a bunch of super secret REAL first clones getting shuffled into the order. is boba the oldest? in my mind it goes 1 boba 2 nulls 3 alphas 4 the rest of the initial clones that obi-wan saw in aotc but I have no bloody clue 😭

I AM HONORED TO BE YOUR LEGENDS LORE GOOGLE MUTUAL

ok so. sources probably conflict bc this is star wars, of course they do. what i care about is repcomm so we're just gonna go with that as our primary source with wookieepedia as secondary sources

first we gotta get some dates. unfortunately star wars doesnt really give months for most dates but years is still a starting place. these dates are all pulled from wookieepedia, legends page when applicable/different

also we're using geonosis as our date reference point since the timeline is honestly so hard to work with

order 66 happens 19 bby

1st battle of geonosis, 22 bby, the clone wars are 3 years long

boba fett's birth date is listed as 32 bby, meaning he was 10 at geonosis. cody, rex, ordo, fi, spar, and sull are all also listed with a birth date of 32 bby, so we're down to a difference of months here. essentially they're all the same age though- boba himself, troopers, nulls, commandos, and alphas

I REPEAT. ALPHA IS NOT SIGNIFICANTLY OLDER THAN THE CORE OF THE GAR. PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD. HE ISNT THE ONLY ALPHA EITHER.

but who's actually oldest? and is wookieepedia entirely correct? this is the part where i open repcomm and ignore everything else. i don't even know if anything else contradicts because i'm not checking

chapter 1 of triple zero, kal has just arrived on kamino. it's eight years before geonosis, and 2 years into the cloning program

(ALSO ITS SO FUCKING GREAT THAT THIS IS KAL'S INTRODUCTORY LINE LMAOOO <3)

he does see a lot of clone babies in gestation vats, just like we see in attack of the clones as well as cadets of varying ages- the kaminoans continue producing troopers through the entire ten years of the cloning program, so yes, the 'first generation' (clones deployed at geonosis) ARE older than a lot of later clones. but we dont really have a lot of those later clones as named characters as far as i know

anyways

the nulls appear to kal to be 4 or 5 (also peep jango apparently being legitimately shocked by them)

chronologically the nulls are NEARLY two, which probably means like 1 year and 11 months or something

(pause for me to cry about this entire scene, 'kal was instantly proud of all of them,' 'how would you like to be called ordo, he was a mandalorian warrior,' kal teaching them to embrace their fear as a mechanism their body uses to help protect them, but this is gonna be long enough as it is)

and then we have jango showing up with boba. no real indication of if boba or the nulls are actually older, but it's implied that they're very very close in actual age, if not the same age. we also get mention of the commandos and the alphas.

now, this is now just down to what i think and what makes sense to me. the whole point of the nulls is that they were experimental units- the kaminoans wanted to see if tinkering with the genome would be worth it, and ultimately decided it wasn't. it would actually make sense to me if the nulls were at least a year or two older than the rest of the clones- the kaminoans need time to see if their experiment panned out, don't they? but the nulls are also 10 at geonosis

while the nulls have been flash-trained and put through some trial runs at this point, it's indicated that the alphas and commandos aren't quite ready for training yet. this could be because the alphas and commandos are just a bit too young yet, it could be that the kaminoans put the nulls through training at a younger age than they're doing for non-experimental units. not totally clear

this is another point that is important to me: multiple times the nulls pass for clone troopers. i keep seeing headcanons of them being noticeably taller/bigger than other clones and while it is true that they're canonically slightly heavier, i think the difference is probably like 10-20 pounds, most people cannot easily tell the difference. ordo puts on corr's armor and just notes that it's slightly tighter than he's used to. mereel infiltrated kamino in trooper armor unnoticed, even while directly speaking to a kaminoan

here is my opinion on it: -the nulls and boba are basically the same age -the alphas were created next, but a few months after. by this point the kaminoans had decided (possibly because of the nulls' high mortality rate in gestation) that the alphas would be fully unaltered aside from the accelerated aging. the nulls' behavior 'issues' proved to the kaminoans that this was the right call -the commandos were created at the same time or shortly after the alphas. we're talking within weeks if not days. they have minor genetic changes to work better as a team but that's about it. -the troopers then begin production, now that the kaminoans have lots of practice altering jango's genome. heavy alteration for better social cooperation and obedience. -we're talking a span on like 4 months for all of this

you could say that ordo's gray hairs support the nulls being maybe 4-6 months older than everybody else, but i really think he is just that stressy, and there's also book evidence for clones actually aging at variable rates depending on how much stress they're under

quick note for omega: i think her existence is just insane and she's only here because disney was making a children's show and needed a child character (and girl so they can get inclusivity points), but i could see her being made anywhere from at the same time as boba to up to 3 years later. her wookieepedia page doesn't say, because the bad batch never bothered to give us any concrete information on... anything.

WE ARENT EVEN TOUCHING ON EMERIE. WHAT THE FUCK

[friendlylocalwhumper]

I was just reading through some of your older works with major (holy shit) and been seeing his Trauma with thunderstorms and I'm wondering if that ever comes into play during his time with Simon?

The Cycle series in chronological order (pts.1-30) | In the Dark (pt.30)

“...for Sunday to Tuesday, remaining unsettled with showers or longer periods of rain. Some of the rain may be heavy at times and temperatures will be close to…”

Cupcake lies flopped onto his side, curled up around a mug of hot cocoa, mostly ignoring the weather channel. The cocoa wasn’t his idea. Simon’s trying to fix things.

Simon is out of the room. That’s the only way Major can really relax.

“...for tonight, though, because - and cover your little ones’ ears - we’re going to have one heck of a storm. I mean, don’t even bother bringing your umbrella in from your car when you get home tonight. The wind’s already started up, and I know you hear that rain that’s already started up, if you live in these areas…”

An entirely new tension is building up behind Major’s shoulder blades. His eyes flit to the window to the left of the TV, scanning across the dark gray sky out there.

“Simon.” The croak comes out as a betrayal to his resignation to stay out of trouble, stay out of focus. But this is important, this is a time crunch. “Simon?”

It might have been the volume of his yell. The fact that he called at all. Or the panicked pitch. But something about it has Simon dropping something and skidding around the corner. “What? What’s wrong?”

The cocoa has spilled. Major hadn’t even noticed, at first, too used to being messy and destructive - the heat seeps into his clothes with the oddly nostalgic feeling of pissing himself. His arm is outstretched to point at the television. “Gonna - ‘bout to storm.”

The perfect picture of clueless-but-desperate-to-help, Simon stands there for a moment, mouth agape. “Uh - yeah. Looks like it.” He spots the spilled chocolate, the tremor to that arm. Whatever’s going on, it’s a big deal to Major. “So?”

The captive tries to shake loose words from his head. They are trying to come slow but he wants to explain before the first one hits. “I got… this messed up thing, happened… uh, you know, uh, I…” The weather report is repeating. Grating on his nerves. The clouds are picking up their speed with a vengeance outside. “I’m scared of thunder.”

It is his instinct, condescending as it might be, to crouch down to a less intimidating height and soften his voice. Simon watches as Cupcake starts urgently, impulsively chewing at his stubby nails. “I’m here.”

Uncharacteristically emotive, Major throws up his hands and waves them both in a no, you don’t understand gesture. “Really scared. Like, like - guy with magic, he…” Obscenely, his hands form the finger-penetrating-a-circle gesture, and then point to his own temple. “Made me scared. Crying and freaking out and sh-, and stuff.”

Brows raised and jaw set with concern, the captor nods slowly. “Will I have to restrain you?”

He itches at his curls idly. “Wha-...? No. Not gonna attack. I just… it’s embarrassing, you know? Can’t even calm down. Snotty and shit.” He leans to stare out the window again, too preoccupied to remember an apology for cursing. “...Sorry. Spilled the…” A distracted gesture to the now-stained beanbag chair.

“Do you want to go in the cage?”

Cupcake’s head jerks back to lock eyes with Simon’s. He looks hurt, frightened back into shoulders slumping.

Simon waves a hand dismissively. “Not like that. I mean, would it make you feel better?”

The healer shrugs. “Uh…” His eyes are aimed at his knees, now, sore red fingers picking at the carpet fiber that he’s stretched out. “Nah.”

Howling against the gutters first, then slowly picking up to moan against the siding, the wind insists on being noticed. Major hunches down in his seat.

“Then there’s only one thing for it. Come on, come with me.”

~

“What is this?”

Head ducked down to avoid cobwebby string lights, Major decides to just flop down onto the nest of pillows in the corner. Clothes hang above and distort the illusion but if Major chose to, he could believe this was a little magical space completely separate from the house it’s in. There is a short stack of books in the corner, a stash of snacks, a notebook, and a messenger bag.

None of it really makes sense. He can’t figure out why Simon would have this kind of hiding spot in his house, or why there’s a bunch of random shit stashed in here. But the pillows are soft, and the whole closet feels so comfortingly small.

Simon sighs and curls up on his side, too, to avoid having to hunch forward sitting up. Major’s eyes search for anything to look at but the face of his captor inches away. “An old place. I don’t have a reason to come in here anymore. The lights don’t work, sorry. Going to be dark.”

“S’fine. Hey, don’t - don’t grab on me or anything, in here. Please.”

His usual smug, calm expression smoothes out into one of plain honesty. “I won’t.”

Finally he settles on just closing his eyes instead of trying not to see Simon. Cupcake lets out a shaky sigh and grinds the side of his head harder into the tassel-fringed pillow. “If I scream, or cry, or whatever. When it starts. Don’t make fun.”

The soft nest shifts slightly as Simon shakes his head. “I won’t.”

A faint flash glows from under the sliding closet door. Major’s whole body jolts with a flinch. In the darkness, he reaches out blindly to find Simon’s hand and cling to it. The thunder is seconds away.

Seconds. Seconds that feel like hours. As if he only has those few seconds left to live, Major frantically angles his elbows to move, and scurries forward until his body is flush up against Simon’s, shielded by him. His grip on Simon’s hand is tight enough to risk breaking bone and his eyes remain screwed shut with a violent intensity.

taglist: @morning-star-whump , @lthrboy , @apokolyps , @paperprinxe , @vampiresprite ,

@wollemi-whump , @watermelons-dont-grow-on-trees , @whumps-and-bumps , @defire , @notactuallyluska

[wr1t3w1tm3]

More unsolicited thoughts on The Outsiders a New Musical.

Tw: mention of suicide in some of the last paragraphs. If you've read the book/watched the movie, ya know.

Contains spoilers for all forms of The Outsiders (book, movie, and musical). All spoilers are below the cut.

I figured out why some of the songs in the new Outsiders musical didn't make as much sense.

They changed several plot points!!!

Most aren't egregious and I'm cool with them, but there are a couple they got me some kinda way.

(This is based if the plot synopsis on Wikipedia. It could be wrong but it's all I've got cause im a broke pleb).

In Chronological Order:

Obviously there is no Steve. Personally don't care either way. Like him and Soda's platonic relationship, particilarly what we see in the movie, but otherwise I understand why it was easier to cut his role.

Johnny only got jumped a week before the musical (but then Justice for Tulsa sounds weird because Cherry suggests Johhny killed because of how Bob treated him and she implies that he was hurt a while ago...? IDK man. Not to big a gripe but it's just weird).

Grease got a Hold is essentially a ritual initiation because Ponyboy survived getting jumped (they skip his getting saved by the gang by having Pony get knocked out) so him surviving makes him a Greaser? I don't understand and frankly I would've preferred slightly less deviation from the source material here but again, I don't mind this change, it's all down to preference.

I almost don't like how much of a main character Darry has become? Like I like him in the adaptation, but I feel like his upgrade came at the cost of the downgrade of Soda and Two-Bit. I love both those characters and from what I've read/heard they both had there roles reduced, Soda it seems almost severely. But typical middle child shit I guess. Again, he could have a lot of speaking bits because I'm going off a couple synonpses and the cast album, but man I miss him. And Two Bit. I hope that they at least had him and Pony together going to visit Johnny. That's one of my favorite parts of the book and movie.

They add a scene between Johnny and Dally where Dally sees Johnny outside his house. I'm out of order here bit it's the night before the Drive In. Johnny says he's afraid to leave because his dad could kill his mom? Interesting take on that relationship but okay. I do love this scene personally.

I don't know if we get the Two Bit and Marcia fling. It didn't get mentioned in the plot synopsis so I won't comment further.

The addition of Ponyboy going unconcscious during the first fight means I get a two nickles meme about Ponyboy blacking out during fights in this musical.

There's no Randy?!?!? @annacatbeth13 said he got cut for the Broadway run and I'm sorry. He is a hella good character and even though his movie role is reduced, he's so good. I kinda feel like the musical suffers by having only Cherry as the oposition to Soc POV when you've got minimum of Pony and Johnny verbally against the Greaser POV and Darry is very much contrary in action during the book/movie and verbally here.

B/c there's no Randy a lot of Bob and Randy scenes are just Bob and Soc scenes.

I'm sorry, the fact that the guy who plays Bob plays the cop that investigates Bob's murder is sending me. MF rolls up like "yeah, I didn't just die here. This is fine" and everyone rolls with it. It's show business, I understand, but I feel like if I saw this show in person I'd notice and I'd lose it.

Also, I'm gonna note here that Brent Comer played Paul in La Jolla and now plays Darry. Ironic. Speaking of Paul and Darry as much as I don't like them removing Randy using Paul to fill his role as Bob's friend works quiet well. However, isn't Paul 20? And wasn't Bob like 17 or 18? I have questions that I'm not sure I can answer so I'm just gonna assume they were friends in high school and Paul stayed local for college.

I also don't know if they end up going to the Dairy Queen? Like the synopsis says that Dally comes up to see them and that it's Pony's discarded cigarette that starts the fire... but then the kids show up out of nowhere so where the hell did they come from? This entire incident is assumedly spoken so all I've got's the synopsis.

I was told again by @annacatbeth13 that Randy sang Hopeless War with Cherry and Pony and dammit, they took out that entire thing and that is such a catalyst for Ponyboy seeing the world in shades of gray like Cherry mentions in Hopeless War and I'm... I'm sorry. It just feels kinda wrong. I understand why they had to cut him but dammit it doesn't mean I'm not sad.

Everything in the hospital feels rushed. It does seem like they cut the Two-Bit taking Pony to the hospital bit (which makes sense, still sort of makes me mad). It also sounds like they upped Johnny's charge to first degree murder!! Like that doesn't make sense to me. He didn't premeditate shit. I honestly don't even think you could get second degree murder to stick. They then just mention and drop the charges in like the same song? Or in pretty rapid succession because it seems like the cut the juvenile court and Darry having to be checked on by the state storylines. Again, I understand having to strip a musical down to be a bit more barebones because of time contsraints but, like, if Fiddler can have four different plot lines within the same family, you can have the main issue, the sibling fight, and the Pony/Cherry/Randy bit. It's only three plotlines. I don't know why this makes me so mad but it does and IDK why?

I love Trouble. I love Darry in that song. And Dally. But also... Pony in the book and movie has been in multiple rumbles. It is mentioned in greater detail in the book and I don't know how I feel about them making Ponyboy so innocent. Like. He was never innocent, in the book and the movie. Everyone just thought he was? Again, simplifying for time constraints but I do miss it.

I like what they did with Paul. He's always felt very flat, more of a mirror to reflect Darry against same as Steve reflected Soda and Cherry/Randy/Johnny reflected Pony. But I do like the sort of righteous indignation they gave this version of Paul. It gives him that little bit of motivation to convince me that he should be at the rumble, despite being 20. Because in the book we get told that Darry is there specifically as the leader of Pony's "gang" but we don't get told why Paul is there so it feels odd. The musical does rectify that, which I kind of like.

However, I have to say I love Dally and Johnny's relationship in this musical. Just based on what I've seen they made it the most clear and concise interpretation of all versions of this story. Both songs where Dally talks to Johnny he refers to him as little brother, which cements that relationship and helps us understand why he eventually snaps. Which I will be talking about but I cannot give enough praise for their relationship.

I also cannot give enough praise for Cherry. I don't know exactly what they did, and they really ramped up Cherry's invovlement because she had to take some of Randy's place but they did such a good job with her. I like how they put her in the middle of all the conflicts (mostly with the Justice for Tulsa number) and I think seeing how she reacts really cemented this version as my favorite. I think they manage to get across that she actually does care about Johnny and Pony as people. All the other versions she comes off as pitying them which I don't like because it feels fake. And I understand why Pony doesn't like her. I kind of like that her relationship with him extends to her giving him Johnny's clothes because she starts volunteering at the hospital. I think that also helps humanize her too.

Alright, this is the most egrious change, in my humble opinion. They change how Dally dies. I think that him commiting suicide is necessary to the story, but in the musical he JUMPS IN FRONT OF A TRAIN!! You could argue that this is because a train killed the Curtis Parents (as seen in the complete novel edition of the movie) and you could argue that it's a symbol of death or of constancy for the Curtis' as they lose people to trains (technically Pony and Johnny are taken away to Windrixville via train). However... I think it still would've made more sense to stick to Dally dying via suicide by cop. It seems like they cut the Dairy Queen scene and if they did they probably cut Dally carrying a heater, which then makes the suicide by cop not work so they have him jump in front of a train... but that still feels out of character to me. I could be wrong, but when Pony talks about how Dally would go, he says Dally would die young and violent and angry. Him jumping in front of a train doesn't tell me he was angry. It tells me he was depressed. While you still get desperation, it's sad desperation. Not the angry desperation that you get with him doing the suicide by cop.

It would not surprise me in the slightest if they choose not to use Dally's original death because of the police discourse in the media. I want to say now that I have several cops/ex-cops in my family and from what they have told me, if someone pulled a stunt like what Dally did in the movie/book, they would be forced to shoot. It becomes a kill or be killed situation because they don't know if the gun is loaded. Now, the offending officer would be tried later on for manslaughter or related crimes but probably acquitted because they couldn't have known (in the movie it's debatable because the gang yells that the gun isn't loaded, but the police still probably wouldn't have listened). I think that the writers probably wanted to avoid having that controversy drum up. I can't blame them, still pisses me off.

All that being said, I do like this adaptation. But of the three versions of this piece of media, it's my least favorite. Love all the songs, love what characters we do have, and this is by far my favorite Cherry and my favorite portrayal of Johnny and Dally's relationship, but I don't like what they did to Dally in the end. No hard feelings against anyone who likes this or the creatives behind it, but it's just not my favorite and I don't know how faithful I would consider this adaptation.

[happysaddca]

Some notes.

First, thank you @overly-dramatic-artist for letting me borrow Cassandra. I hope I didn't write her totally OOC. As I was telling @wyervan, I actually have a tarot tattoo of the major arcana that resonates the most with me (the hermit), so this was really fun.

That said there's no beta. And there's gonna be tarot notes at the bottom because I pulled out my watercolor Linestrider deck to do an actual reading for Ellis and I wanna discuss my choice in interpretation.

I'm not writing in chronological order but this definitely takes place a couple months before this fic from yesterday (there's a TW for violence against animals on it. I promise no animals are seriously harmed).

Oh and @authormeat Merlin mention. I just kinda made up Mer's coffee order without asking sorry. v.v;

“Morning Knapp. Usual order for the arcade?”

Ellis isn’t even fully inside yet, struggling with stomping off the excess snow from their boots. They wave off Cassandra’s greeting, pulling their glasses off to clean as the door slams shut. “Add a black coffee, lots of sugar. Merlin’s in today.” 

Coffee runs are not Ellis’s favorite thing to do, but as the resident floater and go-for, and with the recent cold snap, this has become a daily routine. And it’s not all bad, they have to admit. They don’t drink coffee, but Cassandra feeds them scones in exchange for shoveling and salting the sidewalk. 

Cassandra’s working now on the order, giving Ellis time to free themselves of some of the excess layers. “Your sidewalk stayed clear overnight?” 

“I don’t think it snowed last night.” Cassandra’s got one of the bigger machines going for Sun’s espresso, whatever that was. Ellis leans against the counter to watch Cassandra fill a hand grinder and set up a glass container—a French press, they vaguely remember. For Merlin’s coffee maybe? Or Moon. They can’t keep track. “Are you sure I can’t tempt you with something? I know some of our coffees are more sugar than bean. You might actually like it.”

“No thank you, at all. I don’t want to turn into Sun.” Cassandra laughs and Ellis hides a smile in the collar of their coat. They like making people laugh. 

And they like watching Cassandra work. She reminds them a lot of the people Gertrude hung around: big earrings that catch the hairs not caught up and contained with the wavy plastic hairband or giant clip. It’s early enough to still be cool in the cafe, so Ellis pushes away from the counter when Cassandra finishes prepping the machine and turns to them. 

“If I can’t tempt you with coffee, what about a reading?” Ellis turns to look out the window at the street, stuffing their hands back in their coat. “Oh come on. What is it this time? Don’t believe in the power of tarot?”

“Don’t fuck with that shit.” Ellis mumbles it more to themself than addressing Cassandra, and they can feel their face go hot. “I live in a tiny bus. If I invite demons in, I’ll never know peace. Hell, Moon already takes over my bed half the time.” 

“Does he really?” Another laugh, a giggle really, but when Ellis glances Cassandra’s way, her grin is far, far too bright. Cassandra has the good grace to look away until her expression smoothes out. “Is my coffee not strong enough for him?”

“I’m not sure it affects him or Sun really. Pretty sure they got that stuff where caffeine just doesn’t get absorbed, you know? The ADD shit.” It’s gossip, but it’s not about them, so Ellis is okay with it. They return to the counter when there’s a hiss of steam. “What’re you doing?” 

“Somebody didn’t clean the espresso machine properly last night and I only just realized.” Cassandra pulls a something out and makes a face. “Spoiled milk. I’m gonna have to flush the system. It’ll take a few minutes.” 

Silence, other than Cassandra grabbing a pitcher and filling it with water. Once the machine is self-cleaning, she glances Ellis’s way. “Are you sure—?”

“The demons Cass.” 

“What if I promise no demons? Cross my heart and everything?” The look she’s giving Ellis is steady, a touch of hopeful. Ellis has been coming in off and on for almost a year now and they still haven’t had a reading. Maybe Cassandra wasn’t used to people holding off that long.

Why was Ellis being so reluctant anyway? They didn’t believe in demons, not really, and they weren’t sure tarot could actually tell the future. Or maybe that was the problem. Future telling didn’t mean a lot when they weren’t sure there was a future to be had. 

This wasn’t something they liked to think about often. 

“Okay.” They sigh. This would make Cassandra happy and she does have access to the best scones. And they like her. Star, Sun, Moon, and the others do too. Cassandra’s smile is infectious and they manage a small one back, following her to one of the smaller tables. They aren’t surprised to find Cassandra has a deck handy, easily shuffling as she walks and sits. 

“You’re not going to be all spooky about this, are you?” Ellis perches on the edge of their seat, gesturing vaguely behind them. “Cause I do remember where you keep the salt. I’ll take it and run.” 

“Not spooky no. I’m not a spooky fortune teller. It’s just a friendly reading.” She’s still shuffling. Ellis is already impressed. Tarot cards are so much larger than playing cards, and Cassandra is acting like they aren’t basically the same length as her entire hand. It’s while Ellis is staring that Cassandra pauses her riffle shuffle, neatly stacking the deck together and passing it across the table. 

“Um, what do you…?” They look down and up again, resisting the urge to chew on the inside of their cheek. They start to push it back, but Cassandra closes a hand over theirs. 

“You just have to cut the deck. It’s a way to get more in tune with the cards,” she explains, and Ellis starts to make a face. Cassandra lifts a finger, tapping her nail lightly against the back of Ellis’s hand. “I know you don’t really believe in this, but indulge me. Please? I did promise no demons.” 

She’s friends with most of the arcade. She’s nice, and she has access to the best scones. She’s a friend and friends do this. Ellis repeats that to themself. Friends indulge in each other’s interests. Or, Ellis tries to. 

So they take the deck, unsurprised to find them too slick to manage on their own. They attempt to mimic Cassandra’s riffle, but it doesn’t take a psychic to see that failing, the cards flying free from their hands with barely any involvement from Ellis themself. They just sit and stare as a card with an embracing couple slips off the edge. If that’s what they think it is, they’re more than fine with it disappearing from play. 

Cassandra doesn’t seem to notice, more amused by the mess than upset. Even as Ellis tries to open their mouth, she just points at the table. “It looks like we’ve got your first card already.” 

“How? It’s just a mess.” Ellis has to follow Cass’s finger to a card sitting face up. “That one?” 

“Yes, it’s perfect. It even looks like you.” Cass gathers the other cards easily, flipping a few errant ones back the same direction as their brethren. The one card remains in place, but when Ellis goes to touch it, they’re lightly smacked. “Nu uh. That stays right there. He’s even already in the past.” 

“He?” Looking closer, Ellis can see that the person on the card is actually a man, dark-skinned like themselves, though that’s where the similarities end. He’s holding a sword, for one, blown about by a breeze in a field that looks almost cartoonish in contrast to his weapon. The card is helpfully labelled too — the page of swords. “What’s the past position?”

“Well, since it’s your first reading—”

“My only reading.” 

“— I thought we’d keep it simple. Or did you have a question in mind?” Cassandra has her deck held neatly in her hands once more, two cards missing. 

“Isn’t it too late for that?” 

Cassandra shakes her head, curls flying despite the clip holding most of them high on her head. “It’s never too late. The cards do hold meaning on their own of course, but they do their best when in concert. We could even just consider the page of swords to be your herald.”

Ellis’s confusion remains, and they slouch back into their chair, regretting playing nice and allowing this to happen. Their hands itch to do something, go out and shovel snow or, hell, they’ll go and clean the entire ballpit on their own. Scrub every ball by hand. But they’re here, and the espresso machine isn’t even whistling. “What’s my… herald?”

“It’s the card that resonates the most with you. Your beacon would be—but you’re not interested in all this.” 

“No,” Ellis agrees, though they are a little curious. They eye the page of swords more critically. He just looked so… carefree. There was no way they resonated or whatever with that. “What should I be asking?”

“Most people ask about finances or job security.” Cassandra shuffles slowly, each cut of the deck in time with a potential question. “Or they’ll ask about relationships—missing your family perchance?”

Ellis doesn’t know what their face does, but there’s a painful lump in their chest that spreads ice through their ribs and heart before they can even try to answer. They shake their head quickly, not trusting their ability to speak. 

“Okay, well there’s talking to demons—no, don’t look at me like that it’s a joke silly—and, oh. Romance is pretty big.” Ellis must’ve looked sour because Cassandra just smiles. “We’ll just keep it gen ed today. Ready for the next card?” 

“I don’t know what this one means,” Ellis complains, but the second card is already laid out, a knight on a horse with a cup in hand. Of course, it’s labelled too: knight of cups. 

“This is your present card by the way,” Cassandra supplies helpfully and Ellis shrugs back into their jacket, wishing they’d picked up Moon’s tendency to wear hoods. They were starting to see the appeal. 

Cassandra can tell they’re frustrated, or maybe she just knows that the espresso machine is nearly done with its cleaning cycle because the third card is laid out with little fanfare. “And the future. The Empress.”

Ellis straightens up. “Hey, it’s upside down,” they complain. “It’s from me making a mess of things, isn’t it?” The woman on a cushioned throne isn’t facing Ellis like the other two cards.

“No, no, it’s on purpose.” 

“This doesn’t happen in the movies,” Ellis protests, and Cassandra laughs.

“This isn’t the movies and these cards aren’t being picked on purpose to be scary or whatever ham-fisted message is being communicated in the moment. All cards are important here, and they can have meanings while reversed, like our Empress is here today.” Cassandra sets the remainder of her deck down, setting it aside so she can lean forward and look over the cards more closely. After a moment, she clicks her tongue against the roof of her mouth. “I’m not sure you’re gonna like this Ellis.” 

“What?” they ask. 

“This is pretty pointedly referencing a relationship of some sort.” Cassandra taps the middle card first. “This guy right here, hopeless romantic really. And in the present too, so it’s a current relationship we’re concerned about.” 

Ellis does not like that their mind immediately goes to Moon. They do not like how their stomach twists either, and they slump further back in their seat. “The cards are assholes.” 

“Okay, well, let me think.” Cassandra pushes the first card over, the page. “This is you coming into the situation, whatever situation it is you’re thinking of here, bursting with ideas and creativity. That sounds like you, doesn’t it? You live in a bus and Star’s told me about some plushies you’ve fixed up for them.” 

“I… I guess.” That’s what that card means? They frown at it. It still looks too childishly happy with that big sword. Cassandra fingers moves to the knight. The romantic. Ellis bristles. 

“This is warning you not to live off a fantasy. Whatever bright new ideas you’re having, you’re dreaming about them too much or maybe even trying to talk yourself out of it.” 

“That doesn’t sound particularly romantic.” 

Cassandra spreads her fingers over the page and the knight. “These two cards are playing off each other. Swords are of the mind, and cups are of emotion. You’re thinking too much about something instead of just following your heart and doing whatever it is you’re thinking about.” 

“Like… a project?” 

“A project, a trip… and yes, a relationship?” Cassandra meets Ellis’s eyes and they fumble for their glasses, desperate for the barrier. They’d been left by the door, so Ellis is pinned in place, Cassandra feeling like she could read their emotions better than themself. Her voice softens. “Is it someone from the arcade?” 

The question frees Ellis, their gaze dropping down to the table and the upside down card. “You didn’t explain her yet. And why she’s upside down.”

Cassandra pauses, settling back quietly in place and picking up the Empress, twirling the card in her fingers. “She’s…” A sigh, and the card goes back down. “There’s two cards, the Empreror and the Empress. They’re tied strongly to gender, something which you and Star especially don’t seem to care for.” 

“So is her being upside down me rejecting my femininity or something?” That is rude of the deck, and this time the thought is genuine, not a deflection from reality. Ellis catches the thought and frowns to themself. Why are they taking this that seriously?

“Not really no. Just wanted to tell you that sometimes these cards can be a bit judgey. And in this case, she’s telling you it might be time for some self-love. Maybe a trip?” 

“Oh.” Ellis stares at the card. “But… how does that tie in with the others?” 

Cassandra hesitates and the espresso machine whistles, steam escaping once more. “Oh!” A ringed hand sweeps the cards back into the deck, and Cassandra is standing. “Let me get those orders started for you before Sun sends someone looking for you.” 

“But, what about the cards?” Ellis twists in place, following Cassandra back behind the counter. 

“Thanks so much for indulging me Elllis! You like the chocolate scones right? We made some last night before I left for the day.” Like this, Ellis can just make out her hair bobbing about from where they’re sitting. They’re still confused. How did a trip solve overthinking? And what about the femininity part Cassandra mentioned; what’s the point in that? Mother nature maybe? 

They had been wanting to visit a friend lately… and they have been stagnant far too long. Was the deck saying it was time to move on? The sour feeling that left in their mouth disagreed, but even when they stood to try and get answers, Cassandra can’t seem to hear them over the machines. They give up, taking the order back over, forgetting their confusion when they realize Moon has once again broken into their bus for a nap. 

It’s after the late morning rush that Cassandra pulls her cards out once more, pulling the three out and musing over their reading. Ellis is a surprisingly easy read for someone who hates to give too much away. An idiot could tell they’ve gotten attached to one of the neighboring clowns. 

Which made this more concerning. Oh, the creative energy and warning not to just fantasize about what could be was straightforward enough. Ellis nor Moon were exactly forward with their intentions ever (even if Cassandra could see right through their facades). Ellis especially cared too much what others thought of them, all things the knight warns against in regular readings. 

But the Empress. 

If only she hadn’t been reversed. Abundance, connection, birth, though the latter was likely metaphorical here. Reversed was… stagnation, overprotectiveness, blockage from the self, from nature, from 

Well, if this reading was about Moon, and the retrieved Lovers indicated that was very likely, then maybe a trip out of town would do Ellis some good. 

----

Okay so tarot talk! The only card I chose on purpose was the Lovers, as Ellis is supposed to be someone who knows only the most generic of things about tarot and the Lovers, like the Devil, are oftentimes misread to be about one thing only. If I had actually pulled that for Ellis's reading, they would've died and the slasher au stuff I'm writing would be done.

I do poke a little fun at movies that insist on using tarot as foreshadowing. There's a tendency to use only the major arcana when the minor are so so so cool (I know, I know, I got the Hermit as a tattoo. Listen). Each suit has a different focus, and then each number or face as well. It actually helps a lot in learning how to read tarot quickly! For example, knights like our knight of cups are galvanizing forces. Cups are water based and focused on emotion, hence our hopeless and ever classic romantic man. Pages meanwhile are new and bringing forth raw youthful energy and passion. Swords are aligned with air and intellect, problem solving etc.

So the fact Ellis has the page in the past, bringing their raw energy and potential, and now the knight is pushing ahead in the present is just a really fucking cool reading that could go in so many ways. But with Ellis, them learning to bond with people and develop strong relationships is crucial, and Cassandra can tell. Ellis is an extremely awkward person to be around, and that's why it's so important to them to be able to recite who is important and why.

The way they do friendship is weird.

The Empress is a tough card for Ellis in particular. It's not come up, but they struggle with their femininity being intersex and learning as a young adult they could never carry a child to term. They spend a lot of time explicitly rejecting their femininity and AGAB, but it's not something that's come up yet since Moon doesn't really know or give a shit, you know?

Anyway, the Empress is such a powerfully feminine card discussing nurturing, nature, self-love, and creativity. Her popping up can be a sign to connect to your feminine side, be it through nature (as Cassandra suggests to Ellis), or some other way.

Reversed tarot cards you can usually ask yourself not "what is the opposite" necessarily but sorta "what is blocking you from the positives here?" Reversed Empress without the romantic and creative slant from our page and knight (such positive forces of energy!) would be pinpointing Ellis's lack of self-worth pretty damn hard. But with the two and with Cassandra knowing that the cards are trying to indicate Moon and Ellis's relationship here, we get this (simplified):

You entered a new point in your life, bringing with you new ideas and energy. A literal breath of fresh air for those with whom you came in contact. This positive energy has matured over the last yearish and you have begun sincerely bonding with people and dream of pursuing more (what is more here? Cassandra doesn't know that Ellis is aroace so she assumes it is romantic in nature). But there's a risk here if you do listen to the cards and pursue things into reality. And that is a powerfully imbalanced relationship, something that can smother Ellis with their current lack of self-worth or love.

It's a warning to Ellis that pursuing something that would make them happy could lead to them no longer being themselves. But is it a metaphorical death, a loss of self to Sun and Moon's greater agenda? Or will it be literal?

And what does poor Cass do here when she shares her name with the least listened to and most correct woman in Greek myth?

[vettelsvee]

hi everyone :) i posted all the history series yearly masterlists since i've been thinking for quite a long time changing how i post it and posting fics in not a chronological order (which is ok to me since i have already planned!) and I'll create more kind of content than just written fics (mari if you read this you're gonna love this or at least i hope so!). also, i'll be posting the seb x oc version soon on a side blog as well!

i'll leave you some links here! requests q&a (in case you wanna know something about me or my works!) my wattpad account a not so secret santa (christmas f1 fics project)

sorry for this absolute disappearance, especially from writing and posting my works. sadly, i've been quite busy with uni deadlines for this upcoming week (i'm almost done now finally), but also i've been battling with my mental health for the past weeks/month as it's been absolutely like shit, and i wasn't in the mood to do anything except going to my internship and staying in bed doing nothing sadly. so please, if you're not going through a nice moment: stop, and take care of yourself <3

[opalish1]

Kate Bishop Reading List

Long ago I made myself a (roughly chronological) list of Kate Bishop comics, and I recently updated it and figured I might as well share. There are some fairly minor appearances included; just know I cut out SO MANY MORE.

Also, I don't care how minor the appearance is, if Deadpool and Kate are in the same issue then I'm including it.

YOUNG AVENGERS ERA

NOTES: This is the most streamlined segment, because I've read these through enough that I more or less remember which appearances have substance and which are just Kate's nostril on page 16.

-Young Avengers vol 1 #1-8

-Young Avengers Special (one-shot)

-Young Avengers vol 1 #9-12

-Civil War 1 #1-2

-Civil War: Runaways/Young Avengers #1-4

-Civil War 1 #3-7

-Winter Soldier: Winter Kills (one-shot)

-Captain America vol 5 #26

-Civil War Fallen Son: Death of Captain America #2-3 & #5

-Young Avengers Presents #1-6

-Secret Invasion: Runaways/Young Avengers #1-3

-Dark Reign: Young Avengers #1-4

-Nomad #4 (set during Civil War)

-Siege Young Avengers (one-shot)

-I Am An Avenger #1 & #5

-Avengers: Children's Crusade #1-4

-Avengers: Children's Crusade Young Avengers #1

-Avengers: Children's Crusade #5-9

HAWKEYE DUO/YA2 ERA

NOTES: I once tried to work out the exact timeline for Hawkeye v4 and YA v2; I've broken things up according to that timeline. YMMV on accuracy and you certainly don't have to read in that order. I in no way tried to integrate HvD or anything listed after that into a coherent timeline. Also I don't entirely remember how large of a role Kate plays in the Patsy Walker/Ant-Man issues, sorry.

-Hawkeye vol 4 #1-5, #7, #6 & #17

-Young Avengers vol 2 #1-15

-Hawkeye vol 4 #8-9; #10-13 are concurrent

-Hawkeye Annual (one-shot)

-Hawkeye vol 4 #14, #16, #15, #18-22

-Hawkeye vs Deadpool #1-4

-All-New Hawkeye vol 1 #1-5

-Gwenpool Special #1

-Astonishing Ant-Man vol 1 #1

-All-New Hawkeye vol 2 #1-6

-Patsy Walker v1 #2

-Old Man Logan v2 #2-4

-Astonishing Ant-Man vol 1 #6

-Civil War 2: Choosing Sides #2-3

-Uncanny Avengers vol 3 #13

-Civil War 2 #4-6

-Year of Marvels: October Infinite Comic (one-shot)

-Spider-Man/Deadpool vol 1 #12

KATE BISHOP SOLO/WCA ERA

NOTES: Gonna be honest, I never really tried to make a timeline for the concurrent pubs during this time, so...whatever. And, uh, I don't honestly remember how much of a role she plays in the Wasp stuff, so I included those to be safe. She's basically just in flashbacks during the Empyre stuff (Aftermath excluded) but I've included because...Young Avengers love each other okay.

-Hawkeye vol 5 #1-16

-Unbelievable Gwenpool vol 1 #14-15

-America vol 1 #1, #5-6

-Generations: Hawkeye & Hawkeye

-Despicable Deadpool #299

-West Coast Avengers vol 3 #1-10

-Season's Beating (one-shot)

-Unstoppable Wasp v2 #7

-War of the Realms: Journey Into Mystery #1-5

-Fearless vol 1 #1 (she's BARELY in this but...funky chibi Kate, yk)

-Avengers vol 8 #22

-Death's Head vol 2 #2-4

-Gwenpool Strikes Back vol 1 #3-5

-Empyre vol 1 #4-5

-Empyre Aftermath Avengers (one-shot)

-America Chavez: Made in the USA #1-2, 5

THE (MOSTLY) UNREAD ERA

NOTES: Aside from the H:KB solo, this is basically my to-read list, so it's entirely possible some of these appearances are extremely underwhelming. I did try to cut out anything that seemed SUPER light on Kate content, but that also means I might've cut some comics where she has more of a presence as well.

-Black Widow vol 8 #10

-It's Jeff Infinity Comic #1, #6-7, #9-12, #14, #18, #22, #25, #28

-Lucky the Pizza Dog Infinity Comic (one-shot)

-Hawkeye: Kate Bishop vol 1 #1-5

-Alligator Loki Infinity Comic vol 1 #13, #15

-Marvel Meow and Pizza Dog Infinity Comic #1-4

-Women of Marvel vol 4 #1

-Avengers: War Across Time vol 1 #5

-Captain Marvel vol 10 #50

-Marvel's Voices: Pride vol 3 #1

-Avengers Unlimited Infinity Comic vol 1 #58-59

-Extreme Venomverse vol 1 #5

-Women of Marvel vol 5 #1

-Infinity Paws Infinity Comic #1, #10

-Avengers vol 9 #14-16

-Marvel Mutts Infinity Comic vol 1 #11

-Blood Hunters vol 1 #2

-Venom War: It's Jeff (oneshot)

SOME ALTERNATE UNIVERSE KATES

NOTES: Only really including the ones I've read or that are on my to-read list.

-Secret Wars Journal #1 (Lady Katherine AU)

-Siege vol 2 #1-4 (Lady Katherine AU)

-Secret Wars Too (Lady Katherine AU)

-All-New Wolverine vol 1 #33-35 (Old Woman Laura timeline)

-Old Man Hawkeye vol 1 #5-12 (Old Man Hawkeye timeline)

WRAP UP

It's probably pretty obvious which comics are the most important to read (both YA runs, all the Hawkeye solos, etc) so I wanted to mention some of my favorites you might be tempted to overlook

-Winter Soldier: Winter Kills oneshot. Kate and the YA meet Bucky.

-Civil War Fallen Son: Death of Captain America #3. Clint and Kate's first meeting.

-Hawkeye vs Deadpool #1-4. I love this title so much. Kate and Clint team up with Deadpool for the first but not last time.

-Despicable Deadpool #299. That time Deadpool threatens the Hawkeyes and Kate says he wouldn't shoot her and he agrees that he wouldn't, he'd just shoot Clint twice.

And for MCU Kate fans, shoutout to Black Widow vol 8 #10 for being the only (...so far as I know) comic to place Yelena and Kate are in the same room.

[javaghoul]

Oh god 💀

Ok first off. Ayato is like, what. 15 when we meet him? That pubescent rage is a class all its own. Kaneki and Ayato are COMPLETELY different because as stated before, Kaneki is a lil bitch. Though I will admit my knowledge of Ayato is much, much less, my perception of him is much more "the world fucked me over and I'm gonna fuck it back" than Kaneki's "the world fucked me over and I deserve it, but maybe if I do the right thing I won't deserve it anymore and people will mourn for me"

Re: People get catharsis from Kaneki's breaking point -

Oh absolutely. It feels so good to watch the underdog get a lick in. People want to have their break and change like they perceive him doing, but... He doesn't. He has an episode. Freshly traumatized even further than he already is. But that meek little guy is still in there. It doesn't go away. He's awkward still. He makes poor decisions. If anything he's WORSE - Touka beats him up for a reason 💀 Because now he has this complex in his brain that makes him a BITCH to work with

Also. I almost never see anyone relate to the other Kens :/ I have one friend who was Shiro through and through like that was HIS STAPLE (And he like. I'm not razzin him for that. Considering his life it's valid and his perception isn't one I have this issue with). That's fine like idc, but he's kind of in love with me and has been for a very long time, so when I start gushing ab the Haises, suddenly he's Haise. Suddenly he's Reaper 🙄 Fool. (Sorry, that's gossip, but that's the only divergence I've seen. Also Reaper still makes sense ofc like I said but the TIMING yk?)

- 👽

hahaha, but you know what I mean right, you must've seen the comparisons that are occasionally made between Ken and Ayato too? I agree with you in that they are polar opposites in personality and motivation. Any similarities are tenuous I think. I never thought of it that way (ken acting the way he does in a way to prove he doesn't deserve that treatment)... Looking at it from that angle adds another layer of psychological issues he has to deal with.

I think after aogiri and before "Haise" he would Def be more difficult to work with as you said. He gives off an unapproachable attitude and like he can't be told/helped because he's lived 10fucked up lives already and nothing is new to him. I kinda understand that too, because he's definitely the only (except Naki? Maybe?) character to go through Yamoris' torture and come out the other side, not to mentioned the ghoulification etc etc. but yeah, I think "that" Kaneki is the one I would find most frightening. Because he's unreachable.

Lol I can't offer any advice or anything regarding your friend who is Haise-inspired. Is he at least going through the Kaneki/Haise evolutions in the right chronological order 🙃😅

Thanks for writing anyway!

[gemini-enthusiast]

I've finally almost finished uploading Apollo 11: Men on the Moon to youtube. There's just a few more videos to go and then the bonus features. The entire EVA is finally there. Sorry it took so long, I had some trouble with the multi-angle footage but it's fine.

Now, normally I try to put the videos in order via the way they were organized on the disc, but here's the thing. The bonus features are all related to preflight activities. No one's looking at the end of a playlist for preflight activities. So I'm gonna reorganize it slightly and include the bonus features at the beginning of the playlist so that it makes more sense chronologically. Otherwise, everything will be laid out the way Mark Spacecraftfilms intended.