#'oh yeah Batman's cool :)' IS IT TRULY SO SIMPLE??? | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

crowbarstodd · 5 years

Text

Course Of Nature (6)

TW: Brief mention of suicidal intent. I’ll mark the passage with two asterisks (**) before it starts and two when it ends. It’s really short and the rest of the scene will still make sense without it. Chapter Summary: Growth! Ladybug and Robin might not be at odds anymore, and some weird guy with a white streak in his hair helps Mari out. Word Count: 5,263 (a chonky boi) Rating: G except there’s one T scene so uh. PG???? Pairing: DAAAAAMINETTE Prologue | One | Two | Three | Four | Five | Six | Seven The thing about Paris being so dark, even at night, was that it was hard for Marinette to fear the things that went ‘bump’ in the night as a child because she was usually able to identify the source of the sound. That absence of terror followed her through adolescence and was probably the reason she felt so comfortable sitting on her balcony rail at two in the morning, when the night sky an inky, unending expanse, and the world was asleep. Everything that couldn’t be explained away by childhood pluckiness could be attributed to being granted magic via miraculous, and there lay the problem.

The park plan was weak. Now that she was divorced from the situation, she could clearly see that her plan consisted of blunder after blunder, and it was only luck that helped her capture the Akuma. Luck, and Andrena’s fast paralysis.

Robin had told her in one of their earliest patrols that she relied too much on her miraculous. Of course it was yelled in the heat of an argument, but he probably meant it, and he was probably right. She remembered clearly enough what he said; that she didn’t know danger because she had yet to truly experience it.

At the time, Marinette was too consumed by hurt pride to properly consider what he’d meant. Though she couldn’t bring herself to agree with him, she couldn’t help but think that there was merit to his criticism.

Marinette picked the park because it was a wide space, easy to clear of innocents, and easy to see in. She’d failed to consider that the visibility would likely give advantage to their long-ranged opponent, and that the lack of cover could increase the fatality of each attack that the villain sent.

She’d been overconfident, and until Robin and Andrena arrived, she had barely half an idea on how to beat the villain. But she hadn’t been scared, or at least not scared enough to think harder or work better. She hadn’t even stopped to check on Chat during or after his time as a cactus, because without realising it, she’d already accepted that it was something that could be reversed with a ‘Lucky Charm.’

In a way, it might have been better to just see the truth in that and not prod any further, but Marinette was an over-thinker through and through. Now that she’d come to this realisation she couldn’t help but wonder if she was being complacent with her duties. What if one day she came across a problem that couldn’t be solved with a chant of a charm. What would — what could she do then.

Marinette brushed a hand through her hair, closing her eyes as a cool breeze swept past her, bringing with it, an end to her introspection, at least for now. She tapped clean nails on the railing, bopping her head to the new rhythm, humming under her breath.

She should have seen him coming.

**“Don’t!”

She was pushed, not too harshly, back behind her white balcony rails, landing reflexively on her feet with bent knees. Perplexed, she looked up, astonished to see her new patrol partner, in all his traffic light glory, perched on her balcony, looking concerned. Concerned for her.

It took a moment to register his shout, but when she did, Marinette could only splutter out a breathless denial. “No! Oh geez, I wasn’t gonna jump, I swear!”**

Robin nodded firmly, but didn’t seem to accept the answer, if his analytical gaze was anything to go by. “Do you want to talk?” His voice was still gruff, but it was missing the harsh quality she’d gotten used to. To be honest she wasn’t exactly sure how to react to him when they weren’t fighting and he was acting so obviously kind.

“N-no, it’s fine. You can go back to what you were doing.”

He let himself into her room, took a seat on her chaise, and beckoned her over with a gloved hand. His thick brows were cocked, as if expectant, and she found very little choice but to oblige, so she settled beside him, offering him a cushion with wooden movements. This was far too strange for her liking.

“You looked deep in thought,” he commented lightly. She caught his eyes wandering, examining her room, and found that she didn’t really mind. It was a lot less ‘Adrien,’ than last year, but her crush had pretty much vanished completely as she learned to treasure him as a good friend. Where Adrien’s face used to be was now occupied by pictures of herself, her friends, her favourite looks and old design sketches she’d made and loved.

They looked nice, she thought, against the pink wallpaper. They looked like home.

“Yeah,” she agreed, unsure of what to say. “I guess I was... Thinking.”

She expected a snort from him, a huff maybe, or any assortment of disproving noise. Of course he knew she was thinking, he’d just commented that she was lost in thought! Instead he hummed like he agreed, and placed a hand on her shoulder, removing it a second later in what she assumed was supposed to be a comforting pat.

“My... Colleague, Nightwing suggests exchanging questions might help. If you would like, you may ask me a question and I will do my best to answer truthfully.”

He looked just a little out of his depth, overly tense but clearly eager to do something to help. Marinette found that she liked this side of him, unexpected as it was. “I’d like that,” she replied.

Robin gave the briefest of grins.

“I was wondering... Why did you want to be a hero?”

“I’m a vigilante, I operate outside the law.”

Marinette could have probably helped her responding eye roll, but why bother. “The question’s the same. Why do you help people?”

Robin clicked his tongue, head turning a little to the left, away from her, as he thought. “At first, I believed that Robin was something I had the right to. That the position was important and that I was important because of it... Now... Well now I see that it is both my honour and my duty. Because I know things others do not, and because I can do things that others cannot, it’s the right thing for me to help. In the right way. Batman and Nightwing taught me that.”

Marinette squeezed his shoulder and shot him a small smile. As easy as he was to dislike, there was no denying he had heart. Intention was important to being a hero (which Robin was, despite his claims), and he had good intentions in spades. Truthfully, he was a good hero. Was Ladybug a good hero? Did people think Ladybug was good?

“My turn,” Robin asserted. His face finally turned back to look at her, and in his eyes she saw nothing but blazing honesty. “How are you?”

There were a lot of questions he could’ve asked at that moment. Many more she would have been happy to answer without much thought. But he asked that in particular, and she had a feeling he had been waiting to ask. He’d let her ask first, and her question was hardly easy to answer, but he did it so she could feel comfortable. So he could prove he was good. Did he always work so hard to prove himself?

The least she could do in thanks was to reply honestly. “I’m okay I think. For the most part, anyway. Sometimes... I just get tired.”

“Physical comfort can relieve stress. Would you like a hug?” The ‘Nightwing says’ that prefaced the question was left unsaid, but Marinette heard it loud and clear anyway. Her lips split to a toothy grin, and she couldn’t help but giggle a little at him. He was so stiff, almost robotic sometimes when he spoke, and Marinette thought it was strange he could be so uncomfortable with showing kindness when it was clear that it came so naturally to him.

“I’d really like that, actually.”

This second hug was much more comfortable than the first that surprised her during one of their patrols (technically speaking this was their third hug but there was no way Marinette was counting the disaster of what happened after Robin ditched the meeting), and now that she was prepared for it, Marinette could appreciate it.

The first thing she noticed was that’s the material of his costume felt pretty similar to leather. After that, the warmth of his hold registered, along with the firmness of his grip. His fingers were glued together like he was some sort of mannequin. It was probably a practiced pose, she surmised. It was funny and a little bit saddening that he had to train in something that should be simple and familiar to him. Maybe this hug wasn’t just for her?

He disconnected from her after a count of ten, finally looking satisfied that she was okay. “I’ll be leaving now,” he announced. Quieter, and less confident, he continued. “And... ahem... I care.”

He jumped off her balcony rather dramatically and disappeared into the night. She didn’t bother trying to make out his shape in the shadows, electing instead to shut her door and get some sleep.

Marinette’s head felt heavy as lead when she awoke (earlier than her alarm for once), but her eyes blinked open without too much protest, and her mouth moved to form a smile automatically. The events of last night were still fresh on her mind.

Yesterday she saw a new side of Robin, one she couldn’t have known he was capable of had he not shown her himself. He cared about his job, and he cared about the people. He cared about her.

The weekend was a welcome break from the usual hubbub that was her life, a much-needed peace. Her morning was spent perusing her collection of cloth samples to find the best match for her new summer dress idea. Anything within the cotton family was usually ideal for keeping cool, and Marinette had her eyes set on a square of grey-tinted, light blue chambray. But she hadn’t ever been fond of chambray dresses… Maybe a romper? Decisions, decisions…

She placed the square down with a huff, eyeing it critically beside her newly revised design. The thing about sketching something new was that she’d probably be needing more fabric, and frankly, she really wasn’t up for walking a whole block to get an extra meter. She glanced back at the design and groaned. She could almost feel it stare back, begging to be made. It’d look so much cuter on a person than on the page…

Marinette stomped her feet, just a little irritated with herself, but too overtaken by excitement to feel any sort of real anger. A quick snack, and then she’d go. With luck, she wouldn’t encounter any distractions and she could come back before one o’clock to finish her piece.

Trailing down wooden steps was a challenge with fuzzy socks on, but she didn’t fall once (don’t act too shocked, now), so she was in a relatively good mood as she entered the family bakery. “Hi maman!” Marinate greeted cheerily, giving her mom a swift kiss on the cheek.

“Marinette!” Her mother beamed, “perfect timing! I was just about to call you dear, your new friend is here.”

New friend?

Slowly, she pivoted on her heel. “Ah!” Marinate startled, placing a hand against her chest. She leaned against her mother, heart still pounding from shock.

It was less Damian’s presence that surprised her, and more his watchful eyes glaring straight at hers, unblinking as she saw him for the first time that day.

He was sipping calmly from his cup of tea, sniggering openly into his cup, as his brother (woah Dick Grayson was dreamy when he laughed) turned in his seat her an apologetic smile. “Hey there, Marinette right?”

“Uh… Yeah.”

Dick grinned, leaning on the back of his seat to get a good look at her face. “I was worried when Dami disappeared yesterday, and when I asked him where he went, he gave me a slice of Gâteau Basque, and I knew I had to come try all the other cakes. Your parents are really good bakers, Marinette.”

He had an energy to him that made him feel welcoming, and seeing Damian scowl at the back of Dick’s head struck her as familiar for reasons she wasn’t quite sure about yet. “Thanks! How’d you guys get here without getting caught by Paparazzi? I saw your other brother get hounded by a bunch of cameras like an hour ago on the news.”

Damian smiled, teeth bared like some sort of feral animal. “We used our superior evasive techniques.” Marinette was tempted to take a step back. Damian didn’t seem like the smiling type, and that look only barely passed as a smile.

Dick sighed tiredly, though his eyes, trained on his little brother, were still fond. “He tipped the paps off about Tim and took the long way ‘round them. They were easy to avoid ‘cause they were all swarming Tim…”

Marinette felt her lip twitch upward. It wasn’t that she approved of his actions, or that she wanted to encourage it, in fact she was sure Ladybug should feel upset about it. Marinette was bemused. “Sounds superior alright,” she allowed. She waved them goodbye as she made her way out of the store, stopped only by the sound of her mother clearing her throat.

“Marinette?”

She turned. “Yes?”

“Your shoes.”

Oh. Right, she’d come down to get a snack before leaving. Dick and Damian’s eyes felt like heat lamps against her cheeks, and she did her best to hide behind her hair as she ran back up to her room to slip on her flats.

She sped past the boys, shooting Damian a look when she heard him snicker at her. Her maman was waiting by the door, tin-foil wrapped croque-monsieur extended out to her. Marinate gave her mother a grateful hug, impatient to leave, and even more impatient to get her design started.

‘Lemon Crafts’ always seemed to smell vaguely of lemon zest and fabric softener, the most pleasing combination to Marinette’s nose, and she’d frequent more often than she already did if their yellow lights weren’t so painfully bright. It was lucky for Marinette that she could comb through racks and cloth bins of fabric with her eyes shut; the store was almost a second home to her.

They hardly ever re-arranged their layout, and the speakers were always broken so that a solid thrum of bzz rang through in a delightful tenor that flittered to the back of her mind, and out of her thoughts. Regardless of the time of day, or year, the place managed to look, sound, and feel the same. Marinette felt it was a sort of liminal space, one that was oh so easy to peruse and lose track of reality within.

Today, however, she had her eye on her phone as she sped to aisle three, skipping through a tempting assortment of prints and cloths to find the specific roll of cotton.

There was a tingling that started on the back of her neck that trailed down the base of her spine, which left her feeling antsy and uncomfortable. She heard the familiar click as her purse opened from the inside and kept her back straight and walking pace steady as Tikki stuck her head out.

If her Kwami had suddenly gone alert as well, nothing good could be happening. Or maybe it was something exceptionally good? Probably not, but optimism was always welcome.

“Marinette!” Tikki hissed quietly. Subtle as she could, Marinette looked down at her purse, at Tikki who’s head was hardly peeking out. “The man behind the cashier won’t stop looking at you. I don’t have a good feeling about it.”

Marinette looked at him from the corner of her eyes, hands running over denim blends, pretending to examine them. He looked young, just a little older her, probably in his first year of university. His brown curls were tucked behind him in a low pony, earrings dangling from his elf-like ears. He didn’t look particularly dangerous. “I think it’s fine, Tikki, she whispered.”

Tikki let out a disproving sound, but didn’t say anything else, choosing instead to settle herself back in Marinette’s bag.

The chambray was where it was the last time she’d come and bought it. Ten meters seemed excessive for a romper, but it’d be nice to have a collection with a running theme, and the fabric was just begging to be bought.

But was it worth it? 10 meters really was a lot, and it was expensive too! It was sixty-five euros, and while she had that money, she might have something more worthwhile to buy at a later date.

“Marinette he’s still looking at you!”

Her head raised to meet the cashier’s unfeeling, brown eyes.

She dropped the fabric like it was on fire, and left the store, walking as naturally as she could. Her skin itched, feeling his hard stare on her back, and she wanted nothing more than to sprint out of the store.

Come to think of it, she hadn’t ever remembered seeing him, and she knew almost everyone who worked at ‘Lemon Crafts’ on weekends because she visited so often. She really should have listened to Tikki earlier.

She barely made it out of the door, when her ankle twisted painfully, and she tumbled down to the ground.

Marinette gasped as she fell in what felt like slow motion, bag slipping from her hold as it slid against the pavement and away from her. Her blazer fluttered in beats, arms reaching out to catch her body before her brain could even fully comprehend her descent.

Her bag skidded to a stop, the lucky charm Adrien gifted her dropped to the floor with a click, yet she remained suspended, the tips of her toes the only part of her body still flat on the ground, the rest of herself held up by a grip on the back of her blazer.

“Geeze kid,” a rough voice greeted her, as her faceless saviour entered her line of sight, placing her back down. He was smirking at her, as though entertained by her clumsiness, face framed with wild black hair, marred by a strip of white. “Careful next time, yeah?”

Marinette nodded mutely, accepting her dropped items from the kind stranger. She watched his back as he left, hands in his pockets, strides wide and confident. He turned the corner, fluid as water, and slipped out of sight.

Strangely enough, he reminded her of Robin.

____

Marinette sat rigidly on one of the many beams that supported the Eiffel Tower. Her hands folded on her lap, too frozen with embarrassment to brush away the hair of her pigtails that were whipping her face thanks to the force of the winds.

Robin sat on the other side, far looser, with legs swinging, though his arms were crossed tightly against his chest.

Between them, ice-cream from Andre’s melted, untouched.

“How can I give you my apology ice-cream if you won’t even look at me?” Robin huffed.

She wondered if there was a difference anymore, between her mask and her cheeks, or if she looked like a tomato with legs. She turned her head to the side, unable to make eye contact with him, as she spoke. “I can’t look at you without thinking of that night.”

You were fine yelling at me just yesterday against that grossly garish villain.”

“Believe it or not, an Akuma is a great distraction.”

“I would argue that the Akuma was the goal and that the night is the distraction.”

“You would argue about anything, Robin.”

Marinette knew he was making faces at her behind her back when he didn’t reply instantly. She could probably operate like this for the rest of their time together, staring at rusted metal instead of his face. She already knew he was rolling his eyes, anyway.

Robin let out a familiar ‘Tt,’ and sighed dramatically. The old iron whined as Robin shifted. “If you’re still hung up about the kiss—“

“It wasn’t a kiss!”

“Well. Anyway—“

Marinette turned to face him at last, insistent and overflowing with humiliation. “It wasn’t!”

And it really wasn’t. The night had started out almost fine. Robin was in the middle of a tantrum so there was that, but he was relatively nice, and she was doing a favour for Chat which was always good for supplying warm fuzzies.

~~~yes this is a flashback lmao~~~

Marinette had found him on a tree at Parc des Buttes-Chaumont, one knee bent to his chest, while his other swung loose and free, like it was at present. He hadn’t seemed surprised to see her come, though he was notably disgruntled.

“What do you want?” He had demanded, though less acidic than usual.

Marinette had shrugged and walked closer. “Just seemed like the right thing to do. Can I sit with you?”

“It’s your city.”

She used her yoyo to swing herself up, landing beside him with a thud, rustling leaves, her added weight pushing down on Damian’s branch. “It’s your tree. For now, anyway.”

They sat like that for half an hour, almost, just staring out at the park, and the late-night walkers, with their partners and their dogs. After that, the two of them started calling out dog-breeds they could see, and only when it was around two in the morning did the proper conversation start.

“Mind telling me why you stormed out?”

Robin’s response was bitten out with a certain degree of aggression. “Are you my therapist now?”

Marinette had shook her head, a little disappointed in her partner, but hardly surprised. “No, but you’re my partner now. I guess I’m a little worried.”

“It won’t affect my performance if that’s what you mean.”

Marinette knocked his elbow with her own, frowning. “No, I’m worried about you.”

Robin had turned his head to look at her faster than she’d ever seen him move before. He looked completely distrusting, but his eyes couldn’t lie, and in them she saw hope. “Why would you do that,” he’d sneered, upper lip curling.

“I’m not sure,” she had answered honestly. “Feelings are just like that.”

“If you mean to say that emotions cannot be rationalised, then you’re incorrect… But, thank you, I suppose.”

It was the first genuine thanks he’d ever willingly given her, and she was floored when she heard it. At the time, she hadn’t thought much of it, but now, knowing a little more about his past, and a little more about him (yes, she was still thinking about how sad it was that he didn’t know how to hug properly), her mind lingered on the moment. Why did he look so in disbelief that she would care about him?

“I’m experiencing what many would call jealousy,” he admitted, snapping a twig between his fingers. His eyes were set on the moon, but it was clear that his attention wasn’t. “Your partner— your other partner (The difference between the two was clear now. He was distinguishing between himself and his ‘rival’ and she hadn’t even noticed), seems to get along well with mine.”

Her heart had sunk at his admission, taking it as a jab against herself as a person. “Oh. Sorry, I guess. I’m sure Chat wouldn’t mind a patrol with you—“

“No!” Robin almost bellowed. He had looked completely against the idea. “I’m not jealous of their relationship in that I want it, well.” He let out a frustrated growl. “It’s not that I want us to be like them. Neither of us are irritatingly chatty or bright, we wouldn’t be able to emulate it anyway. No, I’m jealous because your other partner has enamoured mine.”

“I’m sure Nightwing loves you too.”

“I know he does,” Robin whispered back, almost afraid to say the words aloud. “But not at first. And not for a while. I’m sure my personality had a part to play with it, but… Well he liked Chat Noir from the beginning— he wanted Chat Noir from the beginning. Makes me wish I had that luxury.”

He loves you now. I can see in how he looked out you, how he reached out, he loves you now. There were a lot of things Marinette could have said in response, ‘he loves you now, included. Instead, she said nothing, and sat with him in silence, enjoying the browning leaves and almost comfortable seat on their tree-branch.

Her pocket buzzed. Almost embarrassed to have ruined the contemplative mood, she had pulled it out in a rush, shrieking when it slipped from her grip and plummeted down.

She went after it on instinct, momentarily forgetting her peculiar position on a tree, and found the rest of her body following after her phone.

Robin had reacted quickly, diving after her, holding her in a compact hold, his hand on her head to protect her from the fall. He rolled them over so that his back hit the ground first, but the momentum was too much, and they found themselves smashing against one another, lips smacking ungracefully, teeth knocking and foreheads rapping against one another. She rolled off him, hand over her mouth, stunned silent.

Their lips met.

Did that count as a kiss?

Surely not…

No way she could’ve just had her first kiss…

No way!

Robin’s mind hadn’t been as occupied, and he’d simply gotten to his feet, brushing himself off as he spat out a wad of blood. She could spot the gash on his upper gum where her two front teeth had tapped his mouth after their not kiss, and she would have felt a little bad if it weren’t for the fact that “you kissed me!”

Robin looked up at her, uninterested. “It was hardly a kiss, besides, you wounded me.”

“But you kissed me!”

“I didn’t intend to. In fact, I’m pretty sure I saved you, you’re welcome by the way.”

“You kissed me!”

Robin rolled his eyes, checking his utility belt to see if anything had fallen. “Fine, fine, I kissed you.”

It was silly, she knew that then, and she was reminded of how silly she was every time she remembered that night, because her reply would likely make her cringe for the rest of her life. “That was not a kiss!”

Silence fell between them, as Robin raised his brows, a smirk forming it’s way on his face. “Oh? But you said it was a kiss.”

All coherent thought left her mind, and was replaced by loud screaming that was barely louder than the beating of her overactive heart. Blood rushed to her head so fast a headache began to form, and her knees went weak. “It wasn’t!” Even to her ears, the argument was weak.

Robin leered, moving closer. She took a step back for every step he took forward. “But you said it was?”

“I was wrong!” Her back had reached the base of the tree, and Robin was still advancing.

“Unsurprising, but I think this time you might be right.” He leaned in so that he was mere centimeters away from her face, but he didn’t come any closer.

Right as she was about to stutter out another half-baked response, he broke out into snickers that tiptoed the edge of laughter.

She hadn’t ever heard him laugh before. It was husky, more breath than voice, but it was pleasing to the ear. He looked a lot younger when he laughed, a certain lightness took over his whole body, and she remembered he was just a kid, like her. She wished he’d laugh more.

Mortified about what had occurred, she wasn’t exactly happy with the situation, but she couldn’t bring herself to be mad, when he looked like that.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“You said it was a kiss?”

Marinette, not willing to have a repeat of their past conversation, shoved a spoonful of ice-cream in her mouth.

Robin tutted again, his trademark at this point, but this time the corners of his mouth were turned upward, and she found herself minding it less.

“It wasn’t a kiss,” she said at last. “My first kiss is going to be with someone I like, and it’s going to be a choice. That was an accident, and it doesn’t count.”

“Okay,” Robin agreed.

Marinette smiled.

“Ladybug?”

She looked at him, properly this time, and without any blushing. “Hm?”

“Why are you a hero?”

A little stunned to hear her own question repeated back at her (not that Robin knew she was the one who asked him), it took a moment for her to even comprehend it. Why was she a hero?

Because she was chosen?

No, she had tried to give away that responsibility once before, but she kept the job for a reason.

“Because I was given the opportunity to help,” she said, finally. “One that a lot of people don’t get. I found that even if I thought I didn’t want the responsibility at first, I couldn’t turn the job down. What about you?”

Robin’s nose turned up to the air once again, reminding Marinette of what a brat her partner truly was. “Because lesser people need someone like me.”

Silly bird. If he hadn’t helped her out, back when she was a civilian, she might have taken his response for its face value. But there was no way she could, knowing what she knew. “I bet you secretly have a really nice reason, you just don’t want to tell people.”

“Don’t act imbecilic. Of course I don’t.”

“Uh huh, sure you don’t”

“Eat your ice-cream and shut up.”

Marinette laughed, extending the cup to him. He took a small bite, nose wrinkling. He kept saying he didn’t like sweets and he kept acting like it too, but he could’ve turned her offer down and they both knew it. What a little liar she had as a partner.

It was the same combination as last time, only tonight Andre had decorated it with black sprinkles and a small, white marshmallow on top. Robin let her have it, not a fan of them, but he said nothing about the sprinkles.

It was divine on her tongue, melting almost instantly (though most of it was soup at this point), coating her mouth in a thick swirl of black and red. “What was this an apology for anyway?”

“I may have spoken out of turn when we fought Bud Omen. Nightwing suggested that I bring a token of apology.”

“Are you gonna get me an ice-cream every time you say something rude? Because I’m not sure you could afford that.”

Robin snorted, taking another bite of the ice cream. “I wouldn’t be so sure.”

And really, she couldn’t. She thought she knew her partner that she had his whole personality down when they’d first met, and even more so during their first patrol. But Marinette found that the more time passed, the less she felt she knew about him, and the more she wanted to learn.

She didn’t hate her partner, of that she was sure. In fact, she might even be starting to like him.

End Notes: The ‘like’ is platonic, unfortunately, but we’re not they’re yet. We’ll get there eventually though! Their relationship is starting to shift now that they know more about each other ayyy. This chapter was really all about growth on Marinette’s side. Changing feelings about what it means and what it takes to to be a good hero, and changing relationships with her new partner.

Also! First glance of Jason, yeah the white streaked guy was Jason I really wasn’t tryna be subtle about it. What’s up with the weird cashier tho? And yes! Now you know what happened that night. Nothing big or romantic, but Robin confessed he was feeling jealous and lips smashed. I wanted to bring it up now rather than earlier though bc I feel like Marinette can use this as an moment to really consider. This happened in the past, but I wanted it to be seen through current Marinette’s eyes.

Tag List:

@just-rant-and-write-fic-idea @kceedraws @mystery-5-5 @2sunchild2 @i-like-fairytail-and-stuff @treebrosha @mooshoon @worlds-tiniest-spook-pastry @aarushi-03 @ladylb @crazylittlemunchkin @kurogaya913 @ki117h3dr4g0n @xxmadamjinxx @sidefrienda @7-sage-7 @throneoffirebreathingbitchqueen @felicityroth @tritaledkitsune @constancetruggle @creator-josie @theatreandcomicfreak @northernbluetongue @yin-390 @ayuchan07 @fatimaabbasrizvi @emjrabbitwolf @resignedcatservant @violatiger8 @interobanginyourmom @thatrandomfandomsgirl @7701deathlyhalfbloodprincess @redgemsposts

Feel free to ask to be tagged/untagged!

#daminette #maridami #maribat #robinette #course of nature #mlb x dc #mlb x batman #marinette x damian #marinette dupain cheng x damian wayne #mlb/dc #ml/dc #mlb au #mlb crossover #dc crossover #mlb fic #miraculous ladybug au

313 notes · View notes

andysawesometoybox · 4 years

Text

Real Ghostbusters: Firehouse. Kenner. 1987

I’m just going to say it: Kenner’s Real Ghostbusters toy line is one of the greatest toy lines’ to ever hit shops. Ever. The End.

I would not be the person I am today without these toys, along with Star Trek from Playmates and Batman. Any Batman.

Let’s cast our minds back to the mid 1980’s! Ghostbusters was everywhere. We’d had the first movie at the tail end of ’84 and then the animated series in ’86. And what does a good cartoon need? A toy line! In fact, the vast majority of cartoon’s in the ‘80’s (and today if we’re being honest) were really just over the top toy adverts and really, Ghostbusters was no different. So toys were needed fast. In steps titan toymaker, Kenner.

Kenner had an incredible track record at the time having created the DC Superpowers line and oh yeah, STAR WARS! So, to say that Kenner in the ’80’s was on a roll would be a huge understatement.

As I said, the Real Ghostbusters toy line from Kenner was massively responsible for shaping my childhood. It was a vast toy line with a massive assortment of figures and vehicles (all of which I will look at in the future), but it only had one proper play set:

The Firehouse

To me, Kenner’s Firehouse is one of THE greatest play sets ever made. When you really look at it, it’s a pretty simple toy. It’s a building. More basic than that, it’s just a big hollow box with two whole levels, 1 balcony level and a pretty cool fireman’s pole (more on that later).

But, to me, that hollowness is one of this play sets greatest assets. As a kid, you filled that space with your imagination. It may sound corny, but it’s absolutely true. To me, the mark of a truly good play set is the ability to use it beyond the brand that it was created for. I cannot tell you of all the different toys that this play set played headquarters to. From the great Transformers/M.A.S.K war that my brother and I would play, to a strange parallel world that my Star Trek away team would discover. Or when He-Man would come over and visit the Ghostbusters just because we could. And they never seemed out of place, because it was a building. But that does not take away from the awesomesness of this piece.

It has the two walls, front and site and then a huge cut away for easy access inside. The vast space inside could easily be taken up by the placement of the Ghostbusters’ car, ECTO-1. Now, I’ve seen this set critized in the past because Kenner didn’t make it long enough to truly house the car, but I don’t agree with that. Sure, if you try to make the car stay inside the building, it’ll either roll out the back or push through the double doors at the front, but I didn’t care as a kid and I sure as hell don’t care now. As a display piece as an adult, I kinda dig the look of Old ECTO bursting through the doors, it looks awesome. The only issue with having the car inside the Firehouse is that it doesn’t leave much room for the figures on that floor. But that’s why you have other levels!

The upper level, which spands the entire thing, thus being a complete floor. It’s bare but has some figure pegs over the large grate in the middle of the floor (more on that in a bit). It also has the fireman’s pole attached at the top. I LOVE THIS THING. To simulate the famous pole from both the movie and the cartoon, Kenner created this system where you attach a figure onto the red platform, two figures work best for balance but it will work with one, then, on the roof, you flick the switch and that activates the pole! The platform, with figure(s) attached, begins to spin down the thread of the pole at great speed before landing at the ground floor. It’s frigging great! Yeah, ok, it is annoying to have to thread the damn thing up again each time, but I really never really cared as a kid and it never got old. Kenner created a pretty good way recreate the pole from the film/cartoon. Sure Playmobil’s version probably makes more sense, but as a kid, this was rad!

The decals that come with the set adds to it. We’ve got a picture of a scary looking old woman on the upper floor (who actually has her own figure and is totally a scary ghost!). We have some book shelves on the middle level, giving us the idea that this is where Egon and Ray would do their research, and on the bottom level, we have decals of various looking industrial type contraptions that no doubt helps the ‘Busters in their never ending battle against the paranormal! I will say, that this set also comes with a full on ECTO Containment unit that you could put the various small ghosts that come with the Ghostbusters figures. I do have it somewhere, but right now, I’m not sure where! It’s rad though.

On the outside, Kenner have done a marvellous job with the sculpt. It looks just like the Firehouse from both the cartoon and the film. Which is a real Firehouse in New York City, by the way. On the side wall, we have more decals of exposed brick, to give us that “rundown” affect. We also have the windows. So yeah, not much going on here, but pffft.

The front as I said really replicates the design of the real building really well. Then we get one of my favourite little pieces, the Ghostbusters sign! This one is actually a replacement that I was lucky enough to find in eBay for a good price. I lost my original years ago and never thought I’d find another, but I did! Wohooo!

This brings us back to the roof.

Like the upper floor, the room has this large grate that lines up perfectly with the one on the upper floor just below it. Everyone who’s ever played with Ghostbusters toys knows what this is for. That’s right. The SLIME!

Slime has always been popular with kids toys and what better toys to use slime with than frigging Ghostbusters! Kenner’s line came with many vats of slime, in many different colours of the life on the toy line. The idea here was to pour the slime through the roof grate, onto the figures waiting on the upper level, that slime would then oooooze down the upper level grate, covering whatever was on the ground floor. I had many of the vats myself and you know what? I hated them!

Seriously, I know that I am in the minority here, but I hated slime as a kid. Still do. Why in the hell would I want to cover my toys in sticky goo that I would then have to wash off later. Or worse, what if I forgot to?! It would dry into this horrible thing and still leave sticky……NO! I’m not having it! This is not something that I’ve come to as I got older, I’ve very much felt this way since I was a kid. I know other collectors are totally cool with it but honestly, keep that crap away from my toys! (picture is Slime from the 2016 Ghostbusters movie toy line)

VERDICT

So, what’s the verdict here?

Honestly, it’s still epic. I’ve owned this thing for well over 30 years and just having it set up on display in my studio, with the toys and car, brings me so much joy every day. I’m not just reminded of all the Ghostbusters fun that I had, but of all the other various toys that my brother and I used it with to play together. So many great memories, all from what is basically a hollowed out box with a Ghostbusters logo on it. Genius.

You can find the Firehouse on eBay pretty easily, but it’s expensive and the price has really gone up a lot recently. I’d imagine it has something to do with Hasbro’s Real Ghostbusters reproduction figures that have recently come out. I have a Winston, he’s awesome and still mint in box!

I’d be surprised if Hasbro do a reproduction of the Firehouse, but if they did, it would be hugely expensive!

Toy Score: 10/10

#Ghostbusters #RealGhostbusters #Real Ghostbusters #Kenner #toys #toy #toycollector #toy collector #retro #retrotoys #retro toys #the real ghostbusters #therealghostbusters #venkman #egon #ecto #slime #slimer #80s

3 notes · View notes

hunter-the-sad-skeleton · 4 years

Text

Nightstorm’s Trials And Tribulations:

Putting Under A Read More, Hope Y’all Enjoy!(Reblogs And Opinions/Advice Appreciated!) Tag List(Feel Free To Ask To Be Added Or Removed): @bccfggffbgv, @new-account-sam-christy-456

Chapter one “Riddles and Rhymes, truly troubled times~!”

Nightstorm stood still as a statue, observing the night streets of Gotham. It seemed quiet. Of course; the one time she decided to visit her family, the streets were practically dead silent. She was about to call it a night when she was jolted to attention by a clattering sound. Pulling out her grappling hook, she aimed and shot at a lightpost nearby the sound, investigating.

“Keep it down, wouldja?! We don’t need that Batfreak and his birdy accomplice to catch us!!” One thug hissed. Nightstorm narrowed her eyes.

“Sorry, it’s stacked weirdly…!” The other retaliated.

“Let’s just get moving, don’t wanna hold the boss up…!” The first chuffed.

“Right.” The second nodded. Now or never, Nightstorm. Nightstorm jumped from where she was situated, rolling out into the open.

“Going somewhere?” Nightstorm asked.

“Yeah, back to the hideout. Talon, take care of ‘em, I’ll get these out of the way.” The first ordered.

“Gotcha, Reed.” Talon acknowledged.

“Wow, name’s Talon? Where’d ya come from? Goons ‘r’ us?” Nightstorm taunted, grappling away to a high up area.

“Hey! Get back here!” Talon snapped.

“If you insist.” Nightstorm shrugged, grappling onto a lamppost and swinging around Talon, effectively tying him up and immobilizing him.

“Hey!!! Reed!! I need some backup here!!” Talon called.

Nightstorm grappled away onto a rooftop, waiting for Reed to return. “I’m on it, Talon.” Reed grunted. As Reed got into position, Nightstorm grappled onto the lamppost again, swinging to perform the same maneuver, but stopping dead in her tracks as her leg was grabbed, almost twisting to a painful degree.

“Hey! That wasn’t part of the plan!” Nightstorm objected, trying to pull her leg away.

“Nope, you ain’t gettin’ away to tell your batty little friend.” Reed grunted.

“She doesn’t need to.” A voice echoed. Nightstorm smiled slightly, feeling a small bubble of hope start to build up in her stomach.

“Batman!!” Reed gasped.

“Right as always, Reed.” Batman scowled. Nightstorm managed to pull her leg away while he was distracted, managing to finish the maneuver from earlier, landing on her left leg and almost crumpling over.

“I gotcha, bud!” Robin said, hurrying over to help her stand up.

“Thanks….Robin, right?” Nightstorm asked, trying to stay as inconspicuous as possible.

“Yeah, are you okay?” Robin asked. Nightstorm winced as she set weight on her leg again.

“Yeah, just a little sore is all..!” Nightstorm reassured. Batman crossed his arms, raising an eyebrow despite it being invisible under the mask.

“Really? I’m sure if you were just ‘sore’, you wouldn’t have almost collapsed as you set weight on your leg.” Batman explained.

Nightstorm went to explain, but her sight was caught by a piece of paper left by some boxes where the lackeys used to be, but had long since escaped. Intrigued, Nightstorm hobbled over, picking up the piece of paper, reading the wording thoroughly.

“I can bring tears to your eyes and a smile to your face. I form in an instant and last for a lifetime, but I can be forgotten. What am I?” The piece of paper read.

“What’s it say?” Robin asked, reading over her shoulder.

“Memories.” Nightstorm said flatly.

“What?” Robin asked, confused.

“It’s a riddle. No doubt the Riddler’s behind the whole thing.” Batman explained.

“But what would he want a load worth of junk metal for?” Robin asked.

Nightstorm flipped the piece of paper over, finding more writing on the back. “I bring you comfort, a soft, smooth delight. I too keep you warm, on a cold winter’s night. What am I?”

“These riddles of his keep getting weirder and weirder…” Robin said, scratching his head.

“A blanket...But why a blanket…?” Nightstorm hummed.

“Let’s get back. It’s getting late.” Batman said.

“Right!” Robin nodded.

“Want some help with that leg?” Batman asked.

“Oh! Only if you really wanna help! I don’t wanna inconvenience anybody!” Nightstorm said.

“Right, come on, we can at least set it until you can get in to the doctor’s for a cast.” Batman said. Nightstorm got up, hobbling to follow, eventually getting help from Robin to walk.

(Later)

Nightstorm sat in the back of the batmobile, reading over the riddles over and over, trying to figure out why he picked those specific ones.

“Still reading those things? They’re probably just there to confuse you.” Robin said.

Nightstorm shook her head. “No, he always has reasoning for his riddles.”

“Right. But now that we’re out of danger, who are you? I’ve never seen you around here before.” Batman said.

“Oh, I uh...Came up to visit some family of mine.” Nightstorm explained.

“Where from?” Batman asked.

“New york, sir.” Nightstorm said.

“New york?!” Robin gasped.

“Yeah, it’s uh…….Extremely distant family.” Nightstorm said, chuckling awkwardly.

“New York is like...a day’s FLIGHT away!” Robin gawked.

“Yeah, but I haven’t seen this family in ages, so uh, I’m paying them a surprise visit…!” Nightstorm said.

The batmobile stopped in the batcave and Robin helped Nightstorm to somewhere that they could make a temporary brace for her leg.

“Thanks again for the help, guys…!” Nightstorm thanked.

“No problem. Us crime fighters need to stick together and help one another.” Batman nodded.

“Will you be alright from here?” Robin asked.

Nightstorm nodded, pulling out her phone. “Yeah, I can call my sis-er, brother to come pick me up when I get somewhere they can pick me up!” Nightstorm smiled slightly.

“Gotcha.” Batman nodded. Nightstorm got up, walking outside to somewhere safe and calling her brother up to come pick her up.

“Yello? Yeah, Hunter? This is Gianna, couldja come pick me up?” Gianna said. “Yeah, I’m here, I’m-I’m visiting ya guys, bud! I’m at the corner of wesley and yellowstone!” Gianna said. “Fifteen? Great! See ya then!” Nightstorm said. “Love ya too, bro! Bye!” Gianna said, hanging up.

Gianna went into a nearby phone booth, changing into a hoodie and sweatpants, waiting by a bus stop for her brother to come by.

A purple car soon arrived, Hunter speeding out and hugging Gianna tightly. “Sis, ya didn’t have to come all the way out here!” Hunter smiled.

“Oh, come on bro! You’re worth the day’s length flight!” Gianna teasingly jabbed.

“I coulda come out to visit you!” Hunter said.

“Yeah, but that woulda ruined the surprise!” Gianna grinned.

“Let’s get home! Mae’s missed you a lot!” Hunter said, gesturing to his car.

“Oh gosh, I forgot about Mae!” Gianna laughed, following Hunter and sitting in the shotgun seat.

(Later)

“Right here!” Hunter said, parking in the driveway of a fairly big house.

“Whoa.” Gianna gasped.

“Come on! Mae’s gonna be stoked!” Hunter grinned.

Gianna got up, almost collapsing as she put her weight on her leg. Hunter hurried over to help her up.

“Dude, are you okay?” Hunter asked, concerned.

“ ‘M fine, bro, just a small sprain is all…!” Gianna said, smiling through the pain.

Hunter raised an eyebrow. “Let’s get inside.” Hunter said.

Hunter unlocked the door, hitting the light and setting Gianna down on the couch.

“So, sis, hit me; what happened?” Hunter asked, looking at Gianna’s leg.

“Nothing, just a simple trip!” Gianna lied. She couldn’t tell him what really happened. It could get him involved.

Mae hopped in, tugging on Hunter’s hoodie sleeve. “Bro! Bro! The news is on and-” Mae started.

“I’m a little busy, Mae.” Hunter said.

“There’s a new hero in town, bro!” Mae exclaimed. Gianna’s eyes shrank.

“What?! Show me!” Hunter said, following Mae to the T.V set not too far from the couch.

“*This evening, protectors of Gotham, Batman and Robin, were spotted fending off two goons by the docks with a new hero.*” The reporter said. “*The two went on to say that “We don’t know her personally, but we know that she could give us a helping hand if we ever get outnumbered while she’s here.”*” The reporter continued.

Gianna shifted nervously. “*When asked if they apprehended the criminals, they only stated that they did for a moment before they helped the new hero out, which is the time when the criminals managed to escape.*” It continued. Gianna felt guilt bubbling in her stomach.

“What’s her name?” Hunter asked skeptically.

“We’ll hear in a second, shush!” Mae hushed.

“*When asked about the new hero’s name, they responded with the following; fellow Gothamites, please welcome Nightstorm to the city.*” The reporter announced. Gianna gulped hard, hoping nobody heard.

“Nightstorm, huh?” Hunter hummed. “I like it. Mysterious, unknown, new, vague!” Hunter smirked.

Gianna sighed silently in relief. “Yeah, she’s pretty cool….!” Gianna smiled tiredly.

“Wait, Nightstorm injured her left leg…” Hunter hummed, looking back at Gianna.

Gianna started sweating nervously. Crap. “Poor gal!” Gianna said.

Hunter nodded. “Indeed...I hope they catch those criminals soon. Can’t have them running rampant, right?” Hunter asked. Gianna nodded.

“Right!” Gianna agreed.

“We can catch up tomorrow, you,” Hunter said booping Gianna’s nose. “Need to get some rest! You were on a plane for a day or two STRAIGHT! You deserve some sleep!” Hunter finished. Gianna nodded.

(The next day.)

Gianna woke up, getting up to take her concerta meds. “Morning, sis, sleep well?” Hunter greeted, trudging over to grab his mug for his morning cup of coffee.

“Yeah, you?” Gianna asked. Hunter yawned, shrugging his shoulders.

“What do ya have planned for the day?” Hunter asked, pouring himself a mug full of coffee.

“Well, I was planning on walking around the city, taking in the sights, just look around, I guess!” Gianna shrugged.

Hunter nodded. “Yeah, Mae’s out of school now, so she doesn’t have anything to do!” Hunter smiled.

Gianna hummed. “Why don’t you show me around?” Gianna asked.

“No.” Hunter said. “Not until we get,” Hunter started. “That leg of yours checked out.” Hunter finished, gesturing to Gianna’s leg.

Gianna slouched sadly, before sighing and nodding, deciding to bite the bullet now. “Fine…” Gianna sighed.

(Later)

“Well, miss Gianna, it seems to me like you twisted your leg doing something abnormal.” Doctor Pecan sighed. “What did you say your dayjob was?” He asked.

“Oh, uh, I work as a uh, gym instructor.” Gianna said, lying so that nobody questioned anything.

Doctor Pecan nodded. “Alright, well, might wanna call off your shifts until your leg gets better, or at least take it easy.” He explained.

“What?! Why?” Gianna asked.

“Because of the way your leg twisted,” He said, gesturing to the x-ray. “If it were to twist in such a way again, it could pop out the socket.” He finished. Gianna’s shoulders dropped.

“I can just take it easy, right? Not completely off?” Gianna asked worriedly.

“If you are absolutely 100% careful, yes, you may continue working.” He sighed, resigned.

“Okay, careful, got it..” Gianna nodded.

(Afterwards)

“You should probably rest up all day. The sooner that leg gets better, the sooner we can show you around!” Hunter smiled. Gianna nodded.

(A while later)

Gianna got up after Hunter and Mae left, going to grab the mail, finding a letter with question marks riddled over it. Gianna’s eyes shrank, hiding the letter as she put the rest of the mail on the dining room table, returning to the couch with the letter, cutting it open and reading the contents.

“Greetings and salutations, Nightstorm! I noticed you were new here, so I saw it fit that I send this letter to you as a means of welcome!” Gianna rolled her eyes at the overly formal introduction. “But also as a means of warning.” Gianna did a double take, continuing to read.

“By the question marks and other clues, you probably know that I am The Riddler(Pleasure to meet you, Nightstorm!), so you know my schtick by now; riddles!” Gianna read on.

“So here is my first riddle to you; ‘keep your family close, and your ______ closer.’. Apologies about not making an appearance last night, villainy is quite busy work, you know! Hopefully soon we get to meet in person! -The Riddler.” Gianna finished reading and folded the letter back up, putting it in her backpack. She thought the riddle over in her head.

“Keep your family close, and your what closer….?” Gianna muttered to herself.

“I’d assume he means ‘enemies’.” A voice said. Gianna nodded, doing a double take and spinning to look at the window. “Sorry, I would have knocked, but I wasn’t sure if you were the only one home.” Batman apologized.

“Oh, it’s fine!” Gianna forgave. “Why did you come here in the first place, anyways?” Gianna asked.

“I saw Riddler drop by, so I wanted to make sure everything was okay.” Batman explained.

“Oh! That’s nice of you!” Gianna beamed.

“I wanted to make sure there was no trouble.” Batman shrugged.

Gianna nodded. “How’s the leg?” Batman asked.

“Oh! It’s fine!” Gianna nodded.

“That’s good. Just a sprain?” Batman asked.

Gianna nodded. “Yeah, just a small sprain. Not supposed to move much.” Gianna huffed. “Thanks for asking, though…!” Gianna smiled slightly.

“No trouble, Nightstorm.” Batman said.

“Wait, how did you-” Gianna started.

“Your height and build is the same. Besides, you spraining your leg at the same time as Nightstorm? Too scary of a coincidence.” Batman explained.

“Well, I can trust you to not tell anyone, yeah?” Gianna asked. Batman nodded.

“I know how important it is to keep your identity secret.” Batman nodded.

“Thanks…” Gianna smiled slightly.

Batman nodded. “Just be careful. The Riddler can be dangerous if he chooses.” Batman warned.

“Right, thanks.” Gianna acknowledged. Batman nodded.

Gianna hummed, reading over the letter again. “What do you think, Bats?” Gianna asked. No response. “Bats?” Gianna asked again, turning around to find he had left. “Huh….Guess I’m on my own.” Gianna said, shrugging. Gianna got up, hobbling to her backpack, considering her options. She eventually came to a conclusion, pulling out her Nightstorm suit, going to the bathroom to change before Mae and Hunter got back.

(Later)

Nightstorm grappled onto a lamp post, swinging up to a nearby roof, almost collapsing as she landed on her leg that she had sprained the night earlier. “Ow….!” Nightstorm winced. Nightstorm got up swiftly, limping to a good vantage point. “Anything going on…?” Nightstorm winced, kneeling on her good leg.

“Aren’t you supposed to be resting?” Batman asked. Nightstorm spun around, almost falling off where she was sitting.

“You scared me!” Nightstorm snapped.

“Apologies. I didn’t know how to announce my presence without startling you.” Batman said.

“NOT giving me a heart attack when I am sitting on the EDGE OF A VERY HIGH UP BUILDING?!?” Nightstorm squeaked.

“How?” Batman asked.

Nightstorm waved her hands around in the air. “Knocking on something?!” Nightstorm sputtered.

“I’ll remember that for later.” Batman said. “Anyways, about you resting, you should really stay off that leg. We don’t want it to get worse.” Batman said.

Nightstorm sighed, rolling her eyes. “I can take care of myself, Bats.” Nightstorm groaned.

“Are you sure?” Batman asked. “I won’t hold your hand if you don’t need it.” Batman said.

“Yes, I’m sure! I-Was that a joke about my height?” Nightstorm asked, offended.

“No, I’m just saying-” Batman started.

“I’M just saying that height isn’t everything, Bats!!! Height isn’t indicative of your skill, Bats!” Nightstorm growled.

“I wasn’t saying that it WAS, Nightstorm.” Batman scowled.

“Really? Are ya sure about that? Cause it REALLY sounds like it WAS what you were saying!!!” Nightstorm snapped.

“You’re twisting my words.” Batman frowned.

“Am I?!?” Nightstorm snapped.

“Yes. I was just asking if you wanted help.” Batman scowled.

“You phrased it as if you were talking to a child.” Nightstorm frowned.

“I didn’t mean it like that.” Batman scolded.

“It sounded like it. Just because I’m younger than you DOESN’T mean I’m a little kid!!” Nightstorm growled.

“I don’t see you like that.” Batman frowned.

“It sure sounds like it you little-” Nightstorm started.

“Alright you two, break it up, no need to fight with each other!” Robin said, swinging over between the two.

“He started it.” Nightstorm said.

“And you didn’t need to continue it.” Batman lectured.

“Oh really?! Says he who reaches above five foot three and a HALF!!!” Nightstorm shrieked.

“No need to yell!” Robin said.

“Okay, how tall are you?” Nightstorm asked.

“Five four, why?” Robin asked.

“HALF AN INCH!!!!” Nightstorm snapped. “HALF AN INCH TALLER!!” Nightstorm squeaked.

“No need to get so worked up over it…!” Robin winced.

“Everyone’s taller than me except Mae….! I get looked down on like a kid…!!” Nightstorm groaned.

“Hey now,” Robin said, getting down to eye level. “That ain’t true!” Robin smiled.

Nightstorm frowned. “You’re proving my point.” Nightstorm grumbled. Nightstorm sighed, dragging her hands down her face. “Ugh…..! I don’t want to be seen as a kid…!!” Nightstorm sighed.

“I get that, but getting snappy at people over height doesn’t quite help your case.” Robin said.

“I know, but it just...Gets old after ten times.” Nightstorm grumbled.

“Just gotta tell people ya don’t like it is all.” Robin shrugged.

Nightstorm stumbled for words. “Buhduhbuh what do you THINK I do?!?” Nightstorm gawked.

“How do you tell them?” Robin asked, crossing his arms.

Nightstorm looked down, breaking eye contact and mumbling something. “I couldn’t hear that, would you mind repeating?” Robin asked gently.

“Snapping at them….” Nightstorm frowned, face heating up in embarrassment.

“And how do you think that makes them feel?” Robin asked.

“Not good…” Nightstorm frowned. Nightstorm shook her head. “Before snapping, I warn them to stop once or twice…!!” Nightstorm frowned.

“Do you?” Robin asked.

“Yes!!” Nightstorm pepped.

“Do you?” Robin repeated.

“Y...Yes…!” Nightstorm stuttered.

“Truly?” Robin asked.

“.........No……..I stay quiet about it….” Nightstorm said, ashamed.

“And how do you think they feel about you snapping at them out of the blue?” Robin asked.

“Besides, it’s never ‘good’ people!” Nightstorm objected.

“How do you think they feel about you snapping at them for no reason?” Robin repeated.

“........Not good….” Nightstorm mumbled. Nightstorm shook her head. “What is this, group therapy with Batman and Robin?!?” Nightstorm squeaked.

“No, not really, we just-” Robin started before getting cut off by a clunking sound. Nightstorm rushed to check it out.

“What is it?” Robin asked, peeking around Nightstorm. Nightstorm held up a tin can with a piece of paper attached to it.

Nightstorm plucked the paper off, reading over it. “A trail, a union, together tied. Come across me and you will find, you cannot change the course I'm on, without me you cannot travel on. What am I?” Nightstorm read.

“Huh….” Robin hummed.

“Railroad tracks.” Batman said.

“Why railroad tracks?” Robin asked.

“The old Gotham Railroad Tracks…!” Nightstorm and Batman said in unison.

“But why would Riddler go there?” Batman asked.

“Suddenly took an interest in trains or history?” Nightstorm shrugged.

“Why not go take a look?” Robin asked.

“Yeah, that would be our best bet.” Batman nodded.

“See ya there.” Nightstorm said, pulling out her grappling hook.

“Are you sure you don’t want a ride there?” Batman asked.

“Nah, no thanks. I prefer to swing; the wind feels nice on the face, despite the mask!” Nightstorm declined. Batman shrugged.

“Suit yourself.” Batman said, walking off.

(At the railroad tracks.)

“Another piece of paper…!” Nightstorm said, dropping down from the rooftops and snatching up the small piece of paper.

“What’s it say?” Robin asked.

“It says….” Nightstorm hummed, before gaining a confused expression.

“What is it?” Robin asked, confused.

“I sound like ‘wrap’, but start with the letter of a beverage. What am I?” Nightstorm read.

“Coffeerap?” Robin said, confused.

Nightstorm read it over again, eyes shrinking again as she registered. “Tea.” Nightstorm said, fear creeping into her tone.

“What?” Robin asked.

“Tea wrap?” Batman said, registering what it meant soon.

“It’s a trap!!!” Nightstorm said in a panic before everyone was tapped in some form of holding.

“How right you are, Nightstorm~!” A Voice chimed.

“Who’s there?!” Nightstorm called, looking around.

“That is indeed the question, my dear~!” The voice hummed.

“Nygma.” Batman scowled.

“Right you are, Batman~! But also not, seeing as Nygma is a shadow now, and The Riddler has taken front stage~!” The Riddler laughed.

“Wait...Nygma...Like...Edward Nygma?” Nightstorm asked.

“Ah! So you’ve heard of me~?” Riddler asked.

“Well, yeah, your puzzle games are really good! Even back home!” Nightstorm gawked.

“I’m glad to hear~!” Riddler laughed.

Nightstorm shook her head. “No matter, why are you stealing so much metal?!” Nightstorm demanded.

“Oh, Batman! You may have to replace your little songbird with this one~!” Riddler joked, patting Nightstorm on the head. “SHE asks all the important questions~!” Riddler smiled smugly.

“Don’t patronize me.” Nightstorm bit back. Riddler pulled back as though just bit.

“Charming little one, isn’t she?” Riddler sneered.

“I’m not little!!! Everyone keeps saying I’m little, but five foot three and a half is not little!!!” Nightstorm snapped.

“Oh! That little half inch is keeping you from the same height as the little Songbird~! How adorable~!” The Riddler taunted.

“I’ll bite!!! Don’t think I won’t!!!” Nightstorm threatened.

“Nightstorm, calm down. Threats won’t get us out of this.” Batman said.

“It makes me feel good!!” Nightstorm snapped.

“My my, Nightstorm~! Are you sure you aren’t a villain~? You fit THAT bill better~!” Riddler hummed.

“No! I’m NOTHING like you, coward!” Nightstorm growled.

“Nightstorm, CALM. DOWN.” Batman warned.

“If you were two more in number, you could have her be the dog of your team.” Riddler grimaced.

“Hey!!! I’m not-” Nightstorm started.

“CALM. DOWN.” Batman growled. Nightstorm immediately fell dead silent.

“Oh my! Seems someone hates getting people upset!” Riddler teased.

“Listen, Nygma-Riddler-whatever your name is now-We can get you the help you need.” Batman said.

“No.” Riddler started.

“Who needs help anyways? Too much effort.” Riddler and Nightstorm said in unison. Both were surprised.

“You too?” Riddler asked.

“I’m supposed to be the one with poor communication skills!” Nightstorm yelped.

Riddler shook his head. “We’re getting off track. Nightstorm, you and I haven’t ‘properly’ met before, so allow me to introduce myself~!” Riddler hummed. “I am the Riddler; one of Batman’s greatest-” Riddler started.

“And least common.” Batman added.

“-Adversaries.” Riddler finished, frowning.

“Wait, least common?” Nightstorm asked.

“He doesn’t do much, but when he does, they’re big things.” Batman explained.

“Oh! That Riddler!” Nightstorm gasped.

“Yes! How many Riddlers ARE there?!” Riddler asked.

“Let’s see, around….That depends, I can think of….Ten, off the top of my head right now-” Nightstorm started.

“Oooooh….Never mind!” Riddler scoffed.

“Okay…!” Nightstorm nodded.

“Anyways, I didn’t quite count on the Bat or songbird to follow you-I just wanted you here so that I could get the measure of you-see what you were like, you know?” Riddler asked.

“Wait, what?” Nightstorm asked, starstruck.

“Oh, yes! I wanted to get to know you! More than what some...News station or...Newspaper could bring me for information! Really, the best source is from the source itself!” The Riddler announced.

“That’s...The first time someone’s wanted to know more about me…!” Nightstorm gasped.

“Don’t fall for it. He’s trying to lull you into a false sense of security.” Batman warned.

“Gotcha.” Nightstorm said, shaking herself out of it.

“So, how about it, Nightstorm~? What are you made of~?” Riddler asked.

“Well…...Spunk, I guess….” Nightstorm stammered, not sure how to speak properly.

“Oh?” Riddler hummed, intrigued.

“Y-Yeah, I-I’m a pretty boring person…! Normal life-siblings, we help each other out-” Nightstorm started.

“Oh? Siblings? I’m Intrigued!” Riddler hummed.

“I, uh….Two..” Nightstorm said.

“Anything else of interest?” Riddler asked.

“N-Not really, like I said; I’m pretty dull and boring…!” Nightstorm said.

“Not to me, my dear~! You’re an unsolved riddle~! Those keep my brain ticking~!” Riddler smiled smugly.

“Huh….” Nightstorm gasped.

“That’s enough, Nygma.” Batman scowled.

The Riddler shrugged. “You’re right, Batman. Me and the others will be leaving now~! Those little restraints will unlock as soon as we’re out of range~!” Riddler said.

“Radius lock. Clever.” Batman frowned.

“Only the best from the cleverest~!” Riddler beamed, tipping his hat and walking away.

As soon as Riddler and his goons were gone, the locks broke and the team fell out, Nightstorm falling on her face.

“Are you okay?” Batman asked. Nightstorm gave a weak thumbs up.

“Nofing boken…!” Nightstorm mumbled through the floor.

“Well, that’s good…” Robin sighed. “But real question, why did you open up to him so easily?” Robin asked.

“I...Ugh….His demeanor got me….Besides, he seemed to actually listen…” Nightstorm groaned. “I know I shouldn’t have, but-” Nightstorm started.

“It’s alright. It was your first encounter.” Batman assured. Nightstorm broke eye contact, guilt bubbling in her stomach.

“Then...Why does it feel like I did a bad thing…?” Nightstorm asked.

“Because you’re a good person, Nightstorm. You don’t want to hurt anyone, so you just...Did as he asked, since he asked nicely.” Batman explained.

“I didn’t wanna upset anyone…” Nightstorm gulped.

“I know, but in that situation, you would have gotten a ‘bad’ ending out of it anyways.” Batman said. Nightstorm hugged herself, guilt bubbling in her stomach. “You couldn’t have done anything about it, you had no control over the situation.” Batman said.

“I….Don’t feel so good…” Nightstorm grimaced.

“Physically or mentally?” Robin asked carefully.

“Both, but not like I’m gonna throw up if that makes sense…?” Nightstorm whimpered. Batman nodded.

“Need a lift home?” Batman asked. Nightstorm nodded.

“Thanks…” Nightstorm said sheepishly.

“No trouble.” Batman said.

(On the ride home.)

“............” Nightstorm hugged her knees to her chest, groaning quietly.

“Are you okay?” Robin asked.

“Just feel guilty…” Nightstorm groaned.

“It’s okay, it was your first encounter with him; you weren’t prepared.” Batman assured.

“I still feel like I coulda held back better…” Nightstorm groaned.

“It’s okay, we’ll get him next time!” Robin assured. Nightstorm nodded tiredly.

“Hopefully…” Nightstorm grimaced.

(Later.)

Nightstorm walked inside after bidding Batman and Robin goodbye, locking the door behind her. “Gotta hurry before everyone gets home…” Nightstorm said, hobbling into her room to change into her normal clothes.

After she was done changing, Gianna plopped onto the couch, almost passing out instantly, the softness of the couch more appreciated than the typical cement.

“Gigi!” Mae called as the door was unlocked and swung open. No answer. “Gigi?” Mae called, walking inside. Mae walked into the living room, finding Gianna passed out on the couch, snuggling with the family dog, Fetch.

“Mae, didja find her?” Hunter called.

“Yeah, keep it down…!” Mae called back quietly.

Hunter walked in, finding his sister passed out on the couch. He laughed, walking over and covering her up with a blanket. “Let’s go, Mae, she hasn’t gotten a full night’s rest in ages it looks like.” Hunter whispered.

“Right…!” Mae nodded, hopping after Hunter.

(The next morning.)

“Morning sis!” Mae grinned, waving from in the kitchen. Gianna waved tiredly.

“Someone had mail for ya, sis…!” Hunter yawned, pushing an envelope riddled with question marks on it. Gianna picked it up, trying not to shake.

Gianna thanked them quietly, rushing to her room to open it. “River, T, time…?” Gianna said, confused. “Wait….Sea u soon….?” Gianna thought. “Maybe I should be more careful...He could show up at any moment…” Gianna worried. Gianna put the letter in a small box, sliding it back under her bed. “Best not to tell Mae or Hunter too...They shouldn’t get involved.” Gianna said.

“Sissy! Breakfast is ready!” Mae said, leaning into Gianna’s room.

“Oh! Coming!” Gianna said, getting up from her knees and hopping over to the dining room.

“What were you talking about, sissy?” Mae asked.

“Oh, nothing, nothing, just...Story ideas is all.” Gianna lied.

“Ooh! Sounds fun!” Mae beamed.

“Yeah….Fun…” Gianna sighed in relief. She wouldn’t tell Mae; she would get curious and try to tag along. No need for that. Maybe when she was older.

To be continued in chapter two!

#My Writing #The Riddler Batman Tas #Batman #Robin Batman Tas #Superhero Oc #My Oc #Nightstorm #My Ocs #Mae Crow #Gianna Crow #Hunter Crow #Talon #Reed #Ask To Tag

2 notes · View notes

ravenquote · 4 years

Text

OoC: Favorite Characters

I decided to focus on villains or anti-heroes, it’s hard picking just favorites in a general sense.

1. Harleen Quinzel A.K.A Harley Quin - DC Comic Universe I have been in love with this woman since September 1992 when she first aired in the Batman Animated series, Joker’s favor. Due to her brilliant creators of Paul Dini and Bruce Tim, led with the voice talents of Arleen Sorkin. She was born from her own raw desire to help people in her own best way possible, using her talents of understanding, reading and in many sense controlling people. Sadly, like Alice in wonderland, she fell into a realm of madness and uncertainty. She has been one of the most complex characters in animated history with large backstory and many turns and takes. Extremely popular on various forms and has made many appearances over the years even scoring some of her own comics and shows and now movies. When she was first created, she was merely a fill in and not meant to take and yet here she stands, a triumphant beauty whose overcome Abuse, trauma and degradation.

2. Azula - Avatar the last air bender animated television show + comics What can i say about Azula? In many retrospects she’s fierce, powerful, driven and just intelligent! I think a lot of people forget something pretty important about her: SHE WAS FOURTEEN! This young teenage, overthrew governments, taking whole cities and was the closest to killing the Avatar compared to anyone else. Not to mention her pure intelligence! People compare to playing a game of chess when it comes to moving people or controlling their actions. No, to this woman it was checkers. I truly believe if she didn’t become as over-confident as she did, the war would have ended with her taking the world. With the right nurturing, she would have become the most feared overlord the world would ever see.

3. Loghain Mac Tir - Dragon age book (The Stolen Throne by: David Gaider) and Dragon age Origins the Video game. Yeah, there’s a theme so far i am guessing you are seeing. I can’t help but appreciate sheer intelligence. Loghain is sort of obvious in the video games, it’s clear his intents. At the same time, there is far far more than what is merely on the surface with this man. An obvious villain, almost to the point of it being boring. Yet, why in the games are so many people hesitant and trusting of him? This man had proved himself, over and over, that he had his country in his heart and would do anything to protect it and keep it from the true monsters of the world. People. He was never shy about the routes he’d take, the lengths he’d go, he was brass, courageous, and deceptive. He called things out, forced people to seeing the bigger picture, he didn’t need to control or lie to people about things. He got what he wanted in the most unique ways possible, not his title, not his money, not his charisma but by being true in what had to be done.

4. Sylvanas Windrunner - Blizzard Entertainment Video games I don’t see her as a Villain, an Anti-hero, yes. Look, we all know Blizz can’t seem to understand women or know how to write them on a large scale. I seriously feel bad for both, Piera Coppola and Patty Mattson as they have to watch this poor woman get brutally torn to pieces. I will always, always have a soft spot for her and remember the days where in many respects was like Illidain, and (above) Loghain. A woman who saw the bigger picture and would sacrifice anything to save everything she cared for. I wont drag on for her, simply because i know the most people who are doing this and following are from the Blizzard franchise and i know we have all heard many many layers to this continued argument about this particular character. If ya wanna PM about it or rant at me, bring it. I’m an Alliance player at heart, but i only got into w.o.w because of this woman. Both sides are shit. *drops mic*

5. Aaravos - Dragon Prince, Netflix television animated show. Okay, seriously, if you haven’t seen the show yet: DO IT! Just as with this theme, INTELLIGENCE, INTELLIGENCE, INTELLIGENCE! Tactful, charming, knowledgeable, i mean...look at that face! He is hands down perfect. Sadly, we still know very little of him but goshdamnit! Love! Love! Love! I can not wait to know more of him and see more of him.

6. Maleficent - Fairy Tale story / Disney The jist of her, from stories and movies, is general: She was snubbed or insulted by the royal court and took her revenge on the child they were all celebrating. I’m sorry, but this has always been fantastic to me. What is more painful and hard to deal with then your own child being cursed? Claim petty if you want, but no, oh no my dear friend, this is a brilliant revenge. A normal person would blame the man in charge and curse him, but meh, whatever. Kings wont remember how they snubbed others, this is proven time and time again in many stories. Will this act ever be forgotten? Will the generations always remember not to snub a powerful faerie? You better believe it! She made a ever lasting mark, an impression that has lasted since the 13th century! Throughout the years no one has changed these facts: Maleficent was powerful, she was disrespected and she took her revenge onto a child. Normal stories like these over the years have changed both villains and heroes, or even circumstances. This classic has even seen the beautiful creation, directed by Robert Stromberg from a screenplay by Linda Woolverton, and still they honour the root of what was and with a focus on the villain and her origins. How many villains get this?

7. Narberal Gamma - Overlord Anime/ Manga series Who doesn’t love a maid? Not to mention a Battle maid. Narberal is...mm, i don’t even know how to express her. She’s just generally cool, powerful, intelligent, loyal and honest with everything around her, just a demeanor of a refined perfection. She’s enjoyable to watch. Another thing i enjoy, she’s not the main villain. The show itself has many “villains”, i say in such way because it’s never really clear or obvious what you can count as villain or hero in a lot of ways. Yes, some are obvious but even then in many cases showed within it’s all about circumstances, who you are following, why you are following them. I enjoy the not so cut and dry of “good and evil”. This character also helps continue that ploy, helping and yet also killing people.

8. Carmilla - Castlevania Netflix series I’m a huge vampire fan, been so since middle school. I’m not as quick whipped as i use to be about the lore, history and so on when it comes to many Vampires and their origins. With such said, damn she made me bring out the books again, especially because she was one of my favorites to read about. I mean, Lesbian vampire. Do i need to say more? For now, i’ll only focus on the more recent adaption of her. So, yeah theme? We get it, intelligence. The world truly is a chess board for her, however she does not expect people to just flip the board on her. God, Jaime Murray, thank you so much for that wtf moment cause you expressed her sheer just horror at watching everything fall around her with perfection. Throughout the points we see Carmilla we see her truly be the tact master, stirring the pot and also showing her prowess in form. There is also a lot of restraint i don’t think people will give her credit for. We see how she expresses her emotions in violence, but i also think we are seeing it in a very, very pulled back way. I look forward to seeing how she changes her circumstances and sets things back into her own order in the coming season.

9. Akasha - Book series: The Queen of the Damned by Anne rice and movie: The Queen of the damned. Ah yes, the books that helped start the joys of vampires and how could i not fall in love with someone toying into the very beginning and trying to draw into the beginnings of a creature known throughout the world and time. Why do i choose Akasha considering i already touched base on vampires? Simple, she will always deserve a spot on any favorite list of anything. She gave so little cares about anything and only wanted the world to die and feel her wrath. Not to mention Aaliyah played this part so beautifully well it deserves every recognition it can get. I know she doesn’t seem to quite fit with the rest, but this is partly why she is so low on the list.

10. Callisto - Xena television series Last but certainly not least, we can’t forgot about this one. Good? Bad? Surely just pure chaos! She does what she wants and cares little about the consequences. It’s been ages since i’ve last seen the show i will admit, so my bases on her is a bit rusty. However, i will always remember her out of the many other villainous people we meet in the Xena universe. Fun, witty, combatant, you never knew what she was really going to do. As soon as she popped into a episode, i would recall fondly sitting at the edge of my seat just wondering how or why she did the things she did. There is my list of favorites, i’m sure you can see the themes between them all as many of them have common traits, inspirations and personalities. Hope you all enjoyed! Tagged by: @olivia-lovecraft tagging: *boops* you!

#ooc #top favorite #top ten #villains #t.v. series #books #fairy tales #video games #history #vampires #comics

5 notes · View notes

wearevillaneve · 5 years

Text

All Winners. No Losers.

When Jodie Comer won the Emmy for Best Actress in a Drama, I didn’t have to go far to find someone disappointed the name called wasn’t Sandra Oh. All I had to do was turn my head and look at my my wife.

“Sandra should have won,” she grumbled.

I don’t entirely disagree with her. In some ways, playing Eve Polastri is a thankless role. Villanelle is self-assured, confident, versatile, cunning, resourceful, flamboyant, stylish, sexy as hell and absolutely lethal. She’s not your regular sort of role model, but being such a total bad-ass makes it hard for her not to be. It’s the juicier of the two parts just as Heath Ledger’s Joker totally shreds Christian Bale’s Batman.

Browse Tumblr long enough and for every one Eve blog, there’s three for Villanelle. Same thing with fan fics. Villanelle is nearly always depicted as the Alpha and poor widdle Eve as the Beta trailing along behind. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Emmy voters didn’t come to the same conclusion.

Nobody “deserves” to win an award. In fact, what these sort of awards are really best for is elevating an actor’s profile and their career. And of course, the money. Always the money.

Sandra has been nominated ten times and never won. Jodie was nominated once and took the trophy home to mom and dad. Is that fair? Is that right?

Yeah, it is. I think the Emmy’s got it right. Jodi Comer ruled in Season 2 of Killing Eve. Period.

If we’re going on performance and nothing but, Jodie demonstrated time and again she is a star on the rise. Think of Villanelle’s emotional breakdown in Amsterdam when Eve didn’t show up. Or the rapid-fire switching of accents and languages while Eve watched. Or the “I’m so bored” scene. I could go on, but you get the idea.

If we are honest, brutally honest, we have to admit there’s certain advantages built in for Jodie. She’s young. She’s hot. She’s sexy. She’s smart. She’s talented. She’s humble. She’s blonde. She’s white. All those things work in her favor.

Sandra is not blonde, not old, but not young either and she’s not white. Being hot, sexy, smart, talented and humble isn’t enough. For women of color it rarely is.

So while the playing field is not level and may never be, what should matter most is this: if things had turned out the other way, Sandra does not get there without Jodie and the reverse is equally true. The simple truth to the success of Killing Eve is Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Sally Woodward Gentile, Emerald Fennell and the rest of the brilliant minds behind the camera crafted a show with brilliant and fascinating characters and then cast Oh, Comer, and Fiona Shaw to breathe life into them.

I have no idea how long KE will run. My guess is maybe four seasons, but it all depends on how long Jodie Comer is contractually obligated to play Villanelle. When you pull off the trick she just did, Hollywood is going to come a’calling and as she’s circling a project with Ben Affleck and Matt Damon to be directed by Ridley Scott, she’s going to receive offers she can’t refuse.

She shouldn’t. It is impossible to recast another actress as Villanelle. Nobody would accept it and truth be told, I don’t believe Sandra Oh would either.

Maybe TMZ will report a rumor of strife on the Killing Eve set with Jodie becoming a pain-in-the-ass prima donna and Sandra grumbling she needs more money if she’s the star of the show. Blah, blah, blah. I’ll believe it when I see it. But I probably won’t because that would petty AF and nothing I’ve seen or read leads me to believe that’s the case.

I truly believe Sandra was just as thrilled as Jodie was when she won the Emmy. If Sandra can fake the fondness and and support she has demonstrated time and again for Jodie, that’s when she will deserve to win ALL the acting awards, and frankly I don’t think anybody’s that good. Not even Sandra Oh.

This is not Jodie winning and Sandra losing. That’s buying into this trap of pitting women against each other and we should know better and do better. Can’t they just celebrate and lift each other up? Can’t we put aside for a little while all this stuff about winners and losers and just be thankful we live in a time when these incredibly accomplished and brilliant actresses build something special together instead of tearing each other apart like some other shows have (looking at you, Sex and the City and Desperate Housewives).

Maybe next year Sandra will hoist the trophy and Jodie will give back the same sort of love she got from Sandra. I would be very happy to see that happen, but even if it doesn’t I don’t want to hear anything about who “deserved” to win. As Clint Eastwood once growled, “Deserves got nothing to do with it.”

It was Jodi’s time even when she thought it wasn’t and I’m cool with that. It made me happy on Sunday night and I’m still happy tonight.

These women Rock and I am will roll with them. All the way until we’re done.

#Killing Eve #2019 Emmy Award Winner Jodie Comer #Sandra Oh #phoebe waller bridge #Fiona Shaw

16 notes · View notes

dcarevu · 5 years

Text

Batman TAS: The Strange Secret of Bruce Wayne

“Sunshine. Clean air. I hate it.”

Episode: 37 Robin: Yes Writers: Judith Reeves-Stevens (teleplay), Garfield Reeves-Stevens (Teleplay), and David Wise (Story) Director: Frank Paur Animator: Akom Airdate: October 29, 1992 Grade: B

Whoa! Wait a minute! Didn’t we just talk about the episode Eternal Youth? And wasn’t that episode #29? Now we’re going to jump all the way up to #37? Did I miss something?

That was supposed to be an imitation of you. Not in a condescending way. Because yeah, we did jump ahead! Oh, don’t worry, we will be taking a look at every episode between Eternal Youth and Strange Secret, but we’ll be doing so in a “split timeline” fashion (term ripped from StephenVlogs/Zelda). I have been really behind with the posts for a while now because of the work I had in college. And I’ll keep getting further behind unless I do something. So today, we have jumped up to where I actually am with the episodes. This way I am caught up, and then I can go back and review the episodes I have missed when I have the spare time to do so. It’s as simple as that. And if you’re someone who would prefer not to read ahead, feel free to wait for me to catch up in the past timeline.

In the present timeline, we’re looking at Dr. Hugo Strange’s debut, as well as the first time we have seen some of Batman’s major villains work together. This episode is important, because it sets up possibilities for the future (ex Almost Got ‘im and Trial), but aside from that, it ends up being pretty inconsequential, and simply a fun episode with some laughs along the way. When we see the title and the title card, though, it is hard not to expect more. Char figured that this would be a deep episode about Batman’s past, and while we do go back in time a little bit through Bruce Wayne’s mind, it’s nothing that we haven’t seen before, and it’s incredibly short. Also, I don’t exactly know who that is on the title card. It looks like it is one of Strange’s men, but it’s also entirely possible that it is Bruce. It has virtually nothing to do with the episode, honestly, and because of that, it’s not one of my favorite title cards. Maybe this episode was much different in an earlier draft, and they had to water it down for kids. That wouldn’t shock me, this episode is a lot more cartoony than most. The main plot features a mind-reading device that leads its victims through personal, repressed memories, and then displays these thoughts as video onto a screen that Strange gets to look at. It also records the thoughts onto tape. Look, I’m willing to suspend my disbelief when it comes to invisibility (See No Evil), or even when it comes to transforming people into trees. This is a little silly. And this is following a pretty tense scene at the beginning, where a Gotham judge is desperately trying to buy one of these tapes back, which shows that she was the one who caused a major fire long ago as a child, and has kept it a secret ever since. She doesn’t have enough money to pay for the tape, so Strange’s goons don’t give it to her, and they tell her that she now owes even more (they also have a duplicate tape as backup, seen later. Evil bastards). She’s so desperate to get the tape, that when Batman swoops in to settle things, the tape happens to find its way onto a dangerous-looking metal beam, suspended above the water, and she crawls out to grab it (nearly falling). It may not be animated that well, but it makes for some good set-up. From here on, though, the episode receives a big tone shift.

After Dr. Hugo Strange reads Bruce’s mind, he discovers that Bruce is Batman. This is a major thing, no one so far in the show, villainous at least, has figured out who Batman is. Shouldn’t this be a super dramatic moment? But it’s really not. I question why Bruce didn’t simply look backwards to see what was showing on the screen or why he was so trusting to begin with, but even more so, I question how Strange deduced that Bruce is Batman through the footage shown. Yeah, we see the bat-signal and Batman’s glove, but this could be a simple metaphor or a desire to be Batman. It proves nothing, to me. But in the show’s logic, we must accept that this is enough to count, and now, armed with Bruce’s secret, Strange attempts to auction the tape to Joker, Penguin, and Two-Face. We get to see all four of these goobery characters interacting, and it is truly great. It’s what makes the episode so watchable. They have such strong personalities, and not once do they ever feel out of character. Even Penguin is a blast, only making one bird pun that I remember. And this bird pun is one that anyone would be likely to make, so it didn’t feel overly gimmicky. This is how to do Penguin right! As he sips his tea in the airplane as they are about to throw Strange out of it, I immediately realized that Batman in my Basement would not taint the character for me. Penguin, we have hope. Don’t screw it up. Two-Face being there wasn’t played seriously either, and this might bother some, but I was fine with it. It is sad to see Harvey stooping at such a low, but he’s a gangster now. It’s just how it is. Not every day for him is going to be that first episode with him all over again, y’know? And with him getting roasted by the Joker the way he did, I am totally open to having such a depressing character in such a casual episode. “Get out of my face, Clown.” “Which one?” Ouch, he walked right into that one.

The one major gripe that I actually have is the ending. I know I haven’t talked about it yet, but it has the same problem that I have with The Cape and Cowl Conspiracy where it is completely unbelievable. You’re telling me that not only does Bruce happen to have a perfect costume of himself that Dick can fit into, but also that Dick can do a 100% perfect Bruce Wayne impression? Get outta town! And then we got that exposition at the end, showing how Dick was able to appear so tall in Bruce’s clothes. I probably would have questioned it otherwise, but that could have been done more elegantly. Just show Dick stepping out of the stilts. We don’t need the “stilted” dialogue explaining it. I really don’t like when the show takes this route of Batman, or someone else, being disguised as someone else, because it always follows damn-near Scooby Doo-logic. Costumes aren’t that perfect. I just don’t buy it. It seems very “kidified", and like the writers simply had no idea how Batman would weasel out of this situation. If Loren Lester can actually do an impression of Kevin Conroy that well, I will eat my coffee cup.

I want this as a poster.

I’m sorry, but her hairline looks like it should belong to some middle-aged dude trying to be hip from the 70′s.

Seeing Batman walk along the top of the bridge was cool. Stealthy Batman is just as great to watch as brutal Batman.

But sometimes he’s both!

Sorry, but that judge was a lot thicker than that. Don’t skimp out.

Gordon chatting with Batman while appearing to be deep in thought, simply peering into the water was a nice touch.

Gordon witnesses Batman disappearing for once. It would be funny if from this point on, he thought that Batman always escaped via plane.

The large tombstones are cool, but this scene lacked the fluidity it required to be interesting.

The big reveal that Batman is Bruce Wayne. Ummm... Okay.

Looks kinda like Keaton Batman.

This face was really creepy. But apparently she started the fire on accident. Doesn’t really come across with a crazed look like that.

The animation didn’t destroy the episode or anything, but some of these characters have seen better days.

Like, I mean, it’s passable, but I’m not feeling the grotesqueness associated with Two-Face.

This was a rough shot. I’ve noticed that episodes tend to have trouble with shots featuring the Joker’s closed mouth.

Yikes. Look at. the henchman’s facial structure. What happened, dude?

I like the Joker’s popcorn-eating as Batman’s identity is about to be revealed.

And Hugo Strange rubbing his hands together with greed was delightfully silly. I also wonder how the rogues obtained so much money. I bet most of it is Penguin’s. Joker probably contributed the cents.

Got a nice screenshot of Penguin shooting the tape.

Nice badge.

Compare this to a similar scene in the Batman Beyond pilot. One has a much easier time climbing on a plane, given the suit.

Oh, Penguin. Thinking he’s so damn sophisticated as they drag a screaming man into the sky and threaten to toss him out the door. See, that would be absolutely barbaric, but the tea.

What a dreadful shot. Also, Strange’s voice actor (Ray Buktenica) knocks it out of the park with his pleas.

Once Gordon and Strange are gone, we see “Bruce” get a bit more of a smug expression that we don’t often see. This is actually Dick, and the change in expression I will praise. Still doesn’t excuse the overall scenario, though!

Char’s grade: A Next time: Heart of Steel (Part 1)

Full episode list here!

#dcau #dc animated universe #batman tas #the strange secret of bruce wayne #batman the animated series #btas #dr strange #dr hugo strange #hugo strange #batman #joker #two-tone #two face #twoface #penguin

3 notes · View notes

hellzyeahthewebwieldingavenger · 6 years

Link

Oh boy one of these again

“Even though both of these characters are awesome, fans can’t help but argue among themselves, so the question is simple: Who makes the better Spider-Man? Is it the new kid on the block who is winning new fans over left and right, or is it the classic Spidey that basically started it all?”

It’s Peter.

This isn’t even a debate.

One character is literally trying to be a replication of the other but throwing in some zigs where they zagged, whilst the other is the thing being replicated that also revolutionized comic books forever.

“As always, the answer to this question is: “it depends.” ”

Yes. It depends if you are a moronic clickbait author or not.

Do most Miles Morales fans even honestly argue that Miles is the best Spider-Man as opposed to just...great in his own way?

Like I’m pretty sure most Ben Reilly and Sam Wilson fans don’t try to honestly assert those guys are better than Peter or Steve.

“How do you even begin to measure something like this? ”

Who has had the biggest impact on the medium.

Who was most original.

Who has the most acclaimed stories.

Who has had the most comparatively unconvoluted narrative.

Who’s stories stick closest to the fundamental guiding ideas behind the core concept of Spider-Man and execute that the best.

Mystery solved.

20. MILES: BETTER ORIGIN

“The Peter Parker Spider-Man has an origin story that is downright iconic. There’s no denying that. However, if we’re being honest, then Miles Morales has a much better origin story. And it’s one that modern audiences will find a much easier time relating to.”

Hmm, a scientifically gifted teenager gets bitten by a super science spider and gains spider powers that he doesn’t commit to using altruistically for the wider community. Because of this he fails to intervene in a crime the results of which ultimately wind up killing a noble person he admired. From this he learned that his great powers should be used responsibily to help others and carried a burden of guilt around with him. o this end he dressed up in webbed spandex and became a crime fighter called Spider-Man.

Yeah...I can see how that is so much better and modern than Peter Parker’s origin...

This doesn’t even explain how or why the origin is better, it just says Peter’s origin is iconic but Miles is better and leaves it at that.

Surely if something is better than the iconic thing you’d have more to say about it.

“Miles, meanwhile, had to deal with his powers being stolen by an uncle (whom we saw briefly in Spider-Man: Homecoming) before Miles’ early exploits with Venom led to the loss of his mother.”

This isn’t part of his origin and therefore doesn’t belong in this section.

Moreover it’s asinine because it omits Peter’s early adventures to give the false impression Miles is better.

Let’s say Miles’ uncle stole his powers. Why is this somehow better than ‘My uncle is dead, I need to step up and replace him as the man of the house, also my aunt is chronically ill, I am cash strapped and I constantly get shit in both my identities’.

Call me crazy but wasn’t Spider-Man supposed to be ABOUT those normal life problems as opposed to the inherently fantastical problem of your magic science spider powers getting jacked?

Or your mother dying due to an ooze monster before she was literally resurrected like two years later negating all drama?

Even if his mother had remained dead, how does this make him better than Peter? His mother died. Wow. I’ve NEVER seen a superhero with a dead parent before. I’ve NEVER seen a female supporting character die in a superhero story before. Certainly not a Spider-man story. Certainly not a Spider-Man story that changed comic books forever before shallow repetitions like murdering the characters mother turned it into a mess of a cliché. A mess of a cliché that the same guy who did it reversed 2 years later.

“In this way, he feels a much keener guilt over the passing away of a family member than Peter Parker does”

**** please!

His mother came BACk to life two years later and it wasn’t like his ENTIRE motivation after she died was BUILT around his grief over her death.

Like Peter brings up Uncle Ben’s death so much that we needed to do a movie that SPECIFICALLY DOESN’T BRING IT UP!

And this isn’t even getting into how despite being a family member the best analogy for Rio within Peter’s story is Gwen NOT Uncle Ben.

And you cannot with a straight face tell any Spider-Man fan Gwen’s death was not AS keenly felt by Peter as Rio’s was for Miles.

Miles quit after Rio died and then an arc or two later after a time skip he was back in the saddle. Meanwhile literally 2 years worth of issues were devoted to depicting Peter’s grieiving of Gwen and then we also wouldn’t shut up about it for another 40 years!

“making him not only more motivated, but more sympathetic in the eyes of the readers.”

If Rio’s death made Miles more motivated than Peter...why did he literally quit being Spider-Man after she died?

This gets even dumber when you consider this article is drawing an analogy between Rio’s death and Uncle Ben.

RIO’s death motivated Miles to quit for A WHOLE YEAR!

Uncle Ben’s death motivated Peter to BE a superhero for *checks watch) 56 years and counting!

And what is this the tragedy Olympics? Miles deserves more sympathy because his mother died when he was fighting a villain than Peter does for when his father figure died due to someone he failed to stop?

At best BOTH things are equally tragic and worthy of sympathy.

At worst if you truly contextualize this, fuck no Miles doesn’t deserve more sympathy.

I’m not saying ‘screw him he deserved it’. I’m just saying of course Peter had it worse.

When Rio died that was the third major death in Miles’ life. His mother, his uncle and Ult Peter Parker.

Yeah, that’s 2 dead family members to Peter’s 1 circa Gwen’s death right?

Wrong. Peter lost his parents, his uncle which was his fault, George Stacy who was another father figure which he also felt guilty over and then also his girlfriend/practically his fiancé...which he also felt guilty over.

Then you’ve got the fact that Miles, whilst feeling guilty over Ult Peter’s death, didn’t actually know him personally. Peter knew all those people personally sans his parents, but they were still his parents.

And then he had to be the provider for May whilst having exactly zero emotional support from anyone other than her. Miles had Ganke through everything. Peter had jackshit and was also getting bullied and was also getting hated on by Jameson.

You can’t even say “Well Miles had it worse because he saw his mother die violently right in front of him.” Peter saw and CAUSED Gwen to die violently in front of him, he saw George Stacy die violently in front of him, he at least KNEW Uncle Ben died violenty and in his own home to boot.

And unlike Miles’ uncle or mother none of THOSE people came back to life!

19. PETER: CREATIVE USE OF POWERS

“Have you ever thought about how limited Peter Parker’s powers really are? No, seriously — he has spider-sense and super-strength, and he made himself some webs and that’s it”

-and, spider agility, and spider speed and you know wall-crawling the one thing his namesake, a spider, FAMOUSLY does!

“Seemingly every issue has him doing something new with his powers,”

Says someone who’s clearly not read much Spider-Man.

How the hell do you even begin to try and have him do something new in every issue across multiple monthly titles across 57 years my god!

18. MILES: COOLER COSTUME

“If you were trying to figure out what the most iconic comic book costume was, it may very well be Peter Parker’s Spider-Man costume. Those red and blue tights have inspired literally decades of comics fans, young and old. But we hate to break it to you: Miles Morales has the cooler costume.”

“The red and blue may be iconic, but it’s also difficult to translate into the real world, such as live action films.”

This is fucking moronic on four levels.

Level 1: It was a costume designed for a comic book which isn’t set in the real world or even in a live action medium so the point is fucking moot because the measure of a COMIC BOOK character’s costume is how well it works in a COMIC BOOK.

By this logic Batman’s costume sucks shit because it’s rarely translated well into live action and usually needed to be made all black.

By this logic ALL MANGA isn’t that great because none of it translates t the real world.

Level 2: If the thing is ICONIC then obviously is does effing work!

Level 3: Solid black with red patterning on top of it. Yes. I can see how this is very original and inherently better.

Level 4: The red and blue costume has literally been translated into film FOUR TIMES!

“Meanwhile, Miles’ black and red costume looks sleek and modern.”

Looking sleek and modern doesn’t counter ‘is difficult to translate to film’. Those are two separate things.

Moreover, it’s ‘modernity’ is afforded it by being again, mostly unoriginal.

Shit Spider-Man’s SECOND most iconic costume, which is also more iconic than Miles’, is even MORE sleek so does that make it more ‘modern’ too?

It’s the same nonsense as before, ‘it’s just better’. How and why!

“ It’s a perfect compromise between comic book sensibilities and real world aesthetics”

Which means it’s not as good in the medium it was designed for as another costume that was!

“and you can’t help but grin whenever you see it.”

That isn’t even a point, that’s barely even an individual opinion!

17. PETER: BETTER LOVE INTERESTS

“Sometimes, comparing Peter Parker and Miles Morales feels like comparing apples and oranges. ”

And reading this article comparing them feels like throwing up.

“That’s because there are some cool things that one hero has that the other doesn’t, meaning there’s no real comparison. ”

Okay like...first of all if the author actually believes that then what the fuck is the point of this list!

Second of all, the fact that they are comparing them means obviously they can be compared.

Thirdly the fact that they are literally both characters called Spider-Man, with spider powers, based in New York, who got their powers the same way, fight ostensibly the same villains and (allegedly) touch upon the same types of sub-genres and are both made by Marvel comics OBVIOUSLY MEANS THEY ARE COMPARABLE!

Like fuck dude, this isn’t like you are trying to compare Spider-Man to the Power Rangers!

“Peter Parker has had an epic romance with Mary Jane Watson, as well as dalliances with Felicia Hardy and Carlie Cooper.”

Really? You are going to list off a quick romantic history of Spider-Man and you mention MJ and Felicia and...Carlie Cooper.

A character not seen since 2014. A character who dated Spider-Man for like one year publishing time.

You will mention her but not, I dunno, Gwen effing Stacy?

16. MILES: MORE INFLUENTIAL

I’m face palming from just the title of this one.

“One reason that we think Miles Morales might be the better Spider-Man is because of how influential he is. And we’re not just talking about more and more fans discovering the character each year. A major bit of evidence is that his character highly influenced the insanely successful Spider-Man: Homecoming.”

Well I’m happy somebody is acknowledging Homecoming was basically a whitewashed Miles movie.

“An example of this is Peter’s friend in the movie, Ned Leeds. Longtime Spidey fans were surprised that he looked nothing like the Ned of the comics. That’s because his design and characterization was based on Miles’ friend, Ganke Lee. On top of that, we even see Miles’ uncle, Aaron Davis, played by Donald Glover. This gave many fans hope we’d see Miles Morales in the MCU!”

Just to be crystal clear here, this ‘article’ is asserting that Miles Morales, a character invented by Bendis and Pichelli less than 10 years ago, is more influential than the character that....literally every teenage super hero after 1962 was inspired by (including Miles himself)...who was created by one of the art Gods of all comics and the single most famous writer of comic books of all time.

And their ‘evidence’ for this was...one movie from last year...that he wasn’t even in...

15. PETER: FANTASTIC…FIVE?

There is nothing objectionable in this sans the fact that he joined the Future Foundation not the F4.

14. MILES: STEALTHY SPIDER

“We love Peter Parker’s abilities but if we’re being honest, they don’t always make a lot of sense. Detecting future danger and being super-strong is really neat, but it never exactly screamed “spider” to us.”

Spiders are very strong for their size. Hence ‘proportional strength of a spider’ as a commonly used phrase associated with the character.

The Spider Sense is more defencible as being ‘not a spider thing’, but there are still ways to explain it.

“It felt a bit like the writers were just making stuff up.”

...making stuff up is literally the definition of writing fiction...

“And if you’re going to make up some weird powers, we say “go big or go home.””

None of Peter’s powers sans his spider sense were even remotely weird if he was intended as a human spider.

“And that’s why we like Miles Morales’ cool stealth ability. His ability to blend into his surroundings creates some really fun stories, and adds a fun dose of Batman to the Spidey stories that we love.”

Not only is this dumb because being like another character is not a good thing (doesn’t it make you less unique), but worse it pretends like having stealth is something that’s even MORE insane for a spider than spider sense.

It’s not.

Spiders can camouflage into their surroundings like you know....shittons of animals people commonly know about.

13. PETER: AVENGERS MEMBER

Nothing that wrong here.

12. MILES: GALACTUS FIGHTER

“When fans argue about which characters are the best, there are plenty of different metrics. One of the biggest, though, is who the character has managed to fight. And if a hero is able to take on a villain well above their weight, it establishes just how serious they are.

So, how can you tell that Miles Morales is the best? He managed to take on Galactus. No, seriously — when Galactus threatened the universe, Miles Morales teamed up with resident big brain Reed Richards in order to get information and allies. While it was definitely a team effort, Miles should get credit for tackling a bigger foe than Peter Parker ever did.”

This is so fucked up it’s not even funny.

By this logic ANY TIME Peter contributed even a little to a team effort that ultimately led to beating someone it should count on his win record.

Okay then. In AvX he contributed to fighting the Phoenix, which is canonically MORE powerful than Galactus. He’s also contributed to fighting Galactus in Secret Wars. He contributed to fighting Onslaught who was approaching a Galactus level threat. He contributed towards defeating Scarlet Witch in House of M and restoring the 616 universe, Scarlet Witch also being even more powerful than Galactus in that story.

If you DIDN’T use this type of bullshit then Peter has taken on supremely more powerful foes than Miles.

Juggernaut, Hulk, Tri-Sentinel, Rhino. The entire X-Men.

Even the stuff that doesn’t make sense for either character put Peter ahead. Peter beat Firelord a Herald of Galactus, whilst Miles beat Blackheart, the son of Mephisto.

Let me remind you that Silver Surfer, also a Herald of Galactus, has beaten Mephisto himself.

Therefore Firelord is most likely put of Blackheart’s weight class.

11. PETER: CIA PARENTS

There is nothing incorrect in this but why is this a point in Peter’s favour? Spider-Man is supposed to be down to Earth so the more James Bond super spy craziness involved the more reductive it is.

Hell it doesn’t even make sense against Miles since Miles dad worked for SHIELD.

“We shouldn’t be surprised Peter is who he is when he had parents like this!”

Yeah or you know it could’ve been because of Uncle Ben as literally every version of Spider-Man spells out for us.

10. MILES: S.H.I.E.L.D. AGENT

“Just as you can judge a hero by who they fight, you can also judge them by who they fight alongside. When a character joins a team with a proud history and powerful members, it goes to show just how amazing that hero is. And this is why we love that Miles Morales is a member of S.H.I.E.L.D.

He was hand-picked as a hero with great potential and trained by the greatest secret agents on the planet and this is all the more impressive because he already has more training and experience at his young age than Peter had way back when.”

See what I said about about James Bond stuff in Spider-Man being a bad thing.

Also, if Miles is better because he fought alongside SHIELD, then by this logic Peter would be better because he was a member of the Avengers and FF...at the same time.

Moreover, whilst it’s true Miles has had more training than peter had, he hasn’t necessarily had as much experience.

And the point is moot if training and experience doesn’t translate into you being a better fighter, and at a comparable age, Peter definitely could’ve beaten Miles provided the writers didn’t cop out and have his Spider Sense not work so he can avoid Miles’ cheat code Venom blast.

9. PETER: CHEATING HIS DEMISE

“One time, Kraven filled Spider-Man with tranquilizer darts and left him to pass away, going so far as to bury him. Peter emerged alive, but he later “passed away” after fighting Morlun, only to be reborn with weird new spider-powers. It turns out you just can’t keep him down!”

Okay, but he also died in Secret Wars, Infinity Gauntlet and Infinity War (the comic, not the movie, or it might’ve been Infinity Crusade).

8. MILES: BETTER SUPPORTING CAST

Oooooooooooooooooooooh boy can’t wait for this!

“Sure, given enough time, you may be able to rattle off a few additional names when it comes to Peter Parker’s supporting cats.”

This is such BS because Felicia alone is a more memorable supporting cat than any of the felines in Miles’ series.

LEARN TO SPELL CHECK ON THE ARTICLE YOU’VE BEEN PAID FOR!

“But when pressed, most people will simply say “Aunt May and Mary Jane.””

No, most people would say Aunt May, Mary Jane, Harry Osborn, J. Jonah Jameson, Gwen Stacy and possibly now Ned Leeds due to Homecoming.

And that’s just for Joe Average on the street. Actual comic book fans would say all those people and also probably Black Cat, Betty Brant, Joe Robertson, Liz Allan, Flash Thompson and possibly Norman Osborn and Eddie Brock (the latter being a mistake due to adaptations but still, they’d mention him).

“And while we’re calling them a “supporting cast,” they often don’t play a major role in the story.”

Almost like they exist to...SUPPORT the main story isn’t it? Wheras being a MAJOR character would be different.

This is also a BS metric to use for Spider-Man. Spider-Man’s core concept involves him being a normal guy in his civilian life who is also a super hero, with those two sides impacting upon one another.

Since most stories are mostly about the hero stuff it means that to get the supporting cast involved in major stories would make them involved in the super hero stuff and therefore make Peter’s civilian life NOT normal.

“With Miles, he gets to have his spider-cake and eat it, too. He has a major supporting friend in the form of Ganke Lee, who provides insight into both the personal and the superhero life of Miles. And Miles has an extended supporting cast as part of all those team-ups: Avengers, Ultimates — if Miles needs help, some A-listers are just a dial away!”

First off, by this logic Mary Jane from like 1984 and Aunt May from 2001 would count as equally as Ganke.

Second of all Ganke is literally the ONLY supporting cast the folks with the most cursory knowledge of Miles could name. Even under CBR’s nonsensical logic of Aunt May and Mj being the ONLY people anyone would know from Peter’s cast, that’s still two vs. one. The author brought up a point against Peter and then failed to demonstrate how Miles is better in comparison, probably because he wasn’t.

Thirdly the Avengers and the Ultimates are NOT supporting cast members, they are team mates!

Fourthly, by that logic Peter again has the advantage since the Avengers, F4, the (Netflix) Defenders, the X-Men and literally everyone he ever teamed up with in Marvel Team up count as his supporting cast!

7. PETER: DEALING WITH THE DEVIL

Forget what I said earlier. Now THIS really should be good!

“We’re going to keep saying this over and over again, but the best way to judge a hero is to look at the villains they have gone up against. And in the case of Peter Parker, he’s actually survived the greatest villain in all of history in the devil himself or, as they call him in Marvel Comics, Mephisto.”

That is such insane broken and desperate logic I almost want to love this article for trying.

Peter is better than Miles BECAUSE of the worst Spider-man story of all time.

Wow. That’s beautifully bonkers.

But seriously, this is...just holy shit.

Peter did survive an encounter with Mephisto...but Mephisto was never trying to kill him. They never exchanged blows at all.

Saying Peter survived Mephisto is like saying Miles survived God Emperor Doom in Secret Wars, therefore he’s more awesome.

Then you have the fact that Mephisto really, really, really isn’t even the greatest villain in the marvel universe. I hate to invoke Quesada, but he isn’t even the ACTUAL devil. He’s not even the ACTUAL guy who rebelled against God and was damned to be the ruler of Hell. He’s one of the 4 rulers of Hell alongside Satan, Satannish and Lucifer, who is the ACTUAL Biblical devil. In fact one of them (Satannish) is himself the SON of the Dread Dormammu and supposed to be weaker than his old man IIRC.

DAFQ are you the greatest villain when the DAD of one of your peers is a bigger deal than you are?

And if we ignore morality for a moment and look at raw power, shittons of antagonists are much more powerful and dangerous than Mephisto or else have been capable at times of owning his red ass.

Thanos. Firelord. Hela. Galactus. Annihilus. Dark Phoenix. Arguably Apocalypse and Onslaught.

“Longtime fans don’t like to remember this because it is a highly controversial story. ”

Longtime fans? It was only 10 years ago!

And the sequel was only 8 years ago!

And it got referenced explicitely THIS YEAR!

“Spider-Man basically gets Mephisto to save Aunt May’s life, but Mephisto’s price is that he will rewrite reality so that Peter and Mary Jane never loved each other. ”

Holy shit that isn’t even an accurate summation of the most infamous story ever.

Mephisto rewrites their marriage, not their love. And Spidey gets him to do nothing, it was an offer Peter accepted.

“Is it the clumsiest reset button ever? Sure. But Peter still survived encountering the ultimate evil.”

He survived in so far as he didn’t die. He objectively lost though.

6. MILES: PLAYING WELL WITH OTHERS

“One of the weirder qualities of Peter Parker is how much he likes to keep to himself. ”

No one in the real world does that. And it isn’t like he has a rich friendship group or anything.

“Sure, he’s been on many teams (and that many more team-ups), but at the end of the day, he prefers to work alone.”

Except when he’s in Marvel Team up or with Black Cat.

“This isn’t the case for Miles Morales, which is why the young man has better allies than Peter does.”

Preferring to be a loner vs a team player doesn’t make you better or worse it’s just different. But even if it didn’t Peter has allies too. Most of Miles allies are also Peter’s and Peter has even more.

“Who are we talking about? Miles is both friends and allies with characters like Ms. Marvel, Nova, Amadeus Cho,”

And Peter is both friends and allies with characters like Captain Marvel (both female ones), the ORIGINAL more powerful Nova, and Bruce Banner, a.k.a. the original and holy fuck immeasurably stronger Hulk.

He’s also friends with Thor, Iron Man, Captain America, Wolverine and most of the X-Men and Avengers and F4.

“He seemed to figure out something early on that eluded Peter Parker for many years: that it’s good to have a support system in place, especially as a superhero!”

And yet, Peter survivied on his own for years like a bad ass.

5. PETER: THE MAN, THE MYTH

“While the comic played coy and never confirmed this, it is strongly hinted that Peter Parker is part of centuries of “spider totems” that are chosen as champions. That means the spider that bit him was not powered by radiation: it had powers it wanted to give Peter, and only later passed away due to radiation. You may or may not believe it, but Peter quite likely has centuries of lineage fueling his powers!”

Again this isn’t necessarily a good thing.

4. MILES: BETTER VILLAINS

BWAHAHAHAHAHA...oh they’re serious...

Do you want to know the secret to nostalgia? Your brain only remembers the good parts of whatever you’re thinking about. Your buddy that loves ’80s music? Trust us when we say that he managed to brain wipe some pretty awful stuff — it’s a lot like that with Peter Parker’s rogues gallery.

Sure, there are some cool villains like Venom, Green Goblin, and Doctor Octopus, but there are also some real lame ones like the Shocker.

a) The author can go suck a dick, Shocker is awesome.

b) Yeah SOME cool villains like those 3 guys...and Carnage...and Kingpin...and Hobgoblin...and Rhino...and Scorpion...and Electro...and Vulture....and basically everyone under the Ditko run

c) By this logic Miles villains suck ass too because he’s fought many lame ones too

“Compared to this, Miles Morales has fewer villains, but that means fewer duds as well. ”

Super hero rogue’s galleries are not marked negatively.

It’s one thing if you have few good villains and most of the time you fight lame ones.

It’s entirely different if you have a lot of good villains, and way more disposable rarely seen lame ones. The lame ones don’t make the whole thing suck shit.

This is particularly asinine since most of Miles villains are either Peter’s villains or else the Ultimate versions of them.

What is worse is that by this logic BATMAN has a worse rogue’s gallery than Miles Morales!

“We’ll take cool villains like the resurrected Aaron Davis over Peter Parker’s C-list baddies any day!”

So would I probably but would you take him over Venom, Doc Ock or any of the Osborns!

3. PETER: ALIEN FIGHTER

I don’t even understand how this is a point in Peter’s favour

2. MILES: SPIDER-BITE

“As we said earlier, it often felt weird that Spider-Man wasn’t more like, well, a spider.”

He is like one the author is just a jackass.

“Which is one of the reasons we appreciate Miles Morales so much. In addition to having a cooler backstory”

A near identical backstory made cooler because the author said so...

“and a more realistic costume, ”

Which is bad because in a visual medium like comics where you aren’t bound by the constraints of reality (hence spandex looks awesome) ‘realism’ in your costume designs is not a good thing.

“Miles has more realistic spider-powers as well, including his “bite.””

...his what?

“With a simple touch, Miles Morales is able to incapacitate villains. Now, Spidey being Spidey, he still has to engage in some wild fisticuffs on more than one occasion, but it’s pretty cool to see that he can take down major bad guys with a spider-bite instead of just fists powered by “radioactive blood.””

Wow.

Lets unpack this.

First of all the author is such a dumbass they don’t even realize Miles’ Venom blast (not named because the author is a hack) is not a representation of a spider bite, but of a specific ability some species of spiders possess wherein they can paralyze foes with bio-electricity.

This is one of THE most well known things about Miles.

Second of all if this was analogous to a spider bite wouldn’t it i dunno involve his fucking TEETH!

Third of all this is Miles’ worst power. It sucks the drama out of action sequences because it’s an auto-win button which means he wins too easily or looks like a moron when he doesn’t just bust it out.

1. PETER: STOPPING THE UNSTOPPABLE

Again, there is nothing wrong in this, but like...how does this prove Peter is better.

This article made me ill

#spider-man #Miles Morales #Peter Parker #CBR #comic book resources #Ganke Lee #Rio Morales #SHIELD #Ultimate Spider-Man #SPider-Man: Homecoming

26 notes · View notes

thebackloggamer · 6 years

Text

Marvel’s Spider-Man

I figure I start most of my blogs with this sentiment but I really can’t help it. After all, I like to write about things that I like. That said...

Wow I love this game. Wow. This is, without a doubt, the best Spider-Man game ever made, and one of the best in the action adventure genre as a whole. And with a great story to boot!

There are three aspects that I want to talk about for this game: movement, combat and story. Spoiler: all three are excellent.

Movement

Coming from Insomniac Games, I sort of expected the traversal be great. I never played Sunset Overdrive but I heard awesome things about how good movement was in that game. I also remember playing the likes of Spider-Man: Web of Shadows for the Wii and Ultimate Spider-Man for the Game Cube. Both are open world games where Spidey’s main mode of transportation, web swinging, felt fairly good. So I figured, yeah, the foundation and all the ingredients are there. We should be in for a good treat.

This game though, it kicks things up a few notches. I honestly don’t how to put it into words. Web swinging in this game feels SO good. It takes a little bit of learning at first, but once mastered, you can zip through roof tops and along buildings with so much ease and quickness. Like Spidey himself truly would.

Traversing the huge open world of the island of Manhattan is incredibly fun. So much so that I almost never wanted to fast travel, which is pretty fun in itself as you see Spider-Man taking the subway and sometimes interacting with other NYC citizens. I sometimes wanted to fast travel only to see these cute interactions, but it was never a necessity. I never cared about saving time because I was never bored of swinging around the city.

There are basically three main of moves to use for traversal. First, there’s your typical, momentum-based-pendulum-trajectory web swinging. This is what you’ll be doing the majority of the time to move from point A to point B and it feels great. Nay, perfect. It truly feels perfect. The senses of momentum and speed make doing this so much fun. Web swinging is realistic in the sense that you can’t just do it anywhere, there must be a nearby, higher point where the web can attach to in order for Spidey to be able to swing. This serves to give you a great sense of place within the world and makes it that much more believable.

At any point along a swing, you can let go of the web to jump off of it. Depending on the point you let go, you’ll be shot straight forward, upward, or anywhere in between. It feels great when you know when to let go in order to make traversal more efficient for your specific destination. Chaining web swings together to get to where you want to go as quick as possible is just a ton of fun.

The second move available for traversal is a web zip that pulls Spidey straight forward. This is very useful when moving horizontally to get sort of a speed boost. You can’t do many of these in succession so the idea is that you alternate it with the regular web swing. In particular, this move becomes a necessity when there are no higher points around you for the web to attach to for a swing.

The last and final traversal tool is another style of web zip. This one, however, attaches to any point in range and pulls Spidey towards it in an instant, regardless of direction. There’s a targeting system as well that highlights these points as you traverse. These points can be the top of a sign, a space that Spider-Man can quickly squeeze through, a building’s roof corner, etc. Pretty much anywhere. What’s important though, is not where this can happen, but the fact that, thanks to the auto targeting system, it can happen at any moment, mid flight. Also, just after landing from one of these web zips, Spidey can jump right away and continue moving forward while gaining some speed.

So, with these three moves, Spider-Man has all the tools he needs to traverse Manhattan quickly, with style and having a ton of fun while doing it. The traversal then, becomes a sort of rhythm that alternates between swings and both types of zips. It is truly a thing of beauty because, it not only feels great, but it also looks awesome thanks to the incredible job that the animators did for this game.

There’s also crawling and running up and along the sides of buildings which, while not as exciting as the previous three moves, can also be chained together in the “traversal rhythm” to produce something truly exceptional. They all come together into what is, in my opinion, one the most fun movement systems in a video game to date.

Combat

The combat is also a highlight in this game. There are punch (or kick, depending on the situation), jump and dodge buttons. It is clearly Arkham-inspired but with a host of Spider-Man inspired twists that make it have its own identity. The combat system in this game is far more dynamic and fantastic that anything you’d see in an Arkham game. There’s a great emphasis on air combat and using the environment and gadgets.

On the ground, Spider-Man plays a lot like Batman. You punch dudes until some dude, by trying to hit you, alerts the Spider Sense, prompting you to dodge, rinse and repeat. You need to be careful about different types of enemies though, as some are immune to certain things. Some guys hold shields, for example, and are only vulnerable by slipping to their back and hitting them there; some others are big brutes that will take some webbing before they can be taken down by hitting them (more on the gadgets later).

The environment is also ripe with opportunities to help mess up your foes. Spidey can pick up stuff like barrels, manhole covers and cement bags that are lying around, swing them with a web rope, and throw them at some dudes. The dudes themselves, once incapacitated, can also be swung around with webbing and thrown at other dudes. You can also take the weapons (bats, rifles, bazookas, and the like) from said dudes hands and throw them back at them. Oh, and if you’re close to a wall, Spidey can quickly jump and stick to it to then spring back with a punch! It’s all incredibly fun.

When fighting groups of enemies, you’re encouraged to lift them off the ground whenever you can with a well placed uppercut. Once in the air, enemies can be comboed, thrown away, smacked back down to the floor or brought back up for more punishing. This is not endless though, as Spidey will lose altitude gradually until he’s back on the ground.

Spider-Man also has many gadgets which have been implemented in an awesome way. There are web bullets, web bombs, web mines, impact webs and even a flying spider that shoots lasers to the thugs. Just thinking about it while writing this brings a smile to my face. These gadgets can be upgraded individually by spending tokens that you earn as you progress through the game.

Oh! And there are even stealth sections which also feel great. There are few things better in life than being Spider-Man sneaking around and dispatching thugs without them even noticing it. Simple pleasures.

Anyway, the combat system is also a home run. It’s so much fun. It can also get pretty difficult at times when the game throws many enemies of multiple types and weapons at you in a single group. It all adds to the excitement and fun. Another point that I like is just how true to Spider-Man the combat feels. It’s all just punches and kicks and gadgets and throwing people and stuff around. But it’s all so fluid and acrobatic and dynamic and well animated. It truly looks like this is how Spider-Man would fight.

Story

This is one aspect of the game that caught me by surprise. Honestly, I think this game’s story rivals that of any of the movies and, in some aspects, maybe even surpasses them. In that sense, I feel like, not counting the comics, of which I’m no expert, this is one of the finest Spider-Man stories ever told. The campaign in this game is exciting, emotional and cool. It brings together familiar elements of the Spider-Man ethos, but also is not afraid of shaking things up a bit. The characters, both new (to me!) and old, are charming, engaging and I ended up caring about them and what they go through. Both villains and good guys. I don’t want to say anything more as I don’t want to spoil anything. Just go ahead and play the game.

What else can I say? Well, actually, I can still say much. I can talk about how good the score is (I’m actually listening to it right now as I write this), or the collectibles, or the suits, or some of the side quests. But I think by now I’ve gotten my point across. This game is great, a masterpiece even. I think that any fan of Spider-Man or video games in general should try it out.

#spiderman #ps4 #insomniac games #spider-man #marvel's spider-man #10/10 masterpiece

2 notes · View notes

pellicano-sanguino · 6 years

Text

Random thoughts while watching... OSK Revue?

I finally saw my first OSK Revue show (Dracula, 2017), so thought I'd write about it. This is not a proper review, just a bunch of random thoughts. I will be making a lot of comparisons to Takarazuka in this, and please understand that I do not mean to imply that OSK is just a zuka copycat, I simply wanted to compare the two and see what they have in common and what not (also, all opinions are about this production and these actresses only, I'd need to see more shows to form a proper, better educated opinion on OSK's style as a whole.).

First impression was a surprise at how small the production is. I knew OSK isn't as big as zuka, but still, the theater's stage was very small and there were only about ten actresses, many of them pulling several roles, I think. I felt like I was watching a Bow Hall show cut in half both by stage length and actress numbers. Having a small number of actresses causes there to be some slower, quieter scenes, where a character monologues for a while so that everyone else has time to do the costume change.

Even so, it still felt very similar to zuka. Despite the small stage, they do dance, including a post-show minirevue that includes the main otokoyakus dancing in pretty, sparkly tailcoats and a duet dance with the main leads. The makeup is similar but there's some small differences that I'm not expert enough to point out (don't know anything about makeup). There are some stylistic differences in zuka makeup too, so it felt like I was watching a sixth zuka troupe and this was their troupe's personal style.

Minirevue dancing (and look, some parade feathers. Small feathers but feathers none the less.)

Otokoyaku still sing like otokoyaku and musumeyakus sound just like zuka musumes. I liked the leading otokoyaku's voice, it was pleasant to listen. Though she has to do a lot of angry angsting throughtout the musical, which is occasionally bad for her voice, making it sound like she has a bit of a sore throat. The songs were ok, nothing particularly memorable or catchy. A lot of the music is rather simple, like piano music and such.

I admit, when I was putting the disk in the DVD player, I was chanting in my head ”Please follow the book at least barely, please don't be weird and rewrite the story wildly.” Well, no such luck, this isn't a book faithful adaptation. Which unfortunately leads to me not having a clue what the hell is going on most of Act 1. But I am happy that it's not a comedy or a super weird adaptation.

I have to say that seeing a completely serious take on a vampire musical is a breath of fresh air and something I wish zuka could do. Don't get me wrong, I love the lighthearted vampire shows like Seal of Roses (which maybe didn't aim for lighthearted but kinda accidentally became one). Zuka always makes the vampire stories, well... kinda weird (I've already ranted about the randomness, plot holes and inconsistent vampire lore in my Random Thoughts While Watching Zuka #4). I appreciate them thinking outside the box and surprising me instead of recycling the most generic vampire story plots and tropes, but as a vampire lover I would die for vampire show that actually takes itself seriously. I suppose the Poe Family show is a serious take on the subject (no comedic parts or weird story elements), but that is probably thanks to the source material. Zuka can do cool&dark, they've done Elisabeth, so if they wanted they could make truly awesome vampire shows.

While I said that this is a serious take on a vampire story, there's still a short comedic song number in the beginning of Act 1, where a bunch of reporters try to interview Dracula after his arrival at London, only to have him scream NO COMMENTS at them.

This show uses sound and screen effects a lot. Most of the time they make sense (like hearing the sound of a train in the station) but there are moments where I hear a random noise or see strange images projected on the screens and go ”What the hell was that?”

There are only three big roles in this show: Dracula, Mina and Jonathan Harker. There's also this one lady in black who I suspect to be the spirit of Dracula's dead wife, who he grieves and longs for all the time. So yeah, the beginning of Act 2 reveals to us that this show has taken inspiration from Coppola's Dracula and lifts the vampire's origin from the movie. He was a warlord in medieval times (which means he's dressed in armor and has a sword YES me likey) and somehow a false letter was brought to his wife claiming that he had fallen in battle, which led to her committing suicide. When human Drac got home to discover his wife dead, he was devastated and broken, that is, until he hears that the church refuses to bury his wife because suiciders are sinners who go to hell. There's a literal DUN DUN DUUUUN sound effect as the count builds up rage, then curses God and allows the forces of evil to corrupt his body in order to revenge. He then proceeds to kill all of the priests/monks/whatever the church folks were supposed to be.

This slaughter of innocent unarmed humans would be brutal and super dramatic, but the fight choreography leaves... much to improve. Yeah, zuka battle choreos can look like they're from the 60's Batman too, with punches that miss by a mile, but here... the stabs are so lazy it looks like the poor victims are literally walking into his sword.

If Heaven won't accept

my suicided wife

I'll follow her to Hell!

(...and lick her knife.)

Not gonna lie, this is something I haven't seen zuka do. Sure, they've implied licking things, but it's always done quite swiftly and * elegantly * and not, well, like this. Tongue out and all, literally licking the knife prop.

I was curious to see if the kisses are still fake or not, since OSK is free to have their own traditions and don't have to follow rules set by Hankyu. Also, I keep hearing rumors that OSK is supposedly more daring than zuka when it comes to love scenes. Not in this show, at least. The romantic scenes are very chaste and more cute than sexy (also, the blood drinking scene, while definitely romanticized and very nice&dramatic, not any hotter than the blood drinking scenes in zuka). And the kisses are very much fake. Oh well, the actresses are spared of messing up their lipstick.

Speaking of messing up lipstick, I know that stain is supposed to be blood but it looks like a group of amorous ladies gave the count several sloppy kisses.

So, my guess for the plot is that Dracula comes to London in search for the woman who is the reincarnation of his wife. To lure women for him to see, he puts up... a fashion show or something? Dresses are on display, including dead wife's wedding dress. Which Mina gets to wear, and Dracula is immediately convinced she's the incarnation and for the rest of the musical never calls Mina by her real name, just by the wife's name. Which is... Elisabeth. I don't remember what the wife's name was in Coppola's movie, but still, the dramatic way Dracula pronounces this name does make it sound like it was lifted from another musical.

In Act 2 Jonathan, on his way to rescue his girlfriend from the vampire's castle, meets an annoying little kid. And yeah, just like in zuka, there are no child actors in OSK, children are played by adult women using cutesy kiddie voice and being super genki. But then the kid finds the knife that Elisabeth used to suicide herself and turns to face the audience while holding it, and I was like ”Great. The annoying kid has turned into a creepy kid.” If the child had turned out to be a vampire and in team Drac all along, that would have been an awesome plot twist. But instead he's actually an angel or something like that, providing Jonathan with the weapon that can kill the vampire.

Dracula has a bunch of vampiric minions at his castle, not just the three brides. I have to ask, what is it with vampire shows having one main vampire who behaves normally and then having a bunch of background vampires/minions who speak/sing like they're high as a kite and lumber around dancing artsy inteeeerpretive dances? It's... weird. Why are some vampires normal and some complete fruitbats?

This Dracula must be the angstiest version of the character I've ever seen. There's occasionally great moments where he's charismatic, seductive or in rage mode, but the majority of time he is either silently depressed or actively whining (even many of his angry scenes come out as more whiny than aggressive). It's a very dialogue heavy show and because of the language barrier and free adapting of the story, I have no idea what his angsty dialogues are about. But whatever he says, he actually manages to win Mina's sympathy and they dance together. Even if they kiss, I still think Mina's feelings are more pity and less sincere romantic interest. Also, I should point out that I have nothing against depressed, angsty, reluctant vampires in general, it's just that I don't usually associate that kind of behavior with Dracula (depression and angst is more sir Francis Varney's thing.). Dracula is cold, ruthless, cunning and irredeemably evil, not some emotional lovelorn wreck.

I have said this before and will say again: Dracula does not aishiteiru.

Jonathan makes an attempt to save Mina but doesn't get to kill the count. Which is good because while the Jonathan of the book would definitely want and be able to fight the count, this musical portrayed the character as a cute and awkward softie nerd (I approve, not all male heroes need to be tough guys) and avoiding getting his hands wet with blood was a good move. Poor guy would be traumatized for life, even if it would be to save his girlfriend, he's just not a killer. Instead, Dracula decides to let the lovers go free and suicides himself, like he usually does in adaptations where they make him have a romance with Mina.

You know how in zuka there's the tradition that in the end the dead characters make an appearance dressed in white, to sing and prance around in an afterlife epilogue. Well, not in this show, but there is something kinda similar. In the ending scene the spirit of Elisabeth appears behind the dying count and poses dramatically with him, spreading her cape like white bat wings, taking him with her to afterlife. I think it looks cool.

To end this, let's talk about the blood drinking scene. In all vampire stories, these are the most important scenes, in my opinion. Blood drinking is what vampires do, it's their trademark thing, and if you chicken out of showing it or handle it lazily, then why the hell are you making a vampire story in the first place. You don't make Phantom of the Opera adaptation and fail to have the unmasking scene be the most dramatic and memorable scene, and similarly, you don't make a vampire story and fail to deliver the blood drinking scenes properly. Yes, I have weirdly strong opinions about this, deal with it.

Very early in Act 1 we see Dracula suffer from malnutrition, his hair turning gray and his knees failing, making him slump to the ground, very visibly suffering. For emergency he empties a small vial of blood that doesn't seem to make him get any better. And it is this moment when Jonathan decides to visit him for the first time for work-related reasons (no idea what his profession is in this story. In the fashion industry?). So, we have a thirsty vampire and a nice, cute bloodbag in the same room all alone.

Me: Drink him!

Dracula: Nope. I'd rather suffer. :)

What the hell? In the book he totally noms Jonathan. Is this because he's a male? This Dracula afraid to drink from someone who has icky boy blood? Oh well, he gets better later anyway, so I assume he gets some blood off-stage. But still, it was very confusing to see a starving vampire not take advantage of an opportunity of some easy blood.

Well, later Dracula is introduced to Mina and immediately decides ”This is the One.” And I cheer him on.

Me: Drink her!

Dracula: No. Now is not a good time. :)

Me: Damnit! DRINK SOMEBODY!!!

We have to wait all the way to the end of Act 1, but finally, we get a genuine on-screen blood drinking scene. Just as important as the moment of blood drinking itself is what leads up to it. In this musical it's Jonathan piecing together all the clues and finally getting Dracula's real identity (in a rather nerdy monologue of stuff like ”...Dracul means Dragon, and the A at the end makes it Son of the Dragon... wasn't there a warlord named like that in Romania hundreds of years ago...”).

Nerdsplaining time!

Terrified with his discovery he tries to save Mina, who Dracula has just kidnapped, spilling the beans for her as well. The revelation of Dracula's vampiric nature scares the two humans and there's plenty of dialogue that goes over my horizon, but I do get that the thing that makes Dracula snap is when Mina confesses to loving Jonathan.

The jealous vampire then starts to torture Jonathan by... some kind of Darth Vader mind-choking magic. Well, I suppose it's choking, because Jonathan holds his hands around his throat as if struggling against invisible fingers, but the sound effect doesn't suggest choking at all. It actually sounds much more gruesome and painful, a nasty ripping sound, as if the count is telekineticly tearing the poor man limb from limb and simultaneously flaying him alive. Eww, it's a gross sound effect.

Mina obviously can't idly just watch as her boyfriend is painfully tortured to death while she has the power to put an end to it. To save Jonathan, she loudly exclaims that she doesn't love him. And the count, being a little bit of an idiot here, buys it. Strangely, Jonathan seems to buy it too, crying Mina's name in disbelief. The torture ends (thank goodness), and to make sure no harm comes to Jonathan, Mina tells Dracula that if you're really a vampire and if it's blood you want, you can have mine!

Just let me gather this bothersome veil...

...and Behold! Vampire bait.

She dramaticly pulls the veil of the wedding dress on one shoulder and reveals her neck. I love this. And so does Dracula. This is the one moment where his eyes actually light up with passion and while he attempts to stay cool, you can see his chest rise as his breathing gets faster with excitement. Darn right, count. Blood offered by free will is the best stuff there is. And it was about time you finally drank someone.

It's always interesting when humans offer their blood to the vampire out of free will, because there's usually good and complex reasons behind it, and this is no exception. Mina doesn't offer her blood out of sympathy or under the influence of vampiric hypnosis or even being seduced by the pretty blood drinker. It's offered by free will but it's very much not concensual. The offer of blood is the only way she can distract the vampire long enough to let Jonathan escape and get help. By playing along with the count's delusions about Mina being the reincarnation of his wife, she is cleverly buying time, manipulating him. Only, unfortunate for these two, there is no van Helsing or any other member of the book's league of merry vampirehunting men in this show for Jonathan to run to, so all he can do is to follow them to the castle and attempt a lone rescue mission (which fails).

Frankly, the one who eventually defeats Dracula (kinda) is Mina, who manages to win the count's sympathy (making him learn the good old ”if you really love someone, you'll want what's best for them and let them go instead of selfishly trying to force them to stay with you”). And this blood drinking scene is the first time we see that she is aware of the power she has over the vampire. Maybe in the end she didn't exactly intend to make him commit suicide, just trying to make him let them go, but old Drac was living a horribly depressed and angsty unlife anyway, so it doesn't surprise me that he decided to end it. That's why the (kinda). Mina has great influence over Dracula but I do think his decision to die a final death seems to be not a result of manipulation but a genuine decision. Though he still technically makes her do it, by forcibly placing the knife in her hands and then grabbing her wrists, stabbing himself, making her involuntarily deal the killing blow. Kinda dick move (Mina is quite horrified of this, understandably), but at least I'm happy Mina doesn't kill herself too in this one (yes, I'm still angry at that ending in 2011 Wao Youka's Dracula. The count kills himself so Mina can go back to being human and back to Jonathan. And then the dumb woman makes the count's sacrifice completely pointless by throwing away the life he attempted to save.) Dracula ends his unlife but Mina and Jonathan return to the world of the living, where they belong.

Final random thought: Knightly warlord Dracula looks a bit like Lancelot’s long lost, dangerously unhinged brother. (it’s the wig and the silver armor with blue details. The actresses are very different.)

#osk revue #dracula #random thoughts while watching osk

16 notes · View notes

solitaryenigma · 6 years

Text

Tag Game

Tagged by @astraxh thank you btw I feel honored. I’ll do both tag games bc I was tagged in it

1-20 Questions

Answer 20 and tag 20 people you want to know better

Name: Nate

Nicknames: Umm Nate

Gender: Male

Orientation: Straight

Nationality: Italian/Irish

Faith/Religion: meh

Hobbies: Anime, Video Games, Comics, Dirty Things

Pets: My family has pets, I don’t personally have any

Favorite Color(s): Gray, Blue, Green

Favorite Holiday: Halloween

Books: Scott Pilgrim!!, various Manga

Movies: Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World, Animated Batman Movies, Anime Movies like Ghost in The Shell, Akira, Summer Wars, and Your Name, also the Rocky movies they’re awesome

Tv shows: Naruto, FLCL, Soul Eater, My Hero Academia, and way too many others so besides anime, Teen Titans (just Teen Titans not that GO nonsense) Avatar the Last Air Bender, Steven Universe, Freaks and Geeks, Archer, Rick and Morty

Music: A large verity mostly angsty stuff like MCR and AFI, but specifically Breaking Benjamin, Paramore, Linkin Park, Green Day, Queen, and Simple Plan

Coffee, Tea or Hot Chocolate: Hot Chocolate but only in the winter obviously

Favorite meme: Why the fuck you lyin’, the Y Tho memes, the bad renaissance art with captions, it’s over 9000, and fucking Skyrim memes especially ones with cats as khajiit hahaha

I want to live long enough to: Be influential even if it’s just in the lives of my friends or my future children, I want to make a mark on the world and be remembered

Weird Obsessions: Taking really long showers idk if that’s weird but its something I love, Japanese Onsens (public baths) I went to a few during my study abroad to Japan and they are magical, making others feel good I think that’s becoming weird and less common in today's world

Random Fact: I never poop with a shirt on

Goals for 2018: GET MY SHIT TOGETHER!!

Get to know me tag

Rules: Answer 30 questions then tag 20 blogs you’d like to know better

Nickname: Nate

Gender: Male

Zodiac: Sun Sign: Cancer Moon Sign: Leo

Height: like 5′2

Age: 23 I know I’m old

Time: as in like rn its 10:43 pm

Favorite Bands/Solo Artists: See above

Song stuck in my head: Okay it’s either Only by nicki minaj or Basket Case by Green Day nothing else

Last movie I saw: Solo

Last thing I googled: How to spell nicki minaj hahaha

Other blogs: just this one for my own enjoyment

Do I get asks: No I wish I guess I’m not cool enough haha

Why I chose my username: Oooh so Solitary Enigma is the username I use for everything not just bc I think it’s cool but bc in HS I saw that as who I was. I guess today I still kinda do but its the idea that I am a v complex contradictory and unique human being I was mostly alone and I enjoyed my solidarity, but you can also have solidarity in a group so it could be a group of unique and perplexing individuals. So yeah there’s a lot of overthinking that went into that name hahaha

Following: Any random person’s blog that tickles my fancy one way or another, some friends I actually know but not many of the people I know use tumblr

Average amount of sleep: When I was in school like almost none, but now that it’s summer waaaay too much

Lucky number: 4 not sure why maybe bc its nice and rounded

What am I wearing: What is this phone sex!!? (that’s a Scott Pilgrim reference) but umm I wish I could say something hot but I’m in my pajamas pants with a white T-shirt on.. my boxer briefs are red is that sexy?

Dream job: I’ve come to realize that I want to create things and entertain people, what that actually means idk, maybe I’ll learn to draw or animate, or write stories, maybe act or do film making I’m not sure yet??

Dream trip: Ohh man lots of places I HAVE to go back to Japan, but also, Vegas, California, Toronto, Italy, Rome, just everywhere

Favorite food: uhh Pizza, Japanese Crepes

Play an instrument: I played cello when I was in middle school I sucked and my teacher hated me hahaha, I’d love to learn Bass Guitar and the Ocarina

Favorite song: Oh man I love Everlong by the Foo Fighters, no clue why it’s just soo mystical

Play(ed) any sport: I tried out for a bunch of track and field stuff in HS and blew at all of it so I just worked out a lot and got pretty ripped but then I went to college and had no time to work out so that’s gone, I like Basketball and Football but as I said above I’m like 5′2 so that wasn’t going anywhere

Hair color: Just dark brown, I never dyed it or anything I know I’m boring sorry

Eye color: Brown again sorry boring hahaha

Describe yourself as an aesthetic: Oh gosh ummm idk how about that feeling of a cool fan on a hot summer day when you’ve been working hard and you just get that amazing breeze. Is that an aesthetic hahaha I have no idea

Random fact: I have no clue how this website works my friend made me make one like a million years ago and I got into it bc of boobs and anime so she unfollowed me bc I posted too many boobs and anime hahaha that jerk

I tag: @alexjj1522 @majessticc @sugjesstive @eternal-adventure @radiomaru @h8rsbrunch @harrietsugarcookie @danaswanswan @suffragettequeen @mobpsycho100 @kurousagi744 @tampax-pearl

Don’t feel obligated or that I called you out I’m just following the game rules, then again that’s not 40 people so I guess I’m also breaking the game rules.. welp have fun!! and thanks for reading if you got this far you are truly a treasure

#tag game #thanks for tagging

7 notes · View notes

extraguynews · 6 years

Text

Wellp! E3 has come and gone and I am feeling the crash. Hard. Sometimes it feels like I wait all year for this event to come along and tell me how long I can expect to wait some more. And wait I do! I wait so good. I huddle in the darkness with the other nerds. We draw fan art and listen to gaming podcasts and start blogs. We remember the teachings of E3 and keep faith that the nintendos it told us about in the long long ago will come to us from the video place! We believe and we wait and we pour sacrifices of blood and mountain dew into an old Commodor 64 that we call "Father"... And so! In that collective spirit of anticipatory agony, here's the list of things from E3 that I am exceptionally pumped about! Fallout 76: As you will learn rather quickly throughout this list I am a bit of a sucker for anything even vaguely MMO-ish. It's a sickness that began in high school with EverQuest and yes I am taking medication for it. Anyway, Running around an open-world wasteland, killing nuclear monstrosities with my buddies? I mean, that's where I thought I would be by 2018 anyway. Sign me up. Elder Scrolls 6: Oh bethesda. You old Honeydripper you. So coy. So Flirty. All it took was one glistening flyover video of a nondestript fantasy land that could be rural New Jersey for all we know, and the entire gaming community is nervously shifting their trapper-keepers over their boners. Topping Skyrim will be no mean feat, but I'm pumped to see how they try. Anthem: This one looks like Destiny and Borderlands making out in a James Cameron Movie. Yes. Yep. Mmmhm. Cyberpunk 2077: Here's what we know so far about the much-anticipated new property from CD Projekt Red, Aka the studio that has repeatedly blown our minds to smithereens with The Witcher franchise: It's Cyberpunk It's 2077 It's an open world, First Person RPG with stealth/hacking elements and my sexy cyber-cop character can have a sick undercut and a robot eye and it's all I've ever wanted in a video game. Sounds pretty amazing to me but it wont be coming out until FOREVER so, if anyone wants to join me, i’ve found a fairly comfy cave in Yellowstone where I plan to hibernate until the release. See you there! Bring salmon. Destiny 2 - Forsaken: Ok. I know what you are thinking. Why the fuck am I still even PLAYING Destiny, let alone getting excited about another expansion when I've been burned 6 out of 7 times before. Well the simple truth is, I have no fucking idea. There’s something so immensely cool about the world, the gunplay and co-op space-opera sentiment of Destiny 2 that I just can’t stay away. Does the game somehow do a terrible job of telling stories within what seems to be an infinitely compelling world? Yes. Does it have next to no respect for the time, hopes, and dreams of it’s player base? You bet. Does it have a seemingly zero foot view of what it’s game could, should and hopefully someday will be? You betcha. But does it also send my pupils agape, weekend after weekend, as I delve, guns blazing into the heart of an epic space fantasy with my best online buddies, only to emerge, sweaty, victorious and heavy with cosmic treasures untold? That’s a big, fat-ass, yes. I know I should leave. I know she’s bad for me. But what can I say? We don’t get to choose who we love. Plus I get a poncho in this one so… fuck you? Spider-Man: Insomniac has spent years building what it hopes will be the Batman: Arkham Asylum of Spider-Man games. Which is great because, if anyone needs a good Batman: Arkham Asyluming it's Spider-Man... I promise this sentence makes sense. See, in the long history of people trying to make Spider-Man into a video game, nobody has ever really done a good Job. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 came close with some very dope web-swinging mechanics, but ultimately, the franchise has been seemingly snakebit from even the earliest attempts. The studio that brought us Ratchet and Clank, Resistance and Spyro the Dragon aims to end all of that with this open-world adventure game that promises cool gadgets, unlockable suits, and the best web-slinging to date. It is an independent IP, has nothing to do with any movie franchise and this one has my full support. I am officially overhyped for this one and I don’t care who knows it! Metro Exodus: Never played a Metro game but the graphics look slick as hell and there is a big land-bat thingy, so yeah! I can chuck some bullets into you, land-bat thingy. Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice: Samurai with a skeleton hand? Cool combat with parries and zombie powers? From Software? Yes. Obviously. Last of Us 2: The Last of Us is one of the most poignant, terrifying and truly moving video games I have ever played and I have been waiting for the follow up from the second I finished the first game. They took their time with this one and I can’t wait to see what's next for Joel and Ellie. Pokemon Let’s Go Pikachu and Eevee: 35. The answer is 35-years-old. Don’t judge. And that’s it! Everything that is not one of these games can go ahead and suck silence for the next 3 to 17 months. And when I emerge, blinking and dehydrated, from my self-imposed exile, I will have all of the games that I’ve ever wanted to play ever, and everything will be good and peaceful for the rest of all time. Unless, of course, they decide to do this E3 thing again next year, but that seems highly unlikely. I mean they wouldn’t. Would they? Oh god…

#playstation #xbox one #nintendo #pokemon #pokemon lets go #cyberpunk #fallout76 #destiny 2 #destiny 2 forsaken #metro exodus #last of us 2 #sekiro shadows die twice #spiderman #anthem #the elder scrolls

1 note · View note

jinkies-its-a-writer · 6 years

Text

Mud and Daisies || Bruce Wayne

Pairing: Pre-Batman!Bruce Wayne x Reader

Word Count: 2,415

Warnings: Enough fluff to make you smile :)

Prompt: Based on this - (Eventually)

Listen While You Read: Lava

Notes: Part 2 to Dirt and Roses

“This is the most amazing lemonade I have EVER tasted.” You rubbed your lips together, the sweetness of the ice-cold drink clearing your head and quenching your thirst on the spot. “Mmm… Man, that is good.”

Bruce grinned through his cup as he tilted his head back to drain the contents of his own glass. “Alfred, she’s right. This is some magnificent lemonade.”

“Thank you, Ms. (y/l/n), Master Bruce.” The butler poured you each another glass.

“I could drink this for the rest of my life. Thank you, Alfred.” You turned to the man, hoping he realized how sincere you were.

“You’re welcome Ms. (y/l/n). It is my pleasure.” The older man returned your smile. Then it slowly faded from his lips as he held out his wrist to check his watch. “I apologize, Master Bruce, but I believe it is time for your meeting.”

Bruce’s expression soured quickly, an abrupt change from the flirting he had been doing a minute ago. “Ah… Thank you. Have a car pulled around.”

The butler departed, but not before letting you know that it was a pleasure to meet you.

“Thank you for the lemonade, Bruce… And the second break.” Your sun-kissed skin glowed in the brilliant daylight as you grinned at the young man before you.

Bruce couldn’t recall ever being this reluctant to attend a meeting. Sure, they weren’t his favorite things in the world, but he had never had an actual reason not to attend before. He tried his best to wipe the disappointment from his features. “Thank you for sharing a glass of lemonade with me.”

“That wasn’t difficult, it’s still the best lemonade I’ve tasted in my entire life. I honestly don’t see why you would want to share it with anyone.”

That seemed to bring a spark of happiness back into his eyes. “Well, (y/n), you’re not just anyone.” He turned and entered the car before you had a chance to respond, and all you could do was watch the license plate as it disappeared down the driveway.

You sighed before realizing you still held the crystal glass in your grasp. You are such an idiot (y/n)…

You slowly climbed the front steps of Wayne Manor, hesitating before knocking softly on one of the large doors. It momentarily swung open, Alfred standing behind it with a polite smile.

“I’m really sorry about this, I forgot I still had the glass in my hand…”

“Come in, Ms. (y/l/n).” He held his hand out for the glass.

You passed it to him, then gripped your hands together. Your nerves were completely wack from everything that had occurred today.

“Thank you.”

You tried to maintain eye contact with the man, but you had never been in a place like this before and your eyes were wandering absolutely everywhere. “Uh, you’re welcome. I’m sorry to have caused so much trouble.”

Alfred shook his head. “I apologize, I meant to thank you for Master Bruce.”

Your eyes snapped back to the butler with the mention of Bruce. “What?”

“It has been a long time since he has been happy and to see him smile again is truly a magnificent sight that I thought I may never see again.” The tiniest glimmer in the old man’s eyes led you to believe he was telling the truth, and that made you feel a whole handful of emotions at once.

Mainly you were confused. How could someone so… so… you, make someone who could have anything they could dream of wanting, happy? That didn’t make any sense. Then there was some happiness. You made him happy? Well, he made you happy too… even if it was in a flustered ‘I am making a total fool out of myself’ sort of way. And there was some sadness. Had he really been so unhappy before today? For as long as Alfred made it sound? You had never met him before today so you had no idea what he was like before you talked to him, but for someone to be devoid of happiness for so long… the thought of it broke your heart. All of these flooded over you in a tsunami of emotion, all because of what the butler had said.

You stared, dumbfounded, at the older man for a few seconds before realizing you should probably say something.

“He makes me happy too.” The whole world seemed to stand still when you spoke those words. Everything was frozen in time. In that moment of silence.

“How would you like to join Master Bruce for lunch tomorrow?” You could tell the man was feeling a little more than mischievous.

“I would love to, but are you sure? I mean I don’t want to bother him or anything.”

“I’m certain. How would noon work for you, Ms. (y/l/n)?” He looked so casual, practically setting you up on a date. A date with a billionaire.

“Okay, yeah. That sounds good.”

“Brilliant.”

“Well, I should get back to work… Thanks for everything, Alfred.” You smiled, if a little nervously, and waved before exiting the humongous house.

“You are most welcome, Ms. (y/l/n).” The large door shut behind you, pushing you back into the reality that you still had a couple of hours before you were free to leave for the day. You mentally prepared to have the events of the past half hour on repeat for the rest of your day. Or the rest of your life. You are so in over your head.

Today you wore a watch, which you had checked every five minutes for the past hour. The closer it got to noon, the more wildly your mind ran in every other direction except towards your job. You and Mrs. Evans were working on the daisies today, near the east side of the manor.

“Lass, you’re stressing me out.” Your friend, Mrs. Evans, had been trying to get you to calm down for the past hour. “You’re going to have lunch with a nice young man in half an hour and that’s it. You have lunch with me every day and you ain’t never been this nervous ‘bout eating near me before.”

“Yeah, but you’re my friend, Mrs. Evans. I like Bruce. I like him more than I’ve ever liked anyone before and it’s just got me on edge a little is all.” You stood up to move your equipment to the right a little before bending back down and resuming your work.

“A little? You could sharpen an ax on your nerves today, missy.” She chuckled, taking a breather to grab her water bottle.

“When I spoke to Alfred yesterday, he practically said he thinks Bruce likes me. Nobody has ever like liked me before. I have absolutely no idea what I’m supposed to do. I have absolutely zero experience in the romance department. Zilch, nadda, nothing!” You pulled your glove down to glance at your watch again. 11:33.

“And - another thing! He’s so handsome! I doubt he’s ever met a girl who hasn’t swooned over him. I don’t want him to think I like him just because he’s got money and he’s hot.”

“Thanks… I think?”

He did it again. He had walked up behind you exactly when you said the most embarrassing thing you could have said.

“Ah, hi… Bruce…!?” You honestly couldn’t believe that this was how you were going to start off your lunch. The same way every single thing you did yesterday had gone.

He rubbed the back of his neck, apparently taking the awkward situation a little bit more smoothly than you. “I was wondering if I could help... Alfred’s still putting the finishing touches on our lunch, and I was getting tired of waiting.”

“Uh. Okay.” You tried to get your brain to move again. He wanted to help. Help with what? What were you doing a second ago? Embarrassing yourself… Um… your job. Yeah, you were pulling weeds. Okay, he wants to help pull weeds. Simple enough to teach. Okay. You got this.

“Here, use this so you don’t get your clothes dirty.” You got up to hand him your kneeling pad, but he waved it away.

“Okay, um, first things first. Take these so you can protect your hands.” You went to remove your gloves and pass them to him, but again he waved them away.

“No thanks.” He almost had a sort of pride in his voice like he was trying to prove something to you.

“Are you sure? Your hands are going to end up caked in dirt.” You weren’t quite sure what he was up to.

“Positive.”

“Fine then,” you pulled your gloves off completely and stuck them with the rest of your tools, “I can play this game too.” You grabbed the kneeling pad and placed it beside the gloves. You stretched out after having been kneeling already for a couple of hours previously, cracking your knuckles.

If he was surprised by your actions, you couldn’t tell.

“It’s on.” After a moment, his smirk faded into a confused frown. “Wait. I have no idea what we’re doing.”

“Pulling weeds?”

“Yeah, I got that, but I’ve never really…”

“It’s fine, I’ll teach you.” You plastered the first confident smile you had been in possession of around him on your face. Not everyone pulls weeds in their lifetime, and you didn’t want him to feel bad about it.

You got down on your hands and knees, motioning for him to do the same.

“Okay, so there are a few different types of weeds in here with the daises. You pointed to the different weeds. “This kind right here,” you grabbed ahold of a taller, thicker weed, “it’s extra stubborn so you really have to use your muscles.” You let go of the bigger weed and grabbed a smaller one. “And this type, it breaks off easily, so occasionally you’ll be lucky and be able to pull the whole thing out at once, but more often than not you’re going to have to dig it up roots and all while avoiding hurting the daisies.”

You looked back to him and he seemed to be following along pretty well.

“There’s a bit of clover and some wild grasses and stuff but those are quick and easy. Got it?”

He nodded, that little bit of pride still sticking to his features. “Yep.”

“If you have a question about anything just ask.” You smiled back at him. “Sometimes a random weed sneaks its way into the mix… Oh, and you can put the weeds you pull in this bucket, and when it fills up I’ll dump it into the barrel.”

“Aye aye, captain.”

You laughed a small laugh, feeling surprisingly more comfortable around him now than you had yesterday. That didn’t mean your mind wasn’t still reeling though. The moist coolness from the dirt soaked into the palm you were resting your body weight on. The smoothness of it always calming. You other hand removing intruding plants and placing them in the bucket beside you.

“Do you like flowers?” Such a stupid question, but you were slightly curious. You worked in his flowerbeds for a living for crying out loud, but that didn’t mean that he actually liked them. There was an equal chance that they were just for show.

“I don’t know.”

You hummed slightly at his response.

“I’ve never really thought about it before, but I think I’m starting to.”

Suddenly he fell backward, dirt spraying everywhere, most specifically all over both of your faces.

You couldn’t help but crack up at the sight, soil in his hair, his clothes grass stained and dirty.

He sat back up, and this time he was the one feeling embarrassed.

You reached up with the hand that was covered in the dark substance, “You’ve got a bit of dirt right here.” sliding your finger down his cheek you smirked at him, giving him a taste of his own medicine.

“Oh, really?” He dragged his finger down your nose. “Well so do you.”

His eyes diverted from you, fixing on something you couldn’t see he got up and ran to something a few feet away.

With a start, you remembered there being a wheelbarrow nearby full of soil that was going to be used for some of the surrounding flower beds.

“Oh, no you don’t!” You took off after him, but he had already beaten you to the treasure. The soil inside had gotten damp recently, and instead of plain old dirt the wheelbarrow was full of mud.

“Jackpot.” The boy had a devilish grin spread across his face.

You froze in your tracks. How were you supposed to get any ammo? He had the whole thing to himself. Unless… You decided to brave it, rushing towards the pile of mud.

*Smack*

A goopy spot of brown guk landed smack dab in the middle of your stomach. You met the eyes of the offender, but you couldn’t quite read what he was thinking. Was he concerned he had gone too far? He definitely didn’t look like he wanted to give up yet, a glop of muck in his hand ready to be launched.

You continued forward a look of pure determination hardened on your face. Another blob gloshed into your shoulder, but you continued onwards, reaching the pile of glooshy gold. You sunk your hand into the mix, pulling up a large glob of ick and hurled it back at him, catching him right where his heart would be. He faked being shot, calling out to the light, and saying not to forget him. To go on without him.

You sent another blob of nasty towards him, again in the chest. He crawled his way towards the barrow, you peppering his back with gross sploshes of mud as he made his way towards you. Slowly he pulled himself up and started flinging mud at you again. You grabbed some and rubbed it into his hair, and he returned the favor.

He took off sprinting again, you following behind. Both of your laughs echoing through the air. He continued to the font of the property where he abruptly jumped into the fountain, splashing you furiously. You followed suit, trying to aim for the face. Out of nowhere, he managed to tackle you and you both fell into the water, completely soaked from head to toe. You were both laughing so hard that you just laid there in the water, breathing heavy and grinning like idiots.

#bruce wayne #bruce wayne x reader #alfred pennyworth #mud and daisies #jinkies-its-a-writer #batman #batman x reader #batman fanfiction #bruce #alfred #dc #dc fanfiction #dc reader insert #bruce reader insert #bruce wayne reader insert #batman reader insert #reader inser #fanfiction #bruce wayne fanfiction

17 notes · View notes

bluboothalassophile · 7 years

Note

ah blu, your Fathers fafic is awesome!!! oh please blu, if possible, continue :) it's really cool constantine/raven as father & daughter, and damn, why they can't understand that raven is not like trigon :X

Hello,

I don’t know why DC doesn’t see all the wonderful potential they have with Raven. She’s a wonderful character, and she’d be a good bridge for magic and non magic characters. Now if only DC would see her potential instead of leaving her on Titans only. -.-

As to your request, more than happy to continue trying that out! Hope you don’t mind some Bruce & Jay too! =)

Dads,Not By Blood, But By Everything Important…

It was simple, a simple task.

Now he just had to accomplish it without her decimating thepark. Easy, he could do this, he could do this, he just had to… let go.

“Alright, love, now we’re just going down the walk way,alright,” he said. He wanted to smoke, but he wouldn’t.

“I got this,” the ten year old stated confidently.

“Uh-huh, where’s your break?” he demanded.

“Here,” she squeezed the handle breaks on the bicycle then.

“Good,” he nodded.

“Let go,” she sighed.

“Rae, you stop at the tree, see that big tree, stop rightthere,” he ordered.

“I got this daddy,” she promised.

“I’m sure you do,” he lied smoothly. She bit her lip andpushed her foot on the peddle, he slowly released it as his girl wobbled forher first few strokes. Raven caught her balance, and he watched as she smoothedout. He jogged after her hurrying to keep up as he stared at Raven on herpurple bike with her purple helmet, knee pads, elbow pads, and wrist guards.

There she went, his baby girl.

Fuck!

He caught up to her at the tree.

“That was awesome!” Raven exclaimed.

“Good, now let’s go up the hill,” he said helping her turnaround. Raven had another wobbly start, but she was doing pretty good giventhat she had never ridden and there were no training wheels.

Then she wobbled, there was a crash, he ran when there wasthe scream.

~~~*~*~*~~~

Bruce had Jason with him today. They were walking throughthe gates for the stadium. Jason was acting very nervous and skittish, stickingclose to him. But the kid was interested in everything going on. He took thatas a good sign.

He had only had Jason for about a month and he had learnedin that time that Jason wasn’t a fan of crowds, and had other hidden secretsand issues. He was also not the most trusting of children, and watched everyonebut Alfred with a look of pure suspicion.

So today, in the hopes of showing the boy not everyone wasout to use him.

“Ready Jason?” he asked as they walked to their seats.

“I’ve never been to a ballgame Mr. Wayne,” Jason saidnervously.

“It’s Bruce, you’re my ward now,” he reminded the boy.

“Right…” Jason drawled. Bruce softened in exasperation.

They made it to their seats and sat, near the foul ballsection, because that was the baseball experience.

Three chilidogs and two ice creams later Jason was acomplete fan of baseball cheer for the Knights with glee. Bruce chuckled at Jason’senthusiasm about the game, demanding more information about the pitches, thechange ups, and the positions around mouthfuls.

“Oh! B! It’s a foul!” Jason shouted.

Bruce looked barely in time to see it before there was askull numbing thwack on his eye which had him falling backwards in his seat,over the edge to the other row.

“I got it!” Jason shouted.

~~~*~*~*~~~

Raven sat in an ice cream shop munching on a hot fudgesundae with her calf covered in a big bandage for her road rash. Constantinewas sitting right beside her as he ate a strawberry sundae.

“Is that what it’s like being human? Getting hurt?” sheasked as she took another bite. The tears had long since dried up.

“Not always. You do get hurt, but that’s life,” Constantine shrugged.

“I don’t like getting hurt,” she scowled as she took anotherbite.

“No one does.”

“I don’t want to ride a stupid bike anyways,” she mutteredenviously. For she had wanted to ride that bike, been dreaming of it. Now shewasn’t so sure.

“Now wait one moment, love,” Constantine snapped. “You’regoing to get hurt, get knocked down, and beaten up, that’s life Raven. But what’simportant isn’t how hard you get hit or how bad you get hurt, it’s about howyou get up and keep going. Now you will learn to ride that bike, and if you geta few more scrapes along the way then so be it.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“But what if I fall again?”

“Then I’m going to try my damnedest to catch you. you’re mygirl, Rae, I got your back and I won’t let anything truly wretched ever happento you.” Constantine ruffled her hair and Raven smiled. She never had a dadbefore, and she didn’t think there was a better one than Constantine.

~~~*~*~*~~~

Jason sat beside Bruce in the med bay as Alfred looked himover.

In Jason’s excitement about the foul ball from the Knightshe hadn’t noticed Bruce getting creamed by the baseball. He was kind of nervousabout being sent out now because he knew that this qualified as a massive fuckup.

Also he still had the ball in his pocket; he didn’t want togive it up. He never had a baseball before.

“I’m sorry,” Jason muttered when Alfred had gone up to get ice.

“What for?” Bruce asked looking startled and Jason just didn’tunderstand these people!

“Because I shouldn’t have let you get hit by it,” he saidsoftly.

“Jason, that’s not your fault, we sat in the foul section,”Bruce said. He just looked at the ground.

“You still have that ball?” Bruce asked.

His head snapped up, and he thought about lying; but the dudewas freaking Batman! So he nodded.

“Good, keep it, later this week we’ll start playing catch,”Bruce decided.

“Really?”

“Yeah” Bruce nodded.

“I never played catch before,” Jason said thoughtfully. He mostlyplayed escape and evade. Also run, he was very good at run.

“We’ll have you being a champ at it in no time,” Brucepredicted with a smile as he ruffled Jason’s hair and Jason grinned. He watchedas Bruce walked off.

Jason briefly wondered if this was what it was like having adad. If so, he kind of liked it.

He still didn’t trust the guy, but Bruce wasn’t bad so far. Jasonmight even be starting to trust him.

#bluboothalassophile #one shot #raven #john constantine #jason todd #bruce wayne #family bonding #fanfic

32 notes · View notes

randomnessunicorn-imagine · 7 years

Note

hOI!!! May you please do "I'LL PROTECT YOU! I'M BATMAN!" with UF Sans from the meme prompt? Thanks!!😘

— Post Scriptum: This prompt is so old but I had no time and inspiration for thinking about fanfictions before, so I am doing it now. Even now, the reader has a name that is neutral, since I prefer like this, their name is Alex, simple. It’s totally random-!I hope someone can enjoy it since I am not truly sure if it’s good enough eue’’

Prompt: “I’ll protect you! I am Batman!” ( From this list )Pairing: Fell! Sans x Neutral! ReaderRating: Green (General contents)

A Drunky Mess ~

It should have been a calm and relaxing afternoon and Alex should have spent this day in peace. Sadly, a certain skeleton has decided to get drunk just today. Actually, Sans had promised to Alex that this was the last bottle he touched but it was not true. There were so many bottles he had not only touched, it was like he was doing love with them since he was hitting to the bottle like Gollum was attached to his precious, so it was not a beautiful picture since it appeared very creepy and Sans was still a skeleton. The sense of macabre was part of his nature. Alex did not know the reason why he was drinking since when they came back home, he was already in those miserable conditions and Alex was looking at him with pity.Actually, those last days Alex was very busy with their job so they stayed by themselves most of the time and Sans could not tolerate to be ignored like this so he felt a little offended like he was the child who felt less loved by his mother. He was losing time and he hated working so much, it was a waste of energy and time for him. Sans said he did not want to be part of this capitalist society to justify his laziness. He felt just like the protagonist of the famous movie Fight Club, the man without a name who lived his life without any purpose and his main passion was reading Ikea’s magazines searching for the perfect furnishings that would have given to him the peace of mind. It was impossible anyway, and even this drunk Sans was telling free nonsense without a purpose. At least, he did not start to frequent clubs of terminally ill patients who got testicular cancer, and it would have been so problematic. Maybe Sans would have been a member of the A.A. if he kept on drinking like this. Alex tried so hard to dissuade him asking for an explication about his obscene behaviour, then Sans looked at them with a sad expression confessing the truth. Alex was avoiding him because they did not want to stay with him anymore for some mysterious reasons. The eyes of Alex became wetter and they felt a warm feeling in their heart since he seemed so serious in his drunkenness and everybody knew drunk people never lied. They hugged him instantly, patting their skull since this was a scene too adorable to be denied. «I was just busy with my job, you know? It’s the thing people do for living and pay their bills and all that capitalist stuff…», Alex said ironically, laughing a little, «That thing you should do but you are a lazy ass…», they tried to be playful even if this phrase was a hidden critique. It seemed, this explication did not help Sans to stay better because he felt tired and lost anyway, «Ouch—Ya’re gonna to become a maniac worker like my bro, fuu–», he said with confusion in his voice and then he started to sob searching for the bottle that was his only friend and his only hope in this moment. Alex was losing their patience since he acted like a little child and maybe they had to behave like Papyrus to have some consideration from this impertinent skeleton. «So, do you want I ask to Papyrus to kick your ass or you decide to be less lazy and act like a mature person, hum? ». It seemed “Papyrus” was like the magical word because Sans’ sockets became black and he started to panic, sweating like he already went out of a sauna but the sense of looseness was not the same. Sans could not even speak and he felt pain in his ass yet so maybe it was the time he could stop with this awful show. Alex felt a little sad because it seemed Sans listened only to his brother ignoring them like they were not truly important. So many times, they have told to him to stop with those bad habits but he has never considered their opinion like it was not worthy. Only now, Alex realized it, and this consideration filled their heart with rage and gloom. Their expression became darker, and with a low tone of voice they said, «Ah, I am not going to call your brother, I don’t want to disturb him.» Sans seemed more relieved after this conclusion. Before he could answer, Alex continued their discourse, «Since you are unable to be serious and you don’t give a shit about me and my worries, I think I will go. Cheers to you-!». Then, Alex took their things moving towards the door because maybe Sans was not the only one who needed to drink.

Even if he was drunk, he could understand Alex was mad at him and they had all the reasons to consider him like a total insensitive bastard. Before they could leave, he started screaming that he did not mean it and he cared a lot about them. Sans was just a freak, so Alex was free to leave him since they had kept persevering to him even if he did not deserve anything. Then, his voice became harsher and the act of speaking seemed so difficult to Sans since his words turned into sighs and he exploded in tears like a little baby. Since he was still drunk, Alex doubted he could remember this conversation since it seemed he was suffering so much and maybe the alcohol was not helping him to dissimulate this stress. Exhaling a deep breath, Alex turned around saying they were sorry but they felt truly sad for his childish behaviour, «Ah, ok… We both crossed the line, and maybe you should stop to drink and I should stop to overwork myself… Ok?». Alex got closer to Sans showing a little smile, maybe it was all useless since he was going to forget everything when he became sober, but Alex wanted to try anyway. Sans looked at them like a frustrated dog, «Uhm… You are not going to leave me…?», that was not suppose to be a question because he wanted them to say the same phrase, but he was still unsure. Then, Alex embraced him kissing his bone cheek and his crying get intensified since his emotions were so much and he could not understand his mind anymore. «I am not going to leave you but stop to cry, you are such a crybaby. Where is the badass skeleton I know?», Sans sniffed in a way that was not that badass and Alex laughed. He grunted full of embarrassment because he had to be strong and cool for them, without acting like a spoiled baby. Sans, trying to act chillier than ever, stood up on his feet staggering like a monkey, then he took the bottle and Alex started to worry he was still too drunk. He raised the bottle up, screaming between his sobs, «Yeah, you’re right. I decide, I stop with this shit–», he looked the bottle with the most hostile glare he could ever do even if it appeared funny because he did not appear scary, at all. Then, he continued saying, «You know, you said I don’t have a job, but I actually have and it’s very cool.» he was raving again and Alex looked at him with curiosity, asking, «Oh, really? And which one?» they raised an eyebrow, dubious. «I’m a fucking hero babe, and if I’m drunk I can’t protect you… Yeah!», it seemed he had a revelation, « I’LL PROTECT YOU! I’M BATMAN!». Alex face palmed themselves but it was better if they would have seen the next scene because Sans’ drunkenness was still exponential. He hit his skull with the same bottle, like it was a normal thing, then he started laughing like a mad man saying he was fine and it was the final demonstration of his coolness because he was still strong and worthy to be their mate. Yes, it was crazy but Alex was happy seeing the usual jerk they loved so much. Maybe Alex had to be the one to protect him especially in these weird situations where Sans lost his rationality becoming a freak of nonsense.

9 notes · View notes