#marve slander

[qcomicsy]

I think whats been pushing me more and more to DC is the fact that I'm sick and tired of big boom movies.

Like movies that pass on the span of 1-3 days. There's no development the characters as stagnant, the writers tries to gaslight you the entire time between fight scenes and overly emotional moments that those guys are bonding and actually becoming friends when they don't even know eachother. It feels artificial and you have no moment to breath and care about those characters. But you need to care anyway because- Oh! Another boom moment OOPS the might dieee~~

Like no.

The last movie I've seen from the mcu that felt like it give a shit about it's characters and their development and their bond as human beings were The black widow AND EVEN SO. They managed to push in a stupid fighting in the middle of the air scene.

IN A BLACK WIDOW MOVIE??????????

The entirety of many super-hero movies this days feel like it's trying to distract you from the plot holes with shining explosions and shallow humor instead of, you know? Building a plot.

And I'm not going even start about how many characters are a shallow form of their comic counterparts.

And listen. I like big boom movies. I like explosions, I like big actions sequences and I love LOVE scream at my screen wondering if it all go to hell or they all will make it. It's rewarding it really is. When it has stakes about it.

I think the best example I could give is Transformers and Fast and Furious franchise and listen people can complain about it all they want. It's not perfect and it was many many early-2000's sins and flaws. But anyone who watched for not a single moment, a single minute, question how much those characters care for eachoter. The movies take time to introduce them, to care about their friendship, to stabilize their personality traits, to built and give every now and then little tips about their inner lives and relationships and the fucking world building.

The world building of those movies is insane. It has so much freedom and so little shame (confidence) on what their doing that "Yeah of course students from Tokyo spend their time out of school drifting with cool Y2k cars why wouldn't they?"

Superhero movies most of the time feel like they're ashamed of being super hero movies. They're ashamed of their characters having emotions and they're ashamed about their characters being vulnerable (if isn't for a cool inspirational fight scene that will look cool in a trailer).

We joke and all, but for not a single scene fast and furious were ashamed of showing how much Don Toretto love every single one of his friends. How he would die for each one of them. They hug, they joke, they laugh with eachother between scenes, they feel like a family.

All that mcu characters seems to do this days is be annoyed and complain about every little shit and every single person they claim to love. If you would take a shot everytime a mcu character bitch about something, I don't care how much alcohol you generally can take it, you'd probably end up in a hospital anyway.

Transformers were less pussies about showing a man bonding with a fucking car (with even music montage!), than mcu showing what is supposed to be a literal "found family".

Transformers had more patience of showing world building and show-not-tell about cars who were secretly space-aliens than MCU had for what twenty movies? They literally put an know-it-all character to infodump the shit and then somehow make the audience feel stupid if they don't get it.

for example there's this thing that the main character doesn't know so he goes to the know-it-all character (generally Strange but it used to be Tony), so the know-it-all character roll their eyes because how stupid of the main character not know about the fucking powerful magic pen or whatever who was made by a fucking titan-witch-who-cares-because-it-probably-was-made-it-up-for-this-one-and-only-movie and then get all passive aggressive while they infodump the instructions that the main character is going to fuck-up anyway, because they need a third arc.

Bro I'm tired.

They have no comic accuracy (which you know? whatever at this point. They're doing their own thing anyway), no character development, no respect for it's characters and/or their traumas, no actual interesting world building thats not "oh! look at this refereeeence!!! aren't we coool??? please please tell us were still cool!! 🥺🥺" , no interest in exploring or developing actual bonds and friendships, no terrifying villains, no original plot, no different methods of story telling, WHAT DO THEY HAVE????

COOL EXPLOSIONS??? FIGHTING SCENES????? Its 2022 babes you got that from commercials.

And I'm this pressed because I'm disappointed. Because it used to be great. It used to actually give a shit. Many characters are being introduced to their first time in FOREVER. And now they don't even feel like trying.

We used to go to a movie theater having no idea what they would adapt and how they would portray the character and be pleasant surprised in the different forms of telling a story. Like remember how people used to be friends on mcu?? Actually give a shit about eachoter, actually be pleased about being around eachother. Like-they made Tony Stark seem like a cool chill dude who genuinely cares about people.

They would take actual comic book arcs and introduce to the theaters in a way to explain why their characters are like that, what they stand for, what they represent. The story was made for it's characters not the other way around. It took time and care and innovation.

Fuck they even were better at making military propaganda (which I don't know how to feel about it).

I'm just not excited anymore to watch a movie and than think about it and realize I didn't even enjoy the time I had, because it never fucking stopped to breathe, so I was just stressed the whole time about the big boom thing that wasn't even that good in the end.

It's shallow, it's annoying and I'm not sure if I can do it anymore.

And as a queer person I'm also fucking exhausted about seen straigh people have all the fun all the fucking time, even when the- you know, the actual character? from the comics? Are not even straight in the first place, yeah I'm looking at Peter Quill.

Thanks for coming to my tedtalk fuck Marvel and their constipated repressed ass.

[shy-urban-hobbit]

20 with Laiden please!

20 - "I'm always on your side."

Lambert slammed the door to his room closed, fighting the urge to scream or yell or throw something, no matter how cathartic it might be. He didn't want to give Vesemir the satisfaction of knowing how much he'd gotten under his skin.

The two of them had always been at loggerheads ("Too alike" Eskel had commented once. Lambert had promptly and soundly beaten his ass in training for such slander), but it had been worse since the other Wolves had found out about Aiden.

For all their suspicions at first, Geralt and Eskel at least eventually reached some form of grudging acceptance: Lambert was still returning to them alive and well every year after all, and The Cat - according to Lambert - had never pushed his luck fishing for an invitation to The Keep, nor had he dragged Lambert off to the proverbial lions den that was Dyn Marv. Vesemir on The other hand...

Every winter since, it had been more criticism, more thinly veiled comments about Lambert's decisions, snipes about his sense of judgement, backhanded comments on things he knew wouldn't even register had it been either Geralt or Eskel. The old man had started early this year too, he hadn't even been back a full week.

He was sure that if he bought Aiden up here, Vesemir would soon change his tune if he gave him a chance. The problem was, he didn't trust Vesemir enough to not try stabbing Aiden for long enough to do that. His brothers had tried to help to begin with but over time the words had dwindled down to sympathetic looks. Lambert didn't want to blame them - if Vesemir hadn't listened the second time, he wouldn't listen the hundredth, but part of him that was steadily growing bigger wanted to curl up against the feeling of being so alone in his own home and yet knowing things would be worse if he didn't return every year. There was no way Vesemir and by extension Geralt and Eskel wouldn't assume the worst if he just didn't show up, just as they would if he told them he'd be wintering with Aiden (if he ever asked). He was damned if he did, damned if he didn't.

Just once, he'd like someone else to yell at Vesemir when he started on him. To tell him to shut the fuck up, that he didn't know what he was talking about, 'respect' be damned. He knew that would never happen though, it was his job to be the disrespectful one, after all.

He dragged himself from where he'd been slumped against the door on the cold stone floor (when had he sat down?) and grabbed his pack, upturning it aggressively. Didn't want to give the old man any more ammunition by not doing laundry.

He blinked in surprise when he saw it. A small slip of parchment rolled up and placed in one of his empty potion bottles. Odd. After some minutes trying to fish it out and not give into the urge to just smash the damn thing to get it out, he unfurled it and gave a small smile. Someone up there had a weird sense of humour.

As if summoned by Lambert's thoughts, familiar, spidery writing stared back at him. The slightly slanted i, the y that sometimes looked more like a g and could only be differentiated by the loops made by the tails - Aiden always went a little fancier on his Y's for some reason.

"I'm always on your side."

[fancyfade]

Been reading your posts and saw the meme about how other dc characters act when they are around a Batfamily member and they loose all their critical thinking skills

Has that been a problem in comics for decades? I noticed that with Damian in titans stuff…to the point I became annoyed because it just making him a mini Bruce rather then played with the potentially interesting dynamics he could have.

Do Dick and Tim suffer from the mini Bruce approach in their titans stuff a lot too? It gotten to a point in Damian’s stuff for me, that there should be an editorial mandate saying “Just because they are Batman legacy characters, doesn’t mean they are clones of him.”

for Damian, it's been a long time since I read his teen titans stuff (and I didn't read a ton b/c most of it wasn't good), but I do remember that in the intro arc it did feel very Damian centric, and some of it was like.. the other characters powers were too easily cancelled out by some random gadget. like the gun that shot kory when introducing the capturing the team part of the plotline. that was stupid. (and in general, characters powers get randomly cancelled out by a gadget is a common thing in the batfam characters stuff). I can't remember WRT critical thinking, been literal years since I read the comic, but I do narrative focus was disappointing.... even for being a Damian fan while reading it.

for Tim in YJ I guess it felt like he was the leader for no reason, but I can't remember who had the general critical thinking skills or if none of them did. But he also got randomly super tough in one plotline in a way that made me give up on the series for a bit (where he was treated as like. the only person capable of standing up to Harm for some reason which was 9_9). However, in Titans / Young Justice Graduation Day Tim definitely felt like he was the only YJ character who was allowed to be portrayed as "right" (in which "right" obviously means listening to Dick, the paragon of reason) , because everyone else's recklessness had to be exaggerated to explain why the YJ team is so terrible. But god forbid Tim be slandered with the rest of the team 9_9

Dick it definitely holds so true, he was part of the inspiration for me reblogging it :P like the whole "robin is the default leader" thing doesn't start except with Dick, and it wasn't just because Dick was such a logical choice. It was b/c the writers decided to not let anyone else have ideas besides him in the original teen titans series. I've heard it as "everyone had one character trait and his was leader" but like... many characters didn't even have one character trait. Donna's was "girl". like the writing was clearly not balanced or good. and it's sooooo conspicuous because even in NTT, which is generally a pretty good series, the other characters will come across investigations when doing stuff while Dick is absent and be like ":C :C :C oh no dick our critical thinking person is gone whatever shall we do". Like multiple times! and IIRC that happened in the 1966 Teen Titans comics I read too in 1 issue where Dick was off screen. but like "dick is the smartest teen titan" "dick is the best leader" "dick could take out the other titans with planning but just won't b/c he's nice" - any of these situations existing is basically because he's writer's pet a la bruce. inb4 - I'm not saying any instance in which Dick is a good leader shouldn't count. but like. him being the obvious choice over other people is writer's pet-ism and Marv does not give other characters a chance to shine in the role, yet gives Dick plenty of chance to shine. So there is no fair comparison or way to say "he's best".

Anyway, I'll say Dick is by far the one I have noticed it being most true of. If you want to just read Teen Titans comics and have fun he is fr like the Batman of teen titans comics.

[walker-extended-universe]

Abby: You got it all now. How sad that it’s not enough.

I feel like this really encapsulates a lot about Gale’s character. It’s never been enough.

It wasn’t enough for Cordell to give her the win in the chili cookoff; she had to use the opportunity to slander the Walkers.

It wasn’t enough for Cordell to try and be peaceful with their family; she had to see him convicted for Marv’s death.

It wasn’t enough for her to have married Marv; she wanted him to be completely removed from Abby.

It wasn’t enough to race for the land in dispute; she had to raise the stakes to the entire plot of both lands.

No matter what anyone does to appease her, she just wants more. 

This is a trait we see in Denise too. It’s not enough for Cordell to be friendly with her; he must have blind faith. It’s not enough for Dan to apologize; he has to take the blame for everything that’s wrong with their relationship.

[slash-em-up]

Re-Assessing Presuppositions pt. 1: The Collector x Reader

First off; this is a monster of a fic. It’s around 3.5k and I don’t think I’ve ever written something this large - SO LARGE TUMBLR WONT LET ME PUT IT ALL IN ONE POST!!

So this is going to be a two-parter.

Secondly, this deals with a lot of INCORRECT assumptions about BDSM, M/F power dynamics, sexuality in general, and homosexuality. I think we’re all pretty aware that Asa has some #issues with masculine identity, and that comes into play here. So take everything said with a grain of salt.

Huge huge HUGE THANK YOU to @voorheehees and @princessprofanity for their beta reading and big-brain ideas about Asa’s book club, respectively.

Enjoy!!!

*********************************

Mary-Ellen rolled her eye as Gladys and Marlene giggled on the couch, whispering and gasping as they poured over their recommendation for the next Oak Grove Bookclub selection.

This happened every time they ended their current selection, and frankly Mary-Ellen was getting tired of it. They thought that just because they talked the group into reading that dreadful ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’ book that it was their solemn duty to provide something equally as salacious for the next get-together.

Mary-Ellen huffed again and clutched her ‘Ms. Marple’ book a bit closer to her chest. Not this time, not if she had to stand right up and filibuster until they caved.

Marlene’s husband was falling asleep beside her; but she knew the former lawyer might protest that by using her walker to stand on she wasn’t technically following the rules of a filibuster – but frankly screw him. She only had so many years left to live and she wasn’t going to waste whatever time she had left reading that trash.

She perked up as the door to the community center opened and the youngest member of their little club walked in to the room.

Asa Emory was probably the person most likely to protest another smutty novel, next to herself; so she was very glad he decided to show up to the meeting.

After he pursued the selection of baked goods laid out on the center table (grabbing one of Lydia’s walnut blondies – smart man) he took the seat on the couch next to Mary-Ellen.

“Hello honey. How are you today?”

The large man turned slightly in his seat and offered her a brief grin.

“I’m doing fine Mary-Ellen, thank you. How’s your hip?”

Mary-Ellen sighed and leaned back.

“Never get old, honey. It’s not worth the social security check.”

Asa hummed in the back of his throat, tilting his head towards her with a teasing glint in his unique eyes.

“I’ll do my best.”

He set the book he’d had tucked under his arm onto the table, taking a large bite of the blondie he held.

Smiling, Mary-Ellen noted that he’d brought an older mystery novel as well.

Seeing her interest, Asa swallowed his mouthful and offered “Y/N picked it.”

A wrinkled hand rose and patted the solid knee next to her own arthritic one.

“I knew I liked them for a reason.”

Breaking the calm, Marlene clapped her hands together to get the rooms attention – pulling her husband from his slumber with a jolt.

“Hello everyone! Thank you for joining us for the fifth Oak Grove Bookclub content selection meeting!”

A polite smattering of applause echoed across the space.

“Now, I know there are so many wonderful choices out there, so lets get started with the book pitches!”

She looked knowingly over to Gladys.

“Gladys, would you care to start us off?”

Mary-Ellen groaned, making Asa huff in amusement next to her.

“Thank you so much Marlene! First, lets all have a moment of silence for our dear Robert, who we lost to prostate cancer last month.”

A murmur of assent rose from the group as they nodded or crossed themselves in remembrance of their lost member.

“In his honor, Marlene and I have chosen this book – ‘Beg for It’ by Megan Hart. An erotic story about two business people in a BDSM relationship where the man is the submissive!”

“Gladys! Stop using all those strange words, you know I wasn’t here when you read that ‘Fifty Shades of whatever’ book!”

Gladys sniffed.

“It means ‘Bondage, Domination, Sadism, and Masochism. Get with the times Albert.”

Mary-Ellen saw this as her opportunity to pipe up.

“I don’t like it when we read these smutty novels. It’s not what I joined this Bookclub for at all! If I wanted to read about two people doing naughty things, I would go over to Harriet’s house and read Earls ‘Hustler’ magazines!”

“Hey!”

“Don’t be such a prude Mary-Ellen, we’re all adults here. And quite frankly reading that other book helped Marvin and I try some things we hadn’t thought to try in our sixty years together!”

Someone laughed loudly.

“Which was all well and good until Marv’s back gave out!”

“Hush, Gloria!”

“All I’m saying is that we should be reading something relatable.”

“Yeah, if anyone can get anything out of those horn-dog books it’ll be Asa! At least he and Y/N have a better chance of getting through it without needing to stop for a pill-break!”

“Well then, lets ask Asa! How about it sweetie? Want to get some tips for the bedroom?”

Asa looked like he was going to implode or run out the door – meaning he looked closer to a statue than a man – back straight as a board, and gripping his leg tight enough to make his knuckles go white.

He cleared his throat.

“We’re fine, thank you.”

Marlene spoke up –

“So like a man - as long as they’re getting themselves taken care of they’re perfectly content to leave everything else alone.”

“Asa, have you asked Y/N if they’d like to mix things up in the bedroom?”

“Carl, you can’t ask people that!”

“Whaaat? I’m too old to be shy. And when Dorothy is on top I get a free prostate exam!”

This comment was met with several screeches and hoots from the room; but Asa remained quiet.

He stood suddenly, and grabbed his book.

“I’m sorry, I have to leave. Please let me know what the final decision is. My vote is for whatever Mary-Ellen picks.”

***************************

Asa walked back to the house slowly, deep in thought about the situation he’d just departed from.

In all honesty, he wished he’d left sooner – never even heard the lies and slander about male pleasure and bedroom power dynamics.

He liked the members of the book club well enough – as much as he liked anyone who wouldn’t be joining his collection, he supposed; but they were wrong on this. They had to be.

For all that the occasional victim would yell and scream abuse while he was perfecting them, he knew the truth. Only homosexuals could feel pleasure from anal penetration – and he definitely wasn’t a homosexual. His father had made sure of that.

And he’d gotten so lucky with you. Not only were they accepting of his ‘hobby’; but they never tried to undermine his authority in the bedroom. Even when things got more heated than normal – like when you had purchased that lovely lingerie several weeks ago – Asa was assured that he’d be the one calling the shots, metaphorically.

Of course he’d heard people talk about their predilections before – woman on top, tying up your partner, and most recently pegging - but as long as you stayed where you belonged, there was no reason to let this upset him any further.

He nodded succinctly to himself as he strode up the stairs and turned the key to your house.

‘GET ON YOUR KNEES GET ON YOUR KNEES GET ON YOUR KNEES, BABY JUST GET ON YOUR KNEES’

… Or not.

**********************************

“Asa?”

You poked your head out of the dining room where you’d been dusting. Enjoying some alone time to play the pop music you knew Asa didn’t enjoy.

You’d thought you’d heard him enter, but then the door slammed…

You looked out the window as the green Buick Asa drove screeched out of the driveway and took off towards town.

‘Guess he must have forgotten something.’

[mrsspidermanmaryjanewatsonparker]

The thing is, Spider-Man is a mystery to his general public -- he could be anyone under that mask. No one would know about his marital status -- or even give it much thought, unless they were enemies looking to strike at him through loved ones. In those pre-“Brand-New-Day” stories, it wasn't really Spider-Man who was married, it was Peter Parker. And Peter for the most part works best as a young, single guy. I would never say he should never marry. But he certainly should not be married to Mary Jane Watson. That's just crazy. The only way the writers were able to keep that marriage going on the printed page for as long as they did was by changing who Pete and MJ were, by turning them into different people. And a lot of talented writers worked on Spider-Man during that period, doing their best, but that marriage never quite worked for to me. It was like hearing about two old friends who'd run off and made this terrible mistake.

Roger Stern

Proponents of single Spidey often use this specific quote to back up their positions so let’s deconstruct it a little shall we?

“The thing is, Spider-Man is a mystery to his general public – he could be anyone under that mask. No one would know about his marital status – or even give it much thought, unless they were enemies looking to strike at him through loved ones. In those pre-“Brand-New-Day” stories, it wasn’t really Spider-Man who was married, it was Peter Parker. ”

    This is just a pointless talking point to bring up.

    Let’s pretend we buy into his logic and claim his marital status only matters in so far as villains striking at him through his loved ones.

  Well during the marriage...exactly that happened...a lot...

  In fact it happened BEFORE the marriage multiple times famously with Gwen Stacy at the hands of a villain Stern loved and wasn’t entirely against being brought back. He was against actually bringing Norman back in his own run but when someone else did it he happily wrote the character’s origin story in the 3 part mini-series Revenge of the Green Goblin.

  Part and parcel of that story was Norman targeting Peter’s loved ones.

  So Stern’s point here doesn’t hold up to any scrutiny.

  He’s treating the idea that marriage is irrelevant to Spider-Man unless his wife can be targeted as incidental and a small deal when historically it just hasn’t been, it’s been HUGE.

  Now let’s stop pretending and acknowledge that the rest of Stern’s logic here is really, really, really broken.

  Sure the general public don’t care if Spider-Man is married because he is a mystery to them. But we aren’t reading the series for the general public we’re reading it for Spider-Man himself. He isn’t a mystery to US the readers.

  Moreover Stern is making a frankly alarmingly naive distinction between Peter Parker and Spider-Man.

  ‘Spider-Man wasn’t married. Peter Parker was.’

  But Peter Parker IS Spider-Man.

  It’s not even a Clark Kent/Superman or Bruce Wayne/Batman deal, wherein (in some incarnations) one identity is mostly a pretence in service of the other.

  The character’s civilian and superhero life are two legitimate aspects of who he is. He doesn’t put on an act of pretence in either identity beyond the denial that he even has another identity.

  Spider-Man IS Peter’s personality but he’s just making use of different traits, much the same way we are not the same person we are at work as we are at home with our friends and family.

  In talking as though that isn’t the reality of the situation Stern is either revealing a level of ignorance I don’t believe of him or else is being disingenuous in support of his argument/agenda.

  It gets worse when you consider that the premise of the series since day 1 has intrinsically involved the events of one half of Peter’s life impacting upon the other.

  Not stopping the burglar as Spider-Man leads to the man who lives in Peter Parker’s home dying.

  Hearing an inspiring speech by Johnny Storm as Peter Parker pushes him to fight Doc Ock as Spider-Man.

  Foiling the Green Goblin’s gangland schemes as Spider-Man, but also causing Norman Osborn’s son to (allegedly) take drugs prompts the villain to hate Peter AND Spider-Man and target Peter’s girlfriend whom dies in a battle where Peter is Spider-Man.

  Peter’s life has always involved one half bleeding over into the other to one degree or another. In fact in the Ditko run his primary motivation almost was to earn money to support Aunt May but he did this by taking pictures of himself AS Spider-Man to then as Peter Parker sell to the Bugle who slandered Spider-Man.

  So Stern is saying just...nothing in this initial statement. Peter Parker being married IMPACTS upon Spider-Man’s life and vice versa.

      “And Peter for the most part works best as a young, single guy.”

  Yeah no he doesn’t.

  He wasn’t single in the best parts of the Gerry Conway’s run.

  He wasn’t single for most of the Straczynski or Sacasa runs.

    He wasn’t single for MOST of the Lee/Ditko run or the Lee/Romita run.

  He wasn’t single in Kraven’s Last Hunt.

  He wasn’t single in the Owl/Octopus War.

  He wasn’t even REALLY single in Spider-Man vs. Wolverine.

  He wasn’t single in the Death of Gwen Stacy.

  Oh and he wasn’t single in STERN’S OWN RUN!

  He also wasn’t ‘young’ in a lot of these and other great stories.

  In Stern’s run he was 23-24 and working to support himself and Black Cat after leaving student life behind him.

  In Lee’s run he was young yes but with adult responsibilities such as supporting Aunt May and towards the end of Lee’s run looking to be a provider for Gwen whom he had ambitions to marry.

  He was an adult in the Death of Jean DeWolff which dealt in distinctly adult subject matter.

  He was an adult in the Owl/Octopus War, Kraven’s Last Hunt, ASM #400, Spec #200, Hobogblin Lives (also by Stern himself) and the JMS run, Renew Your Vows or basically any high calibre story you can think of during the marriage.

    So no.

  Spider-Man doesn’t ‘for the most part’ work better as young or single.

  He works great either way.

  “I would never say he should never marry.”

  And there it is.

  Pro-single Spidey guys just IGNORE this part of Stern’s quote where he doesn’t disagree with Spidey being married in theory thereby gutting most of their arguments that cite this quote.

    “But he certainly should not be married to Mary Jane Watson. That’s just crazy. The only way the writers were able to keep that marriage going on the printed page for as long as they did was by changing who Pete and MJ were, by turning them into different people.”

  You know what’s crazy?

  One of the most acclaimed and experienced comic book writers of all time not being able to recognize blatently obvious examples of character development when they’re right in front of him.

  Or in fact claiming it was arbitrary changes to the characters when he himself initiated some of it.

  People forget this but the first time we ever got an inkling that MJ had a sister whom she felt guilty over wasn’t in DeFalco’s run with Frenz it was in Stern and Romita Junior’s run.

  STERN was working in some character development which fundamentally changed how the readers perceived Mary Jane, but then disingenuously he has turned around and pretended it was cheap arbitrary changes in service of a status quo and not character driven.

  What’s worse is that his logic not only falls apart when you look at the organic development and characterization for Peter and MJ leading up to and in the early days of the marriage, it actually doesn’t even make sense preceding Stern’s run.

  Much like Marv Wolfman Stern seems to have adopted an attitude that Conway’s 1970s ASM run somehow doesn’t count and MJ happened to close that door at the end of the Death of Gwen Stacy, but it didn’t really mean or amount to anything.

  Except yes it totally did. 

That was the start of MJ’s evolution as a character wherein she transformed into a different person who could believably be in a long term relationship with Peter. 

Him marrying her back THEN made sense! 

[tessatechaitea]

Deathstork the Terminator #21

Deathstork fingers Vagilante in her vagina. I think. Is that where the vagina is? Or is the vagina under the 'V'? Is that what the 'V' stands for?

How can you say "based on the true story"? It's just based on a story some guy told! If I told a screenwriter a story about how Marv Wolfman wouldn't stop telling me his rape fantasies at urinals at Comicon in the year 2000 and he turned it into a script, could he proclaim it's based on a true story? It's based on the true story that I told the story! But I don't think that's a defense against libel. Unless this time it was slander.

This issue begins with a prologue that puts Slade back in his ugly orange and blue outfit with the garish boots and flared gloves. He doesn't look as cool as I remember him looking when I first saw him in the early eighties. Other people I thought were cool back then: Doug Henning, Charles Nelson Reilly, Scatman Crothers, Richard Mulligan, and Roddy McDowall. I was an awesome kid. Deathstork has just finished a disastrous job for The Company (I think that was some black ops U.S. government agency. It's hard to remember since I read Issue #20 months ago) so he's looking for something a little less stressful. He takes a job from an alcoholic breakfast drink that hides behind darkened mirrors. It's all very mysterious but it'll probably put him at odds with Vagilante and her sexy vagina. Unless her vagina is deadly. I wonder if I say "Bloody Vagina" in front of a mirror in a darkened room, one will appear before me? I'm too scared to try it.

Deathstork is a self-hating criminal.

Vagilante attacks some criminals guarding a cardboard box warehouse. She's looking for Bloody Mary because Bloody Mary killed some cops and killing cops was wrong in 1993. Killing cops makes you a criminal. That's why Deathstork doesn't like Bloody Mary. But he likes Bloody Mary's money, so what can he do? Deathstork shows up to show Vagilante that his hands are practically welded together on the matter.

Ew! Stop using the "L" word!

After calling Vagilante his lover, he punches her in the face, bloodies her nose, and threatens to kill her if she interferes. I guess if murder doesn't make him a criminal, beating the shit out of his lover doesn't make him an abuser. It's tricky being Deathstork the hero! You have to have to redefine ideas, rationalize inconsistencies of character, and live in a deep well of denial. Not that Vagilante is much saner. Later, she tracks down Slade in his apartment so she can fuck him. She's only doing it to get information out of him, of course. And of course Deathstork falls for it because he has a penis. His penis isn't any smarter than anybody else's penis. I bet it's dumber because it's quicker to react than other penises. As soon as Vagilante pops her tits out (which she totally does! She can show them in the Deathstork the Terminator comic book because they don't have any nipples on them), Deathstork's penis is all, "Hey hey now! What's this?! Sproing-doing-doing!" That means it's now erect and not that it has dementia.

I knew you'd be curious about the tits so here they are.

Deathstork apparently tells secrets about the job he's currently on when he sleeps so Vagilante now has a lead on Bloody Mary. That seems awfully convenient! Maybe Vagilante's vagina is full of Sodium Pentathol. Or maybe Slade was just pretending. Which Vagilante would totally know he was doing. And he's totally know that she totally knew! But that's as deep as that mind game goes because Slade is smarter (but only because of the military experiments performed on him). So Vagilante is gone when Slade wakes but he knows she knows he was just fooling her so he knows she'll follow him when he leaves the hotel. She does follow him but she doesn't come after him directly. Maybe she's smarter than he is after all! Instead she calls the cops so that Deathstork has to beat up some police just doing there job which doesn't make him a criminal, exactly. It just makes him an asshole, I guess? Deathstork catches up to Vagilante at the hospital where she's tracked down Bloody Mary. The two of them fuckfight for a bit before Vagilante discovers Bloody Mary just wanted to have her baby outside of prison so that it wouldn't become Bane II. Plus she wanted Vagilante to adopt it! Vagilante is all, "What am I supposed to do with a baby?" And Deathstork is all, "Ha ha! You have to take care of it now because I called it!" And Vagilante is all, "Damn! I guess I'll raise it to be a gun!" This story wasn't written by Marv Wolfman (at least the non-Prologue part of it wasn't) so it's the greatest Deathstork the Terminator ever written. At least in this series from the 1990s. The letter column is called Deathstorks which makes no sense. At least one letter shit all over Marv Wolfman's writing and terrible way the Deathstork books were part of the Total Chaos crossover even though nothing in Deathstork ever affected that story.

[tessatechaitea]

How old does Slade usually like them?

I don’t know! What do I look like, a Slade scholar?! He’s a fictional character so I don’t mind slandering and/or libeling him!

Wait! Let me start my answer over!

I don’t know! I’m not a Terra scholar! I don’t know how old she was when she and Slade fucked! Probably younger than sixteen and a half though, seeing as how Marv Wolfman wrote it.

Wait. Is Marv Wolfman a fictional character? His name sounds fictional! If it sounded like I was slandering or libeling him, you read that last part wrong! I just meant he was an avant garde writer who wrote sophisticated European literature where young women fucking older men is much more acceptable and not that he’s a leery old perv who has a weird fixation with rape demons!