wanderingmind867

[wanderingmind867]

(Who's Who: The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe #1): Apokolips is just the successor to Ragnarok! I was right! When the aesir, vanir and the giants go to war, vanaheim and asgard will blow up. The energies from all the death formed new life. The souls of those like Frey, Thor, Odin and Balder is used to form New Genesis. Beings like Surt, Hela, Loki and so on were probably the ancestors of Apokolips. So...yeah. It's explicitly what comes after Ragnarok. And I still would rather take my chances with Apokolips than New Genesis. Apokolips is the home built by Hela and Loki and Surtr and Fenris Wolf. It's brutal, but surely it's not as pure evil as everyone says. I refuse to believe it's all evil.

Now I do kind of want a New Gods/Magnus Chase crossover, however...I feel like that could be kind of fun. There's probably some great potential there.

[wanderingmind867]

(Who's Who: The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe #1): Even the glorified yellow pages of the DC Universe has no clue who or what ambush bug is. One thing's for sure, though: he's got an inability to deal in linear logic. The man is insane. Also, I didn't realize Amazo was so suicidal. He doesn't enjoy living. He prefers his endless sleep. He wants to be in dreamless sleep forever. That's kind of sad, you know.

[wanderingmind867]

(Who's Who: The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe #1): I like that DC and Marvel began publishing these things in the 80s. How else could I learn all these character's heights and backstories? Like how the House of Secrets is a permanent fixture in Kentucky, and it has a strange sort of sentience to it. Or how Air Wave somehow transferred from Earth-Two to Earth-One and retired there. It's nice to get all these little details. It's fascinating.

[wanderingmind867]

I always have a slight fear that these opinions will come back to bite me one day, but I can't help it. I really don't like the history of Japan. That doesn't mean I hate the people. But you can probably see my paranoia in here.

I am a weird individual. I have not once watched an anime (unless something like pokemon counts), but I have listened to some of their soundtracks (some in native japanese, some in english covers). I tried watching anime once (i think, it's hard to remember), but i found it too hard to focus on. Maybe because music is usually shorter, it's easier for my brain to grasp? I don't know. But the soundtracks are good. Not good enough to persuade me to sit through millions of episodes of something in art styles i'm not even super familiar with, but enough to appreciate listening to them.

I might sadly now go back on a tangent about the many ways aspects of japan sounds unappealing (imperial japan was horrible, and they still have a problem with ww2 apologising, i've heard. Emperor Meiji all the way to Emperor Showa were bad rulers to me. Also, sushi sounds awful), but I'll stop now. We in Canada did have residential schools and other bad things. So i know i can't throw too many stones. But i just have a weird dislike of a lot of 20th century japanese history. I don't hate the japanese at all (i'm not one of those judgmental idiots over something like country of origin), but i can't help my stupid biases slipping through in regards to historical opinions. But i try my best to not be a jerk about things, because i don't want to be ostracised.

[wanderingmind867]

(Who's Who: The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe #1): The All-Star Squadron, otherwise known as every ww2 hero DC ever had. I admire Roy Thomas for his ambition. It doesn't quite work for me (it would've worked better if i'd been able to find good quality copies of all these characters and their original comics, i think), but I admire that ambition.

[wanderingmind867]

Christ. Vulture really is an underrated spiderman villain. I always found it sad that he never stood out, but it's really insane. He made 7 appearances in Spiderman comics prior to 1976. That's it. Just seven appearances. And half of those appearances were group stories. Or stories where another guy stole his costume. Adrian toomes got no love. Shame, really. Because how often do you see 60 year old men fighting against opponents far younger? It's not that often, I don't think. The Vulture belongs to a rare niche of villains in that regard, and they could've used him way more than they did.

[wanderingmind867]

My take on The Bookworm (A.S. Scarlet):

The Bookworm goes by Arthur Stearns Scarlet now, but that was not his birth name. No, he was born Joseph McDowall. The new name is a tribute to two of his favorite authors: Arthur Conan Doyle and T.S. Elliot. Also, it's a cunning abbreviation for "A Study in Scarlet," the first Sherlock Holmes story. The Bookworm put significant effort into redefining himself. But he wasn't always a masterful criminal capable of defying many a super-hero. No, once he was just a man. A young man, lonely and lost…

As a child, Joseph McDowall had no friends. He could barely leave his house, since he had such a weak constitution. Asthma, one knee slightly bigger than the other, an underweight body mass, no physical activity was too strenuous for this kid. He could never play with the other boys. None of them liked him. He was all alone in this world. If not for his parents, he probably wouldn't have survived. He was so frail; everybody except his parents looked down upon him. Add to that his autism diagnosis, and we have a recipe for instant ostracization, bullying and feelings of deep-seated loneliness. Again, his parents were his only salvation.

You see, Joseph's parents were middle class english folk, and they had a decently large book collection. When Joseph was three or four, he read his first book. A collection of assorted poems his family owned. He adored it, and soon books became all he lived for. Nobody ever wanted to be his friend, nobody beyond his parents ever showed him real love. Unable to participate in games with the other boys, books became Joseph's escape. He would hide from the pain of everyday life by holing up in his bedroom with a stack of books. That's how he spent 90% of his childhood.

Although Joseph grew up in England, he eventually moved to the United States, hoping to pursue a career as a writer. The transition between countries really messed with him, but he persevered, all in the name of following his dreams. Sadly, no publishing house ever wants to speak to him. They find his ideas too derivative and unoriginal. They reject him constantly, slowly breaking down his spirit. The only people who accept his interview laugh in his face, only to then steal his idea months later. Nobody thinks Joseph McDowall is good enough, and that knowledge breaks him.

The indignities break him, and it leads to the birth of The Bookworm. He designs a costume, begins plotting revenge schemes, and even changes his name. He knew his parents would be ashamed if their darling son became a criminal mastermind, so he purposefully takes the identity of a.s. scarlet to spare them from learning of his stateside activities. And from here, The Bookworm gets to work on exacting his revenge; a revenge most successfully delivered, might I add.

Bookworm is a rare type of villain, you see. He's incredibly weak and frail, incapable of combat in any circumstances. But he is a man with an eidetic memory and an ability to speed read beyond any other humans capabilities. He is a genius of the nth degree, and he is more than capable of leading succesful crime waves. Batman didn't initially beat Bookworm, you understand. It took him three tries before he successfully arrested him. Which means Bookworm completed three whole crimes without being caught. And he got away with them, too! How many other criminals can say they've done that!? Not many, that's for damn sure!

The only reason Bookworm got caught was because he was extremely temperamental, and he shot too bold with one of his later crimes. But as long as he holds his temper in check, he can usually execute any crime he sets his mind to. He is a criminal genius, a man capable of running rings around almost any superhero (as long as he's had enough time end preparation).

The problem for Bookworm is that everyone assumes he's The Riddler. They're both intellectual types, and Bookworm works in the shadows so often that nobody ever remembers his name. So every time Bookworm successfully steals a priceless manifesto, the media assumes it was The Riddler who did it. On one particularly horrid occasion, they actually it was The Cluemaster. The Cluemaster! That D-list hack!? Has nobody ever heard of The Bookworm before!? Idiots! Those were the things he yelled at his henchmen, as he threw books all over his hideout in a tantrum of rage.

Once he calmed down, he moved from anger straight into depression. He became a criminal because everyone billed him as an uncreative hack. His ideas were great, but his writing was stiff and stilted. He was unwanted and unknown. Now, even other criminals don't know who he is. Just like his old life as Joseph McDowall, A.S. Scarlet is an unwanted unknown. And that thought deeply depresses Bookworm.

Although he's usually far too stiff a person to drink much alcohol, this misfortune and confusion led him to a seedy underground bar, nursing his woes into a bottle of liquor. Also at the bar that night was Peter Merkel Jr and Darius Chapel, fellow criminals known as Ragdoll and The Music Meister. They, too, were suffering from identity confusion. And so these three men quickly come to realize they'd all been mistaken for a pair of criminals known for their unofficial alliance: The Riddler, the Scarecrow and the Mad Hatter.

And now knowing they all share a common set of enemies, these three team up as Gotham's newest criminal enterprise. Introducing the Nerd Band! With Bookworm's brains, Ragdoll's contortionist abilities and the Music Meister's hypnotic voice, a team for the ages was founded that night. A team to surpass all others in Gotham. The "Rip-offs" shall end up eclipsing their more popular variants, or they'll die trying!

PS: I promised to tag you to this. And I don't want to seem disingenuous, so here you go: @the-fyre-flie here's the other note i mentioned having made in my phone's notes.

[wanderingmind867]

My newest complaint about the Magnus Chase series: Halfborn Gunderson and Mallory Keen have a relationship built on calling each other names. I don't like that. It feels abusive. It feels like bad friendship. And I know I'm nobody to talk on bad relationships (i snap at my dad all the time), but I still know what I do is wrong. I think Rick Riordan actually wants us to find Halfborn and Mallory's relationship romantic. And…no. Calling someone an idiot repeatedly does not a romance make. These characters are unlikable. And to prove how unlikable this is, i'm going to make a list of the characters i like and the characters i dislike, to show to divided i am on these books.

PS: I was bullied by a girl in grade 4. The amount of times they told me it might have been her having romantic feelings for me…well, it was suggested more than once. And maybe that experience deadened me to romance. Maybe that's why I never feel romantic attraction. At the very least, I see Halfborn and Mallory as loose parables for my old bully and me. Someone yelling at me, pushing me around, calling me names…and yet they were apparently trying to display romance? I refuse to accept that. That's not love. That's hurt. My bully ruined grade 4 for me. I still hate thinking about that period of my life…

[wanderingmind867]

I'm sorry. But Rick Riordan…what!? Odin offered to return Magnus to life, and he didn't accept!? No! Screw that! That's a horrible message! He'll stay in Valhalla, where his body is more strong and all his human traits (like childhood calluses and scars) have been removed. He'll stay where he can die every day. He'll stay there.

No! What is wrong with you, Rick!? How is this a happy moment!? It's a moment where I want to kill Odin! Magnus will stay dead, he'll never see his mom again, and he's agreed to be an immortal soldier subservient to Odin. This is practically slavery in death. This is all sorts of wrong, it feels like the exact wrong conclusion to end the book on, I hate it. You can't just…you can't just end by endorsing this! With every line he writes about Valhalla, Rick makes me want to burn the hotel to the ground.

Loki and Hela are the heroes of this book, because they aren't servants to a weirdo who wants people to fight to the death over and over again for all time! At least Helheim is spared of combat training (from what little we learn of it)! My gods, I hate this storyline. I hate it so much. I have strong opinions on the afterlife (due to losing a parent), and they will always affect my reading of these books.

PS: I have the self awareness to know apologize for all of my exclamation marks. But I couldn't help myself. I got really upset by this. Ever since they said Magnus would never see his mom again, my anger was simmering. Because i also lost my mom. And if i was told her soul was barred to me in the afterlife, i would've gotten far angrier than magnus ever gets. Maybe that says something about me. I don't really know. But i got all bothered, so i had to made this.

[wanderingmind867]

Frey is not a god I love. The God of Summer, otherwise known as that infernally hot seasons when everything sucks and I feel miserable. I'm sorry, but where's the god of winter? Winter is cozy and cool and festive and happy. Winter is the happy season. The time of the major holidays like Christmas. The time for happy songs and staying indoors as you watch the beautiful scenery outside. Winter is the only season you need.

Like… Autumn and Spring are good too. But Autumn means Halloween and Spring means allergies. Neither is perfect. But winter is nice. Summer is trash. You sweat so much that you're always uncomfortable and stuff always sticks to you. The humidity makes it hard to breathe without feeling like choking. The Summer is a terrible season, and I always hate it. Heat is not my thing. I far prefer the ice and snow.

I know this is now a tangent, but i've run out of comments on frey. So let me just say that there's a reason I prefer ice based characters to fire based characters. Mister Freeze, Captain Cold, Iceman, etc. Almost all of them are better than their fire equivalents (Firefly, Heatwave, The Human Torch or Pyro, etc). There's something about the ice and snow that just speaks to me. Ice is more liveable, too. You could live in the arctic better than you could live on a volcano, i think. Ice beats fire and winter bears summer. That's the way things shall always be.

[wanderingmind867]

The Magnus Chase books are decently fun, but like… I think I find that I have hangups with rick riordan's portrayal of Norse mythology. I had hangups with his portrayal of every mythological sphere besides Egypt, though. So I guess this really tracks for me.

In any case, there's so much about these books that feels unfair. Magnus being dead but still not getting to see his (also dead) mother. Ragnarok being an inevitability, to the point where I can't bring myself to care if Loki leads his army of the damned to kill Odin. Hotel Valhalla being one of the apparently "good and righteous" afterlives, but it also being a place where you die on loop over and over. Nothing about these books quite sits with me the right way. That's sometimes i've noticed more and more as i've aged.

I keep reading only for the good moments I know are sparsed in between the really horrible moments. Like Loki's scenes. Or the out of place references to old music and culture. Or the scenes with Blitzen and Hearthstone. These are some of the only good things I remember about the books. But they're enough to make me want to try and persevere. Even though I hate Valhalla and kind of want Loki to win. I don't lie when I say that Frey and Odin and Thor aren't too likeable. I'd take Hela and Loki any day of the week.

Also, I that Rick Riordan wants to make a point about letting go of grief. But after losing my mom to cancer back in 2022, my stance on death is irrevocably changed. I've faced a death, and it was so painful that anyone writing about it makes me want to scream. If I die, I better be able to see my parents. If I can't, I would fight any number of gods. Rick Riordan always presents the most unfair freaking afterlives, and I hate it.

If not for the Valhalla scenes and the inevitabilily of Ragnarok, I would probably love these books. But those two elements are my hangups. The banes of my existence. I would like to think this is all understandable, but sometimes I worry people will think i'm being needlessly critical. But I can't help it. It's just who I am. sigh…

[wanderingmind867]

School was okay today. But the library at school is closed tomorrow, I think. So I may only go for the first period, and then i'll head home early. Spending more time at home means more time with my dad and more time to do stuff online, but it could also mean more boredom. It's hard to say, and it's a double edged sword either way. But in any case, I made more notes at school today. A whole nine new notes today, although only eight are ready to even be shared.

Most of them are angry rants about the sword of summer. I finished it, and I had many complaints. Too many, probably. I swear: I do like rick riordan! But I also have a very, very negative outlook on things. If i know people (like those are here) are willing to listen to me complain about everything, that might honestly help fuel the notes. I started the hammer of Thor, though. And so far, it seems less bad. So that's good. Let's hope it keeps up.

My other few notes involve me creating an elaborate backstory for the old Batman '66 villain The Bookworm, and then me reminiscing on old hyperfixations (and beginning to wonder if my hyperfixation might be changing again). I'll share all of these things, but I just need to figure out which ones I want to share first.

[wanderingmind867]

Progress....Not quite there yet

[wanderingmind867]

If Anthony Ingruber and Jeff Bennett don't get more votes, I think I know what i'll do. I'll make a second version of this poll and i'll swap Mark Hamil, Kevin Michael Richardson and Cesar Romero out for some new actors. I'll just need to think of which actors to swap them for...

I'm a bit concerned that having Mark Hamill on my list of favourite jokers is going to really skew this poll's results, so i'm gonna make a second version later without him on it. But as it stands now, here's my favourite joker performances in a poll (with mark hamill included):

[wanderingmind867]

@fakeicecubes that is fair. If i may go on a tangent loosely tied to all this: I didn't actually see much of BTAS as a kid. I don't know if any of the riddler episodes were ones I caught on reruns as a young kid. The episodes I remember are some of the earliest ones, plus the origin ones for two face, mad hatter and Mister Freeze.

BTAS had the best Two Face. Richard Moll is an actor who's pretty much affected me with that performance since I was 5. But I never saw enough of John Glover as Riddler to love him the way you do. I don't hate him, though! There are ones I really dislike, and he's not one of them. He just never breached my top six.

If you ever want to hear my bottom few, I could make a post listing them. But I kind of worry i'd ostracise people with that. So I don't know.

I haven't got much feedback on whether I should continue making polls to see if people like the same batman villian interpretations as me, but I want to make at least one more. I want to make one for my seven favourite riddler actors. So here we go:

PS: Again, I'm gonna ask for feedback. Should I continue this? Yes? No? If I don't get any more feedback, I may make one more poll, but that would probably be it. I don't want to waste my day doing a thankless task like this if nobody votes in the poll. And I hope each actor on here gets at least one vote.

[wanderingmind867]

My Interpretation of Ragdoll (modelled after the Ragdoll from the Batman 2004 show) is the Peter Merkel Jr. of Earth-One. Earth-Two was home to two Ragdolls: Peter Merkel Sr (who was an enemy of Golden Age Flash) and Peter Merkel Jr (who was an enemy of Infinity Inc). On Earth-Two, the identity of Ragdoll became a criminal legacy act. But on Earth-One, it was never like that at all.

On Earth-One, Peter Merkel Sr was a popular contortionist, that is true. But his circus remained popular for most of his life, and he never had to turn to crime. No, he was actually able to provide a stable life for his weirdly hyper child. Peter Jr managed to become his father's apprentice in entertaining, and he proved to have a natural born gift for it. Perhaps it's because Peter Jr seems to have some form of ADHD, or perhaps it's just because he grew up in a performing arts household.

Either way, Peter Merkel Sr of Earth-One dies in much the same way he does on Earth-Two. He just dies quicker than his Earth-Two counterpart. He had to retire from circus performing at 45 because his health was in severe decline. You see, Peter Sr was a good contortionist because of a bad set of family genetics. The Merkel family all carry the risk of inheriting a rare genetic disease that makes their bones softer and more flexible than others. But it also means they get weaker and weaker as they age. Most of them never live past 70 (if that). Peter Sr died at 70 on Earth-Two, but he dies at 50 years old on Earth-One.

Since his father retired at age 45, Peter had been performing as the contortionist for the circus in his stead. Since he was 16, he had been his father's substitute. But now he's 21, and his father's dead. Around a year later, the circus closes it's doors, unable to earn any more money out there in the Central City area. Now unemployed, Peter finds himself desperately out of luck when he goes on a job hunt. Nobody wants a contortionist like him. But one day (while he's busy at home watching tv), he hears stories of an elaborate crime wave that only ended recently. It inspires Peter. Who better to commit robberies than a man like him!?

So with his newly realized abilities in hand, Peter designs a new costume (abandoning the one his father used to wear), and he becomes a well known thief on the national level. He keeps a low profile, so most people don't of Ragdoll. But he moves from Central City to Metropolis to Midway City and so on and so forth. He steals himself a good sum of money, getting a knack for the abilities in the meantime. And that's when Peter Merkel Jr goes to Gotham City.

Initially, his crime career as Ragdoll was going swimmingly in Gotham. But eventually, Batman catches him and he becomes a minor criminal, forgotten amongst the city's higher echelon rogues. And once Scarecrow arrives on the scene, things go from bad to worse for him. Since their costumes are so similar, everyone starts to assume Ragdoll is Scarecrow. But he's not. Do you know how humiliating it is to have people fighting him with gas masks!? It's not funny! Sure, it means he's always underestimated and can easily score his robberies, but it's still so humiliating! His family was famous in the entertainment industry back in the day. But now he's seen as a cheap rip-off of another villain. It's unfair, and it makes him feel miserable.

This is all the buildup that we get before we see him meeting The Bookworm and The Music Meister in a seedy Gotham bar. All three of them are depressed and angry about being mistaken for other people, and so all three of them band together to change their reputation and make themselves icons of crime once more. Scarecrow, Riddler and The Mad Hatter can't keep hogging the spotlight! These three have been called rip-offs long enough. It's time they finally proved they're more than just cheap knockoffs of these other crooks! And in this way, a beautiful and brilliant partnership is born…

[wanderingmind867]

No wonder Hela/Hel is one of my favourite gods in the Magnus Chase series. Rick Riordan even namedrops Two-Face shortly after describing her. And it's an apt comparison. And it's also a really beautiful character description. But since nobody (including me) has that description easily available on hand, i'm now going to transcribe it from the pages of the Sword of Summer (pages 415 and 416, to be precise). So here it is:

Standing next to me, gazing at the monument, was a woman with elven-pale skin and long dark hair. In profile, she looked heart-achingly beautiful, about twenty-five years old. Her ermine cloak shimmered like a snowdrift rippling in the wind. Then she turned toward me, and my lungs flattened against the back of my rib cage. The right side of the woman's face was a nightmare - withered skin, patches of blue ice covering decayed flesh, membrane-thin lips over rotten teeth, a milky white eye, and tufts of dessicated hair like black spiderwebs.

I don't know why, but this design fascinates me. I actually love it. Because to me it just makes sense. Of course the woman in charge of the halls of death embodies life and death. Of course she does. On one side, she is what we associate with life - beauty, youth, grace, charm. But on the other side, she embodies the mortal perception of death - decay, ugliness, age, pain and suffering. She is all. She is Hel or Hela, the guardian of the "dishonourable" dead. If you die of old age, you go to her. If you die of anything beyond a heroic feat involving combat of some sort, you join her in Helheim.

We're meant to be afraid of Hel. But honestly? Although she does look sort of scary, I can't help but prefer her realm to Odin and Freya's. Because Hel accepts everybody. She doesn't play favourites. She doesn't choose heroes. She chooses all those who weren't heroic. Whether that means evil people or people who lived merely "average" lives…that was never made very clear to me. But what is clear is that she doesn't choose favourites. All the dead are allowed in her halls. She isn't cruel, so I imagine life in her halls would be pleasant enough. But I just love her for refusing to play favourites. In her own words:

"For every hero, a thousand cowards," said Hel. "For every brave death, a thousand senseless ones. For every Einherji…a thousand souls who enter my realm."

And that is why I love Hel. That line right there sums up why I love Hel. I don't know what else I can here beyond that I love Helheim.