#source: spider-man: homecoming

[therighthandofvengeance]

Londo: Don’t do anything I would do, and definitely don’t do anything I wouldn’t do. There’s a little gray area in there. That’s where you operate.

[shit-the-vampyr-cast-never-said]

Edgar: I’ll call you back.

Jonathan: Feel free not to.

[incorrect-losers]

Bev: You guys are losers

Eddie: Then why are you sitting with us?

Bev: Because I have no friends

[spideyspetertingle]

Aunt May: We love having you around MJ, you're welcome any time. Heck, let me give you a house key, pop in whenever! MJ: Thank you, May! Peter: ...I don't even have a house key.

[actual-howlinglikeaseaturtle]

[tomixslefttoe]

[“The Gala”]

Melissa: I can’t believe you’re at this lame party.

The Hero: You’re here, too.

Melissa: Am I?

[spider-jaysart]

Jon and Billy both going to Kathy's house for a party that she's throwing:

Billy, now that him and Jon are both at Kathy's party: Okay, you're gonna have Superboy fly in, say you guy's are tight and then I get a fist bump from one of those half broke punks

Damian, spreading some cream cheese on a slice of toasted bread for himself: Can't believe you guy's are at this lame party

Billy: But-you're here too

Damian, before taking a bite of his toasted bread with cream cheese and walking off: Am I?

Billy and Jon, mentally while left with confused faces: ????

[splat-goes-the-nat]

*in a language class*

Peter, to the teacher: OH you're asking what we did yesterday

Peter: *turns to MJ* how do you say "cried"?

[ffiamgoku]

All I see is Tom's version of Ben Reilly/Scarlet Spider.

blonde baby🐥🌼☀️💫💛🌻🐣

[sciderman]

this might be an unpopular opinion but actually i think that in homecoming mcu peter was very well characterized? i thought he brought the sass and was very headstrong and i think that's why that film is my favorite out of his, he was throwing himself into situations without deliberation with just a very restless and agitated feel to him at points, and actively driving the plot forward in a way that to me felt very baby peter. i think that fanon (like irondad, woobifying him in fics etc) has contributed to a perception of him that isn't super strong in actual canon. i also think the writers would benefit from reading your tags on that post lol, cause mcu spidey is at his best when HIS choices are actively driving the plot, and at its weakest when hes reacting to things happening to him like in far from home. there's potential for spidey 4, there's a lot of room for angry, broken, but hopeful peter, and i'm sure the mcu will disappoint me but i am a fool and live in hope :')

i guess you have some kind of a point there, and i can see the point you're making - but – i think where it doesn't work is that we never actually get an inkling as to why peter's restless and agitated. why he cares so much about being a hero. why he wants to. when like, in civil war he actually kind of didn't want to get involved with the avengers. he was blackmailed into it. so why that 180?

no consistency in the mcu. no consistency at all. i hear that writers don't even consult each other between movies, and i believe it ,, considering how much whiplash i consistently get from mcu character motivations. (constantly thinking of civil war where hawkeye tells scott "you might go to jail for this", and scott says "yeah well what else is new" nonchalantly, like he didn't just fucking have an entire movie where is whole motivation was "i do not want to go to jail because i want to be with my daughter." what the fuck?? what the fuck mcu??? what the fuck?????????? the mcu does this with literally every character too. tony destroying all his armor in one movie and the next one making ARMOR FOR THE WORLD??????????????? 180s just across the board. we're gonna do a thing and then 3 seconds later we're gonna do the exact opposite thing. i hate the mcu.)

in the comics we entirely understand why peter is agitated and restless. we've seen it. we see his justification literally on the front page of his first appearance in amazing fantasy #15.

the world mocked timid teenager peter parker. so peter wants the world to see the awesome might of spider-man. there you go. that's why he put on the stupid tights. we get it. two sentences and we get the whole schtick.

we pointedly do NOT get to see what kind of kid mcu peter parker was before the spider-bite. we never get to know. we do not know what changed. he doesn't even talk about it. not even freaking once. he never laments that he used to be weak. he never expresses the sentiment that his life has improved now that he has powers, or even what having powers really means to him. just a "i've got powers now. guess i have to become a hero. i guess." there's no motivation for him at ALL. power doesn't mean a thing to him. he's just some kid who has powers i guess and who else is kind of super? uh? tony stark?? yeah okay i wanna be tony stark i guess.

IT ALL MEAAAANS nothing!! ! ! ! ! ! nothing fucking at all!!!!!! it's actually SO SO missing the point of spider-man entirely to not pay any mention at all to who peter parker was before the spider-bite. that lives in him every day. it's an ANXIETY that lives in him every day of his life. it's something really important for you to know about peter. in every issue spider-man is IN, this anxiety manifests in some kind of way, in everything he does.

we never see what's changed for him, how it affects his dynamic with his friends, with aunt may, with anyone. it's barely a source of tension for him because actually, his secret identity is thrown around like it's a joke. it baffles my mind how much the mcu misses the mark with spider-man, actually. whenever i think about mcu spider-man i discover some new way they misunderstood spider-man. i didn't even think about how much is missing from just the omission of pre-spider-bite peter parker. it's such a vital part of spider-man's motivation that's been wiped. his motivation in the mcu is so, so vague. his motivation is the same as any kid who has seen an iron man movie. "hey that guy can fly. i want to fly too. and i want to buy iron man action figures and i want a cool suit too." uhh?? yeah?? what kid doesn't?? lame. lame and weak. mcu peter parker doesn't have a unique personality trait to differentiate him from any 10 year old who's watching these movies. weak and lame.

[therighthandofvengeance]

Marcus: I’ll call you back.

Franklin: Feel free not to.

[thatstheproblemwithnapkinman]

i want to preface this with a few things

dick grayson is my favourite character. i am not here to slander him or talk bad about those who like him

fanon is what got me into dc. i have grown since and now have a substantial comic collection (at least for the few months i've been collecting). i still enjoy fanon but i am a canon person

with all of that said...

a pointless rant about dick grayson in fanon

sources listed at the bottom

this discourse surrounding dc, the batfam in particular, has really been irking my lately. i don't know why, it just has. i see so much around these characters and the way fans interact with each other here on hellsite and on tiktok (i avoid twitter like middle-aged cis white british dads avoid talking about their feelings) and i just wanna scream about it

the erasure of dick grayson's character

dick grayson isn't a himbo

this is particularly common in fanfictions given that the barrier of entry is non-existent but the idea that dick is a silly, ditzy, idiot that can't cook is arguably the complete opposite of his character

i have a feeling this idea stems from the nature of dick as nightwing, the cracking jokes whilst fighting, the appearance of not taking things seriously (when he in fact does, just not as outwardly as the likes of batman). this in and of itself is ridiculous given that a similar character, peter parker aka spider-man, also crack jokes and honestly is very similar to dick in the way he is as a hero, and yet, for the most part, is still taken seriously and isn't diminished to the same level that dick is

which could come down to public knowledge of the character

let's be honest, the majority of the public could tell you who peter parker is, have probably seen at least one live action iteration of the character, if not all 3 iconic versions (maguire, garfield, holland) most (and please forgive me for using generations) millenials and gen z can define their teen years based on which spider-man was coming out. which they went to the cinema to see. all live-action appearances are:

the amazing spider-man ('77-'79) played by nicholas hammond

spider-man (also japanese spider-man) ('78-'79) played by Shinji Tōdō

spider-man (1, 2, 3)('02, '04, '07) played by tobey maguire

the amazing spider-man (1, 2)('12, '14) played by andrew garfield

spider-man (homecoming, far from home, no way home)('17, '19, '21) played by tom holland

given that dick has just as many live action appearances, stretching back to before spider-man had even debuted in the comics:

the batman serial ('43) played by douglas croft

the batman and robin serial ('49) played by jonny duncan

batman ('66-'68) played by burt ward

batman forever ('95) and Batman & Robin ('97) played by chris o'donnell

titans ('18-'23) played by brenton thwaites

EDIT: in my excitement i never included the first comic appearances of either character. dick debuted on the 6th march 1940 in detective comics #38, peter debuted on 5th june 1962 in amazing fantasy #15

(i am not talking about animated appearances as for both peter and dick they are much less known to the general public than live action)

i'd say i was surprised to see the same number of appearances, but by comparing when the show/movie came out, you can see a clear difference

every live action spider-man project listed has occurred within the past 50 years, with the movies being in relatively consistent from 2002 onwards. dick grayson is more sporadic, 2 appearances in the 40s, again in the 60s, again in the 90s, and finally in the late 10s. no wonder he's less well known when you have to go back to the 90s for a movie version and even then it isn't really dick grayson (in terms of characterisation)

most people can tell you there's batman and robin, and maybe just maybe they can tell you robin is dick grayson, but that's about it. mention nightwing and they blank. and don't even try to tell someone that there's been more that one robin, it won't end well

i can hear people yelling "but dick is a sidekick and peter isn't"

yes, that is true, but dick hasn't been a sidekick since the early 80s, after he'd been around for over 4 decades. that's a pretty old sidekick. but yes, this does hold some merit but given that dick is a lot older it's interesting. and with the most recent live action appearance being titans, a show that spends the first 2 seasons exploring dick's journey from sidekick to standalone hero, it does pose some questions

that was a long tangent to basically say that an equivalent character in personality isn't erased so much in fanfiction because they have more recent and bigger exposure (probably)

also, random, but in my research i came across this list of best teen heroes and look

fig 1. image showing spider-man and dick grayson in positions 1 and 2 relatively in a fan voted list of best teen heroes, spider-man having 3446 votes and dick grayson having 3191 votes

anyway, back to the rant

a wayne family adventures (WFA) tangent

i see people blaming WFA for this but i really don't think that is the case. he may not be the same as his comic counterpart but he is not out of character. everything he does is still very much him. examples include:

comforting duke after ana broke up with him (ep. 10)

helping damian make a friend (ep. 24)

being torn between his brothers (ep. 27-28)

teasing bruce after zatanna made him superman (ep. 54)

teasing helena into swapping weapons (ep. 63) i just like this one

organising everyone back to the manor when he realised alfred was left on his own during thanksgiving (ep. 68)

picking the rainbow suit for bruce (ep. 77)

talking to a little girl who just lost her parents (ep. 80-81)

annoying wally (ep. 84) birdflash time

helping duke with the kidnapping threat (ep. 99) also like this one

competing with jason over lian and roy (ep. 108)

making tim do all the work in his apartment (ep. 111) + haley

comforting and helping damian when he doubts himself (ep. 113) arguably my favourite episode

ok that was most of them BUT seriously WFA is not the problem here

there's no "fix" for this, i just wanted to tell people to stop blaming WFA for everything wrong with new comic fans; you can enjoy WFA and enjoy the comics, the aren't mutually exclusive

WFA doesn't erase him, they just choose what to show in the limited time you get with him. the only thing i remember being "wrong" is that dick can't cook (ep. 17 - top chef)

and yeah, WFA does play into the golden retriever vibes fanon dick has... in one episode, specifically the haley episode (ep. 111) see below. if it takes 111 episodes to fall on a fanon trope, i think that is fine. if you want to include ep. 17, that's 2 episodes out of 116! that's pretty good going. even the comics have more ooc moments (see the current nightwing run)

fig. 2 screenshot from wayne family adventures showing dick grayson smiling and saying "thank you" whilst a tail wags in the background

fanfiction

unsurprisingly, fanfiction is probably to blame but don't think i'm blaming authors (i kinda am but stick with me here)

i don't think writing a comic canon charatcer should be required, but i do think writers should disclose when they haven't read the comics. from experience, i get not annoyed, but have a "ugh" moment when i read a fic and the character is ooc, but if the author has stated in the notes that they haven't read a comic and the character is probably ooc, i am still going to read the fic

ooc or not, if a fic has a decent plot, at least 6th grade (UK year 7) level writing, and not "want to punch them in the face" characters, i'll enjoy it. throw in a popular trope and it'll be a favourite

and if you tell people "hey, this is probably ooc from the comic canon" they can't get mad or blame authors... just saying

i mean the whole reason this is "the problem" is that people get mad over ooc in fan works. like i'm sorry, have you read gotham war?!?!? the current nightwing run?!?!? lots of ooc in the comics themselves

tl;dr

fanfiction is the root of all evil

no, but seriously, dick's, mis-characterisation is a product of his prevalence in media, the material people have, and a lack of disclaiming ooc in fanfics. the last point could be a solution, but honestly expecting fanfic authors to do that is ridiculous

this rant was for nothing, hope you enjoyed wasting your time

i did tell you it was pointless

(i should've called this section a conclusion bc the word count is 1559 and that is insane. it's literally longer than the essay i have due in next week that i'm only half way through)

(also, this was supposed to be the first part of a longer post about how dick is over-sexualised but at that word count i'm splitting it up)

sources

list of live action dick grayson

list of live action spider-man actors

used for dates of spider-man films in the correct order

wayne family adventures

[practically-an-x-man]

👑🏆💋💔🩹⚙️ for Katherine, Spider, and Gia?

Thank you so much!!!

OC Background Relationships Ask Game

👑 - Person who raised your OC and/or was important during their formative years

Katherine: Her mother and grandmother

Spider: His mother, father, and two younger sisters

Gia: Her parents, older brother, younger sister, and her extended family in Greece

🏆 - Best friends (past, current or future)

Katherine: Emília Mendoza (her friend in art school) and Jace Scott (her roommate in NYC)

Spider: His film colleague Amina, roommates Newt and Ginger, and climbing buddies Ghost (Jaxon), Dart (Sophie), and Sparky (DJ)

Gia: Several online friends, though she doesn't know any of their real names (and they don't know hers) and tends to keep personal talk to a minimum- that's about all her anxiety will allow her, at first.

💋 - First kiss

Katherine: A boy she went to Homecoming with, her freshman year of high school

Spider: A girl at summer camp, between 7th and 8th grade (he climbed up a tree and swung himself upside-down so they would do a "Spider-Man kiss")

Gia: One of her girl friends, senior year of high school (about a half-dozen of them were having a sleepover and learned Gia still hadn't had her first kiss, so they dared her)

💔 - Exes

Katherine: That same boy she went to Homecoming with, who she dated for only about 3 months

Spider: Assorted lighthearted flings of various genders, briefly dated his roommate Newt before they realized they were better off as friends, but never had a particularly serious relationship bc he was so caught up in his work

Gia: None, Kate is her first serious relationship (she realized she was a lesbian late, realized she was ace even later, and then her trauma from HYDRA got in the way of any other relationships she might've sought out)

🩹 - Someone who was a source of trauma

Katherine: Her high school bullies, Jason and Ezekiel (Zeke)

Spider: Do the Death Angels count as a "someone"? The whole silent apocalypse is really the main thing in his life that could be considered genuinely traumatic

Gia: Her younger sister Yadzia - it wasn't her fault by any means, but her leukemia struggle and later death definitely resulted in some trauma for Gia that she never really worked through

⚙️ - Coworkers/boss (krewe/other charr outside of warband)

Well, this is an interesting lineup for this particular question XD

Katherine: Artist on commission, but mainly works with museum directors like Dr. McPhee

Spider: Also a freelancer, works with a variety of film directors and studios

Gia: Owns her own flower shop and works alone

[aogram]

Homecoming - (Prisoner 004) Danzmyr Trial 1 MV transcript

Read under the cut! TW for brief mentions of slavery.

A much younger (although still an adult) Danzmyr, dressed in torn clothes and covered in dirt, climbs up a ladder, escaping a subterranean cavern that stretches out beneath him. The first words are sung as he reaches the surface and doesn’t look back, saying ‘I’ll never return’.

We cut to a substantial timeskip, where we start to see various shots of Danzmyr, fighting various opponents. At first, he is fighting plainly with no extra flourishes, dressed in nothing but rags. The segments where he interacts with people are in run-down taverns, where people look upon him distrustfully and carefully slide him envelopes of money as he hands in a bounty poster. But as he makes his way through more battles, he grows more adventurous. He is wielding a rapier, slaying various more dangerous monsters. His swordplay has more flourishes, and he is shown saving people rather than simply killing monsters as well. The segments in between battles show him being celebrated for his work, telling stories to children, and generally seeming happier. His clothes change every time he enters a new diorama, signaling time passing. Here, the lyrics sing about how life ‘up here’ is so freeing, and how he feels at home, and general praise for how much more natural it feels for him to be on the surface (“up here, where the birds sing, I feel at home / the scent of flowers, and the sun’s gentle burn / the benevolence of it all / it sinks itself under my skin, warming my soul / and I am benevolent too”).

We move to the chorus, where he starts fighting an especially large monster. This battle takes longer than the others, and he stumbles a few times, but ultimately defeats it. The lyrics in the chorus sing about his desire to be a hero to prove he’s different and that he will never go back. (“I'm not like you, I never was and never will be / I never want to look in your eyes again / you want me back home? Send your best. / Drag me back down, kicking and screaming.”)

However, as time passes, shadows begin to creep behind him, following him as he makes his way through all of the different shots of battles. During a segment where he is relaxing at an inn, we see these shadows get unavoidable, and he notices them as a tendril of shadow wraps around his ankle. We zoom in on his leg, with the shadowy tendril wrapped around it, and a large black spider climbing up it, as he is paralyzed in fear.

We are out of the diorama view, and we get a shot of the hole with the ladder he first crawled out of, which seems to be the source of the shadows. He is standing in front of it, with a horrified look on his face. Behind him, people seem to urge him to step away from it. He doesn’t heed their warning, and instead walks towards it. The words ‘I have to go back’ are belted quite loudly and powerfully. We cut to an aerial shot of a sprawling Drow city on the Underdark, then to a shot of Danzmyr walking down a dark street. He’s wearing a cloak that obscures most of his face and body.

We get a lot of establishing shots of the city- cages full of slaves, well-dressed Drow women with stern looks on their faces, a shady dealing where a man in rags hands a woman a bottle full of a fluorescent green liquid. Here, the lyrics leading into the chorus talk about how much he detests the Underdark and especially the city (“down here, where the darkness lies, this makes me sick / the scent of poison, and the suffocating gloom / the cruelty of it all / it sinks itself under my skin, and my blood boils / and it fills my heart with cruelty too”). All the while, the shadows are still at the corners of the screen, although they are harder to see with the whole MV now being darker.

We are back in the chorus as he reaches a large estate carved into a stalagmite. He takes a deep breath and with shaking hands opens the door. He enters and walks slowly through a manor. As he drags his rapier across the floor, servants scutter away and hide in different rooms of behind furniture. He makes no move to attack them. Eventually, he reaces a large antechamber, where an older drow woman is standing. He says something unintelligeble to her, and she responds with something also not heard, although her facial expression is smug, before anger crosses it. Cut to a shot of the woman’s hands reaching for a dagger, then Danzmyr’s sword arm rising. The screen goes completely black. The final sound in the MV is not music, but rather, a woman’s loud scream of agony.

---

Read Danzmyr's first trial Voice Drama here

Vote here

[cranes-menagerie]

This is gonna get sappy, so just beware.

I miss getting excited for Marvel movies.

The first Marvel movie I ever watched in theaters was ALLLLL the way back in 2012 with Avengers 1

And brother I was ENAMORED

Put a 5 year old kid in front of a movie with 6 superheroes and it's like narcotics.

It was a form of escapism with my turbulent childhood. I started getting REAL invested in phase 3 with stuff like civil war, homecoming, Infinity war and endgame.

Then, in about 2021-2023, I started viewing these movies as comfort media. Spider-Man was a character I started to relate to immensely. It's for the same reason that I love Superman, It's someone who balanced his powers with humility, I loved that.

I love Bucky and Matt Murdock since I was going through things that made me relate to them, and I still relate to characters that fit a similar role, such as Logan and especially Moon Knight(oh my fucking God I love Moon Knight)

Nowadays it's just.....meh

Quantumania was fine in the moment, and several things with Marvel nowadays are just kinda there. Deadpool made fun of several things I've been saying

"Can we just stop with the Multiverse"

" Gratuitous use of cameos"

And all the movies that I think look good have things that make me reluctant to watch it

Brave New World looks FANTASTIC it gives me Falcon and the winter soldier vibes, and I LOVE IT.

....butttttt they have a character in the movie who in the source material was a zionist, apparently they made her an ex black widow agent, which is admittedly better but still.

Thunderbolts looks so.fucking.good. I loved Black Widow, and it makes me so happy that Alexei and Yelena get to interact with people like Bucky and John.

But why do Ghost and Taskmaster look like this

Fantastic 4...immaculate, the vibes,the cast,the music, all great.

.....

Moving on

Don't even get me started on Blade

I want Marvel to go back to being a studio that makes comic book movies and not try to make a blockbuster every time.

Have people read the damn comics you're adapting

Give your workers time to do their jobs

Essentially tldr: do what James gunn is doing with dc.

I am INFINITELY more excited to watch Creature Commandos, SUPERMAN, Penguin, Booster Gold, Batman: Brave and the Bold. Than anything coming out in the mcu and it sucks because I love these characters and no one does anything with them. This film franchise I grew up with isn't for me anymore. does it suck? yeah but its whatever

I do remain excited for things such as Marvel Zombies,Born Again and X-men 97

[james-stark-the-writer]

been thinking about the DCEU and how movies like Black Adam and Shazam! and Aquaman are extremely silly but aren't ashamed of being silly, or even basically modern day early 2000s camp-schlock like the Venom movies, which aren't ashamed to be what they are and just do what they want to extremely sincerely, and thinking about how the MCU recently tried to claim that they were doing something great by having Wolverine be in his stupid yellow costume and pretend like they're finally embracing comic book camp and are not ashamed of it when they have built their entire fucking universe on ironically making fun of their own silliness. it's genuinely infuriating, like i'm genuinely getting heated just thinking about it, i hate you so bad, Marvel.

like the devil was speaking to me a few days ago, telling me to catch up with Phase 5 because it wouldn't be a lot of work, and i had to stop myself and go "no, i don't actually care, like the memories i have are actually not reflective of how these projects think of themselves". like the reason i liked Phase 4 is bc beyond the experimental stuff which made it the most artistically interesting phase by far, it wasn't ashamed of being a superhero thing for the most part, like the best projects in it just embraced their silliness and didn't constantly make fun of themselves for it.

but the fucking audacity to claim that the MCU is embracing comic book silliness and isn't ashamed of being silly because they put Wolverine in a yellow costume is so beyond stupid, like you know what projects embraced comic book silliness and weren't ashamed to be what they were? Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. Eternals. Thor. She-Hulk. Iron Man. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. Hawkeye. Ms. Marvel. Werewolf by Night.

those were all silly as shit, and you know what they didn't have? jokes making fun of themselves for being silly. they were all deeply, deeply sincere projects, regardless of their level of stakes.

anyway, give people like Sam Raimi and Chloe Zhao and Michael Giacchino and Jessica Gao and Rhys Thomas and Kenneth Branagh and Adil & Bilal more shit to do, and if you're going to make stupid fucking jokes like that, don't build your universe on like ironic mockery of the source material for being silly bc it's so easy to prove you wrong. i miss phase one and phase four, even phase 2 was largely sincere about most things. phase 3 is genuinely so irony poisoned it's hard to go back to its projects, i haven't touched my rewatch after i saw Guardians Vol. 2 bc i can't make myself sit through Spider-Man: Homecoming like i genuinely have just let it languish for like over a year because i don't want to watch that movie.

i have a lot more fond memories of movies that aren't ashamed of being silly like Black Adam and Shazam! and Aquaman and Multiverse of Madness then i do of shit like the first Doctor Strange or Ragnarok or Homecoming or No Way Home. i would happily sit down to watch anything sincere, i can't make myself go through phase 3 bc i simply do not care for all that ironic comedy bullshit anymore.

to quote David Ehrlich's review of Deadpool and Wolverine: at a certain point, the story of the Marvel Cinematic Universe became more compelling than any of the stories in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

and i need the stories themselves to become more compelling and more sincere again. one of the greatest strengths of the DCEU has consistently been its sincerity and that's why even it's worst projects are still pretty good, outside of like Wonder Woman '84 and Suicide Squad (2016). even its weakest projects have a lot of sincerity at their heart.