#do i bother tagging the characters?

[knackfandomarchive]

Rambling Contexts Behind My Crossover Headcanons and Drabbles: Kaiju No. 8 X KNACK.

Well the funny part is I won't actually get to the story; I just found this dusty thing in my drafts and am emptying it. Too many stories in my brain...

This is basically a huge lump of headcanons and brief summaries for the game and anime, that might have been important if I got around to writing a crossover. I go over KNACK, then Kaiju Number Eight, then a small amount of crossover, so you can skip to the headings you want.

KNACK

Knack is an off-duty Superhero in his home dimension among humans. Participating in a dodgy military operation to kneecap the goblins in a racial conflict after they threatened to even-out the battlefield, Knack provided much of the manpower alongside (and against) Viktor Industries' army of robots. In an ego-driven turn of events, Knack's father-figure - Dr. Vargas - competed with Viktor to find an Artifact thought to revolutionize the field of relic energy, only to wind up releasing a dangerous entity that threatened to destroy the planet. An entity that Knack put in the dirt for the last time.

Knack himself is composed of "relics" - devices of simple external geometry made from metal and carved stone that also serve as an infinite power source (with the right tech), thought to have come from a lost civilization. He can grow in size by picking up these or similar items.

My storytelling has him at 2 years old chronologically, but he has super-learning. His emotional maturity isn't quite as fast, but it's hard to pin down. He is playful and quiet, a teacher's pet, but he can be hateful, putting on a show of a trash-talking action hero. His behavior toward others depends on who they are to him. Naturally, I enhanced his propensity for mimicry due to his age. My impression of his character may be wrong, but I can't see him any other way.

Interestingly - and I wrote this headcanon long before I was made aware of Kaiju No. 8 - Knack is also making good on a childhood promise of sorts, and he's been awfully successful at it. *malignant gleam*

Knack and Lucas had inadvertently transported themselves into the Kaiju No. 8 universe. More details on how it happened here.

One power Knack has now: the ability to create portals within anything shaped like a ring or doorway, connecting the KNACK and Kaiju Number 8 universes. I add some powers thematic to his character, as well as required secondary ones, e.g, voice amplification or self-applied minor gravity distortion, respectively. In canon, he often has powers as the plot demands, but I'm pretty conservative about it, I think.

His crazier abilities are canonically powered by Sunstones. A Shockwave that sends relics flying with a burst of energetic force that radiates outwards, knocking away foes and things and doing more damage than a normal punch. A Relic Storm that swirls around him to protect him, which doesn't have the same reach or damage (as far as I could tell) as the Shockwave, but allows him to move his position a short distance with a kind of invulnerability. And what is essentially a Relic Cannon, which lobs balls of relics at up to three or four targets to do massive damage. I give him a fourth ability sometime within his stay with Kaiju Number 8, which I can't put here because Long.

Dr. Vargas's (wife? Girlfriend?), Charlotte, who is herself an intellectual powerhouse, mothers Knack and Lucas at their home dimension. She would be keenly curious about Knack's newfound abilities, though somehow I have trouble picturing the Doctor doing the same (he often puts his ego above scientific discovery, so I question his love of the craft. I might ask around some folks for their impressions of him). Doc's friend - and Lucas's uncle - Ryder is often busy exploring. I am curious how he might react to the portal thing and what lies beyond.

Lucas is effectively Knack's adopted human brother to me. He is also featured in the screenshots above. I have him at 13 or so; he's a lot like Reno in that he's smart and quick to criticize his mentor, though Lucas's relationship with Dr. Vargas is often strained instead.

Kaiju Number Eight

It's an anime and also a manga.

32-year-old Kafka Hibino worked for Monster Sweepers, cleaning up Kaiju corpses after Japan's Anti-Kaiju Defense Force sprays their guts everywhere. Incidentally, his childhood friend is now-27-year-old Mina Ashiro, Captain of the Third Division of the Defense Force. Kafka had given up joining a long time ago. Reno Ichikawa, 18, appeared as a new co-worker, treating the job like a stepping stone to get experience for the entrance exams to the force, and later explained to Kafka that the age barrier had been raised to 33.

Within the hour that Kafka decided to give getting into the Force one last try, a small insectoid kaiju appeared, supposedly looking for him. It took advantage of his shock at its appearance and entered his body through his mouth, transforming him into a humanoid Kaiju. He can return to human form for the most part, but can't fully relinquish his powers, and his new terrifying visage can "slip out" if he's not careful. He is among the weakest humans and the strongest Kaiju.

I can't quite boil down Kafka's character either. I love the way the anime does him subbed as a very emotional character. His doubts feel real and relatable, and he has a fatherly sort of tendency, but he's also silly. Knack might be a bit of an actor, but I like Kafka more honest and vulnerable.

Reno is just too cute. He reminds me of Lucas a whole lot somehow. He did this whole show of rivalry or whatever but when it came right down to it he would never leave Kafka behind.

Crossover

Kafka had appointed himself as guardian of Knack and Lucas, which had inadvertently cast some suspicion in his direction, as the latter two had no papers to their names. Knack always wore a mascot costume to cover his metal tusks, stony face, and pointy ears. But Lucas couldn't hide his unusual proportions - long arms and large hands mainly - as he was otherwise fully human.

Lucas was quick to explain to Japan's Anti-Kaju Defense Force (which had an assistant question him privately) that he was an orphan - which was true - and that his records must have been destroyed. When asked how he was related to Kafka in any way, he struggled to come up with a good lie, feigning forgetfulness. He alleged that he must have met Kafka when he was too young to remember, and that he definitely believed Kafka had a familiar face (another lie). For most questions, Lucas couldn't properly answer, in the end summoning some bad memories to start the waterworks. To others, his outburst seemed reasonable for a thirteen-year-old boy who'd been through some things. Lucas always maintained that Kafka was a familiar friend (which was true only recently) and that he never made Lucas uncomfortable or unsafe (completely true). Ultimately, that conversation soothed most of the worries the Force had at the time.

Knack never spoke with anyone on the Force, no matter the question. He feigned distress when anyone touched his costume, and his small stature lent an extremely youthful impression. Aside from the long arms occasionally seeming too articulate, Knack could come off as an eccentric toddler, even using his mysterious powers to lighten the weight of his stone-and-metal body. He utterly refused to have his costume removed for a picture. And there was only so much the Defense Force could reasonably do with a presumably-traumatized kid.

[ineed-to-sleep]

I'm still tossing around ideas so idk if I'll keep the design like this or change it later but do we see the vision........ ?

[cait-sith]

Hey what if Starscream repainted himself post-canon

Unnecessarily long thoughts and ramblings (mostly about Starscream) under the cut.

This was originally in the tags but then it became an actual wall of text so. Keep Reading be upon ye.

So in IDW Till All Are One 12 Windblade shows Starscream his “true” form quote unquote and it's like this blue-white-and-red colour scheme. And while I don't really know how to feel about that; got some implications vis-a-vis transgender stuff, Starscream clearly took it as something that was taken from him, something that defined him, something that would have made him different (more likeable, more successful, unclear). On the other hand, I also think that Starscream sort of clings to that idea, because it's more painful to believe that he couldn't have changed anything, that it might just be a flaw in him. Something external to blame, y'know.

Windblade kinda points that out, it wasn't really the point of showing him that, but maybe that's just my personal interpretation. “I could have been so much more had I just been allowed to be born as I was meant”. Missing Windblade's point that he is still the same person in his spark, regardless of frame, it is ultimately up to him who he is. His actions define him, not his appearance. BUT. I feel like that kinda misinterpretation would be in-character for him, and so maybe in post-canon he'd... well really I think he'd reframe but maybe as like an attempt to reclaim what he thinks he should have been (even if he doesn't need to, even if he was perfectly capable of changing who he was without that). He frequently sabotages himself, because he doesn't believe in trust and he's so used to being in adverse relationships where he cannot rely on anyone being on his side. So then he gets everything he ever wanted, and it's.. not really what he wanted. Metalhawk, Wheeljack, Windblade and Bumblebee all sorta get under his plating, in different ways, and he admits to liking them, but can't bring himself to trust them. He's constantly at loggerheads with Metalhawk and Bee at the start, but Metalhawk tries and gets murdered for his troubles.

Wheeljack, well, he's just kinda mostly nice and willing to forgive and help, even while he's wary. In a way, I think Starscream gets attached to him because he's safe to get attached to, because Wheeljack doesn't take the shot when he's vulnerable, offers to help, to be on his side. From a distance. He doesn't really... actually initiate much of a friendship, but he talks about the idea.

Windblade, I think that relationship is a bit more fraught. They end up working together a lot by necessity, given their positions, and Windblade frequently has to fix or contend with Starscream's messes, and she has none of the prejudices of the others, but again, she's a threat to his power, to what he wants, can't really look past that. She tries, though, and I think he does sort of like her as time goes on. It just doesn't stop him from doing what he always does. No trust and all that. As for Bee. Bee. While he's alive, he's much like Metalhawk and Windblade: A threat to Starscream's power, with the added issues of being a major enemy and an autobot, with all the prejudices that brings. They don't make friends. Only Bee "dying" changes that, and only because Starscream is utterly convinced he is a ghost. In his own mind, he's *almost* okay with admitting to his flaws, his worries. Bee's ghost becomes his conscience, his confidante and companion, and because he's fictional, a fragment of Starscream's mind (or so he thinks), he's safe. Safe in ways none of the others are. And Bee tries, he has nothing really left to gain, no power to hold onto. For all intents and purposes, he *is* a ghost.

That was probably terrifying when Bee turned out to not be dead. Someone who saw all of Starscream's vulnerabilities, with so much power to hurt him. He can't help himself. He does have moments, though. Rare choices where he does trust, sometimes for lack of better options but still. And by the Unicron-finale, he's, well, still not friends, but he admits to everything, he comes clean, kind of.

So. We're going to ignore that he dies for the sake of this. <3 Just temporarily. In a hypothetical post-canon, I think he'd try to get a bit of agency back, try and follow that dream of his better self. And I think Windblade, Wheeljack and Bumblebee are the closest thing to friends he's had since his trine. And Metalhawk, technically, but he's kinda dead and also with the dead universe revival wasn't too happy with Starscream lmao. Perhaps Bee's the most comfortable, after that, if he ever gets over himself, because he's already spilled his guts to him, if accidentally. I don't think Starscream would ever be *easy* to get along with, and Bumblebee doesn't really take shit, but I'd like them to be friends. Squabbly-bantery friends, but still. Wheeljack seems a bit gentler, while Windblade's a bit more professional, she's kind but responsible.

Point being: this is Bee helping him repaint himself to leave the past behind.

Thanks for listening lmao

[remcadll]

Gen obsessed with how.. *dead* your Jason's color pallete is. Like, that's corpse pale right there. Not a spec of blood left flowing in there (also father Todd's skin being full of color in comparison is a nice touch)

THANK YOU I love making him look a bit ghoulish. Guy who's not supposed to be alive but yes he is. no he isn't <3

[mutejester]

Monte d'Or most loved nuisance

[beargregor]

wait i'm curious, what makes you say that gregor doesn't like everyone else (if i read that post right)? just curious since i've never seen anyone else say that

i don't necessarily think gregor dislikes everyone else at lcb but i do think that gregor is an incredibly petty person that isn't nearly as close to the rest of the sinners and even outright dislikes some of them cough cough rodya cough cough which a lot of people just Refuse to see because he's as much of a doormat as he is. there's several examples i could get into to try and prove my point however i'll just focus on what i personally think to be the biggest ones.

additionally, this is going to be kind of long, so i'm adding a read more. read more! read it. sorry for being so wordy. i have several diseases.

Pt1. gregor is the type to try and get along at least decently with everyone, especially if he gets a good first impression from them.

this is less a point in favor of gregor's distance w/ the rest of the sinners and more just a contributing factor to it. once again there's several examples i could point to here but i think the most in your face one happened in canto I with yuri, as several people have pointed out. even before gregor comes clean about growing attached to her as quickly as he did because she reminds him of his sister, we get this interaction.

i'll go ahead and make the disclaimer now that i don't necessarily think gregor is the most reliable of narrators, especially when it comes to his feelings and interactions with most people, but from the way he acts when the topic of yuri comes up (and the way we still see him act even all the way up to c7, nearly a whole year after yuri's death) i don't see reason to question his sentiment here. gregor immediately got that aya and yuri were close, potentially even taking note of their traded belts, and went out of his way to get something nice for yuri despite hardly knowing her.

i feel like a lot of people have forgotten as much, especially since it's been so long since c1, but gregor actually spent a good bit of season 1 doing the exact same thing with the other sinners! gregor reads a connection between him and ishmael pretty quickly despite getting off to a rocky start

mostly because gregor can tell that ishmael is pretty sardonic in a very similar way to him. there's been multiple instances where ishmael and gregor have essentially expressed the same sentiment at different moments, most notably gregor's little argument after ishmael got shot with a decay ampule in c4

and ishmael's response to pilot talking about self-sacrifice in c5

i could go ahead and pull up more examples, but in general pm has gone out of their way to show us that gregor and ishmael are pretty similar, so it makes sense for gregor to assume that they're friends, right?

this will be pushpin 1. keep note of this for Later.

ishmael's only the first sinner we see gregor trying to do this with in s1, we also see him try it out with heathcliff, sinclair, and ryoushuu

he's tried to get along with charon, being one of very few sinners that we've seen actually try to establish a connection with her at all

even rodya, despite my insistence that gregor doesn't like her nearly as much as the fandom thinks he does

all of these seem pretty fine and dandy, right? sure it frequently leans towards self-degradation, micromanaging, and commiseration, but gregor can at least be pretty chummy with most of the sinners, can't he?

Pt2. hell's chicken was more than just comic relief guys please

i'm fully aware that this is quite the hot take, but i think hell's chicken deserves a lot more credit for character writing than the fandom gives it. hell's chicken gave us foreshadowing for several events, such as the donqui bloodfiend reveal

heathcliff's distortion in c6 (as well as hong lu's highly speculated distortion at some point in the future)

and ryoushuu and sinclair's continued connection by making him the odd one out on her team

which, hey! that implies something about gregor's odd one out, don quixote, too, doesn't it? yes. yes it does. that's pushpin 2. keep note of that for later.

speaking of pushpins, hey! that's pushpin 1!

splitting into teams is one of the major events in hell's chicken, and most of the sinner's choices are either motivated by very little, backhanded, or motivated primarily by not wanting to be on the opposite leader's side. i didn't include all of the picks, just because i feel like including most of them already gets this across, but i think gregor took one major thing from this: most of the sinners, when push comes to shove, will only side with gregor when they refuse to or can't take his opponent's side.

now, don't get me wrong, i'm fully aware that this is primarily intended to be comedic relief, but when gregor is being described as having his trust broken by ishmael or nearly crying because no one on his team properly sided with him for him, i feel like it's pretty fair to read into this.

something that i think is pretty important to remember in conjunction with this is that we know that gregor is the type to hold a grudge, both from his general attitude towards the G corp soldiers in c1 as well as his continued distaste for vergilius

even beyond the splitting into teams of hell's chicken, the sinners have given gregor plenty of reasons to feel bitter. i feel like this is something people have noticed but haven't really put a finger on, but it's kind of wild just how often the rest of the sinners make gregor the butt of the joke

and sure, we could argue that a fair few of these aren't really made with any ill intent. quite a bit of it could have been meant as harmless teasing, but with gregor being more sensitive than most, it coming from nearly all sides, and as often as it does? yeah, i think he's prone to taking it a bit personally.

Pt3. yes i do still think gregor was the third most important character in canto VII you guys gotta hear me out okay

of course, all of this leads up to the bit of the story i highlighted, doesn't it? c7? i totally get why people haven't really picked up on all the gregor things i did in it, seeing as they were mostly not *directly* said about him or by him.

personally, i think that gregor's distaste for talking about himself on any serious level and thus leading to him getting sort of "sidelined" narratively (which i take issue with that claim, but still. it's effective for getting what i mean across atm) is supposed to lead players to take a deeper look at the times gregor gets held up to other characters and compare and contrast what's being said about them by the matchup. as i showed earlier with his immediate latching onto ishmael, i think this is something gregor himself is at least partially aware of too.

so, that begs the question, who was gregor compared to in canto VII that makes me think it's one of the most critical pieces in understanding his character?

really, i'd like to avoid getting too lost in the analysis of this canto specifically, since i'd like to do a proper post about this later, but i figure i can bury the lede a little before doing it properly.

c7 features several characters being made to perform in sansón's play, acting out the relevant backstory for this segment of the plot. a lot of these characters have rather direct, degrading reasons for playing the roles they do.

outis, a character with an inflated ego who wants her journey to have a purpose, is made to play an aimlessly wandering villager with a single line.

hong lu and ryoushuu, two characters for whom families and the expectations placed upon them are likely going to play a major role, are made to play bloodfiends.

rodya, a character who resents her lot in life and is constantly shown to be eager to leave her destitution behind her and become someone special, is made to play a helpless villager that's too poor to even offer any money to the hero that saves her.

heathcliff, a character that has spent most of his life getting dehumanized by comparing him to beastly animals, is made to play a literal bear whose sole purpose in the plot is to get beat up and then quickly left by the wayside.

sinclair, a character that has two opposed parties essentially treating him as a macguffin to procure for their side, is made to play the character who was arguably the catalyst for this entire canto, not to mention playing a decently major role in ruina.

our star don quixote is made to play her father, the first kindred, but there's someone by their side the entire time, isn't there? don quixote's dear, steadfastly loyal companion. a character which don quixote has tasked themself with getting to come out of their shell?

hello again, pushpin 2.

gregor has been made to play our unreachable star, sancho. someone had to, of course. you can't really tell a story without it's main character, now can you?

now, i should once again give a disclaimer. i am not trying to say that i think adapting what happens to donqui/sancho in c7 to gregor is the road pm is going to take here, not only would that toe a bit past the line of foreshadowing, but it'd also just amount to rehashing that plotline again, which i don't think would make for a particularly exciting story.

what i DO think is that we can take a lot of the things that are said to either directly be the case for sancho and use them to inform how we see gregor.

and god, does playing sancho have some fucking implications for our favorite ossan archetype.

starting off, the earliest moment we get to see of sancho is quite literally her just waiting for death to take her in a pile of ashes.

which, i should remind everyone, is actually pretty damn close to what happens to gregor's literary counterpart at the end of the metamorphosis. gregor samsa experiences one final breaking point that pushes him over the edge and makes him decide to just wait for starvation to take him.

gregor and sancho both consider themselves to no longer be human, something which sancho goes out of her way to highlight repeatedly throughout the canto and gregor is quick to get defensive on her behalf for when outis starts really tearing into her

sancho spends quite a lot of this story denying herself the joys of community and friendship, despite knowing that, even with the rest of the sinners frequently making jokes at her expense and outright insulting her, they were things that she desperately craved.

and, while this is getting into my "outis is a red herring meant to distract us from gregor's eventual betrayal" theorizing, i also think it's worth noting for this discussion that sancho's fellow kindreds, her family, all seem to be under the impression that she dislikes them and ultimately her departure was an act of betrayal

and that, despite gregor being one of LCB's resident mood makers and attempted conflict de-escalators, one of the sinners that's most prone to making appeals to the bonds they've all forged together, only him and faust remained silent during everyone's speech

so yeah, i think there's quite a lot of little details and hints building up to the reveal that gregor's not quite as fond of everyone as he presents himself to be. i do think a lot of this ultimately comes down to gregor getting in the way of his own happiness, similarly to donqui, particularly because he's been frequently portrayed as something of a self fulfilling prophecy, especially by giving him as many christ allegories as they have by way of priest and garden of thorns. gregor is convinced that the rest of the sinners don't like him because he's not convinced anyone could like him, so he convinces himself that he hates them because why should he care if someone that he hates hates him too?

a lot of this ultimately ties back to my personal interpretation of what happens in the metamorphosis as well as my own theories regarding all the times gregor has made weird callbacks and references to lobcorp and ruina, but yeah. i think about this guy and his deeper characterization a fairly normal amount, i think.

to end this off i'll highlight one of my favorite little "gregor is fucking seething and trying so hard to keep it cool" moments, in the credits CG for c7 we see rodya teasing him by drawing a little horse on his window and actively pointing and laughing at it, which gregor really doesn't seem all too pleased about.

i personally think this ties into the other cruel part of sansón forcing gregor to play rocinante, which is the more literal "he's actually just straight up playing rocinante" side of things. gregor was quite literally made to play something less than human, less than even animal really, as he was reduced to nothing more than the shoes don quixote wore as she got to play the leading role. sansón directly makes jokes about gregor being nothing more than shoes in the play twice, which adds to this reading, i think.

this, imo, really plays into the adaptation of the metamorphosis! i've seen a lot of readings for the book that posit that, despite being the protagonist, gregor samsa can't really be considered the main character due to nearly everything he experiences in it being used to further his family's character development at his expense, which i think fits nicely with limbus gregor seemingly having the most said about him through indirect means by holding him up to other characters. also it's rodya carelessly making fun of His Big Major Insecurities™ again like she did in c1 which i always find fun. rodya i love you but god you're the worst.

[blueskittlesart]

thinking abt hungergames yuri... how do u feel abt madge and katniss <3 both as friends and as a romantic pairing :>

rereading a book you originally read as a young teenager when you're an adult is a really fun experience if only because i can now appreciate how insanely Sixteen Years Old katniss everdeen is. "yeah she talks to me at school and sits with me at lunch and she came to say goodbye to me and cried and gave me a pin that belonged to her dead aunt but idk if we're like FRIENDS or anything" KATNISS THAT GIRL LOVES YOU. JUSTICE FOR POOR MADGE SHE WAS TRYING SOOOO HARD.

[tnbc-thoughtsandheadcanons]

"We get it, we get it! Tim Burton did not direct The Nightmare Before Christmas! Shut up about it! It's so annoying!"

I hope it's as annoying as the 30+ years Henry Selick spent where he heard the vast majority calling the film he directed for 3+ years a "Tim Burton movie". I hope it's as annoying as the times he had to listen to people thanking Burton for Nightmare and calling him a "genius" for it. I hope it's as annoying as Disney was when they slapped Tim Burton's name in the title only 3 weeks before the movie came out to market it. I hope it's as annoying as Henry Selick watching people call Coraline a "Tim Burton movie" because they heard it was from the same director as The Nightmare Before Christmas.

I hope it's that annoying.

[reds-skull]

Comic request by @1stunseeliefaelass of reader witch and Ghost (+the Rileys)! Only... about 3 months late 😬 (really sorry about that, uni hit like a truck)

I hope this is accurate enough to your work!

[capricioussun]

2am post jumpscare

[zipmode]

moreeeeee silly stuff

[erinwantstowrite]

what are your thoughts abot how Damian and Tim's relationship is portrayed in most fanfics?

personally, although I like the angst part of their relationship I wish there was more fanfics where they're closer and have real siblings dynamic (like u know they 'hate' eachother but they would destroy anyone who would want to hurt their brother)

oh, boy, do i have a lot to say about this one. buckle in, folks.

i feel like a lot of the time, if they're in a fic together and the fic author doesn't like one of them, the other is going to be mischaracterized to hell and back. sometimes... both are mischaracterized.

i'm all for a fanon interpretation of a character- obviously, because i have fanon interpretations in my fic too at least a wee bit- but sometimes it goes too far and it no longer feels like we're reading about the same character

let's talk about Tim.

Tim doesn't have a good view of himself or his standing in any emotional aspect. which is often misconstrued about him believing that he was Jason's replacement (neither he nor Bruce thought this, but it was Bruce's fear), or that his worth as Robin wasn't enough. that's not true at all. i'll say it again here: Jason didn't nearly kill Tim at Titan's Tower, nor did he go there to kill Tim. and Tim fought him back. he even told Jason to his face:

"you can't be that good" "I am."

he knows he's a damn good Robin! he trained with the best, he helps lead the YJ! he doesn't doubt that he was the best person for the job. but when it comes to the emotional aspect of Robin, i think this is where Tim stutters

this is because of how Tim's parents showed their affection.

i think canon neglects that aspect of his trauma, which is why so many people hang onto it. in the comics, Tim is shown to have a lot of friends both in and out of suit. he's abrasive and isn't afraid to ask the hard questions. but he is riddled with self worth issues. his parents were barely around him, they didn't know him well at all. and they loved him, but from a distance.

Tim now sees himself as someone that can receive love from a distance. he is incredibly self reliant, and has been from a young age. he sees all of his accomplishments as obligations. he does well at school because he had to. he takes care of himself because he had to. and in his mind, taking up Robin was partly another obligation. he does his job well because he has to, and he might doubt this sometimes like anyone else, but at the end of the day he is confident in his ability to get shit done.

now, the emotional part of Batman and Robin is where i believe i enjoy a fanon interpretation more. he actually does have a good relationship with Dick, but I'm not too sure about Bruce at this point. this topic is nuanced because Batman writers make him so diabolical at times to the point that i would consider it ooc. but other times they're very close and Bruce admits this. so i replace it in my head with a more stable and realistic version that i've seen written by fic authors very well.

Tim views himself as someone who is there for a job: help Batman. but there is a lot of wonder and awe there. his favorite Robin was Dick. (I'll say this again so everyone hears me: his favorite Robin was Dick. yes you are allowed to have nuance and put Jason in there as someone he looked up to as well, please do. but put some respect on Dick's name!) now that he's working with Dick Grayson, someone he admires so much, as well as getting the honor to wear the Robin suit, he feels more like himself than he has in years. he's good at this, and it's also fun. he meets so many people and he gets to make a difference in the world. yes, it's a job, but it's also very freeing

he never did this be Bruce's son, or to replace Jason. his relationship with Bruce started off extremely rocky, with Tim forcing himself into his life in some way because he believed that Batman was going to get himself killed or get someone else killed, or Batman would cross the line. and Gotham would lose the only person who had such unwavering optimism for them. he and Bruce come to an understanding of being partners but not father and son. Bruce doesn't want to open himself up to that hurt again. but we all know Bruce, and that's not what ended up happening. Bruce would never be the same person he was before, but he is not incapable of love.

Tim would not understand that change. I'd get more into this but i don't want this post too long and i wanna save it for when i'm not supposed to be sleeping and when i'm writing one of my Tim fics for once. all we really need to know is that Tim's emotional intelligence is dogshit, and him coming to see Bruce as a father, and Bruce seeing him as a son, would baffle him. because his parents love him... at a distance. and Bruce sees him every day. that's not how it's supposed to work, right?

so.

sometimes, Tim is treated like a porcelain doll who can do no wrong. many aspects of his canon has been altered by fanon to be "worse" than it is. his neglect by his parents did, indeed, happen, and it affects him deeply. but his parents weren't like. beating him, or leaving him without food or shelter or supervision. Tim was clever enough to get around that supervision all on his own. which is why they should have been there in the first place. (they should have been there regardless). and emotional neglect is still a very real issue??? no one has to make it "worse" by making the Drakes out to be monsters. i think Jack often emotionally manipulated Tim when he was around, and I don't know if Jack was even aware that he did so. (which is why i can see some people delving into that nonexistent relationship that DC gave us, and finally giving those implications more depth. there are a lot of good fics that go over this)

often it's hard to read a fic for Tim because they go too hard into making Tim an anxious shy ball of sunshine. Tim is weird, and he stalked the Bats, he stalked Nightwing, he broke into Titan's Tower before he even became Robin. he's a weirdo. he fits right in with the Bats for that reason. some people make him out to be the victim or some kind of damsel in distress, and sometimes we get to see a phenomena where other characters talk like a book about emotional intelligence that their therapist gave them. which is... fine, if you're just writing to write it, maybe helping yourself. but let's take a step back and see Tim is not like that. he is a very capable person, and his not some "uwu, woe is me, i'm so shitty at everything and if you even look at me wrong i'll cry." i honestly believe that Tim is the type of character to hate crying in front of someone and even if he was actively dying he'd be holding back those tears.

whereas Damian? gets the opposite treatment??

granted, i don't actually know too much about Damian, but i at least try to understand him and his background

he's the youngest of them, and i think many people forget that Damian isn't a reader of the comics like we are. he wasn't going into that family with the emotional connections to these characters and their backstories like we did. he was taught about these people, the idea of them. like how we could be taught in class about people from a long time ago. and i can ensure you that Damian was not taught proper emotional intelligence, nor would he have the best grasp of it himself when he was younger than 9 years old. imagine all of your teachers and also your mother told you about these people and their accomplishments, and then told you that the person all of them look up to is your father. the person that you want nothing more than to know, to see, because the people around you talk about him so highly. someone you haven't gotten to meet yet, because you aren't "worthy." can you imagine being told all your life that you are not worthy to see your father yet? and not knowing if he believes that too?

but one day, you are going to be by his side as his son. i don't want to get too into the culture of the Al Ghul family because i don't actually know that much (i'm sure someone would know more about this, feel free to add on if you want to), but this is important to Damian. it's important to his mom. it's important to his grandfather, the leader of an extensive organization that stretches hundreds of years.

then he gets dropped off in a different country, culture, language, and family and he finds that things are not as he had been told his entire life. his father has many flaws, they do not believe the same importance of a blood tie as his family back home does. they question his entire upbringing to his face many times, they question his mother who he loves deeply. he's nine years old. imagine yourself in that position. you don't know yet what role you're playing in an adult's life, but you want to. desperately. you want to know where you stand. you want a hug. not to mention that Damian actually is a very emotional kid. he was taught to shove that deep, deep down, and not let that out.

too many people write Damian as if he was a "feral" kid which is kind of not something to put on him? i don't like it both because he wasn't feral, he was an asshole. there's a difference. and because it feels like a microaggression?? at times?? because once again... the culture that he is from... is important.

they have been racially profiled for many many years... and yes, everything that you read is political whether you want it to be or not. the act of reading is political. you should definitely be aware of what a writer's goal is when they were giving something to you. you should be reading deeper. again, i'm not from his culture and i can't say if it is an insult/insensitive joke or not, nor am i saying everyone who's made the joke before is a bad person. i have made jokes about Tim being a feral kid before and whatnot. i'm saying that no matter who you are, it is your responsibility to think critically about your media and kindly about other people. it feels uncomfortable to me because i know how wrongly the Al Ghuls (specifically Talia) have been treated by writers in the past. and Damian is an extension of that bias. just look at how many times they try to push Ian Wayne on us. or how they'll pull back on Damian's character development when talking about the Al Ghul family.

this probably isn't my topic to write about, at least not before i learn more about it. but since i get a fair amount of viewership, maybe someone will listen to me that won't listen to someone of color that has already pointed this out many times. with the comics fandom, and Batman fandom specifically sometimes, people don't care to think further about why the characters of color are so often and conveniently left out or forced into an archetype. take that as you will

so! he has spent his entire life believing he had to live up to two great legacies, both of which are VERY different. the intricacies of the Al Ghul family are often boiled down to pure evil by both fanon and canon writers, which dulls Damian's resolve and reasoning for what he had done, or makes it hard to connect to him. he has since learned more about who he wants to be and has come to respect his family in many ways. excuse me if i'm wrong, but i think part of why Damian came so hard for Tim was because Tim had everything Damian wanted. he had a place by Batman's side as both his son and his partner, and was very well respected by Batman and Nightwing both. he's older, more mature, he has stature in both this society Damian now has to fit into and within the family dynamic. considering Damian grew up in an assassin cult that solved threats to their dynamics or positions in power by murder, it wasn't a far leap for a child from that environment to make. he was modelling what he had been taught his entire life.

think about the mistakes that you made as a kid. and i don't mean something silly or funny now, i'm talking something that makes you feel ashamed. embarrassed. hurt. something that perhaps now as an adult, you reflect on as being totally uncool. and i want you to think about if maybe your environment had a role to play in that. maybe you made an insensitive joke that your mom or dad would have found funny, and someone pointed it out and reasonably made you feel like a jerk. shit happens. but you hopefully grew from that.

now imagine that mistake was you hurting someone.

yes, he was annoying. he was bratty, at times. he could be a little calculating shit. he hurt people with both his words and his weapons. Tim obviously had many many many reasons to be upset about his treatment- but I fear that most of his anger ended up directed at the older people in their lives that were supposed to be the ones to do something about it!

and though i hate that Tim went back to being Robin (it feels redundant), i have seen panels that show that the two of them working side by side after Damian and Tim both went through some life and perspective altering events both together and alone, has made Tim see Damian as his little brother, and vice versa. Damian has grown so much and many people just... don't care. no matter their reasoning for hating Damian, it's unfair to not look further than those cutting words written decades ago, or to bring up his mistakes every time you want to be mad at him. and i think it does a disservice to Tim to make him a bleeding heart about this when he has clearly forgiven Damian and cares about him. he rags on Damian like any older brother would, and Damian makes remarks like a younger brother would. personally, i think the two of them are doing pretty good right now

the development of their characters is actually so interesting within the canon aspect, even if they can fumble the ball every now and then. and the mischaracterization takes away the value that their canon relationship has. i personally love reading fics that have Damian and Tim teaming up. in aus where one thing changes and Tim and Damian become brothers later, i think it's actually so silly and fun when Damian respects Tim or thinks he's cool. or even without the au aspect! just like, a fic where the two of them are working together and it's either silly or serious, Damian having a begrudging respect for Tim and Tim being protective over Damian, etc etc, is sooooo much fun

[locksox]

artfight prep (ivys page)

timelapse and a closeup under read more

[mamawasatesttube]

why is popular timkon fanon just like every boomer sitcom "i hate my wife lol" joke but it's funny bc we made it gay. breaking news: tim and kon actually like each other (a lot, even)

[gomzdrawfr]

NAKED GRANDMA

Now that I have your attention, just wanted to put out a few things. This does not apply to anyone in particular, but set as a reminder to everyone, though I will be directing some of these to people who warranted it. This applies to both here on tumblr and on my twitter page.

At the end of the day, Raven is MY original character.

about the top/bottom thing

I get a lot of asks pushing the idea that Raven must be dominant or topping Price because she's a badass which let me be clear, Raven is a switch. Sometimes she tops, most time she doesn't. If I've already talked or drawn things where she's explicitly bottoming or just being submissive, you who comes in and push her to topping instead in an already established dynamic and context is kind of a dick move to me. Listen, just because a character is strong and competent doesn't mean she is also dependent in the bedroom, that they are only valid if they're dominant at all time. Get that misogyny bs out of here.

about requests and rude comments

If you're sending ask telling me to draw a mlm art with Price, going as far as telling me that Price is gay why do you have to do what every tiktokers/artist and ship him with a skinny copy and paste girl- Get out. This is my blog and you're coming here to frame her presence and existence as somehow inferior just because "it's better" then please fuck off. Take your sexisms and poorly disguised fetish FAR AWAY FROM ME. I won't entertain these asks and simply won't care. This is my main OC with stories and lores I care about. You want mlm? then find it elsewhere, there are places out there with this sort of content. Also, just fucking block me if you hate my OC stuff so much. Block the tags block my blog everything, if you need a tutorial here's one. I promise I don't give a flying fuck of your feelings.

Also, another subset of asks who's somehow disappointed about the fact with Raven marrying and having a family with Price (which mind you, the kids exist in a different timeline and not the canon one even), as though settling down with someone you love is????wrong???bad????? You people gotta be coming from the most narrow-minded or cesspool of tiktok/twitter to think settling down is downplaying her character. Again, this must be fucking linked back to the idea that "strong woman" must remain cold, isolated, work all the time to be valid. Don't bring your "oh she could've earned her Master degree and that high paying job at New York but noooo she settled with a boy without frontal lobe development who still stays at his mom's basement without a paying job instead :(((" and "just as worse as early Disney Princesses story" into MY NARRATIVE. Raven and Price are both approaching 40, coming from high demand and stress work who WANTS to settle down and build something NICE and domestic together. It's healing and they deserve it. Don't go around projecting your dislike for marriage and kids onto my, or ANYONE'S characters and dynamics (again, it's my OC??? like???? kindly fuck off once more??????)

Raven should and must do this or that

No, Raven should rest. Tone is important, if at any point it sounded like a pressure than a chill hey an idea :D then out the door you go as well.

Final note

I'm not trying to deter anyone from sending ask about Raven, you're welcome to make your HC and interpretations about Raven because well it's the internet and part of the fandom experience. I do enjoy and love answering ask about them! On the occasions I don't engage or respond to them, it's not personal alright? I just don't agree with or vibe with the take, I'm very specific with Raven specifically because she's the closest OC I've got here. But please please don't keep pushing your view onto mine, especially when I've already established my take on her.

I am sharing my OC with you, because I love her, I love her story and everything I've done to build her, and to share some of those moments both sad and joy with you because it's fun. I'm not here to warp her by popular demands or to change what she does just because you're whining about it.

Thank you for reading this far, and thank you everyone who has been kind and respectful. Here's to more OC shenanigans.

[flowerbloom-arts]

The Lonely Mountains (2023)

Original Dungeon Meshi drawing by sweepswoop_ on Twitter