#the ghosts between us

[smashing-teacups]

The Ghosts Between Us

Extended/missing scene, 7x12 Showverse Rated M

It should have felt victorious, taking my wife on the dining room table of the man who’d last had her.

A great many things should have been true, but weren’t.

Perhaps I’d expected too much. Perhaps this was the triage she’d spoken of; perhaps we’d only stemmed the bleeding, and that would have to be enough for now. Still… it had been a great many years since the two of us were unable to resolve a lingering hurt between us with honest conversation and the joining of our bodies. It was hubris, I supposed, to have thought us beyond that — for even as Claire trembled in my arms, satisfied and gasping and mine, I found that I was no closer to smothering the blackened pit of betrayal within me than before we’d begun.

Keep reading...

[starsofang]

you love simon. truly. playing games with him in your free time was your favorite pastime, especially when you knew he was getting deployed and wouldn’t have the chance to join you for an extended leave. there was only one tiny issue.

the man is competitive. no matter the game, no matter if you were a team or against one another, he’s slipping you teasing comments that you’re 90% aren’t fully teasing and actually hold a bit of honesty.

some of the games he plays with you weren’t supposed to be competitive. some are even simple customization games that you had to beg him to play with you so you could create each other’s characters. now that he is playing them, you have moments of restraint to not shove his head into the screen.

“your colors don’t match the theme, lovie.”

“shut up, simon.”

“yes ma’am.”

“i think you need to spend more time in an aim training.”

“are you saying my aim is bad, simon?”

“no, ma’am.”

“how many times are you going to miss the damn jump?”

“i’ll do it again if you don’t shut up, simon.”

“you’re doing amazing, lovie, keep it up.”

it was utterly infuriating. but when the times came for his long deployments and the house was quiet, no snarky quips being thrown from beside you on the couch, you longed for it.

to hear him trash your aim, or tease you for not being as good as him — it may seem like he’s mean to you from an outsider’s perspective, but to you, it’s his love language, and you desperately miss it.

so, you’ll take whatever tease he throws. you know it’s his way of saying ‘i love you’, even if you want to rage quit every time.

[pricklenettle]

inspired by this post, Danny’s lost in the ghost zone and comes across pariah dark’s keep. I had to draw it and had The most fun with the spooky green ghost zone

[sgt-tombstone]

Call signs weren’t supposed to be flattering. More often than not, they were the direct result of some embarrassing fuck-up that trailed a soldier for the rest of their life. They were voted on by the first platoon that a soldier joined, usually within the first few months, and they then spent the next few months cringing every time they heard it. Simon’s first platoon had seen a recruit land the call sign “Seagull” after a drunken dare to nick a fry from their captain’s tray in the mess hall, and he had personally bestowed the call sign “Dash” upon a soldier who had somehow managed to clip himself in the leg with his own bullet. Dumb Ass Shot Himself…

The embarrassment wore off, though. When one was stuck with a name for the rest of their lives, they learned to live with it sooner rather than later. The associated stories either got buried deep or drunkenly flaunted; the stupider the better. The funny ones became a point of pride and the truly humiliating ones eventually settled into something sort of like mundanity. Amusing tales became nothing more than yet another name, a stitched moniker, an email signature. The point was: by the time they made it to the special forces, and especially once they were assigned to a task force, no one gave a shit about their call signs anymore.

Whenever Soap heard his call sign, whenever anyone asked after its origins, he laughed it off, citing his ability to clean house or, more flirtatiously, his ability to clean up after himself, but he always internally cringed.

No one ever noticed. No one except for Ghost.

He never said anything, never asked about it, which Johnny was thankful for, but he was infinitely more thankful that Ghost took every opportunity to call him literally anything else. Sergeant, at first, then Johnny. MacTavish, if he was mad; any other combination of insults if he wasn't, because they both knew he never really meant them. Sunshine, sometimes, in the mornings when Soap stumbled out of bed in whatever safe house they were staying in, still rubbing sleep from his eyes. Scottish Bastard, or Our Johnny, or Pyromaniac, or Lad. Rarely Soap.

It was in his file, Johnny knew, the file that Ghost had read cover to cover, too paranoid to blindly trust Price's judgment with a new team member. Evidently, he hadn't made the connection between the incident report nestled in the sheaves of paper and Johnny's embarrassment. More likely, he just didn't care. Johnny wasn't sure which option he preferred.

Johnny had always had an issue with authority, and joining the military had done nothing to quell his rebellious streak; he was still a teenager, fresh out of basic, barely legal, the first time it happened. His sergeant had been giving him eyes for the entire two months since he'd joined, and Johnny'd be lying if he said he hadn't pushed himself just a little harder in response to the attention. The night of graduation found Johnny in the sergeant's bed, taking everything he was given and begging for more.

He hadn't seen that sergeant again after that, but it had more to do with Johnny's SAS training than anything else, and it started a bad habit. Nearly every unit he joined, he eventually ended up in his superior's bed. It was all consensual, and Johnny would be willing to attest to it if need be, but he never got caught, and he moved from unit to unit so often that it never really mattered.

Until it did.

Two years out of basic, about halfway through his SAS training, he got caught. Rather, they got caught. They were in the showers, his lieutenant pressing him against the tile wall, when their captain had walked in. The implications were clear, especially with Johnny on the receiving end, and the lieutenant had gotten discharged, despite Johnny's protestations. It had been his idea, but it still looked like an abuse of power. Word had flown around the base, and Johnny had gotten stuck with the call sign Soap as a terrible joke; "don't drop the soap" was uttered nearly every time he entered a room, and he ended up being the youngest to pass selection largely to get away from the teasing.

Once he joined the SAS, he never saw anyone involved in the incident ever again. The incident report went in his file, but it got buried among the accolades, the outstanding test results, the exceptional service record. No one except his superior officers had the clearance to read his file, which was for the best; their knowledge of his bad habit kept him from indulging, and he hadn't looked at another superior officer the same way since.

Until Ghost. Who called him Johnny, not Soap. Who tolerated and even encouraged his flirting. Who knew every detail of his file but never pushed for more.

Whenever Johnny got too close to a line, Ghost would switch back to Soap, just once, just enough to nudge him back a step, but he was never cruel. It was a slap on the wrist, not a sharp reprimand, and Johnny had learned enough about Ghost's tone and eyes to see the switch for what it was: a gentle warning, a clearly expressed boundary.

And then one of their missions went to shit, and Johnny ended up in the hospital for months, and Ghost stopped calling him Soap altogether. In the aftermath, Johnny danced closer and closer, always expecting his cautionary call sign to fall from Ghost's lips, but it never did. On and off the field, Ghost simply watched Johnny get closer, stopped holding him at arm's length. He started welcoming his flirting, started actively encouraging him, started reciprocating.

The first time they fell into bed together, something panicked fluttered in Johnny's chest. He'd been here before; he'd gotten a lieutenant wrongfully dishonorably discharged before, for nothing more than the very act that he and Ghost had been dancing around for years. The moment before their lips met, he backpedaled sharply, only to be caught by the rigid warmth of Ghost's arms.

Ghost knew. Ghost knew his past, knew his record, knew what he'd been walking into. Ghost didn't care.

Price knew. Price knew his past, knew his penchant for gravitating towards authority, and still had placed him within Ghost's grasp time and time again. Price didn't care.

And Gaz... well, Gaz was Johnny's biggest enabler. Gaz didn't care.

So he let himself take the final step, the leap of faith, and landed safely in Ghost's hold, in Ghost's bed, and in Ghost's life. Loved, satisfied, and most importantly, protected. Safe.

And if he started wearing his call sign like a badge of honor for the first time in his life... well, he was sleeping with a superior officer, and he wasn't ashamed of it anymore. Whenever Ghost looked at him, reverent, bordering on worshipful, Soap couldn't find it within himself to feel a single ounce of embarrassment over his name.

[ghost-bxrd]

The Pied Piper of Hamelin but make it Red Hood accidentally amassing a loyal following of street kids in Crime Alley that systematically sabotages the Bats whenever they get a little too close to catching him, including but not limited to staging brawls and muggings.

The Bats think there must be some kind of mind control going on because ain’t no way that kids flock to a violent crime lord without some type of magic or bribe involved.

Jason doesn’t know about any of this until there’s a group of furious kids jumping Batman, and another group teens dragging him away from where his neck had been kindly sliced open by his kind-of father.

[mikami1992]

Supernatural Cops

The fandom has come to the conclusion that all kinds of supernatural or unusual things happen in Amity Park and people take it like any other Tuesday.

Still, I wouldn't be surprised if this place is the only place in the country (not to say the world) that has a police division in charge of handling Cults…

Yes, in Amity Park there is a group of police (not to say half of all the police in the city) that are dedicated to controlling cults and their peculiarities, because we must remember that, despite the reputation of being a tourist trap, this town in the middle of nowhere has the reputation of being the most haunted place in the country (or the world), so it wouldn't be crazy to say that on certain dates of the year many "tourists" (cough cultists cough) arrive who come in order to do "events" (cough rites cough), so whether they want it or not, someone has to control that the limits on how they are "celebrating" are not broken… and to top it off, the limits of what the city considers acceptable is a greater margin than other places, so it has become common for some groups to come back later.

So yes, Amity Park has one of the most effective police departments in dealing with cults and supernatural beliefs, not only are they effective in identifying participants, most of the time they know what kind of cultist they are dealing with, whether they are just playing a game or are the real magic business and how dangerous/troublesome they will be in the end.

What's more, this group is so good at what they do, that many times the inhabitants of Amity Park prefer to call them instead of the GIW (they are too destructive and there is still no 100% reliable insurance that will pay for the damages they cause), when it comes to a problem with a ghost and the ghost child is not around.

and that competition is more noticeable when other cities in the country begin to ask for help with some unknown cults that are appearing rap

[starry-bi-sky]

Blood Blossom Au: Baby's First Commissioner Meeting :)

TL:DR This Post: Danny (orphan) gets poisoned with blood blossom extract by Vlad. He runs away from him and ends up under the care of one Pre-Robin Battinson Batman! Starry is loudly pushing her batdad agenda.

(Also known as "Late At Night, When The Nightingale Sings" on my ao3!)

This was a fun rough idea I've been sitting on for weeks, thinking about how Commissioner Gordon and Nightingale's first meeting might go.

---------------

Commissioner Gordon likes to think that he's adjusting to the new normal of Gotham very well, -- the new normal being grown men running around dressed like bats, in military-grade strength body armor, committing acts of vigilantism, -- and slowly, little by little, he was no longer being surprised when this new normal pops up out of the shadows like the world's most terrifying daisy. His shaving lifespan thanks him for it.

....

The kid is a surprise though.

Granted, he seemed to be a surprise to the Bat too.

There's been a string of murders lately, -- which, in Gotham, is kind of like saying there's been another storm during monsoon season. And there's just been another; in some dilapidated building down in south Gotham, with the broken, boarded-up windows and mildew-crawling walls to match. The victim is a man in his thirties, multiple gunshot wounds to the chest, left in the center of the room for the blood to pool out around him.

The place is already secured when he arrives, the building swarmed with officers and the forensic detectives. The Bat emerges shortly after he does -- or, he might've been here the whole time, hiding someplace dark and shadowy. For his own sanity, Gordon doesn't think about it too hard.

The kid is a surprise, and he appears like a bolt of lightning.

He shows up in the middle of a conversation Gordon is having with the Bat.

A whistle, sharp and loud, slicing through the air, meant for open air rather than a confined space. Gordon's ears pierce and protest the sound, and the solemn, murmured chatter floating through the room abruptly cuts off like the swing of a gavel. As he turns towards the sound -- as they all do -- he swears, up and down, that he sees Batman's shoulders jump, just slightly.

At the source, perched on the window, is a boy. A boy in a gray-blue scarf and an oversized black hoodie, one that hangs off his frame and has ace bandages wrapped around the wrists in some attempt to cinch the sleeves. The hood is up, big like the rest of it, and threatens to swallow the upper half of the boy's face whole in the fabric. What upper half Gordon can see, is smeared with some kind of opaque, black face paint. He's holding onto the side of the frame with one hand, on his hip is a grappling hook. A familiar grappling hook.

Gordon has multiple questions, and his officers tense up.

Martinez puffs up, brows furrowing as his face shapes into a frown. Shoulders rolling back. "You can't be here, kid--"

The reaction is immediate, like a spark to gunpowder, the boy yanks his fingers from his mouth and his mouth twists into a scowl. Head snapping over to Officer Martinez, his hood manages to stay on but Gordon swears that as he bares his teeth, the glint makes them look sharper than they should be. His voice is rasp and quiet and harsh; snappish in its hissing; "Put a fuckin sock in it, Martinez. I'm not stayin."

Martinez reels back, and the boy immediately veers his attention off him. Like a switch, his demeanor drops. Despite half his face being covered, his mouth twists into a cringing, apologetic smile. Slanted and off-beat, embarrassed. It'd be disarming if this wasn't Gotham, and if he didn't just hiss at Martinez like he was about to bite his head off.

"Sorry." He whispers, voice deceptively polite and softer now. Gordon has to strain his ears to hear him. "I was looking for him."

He points his finger towards-- Gordon? No, Gordon follows the direction, and finds himself looking at -- the Bat.

The Bat, who always looks stiff as a pole, now looks even stiffer. Somehow. Well, the explains the grappling hook attached to the boy's waist.

"What are you doing here?" The Bat says, gruff and unable to completely smother the stumble of surprise in his tone.

The boy still holds a sheepish smile, and slips off the window ledge. His feet hit the creaky boards with a near-silent thud, the Batman finds his feet and rapidly begins crossing the room.

Gordon notes the slight tremble in the boy's legs as he straightens. He adjusts his scarf, which droops close to his knees now that he's standing, and slings a backpack -- how long has had that? -- off his shoulders. When the Bat reaches his side, he does as he always does, and looms over the boy like a spectre. A threatening mass of shadows cloaked in all-consuming black. Standing next to him, the boy looks teeny in comparison.

The Bat is a man who terrifies even the most hardened criminals, Gordon has seen grown men shiver in fear at the mention of his name. And yet when the boy looks up at him, he doesn't even flinch.

Instead, his sheepish smile melts away like ice under the sun, holding only traces of his previous embarrassment. It remains as a shadow on his face, a small upturn at the corners of his mouth. The boy pushes his hood back just enough to reveal glinting, ice-flint eyes surrounded in tar-black face paint. He holds the backpack up with one arm. "You forgot this."

[roses-and-revolutions]

Everyone from babies to young adults suddenly disappears from Amity Park, and the ghost portal self-destructs as well. The GIW and the Fentons obviously come to the conclusion that it’s ghosts but realize that this issue is way bigger than they can handle, so they call in the big guns, The Justice League.

Of course, they don’t tell the Justice League everything when they come. No matter how much they thought themselves to be heroes, they were simply glorified police in spandex. And with how they operate, they are all too small-minded and won’t be able to see the bigger picture. They also knew fully well that a lot of their methods weren’t even remotely close to being morally or ethically right, and if the JL found out, they would be screwed. So they simply told them enough to get them on their side. 

Besides, how could they not help with how many people were missing? This was going to be easy.

_______

The Justice League didn’t trust the GIW. Something about them was just off. But so many missing people were on the line, so many kids! 

Ghost?

Should they call in the JLD?

_______

Jason knew something was off with Crime Ally.

Nothing was wrong per se. In fact, everything was going great. Crime was at its lowest in like… forever. The general atmosphere was more calm, if not a bit chilly. He himself was calmer. And there were fewer kids on the streets. Which would have been a good thing if this wasn’t fuckin’ CRIME ALLY!

Jason’s been stressing himself out, trying to find out what was going on. He’s been searching up and down, talking to people left and right. No one was reporting anything amiss. Some even told him that they still saw the kids walking around, though not as often as before. And they also looked like they were being well taken care of.

He even saw and talked to some of the kids himself and it was the truth. 

But when he asked where they went, they only laughed and ran away from him. Shouting that he would know soon before they disappeared around the corner. At this point, he was sufficiently freaked out and was so close to getting Batman to contact the JLD, but something told him otherwise.

A few days later Jason was in bed. He had ended patrol early that night and intended to get a full eight hours if he could.

But as fate would have it, he would not. Because just before he could hit the hay he heard it. Well, felt it would be more accurate but how could you feel a siren’s song? Pulling you? Drawing you in. Telling you that it would give you your deepest desire.

He didn’t even bother to suit back up into Red Hood. He just followed it. Followed and followed, Until he got to a dead-end alleyway. But there was no ‘end’. All there was, was darkness. 

He began to get skeptical and took a few steps back. But the feeling was still there. Pulling, telling that all of his answers were in that darkness. Everything he wanted, needed, awaited beyond it. 

He did the stupid thing and went into the darkness.

He didn’t know what he was expecting, but it wasn’t the feeling of walking through thick goop. But the feeling didn’t last long, and he eventually stepped out.

Again, he didn’t know what he was expecting, but it wasn’t this. 

Kids running around without a care in the world, unrestricted. Teenagers just hanging out and being kids too. Whatever adults he saw all looked pretty young, but they were all happy. 

He looked around and noticed that it looked like a weird mix between a suburb and a night market, but it worked quite well. The stalls were all unmanned, and it seemed whoever could just take whatever they wanted. Dim but pretty lights connected all the stalls to as far as his eyes could see. And the sky.

In Gotham, there’s so much smog and bad weather you’d be lucky to even see a piece of blue during the day so no wonder people often forget about the night. But this, the night sky wherever he was, was beautiful, beyond what words and even thoughts could convey.

“Hello, Mr. Red Hood.”

Jason jumped. Was he so out of it that he didn’t even notice someone coming up behind-

Forget what he just said about the sky. The woman right here that was now standing before him? She- She-

“Are you single?”

There was silence. Then she giggled. Guess Jason didn’t need his helmet huh? His face was enough.

He also wanted to die again but hey, at least she laughed!

[kizzer55555]

Core Gems

So when a ghost becomes injured, they have a last ditch defense where they retreat into their core. And I mean, injured badly where their body is rip apart to the point they can’t hold a solid form anymore. And they basically go into a hibernation state until they are strong enough to form again.

Ellie, Danny, and Dan are all injured in a final battle against the GIW. The organization was destroyed and the ghosts were safe but the halfas ended up being so injured that they reverted to core form and then went to sleep for a bit. When they woke up, they were still weak but at least recovered enough to gain consciousness. And realize…they are in some kind of auction…in the middle of a heist. It appeared that two furries (one in a bat costume and one in a cat costume) were ducking it out. And they…they were a necklace. All three of them had been turned into a necklace with their cores as gems accompanied by sapphires, pearls, and opals. And frankly gorgeous craftsmanship as the metal was crafted around their cores as if to cradle them and the other gems.

Unfortunately, they were too weak to take a form properly, they could still feel the strain on their bodies. But at least they could still communicate through their auras. Then the cat lady punched a hole in the glass container surrounding them and grabbed their necklace.

However, the bat grabbed the other end and it resulted in a sort of tug-a-war. Meanwhile, Danny, Ellie, and Dan were having a back and form commentary on the situation and what they should do. Completely unheard by the other party.

In the corner of their eye, the three halfas finally noticed a third contender. Some kind of clown who was…hold on…holding a gun?! And it was pointed straight at the two fighting furies who had yet to notice him. The ghosts’ protective instincts went into overdrive and they frantically tried to shout, yell, move. Just do something to warn the two but their cries fell on deaf ears. All they succeeded in doing was faintly glow which immediatly caught the attention of the fighting duo. The two turned to look at the strange necklace but right at that moment, the clown fired and a gunshot rang throughout the auction room. Having no other options, Danny and the others poured every ounce of ectoplasm they had to try and phaseshift, making the two furries intangible as the bullets passed right through them, but in their shock, the two jumped away in opposite directions and accidentally ripped the necklace apart. Gems and pearls went flying and the three cores bounced along the ground.

Luckily, the two finally noticed the clown and went to deal with him and his minions who had appeared. Seemingly putting their fight on hold and forming a temporary truce. The three halfas could only watch as the battle finally wound down, ending with the cops barging into the place and arresting the clown and his grunts, the cat managing to escape with half the scattered gems and pearls from the broken necklace along with a few other jewelry pieces (none of their cores though) and the bat leaving through a skylight.

The auction continued and in the end, despite being broken, their necklace seemed to have caught someone’s interest. A man named Bruce Wayne bought up every piece of the shattered jewelry wear. The auctioneers appeared relived that the item managed to sell in the end and gratefully gave it to him.

Bruce had no idea what happened at the auction, but he could have sworn that some of the gems faintly glowed right before he and Selina were shot. If the necklace was some sort of magical item, then he needed to understand exactly what has been brought to Gotham. It was unfortunate that Selena had taken some parts of the necklace but he utilized his vast wealth to make sure all the other parts ended in his possession. Now he would take them back to the mansion for examination.

[bluerosefox]

Red Hooded Phantoms

Hmm

Another deaged or reborn Danny idea

But also Danny is Jason plotline. I've seen a few Danny is/reborn Dick, Tim, and a few rare Damian ones but I feel like we don't see a lot of Danny as Jason.

After being deaged by Vlad in another failed attempt to make Danny his son, he decided to try raising a deaged Danny instead because the boy would have no memories of his past, however during the struggle between Vlad and Team Phantom, Danny is sent into Vlad's lab portal and into the Zone, only for another random portal to open up and drop him into the DCverse and into a Gotham alleyway.

He is found by Shelia Haywood and well, we all know the life of Jason Todd after that.

Or he dies due to like the GIW, or bad Vlad, or bad Fenton Parents (Not picky on which) and is later reborn due to the damage done to his core.

It isn't until he dies and returns that Jason Danny feels like its something familiar, something is itching in the back of mind as he mindlessly wonders around Gotham after digging himself out of his grave.

And it only becomes more and more familiar when he is later found by the LOA/Talia and tossed into the Pits. Even the rage he gains feels familiar.

Later he becomes Red Hood, and that timeline happens.

Jason Danny doesn't find out the actual truth until one day the sky is ripped open by a glowing Lazarus green portal and a large armor covered being steps out, declaring he is there to fight for his crown/throne against the one that bested him last time and to bring forth Phantom for their battle.

And he had less than a few hours to come forward or else he will rip this world apart. (Pariah Dark may be a Tyrant King but he wanted his throne/crown back along with revenge against the one that stole it in the first place legitimately so it couldn't be denied)

A huge JL and JLD meeting is held and no one can find this 'Phantom'

So someone in JLD has a suggestion to summon someone from the Infinite Realms who might be able to help them locate Phantom (or maybe summon Phantom himself since he's technically the Ghost King.)

If we go with summoning someone other than Phantom, they manage to summon Jazz (whose acting as Queen Regent at the moment since Danny went missing)

And the moment he see's Jazz, Jason Danny feels his head and soul start to hurt. And memories he's sometimes see's in his dreams start bubbling into the surface.

[starlingstalk]

They‘re doing weird ghost merge things :3

this is dedicated to @absolutelynotsanebaby and all the sandstorm people you guys are all right. why are they so addicting to draw why must they be everything and all the other things too

Also asks are open if there‘s anything you‘d like me to draw!! Might not get to it in an instant bcs of the whole Christmas thing tho.

[electrozeistyking]

Ghost Drone is an AU where the events of Murder Drones have been spread out some odd years and changed around (except for Episode 1, which remains the same as it does in the show). Alternate takes on Episodes 2, 3 and 5 have already occurred.

The first comic isn't canon to the AU anymore, but since it's the initial concept, I figured I'd include it. This entire post is basically my way of saying "Hey, this AU has been stewing in my brain since the 16th of November in 2023."

[gogodollie]

Killing myself one billion times

[kayzean]

Bungie once again COMING FOR MY FUCKING LIFE.

I- I'm... I'm going to scream.

[necrotic-nephilim]

@profandomhopper i was going to reblog the original post this comment was left on but i felt it divorced itself from the original topic so much, you get your own post for giving me delightful permission to ramble about this. buckle in people this is long.

so, DC is a big fandom that expanses a lot of different types of content, and like anything, is subject to crossovers. the obvious ones like Marvel are for the reason of being a similar and equally popular superhero world, so it's easy to transpose the worlds onto each other and overlap the characters. both of these worlds deal with multiverses and endless, endless heroes. it makes sense and there's no real stretch to think Batman and Spider-Man could co-exist. i mean, there have been canon crossover comics. and even some more random crossovers like White Collar have pretty easy to trace origins, being an actor in WC was a popular Dick fancast back in the day so there was some bleeding over that led to a well-loved niche crossover space.

but Danny Phantom and Miraculous Ladybug are where it gets interesting. because at a surface, MLB sort of makes sense. it's a superhero world, you're following a teen girl superhero and sure the mechanics are pretty contained, but the crossover should make sense. but when you compare it to the crossover numbers of other superhero media like say My Hero Academia, Ladybug takes the *crown* with such a bizarre popularity. and of course, DP feels like it makes even less sense. sure, you *could* lump it into at the very least, superhero-adjacent media, but it's not a true hero world like MLB or DC is.

but, the thing to always understand about DC, *especially* the Batfamily (which is where the crossover content propagates the most) is this: a *very* good chunk of fans don't interact with the comics. i would venture to say even most Batfamily fans don't read the comics and actively talk about it. we've all read a very fandom big Batfam fanfic where the author's note mentions the writer has never touched a comic in their life. typically, these fans are either cobbling together their understanding from fandom content, or by frankensteining unrelated DC adaptations to understand each character. you take Bruce from Batman: TAS, you take Dick from the animated Young Justice, you take Jason from Batman: Under The Red Hood animated movie, you take Damian from the DCAMU Batman vs Robin, and you read some fandom metas to fill in the rest and well, you've got some sort of an understanding of these characters. read enough incorrect quotes, some genfic, a couple of character metas, and boom, you understand the Batfamily fandom enough to start creating your own content. and of course now. now you have Wayne Family Adventures so it's even *easier*. a pretty easy to pick up webtoon that's filling in all the gaps for you. but i've been in this fandom long enough to remember before we had WFA and even then, this was still a common, if not the most popular way, to ween yourself into the DC fandom space. you cherry-picked the canon you liked and then plunged into the depths of fanon.

i'm not here to make in depth commentary on if i think this is a good or bad thing. trust me i have that commentary in my head, but that would need it's own post. i'm very split on it and my feelings are complicated. my feelings on WFA are even *more* complicated. because oftentimes, the attitude expressed by these fans who are frankensteining this version of the Batfamily/DC world they have in their head is they don't *want* to read the comics. the comics don't contain the content they're after. and to an extent, i understand that. if you're looking for light-hearted vibes of the Batfamily all getting along and having the occasional hurt/comfort moments but in the end, they hug and make up, you're right. largely, you won't find that in canon. of course there are so many comics to recommend for Batfamily interactions, but you have to get specific. you'll find them interacting in small groups, Tim and Dick bonding here, Duke and Cass bonding there, but largely, the comics don't care to balance the ridiculously large cast they've given themselves. but fandom does. it's easy to toss them all in a blender and ignore the parts you don't like. the default argument to ignoring the comics or writing something OOC is always "well the comics are OOC and inconsistent too" which, while a flawed argument that massively misunderstand how comics work as a medium, isn't an entirely incorrect one. you could serve on a silver platter to these fans, an easy and accessible way to get into comics and they wouldn't be interested. it's not what they're here for. fandom is always character-driven above all else. it's driven by character relationships and dynamics. if someone wants to consume content where Tim idolized and stalked Jason as 'his Robin' and now is trying to help him rehabilitate and they're super complicated but have this long epic forgiveness arc, why *would* they read the comics? because they're sure as shit not going to find that dynamic in the comics. it's laughably OOC and not canon at all, but that doesn't matter. what matters is the sandbox. most Batfamily fans care *far* more about the sandbox canon gives them than the actual canon itself. feel how you feel about that, this really isn't being negative toward that attitude, but it is a common attitude.

so, you have Batfamily fans playing in the sandbox and building their own narrative. common fandom headcanons are so common, you could practically write a guide on how the fanon Batfamily works with how consistent people are about it. or you could just read WFA, which is practically the new manifesto of it. even now, with this sudden spike in people talking about canon accuracy and "actually this happening in the comics", they don't actually care about the comics, just what they can cherry-pick for fodder. (even if they rob it of so much context they're just as OOC as they were before. see specifically: the recent phenomena with Tim Drake going from the woobified weakest member of the Batfam who everyone needs to save constantly and he's the smart boy but he's also the one with a sad tragic neglectful past who gets overlooked being the way Batfamily fandom played with Tim for years. but recently, people seem to be pushing this idea of a ridiculously badass Tim, Tim who *totally* has a kill count because of his actions in RR (2009) if you take them completely out of context, Tim who bested Ra's and is even more badass than Jason and he's the 17 yr old CEO of Wayne Industries being cool and flawless it becoming the new fandom zeitgeist. neither of these versions of Tim are canon, and the second fundamentally misunderstands his arc in RR (2009) but the shift has undeniably happened and it's been fascinating to watch. the same thing happened with people suddenly deciding Jason isn't the "angry violent Robin", he was a sunshine sweet boy who was perfect as Robin. neither of these are true, but the second feels more transgressive and new to fandom from cherry-picked panels.) the point is largely, Batfamily fans would rather build their own canon than play with the actual canon.

and then, you have Danny Phantom. i'm not into DP and have no interest to get into it, but what i know about it via fandom osmosis is this: DP fans sort of also don't give a fuck about canon. once again, the canon of DP is a sandbox, not a rulebook. the concepts and the characters are the draw, not the plot itself. i've seen DP posts explaining characters who are essentially OCs, but have become so dominant in the fandom via fandom osmosis. there are concepts and ideas about how Danny's powers work and potential concepts with his ghost nature that either aren't in canon or only happened once in canon and fans decided to expand on that and doesn't care about it's own in-universe logic. i've seen a lot of DP fans also express they haven't seen the show and they don't have plans to see the show. because the show is just some children's cartoon with some inconsistencies and a simple plot, as you'd expect from CN. the show isn't the point. no one cares about it's plot, they care about it's characters. they care about pushing the concept of half ghost boy to a logical extreme and seeing what you can get out of that. can you make it weird and fucked up. how much can you highlight on his trauma and body horror. what identity crisis can you give him and how can you build his interactions with other characters in his world around that and also make those characters fun and unique on their own. sure, the skeleton of canon is there, but the meat lies all in the fanon.

Miraculous Ladybug also exists in this similar vein. the characters, the concepts, those hold intrigue. and not even mentioning the fact the original concept for this show was supposed to be aimed to an older audience, so you can see the bones of something a bit more mature and nuanced under this typical, villain of the week magical girl transformation show. the show itself is a bit shallow and that's not a *bad* thing, it's just the medium it exists within being aimed towards children. but the concepts of a teen girl who's basically a sort of chosen one, a boy who doesn't know his father is the big bad of the show, and their weird identity porn love... square thing. those dynamics are *so* complicated and such a fun sandbox to play in with character-driven fandom.

so, at the core, you have three fandoms that care more about the culturally accepted fanon than the canon, with a good chunk of people often not even consuming the original canon content. and well, DC is an *easy* world to transpose just about anything onto. a boy who's half ghost and fighting supernatural threats? that makes sense, DC has ghost heroes like Deadman already. a girl who has this magical item that gives her animal themed superpowers? i mean that's practically the same thing as Vixen's Totem so that one makes sense too. they fit in pretty easy, no needing to change the world to accommodate them. and of course, if you're a fan of *one* fandom where you don't care for the canon content and only like the fandom sandbox, chances are, you'll get drawn in pretty easily to another fandom with similar mechanics. if you can teach yourself the DP fandom rules/concepts, you can teach yourself the Batfamily fandom rules/concepts. and well, since there's so much crossover in fandom members, why not write the fanfiction? crossover fics will always exist, but with such a shared member base, you have a really big boom.

it's why the characters you see DP interact with in DC are *always* characters who are far more driven by fanon than canon. Danny and John Constantine is a *massive* concept. for people who don't read Hellblazer comics. my poor partner, @divine-dominion has lamented to me pretty often about finding DP content in the Hellblazer tag that is essentially turning Constantine into an OC. because whatever version of Constantine is being written about isn't one bit comics accurate, and really, isn't trying to be. and the same thing happens with Shazam. you watch Young Justice and understand him well enough, you get drawn in by the character concept that you just run with it. people put their favorite blorbos in the same place because hey, wouldn't ghost boy be pretty cool in a city like *Gotham*. how would Batman even react to him. and then, the shipping. because ages for the Batfamily can be easily hand-waved and moved around based on where you plop Danny into the timeline, you have your pick of the litter with him, and same with Ladybug. of course there are the most popular ships but largely, the world is your oyster.

i don't think this is the worst thing in the world for either fandom. it's not hard to filter out the crossover tags and scroll past content i don't like. and sure, i see the appeal of making your blorbos from two different places meet. i've got my drafts *full* of DC/MHA crossover ideas because well, i like them both and think that would be cool. i think my only gripe with it is when DP or MLB crossover content seeps it's way into the wrong tags. using the above example, if you're writing about Danny and Constantine but there's zero content of the actual Hellblazer comics, i don't think you need the Hellblazer tag, just the Constantine character tag. tbh i wish this extended onto Ao3 and people utilized fandom tags better. if you're writing Batfamily fanfiction that is very clearly and obviously WFA driven in characterization and concepts, i would far prefer those fics be tagged with the WFA fandom tag rather than the Batman (comics) fandom tag. because well, you're not writing about the Batman comics. and there's nothing wrong with that, but it helps if you don't confuse yourself for content striving to interact with canon more. (this especially extends to Young Justice, by the way. if you're writing for the Young Justice tv show please, please stop using the Young Justice (comics) fandom tag. i'm at my wit's end- /lh)

the whole thing is fascinating. i've got zero interest in entering DP or MLB as fandoms because that's not my speed, but witnessing it as an outsider is my favorite pastime. i see a *lot* of posts going around the DC x DP space that are helping explain to people who's who, what's what, and understanding the canon/fanon of both of these properties so others can better enter the space. which is not something you'd need in a fandom driven only by it's canon content, but it is sweet watching others try to help newbies enter the space. it's a very inviting fandom space, i think, whether you lament it's existence or not. they're just sitting in their corner with their blorbos, and i gotta respect that. the posts explaining the Batfamily to DP fans are always fun for me to read, even if i disagree with some of the characterizations in them because it helps shine a light on what the fans of this crossover regard as "important" enough about each fandom to be worth including those sorts of primers. very fascinating stuff.

[hyakunana]

Ah yes, the Prismatic experience when they deliver your main subclass in the starter pack 😌