#and also - diana dead means that no one else has the steel for killing others and staying steady - of course Bruce would pick up some slack

[lazlolullaby]

justifying a "failed timeline" aka: let's give Batman Beyond a distinct event that sets it apart from the DC multiverse

So. As we all know. Comics are nuts. They are constantly shifting timelines and labels. They created Elseworlds and alternate timelines to deal with that, to sort and return to it if they wanted to.

Technically the DCAU world is Earth-12, a world set decades in the future from the world we follow. The current Batman Beyond run of comics is set there. It's also inside the "cartoon rim" a group of worlds that are/are close enough to the animated series and animated movies.

The designation "12" has been used multiple times so just be aware when you are researching.

But Batman Beyond has this different tone that the original shows have, even Justice League Unlimited never really dove into. Batman is isolated, Bruce Wayne is in a dusty manor, the Justice League is short about 20 members at least...the list goes on.

tl;dr: Batman Beyond world is so cyberpunk, desolate, and isolated because in the Near-Apocalypse of '09, Wonder Woman dies.

At the time of Batman Beyond in the DCAU, they didn't have the rights to portray Wonder Woman. Instead they used Big Barda in their Justice League episode (which, happily, was proof of concept for the Justice League series) . They only got her in the Justice League series proper. And if the DCAU is a connected universe...what happened to Diana?

(yes I know she shows up in the follow up comics. But again - alternate timelines.)

so. speaking of alternate universes. Earth 50, the Justice Lord universe as seen in JL s2 eps11 and 12 "A Better World".

Wasn't it implied in Justice League that the Flash's death caused the Justice Lords to take over the world? That Flash's personality and interactions with the League prevents them from going too far? Stopping them from becoming too serious?

I submit to the Fandom that the main divergence point of the DCAU (or at least, post JLU into Batman Beyond) timeline is Wonder Woman's death. Presumably in this "near apocalypse of '09", which was mentioned in s3 ep 4 "Out of the Past" but not followed up on.

This explains why Diana never shows up to talk with Bruce. That the Future Justice League is so small compared to the ranks in their self titled show. Once their heaviest hitter was gone, it broke the trust in keeping them together. The lack of magic in the world. The loss of heroes that actually don't have trauma, that just want to help. The lack of Truth, the reliance on lies and masks to make a difference.

anyway: Fandom Homework/Class discussion:

What would the DC universe look like if we kill off one of the Seven Founding Justice League Members? That is Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, Martian Manhunter, Green Lantern, and The Flash (we did that one, but you can redo it if you want.)

What does each of the Core 7 bring to the team? What do they guard against? How does the team fall apart without their input?

And if you have a super team you like, i.e. Teen Titans, Young Justice, Avengers, ThunderCats, the Gaang, etc. Use your creative muscles to push them around and see what makes them tick. It is fun. It will hurt.

(bonus points if you reference Community s3 ep 4: Remedial Chaos Theory. All those relationships collide so beautifully in that ep.)

Thank you.

[gaylorlyrics]

Folklore Songs - what are they about??

This is a developing thread, but I’ve been listening all day so I’m taking a stab at it.

1."The 1"  

Common consensus is that this is about Dianna Agron and what they could have been. Telling lyrics are the general idea that the relationship wasn’t truly given a chance (”it would've been sweet, If it could've been me”) and “Roaring Twenties”, referring to the below circus themed party pics with Diana dressed like a flapper

tbh im not totally sold on this - most because it seems more recent with lyrics like, “In my defense, I have none for never leaving well enough alone” sounds like a reference to ME! and “Roaring twenties” sounds like a reference to something that happened this year (2020). Also “throwing pennies in the pool” could be a reference to throwing Penni (Karlie’s agent) in the pool. Finally, Route 1 is the road along California’s coast, where Tay & Karlie drove on their legendary road trip...this makes my lil Kaylor heart worry. 

2. Cardigan

This is the first installment in the Teenage Trio, which also includes August and Betty, and is told from the perspective of Betty. It’s about feeling so loved by someone but then being betrayed by them (”Chase two girls [Betty + August’s narrator] lose one”). The line ”And you'd be standin' in my front porch light” foreshadows to James professing love in “Betty”. Potentially Taylor is Betty - but I’m still thinking about that theory.

3."The Last Great American Dynasty"  

We <3 a Rhode Island throwback. Here Taylor tells the story of her house in Rhode Island that Rebekah “Betty” (??!?!??!! more on that later) Harkness used to live in. Rebekah married an heir to Standard Oil which made her one of the wealthiest women in the USA at the time. She was also known for making a scene (”She had a marvelous time ruining everything”). Additionally, she founded the Harkness Ballet (”And blew through the money on the boys and the ballet”). After Rebekah’s death Taylor purchased the house and it is now best known as the place of many epic 4th of July parties.

4. Exile

Such a sad song! This is a duet between Taylor and Bon Iver, telling the story of a failed relationship that they have tried to mend many many times. Interestingly, this is also about a love triangle (like the teenage trio) -  "I can see you starin' honey/Like he's just your understudy." This line specifically feels like it could be about bearding, and seeing someone else with the person you love, but feeling like - or knowing - it’s fake. “You were my town Now I'm in exile seein' you out” references and end to the relationship Taylor discussed in False God “Staring out the window like I'm not your favorite town I'm New York City”. To me this indicates that it is about Karlie and them breaking up or going through a rough patch - continually trying to fix things - and eventually being unsure that it could ever be repaired.

5."My Tears Ricochet"

This is pretty clearly about Scott & Scooter - “And if I'm dead to you, why are you at the wake? Cursing my name, wishing I stayed” and “You had to kill me, but it killed you just the same” seem to be a reference to them trying to exploit her work and how her leaving Big Machine really ruined the business - plus there’s some LWYMMD imagery. “You wear the same jewels that I gave you as you bury me” also seems to be a clear reference for trying to use Taylor’s own work against her, taking the profits, and pushing her out of the deal. As if we needed more evidence “You hear my stolen lullabies” clearly references her stolen masters.

6."Mirrorball"  

Big 80s prom vibes from this song. Mirrorball is about being famous and all of her work - her most personal thoughts and dreams - just becoming different ways for other people to see themselves once she releases her music into the world. Part of being an artist is knowing that your work will reflect more of who the viewer is than who you are yourself. Here she uses the metaphor of a disco ball to explore that idea, and worries that she is losing her own identity through it “I'm still trying everything to keep you looking at me”. She also alludes to her fears that she will age out of relevancy “I know they said the end is near”, something she discussed in her documentary Miss Americana. Obviously this is internalized misogyny because we love Taylor and will listen to her music always and do not subscribe to the belief that women need to be young to be relevant because if they were a man then they'd be the man, and tay’s the man <3 

7. “Seven”

Personally, this is one of my favorite songs on the album. It’s so sweet and pure and lovely. This is about young love, with imagery of summer, toys, and child’s dreams to runaway together. Many people have speculated that it is about the same girl that the two unreleased Taylor songs “Sweet Tea and Gods Graces” and “Me & Britney” are about. 

[Side note: initially I wondered if Me & Britney was about Britany Maack, Taylor’s long time friend who recently got married, but the names are spelled differently. Also the line in Seven “I can’t recall your face” indicates that this is about someone who Taylor is not currently in touch with.] 

Both M&B and STAAG seem to be about the Seven relationship because there are general parallels with outdoor scenery, childlike wonder, and ( in the case of STAGG) sweet tea. Also all three songs indicate a gay relationship: STAGG - “And you can love like a sinner and lose like a winner”, M&B - “That boy she went ran off with, well, I thought he was crazy. Maybe I was just jealous that he'd come between me and Britney”, and Seven - “You won't have to cry or hide in the closet And just like a folk song our love will be passed on”.

8. “August”

This is the second installment in the Teenage Trio, told from the perspective of the “other woman” who James meets while on summer vacation. The other woman (she doesn’t seem to have a name...unless it is August...which it could be? idk) is in love, but realizes that James isn’t in love with her - “Will you call when you're back at school? I remember thinkin' I had you”. The line “Remember when I pulled up and said "Get in the car" references the same incident which is retold in Betty, but this time with James telling Betty it was just a summer fling that didn’t mean anything.

9. This Is Me Trying

Here we have a break up song, about Taylor trying to win her lover back and feeling completely lost without them, unable to concentrate or be around people, and turning to self sabotage. It’s about the general loneliness that one feels when they’ve lost someone they truly love, and the miscommunication that can happen in a relationship when you’re not understanding each other or receiving love in the same way (hence the song’s title). I think this could be about Karlie, it seems clear that their relationship has not been smooth and that they have had many on-and-off times. It could also be serving a purpose of building the Joe break up narrative, but only time will tell for that.

10. “Illicit Affairs”

Taylor loves her secret love - this song reads like a sad version of “I Know Places”. It seems clear that this is about Karlie Kloss. “Tell your friends you're out for a run” is one of my favorite lines because Karlie started Klossy run club, where you commit to running a certain distance in a month - and she posts about it on instagram CONSTANTLY. But overall, the song details a relationship of a woman being with someone she doesn’t love (kushnerd) and sneaking around to meet up with the person she does love (tay!). The line “Tell yourself you can always stop” is so sad to me, the idea that Karlie got into this and keeps telling herself that it will only be a little longer and she can leave when she wants, but staying in her fake marriage anyway.

11. Invisible String

This is pretty much the only pure love song on the album - about feeling connected to someone throughout your whole life, knowing that that somebody is out there, and then finally finding them. Taylor talks about being in Centennial Park in Nashville as a teen, and then eventually showing her lover around. The song is really self referential, with lots of easter eggs for her past work, including Bad Blood and Delicate. She also references Joe Jonas with the line “Cold was the steel of my axe to grind For the boys who broke my heart Now I send their babies presents”.

Some people have pointed out that there is a similar idea presented in Jane Eyre - when the protagonist says to her love interest “I have a strange feeling with regard to you. As if I had a string somewhere under my left ribs, tightly knotted to a similar string in you."

12."Mad Woman"  

Another Scooter one - “It's obvious that wanting me dead has really brought you two together”. “The master of spin” is word play referencing the masters records scandal. “Watching you climb over people like me” points out that agents and labels are making money off the performers they find and pushing them around. There’s also a reference to Scooter’s wife Yael and how he cheats all the time, but she doesn’t do anything likely because of her own internalized misogyny - “has a couple side flings. Good wives always know. She should be mad, should be scathing like me”.

13. “Epiphany”

The first verse of this touching ballad is about Taylor’s grandfather in WW2, storming the beaches at Normandy - “Crawling up the beaches now "Sir, I think he's bleeding out"”. The second verse is about a nurse helping patients with Covid-19 - “Holds your hand through plastic now "Doc, I think she's crashing out"”. The bridge here talks about wishing there was some great epiphany, some magical solution for the suffering in the world. The chorus refers to experiencing trauma with others and staying loyal even in the hardest times, even if it means literally dying. Although this seems like a departure from the themes of rest of the album, the whole album examines loyalty and considering what you would do for the people you love - so I really don’t think it’s a departure at all.

14. “Betty”

Obviously this is the gayest song on the album and an early fan favorite. It is the final song in the teenage trio, told from the point of view of James, going to win Betty back after betraying her and sleeping with someone else (August!?) over the summer. The line "Will you kiss me on the porch in front of all your stupid friends?”, a line that is very clearly about wanting to kiss a woman, is especially striking (& gay!) when sung by Taylor. The clearest version of this plot is someone begging for forgiveness after betraying the person they love.

There is also a bit of a nod to a line in “Picture to Burn”, a break up song off Taylor’s first album. In PTB Taylor says “So go and tell your friends that I'm obsessive and crazy that's fine, I’ll tell mine you’re gay”. This lyric has since been changed in versions available online, but on the original album that's what it was. This is interesting because she’s calling attention to knowing that someone is gay and hasn’t told their friends...which you would definitely know if you had dated them.

The names “James” and “Inez” are both mentioned in the song, which are the names of Blake Lively and Ryan Reynold’s daughters. James was already featured on a Taylor Swift album, as the lil baby voice at the beginning of “Gorgeous”. Worth noting that “James” is traditional a male name, but that this character is named after a female.

ALSO I have this theory I’m working on that Taylor is Betty and this whole album is in the same world with the same people, but WILL POST MORE ON THIS LATER.

15."Peace"  

Ok - this is Archer 2.0 for me, about how she is worried about how no one will ever love her or stay with her because its too much work - “the rain is always gonna come if you're standin' with me” and “No, I could never give you peace” are pretty telling lines about her concerns that people will think it is not worth it to be friends with or in a relationship with her due to all of the baggage that comes with it. 

The opening lines - “Our coming-of-age has come and gone Suddenly this summer, it's clear” feed into my emerging theory that all of these songs exist in the same universe and are about the same three characters...but I’m still figuring that one out. The line “And you know that I'd swing with you for the fences Sit with you in the trenches” reference Seven and Epiphany, respectively - further supporting that all of these songs are in the same world.

16. “Hoax”

Out of all of the songs that make my little Kaylor heart ache - this is the most heartbreaking. Specifically the line “My eclipsed sun” refers to Karlie, who Taylor has called “sunshine” on multiple occasions, and her light being covered up by her contract with Kushnerd and Scooter. The line “Don't want no other shade of blue But you” makes it clear that this song is in reference to the muse for the album “Lover” - aka Karlie. 

However, this is a song about betrayal and completely trusting someone, only to find that they stabbed you in the back, as is clear by the line ”Your faithless love's the only hoax I believe in”.

Additionally, the line“You knew it still hurts underneath my scars” seems to again feed into the idea that all of the songs on the album involve the same characters. This one is a bit more clear, it seems that - if this theory is correct - Betty is the narrator of this song, as she referenced her scars before “Drew stars around my scars” in Cardigan.

OK- I'm going to go deep into song by song later, but I just wanted to get something out there!!! Also def interested in hearing what everyone else thinks!

EDIT: I just found some lyrics from The Lakes in an article from Billboard. I wanted to add them in even though we don’t have the full song because I felt like we really ended on a sad note with hoax and then when I saw these I was like there is hope!!

SO the lyric Billboard included in their review was “A red rose grew up out of ice frozen ground / With no one around to tweet it” which is a continuation from the line from “Hoax” - “ This has frozen my ground”. What I’m taking from this is that in the final song Taylor finds hope <3

[aion-rsa]

10 Injustice Characters the DC Animated Movie Needs to Get Right

https://ift.tt/3fCncB7

As we wait an announcement pertaining to the existence of NetherRealm Studios’ Injustice 3, we at least know that Warner Bros. is set to adapt the games into a DC animated movie.

Ever since its release in 2013, the Injustice franchise has not only become a staple of NetherRealm’s roster, but the comic spinoffs have made it a beloved part of the DC multiverse. The plot revolves around a reality where the Joker was able to mess with Superman so badly that the Man of Steel gradually became a mass-murdering dictator, with the support of several members of the Justice League. Left without any other option, Batman brought in counterparts of the Justice League from the “mainstream” universe to help him fight a civil war against his former friend. It was a story that merged the Justice Lords two-parter from the Justice League cartoon with Marvel’s original Squadron Supreme comic series.

A popular prequel series was released, mostly written by Tom Taylor, that explained the five years in-between Superman killing the Joker in cold blood and Batman’s last stand. Sometime later, the game’s story was adapted into the comic Injustice: Ground Zero. And the Injustice universe has only continued to grow since then.

As snazzy as NetherRealm’s story modes are, they are going to have to make some changes to the narrative for the animated movie. It’s not like every character is going to stumble into exactly four best-two-out-of-three fights in a row before someone else is the focus. Knowing that there will be alterations, some characters are really going to need some tender love and care.

Superman (Both of Them)

Injustice: Gods Among Us didn’t invent the idea of an evil Superman, but things are a bit over-saturated these days. Face it, “Dark Superman” has been done to death, what with Brightburn, The Boys, Invincible, and everything Zack Snyder intended with his Justice League movies.

It’s important that the animated movie really get into the WHY of what turned Superman evil instead of the Joker just getting a tragic win over him. The Injustice comic nudged him over and over again with multiple betrayals and manipulations before he finally snapped and angrily broke every bone in Green Arrow’s body. Hit all that, or at least enough of it.

More importantly, Injustice is a story of two different Supermen. The mainstream Superman has to ring true. He has to be the beacon of hope and positivity that pop culture has been missing for the past decade.

Ultimately, as long as they don’t do that minigame where Superman blows up cars and the people in them with his eye-lasers, we’re cool.

Batman

In this DC take of Marvel’s Civil War, Batman is by default the better person when compared to Superman. He has a line he won’t cross and that means no murder and no tyranny. That said, he still needs to be portrayed as a flawed hero. He may be competent, but he still behaves like a total douche at times and deserves to take one to the chin every now and then.

Being a paranoid futurist who buries himself in contingency plans means alienating allies, friends, and even family members. There’s a great moment in the Injustice comic where he reveals that he infected Cyborg with a virus within a week of meeting (you know, just in case), which Killer Croc says is outright sinister. It’s this kind of behavior that led to Superman’s fall to darkness, because even if Bruce wasn’t behind any of the horrors, he still chose coldness and paranoia over being there for a friend who was going through some serious shit.

Harley Quinn

A hype trailer for Harley painted her as a major protagonist in the first game but the game’s story mode just didn’t measure up. The comics did a better job and the Ground Zero volume was specifically about telling the game’s story from Harley’s perspective. I’m not saying that she should be joined by her team of BFF henchmen from Ground Zero, but she should definitely be a prominent hero.

Similar to the Mark Waid comic series Irredeemable and Incorruptible (also about an evil take on Superman), Harley’s turn to heroism is the universe’s response to Superman’s actions. She’s done some horrible things and may never make up for her actions under the Joker’s thumb, but she’ll keep fighting to stop Superman’s atrocities.

Wonder Woman

While Batman did a bad job trying to pull Superman from the darkness, Wonder Woman succeeded in pushing him in. It’s noted here and there, but this Wonder Woman was also altered by tragedy. In this timeline, Steve Trevor turned out to be a Nazi traitor. His betrayal left Diana feeling much less optimistic and hopeful than her mainstream self.

Wonder Woman’s villainy isn’t as pronounced as Superman’s, but she’s definitely the friendly face who eggs him on and wants him to stand over all mankind. As Superman uses her to fill the void left from Lois Lane’s death, the power couple become very good at bringing out the worst in each other.

Damian Wayne

The Injustice game did Damian a little dirty, revealing deep into the story that the Nightwing fighting on Superman’s side was not Dick Grayson, but Damian. According to Batman, Damian murdered Dick. The comics dove deeper into that and made it more of a freak accident brought on by Damian being an impulsive and angry child. Still, Bruce and his son were unable to make amends due to their shared lack of warmth.

Later stories, and even Injustice 2, added more depth to Damian. It always made sense that he’d join Superman’s Regime, but there was a soul in there who would eventually see that this wasn’t the right path. In the comic Injustice vs. Masters of the Universe, which was treated as a sequel to Injustice 2’s dark ending, Damian took up the mantle of Batman to oppose Superman and even grew a long-missing sense of humor in the process.

Lex Luthor

The great tragedy of the DC multiverse is that Superman and Lex Luthor just can’t get along. They will always be at odds no matter what Earth they come from. The Injustice universe was the one exception, as Luthor was portrayed as fairly warm and altruistic. Much like Batman, he has contingency plans up the wazoo, but they don’t come off as creepy.

Seeing him there as Superman’s longtime friend who sadly has to stab him in the back brings back that multiversal truth about the duo. Just because this is a world where Superman kills and things get very bleak doesn’t mean it’s the worst world and that it isn’t worth saving. The mainstream Cyborg is reluctant to come to terms with this heroic Luthor, but he ultimately accepts the miracle that this universe created a Luthor worth befriending and even looking up to.

Hal Jordan

Maybe it’s just me, but I was never a fan of how Geoff Johns retconned Hal’s past and gave him deniability for everything he did as Parallax. I liked that a boring hero dude like Hal snapped, did some bad stuff, and then had to accept his failures in an attempt to be better. With Injustice, they gave us that exact Hal.

Read more

Games

Injustice Beat Zack Snyder’s Justice League to the Punch

By Matthew Byrd

Comics

Injustice: Year Zero Brings the Justice Society to DC Alternate Universe

By Jim Dandy

Overflowing with willpower and being an otherwise competent space cop, Hal is still something of a dunce at times, and he’s susceptible to manipulation in the right situation. He’s already following Superman’s lead, but having Sinestro pop in to indoctrinate him into the Sinestro Corps makes him actually interesting. Let Hal be the worst version of himself here so he can double back on it in the sequel and beg Guy Gardner’s ghost for forgiveness.

Shazam

Injustice may be the B-side to Mortal Kombat, but the game itself is fairly tame on the violence. Joker’s death isn’t actually shown on screen, Luthor’s end is fairly clean, and Grodd taking a trident to the torso is relatively tame.

But what we absolutely, positively have to see in the animated movie is Shazam’s death scene to really give an idea of how far gone Superman is. It’s bloodless from our point of view, but it’s grisly as hell and made worse when you remember that Shazam is a literal child under all the mystical power.

Batgirl

The Barbara Gordon version of Batgirl was one of the first DLC characters added to Injustice, but it’s unfortunate that she’s not in the main story mode — something the animated movie could fix by giving her a more prominent role in the fight against the Regime. Her ending gives her a kickass backstory where she returns to the cowl after her father dies at Superman’s hands. The comics go deeper into this, even making it so that Superman doesn’t directly kill Commissioner Gordon.

In this continuity, she was already wheelchair-bound as Oracle. She had to go under a very dangerous procedure under Luthor’s care in order to walk again. This is one of the storylines that could make for a captivating arc in the movie.

Alfred Pennyworth

Alfred isn’t in either Injustice game. He’s already dead by the start of the first game. But I don’t care. Alfred needs to be in the animated movie because he is the heart and soul of the Injustice comics. While others bow to Superman, follow him, or even try to reason with him, Alfred Pennyworth doesn’t play those games. He will straight-up verbally clown Superman for his actions without flinching. He is not afraid of the Kryptonian, no matter how red his glowing eyes get.

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This comes to a head in the comics when Alfred takes a pill that gives him Kryptonian strength and he kicks the absolute shit out of Superman for ruining his family. I know I’m asking for a lot, but I simply need to see Alfred stomp a mudhole in Superman so hard that his own shoe explodes from the impact.

The post 10 Injustice Characters the DC Animated Movie Needs to Get Right appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/3hIQH7h

[chronicbatfictioner]

A Real Boy - Chapter 13

"So how does this Lazarus Pit work?" Bruce wanted to know. Actually, every adult in the room - Clark, Diana, Arthur, Zatanna, and a guy named Hal Jordan who glowed green that Tim has only seen from a distance during the Battle of Metropolis, all converged at the Wayne Manor's meeting room.

"Simply speaking, it activates cells with no exemption. Oracle and I have researched, and we found out that Luthor supposedly had a bit of this Pit's liquid that he'd obtained from an antiquity seller. My conclusion is that he might have tried to analyze the remaining liquid and maybe synthesized it to create the clones." Tim explained.

Right after Jason told him of this thing called Lazarus Pit that supposedly could bring the dead back to life, Tim had told Bruce. Bruce had assigned somebody that Tim didn't know to find it, and they found one right away - just right outside Gotham City. Further exploration showed that there were a number of them in the East Coast alone. At the moment, Bruce has assigned his JL colleagues to find all of them. It was quite fortunate that the Pits were not located out in the open.

"It still won't stop Luthor's curiosity from either finding more of the liquid, or - like Tim said - synthesizing it. There was a lot of vials of unknown substances in the evidence list." Clark replied quietly, and Tim had to grit his teeth. Clark was physically older by at least 10 years than Conner, but sounded similar, anyway. It didn't help that his aura was like Conner, too.

Not that Clark knew anything or could change anything about it. After all, Conner was a slightly diluted version of Clark.

"Right, presuming he has actually synthesized it, rather than finding a source; why did his other attempts not work as well as Conner?" Bruce asked.

"Because Conner has - had - a soul," Rachel replied quietly from the corner of the room. Tim exhaled a breath he didn't even know he was holding. Rachel's change of tenses felt like a sharp poke to his sternum.

The adults were quiet for a tad too long before Bruce turned toward Rachel and asked directly, "I shall take your words for it and not insist on explanation; but the question remained, how is it that Conner got a soul whilst the others - specifically the humanoid ones who physically looked like him and presumably has his biological structure - did not."

This time, it was Diana who answered, "because a soul is not included in a 'life' package, Bruce. Not all sentient beings have souls. My people's legend said that souls are granted by the gods, otherwise a sentient being or creature can have one that has either not arrived at or escaped from Hades."

"That's... about almost right," Jason chimed in. "I mean, not sure about the escaping part, but yes. Like familiars. Someone who was not born to have one can obtain one through a number of rituals."

"Alright... still doesn't answer my question of how come Luthor's efforts didn't work." Bruce pointed out.

"He didn't have or do the magick." Jason continued. "Luthor may have the best brain for science; but without the magick of the actual Pit..." he looked at Tim.

"People... like you, Bruce, think that magick is unexplained science, which is right in a sense. But to replicate something that originated in magick, there are things..." Tim hesitated. "Like-- I don't know-- if you cook, maybe? One can follow a recipe to the last T but still the bread won't rise or something like that. The 'gift', I think. I mean, I don't know what else to call it. That something in you that is manifested outward as magick." Tim stopped, realizing that everyone's eyes were on him and that he was rambling incoherently.

"I see," Bruce's glare made Tim want to go and hide or something. Everything Tim has just said insinuated that Bruce, the only one among them who did not have magick by birth, was somewhat un-gifted. Bruce, however, didn't even seem to notice the insinuation. "This is one of the reasons why I would rather have your team be present among us, Tim."

"'We', or 'you'?" Tim wanted to know.

Bruce, Clark, and Diana - Tim knew that they are often dubbed as the 'Trinity' due to their ability to complete each other - smiled enigmatically. He still was not sure whether to feel blessed or cursed.

"Bruce brought in the idea of having and allowing young people to be trained in protection, so I thought my skills couls be put to good use." Clark started.

"Since 'protection' may--" Diana paused and smirked, "--will also include offensive and not just defensive activities, I offered my expertise to train you and your friends."

"So it's us, not just me." Bruce clarified. "Hal will be coaching on the subject of space magicks, Arthur of ocean magicks, Zatanna on the ancients - to make it more tangible rather than if Jason was the one doing the coaching."

"Because Jason is 'just' a familiar." Tim remarked.

"Because Jason is also a young person, not because he's a familiar." Zatanna replied. In other times, Tim might fanboy a little at her. This time, he felt a slight bitterness in his heart and had to assess whether the bitterness was his or Jason's.

"We would listen more to those our age - even an ancient being who merely looks our age." Tim pursed his lips stubbornly.

"Yes, I am well aware of that. That is the reason why I would like to request the use of your island as a base." Bruce replied. "Your presence here is valuable, yet is more valuable there with the site belonging to you. Your peers will be more comfortable, as well."

"Largely because your place will not be 'related' - so to speak - to any of us. Their parents or guardians will also be more comfortable, I'd say..." Clark chimed in. "That was Diana's suggestion, by the way," he added belatedly, as if he didn't want Bruce to take the credit.

Tim wondered if Bruce was as manipulative as that; having Diana claimed the idea he'd suggested or insinuated.

"What are the conditions?" he wanted to know, anyway. It's not like he could say no if the adult magis decided to lump all teen-aged magis at his Island. It's not like he would say no - he knew well how those kids would feel, being a teen that no adults would trust and having a kind of power or another that they could not control.

"I was expecting you to give us conditions." Bruce admitted. If it wasn't for a very small uptick of confusion of his eyebrow, Tim's suspicion would probably flared up more and bigger.

"Do I get to send back the..." he paused, wondered just what category an 'unwanted' magi-kid would be in. Unruly? Unfriendly? Disobedient? --all terms could be applied to himself, after all. "...the ones who didn't want to be there?" he settled for a broader term. "I don't want to force anyone to stay if they don't want to. My island is not a playground or a daycare. And I definitely don't want them to feel like they're in a playground or a daycare." he explained, scowling a little.

The adults grinned and/or smirked. The guy called Hal quipped, "yeeeah, whenever more than two magis of any sources come together, it's gonna be a playground and/or daycare, I tell you."

"Hal," Diana warned quietly. "I can't fault Hal's observation, really, as he's gotten more experience with magis in groups. But no, we do not see or plan your place to be a magi daycare. But maybe one day, it will be a center where the young can find their own voice - proverbially speaking - without constant interruptions from the adults, yet while being safe."

"It sounds overly optimistic." Tim pointed out. "But I know what it's like to be... restrained from my nature. So," he shrugged. "it's not like I'd have many points of objections. Just... I may be a kid, but I know some things will require adult supervision..."

Bruce's smile was kind of all-knowing. "Yes, that's what Dick said, too. He will help you - he and his friends - to mitigate any issues that you might face that would require adult assistance. For the sake of... legal matters, I hope you will allow Dick access to your island. This will be fully at your discretion, and none of us..."

Clark interjected, "...we managed to make Bruce promise not to meddle too much. The point is, Tim, you'll be the metaphorical adult there. I trust you'll be able to manage them all."

Tim blinked and glared at Clark. The man might be the epitome of hope and all that is good in the world - magi or not. But he was more of a stranger to Tim compared to Diana Prince, even. Conner might have been Tim's best friend. But unlike Diana, who has had her times to visibly meddled with Cassie's life - in spite the fact that Cassie still has a mother; Clark has never gotten involved with Conner or anything that he had done. It was Bart's guardian, Max Mercury, who'd brought Conner along with Bart and introduced him to Tim. Max, formerly a foreman in one of Tim dad's archaeological site, noticed that Tim was 'different', and had had no qualm in promptly introducing Tim to Bart, and then Conner, and then Cassie.

Clark, as much as Tim knew that he was a part of Conner by DNA, remained just as 'Clark Kent', and that was it. Conner's life eventually crossed path with Clark's - again, courtesy of Max. Yet Tim could never see him as Conner's guardian of any kind.

To have him commenting that he trusted Tim with a lot of other magi kids was... a lot more unnerving to Tim than if it had been Bruce who said that. Or even Diana.

Bruce's quiet addition, however, steeled Tim's resolve. "I know you can, Tim. You have showed remarkable initiative by forming your group on the first hand."

"Yeah," Tim sighed, tamping down his doubts and fears. "we'll see how it goes in the next few weeks, huh? Let 'em come and hope we don't destroy the island or San Francisco while we're at it."

Note: You know what adulting does to an incomplete story? That's right. It darned near killed it. I haven't posted in the past few weeks thanks to adulting and life-based dramu. All I would exchange gladly for a few weeks of quiet to write.Anyway. Thank you if you all are still reading this. This, IMO, is a crappy filler. But it'll be clearer - I hope - by the next chapters.

[81scorp]

Constructive criticism: DCEU in general

(Originally posted on Deviantart Mar 23, 2018. Has been edited a few times)

I am a big DC fan. When I was little and couldn`t even read, Superman was the first comicbook superhero I was introduced to. The second one was the Hulk.I am however not one of those DC fans who completely ignore the flaws of the DCEU movies. I have studied dramaturgy and I have seen several educational videos on youtube on how to make movies competently.The DCEU movies have two problems. One is the vision of Zack Snyder who who has to make every heroic character into a damaged, dark and depressed antihero who is reluctant to help others. Snyder has however left the DCEU, partly because of a family tragedy but also because he was fired. (I want you to know that in this case I separate the art from the artist. From what I`ve heard Snyder is a nice guy, he has my sympathies.) So with Snyder gone the DCEU technically only has one problem left, and in this case the problem lies with Warner Bros: The movies are too rushed. WB are too concerned with catching up to Marvel than to take their time and tell a good story. If they had taken their time and planned things out beforehand they could have made it much better. It also helps that Marvel, who understand their comics more, have their own studio. If I could run so fast that I could screw the laws of physics, travel backwards in time and change these movies, this is what I would have done.

2013: Man of Steel Make a few changes, like Pa Kent not telling little Clark that maybe he should`ve let those kids in in the bus die. (Yes, I know, he didn`t say it directly, but it was in the subtext.) I`ve gone into more detail about it in my constructive criticism of Man of Steel.

2014: Wonder Woman Yes, it has a few flaws, but I`m not gonna change a thing... with one exception. That scene where Diana gets a package from Bruce with the photo of her and Steve Trevor. Remove it from this film and put it as a mid-credit scene in Batman v Superman. (I mean, in this hypothetical Flashpoint universe WW comes out before BvS, so it works) 2015: Green Lantern Parallax is not the villain, but Sinestro. See my constructive criticism of it. 2015: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice Remove and change all the stupid stuff. (Once again, I`ve gone into more details about this movie`s shortcomings in a previous constructive criticism.) Here`s one thing I would like to add though: Amanda Waller has a cameo in this movie. (She could be one of the people in the interview montage that gives their two cents about Superman and how he affects our world.) And after Batman v Superman I would have made two solo movies, one for the Flash and one for Aquaman (not necessarily in that order) to properly flesh out and develop their characters before Justice League. That way, there`ll be enough room for Cyborg and Steppenwolf to get sufficient character developement.

2016: The Flash In this version Barry is not Sheldon Cooper-ish. Plot Barry`s mom was killed when he was a kid and his dad was framed for the murder. Barry grows up and studies to become a crime scene investigator. He is friends with journalist Iris West. (They are not a romantic couple... yet.) Meanwhile: Somewhere else, a guy named Mark Mardon is being tested as a human guinea pig by some unknown man who`s face we don`t get to see. The tests on Mardon finally give results: He developes superpowers, more specifically: weather manipulation powers. To test his powers he creates a thundercloud. Meanwhile: Barry Allen is ready to go home after a hard work day. He`s about to shut the window when he gets hit by lightning and thrown into a case full of rare chemicals that the police have confiscated from a gang of criminals. He wakes up the next day at the hospital. Later he discovers that he has become superfast, but he also realizes that it is not ordinary superspeed. If it was, his clothes would burn up from the air friction, so it`s something more than just superspeed. He does an act of heroism, while hiding his face by wearing a red hoodie jacket, and realizes that he could become a superhero. (He`s also inspired by Superman who gets mentioned on the news.) Speaking of the news: Amanda Waller gets interviewed on TV, she mentions that a special jail has been built that`s strong enough to hold superpowered individuals. She thinks that it`s a necessity after the destruction of Metropolis. He studies hard with the forensic science stuff while making his Superherocostume from scratch. Mark Mardon goes around and steals hi-tech devices and chemicals, things that are sciency in general. Turns out the confiscated, rare chemicals that, combined with lightning, turned Barry into a Superspeedster are some of the chemicals that are needed to make the drug that triggered Mardon`s latent superpowers. Mardon steals the science stuff because of a quid pro quo thing: The unknown scientist gave him powers so that he could lash back at society (He`s a jerk with a crappy childhood) and in return, he uses his powers to help the scientist do more illegal science stuff. Barry fights Mardon and wins. Mardon gets taken to the special jail by Amanda Waller`s goverment guys. Barry visits his dad in jail to tell him that he`s passed the test and is now a licensed forensic scientist. Iris figures out Flash`s secret identity but keeps her discovery a secret. (This could be revisited in a possible sequel.) Mardon also gets visited in jail. We never see the face of his visitor but we see that he`s... wearing a yellow version of the Flash`s costume? And... he seems to be vibrating, and his voice is vibrating too. The man tells Mardon that he`s willing to give him a second chance, not yet though, maybe in the future. But if Mardon screws up a second time there will be no more second chances... ever. Mardon gulps and understands. Pre-credit epilogue or mid-credit scene: Barry is out late at night running as the flash and runs into Superman who asks him if he wants to join his team. Barry`s answer is a mischievous smile. 2016: Aquaman I`m gonna borrow a little from Lion King on this one. Plot It begins with a mother telling a bedtime story to her son about the atlantean kingdom. How the Princess of Atlantis got married to a man that turned out to be cruel and when the princess realized that she ran away and left the kingdom. One day she would return, save her people and end the evil man`s tyrrany. The mother and her son both suffer from a condition: they need to rehydrate a little more often than normal people (either by drinking an extra glass of water or take a bath/shower) or else they`ll get weak. The mother needs to rehydrate every sixth hour, her son every eighth hour. The mother`s name is Atlanna, she`s married to a lighthouse keeper named Tom Curry and her son is named Arthur. Atlanna has a nickname for her son: Orin, which is the Atlantean version of "Arthur". When Arthur gets older his mom disappears for a few months every year but always comes back. As time goes by Arthur starts to discover that he has powers: He can breathe underwater, control underwater creatures and developes superhuman strength and stamina. One day Atlanna disappears and doesn`t come back. Arthur suspects that his mother`s stories are true and his father confirms that they are indeed true and tells him about his first meeting with Atlanna, how he found her washed up on the shore. Arthur and his dad say their goodbyes and he starts to look for his mom and the city of Atlantis. After some searching he finally finds Atlantis, meets the resistance who are trying to overthrow Orm Marius aka: the Ocean Master. Ocean Master has a henchman: King Shark. He meets Mera, a leader of the resistance, finds out that he has to go on a quest to find "the trident of Atlan". After going though lots of troubles he and Mera finds the place where the trident is hidden and he is reunited with his mother. Atlanna has been wounded (it happened years ago), she can still move around and give orders but she can`t engage in most kinds of strenuous activities, like close combat. She`s sorry for leaving Arthur but she couldn`t just stay with him and his father knowing that her people were suffering. Arthur understands. He tries and succeeds in getting the trident from the giant sea monster that guards after it has deemed him worthy. In the end the resistance is victorious, Ocean Master is defeated and believed to be dead, Atlanna abdicates and is reunited with Thomas Curry. Arthur is crowned the next king of Atlantis. One day he visits his parents to tell them how things are going. As Arthur and his parents have their reunion a woman comes walking, It`s Wonder woman in civilian clothing. She tells Arthur that her people and his people were once allies thousands of years ago. She wonders if he`s interested in rekindling that alliance. Arthur finds her proposal intriguing. ( I changed my version a few months after I had seen the movie to be more similar to James Wan`s version.) (And yes, I`m aware that I`m following the Marvel formula with these two examples, but what Marvel is doing is working.) 2017: Justice League See my constructive criticism of it.

2017: Suicide Squad See my constructive criticism of it. And after that... 2018: Solo Batman movie Batman fights crime with his old partner Dick Grayson who calls himself Nightwing now. Barbara has been struggling to walk again for years. Catwoman appears in a few scenes. The movie`s villain could be... I dunno... Clayface? Mid-credit scene: Barbara learns to walk again. It is strongly hinted that she`s gonna batsuit up in a future movie. 2018: Man of Steel sequel Superman meets Supergirl and fights Brainiac. Detective John Jones can be introduced in this one.Followed by...

2019: Batgirl and Supergirl: World`s Finest Batgirl and Supergirl team up to fight a threat and become friends. John Jones is revealed to be Martian Manhunter.

2019: Wonder woman sequel It would take place in modern time, chronologically after the first Justice league or the Batgirl and Supergirl movie. Maybe Circe could be the villain?

2019: Shazam! Just do the David F. Sandberg version with Zachary Levi. It was pretty good. 2020: Justice League 2 Justice League fights Legion of Doom.

2020: Solo Cyborg movie

Green Lantern Sequel Hal recruits Jon Stewart to help him keep the peace in sector 2814.

The Flash Sequel

Aquaman sequel

(doesn`t necessarily have to be in that order), and after that...

New gods The story of New Genesis and Apokolips. Of how "Scott Free" grows up in the hell that is Apokolips and manages to escape with the help of Orion and his former enemy turned ally Big Barda. In the end he manages to escape to Earth where he meets the Justice League. Man of Steel 3: Doomsday Superman fights Doomsday and dies. Followed by...

Justice League 3 Remember the opening to Justice League with the two kids interviewing Supes for their podcast? I would save that scene for the beginning of this movie instead. It would be followed by a montage of people trying to get on with their lives, people leaving flowers at a memorial dedicated to Superman, and Lois, Supergirl and Batman still mourning. All this to a sad cover of "Running up that hill". Earth is invaded by Apokolips and Superman is back from the dead... as a servant of Darkseid. Flash/Wonder Woman/Supergirl tries to snap him out of it, telling him he`s not a weapon. Supes snaps out of it and fights Darkseid. Apokolips retreats, Earth is saved once again. Hooray! And that`s how I would do it. The sad thing is, DC has done this shared universe thing before and done it well: the Arrowverse and the DC Animated Universe. I used to wonder if Marvel was ever gonna get a good movie made. Now I wonder if DC is ever gonna get a good movie again. WB, please make better DC films.        

[theexperiment-hq-blog]

Sample App - Lex Luthor, played by Admin Lex

OOC Info

Name: Lex

Age: 21

Pronouns: she/her

Triggers: (redacted)

Second Choice Character: N/A

Discord: (redacted)

IC Info

Muse Name and Alias: Lex Luthor

What is your primary canon(s) for this character? Smallville through s3, though I don’t care much for the particulars, just the friendship between Lex and Clark is mostly what I’m after, and of course Lionel. After this it becomes simplified pre-nu52 comics canon. Lex’s views on Superman and his ideals/beliefs are taken from the Lex Luthor: Man of Steel comic.

Approximate Age: 50

OTPs, BroTPs, NoTPs:

OTP: Lex/Clark, big time, although I am more than happy to play it onesided, which is just as fun. Other ships I have are Lex/Bruce, Lex/Dick, Lex/Oliver--basically, I’ll just pair him up with any of the male heroes.

BroTP: Lex/Diana, Lex/Mercy, Lex/Kara, and I love having Lex play father to Kon. Lex becoming part of the superfam in general is something I’m weak for.

NoTP: Nothing in specific, though I do play Lex as gay so ships involving ladies are out.

Give us a bulletpoint outline for what your character’s history might look like:

Lex was born into the extremely wealthy (but new money) Luthor family, son of business mogul Lionel Luthor and his wife Lillian.

When he was 9, in Smallville on a business trip with his father, Lex was caught in the same meteor shower that brought Kal-El down to Earth.  Lex, a sick and asthmatic child, was all at once cured after the meteor shower, though he lost all his hair from exposure to the Kryptonite radiation. It wouldn’t be until much later, doing his own research on his condition in his 20s, that Lex realized the exposure to the radiation had also caused him to become a metahuman. Lex’s abilities are quiet and easy to hide: A superhuman immune system and increased healing factors. As of being abducted, only one person (Jason Todd) is aware that Lex is a metahuman.

No longer the perfect Luthor heir, Lex was regarded with disinterest by Lionel (who hadn’t established a particularly fatherly relationship with Lex before, either) and somewhat discarded once Lionel found out Lillian was pregnant again.

Shortly after Lillian gave birth to Lex’s brother Julian, she realized Lionel’s true intentions--to eventually pit the two brothers against each other for who would get to be the true Luthor heir. Terminally ill herself, and afraid that once she was gone there would be no one to protect Lex, she smothered Julian in his crib, reasoning it was better to have one dead son than two sons damaged and tormented by their father. Lex, once he realized what happened, told Lionel he killed Julian by accident, in order to protect his mother.

After Lillian and Julian were gone, Lionel had no choice but to raise Lex as his heir.

Excelling in his schoolwork, Lex graduated high school at 16 and went off to Princeton to study chemical and biological engineering (Lionel was, predictably, not impressed with his son’s desire to be a scientist instead of a businessman).

Admittedly, Lex did much more partying than attending class, quickly spinning out of control. He never failed a class, but... also had to spend two months in rehab after an overdose.

Lionel decided, five years later, that enough was enough and forced 21 year old Lex to come back to Kansas. Not to Metropolis, like Lex had assumed, but to be exiled to boring, middle of nowhere Smallville to run a LuthorCorp fertilizer plant as a punishment, Lionel having hopes that Lex might… shape up a little.

Upon arriving in Smallville, however, Lex wasted no time in accidentally crashing his Porsche into the river—only to be pulled out and resuscitated by a teenage boy, whose name happened to be Clark Kent.

Lex and Clark became fast friends, despite disapproval from both of their fathers, and despite Lex’s nagging feeling that Clark had been keeping secrets, lying to him all along. He set out, naturally, in search of the truth—was Clark one of the superhuman mutants that plagued the town due to the mysterious meteor shower? Was he something else entirely? Lex became obsessed. With Clark, with  the meteor rocks, with the super powers, obsessed with finding out the truth, and it was this obsession coupled with Clark’s need to protect his own secret at any costs that tore their friendship apart, as close as they had become.

Lex returned to Metropolis three years later, and took up a vice presidency at LuthorCorp while finishing his studies at Metropolis University. For the next few years he focused his energy on quietly expanding his own sphere of interest in LuthorCorp with the intention of dethroning Lionel, whose business practices had become a little too unsavory for Lex’s liking, and who also had no intention of handing the business over to his son.

One boardroom coup later, a livid Lionel Luthor was removed from his position as CEO and forced into an early retirement. Lex rebranded the company as LexCorp and cleaned up business practices considerably. It was around this time that the costumed entity the newspapers dubbed ‘Superman’ surfaced in Metropolis.

Where the citizens of Metropolis saw a savior, Lex saw the destruction of human potential. As Lex understood, it was the drive to be mythic that inspired greatness. It was inherently dangerous when something real became mythic, that we then lose the part of ourselves that yearns to be great. Because when faced with a myth? We can’t win.

The Justice League formed not too long after, and Lex found himself threatened by not only the Alien, but an entire organized council of superhuman beings that thought they had the right to govern humanity’s decisions, stifling the potential of mankind to rise up and handle any obstacle thrown at them. The League, Lex was certain, would mean the accidental destruction of the common man. A council of superhumans and aliens could not be trusted with this sort of power. Mankind, Lex maintained, should be responsible for itself. This was the main reason for his descent into supervillainy, and all his schemes to date have been directly targeted at the heroes, with as little civilian involvement as possible. There are risks Lex cannot afford to take.

Lex has also kept his name impeccably clean in the public eye. Lex being a supervillain is not common knowledge.

His most recent project is complicated to describe, and Lex won’t define it himself if asked. The Justice League, of course, assumes Lex was attempting to create a superweapon, cloning Superman like that. Lex disagrees with the word cloning, seeing as his DNA was also in the mix, but... how do you explain that this was one fucked up, last ditch effort to have a family? Anyway, a father-son supervillain team sounds stupid when you say it out loud. Lex lets them think what they want.

Interview

What would it take for you to switch sides? (hero to villain; villain to hero; neutral to either)

Lex laughs, actually laughs, and it’s silvery rather than malicious. There’s a knowing edge to his easy smile. He leans back, relaxed, amused rather than hostile--as he’s sure some of his villainous peers would be.

“You know, I don’t think the allegiance lines are as clear cut as they would have you think.” It’s just a touch dismissive. They, like a curse, it falls from his lips scornfully. “Their side has stooped to heinous acts too, haven’t they? Is it so hard to think those of us who oppose them are capable of good, too?”

If you ask Lex, nearly everything he does is good. Still, he plays along.

“If the world were in danger, I suppose. I couldn’t see myself not stepping in to protect my fellow man. It’s a shame, isn’t it, how often mankind gets caught in the crossfire of their cosmic disputes?”

And as playful as his tone is, there’s something hard and sharp underneath too.

How would you describe yourself? How would your friends describe you? How would the public describe you?

This is an easy one. He’s answered the same question dozens of times, magazine interview upon magazine interview, how does one define the famous Lex Luthor?

“Ruthless,” he throws out carelessly, that smile still playing at his mouth. Lex rarely looks out of place, never uncomfortable, never phased, never anything but put together and prepared for anything.

He’s a good actor. He has his dad to thank for that. Don’t get caught, don’t cause a scandal was the unofficial motto in the Luthor house, and Lex still finds himself repeating the words decades and decades later.

“I’m sure that’s one you’d hear from any side. Charismatic. Powerful. Intelligent. A gifted strategist. Sexy, if you read the magazine spreads,” and there’s another laugh here. “Of course, if you ask the Alien, I’m sure the description would run the gambit of morally corrupt, megalomaniac, power hungry. And several things it wouldn’t be polite to repeat. I won’t pretend not to be any of those things, but I’d also agree with the public assessment.”

If you could gain any superpower/swap your superpower for another, what would it be and why?

Swap your power for another? Well, if it were up to Lex, he’d have no power at all, as dependent as he’s become on his superhuman healing. He toys with the question in his head, debates on just flatly saying he wouldn’t take a superpower, but...

“I’ve always wondered what it’s like to fly,” Lex settles on finally, an odd tone to his voice, a shadow over his words. “When I was younger, I thought it would be the best thing. You read the comic books too, right? There was that superhero they milked the hell out of, Warrior Angel, and what kid doesn’t look up to some fictional hero and want cool superpowers like theirs? It’s funny, looking back on it. Kill your darlings, or so the phrase goes. Now, I’m more curious what it is he sees, looking down on this world like God above men.”

What is a secret you have never told someone?

This question gives him pause. Lex doesn’t particularly like giving away his secrets, but then, who does? Fine, he’ll throw them a bone. There’s a lot he could say without saying too much, omitting names and dates and identifying details.

“You know how they say you never forget your first love?” And any lingering genuine humor is gone from Lex’s voice now, just an amused sort of ruefulness lingering. “Would you believe I’m still hung up on mine, thirty years later? Maybe it’s the idea of him.” Actually, Lex is pretty sure that’s exactly it. When Lex thinks of him, it’s as that fifteen year old boy, certainly not the Alien.

Lungs full of water; a smile like the scorching sun glinting off the river; golden corn fields as far as the eye can see.

“I was in my twenties, he was a teenager. Our fathers hated each other. We were from completely different walks of life. All excellent reasons not to say anything about it, and I never did, but at the time I used to think I would have followed him anywhere, I would have done anything to keep him, even if it was just as a friend. Made it hurt like hell when he turned his back on me.”

If there was one choice in your past you could change, what would it be?

Lex’s eyes narrow slightly, a frown settling into the curve of his lips. He looks older, without the slight smile. He’s had a long life, a lot has happened to him. But if it’s only one thing he could change, one mistake...

“I would have been at Cadmus Labs they day they took my son,” and it’s about as cold as he ever gets in public these days, icy rather than a slight coolness. He’s made a point of doing that, referring to Kon that way, as his son--and Kon-El is an abhorrent name. Lex thinks of the would-be birth certificate, locked away in his desk with all the other forged papers that would have allowed the boy to legally exist. He was a Luthor by birthright, Lex is the one who wanted him, the one who created him with his own two hands, hours on end spent in the lab. “Perhaps I could have, ah, prevented their acquisition of Superboy.”

If you had one day where you could do anything you want, free of consequences, what would you do?

No doubt they’re expecting some grand scheme, the death of Superman perhaps, or a plot to dissolve the Justice League once and for all. The truth is far less exciting.

“I’d track down my father, wherever it is he’s retired to.” Lionel could be dead, for all Lex knows. He hasn’t gone searching for him, and anyway Lex is sure if he tried, Lionel would be trying to block him at any corner. He hasn’t spoken to his dad since the takeover. He’s not sure what he’d say, there’s always been too much unsaid between them, but it’s... it’s easier, looking back on this as an adult, to reconcile Lionel’s actions with the fact that despite everything, Lex did love his father.

Extras

Lex is half Mexican through his mother. He speaks Spanish (and several other languages) fluently, but his accent is slightly southern.

A few years ago, with some information stores stolen from Brainiac, Lex was able to crack the Kryptonian language and work out the rules of grammar and a vocabulary of a few thousand words. It hasn’t been especially useful yet, but half the fun was learning it in the first place.

Prior to being abducted for the Experiment, Lex had been drawing up plans to run for President in 2020, which is, incredibly, unrelated to his status as a supervillain.

He has a scar bisecting his upper lip from the single time Lionel hit his son--he had forgotten to take his wedding ring off. This is the only still visible scar on Lex’s body, as the rest of his injuries happened after gaining his healing mutation.

[spynotebook]

All Photos Courtesy Warner Bros.

Praise Zeus, Wonder Woman is finally here and it’s even better than we hoped it would be. While it’s a standout superhero film all on its own, there’s something inherently special for women to see Diana of Themyscira, an iconic female and feminist role model, onscreen for the first time.

io9's Katharine Trendacosta, Alex Cranz, Cheryl Eddy, and I sat down to discuss every aspect of this groundbreaking superhero film, including Steve Trevor’s role as a male ally, and what the film’s success could and should mean for the DC Expanded Universe. No boys allowed! (Except in the comments.)

Beth Elderkin: All right, ladies. Welcome to Themyscira! How’s everyone feeling?

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Katharine Trendacosta: I am feeling great and not like I need those hours back again, which is such a relief.

Cheryl Eddy: I agree with Katharine... I don’t think it was a perfect movie, but I had a really good time watching it.

Alex Cranz: Yeah, I was genuinely concerned before the premiere that people were so eager for a success for DC—and for women superheroes—that people were being unnecessarily kind to Diana. They were not! Her movie is good!

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Beth: I mean, it’s a huge deal. This is the first time we’ve gotten a superhero movie of this magnitude that stars a woman. Going beyond your experience as a moviegoer, or even as a comic book fan, how did it feel as a woman seeing this character in her own movie on this scale?

Cheryl: It was very satisfying.

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Alex: It’s not the first time. This is just the first good film.

Katharine: Yeah, I present to you... Catwoman.

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Beth: True, that movie did have a $100-million budget.

Alex: Katharine, no. Shh. But yes, Catwoman, Elektra, Supergirl, and Tank Girl, all comic lady movies. And all films that were disasters either critically, financially, or both.

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Katharine: It is shocking and upsetting, though, that all of those characters got movies before Wonder Woman.

Alex: But where Wonder Woman really sets itself apart is how gleefully violent it is. I love that this was a superpowered woman just fucking shit up for a big chunk of the film’s two-hour running time.

Cheryl: I think it was longer than two hours? That’s one of my few complaints, that it was too long. But that’s par for the course.

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Katharine: Yeah, I don’t know for sure what Zack Snyder was involved in, but that really long fight scene felt like the end of his last two DC Expanded Universe movies.

Alex: Only you could tell what was happening.

Beth: So, obviously we have to talk about the core of the film, Wonder Woman herself. I liked Gal Gadot in Batman v. Superman, though you don’t see much of her in it… but I’ll admit I was worried how she’d do in the starring role. But to me, she was Wonder Woman, mind, body, and soul. I was thoroughly impressed. What about y’all?

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Cheryl: I thought she nailed it, really and truly.

Katharine: It was a good idea not to go with a really recognizable actor for this.

Cheryl: Completely agree.

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Alex: Gadot has so much damn charm.

Katharine: I loved that they made the other Amazons mimic her accent, instead of making her get rid of hers.

Cheryl: ME TOO OMG.

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Alex: It was a true delight. And I liked how young Wonder Woman was for much of this film.

Beth: One thing I loved about Gadot’s performance was how earnest it was. Diana was innocent but not naive. Like that scene in the street, where she’s taking everything in with a combination of disgust and wonder… and then she spots the baby!

Katharine: I liked that moment and I thought they did just the right amount of fish-out-of-water stuff. It would have been really easy to go overboard on that stuff.

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Beth: Which would’ve fallen into the “Born Sexy Yesterday” trope.

Katharine: Or just turned this movie into Thor.

Beth: What were your favorite fish-out-of-water moments?

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Cheryl: I liked the shopping scene with Etta Candy, and also when she sees snow for the first time.

Katharine: It’s the baby moment for me.

Alex: I just loved her entirely foreign concept of war and why it was waged. It was so beautifully naive, like you wanted to wrap her up and kind of protect her from the awfulness of the world... until she beat a man with a tank.

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Beth: This is the first DCEU movie where the lead character is allowed to be joyful. And it feels so overdue.

Katharine: Joyful, but the movie wasn’t devoid of darkness. It actually balanced that stuff.. My god, why did it take this long?

Alex: Because girls are icky, Katharine.

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Beth: Anyone else feel an extra tinge of happiness when Diana spared Doctor Poison? Different circumstances than Man of Steel, but still… I don’t think I’ll ever be okay with Superman murdering Zod.

Alex: Completely different! And I mean, Diana kills people.

Katharine: I’m sorry, Beth, I was busy getting mad that they had decided Diana was the Goddess of Love instead.

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Alex: Let’s talk about the erasure of Greek goddesses in this film. Because Diana has always been an embodiment of the Pantheon right?

Katharine: And specifically truth.

Alex: But this film kills them off screen, and never acknowledges that she’s supposed to be representative of all of them. Instead, she’s just another god.

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Beth: I mean, she’s technically the last one right? If Ares is dead now.

Alex: Apparently!

Beth: I don’t know if I’d classify her as a love goddess. Her strength came from her love—not for Steve, though that was surely part of it—but it was her love of humanity and her need to do the right thing.

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Katharine: I’m still mad, because Hollywood has one setting for goddesses and it’s always love.

Alex: Whatever Katharine, I loved her line about love. I didn’t interpret it as her being the Goddess of Love, but simply as her saying there are alternatives to war.

Katharine: I gave them the first moment, but once they went back to that well, I was very worried.

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Cheryl: I wasn’t mad at that, but I think it’s because my first exposure to Wonder Woman was the 1970s TV show, and it’s there in the theme: “Stop a war with love.”

Alex: Well, I think they make it very clear she’s a goddess of compassion... of compassionate love.

Beth: Exactly, being a goddess of love and a goddess of compassion are two different things. Love just has fewer syllables.

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Alex: Yeah, her saying compassion would not have had the same impact.

Beth: Let’s shift gears for a bit and talk about Steve Trevor. I loved Steve in this film, and Chris Pine’s performance was, in my opinion, kinda revelatory. I’d argue this might be one of the best portrayals of a male feminist ally that we’ve ever seen in a mainstream film—especially a superhero film.

Katharine: I forgot that Chris Pine was that charming. He’s basically just been famous for doing a great Shatner take for so long, I actually forgot there was another actor there.

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Alex: I confess to hating Chris Pine for over a decade, so I was really surprised to like him in this. He knew when to take a back seat.

Katharine: He’s leaped ahead in the Chris rankings.

Beth: Oh, he’s miles ahead of Chris Pratt for me now. It’s almost like the two of them have had a Freaky Friday situation, where Pratt is the typical leading man dick and Pine is the supportive male hero.

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Katharine: Chris Evans better keep an eye out. When Pine tried to seduce Doctor Poison, I was like, “Yes. This is your role, Steve.” Diana does the fighting, you are the Honey Trap.

Beth: And he did such a good job of it too. I love how he wasn’t bumbling or incapable, nor was he cocky about his skills.

Katharine: Or all angsty about it.

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Alex: He was that hyper-competent love interest that usually falls in love with Chris Pratt.

Beth: That “shield” moment in No Man’s Land was my absolute favorite in the entire film. Steve wasn’t forcing Diana to change her fighting style to suit his needs—he recognized what she needed and provided it for her, no questions asked or thanks needed.

Alex: I mean, Steve had his moment of fuckery, but I loved that Diana was immediately like, “I AM DONE WITH YOU.”

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Katharine: The fact that their conflict was based pretty much entirely on them having different world views actually made it interesting. Rather than him being, “The world looks like this, put this dress on and shut up.”

Beth: He recognizes that just because his worldview is different doesn’t make it more right than hers. In fact, he knows that his world is screwed up.

Katharine: I did love that for once it was the dude’s backstory that was cut. Because he briefly mentions having run from the war for too long and then says something like maybe he and the rest of humanity doesn’t deserve to be saved. Like, clearly there was something in his past they meant to bring up to make that hit home better, but, eh. He’s just Steve Trevor, so who cares.

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Beth: I kind of like it better without it. I feel like I knew just enough about him to understand his conflict.

Alex: You know what was really revelatory about Steve Trevor? The moment she saves him from the plane. Any other film it would have been his story from then on. It would have been about him using these women to win the war, and teaching them how everything was different. And the movie never ever ever went that direction.

Beth: That reminds me of my next big talking point: Patty Jenkins’ direction. In particular, how she handles “The Gaze.” There are a lot of shots in here that could and likely would have been exploited for titillation in the hands of another director, like Zack Snyder with Sucker Punch. But I admired how Jenkins handled the fight scenes and choreography, as well as Wonder Woman’s superhero poses. Jenkins didn’t subvert the male gaze, apart from the Chris Pine bathing scene, because she didn’t need to. She simply made it not matter.

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Alex: This was not a sexual movie at all—despite some Grade-A off-screen banging. We never see unbridled lust on screen.

Beth: To me, and this might sound weird on its face, the movie felt like the difference between stripping and burlesque. Both of them have similar elements, but they serve different purposes. A character like Catwoman in The Dark Knight Rises is shot one way, focusing on her assets for the audience, but Wonder Woman was thankfully never exploited. Her body wasn’t hidden, it was celebrated—as well as her looks, because come on, she’s a gorgeous woman—but it was on her terms and for her purposes, not for the male audience. And I think Jenkins was a big part of that.

Alex: I know a lot of people were concerned about Jenkins because her last film was small and not about action at all. But the woman shot really good action and it wasn’t just all in the hands of animators. I mean the final fight is just a cartoon, but the Amazons versus the Germans was not!

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Cheryl: Her direction of the actors, especially Gadot’s performance, as well as the “moments” like the baby and the fight with the shield, were great.

Katharine: This was a movie which embraced the simplicity of its story for the sake of its characters.

Alex: I think we’re gonna see a lot of comparisons, inevitably, to Snyder, and what I loved is Jenkins can actually direct actors and bring emotion into a film. But she also can nail those loving straight from a picture book shots that are Snyder’s bag. She out Snyder’d Snyder in the best possible way.

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Beth: Snyder’s contribution to the film appears to have worked out well, as a story creator and producer, and his recruitment of Gadot was spot-on. I feel like putting him in the director’s chair is where the problems arise, as well as when his direction overly inspires other films in the franchise.

Alex: No doubt that final fight was in the works long before the film was tinkered with, but you can see Warner Bros/DC’s attempt to keep Wonder Woman from being as dour as Batman v Superman. Like the great ice cream gag—that’s a moment that was clearly shot after the rest of the film to brighten things up. And it worked.

Katharine: Ice cream and superheroes have been a fruitful pairing in live-action.

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Alex: If Batman v. Superman had to happen so we could get Wonder Woman enjoying an ice cream cone, I am okay with that.

Beth: Speaking of awesome scenes: No Man’s Land.

Cheryl: People in the theater were cheering so much.

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Beth: I love how Steve’s like, “You can’t go over there, it’s No Man’s Land.” And Wonder Woman basically replies, “I AM NO MAN!” I’ve seen people saying that might go down as one of the best scenes in a superhero film we’ve ever gotten, and honestly, I agree.

Alex: It didn’t end! It was a constant WONDER WOMAN SMASH, which is all I wanted.

Beth: I never wanted it to end!

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Alex: Though admittedly things slowed down so much immediately afterwards that I got a little whiplash. There was a pacing problem in the script that the director just couldn’t resolve.

Beth: I don’t know, I liked the drinks and dancing. It made the tragic bombing of the town so much worse.

Alex: I liked it, but I still felt a little snoozy.

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Beth: What else do you wish had been done differently? My biggest beef was Ares, because I didn’t feel like the big reveal was earned.

Alex: Ares is a bad villain rooted in Christian symbology that makes no sense, but that’s a comic problem.

Katharine: I liked the shape of the villain. Yes, the weird Christian-Greek mashup is a comics problem and I don’t like that, but I actually did like the idea of Ares not being who we thought. I didn’t like... his entire speech at the end.

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Alex: You know what was actually bad about all the Greco-Roman stuff is how firmly they shut the door on all of it. Diana is banished from Paradise Island, her entire god family is dead, it’s just done. Now she basically exists for Justice League.

Katharine: The best thing about this film is that it stands on its own almost entirely, unfettered from the baggage of the rest of the DCEU.

Cheryl: Setting it years in the past was a good choice.

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Alex: Yeah, it didn’t fall into the Captain America: The First Avenger trap. Ares didn’t even do a “worse is coming” death croak.

Cheryl: I get why they framed the story with the photo seen in BvS, so I was okay with it even though it was so obvious.

Katharine: The fact that Bruce Wayne wasn’t literally there was nice. Honestly, I kept expecting the camera at the end to pull out and the rest of the goddamn Justice League to be sitting there listening.

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Beth: I’m so glad it didn’t.

Katharine: So glad.

Beth: I’m also glad there were no post-credits scenes. I don’t care about the rest of the Justice League, I only care about Diana.

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Alex: Well, I care about Aquaman.

Beth: I’m hoping I do, too.

Cheryl: Same.

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Beth: Speaking of which, how does this movie make you feel about the future of the DC Expanded Universe?

Cheryl: Will that future include Wonder Woman 2? Because otherwise...

Alex: It better.

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Katharine: I think that this is proof that the DCEU should have been doing standalone movies with other directors the whole time.

Beth: I’m honestly shaky about Justice League. I already feel like it could be a lost cause, and we’re simply having to look beyond it at this point. The trailer gave me little confidence.

Katharine: Yeah, I’m mostly looking forward to Aquaman. He and Wonder Woman are the ones having the most fun in the Justice League trailer.

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Alex: I have hope. Slap a Blue Lantern Ring on Diana, because Wonder Woman gave me hope that the ship can be righted, and we can get some good damn movies out of the best superhero comics.

Beth: This has been so awesome, and I’m hoping/betting this movie does well enough to keep DCEU going on the right path… with a sequel. In closing, what one word would you use to describe Wonder Woman? Mine is “refreshing.”

Katharine: “Punchy,” in both senses of the word.

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Cheryl Eddy: “Love!” Just kidding... I would say “entertaining.”

Alex: She fucks.

[aion-rsa]

Zack Snyder’s Justice League: Why It’s Better Than the Joss Whedon Cut

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This article contains spoilers for zack snyder’s justice league.

The long-awaited Snyder Cut is here at last. After nearly four years of rumors, innuendos, hints, allegations, online harassment, and everything else that’s good and bad about fandom, Zack Snyder’s Justice League has been willed into existence by the filmmaker and his legions of fans.

Four hours long–one for each year you’ve had to endure the clamor of Snyder acolytes demanding the filmmaker’s vision be restored–Zack Snyder’s Justice League is the ultimate version of the movie that Snyder never completed in 2017. Instead the version of the film that reached theaters was a truncated, patched-together mess that nearly stopped the DC cinematic universe in its tracks.

If you detect a bit of snark in the preceding paragraph, you’re not off-base. The very notion that a vocal contingent of fans could make enough noise to actually get a version of a piece of art or entertainment in their preferred format opens a proverbial Pandora’s box. Everyone treats whenever fans sign online petitions to get movies, television finales, or the like remade as jokes. But a cynic might wonder if the Snyder Cut gets us closer to that happening.

There is of course a key difference between Snyder finishing his passion project and other flair ups between fans and creators: The Justice League that came out in 2017 was a Frankenstein’s Monster of a movie, with half of the finished picture rewritten and reshot by a director (Joss Whedon) with a completely different tone and approach. This occurred after Snyder had to abandon it due to a terrible family tragedy–which, in the most cynical version of this tale, the studio (Warner Bros.) saw as an opportunity to hijack the film and retool it to their liking.

So now that Zack Snyder’s Justice League is a thing, with the original director restoring hours of footage that he shot (and adding some freshly filmed material at the end) while throwing out everything he didn’t, there is one question that burns as fiercely and brightly as the raging eyes of Darkseid himself: Is it better than the 2017 theatrical version, aka the Whedon Compromise?

The answer is unequivocally yes.

Now that doesn’t automatically make ZSJL a good film. Nor does it necessarily make the Whedon version a wholly bad one–but there’s no question that the 2017 version suffers greatly and is diminished by comparison. In fact, it’s almost not fair to call that version the “Whedon” one; regardless of the man’s personal controversies, it seems apparent that he was put in an almost impossible position when he was recruited to finish Justice League back then.

Whedon was tasked by the studio to make a movie more like his own The Avengers out of material that couldn’t be more different in terms of tone, visual style, pacing, and structure. He was also asked to recreate what Marvel had taken six movies to do: introduce and assemble a team of superheroes all in a single film and in less than two hours (minus credits). And he did that by stitching together footage that was already shot by a different director with scenes that he had to craft almost on the fly, all with a desperate, panicking studio breathing down his neck. Whedon could have summoned Scorsese, Coppola, and the ghosts of Hitchcock and Kubrick to help him solve it and it still might have defeated him.

The result was a movie that was the soulless, corporate product that critics accuse all Hollywood blockbusters, particularly superhero movies, of being–but which most are decidedly not. Whedon’s own The Avengers is proof that a studio can make a heartfelt, earnest, charming, and still awe-inspiring spectacle with the right people, story, and vision in place. The vision behind 2017’s Justice League–which does have its lively moments and does benefit in some ways from better pacing (but is ultimately hurt more by its shortened running time)–is a vision only of bottom lines and quarterly profits.

So, yes, ZSJL is the better movie. For one thing, it’s clearly a personal work. Whatever one thinks of Snyder’s directorial vision and peculiar take on superheroes, it’s all there on the screen and unashamedly his, just as Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and, to a lesser extent, Man of Steel were. The fact that the DC film franchise has long moved past his approach doesn’t necessarily factor into ZSJL. It stands alone.

On its own terms, it hits all the marks that Snyder probably wanted to hit. The story and several of the characters are developed much more than they ever were in the 2017 edition. True, a lot of exposition is needed to make that story more cohesive and complete than it was before, but there are plenty of new visuals to go along with that foundation building as well. There is much more representation here of the full breadth of the DC universe, from ancient gods to Jack Kirby’s Fourth World.

The back story of Darkseid and the Mother Boxes, and the first battle for Earth with the Atlanteans, the Amazons, and everyone else somehow seems better articulated and executed. The connective tissue joining Darkseid’s quest to that of his lackey Steppenwolf–tying it all to the death of Superman, whose removal from the board cleared the way for Steppenwolf to return–is strengthened. Bruce Wayne’s quest to put together the team to defend the planet takes longer and has more steps to it, making it feel like much more of a challenge than it did four years ago.

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Some of that team are given much better treatment this time, with Victor Stone/Cyborg getting the most out of the deal. He truly does become the heart of the picture in many ways, getting two extensive flashbacks that are equal parts elegant and clumsy but do a lot to round out a character who was little more than a special effect in 2017.

Ray Fisher’s performance is assured and graceful, and one can now see why he is so angry about what happened with the theatrical cut: it’s quite possible that some backroom studio committee meeting came up with a variation of “we can’t have an unknown take up so much space in a movie starring Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman.”

Ezra Miller’s Barry Allen/the Flash also has more to do than make jokes, although the much-ballyhooed introduction of Iris West (Kiersey Clemons) is little more than a walk-on, seen once and never heard from again (there’s a bit of that going around in this picture). Similarly, Lois Lane’s grief over the death of Clark/Superman is explored with somewhat more depth, although an otherwise poignant scene between her and Martha Kent (Diane Lane) is nearly ruined by a pointless twist.

Aquaman (Jason Momoa) and Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot) are less developed here, and their characterizations clash with what we’ve seen since in their standalone movies. There is a much more melancholy resonance to the absence of and longing for Superman. And although he’s still no Thanos in terms of complexity and nuance, Steppenwolf at least has a clearer motivation in this film. He just wants to get back on the boss’ good side, which kind of makes him weirdly amusing in a movie notable for its almost complete lack of humor.

All the banter that Whedon wrote and shot–the flirting between Bruce and Diana on the plane, Aquaman sitting on the Lasso of Truth–is gone. There are still some laugh lines in the movie, but ZSJL is as self-serious and grimdark as Snyder’s previous two DC entries. That makes it feel heavy-handed, as does Snyder’s deployment of agonizing slow-motion for so many scenes that it feels like he could have lost an hour just by speeding up the film. The colors are murky, mostly brown and gray, and while a number of visual effects are pulled off handsomely and seamlessly, this is supposed to feel mythic but ends up feeling just artificial more often than not.

But most importantly, the story and characters in this Justice League are still ill-served by the way the film was conceived in the first place. Even though our heroes are overall given more to do, this is still a movie that has to introduce three of those heroes, their backstories, and their worlds in one fell swoop. There’s no sense of culmination or victory in seeing them together, like there was in The Avengers. And in the end, Steppenwolf’s pursuit of three magic boxes just doesn’t carry the entire four hours.

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Zack Snyder’s Justice League: A History of Steppenwolf

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For all the world-building that Snyder (and screenwriter Chris Terrio) do, the placement of the “Knightmare” epilogue and its Joker cameo undermine everything that has come before, and undermine the character of Superman again. By the time the movie’s ending rolls around, Snyder is still basically saying that our heroes are going to keep letting us down–especially poor Superman, who’s going to turn evil in the future after being killed off and brought back once already as a rage monster. The addition of a Martian Manhunter cameo (his second!) at the very end is also superfluous, pointless fan service.

It certainly seems as if Snyder put every scrap of footage he shot into this version of his magnum opus, and perhaps that is what it took to give him closure, both for the film and for the unspeakable loss he endured while making it (there is a poignancy now to the movie’s major plot point of trying to bring back someone from the dead). But just because he could do it doesn’t mean he should have. Incredible as it seems, there may be an even better two-and-a-half or even three-hour cut of this Justice League that we’ll never see.

As it stands though, this one we now have will be the one spoken about in the years to come. Meanwhile the 2017 version will fade into history as an oddity. And that is, in the final analysis, the way it should be.

Zack Snyder’s Justice League is now streaming on HBO Max.

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