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crime-scene-psychic · 13 days ago

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I honestly think that the Nolan Batman trilogy was the best and worst thing to happen to the Batman franchise, because on one hand, it was the first live-action instance of trying to make Batman more gritty and serious (because while the Keaton, Kilmer, Clooney movies took the story much more seriously than the 60s television show, they were still goofy at times, which is why I honestly think they're the best rendition of Batman, because they were able to balance silliness with seriousness, which is what Batman is all about, but that's obviously an entirely different thesis) which then allowed for more people to take comic book movies serious, consequently leading to the rise of the DCEU and, obviously, the MCU (we would not have the MCU today and the actual good movies that came out of it without Nolan's trilogy, there's simply no argument there).

However, the Nolan trilogy also unfortunately made "dark, gritty Batman" the norm, meaning that once anyone tries to actually have some fun with Batman, they immediately get shit on by comic book dude bros. It also created the most annoying characterization of the Joker that everyone has been trying to replicate since and no one will be able to replicate, because they simply do not understand the character (I honest to God think the closest live-action actor who has ever made a Joker character work besider Heath Ledger was Cameron Monaghan in the Gotham television show, and he wasn't even really Joker??? but at least he didn't make it everyone else's problem and was a good mix of goofy and psychotic, not just psychotic) and will never be Heath Ledger (but they don't stop trying much to my forever annoyment).

And while I can recognize the cultural and significant impact on the comic and film community that Nolan's trilogy had, it is still by far my least favorite adaptation because of how serious it takes itself (and of course, the racism. The racism is actually the bigger one for me. Fuck Christopher Nolan for that. Ra's al Ghul is NOT a white man just because you want a plot twist, and you CANNOT just erase Bane being mixed race because you fucking FEEL LIKE IT because him being mixed race is extremely relevant to his origin). Batman has had serious moments in the comics, don't get me wrong, and I know things must evolve and change over time and that I cannot expect an 80 year old character to not be further developed throughout the decades, but it almost feels as if Nolan and Goyer (the writer) read a Sparks Notes version of the history of Batman, cracked their knuckles, and said "yeah, I think I got it."

Spoiler alert: they did not get it.

When I watch the Nolan trilogy (which I haven't in quite some time and I really don't want to, even to prove a point to people on the Internet) I notice how uninspired it feels, story-wise. While the action and cinematography is excellent, the story is lacking for me, and when you're telling a story like Batman, that has decades of content, you cannot just forgo storytelling for cool special effects.

I'd much rather watch a Batman adaptation that has the shittiest effects known to man with a writer who whole-heartily cares for the characters they're writing and has taken time to research. And that's honestly one of the biggest problems the comic book film industry is having now, both DC and Marvel. They're not hiring people who actually care about these characters to write them and they're focusing much more at appealing to everyone they can instead of who the movies should be made for: fans.

You're gonna have such a harder time convincing my mom, a woman who only cares about Wonder Woman, to watch the new Captain America film than you would someone who has read the Sam Wilson Cap comic run. And while this entire issue stems from the fact that the film industry is just that, an industry, and has become less about filmmakers making art and more-so how much money investors and producers can get out of ticket sales, it is still infuriating to see franchises you care deeply about be ruined by guys just there to cash their paychecks and be done with it.

And really, the film industry as we know it needs to be fucking demolished from the inside out, but that will never happen and now we're a bit off-topic. So, back to Batman.

I think another issue I have with newer live-action Batman adaptations is that they choose to forgo a VERY IMPORTANT character when it comes to Batman/Bruce Wayne's evolution as a character and story line.

Robin.

Since whatever the fuck the casting of Chris O'Donnell in 1995 was (why was he, like, a grown man?), people have been afraid to touch a live-action Dick Grayson with a six-foot pole (besides Titans, which I'm gonna get to in a sec). Which is ridiculous, because he is, like I said, an insanely important character when it comes to showing the growth Bruce Wayne goes through.

Bruce Wayne becomes Batman because he is so angry about his parent's deaths and the corruption of Gotham that he doesn't know what else to do. All the money in the world cannot change things for the better, his own father tried and died for his troubles, and he is left with no other option. Bruce Wayne works during the day to fight corruption via charity and his company, Batman works during the night and is able to do what Bruce Wayne can't (beating the shit out of people, mainly). The two are separate sides of the same coin.

And despite this seeming like a good arrangement, it's pretty obvious in most adaptations (at least they get THAT right) that beating the shit out of people in back alleys is not a good replacement for therapy. You're able to see the toll being Batman has on Bruce. He quickly becomes more occupied with being a vigilante than being himself. Bruce needs something to break through this internal struggle and help him balance both lives.

And so a boy named Dick Grayson comes along.

Dick's so important (and so are the other Robins, of course, but Dick being the first means I have to talk about him a bit more) because he forced Bruce to get his shit together. Here's a boy who's about the same age Bruce was when his parents died, who also just saw his parents killed in front of him, and is so full of rage he has no idea what to do. Sounds familiar...

Bruce is able to help himself by helping Dick. He gives him an outlet to vent his anger and frustrations while also looking out for him in the best way he can. While there are many issues with how Robin comes to be in various comic runs (and if this was real life it would be fucking ridiculous) Dick becoming Robin is extremely important. If he hadn't been taken in by Bruce Wayne, if he'd been allowed to let that anger continue to bubble up inside of him, he probably would have killed Tony Zucco and that would have been enough to set Dick down a terrible path he might not recover from.

The same goes for Bruce. If he were to set out and kill the person who shot his parents, he wouldn't be a hero anymore because that single event would shatter the entire point of Batman, which is that he is not meant to decide who lives and dies. If he were, how would he be any different than all the villains in Gotham that he fights as Batman? How would he be better than the corrupt businessman and politicians that he has to battle as Bruce Wayne? He wouldn't.

Batman needs Robin and Robin needs Batman, because they are yin and yang. Light within darkness, darkness within light. You cannot separate these characters and still tell an accurate story, it's impossible. I think that's a huge issue Nolan's movies have, on top of many others. You cannot accurately present to me a Batman story if there is no Robin, just as you couldn't give me a Robin story without Batman.

Every Robin is so important to how Bruce Wayne as a character is developed, and disregarding this as a creator is not only disrespectful to the character, it misses the entire point. I refuse to take your adaptation of Batman seriously if you can't figure out how important Robin is. He isn't just some kid sidekick, he isn't an optional side character, he is what makes Batman human. You cannot have gritty, Neo-noir Batman and forgo Robin just because you see him as the sidekick in tights. When Batman was silly and took itself less seriously, sure, there wasn't a lot to Robin nor Batman's troubling pasts. But now that you want to deep dive into Bruce Wayne's psyche and pick apart what makes him the way he is you wanna throw in the towel and erase the part that humanizes him? Fuck. You.

You can't make a complex Bruce Wayne and take away parts that help audiences understand his complexities, that's fucking STUPID!

Titans, for all its faults and problems, will always have my gratitude as it had the fucking balls to give, without a doubt, the best and most rounded live-action adaptation of Dick Grayson we have ever seen. Titans introduces Dick at a very important and rocky time in his character arch: him leaving Bruce.

If you're not in the know, there's a falling out between Bruce and Dick that's been written a couple different ways over the years, but all comes down to Dick being "fired" from being Robin and leaving Gotham. This is a bit of a newer story line in comparison to how long the character of Dick Grayson has been around, and eventually leads to Dick becoming independent from Bruce, signalling his evolution from "side kick" to his own hero, Nightwing. However, there's issues with Dick having to give up the Robin mantel, because it's something that is whole-heartily Dick Grayson. Robin wasn't something Bruce Wayne came up with, it was the nickname his parents gave to him. Even the colors are his, those were the colors of the Flying Graysons' uniforms. Robin is much more than just a vigilante alter-ego to Dick, it is the last link he has to his past and his parents. So when this is taken away from him and given to another, this causes a huge internal struggle for Dick, as he has to deal with the anger he now has for Bruce, a man he originally looked up to and idolized. This is Dick seeing how wrong it was for Bruce to do some of the things he did to Dick, despite at the time those choices being what both needed.

The way Titans is able to portray this extremely delicate time in Dick's story line in a way that not only makes sense for his character, but also allows for growth is really admirable. Like I said, the show isn't perfect by any means (can I PLEASE get a Romani actor to play Dick PLEASE) but it's the first time I feel that the character is wholeheartedly taken serious in a live-action setting. You can tell the writers have a better idea about how the characters should interact in a live-action setting and while some choices are questionable to me, the heart is there.

Nolan's movies in comparison feel soulless and devoid of all creativity and love. He does not care about these characters, no matter how much he tries to make you think that, and he never will. Christopher Nolan, you will NEVER convince me that you give two shits about Bruce Wayne. And if you, the director, can't bother to care, why should the audience? Why should I care about your adaptation if you can't even be bothered to put an ounce of individuality into it?

With Matt Reeves' Batman films underway, things are getting worse again. For a while, we only had to deal with the shitty Joker adaptations that tried to replicate Ledger's Joker, but with the Reeves Batman movies, the film bros are making themselves known again. I remember when the new design for the Riddler dropped and I said it was shit and people on Twitter and YouTube got SO PISSY at me and told me I just don't understand Batman and that I'm childish for enjoying the designs for Gotham Riddler/ Batman Forever Riddler and whatever and that I'm stupid, which none of those things are true, I hate to be confident in anything, but I think I know more about Batman than you do, Twitter troll.

The suit sucked and the character sucked. They just created a new character but gave him the Riddler's name. That's NOT the Riddler. That's honestly closer to Hush than Riddler, so just... do that? But of course, less people know about Hush than Riddler, and you're not trying to make a film for fans, you're trying to make money, so why would you ever be so silly as to do that! I'm not gonna talk to much about the new Riddler, just because it's super old news and it's not the point I was trying to make here, it's just something that continues to piss me off when it comes to gritty recreations of characters, because Riddler really never was supposed to be some Zodiac Killer wannabe, he's supposed to be a guy who leaves you riddles and makes you solve them and he's supposed to be a little silly about it. And I'm not saying you can't do a more gritty Riddler, because Arkham Knights did it super well imo! Just don't reinvent the wheel! Don't just make a new character and call him by another's name, that's a disservice to the character themselves and their creators.

This is a hard topic, because you have people who get the point of these characters (people who have actually read a comic before and paid attention to the story) but you also have insufferable film/comic bros who worship the ground Nolan and Reeves walks upon and who don't even take time to explore the rest of the Batfamily comics (his gang of vigilante children show up in the stand-alone Batman comics, though, so I don't know how they're missing this, unless they have the reading comprehension of a goldfish, which they probably do tbh). It's why I think a lot of these weirdos don't like Gotham Knights or Wayne Family Adventures, because they hate the thought of there being any semblance of fun in the Batman franchise. Not everything needs to be doom and gloom! Let Dick Grayson be bisexual and let Bruce Wayne have a PTA rival! You can have your cake and eat it too!

I know this seems like a silly sentiment coming from a person who just wrote an entire essay on this, but maybe don't take Batman so seriously? I don't mean, of course, that you can't care about these characters, I'm actually saying the opposite! I care very deeply for these characters, so much that I obviously spat all this out. I just think some people need to fucking chill when it comes to realistically portraying Batman. There's nothing wrong with taking a more serious approach to the characters and I have no problem modernizing them, but you can't just have action hero Batman, you have to have the human behind the mask too. And if you can't balance that, then I'm sorry, but you shouldn't be making Batman adaptations, because you obviously don't understand what the character is about.

I'm nervous to see where Reeves will go with the character, and only time will tell. I've heard rumors he plans to introduce Robin, I've heard rumors he doesn't. Either way, it's obviously out of my hands and I'll have opinions either way, but I really hope he has a better understanding of the history of the franchise than Nolan. While I appreciate, again, what Nolan did for revolutionizing not only the Batman franchise but the comic movie industry as well, I can still find faults in how he went about things. I truly don't believe we can have a worthy adaptation of Batman live action without Robin and without embracing the silliness of Batman's villains and I really hope producers, writers, and directors realize that soon.

Sorry if you read all that...

#batman #dc #dc comics #bruce wayne #robin #nightwing #dick grayson #christopher nolan #nolan batman movies #long post #sorry #but i had to say it

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disguisedcheezed · 5 months ago

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what made you like dirkjohn so much? like how did the ship pop into your head?

"how did the ship pop into your head?"

Okay. So, I just did some digging through my old abandoned accounts, and it turns out dirkjohn was my main reason why I read Homestuck in the first place. XD

They got me with their dumb looking faces and I thought I should just ship them because they're my favorites. And the fact that they were a blue orange color combo, which is the color combination I am very obsessed over, is just a mere coincidence that just made me like them more.

I don't even remember other shit from 2020-2022 because I was busy fighting for my life. 😭 I did knew that they had one interaction, so I just read the comic without expecting much of them as a ship but I loved them as their individual characters.

"what made you like dirkjohn so much?"

I don't just like dirkjohn. I LOVE dirkjohn. It's not even an exaggeration. I couldn't talk about dirkjohn(or just themindividually) without making poetry.

Anyway. The depressed weed boyfriends dirkjohn 2016-2019 shippers were right this. It was made sometime after the release of the snapchats where John is alone in his room for quite a while. And then there's other people who say like "of course they're being paired because they're the left overs of the kids ships", but what if it's like they were meant to be that way? What if they finally get to talk to each other and call out on each other's destructive behaviors? What is more romantic than being understood? Everyone else has figured out what to do with their lives.

Dirk helps John be grounded back into reality and tell him that there are friends that care for him. John tells Dirk to get out of his head, stop over thinking about the future and take care of himself. They inevitably take care of themselves by taking care of the other. They should take care of themselves for the other. And over time they get to share interest in watching animes, shitty movies and pranks.

The above is only showing "the good part" of dirkjohn.

"The worst part" ? Dirk and John were created in love of Everything, but they were doomed to be Nothing.

Similarities : They heavily mirror each other through almost all aspects of their lives.

Ex. (only a few. this isn't even the half of it.)

John: Rise up / Prince: Rise up

Liv Tyler / Lil Seb (puttin the bunny in the box)

Dirk sending gifts to his friends through a sendificator(red box) that helps/interacts with his friends physically(robots). John sends gifts to his friends through mail(blue box) that would give them their unique identity forever.

These conversations have the same vibe where they wanted to know what the other is really like apart from them knowing their adult counter parts:

In what aspect are they The Same? :

They hate themselves. Dirk dwells in it. John pushes it in the back of his head and doesn't want to think about any of it.

Dirkjohn Conclusion/Bare essentials: They effortlessly make the appeal themselves.

This is also why looking at HS^2 through a dirkjohn perspective just makes it a huge dirkjohn fanfiction. X

They ascend the need for a label in their relationship/any form of romance because of how intertwined they are to each other that they are a concept as a whole. (looks at the camera)

Dirk and John are the very threads of what makes Homestuck, Homestuck... Which means nothing.

End of ask mood moard;

My body is a vessel that collected every piece of Dirk and John's showed it back into the audience piece by piece and I will never stop doing it.

#which means nothing.... (inside joke)#asks stuff #dirkjohn #i forgot to correct so many parts because of the adhd </3 #dirkjohn manifesto

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popculturebuffet · 6 months ago

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Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck Retrospective: The Empire Builder from Callisota: "No Scrooge McDuck once had everything. Now all he has is Money and What Money Can Buy" (Patreon Review for WeirdKev27)

Hello all you happy people and welcome back to my look at The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck. After a long hiatus, it's almost over. Just two chapters left.

We've also got one I forgot..was banned. Yeah turns out a year ago Disney contacted rosa, told him this story was was banned and weren't really up to discussing it. As for why... well you can look above and get a pretty good idea. This story features Bombie the Zombie and Foola Zoola, characters Barks created... and characters who are entirely racist carcatures in their original form. Rosa DID do his best to give Foola depth, taking him from a one note villian to someone who didn't want a colonizer taking his land. Bombie.. really coudln't as he was a zombie and all that, but you can see from above why Disney wouldn't be crazy about reprinting Bombie and... I fully agree. As seen above, I can see WHY disney would choose to not want to print this story in it's orignal form as while Rosa did his best to fix the designs... Bombie still dosen't look that great.

The problems are twofold. The first is with Disney itself, who is unwilling to let anyone talk about it, is content to bury the story at at most suggested having people edit Rosa's art, something he's against. And I do get it: letting someone else walk all over something you carefully made.. isn't fair. I dont' agree with him on refusing to edit it due to being asked, as while as he says himself

“The Dream of a Lifetime” has only THREE panels of its 25 pages in which Bombie appears. Rather than ban this entire story forever due actually to only TWO of those three panels, the publishers suggested that I allow them to have Bombie redrawn. I would not allow art-tampering if my name is on the book. (I can tamper with my own art in reprints if I made some error, but I won’t allow changes forced on me.)

Look, I do think they should allow Rosa, if he's able as I know drawing is hard for him these days, to draw it and I do think just saying outright "you have to" instead of opening up an actual talk with him over the issue is scummy. Disney is being dicks and their possible "solution" of just removing the story is stupid. This is an integral part of life and tims and editing it is the better part. (As noted with dream of the life time it's only three panels).

That said while I love Don Rosa.. he should redraw it. He shoudlnt' of had his hand forced, again he deserves more respect and it's clear Disney is fairly hands off when it comes to it's comics. if he can't, then I do understand. But Rosa does have to understand.. this IS necessary. This WAS an error on his part as while he did do his best to make the characters look less racist and in Zoola's case an actual character, and was horrified by this chapter in Barks history in his commentary.. he has to understand times have changed. And while he considers the Don Rosa Library just for adults.. that's simply not the case. Jason Aaron , who wrote the recent Uncle Scrooge and the Infnity Dime, read these stories with his kids. Other people will do the same. And black children.. deserve to not have to see a racist caracture. I'm not saying ther eisn' ta market to have an unedited version with a warning label on it, Scrooge has adult readers, but I am saying these comics , while written smartly and fitting everyone.. are all ages and always will be. I'd rather the story be edited slightly to be updated than gone all together.

Let's be fair though: While I do think Rosa is being stubborn, Disney.. is still the worst and still shoudl've given him a more resonable chat than this. Disney clearly dosen't give one iota of a shit about these stories or how important they are to comics as a whole and while this chapter could use an update, it's callous to chuck it in a bin as some racist artifact when while the art.. again could use a slight touchup, maybe make bombie a full on green zombie like the 2017 cartoon.. the story itself.. isn't racist. Rosa took a racist old tale and made it a story of collonalism and scrooge's worst moment. The worst thing he ever did.. was forcibly take land from the people already living there and that's worth telling and Disney is fucking stupid for not getting that.

Lucky for me I own the story already, but I can't say that for everyone and hopefully at some point Disney gets their head and finger out of their ass and compromises with rosa while he's still around to compromise with.

For now the story itself.. and this is the one I was dreading. Not for all the above, i'd happily forgotten that till I went to get the image then had to dig into it a bit. Thank you reddit. No.. this is the sad one. See when we first met Scrooge.. Barks hadn't quite worked out who he was. He was always a bastard but he wasn't the layered bastard we know, one who will undersell his nephews but also do the right thing in a pinch. As a result he entered the story a frail old recluse donald hadn't met yet with Night on Bear Mountain, and earlier stories had him more as an antagonist before Barks took a shine to him and found out just how well the old man fit the adventure stories that he'd been telling with donald.

One of those early stories... was a massive headache for Rosa. Voodoo Hodoo, the story with the racist carcatures mentioned above, one where Scrooge gleefully admits to tearing down an african villiage and getting cursed as a result.

Like me Rosa had dreaded this part as how the hell would this fit: he coudln't ignore it due to his pride, trying to weave everything in, but it was incredibly hard to parse that with who scrooge became.. till it hit him: USE the fact it was horribly out of character for Scrooge. Have it be the one moment that in rosa's words "he became flintheart glomgold" that one moment of weakeness where he became his worst self for just one day, succumbed to every bad instinct he had did something truly unforgivable... and have it have consequences. Have his worst moment, his one bad day, be the reason his family left and he didn't reunite with them till inviting donald and the boys for christmas all those many decades later. It's why I dreaded this chapter: it's the one where Scrooge gains everything he ever wanted.. and looses what he had in the process. It's one of the hardest chapters to read and it's under the cut.

So we open with Matilda closing her scrapbook. Up to this point her scrap book had been the opening page, tracking her brother's journey.. but now she and her sisters are adults working for their brother, staying at the office while he travels the world and the seven seas building his empire and slowly filling his bin. It's a nice bit of symbolisim considering what's about to happen.

Scrooge returns as you'd expect.. inside a canon as he refused to pay extra shipping to ship himself. He could, as Hortense points out let someone else run the show.. but he refuses. No one else has his grit and while he dosen't say it... no one else simply has his stubborness. When mugged and having his hat shot he runs down the new generation of mcvipers in a flashback simply because they shot up his hat and cost him money. The man DOES need a better work life ballance.. but he isn't wrong. Scrooge is simply at his best when he's doing some of the work himself. His 2017 self does delegate more.. but truly thrives when his nephew and niece and later passel of nephews and daughter he never knew he had remind him of adventure. He dosen't always turn a tidy profit.. but the experince is well worth it and for every loss there's a gain.

This mindset makes a LOT of sense in story: We've seen scrooge struggle and scrape to get this far. Fight every minute as he will not settle for a life he does not deserve nor feels his family dosen't. Every time he seemingly got up the mountain and won... something shoved him back down with only a small handful of cash as progress, enoguh to get to the next adventure. Over that, with Rockerduck and Roosevelt's help, he learned he just.. loved the chase. He's in a comfy enough place where he can still keep going on the chase.. but every small loss isn't a gutting reminder he hasn't gotten anything but experince. He can take risks. He sometimes dosen't because he's a cheap old bastard, but he can adventure.. because he can afford it. Before it was just to survive.. now it's because it's what he WANTS to do. He wants to be richer than god, to keep going keep growing his empire and he was taught the only way to get that far is to do the hardest work yourself and maybe let others come to you for money once you got it.

Case in point Scrooge really didnt' see the need for a larger office staff, leaving only his sisters to run it.. and thus hilariously passes out when he finds they hired Ms Quackfaster. For those more familiar with Ducktales 2017 Quackfaster here is more timid, put upon back when it was entirely okay to abuse your secretary/office assitant. Ah the 40's.. please stay 50 feet away at all times thank you. He goes catatonic at finding out they have a full staff, but Hortsens is unphased throwing a whole cup of coffe in his face and making it clear that A) They couldn't do this with two people ya jackass and B) we're comnig with you.. ya jackass.

The girls have brought quackmore to office manage so they can go globetrotting something scrooge is suprisingly happy with.

Sadly this is about as light hearted as this adventure gets as we head into the congo.. where

The story strangely dosen't say, which is uncarctrastic for Rosa. This story has that racist habit a lot of stories do of just saying "Africa' instead of "what country exactly on the largest continent in the world". Which is not great when he was far more specific when we did the previous jaunt to south africa. Yeah... some oft his story has not aged well and Rosa can and should have done better. He does through research but here just... plunks a very plot importnat villiage int he middle of a giant continent.

Scrooge is intent to impress his sisters.. but instead shows them, and us, how far he's fallen: Scrooge does one of the oldest tricks in the colonalist playbook, offering the cheif a quarter for the land rights since the man genuinely DOSEN'T know he's getting screwed over. This trope is.. awful, that old "Oh stupid indgenious peoples they'll belivie anything. So it's not great.. but it is softend a bit as the chief offered a tiny war drum something sacred to him, something not worth money, but worth a lot to their small community.. and scrooge faked that gesture while really screwing the poor guy over. While the optics are sketchy.. the intent works: Scrooge has sunken so low that rather than make his money square and returning a heartfelt gesture of someones cutlure sincerly.. he tricks the person for his own ends.

The sisters call him out for this... and it's a scene I forgot.. but boy does it hit

Seeing Scrooge fallen this low.. is hard. While it's not the man gut punch of the comic, Don Rosa's not even close to done working the body, it still hits to see how much he's changed. It was to the point I THOUGHT this was a bit abrubt, that while it's been a while since the last chapter, it surely can't of been THAT long.

Thinking back though... this was set up most of the story. Scrooge's dark side has always been part of his character, especially in the comics: Even in the better days ahead in the prime of the barks and rosa eras.. he's still rageful, barely pays his family or workers, petty and often wont' do things he easily could simply to be a selfish dick. Christmas for Shacktown has him refuse to help pay for christmas for orphans even when Donald put in the hard work to get 25 dollars.. which is, to my shock 294 dollars and 17 cents in today money. So yeah donald gathered nearly 300 dollars in charity.. that scrooge refused to repay. I'd say he's the worst evil billonare in fiction but his competition is pretty stiff

Point is part of Scrooge's charm is he COULD be an asshole... it thankfully got toned down with time and Ducktales and ESPECIALLY 2017 Ducktales toned it the fuck down, the latter having what I consdier to be my faviorite version, but he's still some form of bastard, and his need to grow as a person or suprising bits of depth and humanity are what make him so fascinating. He's a dick.. but he has a lot of layers to him and a moral code.

This chapter shows just what thin ice that code is on: how it wouldn't take too much for him to tip over the line and become an even worse glomgold. While that darkness isn't there in the early chapters, as younger scrooge is both a tad more naive and way more kind and trusting it slowly builds: in Raider of the Copper Hill he nearly goes mad with power at just the THOUGHT of his newfound fortune and only having to sell his newfound wealth immediatly for pennies snaps him out of it. The Terror of Transval breaks his trust in most people completely, thanks flinty. In King of The Klondike while still sympathetic you can see his harder shell having fully formed, how he avoids other people, is rude to just about everyone and later in the next chapter, is fairly cold to people.It's been bubbling faster and faster: In the billionare of dismal downs, he snaps at the townspeople threanting to leave them all homeless out of petty spite. And finally in the previous chapter, he kicks those boy scouts out rather rudely, which bites him in the ass when they assume he's a foreign spy. The last part is just them being dummies, but there's this harsh sharp edge we simply don't fully notice forming.. because it's who scrooge is even after he takes about ten percent off. The guy is mean.

But Barks uses this opportunity to show why he's a hero.. by showing him, for one shameful moment, as a villian. As a pure monster who gladly tricks an indigenous person out of their land and his response to being called out on it by his anchors, the thing noticably able to snap him out of his worst insincts... is to say "i'm done playing fair."

Scrooge is often honest.. because he's got people around to curb his worst insincts. His family keep him grounded: having the goal of helping provide for them kept him honest, his dad kept pushing him away from his worst instincts and his sisters and mom kept doing the same.

The problem is.. slowly but surely.. he's just about lost everyone: His mentors are long gone or in the white house. He dosen't trust anyone enough to have actual friends. And as for his family.. h'es slowly lost them: His Uncles have passed by now, he lost his mom and found out in the worst way possible, and he just lost his dad. He has his sisters.. but like Donald and the Boys later, he's on an uneven enough playing field with them to ignore them if he wants. After all he provided for them, he gave them a home in america, what fucks should he give they don't care. Their the last tether he has to his humanity and he's kept them at arms length, keeping them at home whlie he journied and letting himself get more and more corrupt. Without the humanizing aspects of his goal to gain wealth, having saved his ancestral castle, given his sisters a good life and become rich, all that's left is gaining more and more money whatever it takes. Scrooge may be unscrupoious on a good day.. but he has enough honor to do the right thing, to be honest about his money. Without that is just the monster barely contianed under the surface and the last thing locking it out.. is about to go away.

So Scrooge confronts the Voodoo Part of the tribe, which while... once again about as researched as Tintin in Africa, is one of the better parts. Again Barks casual racisim.. shows a bit. It's something I didn't notice on previous readings but is kinda.. obvious now as the man just didn't bother ot put in the research he did for white legends and locations. He's not always racist, he put true effort into researching the dreamtime for the Dreamtime Duck of Never Never, but it's clear when it comes to africa he didn't really give a shit.

That said while he has issues I WILL give Rosa credit for how he redid Foola. The racist aspects are gone aside from fangs for teeth.. and characterzation wise he's treated not as some cheap villian.. but as a man who puts on scare tactics because he's used to men like scrooge: Greedy white assholes who try to take everything they can from his sacred land. Foola is unimpressed by this colonizing asshole and it's a part of the story that, unlike most of the other villiage stuff, holds up very well: Barks clearly respects Vodoo even going on one of his signature "old man yells at cloud" rants about how "traditional" zombies are nothing like the ones we know now. Foola is only in the story for a short while but makes a hell of an impression, being one of the few characters to truly best scrooge

Now Scrooge probably woudln't of takent his well in any form at any time. The diffrence is the scrooge later could at least be talked down by the nephews or would've barged back in solo to fight Foola. He also never would've done the racist offering a quarter shit to him or the chief. This scrooge.. does easily the worst thing Scrooge McDuck has EVER done in any medium.

I love the heavy shadows over his face in this scene, just the pure.. evil radiating off scrooge for a moment. Anger, malice.. we've seen it.. but we've never seen him as a complete and utter monster destroying people's lives and homes all for his greed and every minute of it is painful, seeing just how... Broken matilda is by it. You can see just how sad she is to see her brother not only tear her apart for no good reason but tear innocent people apart.. while Hortense.. prepares to pack.

Somehow scrooge manages to do MORE horrible shit, pretending to be someone else to get foola to sign the contract. Foola swears his revenge... and Scrooge returns not to his sisters forgiving him and gladly taking the money as he expected... but a letter

While dishonesty is kinda underselling it, it's a truly painful moment. It's also an awesome one as the whole time Scrooge has ignored what they've had to say.. and now he can't. All he can do is gripe about WHY he's sunk this low: that if the world isn't honest why shoud he be? It's a problem that feels extra relevant these days: if the world is a dumpster fire... why shouldn't I be one too? If nothing we do matters, what does anything matter?

I'd forgotten this scene.. but damn it hits. The one thing that gets through to him.. is his dad. He can lie to himself.. but he can't lie to his dad. And the answer to that hypothetical above was simple: to be true to yourself, to respect yourself enough not to sink to tohers levels.

This does convince scrooge to go reunite with his family.. but first he has bigger issues. Foola's back..a nd he's brougth bombie. And bombie's design isn't great, but Barks reimagines him well: more as an unstoppable juggernaught than a mildly racist zombie. Thankfully Rosa also needed to retcon something else: Scrooge looked like a young donald in the flashback, something that didn't really stack up with later versions, so in not ignoring this story, Rosa found a clever way to deal with that; his earlier disguise looked like donald, so bombie only goes after him when he has a hat on.

The next section is kinda weak, if understadanbly so: Rosa had to cover DECADES of Scrooge's life this time around, so we follow him as he doe ssome buisnessy buieness buienss and outwits bombie, along the way picking up a candy striped ruby. IT's all pretty standard though the climax of it.. is fucking amazing. Bombie follows Scrooge to the titanic. Where Scrooge dosen't notice the boat sinking because he's busy with bombie. It's a sequence I just kinda eyed over in past readings but in this one.. hot damn is it fun.

After he beats bombie we then get a montage as Scrooge makes a global empire, mostly nods to various barks stories I don't think i've read yet, like the gilded man of el dorado.. who then runs in fear as he forgets who he's dealing with. Nothing bad but it feels like it's there more to cover all the gaps in scrooge's history left before the finale than tell a story for the most part. There is one exception though: after he gets shoved off a cliff.. he finds he's picked up a new ability, one of his most famous

Also props to rosa for explaining the "how he can swim through coins" thing: As ducktales 2017 put it it's a hard won skill and just diving in would kill anyone else. Rosa like barks takes this seriously, as while this world has fantastical stuff in it he grounds it in the logical explanation, ones that don't feel like nitpicky fan wankery, but a logical reason why Scrooge can do the thing people know him for.

Turns out Bombie wasn't lost in the titanic... which makes sense: If James Cameron the Bravest Pioneer didn't find him while taking underwater footage of it, he must've been gone. The Chief of an Island scrooge is negotating with takes the ruby in exchange for binding Bombie for 30 years and Scrooge is sur ehe'll NEVER see him again.

Some time ,more finagaling and proftering later, Scrooge FINALLY returns home to a warm reception.. an ddickilsh bashes the mayor with the key to the city

Sadly his return to his office.. means our ending. And it's one of the hardest things i've had to write about. And I had to write about frasier mowing down the ACLU a few weeks back.

No this ending is simple but crushing: His sisters decided to let bygones be bygones, enough time had passed. Sadly.. Scrooge taking the long way round.. meant he just.. dosen't care. He brushes them off, storms into his office and when Hortense storms in.. he angrily tells them they didn't care when he was abroad all that time supporting them before. What he misses.. is that things changed. Two, when he started his trip, small children with no real agency seeing their brother off versus two grown women who simply want him to acknowledge them.. is diffrent. They don't need him anymore.. and Hortense tells him if he shoes them away NOW, it's over. And sadly.. Scrooge pushes them away. While before it was due to his darkest hour.. this time.. it's just due to who he is. Scrooge is a prideful old bastard who can't accept weakness and sees his emotoinal ties as just that. IT's why it takes him so long to actually admit, and rarely to their faces, he cares about Donald and the nephews.. and his sisters need and deserve that. THey deserve to be acknowleged. Donald and the Boys did.

Speaking of Donald he and Della were here and whiel Della was only a character enough at this point to get a cameo Donald... gets the last shot in.

Bout sums up their relationship really.. but it's also oddly sweet.. donald kicks scrooge's ass, literally and desrevedly.. because he made his momma cry.

Scrooge has a chance, to reconcile, to fix this.. but sadly instead...

God that last panel, his sisters sadly resigned to letting him go as the Bin towers over everything, showing off just how lonely he is and forever will be. Even if this story as a whole has a happy ending, this ending... guts you.

And somehow.. I found a way it guts me even more on a second reading. This.. is the last time Scrooge talks to hortense that we're aware of. He DOES see Matilda again, a story we'll certainly get to someday, and one of Rosa's finest.. but it's heavily implied Hortense and Quackmore are gone by the time Donald and Della are adults as we never see them and unlike Della, we never got an explination in the comics. Scrooge's last time seeing his sister was a terrible argument and him turning his back on his family out of pride. He lost so much time with her, her children and his family.. all for nothing.

The Richest Duck in the World is a good story.. if an uneven one. Parts of it are mildly racist, with Rosa again not having cared enough to do actual research this time and that's damming from a guy who prides himself on it, and it drags for a bit as Rosa has to stitch together decades of noodle incidents in Barks work. The titanic scene is great but most of it is pretty much fanservice and while I am a fan of Barks work, i'm not the super student Rosa is, so I don't get nearly as much out of it. I'm fine with fanservice, but the rest of the comic does a better job threading it in naturally.

That said while the chapter is uneven.. the parts it nails.. it really NAILS. Scrooge's darkest hour is truly chilling, a monsterous act that is truly horrifying to watch and the ending just hits like a truck. While we get a SLIGHT breather with Donald kicking his ass, it ends on a gut punch that reminds us Scrooge.. lost his family. The very thing he set out to help... he lost.

Thankfully.. this isn't the end. While this is the climax.. i'ts not the ending. So

Next Time: We end this trek as Scrooge gets to know his nephews and has to deal with an old foe. Till then thanks for reading

#the life and times of scrooge mcduck #scrooge mcduck #donald duck #hortense duck #matilda mcduck #the empire builder from callisota #disney #ducktales

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osomatsuconfessions · 4 months ago

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vaping and general smoking thoughts long long long

osomatsu: sticks with just cigarettes mostly, antiquated frame of reference where old and comfortable is the best with little change allowed. matsuzou smokes so i think oso just followed by example and liked the relaxed feeling and repetition aspect. he would maybe try a vape under the idea that a buzz is a buzz and a buzz feels good but would find the synthetic taste and experience to be offputting. has many complaints that comically go against audience expectation: 'whats the point! it doesnt even smell bad! it doesnt even make YOU smell bad! it doesnt even make my lungs burn!' etc etc

karamatsu: impossibly weak nicotine tolerance, smoked one cigarette and got extremely sick and took it as an omen. wouldnt vape because sucking on a little rectangle doesnt line up with his idea of coolness. holds cigarettes and cigars in his mouth to get the image of being intimidating and tough without ever lighting them.

choromatsu: WOULD be interested in vaping out of the fear of what smoking is actively doing to his body and what it says about his restraint and responsibility over himself by putting his lungs in danger, plus (kiddish and so, hard to admit) the flavors sound appealing. would sneak hits of tottys vape really obviously in the middle of the house any time hes not around and would over time want to start branching out with different pods, making his own rankings in his head. choro does not see this as lame but instead something akin to taking up wine tasting as a hobby (same level of prestige in his mind but less cost so its even better. hes even better). writes whole entries in a journal bought specifically for this purpose about the notes and undertones and things. to him this is for explorational AND educational purposes. this is the hobby of a discerning mind. this is not him being addicted to drugs. this is not JUST some guy vaping a ton for the sake of vaping its DIFFERENT. the other matsus find the journal and mock choro and his analysis of unicorn 50w by reciting passages back to his while she goes catatonic and silently switches back to cigarettes. never gets any buzz ever again from the insane tolerance build up but will never share this fact or think deeper about what it says about his habits

ichimatsu: explicitly doesnt smoke nor would vape. shit in his lungs is shit in his lungs it all sucks

jyushimatsu: intermittent cigarette smoker just whenever the chance presents itself. in line with him sharing the coffee milk with osomatsu where its probably more about the taste and getting to chug it and spin around than the effects of caffeine, its a vessel for comedy and appearances (for reference humor to specific archetypes or doing physically impossible tricks) and stuff more than an actual enjoyment of nicotine. he probably finishes other peoples but doesnt start his own. also thinking of jyushimatsus fixation with chewing and teething on shit like cybers heads or the lollipops theres no way hes not chomping the shit out of the filters. i think vapes initially would kind of confuse him same as all the others, but hed be reeled in by the idea of super sweet flavors and the comedic potential of making giant clouds. hed be like a fog machine. teeth marks on the vape too nothings safe if its going in there

todomatsu: would vape, specifically orange or strawberry pods. totty also doesnt really get it but it SEEMS like its hip cause there was a lot of buzz about it a couple years ago and he is forever multiple seasons late to any kind of trend so hes more than willing. hitting it around other people makes him feel like his fingers on the pulse of modern culture and not a guy who spends his time gambling and fishing like an old man. confidence booster plus he thinks it makes you smell better to women, especially compared to tobacco smoke, which is another plus (and cuts down on buying gas station perfume 2 in 1 bargain). when not accompanied by people totty means to impress (the other matsus) he would smoke cigarettes. he (like the rest) is a fiend of habit and behaviors set by osomatsu especially are ingrained so its pretty inevitable that he followed along in earlier adult years and then got hooked. but by s3 hed give it up more (riceballs using their electronic vape things further pushing the idea that this is futuristic and impressive and something that they should get with the times on, which totty would feel self conscious about not understanding/already doing + additionally having already made his extreme departure from following osomatsus actions beat for beat as he otherwise was predisposed to in s1) but would have an itch for it that hed mostly only scratch when drunk or making excuses. to compensate for his late switchover and to further distinguish himself as The Sextuplet In The Know Of Things hed rub in their faces how bad tobacco is for your lungs and how hes gonna live way longer and chide them about how they prioritize getting a hit in over living a long time like 'good luck having sex when youre DEAD with TAR LUNGS idiots!!!' when asked how vapes are at all better for your lungs he goes silent and looks away

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hbosscreations · 4 months ago

Text

Fixing Hellblazer: Dead in America

Apparently I'm not doing being negative today, so I'm going to channel my bullshit into fixing things.

Let me tell you a bit about me. I love bad horror movies. I LOVE horror movies that aren't great, but you can see how they COULD be great under different circumstances. My favorite thing to do for years was take a movie that wasn't good and think about what needed to be done to fix it.

Dead in America actually has a pretty simple fix that would help with the rewrite. You'd have to rewrite the whole thing, this draft isn't salvagable, but if you really want to tell the story about American Racism, it's such an easy fix, I don't know why they didn't do it in the first place.

Make Noah Ikumelo the main character.

Seriously. That's the big change.

Maybe he's not the focal character for the entire 11 issue run, but have him be the perspective of at least one issue instead of the random racists that keep getting their stories told like we're supposed to care about them.

Issue 1: Flee

Tommy is dead, K-Mag is dead, they're on the run, and John says 'well, I've got friends in America who could help us out'.

Noah's scared, Nat's scared, John seems to have a plan. So, they're off to America with no money, no papers, nothing but the clothes on their backs.

It's okay at first, John's magic lets him manipulate people a bit, gets them through security checks and keeps them fed, but it's definitely not enough to keep them safe forever.

Noah has a bunch of exposition he gives about being black in the UK, about being disabled, about his feelings about his mother (being a cop, being in a coma, being weird about magic).

How he has always felt unheard until John came into the picture and saw him.

They're traveling, the fear starts to wear off, Noah realizes they've fled the country and his mother is alone.

Where's his gran? This is a point to show flashbacks. Maybe she's not mentally all there? Maybe Noah has been sleeping on John's couch. Maybe he's been learning magic during the months we don't see in the original run. Not a lot, John tells him that he likes that Noah's not really involved in this shit.

Until the murder dreams, when Noah starts getting a crash course in magic and hasn't had a chance to think about anything except John and his stupid plans.

The issue ends with them on the freight ship they stowed away on approaching the docks. They've arrived in port, and it's time to leave. John puts his hand on the double decker bus and reassures them both that he's got this. He's got a plan, and things are going to be okay.

He looks fondly at Noah, and Noah wonders if he can trust that face. Can he believe John?

He doesn't really have a choice, does he?

Issue 2: Where is everyone?

This issue is mostly from John's perspective and his narrating voice takes control again.

John reaches out to old contacts. They're gone. Dead or never existed in the first place. No capes and cowls in this universe. Just magic, divinity, and damnation.

They're fucked.

Meanwhile, Noah and Nat both realize that they're being treated differently than John is. Both have experienced different types of prejudice based on race, gender, disability, and now there's an extra layer of it. The American layer that the story really wants to talk about.

John gets a little, but it's pretty clear that people are generally cooler with a blond haired, blue eyed, white man with an accent than they are with Noah's lack of speaking and Nat's heavy Glaswegian accent.

There's a level of cruelty that makes being trapped in another country, unable to call anyone and tell them that you're alive, unable to know if your family is safe, unable to know if you were even a suspect in the crimes committed, extra fucky.

John's contacts he'd normally call are all of touch the easy way.

So, fine. If he can't call them, he'll go to their usual haunts and track them that way.

Hence, road trip.

This leads into the actual comic scene where John is in St. Augustine, Florida and talking to the statue.

You can still have the Girl Scout come and be cryptic and cruel, have John losing his shit over the fact that he's damned Noah to hell.

(Or we can include my favorite headcanon that Noah was supposed to be a tulpa designed to distract John. I don't know if it would work here, but a story about a kid literally designed to be a sponge for prejudice and cruelty might be a mirror this story about racism could play with. It would need a MUCH more competent writer than me and at least two sensitivity readers.)

Noah wants to pull over for a hitchhiker, they've got the space and he's kind, but John cautions him that America is VERY different from London. We learn that Noah has not traveled much outside of his home city if at all because of his mother's profession and then her coma, leaving him in the care of his gran, who lived on the estate and therefore didn't really have much in the ability or desire to go far.

The dream with Dream still happens, which gives us a nice connection to the previous story as well as John's whole...being dead thing. They're looking for the sand, they're looking for friendly faces, they're looking for magic in a world that John quickly realizes is GASPING and DYING.

Because the multiverse still got punched in the dick by Tim Hunter, and while this world hasn't been hit by him specifically, it's feeling some of the multiversal repercussions of an apocalypse that massive.

And John doesn't have the power to get them out of this while he's a corpse. The longer he rots, the weaker he gets.

Dream gives his orders. John agrees.

They wake up, Noah is being threatened by the cop because he's black and driving a bus. We don't make it about the cop being too stupid to know what a bus is this time, instead, we make it because the bus looks strange and 'why is a black boy driving a bus unless he stole it? obviously he's a thief and he's refusing to speak out of disrespect'.

That fucking sucks, but it also works more to the actual threat of racism in the US. The OTHERING. They're dangerous because they're OTHER. They're lesser because they're OTHER.

Nat keeps the cop's gun after he's frozen. She's freaked. Noah's freaked.

John calmly tells them the spell won't last forever and they need to drive. Nat goes to the wheel and we watch Noah sneak up to the upper level and cry.

John watches from the stairs until he's sure Noah is asleep. He doesn't know how to offer this particular kid comfort, how to offer to hold him without revealing his death or just being too attached.

We see him put his coat over the boy as a symbol of protection. He brushes a hand over Noah's head and asks Dream to look out for the kid.

"I know you're pissed at me and I don't really have the right to ask, but hasn't he had enough nightmares for now?"

Noah's dream about all the horrible things he's processing from the previous issue, the previous run, and that night melt into something more pleasant. Maybe the groundwork for him learning John is his father.

John is back with Nat as she's driving. She's angry. The conversation from the original issue can stay and be expanded on. John tries to comfort her, tries to ease the tension, and it eventually works.

She gets what he's doing, even if he's not doing a good job.

This is a Classic John Constantine who cares about other people but isn't necessarily good at showing it.

The sun starts to rise.

"Where the fuck are we going now? We're a target in this thing, John, and that cop's gonna call us in."

John reassures that they're fine and he's got a new plan.

Most of the hero types don't exist now, but that's fine. He's started to tap into the multiversal memories that he'd repressed in the 2019 issue, and he's pretty sure that he's got a friend who will exist in this universe, even if people like Zatanna and Superman don't.

After all, the Green is a multiversal constant.

This leads into the ending of the original issue 1, with the swamp being filled in and turned into a golf course.

And that ends issue 2.

I don't know if I want to invest energy into re-imagining the entire run, and I suspect that would require the run to be finished before I can properly fix anything except the opening. If you actually read this...sorry about the way it's written, this was all just thought to typing, so it has 0 polish.

I think this is a series that could have worked under different circumstances. I think there are elements here that are good, but this was clearly not written with any real oversight or a coherent story beforehand.

I would have loved for them to learn magic on the bus. Scenes of Nat and Noah picking up spells, Nat teaching Noah the proper way to throw a punch that won't fuck up his hands. Noah being REALLY good at making sure they all manage to eat properly (I am deeply invested in this child shoving oranges into people's hands because 'do you want scurvy?').

A scene of John teaching Nat sign language while Noah slept because he's already so isolated and they all need to take care of each other. Nat forcing John to drive, only for him to hit a car and immediately switch back to her driving. Nat reading a novel aloud to keep Noah awake while they drive at night.

Basically, we need to make them seem like they're actual people who actually spend all of their time trapped together.

Also, does John eat? How have they noticed that he doesn't eat? Does he sweat? If he showers, does that damage his skin and hair, since he's apparently molding at the start of the series?

#Lore is Writing Again #Hellblazer dead in america rewrite #John Constantine fanfiction #Noah Ikumelo #I'm not saying I could fix it #but I think I could make it something I hate less #and in the end isn't that what fanfiction is?

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winns-stuff · 2 years ago

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LO RANT:

This is from the fastpass preview that I stumbled across but genuinely nobody gives a flying fuck about Hades. Out of everything that this comic has disrespected Leuce with the most insulting out of all of them has to be her lowering her standards for an absolute man child like Hades, there’s nothing inherently attractive about him and the only reason Persephone is so infatuated with him is because of the fact that she’s literally 19 FOREVER and her brain is too underdeveloped to get better taste. But to sit up here and say that Leuce is just so incredibly desperate for Hades of all people when she’s so desired and sought after that the king of all gods deemed her worthy of marrying his brother is absolutely incredibly insulting. If this was realistic no one would be scared of Persephone’s pick me ass, I’m so sick and tired of Lore Olympus making every woman make an absolute fool of themselves over someone as low as Hades, literally any guy would be more worthy than fucking Hades like come on man are you serious?

Anyways, I’m just so over the mistreatment of the nymphs and I’m over people calling this a girl boss move. The fans love to sit up here and say that this is women supporting women but brutalizing women of a lower class and making fun of their mistreatment isn’t something we should deem feminist worthy. Like genuinely why the fuck is anyone applauding this shit? The fact that nymphs are at the gods’ mercy and they’re constantly being degraded, insulted, and abused by the upper class just for existing is sick. I can’t even say that it’s because of greek mythology since the nymphs were at least respected, like you knew the difference between them and their power but they weren’t treated like disposable waste like the nymphs in LO are. The nymphs have to be the only characters in the comic who deserve nothing but love and support from everyone since every chapter seems like a dig at them and it’s getting really awful to watch.

Another thing is the title of the episode. Are you fucking delirious? Leuce is a homewrecker?? How?? Homewrecking is blaming someone for a breakup of either a marriage or relationship because they engaged into an AFFAIR or other things in that matter with the member of the relationship. Unless Rachel is saying that because of Leuce they’re finally breaking up I don’t ever wanna hear about homewrecking ever from Lore Olympus trying to describe a character like that. Quite literally the only legitimate homewrecker in this entire series is Persephone’s ass and no one gives a fuck because the way she did it was “cute” and “pure”, she’s your little cinnamon roll while everyone else who does the exact same thing are evil witches. Which brings up my main point, Leuce barely poses a damn threat this woman is as small as a mouse and not up to anything nefarious, instead of focusing on KRONOS possibly coming back and taking over your ENTIRE kingdom that you’ve only ruled over for a few days you’re worried about some poor confused woman who got led on by your cheating ass husband while you were away. The major reaction is cringe and laughable, you don’t feel angry towards people disrespecting you or stomping on your values but as soon as it’s something with Hades you’re suddenly the biggest bad guy ever, give me a damn tissue. It’s truly sad that this is giving me more of a reason to believe that Persephone has no personality outside of being a “soft wife”, like where are your morals? What the hell do you stand for if you allow shit like this to happen.

This is why I get so angry and upset with Lore Olympus as a whole it’s upsetting seeing this insufferable main character do the most hypocritical shit that another character got dragged through the mud over yet we’re all supposed to clap our hands and put them on the highest pedestals. The fans don’t make it any better either because they survive off of stuff like that, that’s quite literally all they do all the damn time. They just eat up every little thing Persephone or any of the main cast does and enables this shitty behavior to continue because I swear if there was a time where Rachel decided to do something in her story that a massive amount of the fans hated she would never implement it into her story again, but since everyone absolutely loves these two women idiotically fighting over a pathetic man she keeps this stereotype around every other season.

Moral of the story is stop taking the dignity of these women and stop using them as some sort of cover up for your main character being incredibly boring and bland because I know the only reason for Lore Olympus’ demonization of Leuce is because they needed to prove how “much better” Persephone is. How about Persephone takes her red eyes and shove it in the faces of those who actually fucking deserve it instead of acting cowardly and only using it against nymphs because “they’re beneath you” since I have yet to see her have an actual backbone towards anyone deserving of this shit.

#lo critical #anti lore olympus #anti lo #lo hades #lo persephone #lo minthe #lore olympus criticism

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love-is-a-pearl · 8 months ago

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wait, in one comic where you drew Ash around 5 years old (The one where he got the Z marks on his cheeks) he was already masc presenting there. Does it mean he had been trans since he was a toddler or something? That's highly critical to me, good for him if he really is trans but it seems like Delia really wanted a boy if he'd been trans for so long

is more like.. for me in pokemon universe people just leave their kids go ungendered until they're 10? Kinda?

Like, think homestuck "you only get a name at 13" kinda deal and the whole "what's your name?" and "what do you look like?" that the professors ask in pokemon games intros.

I like to think those are not by accident, they're more like a way to make sure kids are being gendered in the way they prefer once they become "working class", "official adults" or whatever being a pokemon trainer means in pokemon society.

Is more like.. up to the point they get a starter, kids are free to do what they want, go by different names every other day and just have fun exploring that shit yknow?

And when they get their starter, they get to make a BUNCH of important decisions, like picking their forever partner, the name that will go in their ID, their pronouns, all that shit, yknow? So, most parents will raise their kids taking that into account.

(changes can happen of course, I mean I LOVE the idea of gender fluid Ash but that's something i cant say its "canon" in my AU since I havent explored that idea in detail yet)

Is not really "he always knew he was a guy deep inside uwu" but more "kids in pokemon universe are raised in environments that just lets them test this shit out" kinda deal.

And like, I favor drawing the characters close to how they look in the anime cause I prefer that for continuity sake, but since they are cis in there they will never look too different, but I will always try and tweak some small things here and there (like, giving Ash longer hair in that comic) to imply something more.

(also Ash was canonically bullied by his peers because of the issue with his father so.. i wouldn't put it past him to dress up more "boyish" or even using his father's clothes to prove he would go and be like him but better yknow? before realizing that "Hey, is not that I wanted to be like dad. I just wanted to be a dude" lmadopaspd)

...

But for real... sometimes... is just not that deep? People will give sonic top scars and he is like.. 9? and a hedgehog asopdjasiodj

pokemon is just my little escapist solarpunk utopia and I like pretenting it is a better place than real life even with the smallest little things QwQ

#answered asks #|→ not not #no offense but what does it even means to be “masc presenting” for a child anyway lmao??#the way i drew baby ash is based on how his younger self is shown in the anime but also how... i dressed too????#take the suspenders away and that's baby me #and i was NOT seen as a boy in my baby years so

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iholli · 1 year ago

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I would absolutely love to hear about your faves 👀 Tell me everything you know 👀👀👀👀

AAAAAAVUYCDTIGCTUGCH YOU'RE A GEM THANK U FOR THIS 😭😭😭💚

this is super long bc I'm Completely Normal abt J'onn lmao whoops 😂

omfg where do I start. FIRST THINGS FIRST. HE. MY BELOVED. J'onn J'onzz, the Martian Manhunter, my favorite favorite of all time. no really it's coming up on 8 years and I still love him sm 😭 my one braincell may wander off to new fixations but I always circle back around to him sooner or later.

I have like 4747058 images of him ofc but these are SO good bc they tell a lot about him ??? he's cute, he's silly, he's dramatic, he's sassy, he's the heart of the Justice League twenty times over despite DC refusing to give him any time to shine (I'm going to fight them with my bare hands for that).

I've never posted this but it's been in my drafts for ever so I'll throw it in here 😂 I have so many thoughts about him omg

ALSO I have a whole thing analyzing J'onn's moral compass & development through Justice League Animated, Unlimited, and some of the comics a while back so there's tHAT WHICH,,, was super good imo 👏

uuuuughghghghh I could talk about him forever 😭💚

When it comes to people Superman wouldn't want to fight, J'onn is top of that list, that's canon. He's OP as FUCK. He has most if not all Clark's powers, shapeshifting, intangibility, invisibility, phasing, telepathy, seriously his powers seem to never end ??? But he's terribly underutilized :") like I get it but come on DC,,,

J'onn is addicted to Oreos. no, really. in MM 98 issue 24 Blue Beetle and Booster Gold have this Super Funny Idea to hide all the Oreos from J'onn, and you gotta applaud the dedication to the prank bc they literally went out and bought ALL the Oreos from the ENTIRE vicinity of the JL Embassy building. J'onn proceeds to Hulk out and tear up half the city chasing them for it. It's revealed by Batman that Martians can get addicted to Oreos. At the end of the issue it turns out this is just a story J'onn is telling Diana but... he winks and asks if she's got any cookies, so it's up for debate if it's really just a story [I think there's some truth to it. bc it's very funny.]. And the Oreo thing comes up many times in many places including JLTAS 😂

He also likes sweet things in general !! he canonically drinks coffee with a TON of sugary shit to take off the bitter taste. I also made the hc that was the case for him just days before reading it in MM Identity and I'm very real for that 👏

J'onn is a cat person. One of his aliases is even an Italian street cat named Tommaso. And he has an orange cat named Double Stuff,,, of course 😂

however,,, he's totally a dragon nerd, he knows everything about dragons, he likes reptiles in general but dragons are his fav. He shapeshifts into draconic creatures all the time and he talks many times abt a specific species of moon nesting dragon called quonars. He also telepathically connected with an iguana once and it was a wholesome experience 🥺

J'onn lives in Colorado, in a suburb named Middleton, which is actually the name of a real ghost town! it's interesting that Denver is his preferred climate bc you can assume Mars was similar 👀

He is THE sass master. He goes toe to toe with Batman constantly. One of these days I'll just make a list of every sassy line he delivers in JLTAS but I think that would be a whole book by itself. There's a video of sassy moments from Batman: The Brave and the Bold that I watch 400 times a week. One of my favorite comic sass moments is when Batman expresses his annoyance at J'onn for leaving on the middle of an important meeting, which J'onn happily counters with a "you're so right, it would look bad on the League if someone just vanished at random all the time, huh Batman :)." he then also takes a crack at Bruce's lack of people skills. iconic.

He's also a silly little guy. The Batman 2007? J'onn OWNS the noir detective role, down to the cheesy old fashioned music. He also has like, a whole list of quotes he's just waiting to use when the time is right. He waited years to say "You're probably wondering why I've called you all here today." love him fr

J'onn is canonically kind of an adrenaline junkie. He loves driving, particularly an 87 Chevy Impala which he affectionately says "vibrates like a Chihuahua with a head cold." He once physically linked with an entire damaged spaceship to steer it out of danger and got carried away bc he was just having fun. He also said it was similar to the video games he plays with GL-- so he's canonically a gamer, too 😂👏

I 100% believe he's got anxiety or at LEAST separation anxiety [and that may be the case for the entire Martian race]. I already thought as much but then JLU issue 24 kinda confirmed it and it was devastating :") the League is taken over by Starro, J'onn is the only one who dodges the attack and he's left to fight his teammates which. is already awful for him. and it triggers flashbacks to a time on Mars when he was separated from his family in a nasty sandstorm. J'onn went pretty much feral with panic until he broke down and then forced himself to calm down enough to think of a plan. Meanwhile back with the League he's frantically trying not to panic again bc, while fire is a Martian's greatest weakness, "being alone is a Martian's greatest fear." I cried the whole time I read that issue and then I bought a copy LMAO. can DC stop putting him through the PTSD wringer for five seconds thanks

One short comic run J'onn spends the whole time being chased by the Martian god of fire, H'ronmeer, bc it turns out he was psychically keeping the souls of the entire Martian population tethered to the mortal realm. he's super powerful and HE'S GOING THROUGH IT. ALL THE TIME.

I don't have the context for either happenstance at this time, but J'onn has been both a Black and a White Lantern in comics. I have no idea what any of it means, either, I just know it's happened. I'll get there eventually. maybe. [I think he's dead for the Black Lantern thing so...probably...not...]

^^^ this is up there with the whole "J'onn was actually an advance agent for the invading Martian species but rather than let them use him as a weapon he essentially committed suicide after fighting the whole Justice League [beat them easily, it wasn't even a competition] and somehow this split his consciousness into like 4 different people" of comic runs that I really don't want to read [even though I own this one] :") help

I don't know what it is about forcefields but his brain just shuts off when he gets near one fr. Multiple times when there's a forcefield, EVEN IF HE KNOWS IT'S THERE, J'onn just yeets headfirst into it. He's just generally super impulsive tho ??? This guy is constantly jumping into action without a moment's thought. pls stop handing off the braincell to absolutely no one when there's danger, J'onn [he does not actually have the braincell at any given time. only Bruce has it. occasionally].

He totally enjoys starting shit. J'onn is Here for teammate drama. He once gave Batman absolutely what for and called him immature just bc J'onn was annoyed with his attitude. He sends people on League missions that will either bring out complete drama or make them find common ground. Though he says the contrary, J'onn is absolutely in the background of every team squabble with popcorn like Thor watching Tony and Cap argue. "You're all so petty. And tiny."

J'onn's name means "light to the light" and it's so poetic 😭😭 of COURSE he's the heart of the League. akdjfndckdnxkd

I'm going to stop there bc I could go on forever but I've held this ask hostage in my drafts long enough 😂😂 ENJOY THE RAMBLING THANK U FOR SENDING THIS ASK AAAA 💙

#possum screms at this #sorry it takes me 5-10 business days to answer asks i get too excited #enrinchment but i am a dog with an egg. bark and bounce around it with delight instead of interacting Normally #ratkingresponds #j'onn my beloved #here tumblr have a bunch of infodumping abt my beloved #martian manhunter #j'onn j'onzz #dc #long post #i know ive dropped a lot of this info on tumblr before but now its all in One Condensed Post #I HAVE SO MANY THOUGHTS ABOUT HIM. brainrot real #some other favs include loki death the kid shadow the hedgehog donnie rottmnt luigi bowser & king boo #but J'onn is like. my Main Guy yk 😭😭#THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THIS ASK I CANNOT SAY IT ENOUGH 😭😭#nothing brings me seratonin like talking about he fr fr

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practically-an-x-man · 1 year ago

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👻💢🍧🍁🌏📣 💗 for Nikoletta and Katherine? (Sorry it's a lot lol)

Ooooh thank you!! And don't apologize for it being a lot, I love a chance for a good OC ramble :D

OC Emoji Asks

👻 GHOST - do they believe in ghosts? what are their "ghostly experiences", if any?

Nikoletta: No. She's so deep in "haunted history" from her voodoo scam in New Orleans, she's fully convinced it's all a load of shit. Once or twice, she's had an experience that's rattled her a little more, but she'd never admit that.

Katherine: Yes. At this point, she's had so much exposure to magic and gods and other supernatural events, it would be almost stupid to try and claim ghosts couldn't exist when so much else clearly does.

💢 ANGER - what are some habits they have that will take some getting used to?

Nikoletta: She subconsciously tries to control the conversations she's a part of. It's mainly a survival reflex, but she'll duck around questions she doesn't want to answer and try to flip the focus back to the other person instead. It makes extended conversations a little difficult with her, at least at first.

Katherine: She takes on way more projects than she can actually balance, then gets frazzled and scatter-brained about finishing them. If she's bouncing off the walls with some unexplained anxiety, it probably means she's stressing herself over finishing something and can't handle anything else right now - even just suggesting going out for a walk is another thing to think about, so it's best just to let her take the lead for a while.

🍧 SHAVED ICE - do they still have any objects from their childhood? what significance does it have to them? what would their reaction be if they lost it?

Nikoletta: No. She had hardly anything growing up, which already makes it more difficult to hold onto things for sentiment, and on top of that her personal belongings were lost/stolen while she was captive in STAR Labs and she had to start completely fresh once she escaped.

Katherine: Oh, of course! She's got her old comic book collection, a lot of childhood drawings, some stuffed animals... she probably wouldn't be too upset about losing one of those things, shit happens and objects do wear out over time, but it would crush her to lose it all.

🍁 MAPLE LEAF - what is their favourite season? why?

Nikoletta: Early fall. College football and milder weather brings in a lot of tourists, so it's usually her most lucrative few weeks out on the street (it's about the only time of year where she can count on 3 meals a day and a decent roof over her head). And in Belle Reve, the seasons don't matter much since she's effectively always inside

Katherine: Summer. It reminds her of home, and she can't stand how cold New York gets in the winter anyway (especially compared to Memphis)

🌏 EARTH - will they give up the world for someone they love? is this decision easy for them?

Nikoletta: I think she wouldn't realize how attached she is to the person she loves to even make this decision. She's so used to being alone that she's more than a little rusty with having someone to care about like that, so she's more likely just to freeze up entirely.

Katherine: She would, and not even in a romantic-love context. She'd do anything for her friends or family... and actually gets awfully close to this sort of decision in the climax of Who Waits Forever Anyway?. She doesn't give up the world, but she does come awfully close to giving up her life for the people she loves.

📣 MEGAPHONE - how loud are they? what do they speak like? got a voice claim?

Nikoletta: Not very loud. She speaks clearly, but she only speaks when she needs to (in her mind, superfluous chatter makes her seem less powerful or respectable, it breaks the illusion of her being "above" the others). She has a clear New Orleans accent (not Cajun, but Deep South) since she spent her whole life there, and her voice claim is tied to her face claim: Teyonah Parris.

Katherine: A little louder than average, mainly because she gets very exuberant when she's excited. She also has a Southern accent, though hers is a slightly milder Tennessean drawl as opposed to Nikoletta's Deep South. I don't have a particular voice claim for her right now.

💗 GROWING HEART - if they have a crush, is it noticable? what changes when they're in love?

Nikoletta: As I said before, she doesn't really process how much someone means to her since she's spent so much time on her own and putting a mask up over her emotions like she does. Still, though, I think it's obvious to others - when the antisocial ice-queen that is Nikoletta suddenly starts lingering near another random, equally-antisocial prisoner, even performing such bizarre acts as smiling and holding hands, you know something's up.

Katherine: Oh, it's so damn obvious. She's the queen of pining. She doesn't do flings since she's ace, so a genuine crush is a very deep, emotional thing for her. It's very obvious: she's all smiley, she keeps talking about them, her art ends up being a lot more romantic for a while since she's always thinking about them. When she's genuinely in love, she's settled a bit from that whole butterflies-crush stage, though she still talks about her S/O a lot

#my friends!!!#answered asks #ask game #my ocs #oc katherine johnson #nikoletta bordeaux

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