#those are the eXACT conversations that I feel like I see mcu fans being like

[thelaurenshippen]

thanks for all the lovely tags on your falcon and the winter soldier post! i wasn't on tumblr when it was airing but you're right and it should be talked about more, it's a great show.

it's a GREAT show!!!!! I was on tumblr when it aired (obviously, I've been on tumblr since the beginning of time (2009)) and there were of course some folks talking about it, but compared to some of the other marvel shows, it was hardly anything. and part of that is, of course, a general cooling in the MCU fandom post-endgame (I have a lot of theories as to why Loki was an exception to that and the first one is "Tom Hiddleston") but I really can't understand why more people didn't lose their whole minds about it.

the cynical part of me wonders if people are less interested in directly political art from their fandoms when there's also not a tragic love story on top of it (catws of course, has both (and that's not even a shipping thing, even if you view steve and bucky as brothers, it's STILL a tragic love story, just platonic (you're wrong, but still valid))) because fatws was the most directly political piece of the MCU since catws.

it is actively and textually grappling with: the value of nations when nations are inherently exclusionary, the trap of patriotism, the failures of bureaucracy in crisis, the exploitation of Black men by the US government and specifically the US military, who gets forgiven by the state (famous white male war hero turned assassin, not random female government worker who stood up during a coup and then committed one (1) crime to stop a crazy billionaire from building an unbeatable army), how being Black and famous and a hero does not mean you aren't subject to racism by institutions, and the failure of US aid wrapped up in imperialism. to start.

and then it's also dealing directly with bucky's (political!) trauma and sam's complex (and political!) feelings around taking up the mantel of a hero that was personally important to him but that also represents the same country that had segregated the army when said hero fought in world war ii.

the less cynical part of me thinks fandom didn't go as crazy about it because not everyone is as clinically obsessed with bucky barnes as I am, especially when he's outside the context of his relationship with steve. fatws wasn't the most exciting or format-breaking show, it was just a real solid political thriller mini series, which I realize is a genre typically loved by me and middle aged dads. but either way, I think there's SO much for marvel fans to love with fatws and people should check it out!! (and come talk to me about it)

[valkyrieandstrangeridingaragorn]

You've probably heard people online say that MCU Wanda is whitewashed. Do you think that claim holds water?

Yeah, I've read a few things on the matter.

Let me preface this by saying that I know pretty much nothing about the conversations regarding ethnicity, race, etc. I have no qualms in admitting that I'm privileged in that regard considering where I was born and raised, so I'd rather let those who know about these things talk about them instead of me.

With that said, from what I have read I feel like people tend to mix so many different things that have nothing to do with one another. For instance, I completely understand that if Wanda is a Jewish character in the comics there is absolutely no need whatsoever to show a bunch of crosses in her room in CW. None. It serves no purpose, it's not even brought up, they're just there for no reason. I totally get why people are mad about that.

They kinda ignored Marc's Jewish roots in Moon Knight as well, so it wasn't a one-off either.

I also see a lot of people complain that she and Pietro joined a nazi organization (which, being Jewish would be a jerk move) but I don't know how many times I've said this already: they didn't know the ones conducting the experiments were Hydra. The Americans were in Sokovia, do people truly think they were advertising themselves? Of course not. They approached the twins during a civilian protest and told them that they would make them strong enough to fight against the Americans and the Avengers, that's why they joined. They didn't know it was Hydra.

Now, the complaints that they should have hired a Romani actress... dunno, I think actors and actresses can play whoever they want. There should be some positive discrimination in that actors from minorities should be given the parts that had been denied to them so outrageously and so often in the past, but I don't think you need an actor to be the same origin/ethnicity/sexual orientation, etc as the character they're playing, mostly because I fear that would probably lead to the exact opposite of representation. Say, gay characters can only be played by gay men but straights can be played by anyone. How is that not an issue?

So I don't know what to tell you. I think it's a serious and complex matter, I understand some criticism and why some people are mad, and Disney had a really good chance the moment they decided to bring Wanda and Pietro to the screen to depict Roma and Jewish characters but they actively chose to not do that.

Now, whether or not Wanda has been whitewashed I can't really say. I'm not a comic fan so I have no clue what they did there (there were a few retcons, I think? dunno), and I don't know enough about the Roma and Jewish to have an opinion. I think perhaps it would be better to ask them directly instead of me.

[caatws]

I hope it's okay to jump into the vol 3 conversation. Specifically what some people have said about context. I think something a lot of fans forget is not everyone who watches vol 3, or any mcu movies really, is a die hard fan who is going to read every marvel comic and see every cast interview. There are also people who can't manage to watch the movie a handful of times or more while it's in theaters. These people are still part of the audience and the movie still needs to be relatively understood by them. There are also people who love the mcu in general but maybe aren't huge gotg fans following all the movie news. They too might watch the movie and need to understand what's going on. All of this is part of the context of how Gamora is seen as a character in the movie. While some of us die hard gotg or Gamora fans might be able to take the movie and say "Yay, good for Gamora finding a home with the ravagers. She's so awesome and still important to the franchise", many other people are not taking it that way.

I have been all over and I feel safe saying that things haven't been the best for Gamora. If she was ever loved, important to the team or had anything to do with starting the team have all been debates not in her favor since vol 3 came out. She's been missing so frequently from merch I have friends who dont even care all that much who are starting to be upset. This isn't about whether the guardians or the ravagers in an all things being equal world are the better group to have the closer association with. This is about us not living in an all things being equal world and Gamora is not being considered equal right now. IW and EG created problems and there was harmful commentary regarding Gamora when both came out. However I have to say Gamora wasn't being excluded and pushed out of the realm of importance in this exact way until vol 3. There tends to be a conversation if you will between the audience and a movie and I think while vol 3 has many wonderful attributes, it's not having the best communication about Gamora.

right like! i was talking abt the merch situation with some of my irls and even one of them was like oh ya i noticed she wasn't on any merch at target...like HELLOOOOOOOO!!! ppl are gonna notice if one of your lead characters, top billing cast, is literally absent omfg like what game is marvel playing

even among more general audiences and casual viewers, those ppl are still gonna have their favorite characters. there are non-fandom gamora fans out there who are seeing this and probably just feeling so confused. hell even if this WAS your first gotg movie like gunn seems to have wanted, you wouldn't even get a fair shot at getting to know gamora and having her become your fav guardian, and i think that's just unhinged for literally no reason

[wandaposting]

wandavision: the criticisms post

tl;dr: i liked the show, but there were aspects that were annoying and dumbfounding to me and here’s the post that covers That ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

this was gonna be my comprehensive wandavision review post that had both cons and pros, but the cons kind of ran away from me lsdfjs SO YOU’RE GETTING THIS FIRST. if you find my views diverging from yours in either direction, you’re valid, please don’t shiv me. this is just how i Feel in a somewhat shitposty (as per usual) format. 😔

the big con list:

the way wanda’s actual villainy gets brushed away by the narrative: or specifically the way wanda strolls past the people she mentally tortured and traumatized for a week to apologize to monica, who then goes “gg girl i would’ve done the same :)” and then wanda leaves that entire mess—that she caused—behind her and bails lol. that scene is a microcosm of my problems with this show’s attempt at portraying what the creators have described as her ““complexity””. they want us to feel sorry for her, but not in the way that we can sympathize with walter white while still acknowledging he’s broken bad. rather, this show seemed to want to paint her as more of a victim than the people she victimized. they still want her to come out looking heroic and triumphant and rewarded from her journey with new powers, a new superhero outfit, a new superhero moniker. and that falls flat when you realize she’s basically been a self-absorbed asshole throughout the course of this show. she was confronted no less than four times, and told point blank that a few thousand people were suffering under her control. that is not something we can excuse with depression and denial. that means that at multiple times she is making at least the subconscious choice that her happiness matters more than the wellbeing of her meat puppets, which includes children, across the span of a week. i don’t see monica rambeau “doing the same thing.” the fact that they made her say it while the townspeople glared on in miserable silence just rubbed me the wrong way. if they really wanted to make her responsible for westview, while also wanting her to come out looking remotely good, they needed to invest in a much more substantial redemption arc for her than “i didn’t mean to, gonna go self-exile now.” or even holding everything else constant, they could’ve delivered a more nuanced take where westview was in dire straits before her arrival. the westview she initially drove through already looked economically depressed, so i don’t know why they didn’t just follow through with this. but they could’ve made it so that by granting herself happiness and prosperity, she could’ve spread that genuinely throughout the citizens. instead of hex vision waking norm up in horror, you could’ve had him begging to be put back under. that way, her decision to accept and face reality head on could also be reflected by the people of westview. where everyone, perhaps aided through wanda’s mind link, decides they shouldn’t let fantasy consume themselves at the expense of improving their actual reality. there’s still moral ambiguity, there’s still mistakes being made, we can still side-eye wanda for doing the equivalent of drugging people, but at least these npc’s would've gained something from wanda blundering into their lives. but no she made 3 thousand people suffer through the literal plot of Get Out, giving them life-long ptsd and trauma with nothing good, and i think that’s bad. if she has more haters after this series, i can’t even blame them. but apparently she has a shit-ton more fans after this series, so... OH WELL, IT IS WHAT IT IS sdkfjkls

TYLER: which brings me to the thought that, if this show had hayward acting like a three dimensional human person with the bare minimum intellect required to run SWORD ... instead of an incompetent jackass scooby doo villain ... a lot of us would be spamming #HaywardWasRight. tyler hayward might legitimately be the worst villain mcu has ever produced, like edging past malekith. is he supposed to be an analogue to real world tr*mp appointed deputies? unlike agatha, he’s not even entertaining to watch. he’s the ted cruz of the mcu, which is bizarre when he was introduced as the strict but not particularly vexing or unreasonable successor to maria rambeau in episode 4. it ended up feeling extremely contrived how the show attempted to aggressively signal us with “hayward bad” and “wanda good, actually” through the lens of monica, darcy, and jimmy. it’s like they had to make hayward come across as Extremely Dumb in order to make wanda come across as the more sympathetic party, when she was the one doing [gestures vaguely at wall of text above].

and SPEAKING of agatha: she also ended up being the exact kind of simplified reductive cackling “gimme ur powers wanda” evil super witch that i didn’t want her to be. that’s all.

the theorybaiting: i didn’t care about the lack of mutants/doctor strange cameo (lol what happened, charles murphy)/multiverse/blue marvel/reed richards/mephisto/nightmare/chthon (altho we did get the darkhold wink wonk) so much that it ruined my experience. ralph bohner was disappointing, but i got over it. my issue here is more that they deliberately baited a more interesting story than they delivered, and i think they shot themselves in the foot with that. the first 7, even 8 episodes had set up this atmosphere of mystery and intrigue, only for them to wrap up all these questions with the most boring, uninspired answers possible. question: what does hayward want and what is he up to? answer: hayward is simply a stupid dingus. question: who is agatha harkness and what is she up to? answer: an evil witch who just wants to steal yo powers. question: who is fietro? answer: lol boner. question: was it wanda all along? answer: yes, but no it was actually agatha, but actually yes, but she didn’t mean to and is kind of sorry and now she’s gonna fly away so have fun with your ptsd, westview. ????????? yeah they could have ... done some of that better.

the pacing in the end: i remember when they said it was gonna be “around 6 hours,” and we got 4 and a half hours of actual content instead... they should have given us that extra 1 and a half hour to flesh out the finale. the sitcom portion was fun, it feels like the sitcom portion was prioritized in the writing room, and that the overarching narrative beyond the sitcom suffered to accommodate it. when it came time to break away from the format, they stumbled. so in the beginning, there were segments that felt authentic to the era but were fairly critiqued as “dragging on” ... and in the final episode, we had... the final episode. monica and wanda’s ending conversation felt unsatisfying, both wanda’s apology and monica’s acceptance of it rang particularly hollow [also gestures vaguely to wall of text above]. the appearance of white vision should have had much more of an impact on ... everyone, especially wanda. except the dude just dips and no one mentions him ever again. i feel like hex vision being revealed as the the vision that had always been ~part of her should have also had more ... fleshing out. darcy and jimmy basically ended up having no arcs in this show. they served as stand-ins for the audience, and because they were written to feel sorry for wanda (in a situation where she was absolutely deserving of more scrutiny), the audience too gets manipulated toward doing so.

there’s probably more to add but i’m running out of brain juice BUT THOSE WERE THE BIG ONES STORY-WISE

[denimbex1986]

“You guys were gonna be the first MCU show...it ended up being WandaVision...Did you guys follow that show? Did you follow that hype? Was there any part of you that was like ‘Damn, we gotta follow that now’?”

Anthony: “Not at all. Our show is very different. I think it was great that WandaVision actually went first because it set up the audience’s ideas of what this Marvel Cinematic Universe is going be on the streamer. It’s very different because WandaVision was a completely different idea of a Marvel show. So, you know, it was great that they went first, but our show is so different; Sebastian and I are very different than Elizabeth and Paul.”

Kari: “The bar is high, obviously. I’m thrilled for them that it was so - such a success - and it’s such a creative show. So, what is terrific is ours is completely different. As is true of MCU and certainly at Marvel, is they really come at every project with its own unique DNA. And so, there’s no rules, I guess is the way to put it, - and that’s - that’s very empowering.” 

Malcolm: “Anthony Mackie said the other day when we was doing a group thing - and he was like ‘Well all I know is we’re not the ones that are gonna ruin Marvel.’ I don’t know about them other shows, but hopefully we will honor the momentum that WandaVision got for us, but - yeah - it is - I’m stressed.”

“...The Falcon and The Winter Soldier obviously is a little more conventional when it comes to the tone of the past MCU adventures that we’ve seen. How would you guys describe the target zone that you chased?”

Malcom: “It was - what Marvel had before I ever walked through the door was that concept of a buddy two-hander. There’s an array of tones within that genre, if that’s what that is, that you can pick from. And, where we settled was somewhere like, on the comedic end is ‘Rush Hour’ and ‘Ride Along’, right? And we wanted to be more on the dramatic end. And what we found was ‘Lethal Weapon’ and ‘48 Hrs’ in particular dealt with really, very real issues of those times. ‘48 Hrs’ dealt with race, ‘Lethal Weapon’ dealt with the Vietnam War - people don’t even really think about that. It - that genre allows you tackle real issues, while keeping the journey fun.”

“The series opens with a crazy, high-flying sequence...what can you say about filming that opening?”

Kari: “I did a lot of research and wanted to have it very experiential so it really felt like we were flying. Cameras were clipped all over them; on their helmets, and their feet and in their hands. So we did that, and we hired an amazing team who, you know, did many jumps to get all of the - the flight sequence stuff. Obviously rigorous planning because of the danger factor, and there’s a story to it so certain action has to happen, and it has to happen while you’re dropping at, you know, 500 miles an hour, or whatever it is, you know, from a plane. So there was a lot of very detailed, minutia planning that goes in it.”

“Anthony, did you get to do anything new stunt-wise for that? Like, did you Tom Cruise at all for that scene?”

Anthony: “I always do all the flying stuff because it’s just me on a jerry rig looking left, looking right and then they paint me in. So, I always do all the flying stuff and, you know, Sebastian and I had a nice roll in the hay for the ending part of it.” (laughs)

Sebastian: “Yes.”

“Bucky goes on a date in the premiere, and he does say something along the lines of like ‘I haven’t danced since 1943′...I think we all know what that means. Bucky’s a little thirsty these days.  Are we; are we going to see him get - “

Sebastian: “Bucky’s a little rusty.” (Anthony laughs)

“Bucky’s a little thirsty.”

Sebastian: “Those knees are, you know, making sounds once, you know, when he gets on - ”

Anthony: “Bucky’s achin’ for some bacon!” (Sebastian laughs)

“...I know you can’t spoil too much, but are we going to see him get that kind of action in the series?”

Sebastian: “Yeah, I mean, of course like both of these guys get their strengths, and their weaknesses actually. Like, I feel like they’re featured pretty well in the series and I think they compliment each other well in terms of those action sequences, as you’re going to keep seeing it, you know.”

“Anthony, both Kevin Feige and Macolm Spellman have said that the show is going to explore race and identity in America, probably more than past MCU projects. How would you describe the show’s approach?”

Anthony: “One of the big things about Marvel, and one thing that I really enjoy about being part of the MCU, is it’s always very timely. The stories, the characters, their obstacles; they always turn out to be very timely, and there’s nothing different with this show. This show deals with a lot of baggage that we harbor as Americans and with the idea of these characters moving forward post-blip. We’re living kind of in a post-blip society now because after COVID, we’re gonna have to learn what our new normal is. Just like in the MCU, once we came back from the blip after five years, everyone has to figure out what their new normal is. So it’s the exact same thing, and it makes the show very timely; dealing with - you know - economic structure, race and the idea of not only being an American, but being a human.”

Kari: “This is a conversation that’s a very important conversation to be having all the time, but in particular, it’s really bubbled to the fore in the last year. What does it mean for a black man to pick up such an iconic white symbol? What does that mean for the character? It’s a real exploration of what we have traditionally laid into this iconic red, white and blue of it - and now we are taking it down another road, and we’re really exploring what that is. And we don’t necessarily want to give answer; I mean, I think it’s also really important to provoke discussion. So it’s - nothing is tied up in tidy, neat;little bows. The notion is to say, this needs to always be discussed and continually be embraced.”

Malcolm: “It was inescapable. I always tip my hat to ‘Black Panther’ which made it possible, because ‘Black Panther’ proved Marvel fans would go on a ride with heroes that don’t look like heroes have looked in the past. And, you know, the Killmonger speech - we had that printed up and put on the wall. The hashtag Killmongerwasright, because we felt like that was just out jumping off point for this one.  T’Challa is African, which is different from being African-American, and TChalla - RIP to the great Chadwick, like I said he made all this possible - was a King. Sam is a black man, and not only is he a black man, he is a black man from the south. And we knew that the stars and stripes, that symbol in his hand, doesn’t mean the same thing it does in Steve’s hand. And in fact, we wanted to just lean into the fact, like, give Sam a backstory, including a family with strong opinions about it, so that the audience would understand why he doesn’t take that mantle on; that he doesn’t see it as even being appropriate, ‘cos it just means something else. You can’t hide from it and we would’ve been making fake show if we tried to.”

[t-lostinworlds]

Pushing Buttons (Shawn Mendes)

A/N: Surprise!! Haha guess who finally had the urge to write. It’s been a while since I actually sat down and written something, hence why I’m a little rusty so this may be bad or just suck entirely so please bear with me ksksks. Anyhow, here’s a little one shot for Halloween, hope you guys enjoy!

P.S. The next part of Duplicate is on the works so watch out for that soon aha.

Requested:

You sent this like a month ago? I’m sorry for taking so long sweets and also, I changed up the characters love, I hope you don’t mind.

Warnings: Slightly steamy at the end (not really) and typos.

Word Count: 3.6k+

Masterlist in Bio

-:-:-:-:-

Shawn was clueless.

He always has been when it came to the never ending debate on which was better: the MCU or the DCEU.

But the boy does know a few things, one of which is how to get on your nerves very easily.

He knows very well that you love the MCU, that you're a ride or die fan to say the least. Shawn has seen it first hand, the countless amounts of times you've gushed about specific scenes and breaking down each Easter egg to watching the never ending theories as to what will happen next. All of that just goes to prove how much of a fan you are.

Shawn loves it. He loves how you speak with so much passion with that glow in your eyes. And the excitement that coats your beautiful features just makes his heart melt every time.

But with every positive thing about your love of the universe, there's also a tiny downside to it, hence why Shawn also sometimes hate it.

He hates the way you audibly gasp each time Steve Rogers wears an extremely tight shirt and shows off his biceps or when Thor - or any of the MCU heroes for that matter - stands shirtless even for a split second. He hates that certain look on your face as you bite your lip to try and hold back your grin, eyes slowly landing on him showing feign innocence, but Shawn can see right through those eyes. He always has for the past few years.

He can do nothing but scoff with a roll of his eyes each time you do that. Each time you push his buttons because you know it makes him jealous. You know it rides him up the wall how you practically faint each time those men are on screen. You know what it does to him and sometimes, Shawn thinks you do it on purpose, because him jealous?

Let's just say it changes things in the bedroom, just to put it lightly.

It wasn't a toxic kind of jealousy, no; it was more of an "it hurts his man ego" type of jealousy. With those men looking like they were all built from nothing but muscle, how can he not?

Now the time has come that Shawn has to at least get a little bit of revenge. To now push your buttons by the simplest choice of costume for this year's Halloween bash.

He has been planning this since the day he got the invitation, which was roughly two weeks ago. It was a yearly kind of thing, a Halloween party thrown to showcase the best you can do with any character or person of your choice.

It wasn't the kind of party where you can just buy casually something out of a store, not put much effort and be it a done deal. This is the party where people really go all out, as it is a charity event.

So a week and a half before the event, Shawn purposefully says the sentence he knows would push your buttons in so many ways.

"I kinda like the Batman v Superman movie more than Civil War." Shawn states casually as he plops down beside you on the couch. He tried his best to hold back his smirk as your head slowly, almost dramatically, turned to face him. Your hand went to grab the remote without taking your eyes off of him, pausing the movie you were watching which happens to be Captain America: Civil War.

Perfect timing.

"What?" Your voice was merely above a whisper but the surprise coating it was crystal clear that Shawn had to stop his urge to give himself a pat in the back.

The plan was in the works.

"I'm just saying that I enjoy DC movies more than Marvel you know. At least DC has some in-depth stories and great character developments." When Shawn saw your eyes flicker, he was about to back right out and scrap the whole plan. But with one glance at the TV to see that you've paused at the exact scene where Steve Rogers was holding back the helicopter with his biceps in full view – your favorite scene as you've mentioned plenty of times – that's all it took for him to keep this going.

Your glare on him was so intense that he could almost feel the side of his head burn. He can't dare to look at you in the eyes knowing he's treading on dangerous territory, so he keeps his gaze on his phone, scrolling through nonsense to try and seem nonchalant about it. He knows he'll crumble just by looking into those gorgeous but very angry eyes of yours, so be it best to avoid it for now.

"What are you trying to say here Mendes?" Your voice was low, almost serving as a warning for him not to try his luck. Hell, you calling him by his last name was warning enough, but Shawn only shrugged to seem unfazed, flashing you a cheeky smile as he spared you a quick glance before his gaze was back on his phone.

"What I'm trying to say is that DC appeals to me more than Marvel. And I'd like to think I have great taste in movies so..."

You let out a sarcastic laugh that only made Shawn fear you more. That "careful with what you say or I'm going to whoop your ass" laugh that sounds so sweet but very deadly nonetheless. He wasn't even sure if you were laughing at the first part of his statement or the last, or maybe even both, but either way, he was starting to crumble a little bit.

"You're really trying to get on my nerves aren't you?" Shawn shrugged at your words, gathering up all the courage he has to finally look up and hold your intense gaze. To say that you weren't anywhere near delighted with what he was claiming would be an understatement. The look in your eyes just says it all.

"What? I just think the DC movies are better than the Marvel ones." Your jaw went slack at that, and it took everything in Shawn's will power to not even let out the tiniest of laughs or even just make his lips twitch at the sight of total displeasure written all across your face.

Shawn wasn't sure if he was going to make it out alive with this one.

"Don't you dare make me take out my PowerPoint presentation on why you are absolutely and undeniably wrong Mendes I swear." You almost growled at him, hands coming up to pinch the bridge of your nose as you tried to hold on to whatever calmness you could harness within yourself. That simple gesture serving as a signal for Shawn to know that he was almost stepping out of line.

"Okay, you have your opinion and I have mine. I'm just saying I'm definitely not dressing up to be a Marvel character this coming Halloween party, the costumes are just basic." Shawn finishes with the most casual tone, just to dig the insult deeper but not too much for him to end up sleeping on this very couch tonight.

"Basic?!" You screeched as you looked at him in pure disbelief, the piercing sound making Shawn jump in his skin and you almost felt sorry, almost.

Taking a deep breath for a second, you toned it down a little, glare still there but voice a bit calm, just a little bit. "What are you wearing then?"

"It's a surprise babe."

"Fine. I'm not telling you what I'm wearing either." You huffed, crossing your arms over your chest as you turned your attention back on the television; face still contorted in pure annoyance as you didn't even press play. That's when Shawn started to feel bad for ruining your mood entirely.

"My love, come here..." He cooed, slowly moving closer to you as if you'd snapped at him if he gets too close, which was exactly what you did.

"Don't! Don't you dare come near me you fucking traitor." You shot him a glare as you scooted further away from him until you reached the other end of the couch, a deep frown etched on his lips as Shawn flashed you the best puppy eyes he could muster.

"But honey, I just wanna cuddle." He pouted, making grabby hand gestures just like the child that he is. You only rolled your eyes at him, but deep down you were slowly cracking and you know that he knows. Shawn always knows that you can never resist him for any longer.

"I'm still annoyed with what you said. Give me two hours, and then maybe I'll let you near me tonight." You grumbled as you finally pressed play and resumed to watch your movie, making sure to turn up the volume to try and drown out the presence of your annoying boyfriend. Shawn sighed as he sank deeper on his spot on the couch, not pushing his luck any further as he does deserve the silent treatment.

Though that didn't stop him from being all cute whenever you spare him a glance, bottom lip all jutted out as he keeps looking at you with those puppy eyes of his. His sock clad feet always poking with yours until it slowly went up and down your leg in a comforting manner, him trying to take your attention away from the movie and boy was it working.

He kept moving closer and closer until he was seated right beside you, the warmth of his thigh pressing against your own. Sneakily, he was able to land a sweet kiss on your cheek that really did catch you by surprise. Your heart was quick to turn soft no matter how annoyed you are with him as he cuddled into the crook of your neck, placing a soft kiss on your skin and earning a sigh of pure defeat in your part.

And just like that, the two hours of distance from him that you wanted only lasted for thirty minutes. All because Shawn truly knows how to make you melt in so many ways possible with nothing but him and his annoyingly cute and irresistible little face.

***

The day of the party has come.

Both you and Shawn haven't seen each other since the morning, the two of you too busy and preoccupied with your costumes for tonight. That didn't stop him from still getting into your nerves though, the conversation you had a few days ago being brought back by his simple little message.

iMessage from Dumbass Idiot: I really hope you're not going basic this year babe ;)))

The contact name was a bit petty but you just couldn't help yourself.

You weren't entirely mad, just completely and utterly infuriated. After all, everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but you can't stop yourself from getting riled up as you finally caught on to what he was aiming to do. He wasn't slick with trying to hide that goddamn smirk that's for sure. Plus, you weren't dumb either being that you know he hasn't seen much of the DC movies, you know his sole purpose of doing this is to push your buttons, his idea of revenge due to you doing the same to him.

Shawn was in the guestroom right now as he insisted you only see him when he's 'done and polished'. You like to think that you have no idea what he was wearing, but judging by all of his actions following to this day, you know your hunch is just about right.

Just as you grabbed your fake guns to place it on your thigh holsters, the sound of soft knocking echoed throughout the room. "Honey? Why'd you lock the door?"

"Because I don't want you to see me until I'm done and polished." You mocked the words he used earlier, Shawn's hearty laugh following right after. "You're still mad at me sweetheart?" You can just picture his wide-ass grin behind the wooden door, that annoying curve of his lips from him feeling so proud that he knows exactly how to get under your skin.

"Leave me alone and wait in the living room you idiot." That only made Shawn laugh even more and it took everything in your power not to rip your hair out. It took so long getting it as straight and red as you can, you're not ruining your look for the idiocy of your boyfriend.

"Shawn Peter Raul I swear to Go-"

"Okay! okay fine, I'll wait in the living room. Love you honey." You didn't bother to give him a response as you heard his footsteps disappear into the hallway.

Putting on your belt, adding some finishing touches and taking one last look at the full length mirror, you smiled wide and proud at yourself.

Your all black Lycra suit was shaping your body in phenomenal ways. The fabric perfectly fitted to accentuate your figure but not too much for it to be constricting. The guns on your thigh holsters made you look like a total badass, but seeing the whole look finally come together? It makes you feel like a total badass.

Being dressed as none other than the Natasha Romanoff, the Black Widow herself - her suit in CA: The Winter Soldier to be precise - you surely do feel your confidence boost through the roof and you can't wait to see Shawn's reaction.

"So what do you think?" You asked as soon as you reached the living room, slowly looking up to see Shawn already staring at you with his mouth in the shape of an O, the water bottle that he was holding not reaching his lips as he froze.

You stared at him with almost the same expression as you finally got the chance to see who he was portraying. He too was wearing a spandex suit, one that fits him too tight for your heart to handle. His muscles were extremely prominent from his wide shoulders down to his massive thighs, not to mention that obvious package he wasn't even trying to hide. His whole body covered in red and blue, his hair all styled back but leaving just one curl that fell sexily on his forehead.

You took him all in slowly but surely, your heart racing because he just looks so undeniably hot. You tried to get a hold of yourself as you cleared out your throat, taking one deep and tried your best to seem unfazed, maybe annoyed even, when you said,

"Really? Superman?"

Shawn didn't even seem to hear your sly remark with his choice of superhero as he slowly made his way towards you, his cape swaying with his every movement that it made him look like he was actually Superman, such a pleasing sight to say the least.

"Holy fuck babe." He cursed under his breath once he reached you, hand landing on your waist as he stared you down with fire in his eyes.

"Not so basic now huh?" You boasted as you tilted your head to the side, bottom lip caught between your teeth and Shawn almost lost it right then and there.

"I– wow, you look – I can't even – damn it baby, you look so fucking sexy holy shit." Shawn gushed as he gave your waist a squeeze before his hands were roaming slowly, up and down your sides. His head was spinning, heart beating rapidly against his chest at the sight of you dressed in an all-black and tight suit. He was at a loss for words as his mind ran a hundred miles per second, his thoughts filled with all the things he wants to do to you with this suit on and off.

The way he was looking at you was doing unspeakable things to your body, the obvious lust in his eyes clear as day but you kept your cool, a playful grin etched on your lips as you slowly ran your hands up and down his chest, feeling nothing but hard muscles though the fabric. "You don't look bad yourself. Could've been hotter if it was Captain America but oh well."

"Oh don't you even dare start angel." Shawn growled, deep and guttural, eyes growing a shade darker as a switch flicked inside his head. It took everything in your sanity to not let your knees buckle, the look on his face loud and clear that he was ready to pick you up and pin you against the wall and take you right then and there. Both his hands slid down to rest on the swell of your bum, giving it a squeeze that made you lurched forward, pushing you even closer to him. If this was to take a step further, tonight's plan would surely be canceled for sure.

"Calm down Mendes. It's hard to hide a boner with that tight suit you're wearing." You teased with a giggle, and surely enough as you glanced down, his dick imprint was there, big and hard.

"I know. I can feel it getting tighter and tighter." Shawn chuckled deeply as he pressed his forehead against yours, taking in deep breaths with his eyes shut tight as he tried his best to calm himself, a task to say the least being that you were still standing there in that pretty costume of yours.

It was a minute tops until Shawn got his shit together, your sweet laugh echoing in his ear as you shook your head at his boyish antics, giving him a soft and sweet kiss that made his heart grow warm.

Shawn lets out a soft breath. "Let's get going before I lose any sense of control and we won't be able to go to the party."

***

"Superman? Black Widow? Why are you two–"

"It's a long story. Don't ask." You cut Brian off as you laughed at his confused expression. Superman walking in with Black Widow in his arms surely was a crossover people didn't see coming.

"We had an argument on which was better, DC or Marvel and here we are." Shawn answered nonetheless, shooting you a wink before he turned back to Brian. "What's your take on that Bri?"

"Well if were judging solely on tonight… To me Y/N is looking extremely good and exquisite so I'm voting for her." Shawn stared at his best friend with his mouth wide open, seeming surprised that Brian betrayed him. You laugh as you gave Brian a high five, the ginger boy looking all amused at this little completion happening between you two.

"Thanks Bri. That's one point for me Mendes." Shawn narrowed his eyes at you. "Oh it's on."

The two of you spent the whole night having the best time all while racking up as much points as you can. It was growing into a tie because both your costumes were pretty well done to say the least, compliments flying here and there, but most of them directed at you to which Shawn would jokingly make a sound of displeasure each time he lost. But he doesn't even argue as he does agree with everyone. You were looking incredible.

It was a couple of drinks later when Shawn couldn't keep his hands off of you anymore. With you looking as is and then combined with the alcohol? Shawn's mind was all dirty as he wants nothing more than to take you back home. Even more so when you left him with the boys to talk to an old friend of yours. Shawn didn't have a problem with it, that until you purposely shot him a grin, that very same grin you have whenever you try and make him jealous.

You wanted to poke at him. To now get under his skin in payback too all the things he said as you shot him a wink from across the room, where you were talking with a guy friend of yours who happens to be dressed as the Winter Soldier.

You were touching your friend's metal arm all while gushing at how cool it was as it did seem so real. It was nothing flirty at all but you didn't try to hide that playful smirk as you casually shot Shawn a glance here and there.

He knows what you were trying to do. He knows what you wanted to happen and he was going to make sure you were going to get it.

In quick strides Shawn was behind you in an instant, hand landing dangerously low on your back as he smiled at your companion. "Mind if I steal her from you?" Your friend shook his head no with a chuckle, bidding his goodbye and turning to leave.

Once he was gone, Shawn gripped your hips with both hands and pulled your closer to him, your back pressed flushed against his firm chest. That's when you felt that hard poke on your ass that made you let out a shaky breath, "Oh..." You felt Shawn's chest vibrate as he chuckled at your reaction, his grip on your waist tightening as he pulled you even closer for you to feel even more of him.

Ever so gently, Shawn dipped his head to place a kiss right on the back of your ear, his voice deep and hushed as he said. "You're really in for a treat tonight sweetheart, it is Halloween after all. Now shall we go?"

You didn't even hesitate as you dragged him out of the venue, body all hot with excitement with what's in store for you when you finally get back home.

Because when you push Shawn's buttons? He'll give you his all and more behind the closed bedroom door.

-:-:-:-:-

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[thegoldenavenger]

guess who watched given and immediately had to shove tony waist-deep into this fucking thing because [they forgot they already ”wrote” this au]

it’s me

unedited as always, light spoilers for given if you havent seen that and wanted to. 

anyways, tony stark is the high profile son of a business mogul based in LA because the mcu loves giving tony centric plot points to howard stark industries is capitalizing on the silicone valley fever.  after a major manic episode tony uproots his life and goes to school in new york, as far as he can physically move away from his stifling family and the pressure. 

tony’s done with building robots for his father’s business, he’s done being manipulated by the adults in his life and he abandons everything from the stark life.  he picks up a guitar, learns how to play it, and never looks back. 

tony finds he likes the life of a garage band.  he glides through classes and focuses on his fingering (not that kind) and absent-mindedly writing down notes for songs he doesn’t really think he’ll write. He really likes being that guy, bringing out a guitar and everyone groans but people request songs anyways.  besides, he’s never really been a fan of wonderwall. 

of course he plays piano, it was that or violin and his dad thought strings were for girls. he’s used to playing in front of a crowd, stiff collared and sweating under the calculating gazes of his parents’ party guests. just another new trick to show off. 

there’s something so indescribably different about playing guitar under cheap lights in a garage, the casually gathered crowd gaining interest and beer and his fingers feel like splitting over the strings of his instrument.  The noise, the whine as he coaxes his guitar to sing, amplified through speakers that thump with his bassist’s steady beat and he can feel the sweat slick down his back making his shirt sticky. 

tony’s lucky to have met the bandmates he had.  Pepper’s a riot on the drums and Rhodey is tony’s constant, reliable bassist and both of them have deigned to take him under their wing even if he’s less experienced and more annoying then they should have to deal with.  Being able to play with them, it’s more than tony could’ve asked for. 

he’s happy with his life, which is why he’s a little less than pleased when he runs into a short, scrawny blond holding a guitar with white knuckled fingers.  tony runs into him, and the boy jolts violently, the guitar slipping the grip like he’d tossed it. it’s a nice guitar, so tony instinctively reaches out for it. 

“why are you keeping the snapped strings on like this?” he asks, taking the chance to inspect the guitar. 

“Give it back.” The boy says. well, demands. Tony does nothing of the sort. Instead he straightens it out and sights down the fret board. 

“it’s a nice guitar, but leaving your strings like this is a bit--”

“I said: give it back!” 

The boy’s grip is surprisingly strong for someone so small, tony thinks distantly.

“Okay! No need to bite my head off about it,” He lets go of the guitar, but doesn’t leave quite yet.  “Look, these will work to replace those...” Tony digs in his bag for a second, taking out an unopened pack of his own replacement strings. Maybe not the exact match, but they’d do well enough. “Get them done as soon as you can, it’s a shame to see something that nice look like that.” 

He gives the packet of strings away and leaves. 

Tony doesn’t think much of this incident.  But he guesses he made more of an impact than he thought because now he’s been ambushed by the same blond boy.  

“Look, I can’t figure out how to change the string. Just show me!” 

“Can’t you, I don’t know? Youtube it or something?” Tony asks. 

“Don’t be an ass! I just--” Tony notices how startlingly blue the boy’s eyes are as he glares to the side. “I can’t undue the pins.”

It feels like pulling teeth, the way the words force their way past the kid’s lips. Like he’s spitting out something bad, admitting that he can’t do something. 

“I don’t have the right tools and I--I don’t want to break it more.” 

His fingers grip the guitar awkwardly, and Tony knows that kid hasn’t played even one chord before.  Probably hasn’t played even a guitar themed rhythm game with how unbalanced he’s holding the body.  

Tony rubs the back of his neck.  

“God, I don’t know why I tried!”

“It’s fine--” Tony blinks as he cut into the kid’s frustrated venom.  

“It’s fine,” he starts again, “I’ll help. Here.” He holds his hand out and is handed the guitar very reluctantly. 

He remembers his first snapped string. The shock, the sharp sting as it flicked against his hand.  But learning to play guitar was painful.  From the blisters to the muscle aches, the endurance. He finds himself smiling. 

He narrates what he does, his hands gliding over the sleek body of the guitar.  “See, you need to keep track of the pins. it’s easier with tools, I can lend you these ones I have an extra set. My name is Tony.” He shifts the guitar so he’s holding it properly, plucking a string and adjusting the peg.

“What? What are you doing?”

“Listen,” He says, as he twists a peg.  The blond gets that look on his face again, the squinty one with angry eyebrows.  Tony laughs, and strums the guitar. 

The chord comes out sharp and clear. 

“There you go, it’s all fixed.” 

Tony thinks it should be the last he sees of him.  Tony’s pretty sharp, so he noticed the graphite smudges on his fingers and the large portfolio on his hip. An art student.  There’s no reason to cross paths again when Tony’s classes are all music based and he should probably start paying rent for how often he’s fallen asleep in the computer labs.  

But apparently that kid isn’t finished with Tony. 

“Teach me to play this.”

Tony blinks. 

“I don’t even know your name.”

“If I tell you, will you teach me to play?”

Tony shrugs. 

“It’s Steve.”

Tony tries walking away. It’s not very effective. 

He can’t really dodge Steve, and finds himself followed all the time now.  Honestly, tony would be a little flattered if Steve didn’t look like he was swallowing a lemon every time Tony catches a glance at his face. 

To be fair, Tony is kind of relishing the attention.  He complains to Rhodey and Pepper and they both roll their eyes at him before they start jamming. It’s after one of these jams that he runs into Steve again. 

He’s standing outside the door, his face with angry looking eyebrows but his eyes watery. His face is red, he doesn’t have a jacket and Tony is getting reacquainted with the cold himself now that he’s let himself out of the steaming jam room. 

“Teach me how to play like that!” 

Tony tries ignoring him, but Steve is determined to follow him, even through the cold, dry night. Even when his breath hitches and his voice turns reedy.  

“Teach me! Teach-- Te--” Steve starts gasping every other breath and Tony spins around.  Steve’s flushed cheeks from the cold have drained away and now he’s pale, pale, pale. 

“Steve!” Tony stops, right there, his hands hovering over Steve like concerned birds, unsure where to touch. Steve looks, if possible, angrier than ever, still trying to speak even while gasping. 

“Please, Steve shut up!” Tony puts his hands over Steve’s mouth, he doesn’t know what to do. “I’ll teach you, or whatever, just! Do you have an inhaler or something?” 

Steve points to his bag, and after Tony is done rifling through it and hands Steve his uncovered rescue inhaler, he’s grinning the smarmiest grin someone having an asthma attack can possibly muster. 

Tony finds himself feeling distinctly played.  He doesn’t mind it as much as he should. 

Steve is an incredibly stubborn student and Tony is perhaps not the most patient teacher.  He grabs Steve’s hands more than once to force them into the right position and demands he try again, and again, and again.  It almost gives him flash backs, but Steve almost dares him to be less than serious about the lessons.  Like it would kill Steve if Tony treated him the least bit kindly. 

Tony brings him to his and Rhodey’s and Pepper’s jam sessions.  He grins and points and says “this is how a real rock star does it,” and plays with a loose fluidity he hasn’t felt in a while.  He sees Steve’s foot tapping and grins widely, like he’s won something.  He feels like he won something.

Steve learns the chords and how to read tabs and even how to restring his own guitar, though Tony finds himself doing it more often then not.  There’s something really endearing about the ferocious way Steve devotes himself to learning guitar.  

They sit next to each other, out of class but on campus.  Tony is demonstrating a fingerstyle more suited to an acoustic guitar even though Steve is learning on an electric. It sounds like shit, but they’re both grinning anyways.  

“Then what kind of music do you like?” Tony asks, shaking out his hand. 

“Just, you know. Stuff.”

“Come on, you have a favorite song, everyone does!” Tony says, blustering. “You already know what I like.”

“I wonder...” Steve says, trailing off. He stares into the middle distance for long enough that Tony is about to laugh to break the sudden tension and switch topics but Steve interrupts him. 

“It’s like...” and he humms something, his hand doing half-aborted conductions as he feels his way through a tune. He trails off and looks into Tony’s startled face.

“Did you, did you write that?”

“Not, I mean, not really. That’s just what came to mind.”

“Freestyle, just now?!” 

Tony can’t tear out his notebook fast enough, transposing the notes steve had hummed onto the page. Steve finally looks something other than stubbornly angry or determined as Tony pries him for another verse, to repeat this melody, to hum that again.

For once, Steve finds himself following along with Tony, watching as his hand rushes to keep up with their conversation, as the notes spill across the page and Tony grabs his guitar half way through to pick his way through half written melodies. 

Tony’s dark hair is short, relatively speaking. It curls at his neck. But his dark, dark eyes are the same and his eyelashes sweep against his cheek as he leans over to check his fingering on the fret. He’s sitting cross legged and when he looks up to grin at Steve, Steve is already walking away. 

“He’s a genius!” Tony starts as he barrels into the jam room. 

“Ohoh?” Rhodey laughs and Pepper dutifully plays the rim shot as Tony slides his carry case off his shoulder.

“I’m not kidding, look, listen!” he demands

tony does his damndest to get steve to write songs for the band.  he reaches out and compliments him and buys him lunch, and new pencils, and compliments him some more and well, he’s out of practice with the whole shmoozing thing now. it’s fun though, and tony thinks steve at least enjoys the attention. 

at least steve enjoys the attention enough to keep brainstorming with tony as they go through their guitar lessons.  steve has a certain way of composing, tony notices.  he pulls notes from the air that tony wouldn’t choose, but it compliments the way he and rhodey and pepper play.  still, tony can’t help but think the notes are being written for someone else. 

tony knows this life can’t go on the way it has been.  He’s been expecting a shoe to drop for years now. but he’d been preparing for his father to fly in and tie him back down to the californian mansion, or maybe someone from his past coming in to wreck his life. 

he’d been a mess before the move. even after it.  he’s always expected it to catch up, or for his touch to ruin the good things in his life now.  between being half in love with the three people who care about him, and spending too long hoping three thousand miles was enough distance to outrun his past, tony knew his number would be coming up soon enough. 

at least he’d been happy for a while. truly, genuinely happy. 

he was the son of a household name, popular in the tabloids for getting in trouble, and the internet was forever he’d been told.  so he was prepared for the past to come up. 

He had just been expecting it to be his past to come knocking. 

bucky barnes is tall, broad, and missing one arm. he’d be impossible to miss and yet somehow tony didn’t notice six feet of pure american beef stalking across the campus. it must be the arm, or lack of arm. maybe how he kind of hunches down to hide it? 

He approaches with only the sound of boots to announce his presence and Tony looks up startled, but it’s only Steve this man has eyes for.

“That my guitar, Stevie?” 

Steve has kind of locked up, his fingers white against their grip on the guitar. His face is turned away, but Tony can see the tenseness of his thin shoulders.  Tony isn’t good for much, but he’s not gonna sit back while Steve faces whatever this is on his own. 

“Well, I don’t see you playing it anytime soon.” Tony says. 

It’s like shattering a mirror, the moment Tony sees the threads holding Steve snap.  He looks at Tony with something like disgust as he jolts to standing. “I’m sorry,” he says, before bolting. 

He leaves the guitar behind. Tony knows it wasn’t him that Steve was apologizing to.

“Was it something I said?” Tony asks the air. 

Tony doesn’t know his name yet, but Bucky Barnes takes the seat across from him.  

“Might’ve been me.” he says, like a confession. 

turns out bucky barnes and steve might’ve been a thing. tony finds out through less than reputable means, but bucky says himself steve feels guilty about the accident that led to bucky’s hospitalization and amputation.  

he used to play guitar

the one tony’s been thinking of as steve’s.  

bucky’s hand is callused the way a working man’s is.  If tony tried he could probably find the places strings wore at until they hardened, but tony doesn’t try.  he can imagine well enough.  like he can imagine the summers spent listening to guitar plucked on windowsills or whatever sickeningly cute domestic childhood things steve and bucky got up to

and, because tony’s never been one to let himself go without a good rubbing in, he’s found a couple ancient recording on the internet of bucky’s old high school recitals.  he can hear the strings of bucky’s guitar through the tinny audio and though and suddenly he knows just who’s fingers the notes for steve’s song was meant for.

tony won’t let steve go without a fight. whether the songs were meant for him to play or not, tony wants to play them.  he wants the chance.  so he drags bucky into the band whether anyone wants that or not. 

bucky can’t play the guitar--right now, tony suspects with enough research and bugging of that cute radiophyscist that could change--but he still wants to reconnect with steve and it’s easy enough to use that to tony’s advantage.  bucky’s kind of a puppy once you get past the six feet some inches and what seems like solid muscle. 

tony takes him aside one day, with his guitar and set him down. “listen,” he says, and plays the skeleton of the song steve had been helping write. 

bucky blinks, recognition in his eyes and tony nods as he plays.  bucky gets it, tony thinks.  steve is supposed to be writing these songs.  he’s good at it, in a way that tony thinks he used to be good at things. like he was creating something worthwhile. 

“this is steve’s?” bucky asks, softly. tony doesn’t have to answer him.  “I remember. it’s familiar like... hmm, how did it go...” bucky’s hand twitches like his fingers want to find a fret board. “like... i never liked the winter / the cold never leaves soon enough / and i’m tired of waiting / for the sun to call your bluff... something like that...” 

Tony’s fingers have stopped strumming, and he stares at Bucky with widened eyes. 

“what?” Bucky asks and Tony whips his arms out, gripping Bucky’s shoulders as if to stop him from bolting.

“you can sing. no one told me you could sing.”

“well, it’s nothing much.”

“No, shut up.  it’s amazing. you have to sing with us.”

It’s almost harder than convincing steve to write with him was. but eventually tony has all his pieces lined up.  steve writing songs, bucky singing. him, pepper and rhodey doing all the hard work. 

tony can sing, but he’s never been drawn to it the way he had been with playing guitar.  RIP to his father’s weird brand of masculinity, but tony just liked strings. Still, he knew enough to help bucky strengthen his voice. to sharpen his consonants and find where his head voice and chest voices lie.  

he plays scales on the guitar and leads bucky through vocal exercises.  It’s like working on fingerwork with steve, only bucky’s got less of a temper.  He’s surprisingly earnest, taking criticism easily and turning around with the proper work.  tony almost feels out of depth with the ease he has coaching bucky.  

where steve would shove and huff and yell when he didn’t get something right, bucky would nod and clear his throat and ask questions before trying again.  steve would roll his eyes and grab tony’s card so he could pay for his half of the lunch. bucky would smile that half smile and thank tony when he picked up the tab. 

it was cute. 

or, well. 

tony makes steve play the scales for bucky and spends a couple weeks jamming with just the band.  he’s rusty, he says, too much teaching means not enough practicing.  bucky seems understanding if melancholy and steve’s face is stubborn as always. 

it’s while all of them are in the jam room that pepper announces they have a gig in two months.  

“it’s a good opportunity to debut some of the new songs we’re working on.” she says. 

“we should start doing group practices at least twice a week,” rhodey says, narrowing his eyes at tony.  

“ah, we don’t actually have lyrics for most of our songs.” tony says, haphazardly. 

“we have some, you can teach bucky those. or you can sing them like always,” pepper says, brightly. 

Bucky seems to perk up, catching tony’s eye. “you have songs?” 

“nothing that special,” tony says. 

“I’d like to learn them with you,” bucky replies. tony blinks. 

“two months is enough time to write lyrics.” steve asserts. “bucky and i have been working on them anyways.” 

“okay.” tony finds himself agreeing with the rest of them. 

They spend some times going through their set list.  Pepper and rhodey bring up some songs they like that bucky and steve will need to learn. they rearrange the order to accommodate the new song steve and bucky have been working on. 

tony bites his lips.  it’s perfect.  steve writing songs for his band. bucky singing in his band.  pepper and rhodey, perfect and constant.  tony’s hands on the neck of his guitar. it’s as perfect as it can get. 

tony’s glad that the impending deadline is at least forcing steve and bucky to come head to head.  he doesn’t know what happened exactly, to drive a wedge between the two in the first place. he doesn’t want to ask. he doesn’t want to know. but being forced to volley lyric timing and melodies back and forth is eating away at the distance between them. 

it’s also driving home the fact that tony’s the last thing on either of their minds.  he can hear it in the chords he picks out, that steve has written for someone else’s hands. and even though he isn’t going to school for literature he can read symbolism when the lyrics are as plain as what bucky’s been mumbling under his breath for hours now. 

“i thought you were done marching to someone else’s tune.” pepper says to him as steve drags bucky through another practice. 

tony shrugs his shoulders. “i think... i think i’m happy we’re all here. together. i think this is happier than i’ve ever been.” he looks down at his hands.  he’s got the calluses from guitar blisters like every other wanna be rock star, but his hands are rough for other reasons.  his knuckles littered with scars from welding, his thumb and forefinger smooth in the places he’d strip wires.  there’s a burn on his palm from touching something that hadn’t quite cooled.  

he might’ve loved building once. that could have been his life. but he’s sure he would have missed out on this: real friends, who cared about him. who wanted to play with him.  he’s not sure he would have had that, if he’d stayed.  

it’s happier than he thinks he deserves, really. 

the date of the gig draws closer and while steve has been writing and rewriting the song chords--and tony and rhodey and pepper all drag themselves through rememorizing the new versions--bucky hasn’t submitted any lyrics.  

it’s troubling but tony can’t help but feel relieved each time practice comes and goes without bucky’s voice rising in some new chorus or verse. 

each time, tony claps his hand against bucky’s shoulder and grins at steve and says, “you can do it!”

“why don’t you help?” rhodey asks one time and tony shrugs. “i think they need it?” he answers. 

and, increasingly, tony is sure he doesn’t want to help write someone else’s love story.  it’s bad enough seeing steve strike through the tabs tony had just played and know it’s because he wasn’t doing it the way bucky would’ve. steve keeps writing for someone who won’t play again. 

tony doesn’t mind standing in that much. a replacement is what he’s been his whole life. 

but having to sit next to steve and bucky and help spell out why they’re having such trouble? tony’s never been a saint. he can’t just say “you like each other!” without any thought to himself. 

ah. 

he thought it. 

“it’s fine, we’ll just use the instrumental version and lead with Star Driver.” he says. 

“I’m fine with it,” Rhodey agrees. 

“Well, Bucky doesn’t have a part in Star Driver.” Pepper points out. 

“Ah, then we’ll start with uh, Monaco, Bucky you practiced the lead for that one, right?” 

Bucky nods but Steve cuts in. 

“why can’t we do it as planned? That’s the way we practiced!”

“because we spent the whole rehearsal playing the same first chords waiting for someone to start. We’re playing tomorrow, there’s no more time!” 

steve, angry faced as always, steps forward like his short, skinny body was ready to fight tony right then. 

“what happened to ‘you can do it!’ did you not actually believe that?”

“Steve, c’mon...”

“we’re out of time! it doesn’t matter if i believe in you or not if you don’t follow up yourselves!” tony says. 

pepper looks to the ceiling like a prayer.

steve scoffs, “it’s not like you ever believed in us in the first place! you just take whatever new shiny thing there is to put in your band so you don’t get bored and have to fly back to california!” 

tony’s fist clenches and rhodey pinches his nose.  

“we don’t have time for this,” rhodey says under his breath but no one listens. 

“whatever.” tony hisses and spins.

the next day is fraught with tension as they prepare for the show.  none of them are willing to back out, even if they’re a mess. 

“did we decide on a set list.” tony asks rhodey.

“well,” rhodey trails off. 

“we’re doing it as planned,” steve interrupts. 

tony gives him an unimpressed glare, “well, i’m good enough at improvising, whatever actually happens.” he says. 

steve clicks his tongue and turns back to his guitar, tuning it. 

tony pulls a face. he glances up at bucky in the middle of it, and feels kind of bad.  bucky’s been nothing but nice, it’s steve that has a bee in his bonnet. but tony’s words probably hit just as hard if not harder for bucky. 

tony clenches his jaw. 

“Ah, Bucky, I...” He trails off as Bucky meets his eyes.

tony can sing. he even writes lyrics.  he’s the front man of the band, or was before he drug bucky into it.  so of course, after steve and hummed the song to him the first time he’d written some lyrics on the back of a napkin because he couldn’t get it out of his head. and when bucky had started outlining a sketch of verse, tony’d rewritten those lyrics like the impressionable boy he’d tried to grow out of. 

he just likes playing guitar more.  he’s always like working with his hands more than talking in front of a crowd.  but as the hot, heavy lights turn on them, and the crowd in the cafe all face them he remembers the first time he’d ever played.  not just guitar but anything at all. 

plucking the ivory keys of a piano, the discordant clanging echoing through the big house.  his mother had clapped and he frozen up, suddenly frightened at the thought of someone looking at him, of seeing him maybe fail.  his mother had slid into the seat next to him, her finger showing him where to hit. 

his father had swung in and scoffed, said if he was old enough to fool around he was old enough to actually learn. none of this coddling, maria, get the boy a real tutor. 

Pepper taps her drumsticks and lays out, her foot keeping a steady beat. Tony automatically joins in, his fingers following muscle memory.  tony’s used to the lights now, he even likes it.  the heat and the attention. 

he hears steve join in, the dual guitar melody working even though steve isn’t very talented yet.  Rhodey jumps in, the bassline smooth and grounding.  

They play the intro, then loop it when bucky misses his cue.  the second time they loop tony glances away from the crowd to see bucky, sweating by the mic. he catches steve’s worried eyes, sees white knuckled fingers again, and he takes a step forward. 

he gets close enough to bucky he can lean into the mic, and bucky jumps at his presence.  tony grins at the crowd. this is planned, he says with his grin and waits until the cue comes up again. 

“how did it go?,” he says into the mic, “i never liked the winter, i’m tired of the sun. as days go on, i fall apart, and i thought this might be fun.” he steps back from the mic and plays breathing in for the next part. 

“I never liked the winter,” bucky’s voice cut in, and if tony hadn’t been expecting it, well. “the rain won’t go away. but it’s fine, you see, because this is just the start.” 

tony let his fingers follow the frets as he leaned into the song. it was a mistake not to practice this. it was a mistake letting bucky debut a song no one in the band had actually heard the full version of. but tony hadn’t been lying when he said he was good at improvising.  

he followed steve’s lead well enough--hell, he knew enough of steve’s style he could ape a riff or two if need be.  and he’d written down enough of bucky’s half thought poems mumbled through jam sessions that he might well have had the whole song compiled in his notebook somewhere. 

He leans back in for the chorus as bucky’s voice swelled. “And even if you let go, there’s something holding on to you!”

the concert is a blur, with the stage lights and the crowd.  tony backs off as bucky finds his feet, manages to get back to his own mic and sing back up from there. it isn’t like he’d imagined. somehow, there’s room on this stage.  hearing bucky sing, for real, for the first time. it’s tugging something inside tony’s chest.  and even though the riff he’s playing wasn’t written for him he finds that there’s a flair here and there, a little space for him to improvise. 

there’s a place for him here. 

he can hardly believe it’s over, just the cheers of the audience that make him aware that his fingers have stopped moving and no one is playing any more.  it’s a rush to get back stage where rhodey and pepper clap his back and yell, and bucky and steve both look ready to have some kind of attack.

“that was good, right?” bucky asks

“good?” steve says, incredulously.

“that was amazing!” tony exclaims. he throws his arms over both their shoulders. “that was something else!” he grins back at pepper at rhodey who are hugging as well. 

“i want to...” bucky starts, then stops. 

“play it again, right?” tony says.

steve is the one who answers yes. 

“we will! we have to!” tony shouts.  he can barely stop from jumping for literal joy.  the sweat under his shirt makes the fabric stick to him when he moves and now that he’s not under the stage lights his skin is chilling fast but hell if he can focus on that. 

“i want to write more songs.” bucky says

“i want to, too.” steve says and they both look at tony, like if he tells them yes or no they’ll listen. 

like maybe they want him to have a say in this.

“i want to play them,” tony answers. he bites his lips. 

“i want to play songs your write for me. and, i want to play songs we write together.” 

he closes his eyes, his heart pounding in his chest. he can feel it again, the weight of someone watching him, the potential of failing in front of someone he cared about, 

“okay,” 

he blinks his eyes open. steve is staring, stubborn and determined, into tony’s face, like tony was a new fingerstyle he had to learn. bucky looked slightly confused.

“i did write the song for you... well, you and steve but--” 

tony inhaled sharply, looking at bucky for what felt like the first time in a long while. exhaling, he lowered his face into his hands. “nooooooo.” he whined. 

“this is why you can’t have nice things, tony!” rhodey yelled from somewhere behind him. 

“you’re always over thinking it!” pepper agreed. 

someone’s hands patted him on the shoulder. “i thought you knew, you were there when i came up with the first lyrics,” 

tony shook his head. 

“it was pretty obvious,” that was steve.

tony stuck a hand out to swat him, but found it caught instead. he looked up. “i guess it’s my fault.” steve said, “i’m not good at explaining things.” 

“neither am i.” tony grinned. “but i think i get it now.” 

“good”

[imaginationintowords]

About Time.

Chris Evans x Reader fluff

word count: 1551

Requested.

Plot:  He and reader are co-stars in the MCU, and they kind of secretly like each other, but in denial. At a comic-con panel the cast give a few hints about them liking each other, and they later set them up together.

We were all backstage talking, killing time before our big comic con panel. I was talking with Elizabeth Olsen, Lizzy.

“Nervous?” she asked, nodding to my fidgety fingers.

“Just a little anxious. No matter how many times we do this, it won’t ever be ‘normal’.” I tell her. 

“You’re telling me.” someone says from behind me.

I turn around to be greeted by the ever so handsome, Chris Evans.

“Hey Chris.” I smiled, feeling a bit of my nerves fading away.

“If you get too anxious, just squeeze my hand. I’ll be right there to help.” he smiled.

“Thanks Chris.” I smiled, trying to fight the blush forming on my cheeks.

“Anything for you.” he winked, before grabbing a water bottle and joining Robert and Hemsworth’s conversation.

I couldn’t help the smile growing on my face, and the redness on my cheeks.

“Seriously [Y/N], I don’t know what you two are waiting for.” she says.

“What do you mean?” I ask confused.

“You, Chris, - wait. Are you being serious?” she says, even more confused than I am.

“I don’t have any clue as to what you’re talking about.” I tell her, still not getting it.

“Oh, sweet [Y/N]. You’ll get it eventually.” she said, patting my shoulder.

“Okay. Everyone, please line up. Five minutes!” a stage hand announced.

I got in my place in between Chris and Hemsworth.

As they began calling our names, we walked out to be greeted by a room full of screams.

“You good?” Chris turned around and asked me.

“Yeah. I’m good.” I smiled.

“Now you know him as Captain America, please welcome Chris Evans!” the moderator announced.

“Show time.” Chris says, before walking out.

“Now introducing the talented, and wonderful [Y/N]!”

You walked out smiling and waving to the sea of people, making your towards your seat next to Chris.

----

Everything was going smoothly, we were about an hour into the panel, and it was time for audience questions. Those always make me the most nervous, because you never know what they’re going to ask.

“Can we expect any new romances?” a fan asked.

“Great question! Perfect for Evans, and [Y/N] to answer, since they know all about romances.” Robert says winking towards us.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Chris nervously laughed.

“Oh. Just that you and  [Y/N] have first hand experience in that department.” Robert teases, causing the crowd to erupt.

"I think what Robert means, is that our characters have a romantic history." I quickly say, to get the focus back on track.

"Yeah, that's exactly what he meant." Scarlet sarcastically says, quietly into the microphone.

"Right. Our characters romance has been hinted at since the end of Age of Ultron." Chris says, ignoring Scarlet's remark.

"The kiss!" someone shouted from the crowd.

"Ah the kiss, right." Chris says, remembering that fan favorite moment.

"Steamy kiss. Had the whole crew shook up." Hemsworth said.

"Had to hose these two down afterwards." he continued to tease, getting the exact response he wanted from the crowd.

I rolled my eyes at his comment.

"I really thought these two were going to take it back to their trailer." Robert jokes.

"Robert!" I shrieked, in complete shock.

"Hey. It was a nice, hot steamy kiss, you two should be very proud of yourselves." Robert raised his hands in defense.

"Okay. Okay. Knock it off you two. Give the lovebirds a break." Elizabeth says, clapping her hands to get everyone's attention.

"We're not lovebirds." I cautiously say.

"Yeah. [y/n] and I are just friends. The second you hear action, you just get lost in your characters." Chris said, smiling at me.

"Exactly. And I think you'll see that in this new movie also. The differences between Steve and Charlotte, and the dynamics of their relationship, and how it all plays out." I finish off the answer.

------

The rest of the panel went by smoothly, the comments towards Chris’ and I calmed down, thankfully.

We all made our way back to the backstage area.

“Some panel, huh.” Chris asked as we made our way to the craft’s table.

“Yeah. For the most part, I think it went smoothly.” I laugh.

“Once we got the children off a certain topic.” he smiles, as Elizabeth came up to us.

“Hey you two. Me and the rest of the crew were going to dinner later tonight. You two in?” she asks us.

“Sounds good to me.” I say.

“Same here.” Chris agrees.

“Perfect. I’ll text you two the time and the place.”

------

I got to the restaurant at the same time as Chris.

“Hey. Are we the first ones to arrive?” I asked him as we stepped into the restaurant.

“Looks that way.” he said looking around for the rest of the group, as we walked up to the hostess podium.

“Hi. We are here under the Robert reservation.” I tell her.

“Ah yes. Robert for two.” she tells us.

“Uh. No. It should actually be a bigger party. Around 15.” I tell her, sharing a confused look with Chris, as he checks his phone.

“I’m sorry. We only have it down for two.” she apologizes, flipping through her reservations book.

“That can’t be right.” I turn towards Chris.

“Actually, it is. Looks like everyone cancelled.” he said showing me the group chat.

“What a coincidence.” I sarcastically say.

“Will you two still be joining us for dinner tonight?” the hostess asks.

“Might as well. Since we’re here.” Chris shrugs.

“Wouldn’t hurt.” I smiled up at him.

The hostess lead us through the restaurant to our table. Chris had his hand placed on my lower back as we walked through, I could feel the goosebumps take over my body.

“You look really nice tonight.” Chris comments, once we are seated.

“Thank-you. So do you.” I blushed, glancing down at the menu.

------

A few drinks, a full meal, and many laughs later, Chris and I decided to walk the short distance back to our hotel.

“It’s such a nice night out.” I say glancing up at the sky, rubbing my arms as I feel a cold chill.

“Are you cold? Here take my jacket.” Chris said, taking off his jacket before I could protest.

“Thanks.” I smile at him, and he winks back.

“So, do you really think it was a coincidence that everyone magically cancelled tonight?” he asks, walking very closely to me.

“After what happened at today’s panel? I’m going to have to say no.” I laugh.

“Those guys, will be the death of us.” He shakes his head playfully.

“I mean, they weren’t wrong.” I tell him.

“About what?” he asked.

“I mean, that kiss was a pretty steamy one.” I playfully nudge him, causing him to let out a loud laugh.

“It was, wasn’t it.” he agreed.

There was a comfortable silence that fell between us as we walked.

"I'm glad we had tonight." Chris said after awhile.

"Me too. I had a really great time. It's not everyday I get to have dinner with great company."

"Oh, come on. I'm sure men are knocking down your door to take you out." he says.

"You would think so, but no." I lightly laugh at his assumption.

"Seriously?" he asked flabbergasted.

"Don't be so surprised. These days men are either intimidated by your success, or by your independence." I explain to him.

"Well there loss. They're missing out on someone truly wonderful." he smiles at me.

"Thanks, but you have to say that. We're friends." I blush, pushing away the butterfly feeling in my stomach.

"Yeah. Friends." he sighs.

"What if we weren't just friends?" Chris asks after a few seconds of silence, stopping a few feet from our hotel.

"What?" I asked confused, and stopping next to him.

"What if we weren't just friends. What if we had more nights like tonight." he says.

"I"m sorry. I'm confused." I say, feeling a little lightheaded.

"I mean we both had a great night, right. We've known each other for years. It's not this crazy coincidence that everyone cancelled. They've teased our relationship since our first scene together. We get along great." He says wholeheartedly.

"I'm not intimidated by you. Hell, I admire all those things about you and more. I think you're fucking incredible. I always tried to push those feelings away because, why would anyone as wonderful as you want to be with someone like me? But after tonight, if I don't go for it, I might always wonder what could've been. And I've been imaging what if's since I first met you. I'm done being afraid because I now know what I've been missing." he passionately continues, catching me off guard, but making my heart leap.

I can feel my eyes begin to water.

"I know this may all be too much, but I couldn't hold it in any longer." he finishes.

I'm at a lost for words, so I do the only thing I can think of.

I stood on the tip of my toes, and reached for the back of his head, gently crashing my lips against his. I could sense the surprise coming from him, but he quickly regained composure and began to kiss back. I could feel him wrapping his arms around my waist, pulling me in closer.

There we stood for awhile, my arms around his neck, just kissing. Enjoying this moment that took us too long to get to.

After awhile we both pulled back with matching smiles on our faces.

"I'll take that as you feel the same way." he whispers.

"I feel the same way." I whisper back, pressing another kiss to his lips.

"I guess we'll have to thank the guys later." he says, causing me to laugh lightly.

"They're never going to let us live this down." I say, feeling the smile on my face growing by the second.

"We'll be able to manage." he smiles, leaning in for another kiss.

[pr-ay-the-gay-away]

There's so much Brie Larson hate that it's crazy. I've not seen this much hate for a specific actress from so many people for a long time. I don't really know anything about her besides the fact that she's in the Marvel movies. I searched up her name on YouTube and almost all of the videos that came up were videos about how the cast hate her and that she's unlikeable and arrogant. I feel out of the loop. Apparently, she said something racist and sexist, but I don't know what? What did she do?

“Apparently, she said something racist and sexist, but I don’t know what? What did she do?”

The full on anti-Brie Larson hater-bandwagon campaign was in response to this speech.

“I searched up her name on YouTube and almost all of the videos that came up were videos about how the cast hate her and that she’s unlikeable and arrogant”

(Pro-tip: install a browser extension to block YouTube channels, and do that. No-one needs all of that vitriol in their life)

The reason you’re seeing a lot of these videos in the search results is because a lot of conservative couch-commentators are producing “analysis” videos in response to every bit of new media that has Brie in it. These couch-commentators are basically projecting their own prejudice against Brie onto every interaction or conversation that she’s involved in - they want to see everyone else around her hating her, because they want to feel validated in their own hatred.

It’s exactly like if you took a toxic delusional Camilizer and handed them a webcam and microphone - you’d get plenty of idiotic “analysis” videos of how the other girls in 5H “hated” Camila (or just reverse it so it’s some toxic delusional OT4 stan making the same content about how Camila was an epic bitch) LOLS.

We’ve seen this kind of bullshit before in the 5H fandom. The difference is that the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) has a much much much (much much much) larger reach.

Two key takeaways from me; one comforting, the other cautionary:

1) Comforting thought: unless you live in a deeply conservative, already kinda low-key racist and misogynistic area (sorry to you if you do) most of the general public/casual fans of the MCU aren’t massively hating on Brie at all. Remember that people are entitled to their opinions when it comes to creative content, and if they struggle to access Captain Marvel, that’s their own deal. But as long as they’re not personally attacking Brie and making it about the misconceived notions of what she’s like as a person off-screen, try to give those people a bit of a break, but also ask that they do the same for you - you are totally entitled to love Captain Marvel without having to qualify it to others, but likewise, they are not required to qualify their critique of the movie to you. If you’re both willing to share your respective opinions and critiques and perspectives, that’s pretty much a sign of a functioning healthy respectful relationship.

2) Now the cautionary: the vocal anti-Brie rage machines who scream “reverse-racism!” and “reverse-sexism!” (honestly FFS give me a fucking break LOLs) are very much in the minority. Unfortunately they are also very vocal. And their voices are amplified due to the reach and accessibility of digital media platforms. These angry talking heads have taken to social media for a reason. You know how regular people (probably much like yourself) are incredibly weary of what they share and express on social media because of the high likelihood of whatever being shared could be misinterpreted and thus create unintended discord and disagreements? Well that is exactly the reason why these types of vocal anti-Brie rage machines post inflammatory vitriolic rants online. Their whole intention is to invite responses and to incite disagreements. In their minds, being publicly disagreed with is validation that they are fighting some kind of righteous fight.

You will not tackle this problem by entering into an argument with someone who was trolling around looking to start one in the first place.

Stop commenting on these vitriolic angry rant videos with your logic and reason. You’re not going to change their stance, they’re just looking to fight with you. Stop sharing your retort to these videos within your own sheltered social spaces - you’re not changing anyone else’s mind within your own network, you’re just preaching to the choir - what you ARE doing is exposing your sheltered little bubble of like-minded people to a polarizing extremist minority view, which only serves as a straw man to reinforce your own unconscious biases about what the world is like and who it’s comprised of. It’s just quick and easy validation for yourself, nothing else, nothing actually constructive or progressive (and it’s actually an exact mirror of what these haters are doing on YouTube, they’re just happy to broadcast more widely)

Instead of focusing on the couch-commentators who are hell bent on spreading their vitriol in the name of their righteous hatred for others, focus instead on the people who you can influence.

Do you have friends or family members who have bought into the anti-Brie sentiment? Converse with them. Like, actually converse. That means listening to them, acknowledging what they’ve shared, and raising your own sentiments and experiences and knowledge with them respectfully. Consider that there might be concessions to be made on both sides. Maybe someone has taken Brie’s comments personally because of something that has happened to them in real life - try to understand what that experience was for them and how it has affected them. Acknowledge their experiences, and try to find a constructive way forward from there.

If you have friends who are critical of Captain Marvel, don’t immediately jump to the conclusion that they must also hate Brie Larson and strong female characters and just women in general. Try to converse with them through their critique, as well as sharing your own. Maybe agree to disagree on some things. It’s entirely possible that you experience films and narratives very differently to others - this is completely normal. I cannot possibly experience Black Panther on the same level that a black person might. Acknowledge that some men (and even some women) are, from their own personal experiences, unable to experience Captain Marvel on the same level that a lot of women do. But those same people, if they are looking to show you the same respect, need to acknowledge that your experience is valid too.

If you’re lucky, like me, and you live in a progressive, liberal society, you’re going to mostly be responsible for checking your own defensiveness when it comes to men saying that they didn’t think Captain Marvel was great (or maybe they just simply don’t care as much). Yes, this is effort on your part.

If you live in a more conservative society where people around you are jumping pretty blindly onto the anti-Brie bandwagon because **stage whispers** they’re actually kinda already bigoted, unfortunately it’s going to be even greater effort for you. And honestly, I don’t know what that’s like, so maybe in some cases you actually just need to set your own boundaries. If there are people who are unwilling to engage in respectful discourse with you, you probably need to make the decision to not engage with them at all.

[itsclydebitches]

Whats your solution then? Does it have to be a 50/50 divide with genders at all times in all franchises or it's problematical? Will you not be satisfied until that happens? Franchises can be male or female dominated, but that doesn't mean the other gender isn't part of the intended audience. I don't think women being side characters is anymore a problem then a story where men are side characters. It's fine either way so I don't see the problem.

No, it doesn’t have to be an exact 50/50 split. It’s just a matter of incorporating women and giving their characters the same sort of attention you’d give to the men, especially when your story proposes to be sampling objectively from the population. Meaning, a story about an all boys school is obviously going to feature mostly guys. That makes sense. A story about heroes across the multiverse? People rightfully want to know why the majority of the heroes across the cosmos are men. Why the few women we get aren’t nearly as fleshed out. Why, when it’s clear that there are so many women Marvel fans out there and they’re clamoring for some rep---just look at the years-long call for our Black Widow movie---and the franchise isn’t thrilled to deliver? You ask why that is and it sends a message. 

We’re getting better. Each year Hollywood has more women in lead roles, more diversity casting, more minorities behind the scenes, but that sort of change only happens because people challenge the status quo in the first place. They point out where our media can continue to grow. RWBY arguably has a lot of the sort of equality we’re looking for, in that although our four main protagonists are all women, the series still spends a lot of time fleshing out Jaune, Qrow, Oz, Oscar, Ren, Ironwood, Roman, Sun, Adam, in a way that the MCU hasn’t done for most of its women. I can write you up a whole character study on Jaune, everything from his history to his interests to his personal goals; I can give you a basic fact-list for characters like Nat, Gamora, or Wanda. I do love DBZ, HxH, BNHA, etc. but that’s also a very important conversation to have: asking why so much action-centric anime follow men’s stories. There’s a reason why Buffy, RWBY, She-Ra, and other female led adventure stories still feel new to us. It’s still a refreshing surprise when we see them heading the fight. Just because I haven’t written those other shows off or produced scathing metas on their (mostly non-Western) gender issues doesn’t mean those issues don’t exist. As said, you can like something while also being critical of it and if I refused to watch things that were male dominated I’d be eliminating a LOT of my options, especially when it comes to action-adventure and science fiction. Which is precisely the point. 

Gender in the MCU felt like something worth mentioning because gender in the MCU is currently very relevant. It’s the end of a cinematic era, this movie is impacting popular culture in a way few films ever will, and a lot of people aren’t happy with how that film treated its women. A lot of people are happy, but just because some are ignorant of or don’t care about those issues doesn’t mean they cease to exist. And if I spoke about every single issue in every piece of media I consumed... I’d need a whole lot more time on my hands lol. 

[happinessinthedarkest-times]

avengers endgame reaction (spoilers!!!)

**if youre on mobile scroll fast bc idk if the keep reading works

holy shit holy shit fuck fuck fuck

i am an emotional wreak right now

ahhhhh it was so good im crying still

tony fucking stark my heart i guess ill start there 

tony stark i love you three thousand. he got his happy ending with morgan and pepper for 5 years they had 5 years together and he knew that the time heist (lol) would jeopardize that and he still went and helped

that scene where he had it out with steve at the beginning fuck my heart was breaking and i was crying .

i cried a lot in this movie. legit sobbing when nat died but ill get to that

that scene was everything i wanted it to be and perfectly executed. of course hes angry and lashing out because they were supposed to do it together and lose together and the emotion behind that ughh rdj killed it

he literally hands steve his heart the arch reactor

tony and howard ugh everything with them together. tony got closure with his dad 

everything tony was great. 

steve 

he got his happy ending. he got his dance with peggy (now im crying again) fuck. and he PICK UP MJOLNIR omg that scene was amazing and everything i never dreamed could happen when the hammer started moving ughhhh omg i was cheering so loud in the theatre and i dont normally do that. that whole scene ugh theres so much to react to

and he got to say assemble. 

ok now from the beginning. 

i started to cry literally before it even started. the screen was black and i was already tearing up but when clint and his daughter came up and then his family disappeared i was full on crying.

carol coming in clutch and saving tony and nebula yessss

steve and tony’s conversation right when he gets off the ship was everything i wanted it to be. (crying again) everything. 

when they go to thanos’s house thing and thor chops off his arm . its what ive been saying they shouldve done on titan 

and then he went for the head! 

five....... 

years later

fuck them. literally when the ‘five’ came up i was like no no no dont you dare do it dont you dare and then they did it. fuck them

five fucking years?!?! they made them live through 5 years of that trauma?!?!? 

nat was everything in this film. she became the leader and keeping track of everything and her moment of breaking down was just so human. she couldnt move on in those 5 years and it just shows how much the avengers had become her family. 

scott and cassie omg cassie all grown up made me so emotional 

tony and morgan i love you three thousand she is the cutest and sweetest thing 

tony fucking stark figured out time travel. he did that. 

when tony gives steve his shield back my heart could not take it

the scenes where they were trying to pinpoint the exact time to go back and it was like a sleepover sesh and all the domestic avenger fanfics 

going back a little bit

clint killing all the people that should have been killed and deserved to be killed and being a total badass showing up all those people who said he was just really good with an arrow and every scene he has with nat.

‘dont give me hope’

thor. oh where to start. he really did lose everything and he was blaming himself for all that happened so i get where hes coming from. every time you could see him remembering and tormenting himself about what happened broke me. his scene with his mother (crying again)

also hulk/bruce was an interesting choice (not a huge fan of it but ok) 

the time traveling

everything about the new york scenes were amazing. the aftermath of the end of the avengers, loki turning into cap for a second, seeing rumlow and sitwell come out, steve getting into the elevator and channeling that winter soldier energy (i was slapping my sister on the arm so hard at this part) hail hydra and outsmarting them all. cap fighting cap “i can do this all day” lmao i was dying ‘bucky is alive” again dying they really nailed it with this. i was worried beforehand because like it would change how we would see the og avengers but i still think it works

also can talk about how tony (and scott) was checking out steves ass????

“i forgot how that suit did nothing for you ass” (be still my heart) “i like to think of it at america’s ass” (or whatever the line was) 

loki getting away with the tesseract (is that in this timeline im confused about that hopefully someone will explain bc does that mean loki is alive in this timeline or not? lol)

them going back to the 1970s (do you trust me? i do) and tony meeting howard and introducing himself as howard potts. again i know i talked about howard and tony already but i loved their scenes. and JARVIS FROM AGENT CARTER MAKING AN APPEARANCE OMG

PEGGYYYYYYY (crying) when steve walked into her office (grabbed my sister again) and when he was watching her through the window and you could feel his pain. 

thor and rocket are the pairing that i never imagined but amazing none the less. i loved that we got the return of mjolnir here even though idk what that does to the timeline (again who knows at this point) 

rhodey and nebula again another pairing i didnt expect but are great together. everything about nebula in this film. she really has a great arch. i was stressing out so hard when the alternate timeline thanos found out that they came from the past. the scene where peter quill is dancing and singing to no music was great.

clint and natasha. this pairing thie duo the og. fuck my heart. when they started going off to vormir i knew. i knew it and i cannot handle it. the whole scene where they are fighting each other to sacrifice themself i was SOBBING. LEGIT SOBBING. ‘let me go’ i loved this so much and also hated it. she deserved her happy ending too. after everything she gave up everything to save those people. her arch is so good too. im excited for her origin. i kinda want to see her when shes a bad guy and killing everyone and her journey to shield. i hope thats what we’ll see in her movie. 

but also that scene emotionally fucked me up hard. 

the og avengers (minus nat) sitting on the edge of the lake 

thor trying to put on the glove and redeem himself (in his own eyes not my own bc he doesnt deserve the shit he gets for not going for the head)

hulk doing it and the calm before the storm where everything goes back before that missile comes firing down. 

steve tony and thor facing off with thanos. everything about this scene. tony getting a juice-up from thor and lightning to max out his powers. steve jump kicking on thanos’s ass. thanos beating up thor and steve coming in with FUCKING MJOLNIR AGAIN CANNOT STRESS ENOUGH HOW MUCH I WAS CHEERING AT THIS POINT HE IS WORTHY MY BOY STEVE IS WORTHY

also on that note tony coming up to steve and saying “theres my man” or something and giving him back his shield again. 

steve standing there with his broken shield ready to face off with thanos’s army and sam coming in on the comm. and then EVERYONE COMING THRU AND KICKING NAMES AND TAKING ASS

legit cheering and crying so much 

valkyrie with her pegasus

shuri with her blasters 

peter parker and his reunion with tony was heartbreaking. tony looked so broken and complete at the same time. he got him back. 

PEPPER FREAKING POTTS 

AVENGERS ASSEMBLE (YEESSSSSSSS)

peter quill’s semi-reunion with gamora and how she doesnt know him but he gets her back

also gamora, nebula and still-evil!nebula was a great scene. nebula killing her past self is some symbolic shit right there AND to protect her sister who she hated

CAROL FUCKING DANVERS COMING TO SAVE THE DAY AND KICK THANOS’S ASS 

im sad that she wasn’t in the film as much but i get why they did it and it also makes me really excited for her future films

but carol getting the gauntlet and peter saying “i dont know how youre gonna get through that” 

and ALL THE BADASS MCU WOMEN COMING UP BEHIND HER READY TO FIGHT AND REPRESENT FOR THE FEMALES (CRYING) 

this is something that couldn’t of been done a few years ago because there weren’t a lot of female superheroes in this universe and just the fact that this scene can make such an impression and become probably one of the most badass scenes of the mcu is one of the best things that came out of this movie.

side note: ‘activate instant kill’ great callback 

and then we get to the sacrifice.

i knew it. i expected it. i read it in fanfics.

i was still not prepared. 

‘I am inevitable’

‘I AM IRON MAN’

FUCKKKKKKKK they really know how to write these movies. 

he knew he would die. he knew he would never see morgan again. but he knew what he had to do. 

his character arch from a selfish man to a selfless man has been the most profound and powerful story. 

rdj and tony stark have really carried this franchise. they were the start. and it makes sense that his death closes out this era of the mcu. 

to rdj: i will never forgive my mom for telling me that she didn’t like you way back when. that really influenced how i thought about you and about tony stark for years. and i limited me from really appreciating and loving iron man and those movies and tony’s character. but as i continued to watch more of you in the mcu and in real life and have seen how you have grown and who you are today, i have so much love and respect for you and your character. im just so upset at the time i lost where i could have fallen even more in love with you. thank you so much for everything you have done over the last 11 years for this franchise. thank you for the time thank you for the memories and the laughs. the journey has been amazing. 

the funeral scene with ‘proof that tony stark has a heart’ 

(also was the the kid from iron man 3 in the back?)

VALKYRIE BECOMING KING (queen? i say king but who knows) of new asgard. look at my killing baby all grown up and being the leader they need.

thor becoming a guardian basically. 

also was quill looking for his gamora? where was the gamora from this timeline on the ship? she wasn’t there in the scene so idk

also fighting with knives to see whos in charge lol

im glad people mentioned/mourned for nat too 

steve rogers 

steve.

i knew he wasn’t coming back.

bucky knew it too.

im wreaked

but at least he got his happy ending. he got his peggy (again idk what that does to her timeline) 

captain sam wilson america in the house.

(old steve looks like joe biden or is it just me lol)

they ended it with a steggy dance and kiss

it really was a perfect end to his story and it wrapped up his character really well. he got that life he deserved 

to chris evans: as this is probably the last time we will see you as captain america let me thank you too for the years and joy that you have brought to my life. youre it for me. you are the reason i became so invested in this world. when you jumped on the fake grenade i was in it with you. chris you are and will always be the best chris in my heart. your passion for this character and understanding of steve rogers and his motivations have created such a memorable performance. steve rogers will always be the og. he will always have my heart. i am so thankful that you took this opportunity and used it and made this character your own. you live up to the standards that steve holds for himself and i am so excited for your future. i am also so glad that you didn’t die in this movie bc i definitely could not have handled it if i had to watch both my favs die. i love you three thousand.

i literally cried throughout the whole movie. there were laughs, cheers, groans, stress, tears, and love throughout this film. i am so grateful that i am alive during this time in cinematic history. there will never be something as great or momentous as this film. a true culmination of 22 films. its never been done and i doubt itll ever be done again

i am also so impressed and amazed by how well this film turned out. it is just amazing how everything fell into place 

im sure ill read other people’s reactions and they will bring up points or problematic things that will taint my view on this movie but i dont want that to ruin my own experience

and for me, this was truly emotionally draining and fulfilling. the feeling of being in that theatre with all those people who love the characters as much as i do and experiencing this film for the first time is something i will never forget. 

people talk about how they remember lining up for star wars.

well i remember sobbing my eyes out when nat died, cheering along with everyone when cap picked up mjolnir and whipped thanos’s ass with it and when carol and the rest of the badass women of the mcu ready to kick ass, crying with everyone as the light went out in tony’s chest and eyes, watching as history was made in front of our eyes.

and the end credits with the og avengers getting recognition with their photos and autographs. 

i love this franchise and these films and these characters i dont know who i would be without them. 

one last thing

thank you to the og avengers. steve tony thor nat clint bruce. chris robert chris scarlett jeremy mark. you will always have a special place in my heart. you were there at the start. you were the reason this all could happen you were the reason i became so invested in these movies. you brought these characters to life and embodied them. you are all so much like your characters the casting is perfect. thank you for your dedication to your work to you fans and to your characters. it means so much that you all stuck through this together and that you are such great friends in real life and i can only hope that one day i can be so lucky as to meet you all and thank you in person. 

[tomeandflickcorner]

Jericho, Mad Beauty, and Thor for the ask

Whoa, I almost forgot about this!

Jericho-

Favorite character: Tie between Jake and Gail

Least Favorite character: Um...hard to say.  There weren’t any characters that made me groan whenever they popped up.  Though Gray Anderson came close, so I guess I’ll go with him

5 Favorite ships (canon or non-canon): Jake/Emily, Johnston/Gail, Robert/Darcy, Stanley/Mimi and Heather/Beck

Character I find most attractive: Hard to say.  Though I can see why people might find Jake and Emily attractive

Character I would marry: LOL.  Well, all the ‘eligible’ men on the show seemed to be taken, don’t they?  So there’s not much to chose from

Character I would be best friends with: I wanna say Heather.  She was pretty cool

a random thought: I think, at one point, it was mentioned that one of the deputy’s kids was sick with something.  I remember thinking if that was going to be relevant, but it was never brought up again

An unpopular opinion: I don’t think the show did a proper job at explaining why Johnston and Eric held such a negative opinion of Jake at the start of the show.  I got that Jake was basically the town’s ‘bad boy’ back in the day, but... they way they acted towards him when he came back into town seemed a bit mean spirited to me  

My Canon OTP: Jake and Emily

My Non-canon OTP: IDK.  Maybe April and Russel?

Most Badass Character: Gotta go with Robert.  No offence to Jake, of course.  But between the two of them, Robert is the one I’d actively avoid trying to tick off

Most Epic Villain: John Gotez

Pairing I am not a fan of: Maybe Eric and Mary.  While I didn’t actively hate it, I was mostly indifferent to them and pretty much fell asleep during their scenes

Character I feel the writers screwed up (in one way or another): April. hands down

Favorite Friendship: Jake and Robert.

Character I most identify with: Not sure.

Character I wish I could be: I’m drawing a blank, I’m afraid

Mad Beauty-

When I started shipping them: Hard to pinpoint the exact date.  It started off when I saw a post mentioning the pairing, and I was intrigued by the concept.  But the more I thought about it, the more I realized I liked it.  Before I knew it, I was Mad Beauty trash

My thoughts: I just think they make the most sense.  All things considered, Jefferson and Belle probably suffered the most during the course of the Dark Curse that created Storybrooke.  Jefferson was forced to spend nearly three decades watching his beloved daughter from afar, knowing he couldn’t approach her because she didn’t remember him.  Not to mention how he was the only one in town who remembered the truth but knew he couldn’t tell anyone on account of how nobody would believe him.  As for Belle, she spent all that time confined in her cell in the psychiatric ward, where her only human contact were the orderlies who brought her food and whatnot.  She never received any visitors during that time and I doubt the orderlies bothered striking up a conversation with her.  To top it off, if her behavior when she was forced over the town line were any indication, she probably had absolutely no memories, either real or faked, to revisit while in confinement.  While the show never addressed it, I firmly believe that Belle was probably in serious need of therapy when the curse broke.  Apart from that, there’s the fact that Belle was a young woman who clearly craved adventure and wanted to see the world.  Jefferson, who had spent quite a few years as a portal jumper with the use of his magic hat, has most likely visited more realms in the multiverse than anyone else in the show.  So he’d be perfectly suited to be Belle’s personal guide to each and every one of those realms, giving her the world tour she’d always yearned for.  And then there’s Grace.  I think we all can agree that Grace is Jefferson’s top priority.  Can you imagine how much Jefferson would love to see Belle and Grace interact and bond?  Because it’s obvious they would.  Especially since they both know what it’s like to lose their mother through tragic circumstances.  Plus, both Jefferson and Belle are characters with a strong association with tea.  I cannot erase the mental image of all three of them sitting down to a tea party.

What makes me happy about them: That I can write about them.  Writing for this paring is almost as fun as writing about Captain Swan, my top OTP

What makes me sad about them: That this particular ship is so uncommon.  It’s rare to find another Mad Beauty shipper.  That and the fact that it will never be canon

Things done in fanfic that annoys me: Well, there are very few Mad Beauty fics out there, so I suppose the lack of them counts as an annoyance.  Especially since most of the available ones seem more about Rumbelle, based on the fic summaries

Things I look for in fanfic: For it to actually exist (lol)

My wishlist: Don’t think I have one

Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other: Not sure with Jefferson, since we hardly saw him interacting with anyone in canon, but Belle is my multi-ship.  I’d be happy to see her with anyone who deserves her, really  (Including Gold, as long as he actually got his act together first and quit being such a manipulative a-hole)

My happily ever after for them: Ah, but that would be a major spoiler for the fifth and final installment of my canon divergence series, wouldn’t it?

Thor-

How I feel about this character: Overall, I like him.  While I wouldn’t say he’s my favorite character, I’ve always enjoyed his presence.  He just strikes me as someone who’d be a lot of fun to be around

Any/all the people I ship romantically with this character: Jane Foster.  And maybe Lady Sif as a ‘we dated as kids/teenagers but then broke up amicably’ kind of deal

My favorite non-romantic relationship for this character: Loki and/or Valkyrie 

My unpopular opinion about this character: His intelligence seemed to be a bit inconsistent at times.  (Really, he knows about emails, but doesn’t know you need a computer to access them?)  It’s a bit frustrating, because he is clearly an intelligent man

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon: That he hadn’t broken up with Jane.  Whose bright idea was that?

Favorite friendship for this character: It’s a toss-up between Steve and Darcy Lewis

My crossover ship: Does paring him with Ororo Munro/Storm count as a crossover?  I mean, they’ve both technically Marvel characters, but so far, the X-Men aren’t a thing in the MCU

Send me a Number

[asagimeta]

Ok so I never do movie break-downs/reveiws but Endgame is a one in a million type of thing, not only the end of an era, but the end of the era that started the enture connected-universe film genre, so I'm allowing myself because this moment is literally something we'll never have again, there is never going to be a "first" end of era again, sure some day the DCEU will do this, The Conjuring verse may do this, Arrowverse will actually do this next fall with Infinite Crisis, etc, but... this truly will be the only "first" time we get this end of era and I have Opinions so follow me down the rabbit hole

I'm only touching on a few points, as a head's up, and I generally really enjoyed the movie! I don't have the time or patience to type out everything I liked about it so there may seem like there's more criticism than praise but I promise you, I thoroughly enjoyed this and thought it was the best of the four Avengers movies by far

-I think my biggest complaint is the bullshit about the soul stone, for two reasons:

1. As a plot point, the soul stone decision being irreversable is just kind of ... weird, mostly because we don't have that much information on how it works, so it feels a little "stakes for the sake of stakes" to me

2. Are you really telling me that the only two people that had no chance of coming back are two of the only main female charectors the MCU has? Are you really, honestly, telling me that?

The MCU has gotten some more supporting female charectors and that's great but Nat and Gamora were only two of a very small feild of actual female LEADS, Mantis and Valkyrie and The Wasp and so on are great charectors but they aren't leads, and I feel like it was just a really bad decision on the filmmakers' parts to choose specifically those two and ONLY those two, it would have eased things a little if they had either brought back the original Gamora (and I'll touch on why this bothers me later) or if they had had a male involved in the Irreversable Soul Stone Death thing, it just feels frustratingly like fridging (I know it isn't but it feels that way) because there really honestly were other ways to go about it, Gamora being sacrificed in Infinity War was pretty unavoidable, but they didn't have to do Nat like that, and even if they did- because I do understand from a story perspective why they would- the ideal thing to do would have been to literally trade one soul for another, the soul stone only needs one soul to operate right? So when Natasha died, shouldn't Gamora have come back out of that thing? That would have been the ideal way to shift it in my opinion, it would create the kind of paradox that would make it impossible for Natasha to just snap back to existence (thus providing real stakes) but without the frustration of our only Gamora being AU!Gamora

And AU!Gamora is a PROBLEM

All of the development Gamora got in the first two Guardians movies is gone now, what she had with Peter is gone, what she had with Nebula is gone, her feelings of having a real family is gone.... and even if AU!Gamora builds those relationships anew, it's not going to be the same, she's working from scratch so she may as well be a new charector, and the fact that the Guardians and Nebula are already established makes it impossible for Gamora to form into the team the way she originally did, she's no longer one of the founding members with Peter, she's now an outsider being pulled into an existing group, she'll never understand the pain Nebula had been in when they fought because Nebula cares about her now and isn't going to fight her and thus express those feelings, she's never going to see just how badly Peter's father fucks him up or watch Peter sacrifice himself (ish) for the power stone because both of those are resolved issues now.....

The Gamora we knew and loved IS dead, we're working with a new one, and although I feel like Guardians 3 is going to be about finding and recruiting her, it still won't be the same and that's very frustrating

-On the topic of how things work, are you really telling me that after all of the "We have to be very carefull not to mess with the past" discussions, Steve just....... Did That? He really just lived an entire ass life mucking around with the past and having exactly zero consequences? Particularly, with Peggy, who we know for a fact was involved in major ways with Sheild? Like, I'm not speaking as a Captain America fan when I ask this, I'm legitimately confused as to why there was so much emphasis on "don't mess with the past" only for people to repeatedly do that, but ESPECIALLY Steve, it can kind of be excused to allow things like Tony talking to his dad- who doesn't know who he is- or Thor talking to his mom- who made it clear that she wasn't going to fight her fate even though she could- but Steve is just a big ol' block of confusion

Not only the Peggy thing, we could maybe excuse that, but he told his past self that Bucky was alive and his past self just... what...? Forgot??? How is it that he made such a significant change to his former self and there was exactly ZERO consequence at all? Not to mention Nebula killing past!Nebula but I can sort of hand-wave that one as having to do with actually creating a split universe (as proven by the Gamora and Thanos duplicates) but Cap ... Cap would have gone on, having had this weird encounter and being very "!!!!!!!!" about Bucky and done... what, nothing?? And if he did do something, why did that have no impact on the future at all?

I'm also conflicted on Captain America's ending as a charector, I'm glad he lived, but I almost would have preferred him having gotten stuck in the past by some Time Travel Bullshit Reason because it seemed OOC for him to leave his found family, put down his sheild, and risk the ENTIRE FUTURE by going to live a life with Peggy, even if that was a split universe, it still feels very .. I don't know the word for it, not "cop out" but too pushed I guess

For his entire journey to have centered on Steve changing as a person and getting used to living in essentially a new world, not to mention finding and saving Bucky and keeping him close, for him to completely regress and go back to America as it was, go back to the life he used to want, go live his future in the past, it all seemed really counterproductive of his journey and I actually would have preferred him going to retire elsewhere  if he really needed to

-Tony's death was probably the most avoidable thing to me because they laid out a perfect way for RDJ to exit: Retirement

I know that it was very "full circle" for Tony to begin the MCU with his life and end this era of it with his death and the ultimate form of charector growth for him to sacrifice himself, but it still felt really cheap to me when they had gone to the trouble of setting up his retirement so thoroughly and then still choosing to kill him off, I feel like it was more about "needing" to have an enormous death and choosing to "surprise" everyone by making it Tony instead of Steve versus what actually worked best for the story, Tony retiring to a quiet life that had nothing to do with money or fame or saving the world would have been equally showing of his growth in my opinion

These were my major complaints, but I have one plotline in particular that I really have the utmost praise for and that's Thor's

I know that alot of people are upset that Marvel treated his PTSD as a joke with the beer belly and the drunkness shennanigans but I don't personally veiw it that way, I don't think it was played as a joke, I think it was largely taken seriously, ofcourse I think Marvel DID put alot of the humor to ride on "lol Thor is fat and lazy now" wich is .. unfortunate, but I don't think it was as bad as alot of people are saying

Thor's conversation with his mother is probably my favorite part of the movie, Thor is consistantly shown to be a very sensitive, vulnerable person, wich is a MAGNIFICENT quality for someone who's also supposed to be the poster-boy for hypermasculinity

Thor is everything that Toxic Masculinity loves- He's a literal GOD who's gorgeous and gets attention from the ladies and beats shit up with a hammer, and he drinks, there is always EVERY opportunity to make him the living emodiement of A Fuckboy, but instead he's consistantly shown to be the exact opposite

He's sweet and compassionate and good-natured, he's openly affectionate and not afraid to cry in front of others or to wear his heart on his sleeve, he's gentle and supportive and loyal and a complete mama's boy in all of the positive uses for that term, and Endgame only reinforces all of that

Yes they made it a laughing point that he's gained weight and is an even bigger alcoholic than usual, but they also made it a point that out of everyone who had the opportunity to try to change the past, Thor is the only one who took it, because he simply couldn't stand being without his mother, not Tony who could have tried to tell his father to spend more time with him, or Steve who could have tried to see Peggy, but Thor, who just wanted his mom back

They made a huge point again and again over the fact that of everyone, Thor was taking this loss the hardest, that he had lost the most and felt the most responsible, and ultimately he also grew the most from it, he actually gave Mjolnir to Cap, gave New Asgard to Valkyrie (wich by the way is perhaps my absolute FAVORITE thing about the future of the MCU) and finally stopped trying to live up to what Odin wanted from him by trying to have a pissing math for leadership, he even "gave" Peter leadership of the Guardians, even if it was played for a joke, he never *actually* contested Peter, wich is a big step for him

Marvel isn't known for playing with trauma well, but as Marvel goes, I think Thor was handled well

I also have to say that I'm not mourning Loki yet, I feel like the after-credits scene for Guardians 3 is going to be Loki walking onto the ship going "Hello brother, did you miss me?"

Loki is in a unique position where he really could survive without having been a death from The Snappening, we KNOW that he knew something fishy was going on with the two Caps in the past and Loki is a sneaky devil who wouldn't just let something like that go, he probably devised a system for himself to come back to life or to have escaped Thanos in the first place once he realized in new-2012 that something was wrong, and unlike Tony and Steve, there are no story or contract reasons for the  MCU not to include Loki, especially since the Disney+ Loki series doesn't have anything to do with post-Endgame, atleast, yet to be mentioned

Sure split-universe!Loki would have the same problems that split-universe!Gamora has in that his development with Thor and his personal development caused by encounters with people like Hela are now moot, but unlike Gamora, Loki is still an anti-hero, he's still an asshole, and his relationship with Thor is a centuries-long one that has had many ups and downs, meeting Thor later in another villainous position wouldn't be OOC and he and Thor reconnecting over a new enemy would be fairly easy to recreate as opposed to Gamora re-experiencing a relationship with Nebula that has now permenantely changed, becoming a "new" member of the Guardians vs a founding member, and witnessing everything with Peter's family that happened Guardians 2 that can never be recreated- ever

Loki has also never been a leading role in the MCU, a core role yes, but not leading, it wouldn't be a problem for Tom Hiddleston to pop in and out of the MCU as he likes wile his primary series is on Disney+, and as that series is more of an anthology (Loki Screws With History: A Memoir) versus a chronological story to follow Endgame, Disney+ and the MCU don't even have to really consult with how the two stories would mesh, they're virtually strangers to eachother

There's, ofcourse, alot more I liked about this- the all female team-up, the importance placed on Ant-Man, everything to do with Nebula, and more, but this is all I really wanted to discuss or vent on

[daresplaining]

MCU Danny Rand Week: Day 7

(Free Day) Flipping the Script

    The final day! We hope you all have enjoyed this week as much as we have, and thank you to @defenderspositivity for organizing this awesome kung fu party event.

    Now, let’s talk about vengeance.  

    We talked yesterday about 616 Danny’s standard characterization as a friendly, positive guy-- something that can make his introductory arcs a bit jarring for newer readers. That’s because this lightness is the result of a massive amount of character development, through which Danny, mostly due to his supportive friend group, heals from a period of extreme darkness. It takes a certain type of nine-year-old to react to their parents’ brutal deaths with, “I’m gonna murder the guy responsible!”, and that’s exactly what happened.        

Nu-An: “We know of your father’s fate, my son-- and the fate of your mother as well-- and our hearts grieve openly for them! To lose one’s parents is to lose the roots of heritage. Still, we shall try to make you happy here, Daniel! If there is ever anything you want, merely name it-- and it will be yours!”

Danny: “There’s only one thing I want, mister... I want revenge!!”

Marvel Premiere #16 by Len Wein, Dick Giordano, and Glynis Wein

    Young Danny in the comics is a haunted, angry person-- somewhat disturbingly-so for his age. Later writers have made sure to emphasize his love of K’un-Lun, the fact that he thinks of it as his home and has people there that he loves, and that he didn’t just spend the whole time waiting to get out. But his life, from the moment Harold Meachum drops his dad off a cliff, is guided by a desire to enact vengeance, and this is the reason that, ten years later, he is compelled to leave his home to get Harold out of his life once and for all. In the comics, Iron Fists often take time to visit Earth-- some writers have implied that it’s even expected-- so this in itself is not an issue. And as much as this choice hurts him, Danny knows that he will not be able to move forward, find happiness, or dim the pain of his trauma without completing this revenge quest. And for that, he has to leave K’un-Lun.    

Danny: “To eat of the fruit of the Tree of Immortality and dwell among the eternal people of K’un-Lun forever [...] I want to, August One-- believe me when I say that-- but I cannot! Tomorrow I am going back to civilization-- to find Harold Meachum, the man who murdered my father!”

Nu-An: “Then all the years you have spent among us have not dimmed the fires of revenge in your heart, Daniel!”

Danny: “No, Yu-Ti-- they have not!”

Marvel Premiere #16 by Len Wein, Dick Giordano, and Glynis Wein

    There’s great irony in Nu-An-- who, as Danny finds out later, is a pretty vengeful guy himself-- having these conversations with him, but that’s a topic for another post.

    Thus, Danny returns to Earth with a purpose, and bee-lines for what is now just called the Meachum building (A burning question: Why is it only Rand Enterprises in the show? What’s the story there?). He battles his way through a ridiculous gauntlet of death traps before finally reaching Harold Meachum-- a man who has been psychologically destroyed by ten years living in fear of this exact thing happening.     

Harold: “[...] I was obsessed-- with an overwhelming fear of death-- driven to the brink of insanity with gut-sick worry and tension-- paranoia-- every cancerous neurosis you can imagine. And so I spent a fortune designing those death traps and hiring assassins to stop you-- because I just couldn’t believe you would be unconquerable. But I was wrong-- wrong about you... and wrong to try and stop my death. I see now... that I deserve it.”

Caption: “Then he is silent, and you try with every fiber of your being to hate him. But you cannot. You cannot hate-- or kill-- one who is less than a corroded shell of a man. You can only pity him... Pity him... and leave him, as he left you and your mother, to die his own slow death.”

Marvel Premiere #18 by Doug Moench, Larry Hama, and P. Goldberg

    Finally, Danny’s mercy breaks through his rage. He sees Harold once more as a person, rather than the monster he has been picturing for the past decade. And he finds himself unable to kill someone who has already nearly tortured himself to death with regret. This is not the closure he needed, but it is a step that allows him, eventually, to find peace and move on with his life. 

    The Netflix show has taken this simple, straightforward plotline and done something brilliant. 

    MCU Danny’s origin story, while essentially the same (parents die, ends up in K’un-Lun, becomes Iron Fist), has been changed in one key way: the circumstances of his parents’ deaths. In the comics, Wendell Rand is compelled to try and return to K’un-Lun,where he lived for a time when he was young. He decides to take his family-- his wife Heather and nine-year-old son Danny-- and his best friend/business partner Harold on a little hike through the Himalayas. The rest of them don’t believe Wendell’s stories about a magic city in another dimension (which is... fair), but they go anyway, because... it sounds like fun? They want to be supportive? This has always been a weak part of the story. It makes perfect sense that the creative team for the Netflix show would opt for a more believable situation. In the MCU, Harold doesn’t push Wendell off a cliff and then abandon Heather and Danny to die in the mountains. They die in a plane crash. Harold is not even there. And that’s all well and good (we find the comics version more exciting, but the plane crash is ultimately more believable, so we’re fine with it) and they very easily could have made that alteration and then continued the story as it is set up in the comics. Instead, they acknowledge the fact that Harold’s absence, and the uncertainty inherent in something as seemingly accidental as a plane crash, would change everything.          

    Netflix Danny is still traumatized by his parents’ deaths. He still desperately needs closure. But without a target, without someone to blame, without an embodiment of his anger that he can kill, he has no idea how to find that closure. All he knows, after fifteen years of trying desperately to cope with his trauma, is that that closure cannot be found in K’un-Lun. And so, rather than submitting himself to another fifteen years of psychological torture, stuck in a place that he loves but that cannot help him recover in the way he needs, he heads back to Earth when he has the chance, hoping to find something, anything there that will help him heal.

    But this lack of a specific goal means that he spends his entire time on Earth reacting, hitting out wildly in the hopes of finding something to make his decision to leave seem like the right one. He fights to maintain his identity when Ward and Joy try to strip him of it. He fights to get himself into Rand Enterprises, even though he doesn’t have a clue what to do there. And the instant any information arises that involves his parents, he drops everything else to chase it. He is lost and adrift, and all of this is made more effective by the fact that he, and thus the viewer, doesn’t fully understand his own motivations. One of the main mysteries of the show is, in fact, why Danny left K’un-Lun, and he doesn’t know-- or at least, he isn’t able to face his reasons yet, because they are tied to so many raw emotions that he is repressing. 

    As the Iron Fist, in a universe in which Iron Fists seem, generally, to not leave K’un-Lun (with Wu Ao-Shi as a notable exception!), Danny needs to justify his decision to abandon his post. He clearly states that most people in K’un-Lun no longer believe in the Hand, so he can't be blamed for not seeing security as an issue, but he still knows that leaving was wrong, and feels terrible about it. He can’t accept that he left because of vague trauma about his parents that he doesn’t know how to cope with. So he shields his motivations-- for himself and everyone who asks-- behind other explanations. He came to New York because he missed it. He's staying because he needs to fight the Hand on Earth. But the more time goes on, the more people question his behavior, and the deeper he sinks into his own conflicted feelings, the more obvious it becomes that this is all about his parents. And when finally, finally he is confronted with the fact that Harold was responsible for their deaths, the combination of emotions this generates-- finding a focal point for his rage, but finding it in someone he has so desperately trusted this whole time, one of the only parental figures he has left-- makes his final explosion that much more heartbreaking and extreme.        

    Instead of starting off with the revenge quest and moving forward, this rearranging of circumstances turns the revenge quest into the climax of a long, emotional battle of self-discovery-- adding power to it and leaving both long-time comics fans and new viewers guessing. It’s a brilliant move, which reinvents Danny’s origin, shifts his psychological journey in ways he’s is still recovering from post-Iron Fist Season 1, while still maintaining the spirit of the source material.   

[dweemeister]

NOTE: The following contains some spoilers. 

Justice League (2017)

Under the leadership of Zack Snyder, the DC Extended Universe (DCEU) has begun with embarrassing efforts including Man of Steel (2013), Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016), and Suicide Squad (2016). The outlook at Warner Bros. was grim, facing diminishing box office returns and vicious critical reviews. This summer, it took Wonder Woman to provide any hope that the DCEU was on an upward trajectory. In comes Justice League, a film that marks a step forward for Warner Bros.’ most important franchise, but is troubled by writing its way out of the holes dug by Snyder in Man of Steel and especially Batman v Superman. With Zack Snyder’s Justice League (alongside expensive reshoots by Joss Whedon, credited as co-writer with Chris Terrio), the DCEU remains in critical condition. But unlike the recent philosophical shallowness of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s (MCU) militancy, the DCEU – in Wonder Woman and Justice League – is making an honest attempt at a superheroing dialectic.

Shortly after Superman’s death in Batman v Superman, Steppenwolf (Ciarán Hinds; the character is an alien general from Apokolips who serves Darkseid) has landed on Earth to retrieve three Mother Boxes and harness the boxes’ aggregate powers to commence Earth’s destruction. No one knows the exact capabilities, purposes, or origins of the Mother Boxes, but Amazonian Queen Hippolyta (Connie Nielsen) warns Diana Prince (Gal Gadot; Wonder Woman) of Steppenwolf’s arrival. Diana joins forces with Bruce Wayne (Ben Affleck; Batman) and, together, recruit Arthur Curry (Jason Momoa; Aquaman), Barry Allen (Ezra Miller; The Flash), and Victor Stone (Ray Fisher; Cyborg). Steppenwolf and his army of Parademons are making quick work of finding the boxes, and – this should come as no surprise to anyone paying attention to the DCEU – our superheroes exhume and reanimate Clark Kent (Henry Cavill; Superman) in preparation for the final showdown.

The supporting cast is unwieldy – as in any superhero team movies – but the prominent members include: Bruce’s butler Alfred Pennyworth (Jeremy Irons); Clark’s mother, Martha Kent (Diane Lane); Clark’s love interest but, most importantly, Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist for the Daily Planet Lois Lane (Amy Adams); and Gotham City Police Commissioner James Gordon (J.K. Simmons).

Before delving into the heart of this write-up, note that Zack Snyder departed the project after a sudden family emergency. Joss Whedon (who directed the first two Avengers movies) replaced Snyder, re-wrote scenes, and filmed reshoots. The stylistic differences between the two directors clash throughout Justice League – Snyder has always relied on a desaturated brown- and black-heavy color palette, foreboding self-importance, and an attitude toward life that is a cross between an emotionally bankrupt nihilist and that edgy fellow from your Intro to Philosophy class trying to be “deep”, but failing; Whedon established the MCU’s quip-heavy dialogue in favor of slowing down the action and showing us where a superhero’s humanity comes from, oftentimes interrupting thoughtful moments and conversations like a loud frat boy with a tenuous command of the subject being talked about (the frat boy might actually be “deep”, but he has trouble expressing himself).

I profess to appreciate Whedon’s writing only a little more than Snyder’s. Self-important superhero movies need to earn their somberness – see Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy – and humanizing those with superpowers is something that post-Spider-Man 2 (2004) superhero movies have all but forgotten to do. So the Whedon-esque comedic dialogue is appreciated, if occasionally misplaced in the thick of a violent scene. In other times, Whedon’s dialogue is entirely inappropriate and will unintentionally have the audience burst out in disbelieving guffaws. Let us take the scene where Superman returns with Lois Lane to Smallville.

Lois’ first line is to tell Clark that he smells good.

“Didn’t I smell good before?” he asks.

That is the first thing she says in their first private moment together? And second, wouldn’t being buried six feet under make you smell like earthworms? I guess Kryptonian pheromones are pretty resilient even in death! Soon after, Lois asks Clark what was it like being dead.

“Itchy,” he says.

Itchy? Is the Kryptonian afterlife filled with Kryptonian fleas (bad news for Krypto the Superdog if that’s the case)? To pull back before I pick and choose dozens of individual lines of dialogue for ridicule, Whedon’s comedic tendencies – not for the first time – destroy any sense of intimacy between friends, lovers, and family. A Whedon-written subplot about a Russian family fleeing the final battle sequence is manufactured and manipulative, rather than horrifying or inspiring.

For Snyder (and Terrio, who worked with both Snyder and Whedon and whose contributions are less clear), his writing belies little interest in adding dimensions to Steppenwolf. The worst of Snyder appears immediately after Superman is resurrected as Batman, Wonder Woman, Cyborg, and The Flash must combat the awoken Man of Steel in a battle that does not serve anybody’s characterization or the plot’s progression. It is a superficial battle fulfilling Snyder’s dependency on unnecessary violence to keep interest going.

Yet Snyder is also responsible for the film’s most inspiring moment. Unfortunately, that comes in the opening minutes as the film introduces Wonder Woman. She is seen defending civilians from terrorists threatening to obliterate a London bank. From the sequential progression of the moment – despite being deprived of too much context – and the impressive visual effects, it builds off Patty Jenkins and Allan Heinberg’s characterization of Wonder Woman earlier this year. And though the final line of that introductory scene smacks of cheesiness (”Who are you?”; “A believer.” Is Diana a Monkees fan?), it retains what was essential of Jenkins’ interpretation of Wonder Woman: that Diana has always been motivated not by personal animus, but a genuine, learned belief in humanity’s characteristic and fragile goodness. It is a brief moment, this. Yet in that snippet, Zack Snyder – whether he internalized these lessons or not – provides a moment worthy of cheers and, yes, tears.

The balance of screentime between all six founding members of the DCEU’s Justice League (spare a thought for fans of omitted, original founding members Green Lantern and Martian Manhunter) is equal enough, although Aquaman does not truly factor until the final third of the film. For Aquaman, The Flash, and Cyborg, Justice League might feel like an extended trailer for their more interesting standalone movies. Regarding the film’s treatment of Wonder Woman, there are mixed results after that spectacular introduction. One-liners and comments about Wonder Woman’s attractiveness (Flash, Aquaman, and Alfred in particular) are unwelcome, undermining the professionalism seen in the Cartoon Network animated series Justice League / Justice League Unlimited (2001-2006) and even Hanna Barbera’s long-running Super Friends (1973-1986). The angles in which Wonder Woman is shot also contribute to feminists’ justified anger in how Snyder (who has never been concerned with feminism) and Whedon (a self-professed feminist, but whose behavior and past writing suggest otherwise) have portrayed her. Eventually, the film’s roughshod editing between the Snyder and Whedon versions provides a portrait of the Justice League to that is cluttered, confusing, contradictory.

In such a sizable ensemble picture so devoted to narrative and action, it seems useless to comment on performances. With the exception of Cavill and Affleck, every other lead and important supporting cast are doing a serviceable job (for Fisher, Miller, and Momoa, their shining moments will come in their respective movies). Cavill has the muscles, but his charm remains missing despite a more saturated suit for Superman – Cavill remains a more convincing antagonist than a protagonist. Affleck looks and sounds bored. He adds nothing to Bruce Wayne or Batman. Today, it seems even more impossible in film to make the Caped Crusader a sympathetic character – like the one found in the comics and animated television.

It is sympathy that brings us to the direction of this franchise. This paragraph should be read with the understanding that I do not read comic books and that I do not have the emotional ties that many others have to these characters. If Zack Snyder remains sidelined at the DCEU in future installments (unlikely at this juncture, as Warner Bros. did not sack him after multiple critical failures), the franchise’s primary problem will no longer be that it peddles in malformed ideas and soul-heaving darkness. In this case, the primary problem of the DCEU is making its characters sympathetic – allowing the audience to understand each hero’s sense of altruism and showing us where that comes from (e.g. family-instilled values, personal losses processed or otherwise, childhood loneliness into compassion) and having the Justice League become something inspirational to those unable to defend themselves.

Making characters sympathetic sounds simple (anything but!), but it is a good primary problem to have considering the recent history of superhero films. The DCEU has no problems making its superheroes feel larger-than-life. There are few character visibility or recognizability obstacles. As long as the DCEU avoids stunts like Superman’s “death” and Man of Steel’s heinous thesis that the only way for Superman to truly cherish life is to kill someone, its regard for life and understanding of death’s gravity is intact. These are foundational aspects of superhero narratives that must be recognized. Regarding sympathetic superheroes, the DCEU has Wonder Woman (the MCU wasted Captain America due to a convoluted conspiracy-thriller maze of an overarching plot and an unwillingness or inability to meditate on mature themes; the DCEU may yet squander Gal Gadot’s Diana) and must endeavor to make its future installments just as appealing. The MCU might be making the better movies, but this is where the DCEU can still mount its challenge.

Again, realize that almost all of the above is dependent on Zack Snyder’s permanent departure from DCEU films and a need for better writers.

Justice League’s music score has become one of the fiercest points of contention among hardened fans. Just as the DCEU has become the most visible battleground for the soul of superhero movies, it is also the frontline for the future of film scoring. In June 2017, Junkie XL (2015′s Mad Max: Fury Road, Batman v Superman) was replaced with Danny Elfman (1989′s Batman, 1990′s Edward Scissorhands). Junkie XL, who has collaborated multiple times with Zimmer, is a DJ and audio engineer first, a composer second (sorry, but all those categories are distinct), and is interested in rhythm and ambience. Elfman, who has composed for superhero media for almost thirty years, is classically influenced with a rock and ska background, and has always been regarded for his melodic and harmonic constructions. American movies – whether independents or major studio tentpoles – have been moving away from traditional orchestra-based film scoring in recent years in favor of electronic music and Zimmer’s drum “choruses”. Controversy among DC fans ensued when Elfman announced he would recall his theme to 1989′s Batman and John Williams’ Superman theme rather than continue some of Zimmer’s previous musical ideas – the number of incendiary personal attacks directed against Elfman have been sickening and reflective of a lack of understanding of film music conventions and history.

I personally have mixed feelings about the Elfman score. While I despise Zimmer and his associates/ghostwriters’ DCEU contributions and refuse to believe their music is “revolutionary” in the ways they boast, Elfman’s decision to undermine the musical continuity of the DCEU resembles the compositional debacles with the MCU. The 1989 Batman theme is an imperfect, but adequate fit for Affleck’s Batman (variations can be heard early in “Batman on the Roof”; Elfman restrains himself until “Then There Were Three”); Cavill’s sleep-inducing Superman does not yet deserve the soaring strings and inspiring brass and woodwinds that fit Christopher Reeve’s portrayal of the Man of Steel (Williams’ theme is buried underneath a thunderous sound mix, but its renditions in minor key suggests Elfman considered Cavill’s Superman and applied the theme in a suitable fashion). In ways that Hans Zimmer and Junkie XL could never provide, Wonder Woman’s theme is, for the first time, not played by electric cello, but by lower strings, brass, and guitar in “Wonder Woman Rescue”– diversifying the instrumentation is almost always rewarding, as evidenced here. Less developed are Elfman’s hints to themes for Aquaman, Cyborg, and The Flash for any future composers to build upon if they so desire.

For all my gripes about the score and lack of new, recognizable motifs (Elfman’s score is motif-heavy), film composers rooted in classical music have an advantage over composers using drum choruses and harsh electronics: orchestras are more capable to carry multiple, harmonically independent themes in a single cue and have those themes in dialogue with each other. And though it is played underneath the combat, “The Final Battle” is a gorgeous orchestral action cue combining motifs that – and it feels so strange to write this – help tell the story of the battle.

Adjusted for inflation, Justice League is the third-most expensive film ever made – behind the 2011 and 2007 Pirates of the Caribbean movies and ahead of Titanic (1997). With extensive reshoots and a committed effort by Warner Bros. for an extremely late, movie-saving operation, Whedon’s interventions improve the film, even if Justice League is a Frankenstein’s monster of a movie in all of its tonal inconsistency. As expectations beforehand remained abysmal, this Justice League is the best possible movie that could have been made with the talent attached to it. With the exception of perhaps Star Wars, the production history of the DCEU is just as dramatic as the events on-screen. Justice League shows that the producers, directors, and writers of the DCEU are actively learning from their prior mistakes.

The challenge is now to make these comic book superheroes into the ideal that their creators, decades ago, imagined for themselves, their readers, those who can still differentiate between justice and mercy.

My rating: 6/10

^ Based on my personal imdb rating. My interpretation of that ratings system can be found here.

[delusion-of-negation]

character assassination? nah, Wanda started in the MCU as a villain, then switched sides to be a hero, generally she was motivated by her love for her family and her morality, in WandaVision it explored the way her character can be both villainous and tragic simultaneously, with those same motivations - family and morality, albeit greyer than a typical hero's. Falcon and Winter Soldier did screw up Agent 13, but otherwise it didn't really change anything notable in terms of what was driving the characters (bonds with Steve, regret from the past, heroism), I guess it made Zemo more human rather than a shadow that was pulling the strings... but given that the movie version had an absurdly bad plan and no substantial character outside of his plans and evilness and mourning, that's not a bad thing. in Loki they did the exact opposite of character assassination, the whole show is an exploration of different sides of his character, his motives, his weaknesses, his goals - he very much acts in character throughout the show. I don't feel like rewatching the shows and movies just to do a more thorough explanation of why I don't agree, but that's a speedrun of my thoughts on the matter overall. I'm also not going to sit here and make assumptions on how you got to that conclusion, even though you didn't extend that kindness to me. but Loki has not only been my favourite MCU character since Thor, he's been one of my favourite characters full stop since then, and it's not just mindless clapping at the sight of him that makes me enjoy this show, I am actually interested in the direction that he's being taken in, how they're exploring him as a character in an unfamiliar situation. I also think that the show has some of the best writing in mainstream modern tv shows at the moment, with clever uses of their setting and time travel mechanics to fuel the plot (for example, when they uncover that Sylvie has been hiding in the apocalypse situations where the limitations of the time travel would make her difficult for the people hunting her to detect), and I enjoy them exploring themes of free will and purpose via both calm conversations and dramatic choices like what happened with Classic Loki. you are totally allowed to dislike the shows and even to dislike the direction that they're taking a given character in (I already said I wasn't the biggest fan of Agent 13's arc), I made a comment with my opinion just throwing it out there casually, and you bite back by saying that I either never liked the characters or was just mindlessly all starry-eyed at seeing a character. not once in either my initial comment or this did I pull that kind of "well you only dislike the show because blah blah blah" kind of stuff, because... why? it is totally possible that you just dislike it and I've no need to theorise on some deeper motive. at no point did you actually substantiate the fact that they're apparently character assassination but instead you used the three paragraphs to speculate on why I didn't agree with that. that's wild to me. sorry, but that's not a strong case. I didn't substantiate my claim that they screwed up Agent 13, but that's because I'm not making sweeping statements about how other people must feel about Agent 13 that depend entirely on my assertion about her being fully correct.

Well, hearing Black Widow was god awful

Shame.  Was hoping it was only the TV shows that were bad.