#and do cool comics and a fun story arc

[misiahasahardname]

interrupted

inspired by this lovely post:

[problemswithbooks]

BNHA Ch. 429

So, I guess Toga is dead, and people are losing it.

I get why people liked her--she was actually queer, being pan/bisexual. She was representation for them and that's rare in shonen manga. But here's the thing--she was bad representation at best and insulting at worst. Nor do I think she was made queer because Hori really wanted to represent a queer girl. Himiko was always the author's poorly hidden fetish--she just was. She liked girls as much as boys because Hori wanted to draw a girl touching sexually on another girl. You can see this in how he draws her and Ochako in solo pics together.

I mean, people seem to understand this when it comes to Momo and her outfit being overly sexual or that both Himiko and Hagakure's Quirks either leave them naked or they have to be naked to use them. These are excuses to draw girls in a sexual manner. Himiko being into other girls is the same thing and that's the kindest interpretation.

Given how Himiko acts and her Quirk being heavily coded sexual desire, and therefore her use of it against someone unwilling being sexual assault, it could just being playing into harmful stereotypes of predatory gays.

As a queer person myself I just found Toga insulting. She was designed to be overly sexual and give the male author a female character that he could draw being suggestive with his other female characters. When he did flesh out her character, her backstory was eventually the trope/fear of straight people, that gay people will be so overcome with their lust that they end up sexually assaulting them.

In the end Ochako accepts this part of Toga and says she'll giver her blood forever, but as much as a lot of readers took that that as some deep lesbian confession, for me it really fell flat. Hori never really gave any of the main kids time to actually learn about their villain or show how that changed their minds toward them. Shoto only works because Touya is his brother (even though he admits he barely remembers him). But Ochako goes from not thinking of Toga at all pre-first war, to one thought about her during her speech, to suddenly caring about her so much she--given how Toga's quirk is coded, is willing to essentially fulfill Toga's kink for the rest of their lives.

It's weird and it comes out of nowhere. It's made even stranger because Toga doesn't actually change or show remorse for anything she did, which included personally hunting and murdering people before she joined the LOV. None of the death and destruction she is also partially responsible for is brought up either, something that Ochako was rightfully upset about during the first war when less people and property had been destroyed. Ochako just accepts everything about her suddenly and her past serious crimes are forgotten so they can cuddle and cry.

Am I shocked Toga died--a little. I didn't think Hori would have the guts to kill off a young girl character, especially one that he clearly got a lot of joy drawing in sexy poses. But at the same time, once he killed off Shigaraki and ended Touya's story with his slow death, I'm not surprised he went the same route with Toga.

This isn't Naruto--Hori isn't really kind to characters that do something wrong, especially if they don't try and change. Enji, Bakugo, Hawks, and Aoyama all sort of got punished for what they did. Enji is the worst off, being permanently crippled, missing an arm and burned everywhere. Bakugo's hand is damaged, his heart weaker, plus he feels bad that Izuku lost his Quirk so they can't compete the same way he wanted them to. Aoyama, despite doing way less wrong and even helping his class during the forest raid, still leaves school because he doesn't feel he earned being there yet. Hawks lost his Quirk and even though him running the HPSC could be seen as good for him, Hawks always wanted a break, but now he has one of the most time consuming and stressful jobs out there.

So, if this is what characters who actively did good things and even changed and fought to be better get, what would characters who never changed and never did anything positive for anyone but their friends/themselves get?

Before the last Arc started, when so many people said the LoV were 100% going to be redeemed I had doubts and always thought it wouldn't make sense with how the story presented redemption or treated other non-LoV villains in the past. That if the main LoV did get some happy ending where they were bffs with the main cast it would clash with how other characters had been treated.

That doesn't mean that I think how Shigaraki, Toga, and Touya ended up in the manga was well done. I think their endings fit far better then a last minute redemption would have, but at the same time you can feel how rushed everything has been since the end of the first war arc. Hori was done with this story months if not years ago, yet he was contractually obligated to finish it. Because of that I think he left out as much as possible. As much as I think he's written some pretty obsessive stuff, particularly towards women, I can't really fully blame him cutting corners or the story being shit at the end.

We know Manga authors, particularly those that work with Jump are treated like shit. That they suffer incredibly long hours at times not even getting to go home for days. We've gotten messages for Hori saying he's sick quite a few times. On top of that, weekly story telling is not a great way to tell a cohesive narrative. Ideas probably change week to week or at least month to month and you can't go back and change the last chapter no matter how much you need or want to. Then you remember he also gave a lot of ideas to the people who made the movies, which would also change his plans for how he wanted the main story to go.

The story is bad--it has been for a while, but I think a lot of people put their hopes on their favorite characters getting a happy ending, even when there were signs that probably wasn't going to be the case. I know how much it sucks when a character you love gets a shitty ending (Stain was my fav, but he got an absolute dogshit ending) but at least, knowing what I know about the industry I can't really blame Hori the way I see some other people doing. Criticize it, sure, but saying Hori hates his readers or is horrible writer isn't true. BNHA was popular for a reason--he's great with characters and the beginning of the story had some great pacing. We'll never know, but I wouldn't be surprised if BNHA could have been amazing if Hori had been treated better and the story hadn't needed a chapter every week.

If anything BNHA has taught me how much a story suffers when authors/artists are treated like crap and forced to work past burnout.

[snekdood]

ok so i watched the new avatar show (yes obviously thats what my post earlier was about, duh,i wanted to watch it before sharing my thoughts) and it was. iight.

[kathaynesart]

TIP JAR (every little bit is appreciated!)

R E P L I C A

LATEST UPDATE

COMIC: ARC 1 - Boot(y)ing Up - 1 - 2 -  ARC 2 - The Spark - 1 - 2 - ARC 3 - Forgiveness - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - ARC 4 - Probing - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10 - 11 - ARC 5 - Distractions and Dilemmas - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - INTERMISSION - Checkmate - 1 -  HOLIDAY SPECIAL - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8

ANIMATICS: The Funny One Not Dead High Five

EXTRAS: Replica Timeline Future Donnie Design Omega Design (SPOILER) No Love for You Processing Stupidity Peepaw Paradox Peepaw Paradise Peepaw Showdown 1 Peepaw Showdown 2 Peepaw Showdown 3 Peepaw Showdown 4 TMNT AU Competition 1 TMNT AU Competition 2 TMNT AU Competition 3 TMNT AU Competition 4 TMNT AU Competition 5 Feral Leo 1 Feral Leo 2 Cass and Replica Reunion 1 Cass and Replica Reunion 2 (not my art) Cass and Replica Reunion 3 (not my art) Cass and Replica Reunion 4 (not my art) Cass and Replica Reunion 5 Bootyyyshaker GIF Leo PUNCH Donnie’s Eyebrows Handsome Future Donnie

INFO: Donnie’s Scars

MERCH: Processing/Displaying Stupidity ROTTMNT General Upcoming

Finally have an official cover and title!  There were some REALLY good guesses as to what the title could have been, but I can at least explain my reasons why I went with Replica.  TLDR you can still call it Future Booty Shaker if you want. Usual info dump below: 

 There are several reasons why I chose Replica as the final name.  The most obvious being that Omega is Donnie’s blatant attempt at replicating himself in digital form.

The second being that this comic is in itself is an attempt at replicating the vibe and setup of the film’s opening as closely as possible.  Those first 4:05 have literally become the bible for this story and I have already had to make vast changes based off of tiny details that weren’t noticed until later on.  

Ironically the cut full opening just dropped today and I do have some feelings I’d like to address.  It’s obvious how substantially different the two openings are from each other.  As cool as it was to see everyone kicking butt, I will admit I still like the final version a lot better.  Sure it’s shorter, but it felt far more personal and intimate than the action packed cut version, and THAT’S the sort of vibe I want to replicate in this comic.

At its core, this isn’t a story about fighting a bunch of Krang, it’s a story about a family fighting their own personal battles before an apocalyptic backdrop and Replica is a vain attempt at retaining that feeling while building a story around it. Will I be successful?  Who knows.  I will definitely be drawing reference from the cut boards especially the appearance of their colony.  I’m happy my hunch was right that they were stationed beneath the Statue of Liberty, that was already a part of my story haha.

My runner up title would have been “Fall of the TMNT” however I felt it was a little too on the nose.  Though it did make for a fun dichotomy with “Rise of the TMNT”s title.   Anyways that’s my info dump.  Feel free to still hashtag Future Bootyyy Shaker, I know I will.

[olderthannetfic]

Until I read the comments on that one post I had no idea the Bechdel Test was a joke and wasn't supposed to be a serious measuring stick by which you gauged if something was feminist or not. Everywhere I'd ever heard it brought up, it was brought up as a very serious thing, and it was a failure of media if it didn't pass it. I remember the debate about Mako Mori from Pacific Rim and if she was a character you were "allowed" to like as a progressive person despite the fact that Pacific Rim doesn't pass the Bechdel Test, the discourse, the discussion of if the director was sexist for not writing in another woman for her to chat with about non-men related stuff, the camp of people trying to insist that having a fully realized character arc and being as developed as any of the male leads = good writing even if she doesn't talk to another girl...

And I've also had the remark about my writing not passing the test, just not to my face. I searched my fanfic's name once, curious to see if anyone was discussing it outside of tumblr and AO3, and found a Tiktok complaining about it not passing the Bechdel Test. The top comment was "motherfucker YOU don't pass the test but we still watch your ass". I cackled and moved on, but neither the commenter, poster, nor I had any awareness this wasn't Feminist Media Critique 101 theory and was, in fact, a goof.

Right now there's a segment of fandom debating if Blue Eye Samurai is feminist since when Mizu and Akemi talk, they do bring up men, since, y'know. Women aren't considered people with rights in their era in Japan and thus it's something they mention instead of only talking about being cool girlboss badasses who never bring up gender. If something doesn't pass the Bechdel Test, a smug segment of the internet high-fives itself and congratulates one another on being More Feminist Than Thou.

They then get really angry if you disagree, even though by this metric, Sleeping Beauty (the original animated one, where Aurora has only 16 lines of dialogue) is more feminist than Blue Eye Samurai.

--

*DYING*

Okay, so, nonnie....

Dykes to Watch Out For (1983-2008) was a long-running comic and major piece of lesbian media. I grew up buying compiled volumes at the bookstore. To be honest, that kind of 90s-ish lesbian culture isn't really my scene despite me being bi, but it was very nice to have this slice of life-y somewhat realistic, occasionally somewhat parody, look at the queer communities around me. It's up there with Tales of the City for me in terms of being a window into a particular culture and time and place.

If anybody is interested in queer history, in addition to looking up factual info, I think a read of the complete Dykes would give a really good overview of how people were thinking about things and what issues came up a lot. You'll see things like Barnes & Noble increasingly putting feminist bookstores out of business in the 90s, attitudes towards porn in lesbian circles—all kinds of cultural issues of the day.

I drifted away as I got later in my teens and found more genre fiction I cared about, but at one point, this comic was a very welcome antidote to the glurgey coming out stories that made up a lot of the more realistic media.

Anyway, here's the comic itself, reproduced in its entirety because I think it's important to actually understand the context.

This is from 1985, so the era of Rambo, Conan, and Death Wish, each of which you can see being made fun of here. It's based on Bechdel's friend Liz Wallace's actual rule for seeing movies.

That's it. That's the origin of this whole stupid test.

"LOL, fuck 80s action movies". That's it. That's the joke.

The fact that blockbusters still routinely fail to pass in the 2020s is shameful, but that was never the point of the strip.

[mono-dot-jpeg]

child! reader w/blade, yanqing, natasha, & gepard

summary; thoughts being thunk about cute scenarios with child! reader

genre/extra tags; fluff, blade is probably ooc, don't give blade a child, yanqing being a big brother, yanqing and reader gang up on jingyuan, natasha my beloved, gepard big brother arc, but gepard is an awkward big brother, whoops my hand slipped now there's angst (natasha's part), blade wants to punt a kid (/hj)

[gender neutral! reader] [child 7-9! reader] [platonic]

[warnings; implied for reader to be heavily sick often (natasha)]

a/n; *smacks my head* this baby holds loads of child!reader ideas, thanks to their family being the way their family is. good ol' trauma. you didn't pick any characters in particular other than just non-express crew characters. hope you enjoy

it's a fucking miracle that you're even standing next to this man. kafka just had to give you to him. luckily, blade is less violent than he looks. and luckily for you, you hold no fear.

"you look ugly like that." you point at him, your tiny finger inching a little too close to his eye. "why do you look like that?" kafka stifles a laugh as she watches from afar.

"i can't believe i want to punt a child." he mutters. "i don't know, why do you look like that?" he retaliates.

"look like what? ms. kafka says i'm cute!" your hand goes limp to rest on your lap.

"you are anything but cute, you devil spawn."

you gasped, "ms. kafka! blade is being mean!" you get up to run to the woman, who is laughing silently. "he called me a devil spawn... whatever that means!"

"it means you're tiny. and stupid." blade says, watching as you hide behind kafka's leg.

"no, you're stupid!" you stick your tongue out at him.

"you little sh-"

"curse jar!"

"yannie!" you cheered loudly.

"y/n!" he cheers back. you run to him as he picks you up. "do you want to walk around today?" you nodded. "let's go get some allowance from the general first!"

"jing!" you and yanqing arrive at the general's office.

"if it isn't our little cloud knight." jingyuan watches as the young blonde puts you down to go run at him. "i could only wonder what you are doing here with yanqing."

"i wan' to explore with yanqing!" you climb up jingyuan's legs as he watches with a fond gaze.

"is that so?"

you nodded, "but me 'n yan need help." jingyuan looks at you confused before turning to look at yanqing.

"we need some money, general..." jingyuan raises an eyebrow, glancing at you who shows him puppy eyes. and then yanqing tries to play off his ask with an innocent grin.

jingyuan can't help but sigh, "for a lieutenant and a little cloud knight, you two sure are sly." he smiles gently.

"you think we can annoy serval?" an impish grin starts to grow on your face.

"we really shouldn't do that." gepard chides you. you groan.

"but i'm so bored! she's got cool ga- gad-gets."

"gadgets."

"yeah! i wanna see them! i wanna watch serval work!"

"she's probably busy, y/n." you huffed as you struggled in gepard's arms, "stop it!"

"what can we do then?" you pouted. "what do you wanna do?"

awkward silence...

"my idea is better! let's go see big sis!" you tug on his clothes as if it would anything to make him move faster.

"how about we make something for serval? wouldn't that be fun?"

"hm? making something like a gad-gets?"

"gadget. yeah, maybe something like that. or we can draw something for her, and she can put it up somewhere."

"yeah, let's do that!" you cheered, walking alongside gepard and putting your hand in his.

it's no doubt that your parents would leave you in the care of the nicer-est nurse in town (your words, not hers). even if you were a not so amazing state, you can't help but still be happy.

"i think you're a superhero, ms. natasha. i wanna make a story about you!" you've always been a creative soul, it was one of the few things you can do with being bedridden for days on end. writing was a favorite. but you really liked making comics.

"i'm just doing my job, dear. i think you should make a story about yourself." natasha speaks with fondness as she distracts you from getting a shot. "you're just as strong as a hero." her voice is bittersweet but you don't notice it.

"how about i make a story about us? we can be the best-est heroes in the world!" you beamed at your own genius suggestion. "i can be your sidekick!"

"i would love to see that story someday." she smiles. "i know it will be amazing as always." she places a band aid where your shot was taken. her thumb brushes over it once, then again. "i'll even put it up by your bed. framed and everything."

she just hopes you live to see another day.

[galactic-rhea]

The thing with Anakin TCW is that I try to reconcille both "versions" of Anakin, but because I keep in mind that at the end of the day, TCW is a serialized kids show, and he's also a general and in charge of a padawan so he must be really charismatic for that to work (long rambling ahead)

This show came in an era where shows ran long, with very random plots per episode and just very few that advanced "a plot", so characters that are new for the show get more development (since they were at zero), and Anakin with already three movies (technically 6 if we count the original trilogy), a mini series, and a bunch of books and comics, feels more flat for the very short narrative purposes.

The way i see it, TCW can be like seeing Anakin from someone's else eyes, like that's probably how Obi-Wan and Ahsoka and Rex saw him, cocky and sassy and fearless and daring and untouchable and cool and sometimes with anger coming from apparently nowhere, and the movies are the actual "omnipresent" look, we see how actually deeply fucked up and scared Anakin is!

TCW gives like a very pink tinted glasses view of him, a very standarized version of him, since the "otherness" that he has in the prequels was really hated (and with otherness i mean that he acts alienated and tormented, is because of the trauma, but also because he can be so easily read as neurodivergent and/or queer; movie Anakin looks like he might as well be a giant walking target for bullying, so to speak), so TCW Anakin looks like he totally would have never ever been bullied, he's the cool kid.

If I don't constantly keep on mind this is probably Ahsoka's POV, it can be a bit hard to connect, like the last episodes in TCW, when he sees Ahsoka, he's like 2 days before ROTS, and he looks so cheerful and normal and sassy, but then if you look at ROTS, he looks so tired and beaten up and just depressed after that battle. But Anakin, in AOTC and ROTS, in general, is a person that looks like doesn't even want to be there at all, he looks like he would rather turn invisible.

I don't have that many problems with Anakin in TCW except for certain arcs (looking at you clovis), because many things in the show do add to Anakin's narrative and character (or more like, pilling up even more trauma onto him for the big moment), but it's not a complete look because by the point we should see how he's dealing or coping with something the episode ends and the next episode is about something different. TCW is plot focused and there are very little "breathing" moments before the action, and is not very character focused. Which leaves the audience with the task of remembering that whatever happened in the show is another piece of the puzzle that may or may not fit perfectly with the character that was presented on the prequels.

"This episode very painfully reminds you that he was a slave, and he's angry about it, very angry...for one bit of the episode, let's go back to the fun action." It touches it, but it doesn't explore it, if you get what I mean? Like, we can only imagine if he had difficult weeks after that or how even was the conversation after all that whole mess, just as an example.

I agree that Anakin in TCW is a incomplete version of his character, because TCW focuses a lot on the Clones and Ahsoka and other little stories, however I also think it does add lots of stuff to explore, even if the show didn't explore it deeply, but touched on it.

And I understand too why it causes such a division, and why some may prefer the TCW version more, and why some may prefer only the movies version.

I mainly use the movies, and then take from TCW what I feel like it fits/makes sense for him, and shake TCW a little bit if i need to, although i still really love it : D

[atopfourthwall]

To Linkara: Love your videos, especially when you review good comics. Also loved the Fortnite stream you did with other ComicTubers, it's nice to see you being a part of a bigger community again after that fiasco with the other site that shall not be named.

Been meaning to ask you something for a long time, but I couldn't think of what specifically. Problem is I'm a curious person by nature and I also like to ramble. However, while rewatching your Contest of Champions video (great arc, BTW, even if it took longer than expected), a decent question finally hit me. As someone who's a fan of Doctor Who, What If tales, the original Secret Wars and Crisis on Infinite Earths, do you think Hollywood has overused the multiverse idea? I almost got into an argument with someone on YouTube about the subject where I proclaimed the idea still has merit, it's just the folks running Tinsel Town were failed to be creative with it. Heck, to me the idea is like zombies: sure, it can feel repetitive, but that's only if you don't do anything new or original with it. Movies like Spider-Verse have proven as much. Then again, that's just me. Your thoughts?

I still love multiverse stuff and things like No Way Home or Deadpool & Wolverine have shown how the multiverse can be used to give fanservice, while Spiderverse, Loki, and Multiverse of Madness have shown the story potential of meeting alternate universe versions that reflect character development for our main character... but the problem especially with the MCU is that it feels like they don't have much in the way of a PLAN for it. Sure, Kang was being set up as the next big bad and they're shifting to Doom, but even before then it feels like there wasn't much of a story beyond "There are a lot of Kangs." Sure, with Thanos we didn't know his deal beyond the Infinity Stones being powerful until we actually reached him, but you could get the idea how dangerous it was even without that. Still, I think multiverse stuff is still fun and cool as long as it's used in creative ways... and hopefully people will feel the same with the next storyline once it launches. =)

[havendance]

Velveteen vs The Masterpost

When I was in high school, I stumbled across Seanan McGuire’s series of “Velveteen vs.” stories, staring Velma “Velveteen” Martinez, a former child superhero with the power to animate toys, who stumbles from one misadventure to the next. Taking place in a world where superheroics is run almost entirely by a single corporation and child heroes are put through some of the worst abuses of child stars, the series features fun characters, worldbuilding, and relationships, and of course, cool fight scenes. In true comics fashion, it ends on a rather open-ended note and, as far as I can tell, she hasn’t written any stories since 2017, but most of the main arcs are tied up and I definitely recommend you check them out!

(I became obsessed with these stories after finding them. An example of me getting into comics before I actually got into comics.)

(Thank you to https://broken-engines.blogspot.com/ for compiling directory of story links I could borrow for this post.)

Velveteen vs. The Isley Crayfish Festival

Velveteen vs. The Coffee Freaks

Velveteen vs. The Flashback Sequence

Velveteen vs. The Old Flame

Velveteen vs. The Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division

Velveteen vs. The Eternal Halloween

Velveteen vs. The Ordinary Day

Velveteen vs. Patrol

Velveteen vs. The Blind Date

Velveteen vs. Blacklight vs. Sin-Dee, Part I

Velveteen vs. Blacklight vs. Sin-Dee, Part II

Velveteen vs. The Holiday Special

Velveteen vs. The Secret Identity

Martinez and Martinez v. Velveteen

Velveteen vs. The Alternate Timeline, Part I

Velveteen vs. The Alternate Timeline, Part II

Velveteen vs. The Retroactive Continuity

Velveteen Presents Victory Anna vs. All These Stupid Parallel Worlds

Velveteen vs. The Uncomfortable Conversation

Velveteen vs. Bacon

Velveteen vs. The Robot Armies of Dr. Walter Creelman, DDS

Velveteen vs. The Fright Night Sorority House Massacre Sleepover Camp

Velveteen vs. Vegas

Velveteen Presents Victory Anna vs. The Difficulties With Pan-Dimensional Courtship

Velveteen vs. Legal

Velveteen Presents Jackie Frost vs. Four Conversations and a Funeral

Velveteen vs. Jolly Roger

Velveteen vs. Everyone, Part I

Velveteen vs. Everyone, Part II

Sponsorship: Velveteen vs. The Epilogue

Velveteen vs. The Aftermath

Velveteen vs. Hypothermia

Velveteen vs. Santa Claus

Velveteen vs. Global Warming

Velveteen Presents The Princess vs. Public Relations

Velveteen vs. The Thaw

Velveteen vs. Balance

Velveteen vs. Spring Cleaning

Velveteen Presents Polychrome vs. The Court of Public Opinion and Not Punching Anyone

Velveteen vs. The Melancholy of Autumn

Velveteen vs. A Disturbing Number of Crows

Velveteen vs. Trick or Treat

Velveteen Presents Action Dude vs. Doing the Right Thing

Velveteen vs. The Consequences of Her Actions

Velveteen vs. Going Home Again

Velveteen vs. Everything You Ever Wanted

Velveteen vs. The Retroactive Continuity (2)

Velveteen Presents Jacqueline Claus vs. The Lost and the Found

Velveteen vs. Recovery

Velveteen vs. Temptation

[gffa]

Hiiii :D I was just wondering, do you have any good Marvel fic reccomendations? Your massive list of star wars fics is like the no.1 thing I go to when im in a star wars mood, and all of them have been amazing, so thanks so much for that!! I'm just curious if you have any good Marvel fic recs?? If not that's fine lol, thank you for your service 🙏

Hi! Lol, I had to sit with this post for a few days because "Marvel fic" is such a wide range of possibilities, like are we talking the comics or the live action shows? The Avengers movies? The X-Men movies? Which section of those fandoms? Avengers as a team? Captain America? Thor? Iron Man? Daredevil? X-Men: First Class? Just... anything? I don't actually have a lot of comics fic recommendations (mostly because it's too hard to wade through all the movie stuff because so many people cross-tag into the comics tags despite it not being comic fic that those tags are now useless), but my go-to for Marvel comics are always: ✦ Betrayal + Paradox Law + The Game of Empires by Valerie J It's hard to describe this series, other than that about ~15 years ago, it was an ambitious attempt at taking various elements of the X-Men comics and weaving them into a coherent whole, focusing on giving Remy an epic backstory to explain his origins and his powers. It probably wouldn't really fit with more recent comics, but if you're a fan of late '90s/early '00s X-Men comics, this was a hell of a ride with cool powers, surprising family twists, time travel, fun relationships, and incredible ramp ups to tense situations that explode in the best way. ✦ The Gestalt Arc by Lori McDonald Another old school fic centered around the Remy/Rogue relationship and taking them on an epic journey, in an alternate version of what happened after their kiss in X-Men #41. The ups and downs of how they work out their issues, the lives they try to lead with each other, finding their path forward together, it's still one of my favorites for the era. ✦ Anything by Traincat for the Young Avengers My favorite is grab a blanket, brother, but they're an author that I'd write a blanket rec for, if any of the summaries sound relevant to your interests! They also write Peter Parker/Johnny Storm, which isn't my area of comics, but I'd trust them with it! But primarily I'd route you to them for their super fun Young Avengers stories, the Teddy/Billy and Eli/Kate ones especially. ✦ Anything by silverspidertm2, X-parrot, takadainmate, or Mythtaken Identity for Journey into Mystery and Loki: Agent of Asgard-era fic. This is when I was in my prime era of reading Thor comic-centric fic, around Journey into Mystery and Loki: Agent of Asgard, when he was Kid Loki and then Teen Loki. There was a lot really fun worldbuilding or road trips or just feelings explosions fic from this era. Beyond that, my bookmarks are a bit of a mess, but you can scroll through them to see what you're looking for. My primary fandoms were: ✦ Daredevil TV, where I went in hard on Matt/Foggy (and some Matt/Foggy/Karen and Frank/Karen and a little Matt/Elektra), where I read voraciously for about a year before MCU burnout hit. Some faves are Double Blind by smilebackwards and Something Dumb to Do by poisonivory and jump, check parachute augustbird.

✦ Thor (MCU), which is actually the heart of who I was as an MCU fan, I spent a long time there reading a lot of fic and this will take you to my bookmarks with the pairings filtered out. I was a big fan of Thor & Loki's relationship so that's most of what's in there, and I always suggest starting with these three fics: ✦ Bargaining by proantagonist, thor & loki & odin & frigga & cast, time travel, 108.9k Faced with an eternity without his brother, Loki strikes a bargain to change the past. Post TDW. ✦ No Such Liberty by Xparrot, thor & loki & cast, 147.3k The first thing Loki said, after he had swiped his tongue over his lips to wet them, was, "You shouldn't trust me." ~ Following the attack on New York, Thor takes Loki back to Asgard in chains; but this does not mean that the god of mischief's schemes are ended, or that Thor has or ever will give up on his brother. But when Thanos threatens the realm to claim his lost prizes, on which side will Loki fall? [post-Avengers fix it] ✦ The Lullaby Singer by TheOtherOdinson, thor & loki & odin & frigga, 85k wip Odin hasn't left Asgard in over a thousand years. When he finds out Loki is still alive and preparing to launch an attack on Midgard, he could send Thor to stop him. Or Odin could go himself. As a bonus, I have a few more Thor genfic recs here.

✦ Captain America (MCU), where sure I liked some gen fic but lbr I was there for the Stucky. I mostly read during the height of the post-TWS fervor and then tapered off a lot after that (given how hard they swerved away from their relationship) and I haven't read almost anything in the fandom since Endgame, but if you want some fun TWS-era fic, I put together this list recently. (To be fair, I also liked a lot of Steve &/ Natasha, Bucky &/ Natasha and Sam/Natasha, so you can find that in there, too.)

✦ Iron Man (MCU), where I liked a mix of some fun gen pieces and some Tony/Pepper which put me in the minority, but I don't care because there were some banger authors for both. If you're interested in them, I always liked pretty much anything I read by roboticonography. icarus_chained wrote a wider variety of stuff, but I've always liked anything I've read from them as well.

✦ Avengers (MCU), where I read a lot of fic, but it's kind of all mixed in together, even some sprinkled in Black Panther fic, some Spideypool that was super fun for a hot minute, some Guardians of the Galaxy characters showing up, etc. Step carefully if you're not interested in pairings (I read a fair amount of Tony/Loki and Steve/Loki in amongst the other stuff), but honestly by the end I was probably reading more gen than anything.

✦ X-Men: First Class-verse, which is my exception to not reading much for the live action versions of the X-Men, because I am a long time Pietro Maximoff fan and while Peter wasn't my Pietro, I did love him and there was some absolute banger fic for the Dadneto trope, which was where my heart was at. Come Together by blarfkey is absolutely the first place to start!

Hopefully this is what you were looking for, but if you have further refinements on what you're interested in, let me know and I'll try to give some pointers! I've been out of reading Marvel for awhile, but I have a huge backlog from when I was in it, at least. 😂

[silverwhittlingknife]

Dick Grayson & Tim Drake: Reading Guide

Once upon a time, two kids met at a circus... and the rest is history.

table of contents:

who are these losers?

what's fun about them?

why a reading guide?

how does the reading guide work? (tl;dr: there are quick recs, a selected chronological list, and a complete chronological list)

where is the spreadsheet? (x)

who are they?

Dick Grayson and Tim Drake: the first Robin and the third Robin.

Also known as the circus boy and the earnest computer geek, the hotshot and the pretender, the slighted prince and the new apprentice, the acolyte and the hanger-on, Nightwing and Robin, Batman and Robin, Batman and Red Robin, and Marcia and Cindy (BftC 3, N 110 & 119, B 617, DC 677, Detention Comics 1, R 168, RR 14).

Or as Jason calls them, "You idiots" (TT 47).

More seriously, Dick Grayson is one of the most enduring comic characters ever - he's been around since Detective Comics 38 in 1940! He's Batman's first ward, first partner, and eldest son. When Dick's parents are murdered, Bruce identifies with him, comforts him, and takes him into his home, where Dick ultimately volunteers to join his crimefighting mission. By candlelight, the Dynamic Duo swear an oath: That we two will fight together against crime and corruption and never swerve from the path of righteousness!

Tim Drake was created in Batman 436 and formally introduced in Lonely Place of Dying. He's a lonely kid who imprints on Dick when they meet as children, and Dick hugs him and promises to do a quadruple somersault for him; he's horrified and worried about Dick in the aftermath of the Graysons' murder, which he witnesses. He watches Batman comfort Dick, deduces Robin's secret identity, and becomes a secret devotee of the Dynamic Duo. Though he admires them both, it's ultimately Dick who he idolizes and tries to emulate when Bruce is spiraling: Batman needs a Robin. No matter what he thinks he wants.

Their slow-burn strangers-to-friends-to-brothers-to-antagonists-to-brothers-again arc develops from 1989 to 2011, and it's one of the standout examples of the DC Post-Crisis era's commitment to gradual character development and careful continuity.

what's fun about them?

SO MUCH!!! But one of my favorite things is their friendship has RANGE!! They go from sweet kids to tense strangers to loyal friends to brothers over the course of real-life years and tons of comics. They fight, they tease each other, they get protective, they worry, they chase each other down, they walk away... there's just so much story here.

They meet at the circus as children, when both their parents are still alive. They meet again, years later, when Bruce is reeling from Jason's death and they team up to stop him from hurting anyone. In the early days, they're brothers-in-arms and never quite family - instead, Dick is Bruce's loyal-but-estranged eldest son, and Tim is Bruce's new loyal-but-wary apprentice, with his own family and his own semi-estranged dad. The slow process of evolving toward found-family is a delight to watch.

They work together as Nightwing and Robin over four years of in-universe time and for over twenty years of real-time, gradually forging a fierce bond of friendship and, ultimately, brotherhood.

Then Bruce dies, and they have some huge fights.

But even when they're estranged, even when they're not speaking... they never stop loving and trying to protect each other. No matter what.

why a reading guide?

Quotes from New Titans 60 and Batman 441 (1989), Nightwing 25 (1998), Nightwing 69 (2002), Red Robin 1 (2009), Red Robin 12 (2010), Gates of Gotham 3 and Detective Comics 874 (2011)

I think reading guides are cool!! And somebody asked me about one!

More generally, I think reading guides are always helpful, but especially with Dick & Tim... you know, when I first started out trying to read their comics, I got kinda overwhelmed. Because on the one hand there's SO MUCH CONTENT - they're one of the classic enduring friendships in all of post-Crisis! their relationship is a HUGE BIG DEAL! they're constantly calling each other and hanging out and supporting each other and arguing!

But at the same time, all of that content is scattered across lots of different books, in Robin and Nightwing and Detective Comics and Batman and New Titans and Titans and Young Justice and Teen Titans and Shadow of the Bat and Gotham Knights and Birds of Prey and Showcase and DC Holiday Specials and so on and so forth. There's not One Definitive Place where you can read The Dick-and-Tim Story.

So: a reading guide!

how does the reading guide work?

Dick and Tim are in over 400 comics together and over 800 comics each separately. That's a whole lot of comics! So I've made a spreadsheet with three different reading guides, depending on how interested you are in these two:

1-5 Quick Recs: If you just want to check out a couple comics, check out these quick recs for "if you like fluff," "if you like angst," etc.

200 Starter Comics: If you want to do a comprehensive, chronological Dick-and-Tim read without committing to all the comics, this list has some of their major team-ups plus some solo comics so you know what the heck is going on. Most of them have a "sneak peek" you can use to decide if you want to read it.

Big List: A complete list of all the comics Dick and Tim are in, in chronological order, with links to dc.fandom and to DC Universe Infinite. It has filter views.

This spreadsheet was a labor of love, obsession, and SO MUCH PROCRASTINATING doing other things. I update it sometimes.

where is the spreadsheet?

it's here. have fun <3

[chibigaia-art]

Do you have any favorite webcomics?

oh boy, do I

ok, addressing the elephant in the room immediately: homestuck. just read it. don't read anything after the main webcomic ends, don't get into the epilogues, or the sequel, but hs? fun, still love it dearly.

now for the others!!!!

Paranatural - middle schoolers with supernatural powers fight supernatural entities, it's one of the funniest thing I ever read that also managed to punch me in the gut and make me want to draw even more

Sleepless Domain - magical girls protect the city at night from monsters. Everything is fine until things happen :)

Heartstrings (18+) pop star/punk lesbians :]

webtoons:

Public U. Art Club - it's an art club. liloth my beloved

Cursed Princess Club - story about self love and acceptance, I just really really love this comic and I am still so happy I followed it while it was updating. It's finished so it's a good binge read!

Love Advice from the Great Duke of Hell - this one is also finished, idk how to pitch it, just read it, it's so fucking funny, also read Vampire Family from the same author

also on tapas:

Fantasy x Grounds (I'd say 18+ for this one too) - the summary on the page just says "A funny fantasy comic with nameless characters". This is true but it's also a lie, it's also a fantasy comic full of heartaches and characters that feel like real people This one is from an italian author and I've been following it for years, I'm so in love with the story, the characters and their arcs it makes me unwell. There is an english translation and that version has updated art on old pages, some fixes for colors and redrawn sequences that are very very cool - the translation itself is also kinda rough at first but it gets better. I will also say, the earlier parts of the comic didn't age super well BUT. IT'S SUCH A GOOD COMIC. YOU HAVE TO SEE WHAT FUCKERY HAPPENS LATER, YOU HAVE TO SEE THE INSANE THINGS THEY FIGHT. YOU HAVE TO READ THE [MOONANGEL KING] ARC BECAUSE THAT'S WHERE MY FAVOURITE GUY STARTS BREAKING FOR REAL

edit also if you read any of these pls let me know what you think

[comicaurora]

Congratulations on finishing Arc 1! I've been following this comic since pretty much the beginning (I remember when everyone thought Alinua was a cat girl because of how her ears looked under her hood). This comic has come a long way since then, and it's been a pleasure and inspiration to watch your journey!

So with Arc 1 done, how do you feel? Any thoughts about the early days of the comic, or some lessons you've learned? What are you most looking forward to in Arc 2?

(Side note- thank you for Erin. My brain chews on him regularly and I gave a presentation on him in speech class. He brings me immense joy)

Whoof! I feel like it's slowly sinking in, tbh. I'm pretty bad at appreciating my own accomplishments - I have a tendency to Fire And Forget to avoid getting bogged down by "oh I'd have done this better now" or "eek I don't like how I did that" or "oh no this aged badly" or "what if I just redid it but Better this time" - but I've gotten better at accepting all those things as Not The End Of The World and they do not make me a Bad Artist or Bad Person, and as a result, I'm able to look back and just be happy about this one. It's an odd feeling.

At some point in the last several chapters I decided the ending of Arc 1 needed to feel like a conclusion. Not a full series finale, but a season finale. Character arcs needed to hit points of resolution; setup needed to pay off; cool moves needed to get some airtime. It's not in my nature to end stories, but as I worked on this arc I got comfy with the idea that an ending wasn't mechanically locking in the last part of a story and saying Nothing Past This Point, it was resolving the major elements of the story that cried out for completeness. Stories can have many endings before they're actually done, and in order for Arc 1 to feel like a complete thing, I knew it needed to bring those dangling plot threads home.

The fun thing about resolving chunks of the plot is those resolutions open the door for entirely new problems, and I'm excited to play with those! Part of why I wanted to make sure I had the rest of the year off was so I could take my time and just sit in the new status quo, because freeform creative idea-spinning is my favorite part of the writing process, and it's a rare treat for me to have such a wide-open swath of possibility ahead of me.

[blackbatcass]

Hi! Feel free to ignore this but I thought I’d ask:

Do you have any comic recs for someone getting into Roy Harper? Very into Dickroy but want to learn more about Roy and where he came from and what his deal is etc etc

hey!! I can definitely help with that. roy harper my best friend forever <333

i am definitely not as well versed in his og speedy appearances alongside ollie (<- Girl Who Is Ignorant Of The Silver Age) but i think if you're interested in his early years the original teen titans '66 series is fun! there is also a really cute story about early ollie & roy published in dc's saved by the belle reve called 'earn it back' that i'd recommend.

you have doubtless heard of snowbirds don't fly (green lantern v. 2 #85), which. yeah. it is what it is. it's very hard to understand roy's story without reading it so it's kind of a must, but. y'know. keeping in mind the context of the time and everything. i would very much recommend reading the story 'green man and autumn son' from the green arrow 80th anniversary super spectacular after reading snowbirds; it's basically the story of sdf but from roy's perspective this time and it's like essential reading for roy imo.

next big thing would probably be new teen titans vol. 2 #19-21, which is where he finds out he's a dad for the first time!! very exciting! directly after that i'd read the cheshire contract arc (action comics #613-618), a very fun arc where roy actually gets to keep lian. plus dickroy! i would also recommend the arc rocks and hard places (action comics #627-634) which i think gets sometimes overlooked despite basically continuing on directly from cheshire contract. roy looking out for random irish orphans my beloved<3

specifically for ollie and roy's relationship i'd rec green arrow vol. 2 #75 (MY BELOVED), and the archer's quest (#16-21) arc from green arrow vol. 3! really really good stuff. 'you're a good dad roy harper/so are you ollie' augh.

next thing chronologically would be roy's new titans run, i think from around #97-130. this is where roy actually got to lead the titans, and it's an era that not a lot of people remember lol. the series was on its very last legs at that point but it's very cool to see roy in a leadership role!

arsenal (1998) is probably the biggest rec i have. beloved beloved comic. Roy In A Nutshell, four issues of pure gold. batman plus arsenal is also just one issue but very fun and a good look at roy!

titans (1999) is an obvious pick but like. it's so good. such good roy content. donnaroy i love you forever

and yeah if you're a dickroy fan then i shouldn't even have to mention outsiders (2003). The Dickroy Bible

OH almost forgot justice league of america vol. 2, around the first half of it! especially #6 has a REALLY good roy moment. red arrow!roy my best friend

i hope that's a good roy harper starter pack!!

[blackfliesinbluesugar]

I really don't understand why the show is paced like this, I just don't? Even if they were told at production they would ONLY have 8 episodes, low chance of a s2, that this was all they'd get - I dunno, how is sucking all of the fun and investment out of your plot the best solution outside of, like, writing what you reasonably can and then maybe trying for a comic book or something? Again, I know that's shit feeling, I know it'd suck, I know it'd hurt. But again, even if this is the only medium you WANT to tell your story in, how is telling it BADLY the answer? It's crashing 50k words of fic into a list of bulletpoints.

I don't care about any of these characters. Not because I'm some spurned anti or someone who went in ready to hate - I've fandomed this show since June 2019. I've been obsessed with these characters and world. I have written nearly half a million words of fanfiction for these guys, including all of the background characters they keep giving love like Molly and Mimzy and Rosie. But that's all fanon, and I know how to seperate that in my brain. Which means I love the idea of these characters - I'm thrilled to see even the little cameos, It feels like fanservice in a way that makes me buzz with energy - but I don't love the characters. In canon, I don't care about Alastor, or Husk, or Charlie. I actively feel disinterest in ones like Camille and Vaggie and Adam. They have no depth, only gesturing at interesting ideas and trauma. Angel, I'm STARTING to care about, but they only gave him a real personality AFTER dropping all of his trauma on us. So great. It's discord group chats all over again.

Just.. why. Is doing 3 seasons worth in 1 season really worth it? Is it, frankly, better than nothing at all? I cared more about these guys when I had the privelege of assuming they'd have deep developed arcs and connections, that the hotel denizens would get a chance to bond and interact and flesh themselves out. Now they're pretty png's standing vaguely near each other, occasionally breaking into song or crying about their past. Big whoop.

I wish s1 had developed the hotel solely - no Velvette, no Camille, no Zestial, no Mimzy, no Sera or Emily or Lucifer or Lilith, and then saved that stuff for s2 when we CARE about our protagonists and can afford to care about other characters, instead of all of them being 'cool, I guess'

I'm sad. I'm really sad. I waited over 4 years for a slideshow.

[beetleviolet]

My feelings about Tales of the TMNT!

Lmk ur thoughts, especially if you disagree! I would love to hear about it! I, personally, have A LOT of thoughts. Starting with:

I kinda hate the premise.

No, no LISTEN

I LOVE the idea of a series with these characters! I love them and their dynamic, plus with the animation style and cool writing from the movie I was really looking forward to the new series!

I was picturing what I feel like a lot of people were: a story about the tmnt balancing their hero stuff with school, something we haven't really seen before! This also will give them a chance to develop as individuals, something that was touched on in the movie. Awesome! Sounds great!

I hear you cry, 'Wait, so you don't like the series because school isn't a main plot point?' NO

I DONT LIKE THE SERIES BECAUSE NONE OF IT IS ACTUALLY HAPPENING!!!!

I understand 1 DnD episode. I understand a filler episode that is discounted from cannon later. What I DONT understand is entire 6 EPISODE ARCS that CANNONICALLY DONT EXIST!!!!

Inventing characters that apparently don't exist in cannon?? And more important to me, spending entire episodes on a specific turtles development, before finding out that IT DIDNT HAPPEN!

And the worst part is.. im not sure? Its wildly unclear how much of these arcs are true, if anything is true, if these are just embellished stories or what. Its wildly confusing and discouraging when all this is happening but JK ITS NOT REAL LOL.

Like none of this is wildly outlandish either? I found the plot pretty realistic to tmnt (I have problems with bishops character, but that's a rant for another post) and super enjoyable! I loved it! Which makes me even more mad because IT APARENTLY NEVER HAPPENED??? I THINK???

The first was out of Leo's comic book, but it was unclear whether this happened and he was just writing it down, or if the whole thing was his writing (which like. It would make sense if Bishop was written by a 15 year old bc of the inconsistencies in her development- AH IM GETTING OFF TRACK AGAIN). For Raphs story (which i liked so much better) it was ABUNDENTLY clear he was pulling the tale out of his ass.

This kind of thing, for one random filler episode, would be fun! Raph telling a super action packed adventure, or Leo's comic book story would be cool!

But. Idk. I love these characters. Why do all of this cool stuff for them when none of it is real?

Anyway, if you disagree please let me know! I would LOVE to hear about it!!!