#source: have an uncle who goes by Tommy

[brinleyparke]

Arrow Fic Ideas/Prompts

Post 4x15 – Oliver receives comfort from an unlikely source. That source is Quentin Lance. Now that he thinks about it, maybe he isn't such an unlikely source. Quentin knows what it's like to have the person you love walk out on you after all.

Post 6x06 – Oliver is telling William about Slade and how Slade trained him. William wants to meet (for real, not just after getting kidnapped by a maniac and his mom dying) Slade, so Oliver calls Slade and invites him over. Slade turns out to be a big softie. William asks if he can call him "Uncle Slade."

Post 6x17 AU – Slade becomes Oliver's new partner.

H/C sickfic – Oliver gets sick (like pneumonia or something) while on the island. Slade goes into dad mode and takes surprisingly good care of Oliver.

Slade's reaction to seeing Oliver's scars (from where Billy tortured him) for the first time.

AU – Nyssa isn't the only one who trained Mia. Slade helps, too (not with fighting, but with survivalist stuff, i.e., finding fresh water, hunting; intelligence-gathering; stealth; running).

Felicity and Oliver go out of town for their anniversary. William stays with Uncle Slade

Reacher (tv series) x-over: Dig knew Reacher from the Army. Dig asks Reacher for his help. Idk what Team Arrow needs Reacher's help with. Maybe the Prometheus problem. You can just make up something, though.

Moonlight x-over: Tommy, Oliver, Josef, and Mick all hang out. Maybe Josef invites them to one of his parties, or Oliver and Tommy invite Josef to one of their parties.

Moonlight x-over: What if Felicity used to be a Freshie?

S.W.A.T. x-over: Werner Zytle has managed to distribute his new version of Vertigo (it makes you hallucinate your biggest fear) to L.A.. Oliver finds out and goes to L.A.. On a S.W.A.T. raid, Street gets dosed with the vertigo. His team tries to comfort him, but to little or no avail, and they don't have an antidote. The Green Arrow comes in and saves the day.

Supernatural x-over: Felicity meets Charlie. They become besties.

[the-firebird69]

Destiny: The Taken King - Intro Cinematic

This might occur after the events with Warhammer 40K. And her words are very important. And she said you have killed his son and some people know what that means and it is most likely Tommy f who appears to kill Trump and cheesman and many others and has Lady Gaga attached to him possibly or one of the granddaughters and he does it as a threat the empire is helping it happen you need to tighten in the laser to a complement the sources and protect them in order to launch and to keep the empire down

Zues Hera

Well that makes sense and what did you say to her I said quite a while ago that the two are related Warhammer 40K ending and the cinematic and that was him and it was what she said I looked at and I said how is that I said I'm calling you his son and it is not completely obvious so we thought it was about Dan and Dan said sometimes she used that word about you so we went over and said if he's the son then you can't do that and she said why not we do it all the time and we can block it cuz I don't want you to do your favorite a****** and Steph's messing with me I said hold on there we don't want to call you bunch of names and we said we see it she said the publisher was on my name but we can't. Now I see what it means and it's not you doing anything and it's not damn this is a joy and he says one question though who is damn okay the machine is saying damn and you're actually saying Dan dammit

Trump

Haha

Yeah it's really actually funny

Dan yeah that's not the funny part I mean I don't think I'm in the film that's funny no the answer is no that's not funny I don't know where I am I think I didn't make it I'm trying to get poison together they had something I'm not sure where I think it might be Brazil and to cleave Tommy f off the little space ship yeah that makes sense

I'm track so he goes after me too drax this is going to suck

Kind of Killian that piece of s*** and the phones get me clones not the phones you idiots

Jason

We're not here it's okay some of the time we do a lot of stupid s*** this blows real bad it's on film and everything and he says they're manipulating it it would have been better to do it as a team since whenever one of those stands up we get wiped out and it's true

The Todd

I like this relationship but we have to live with it

Tommy f yeah I mean we're always infighting and ruin each other we need each other as a team

We have to have a meeting or something this is terrible

Mac Daddy

I don't think that's going to do s***

Deal with any action Neil adamiak

I think when I meet at my brand new pancake House and all these sponsor and build in like half a day so I can have a business and so you can have this important meeting

Zeus Hera

I don't think we can do that but it's a splendid idea we know we could cook you know about working we can make as a group

Mac Daddy

Where and when I'm famished

Ben Stiller

I don't know where's my knife this idiot's got to go

Terry cheesman I think I'm your grandson or grand uncle or nephew or something yeah Grand nephew well things get out of hand and your blow up and we don't get how and he says he's one of the Chinese guys is Mike the maintenance guy so we are going to have to do something

This blows were fooled again

Terry cheesman

[positively-emerald]

People who go by Tommy are not to be trusted

[wecantseeyou]

a note on color - how line of duty series 6 uses wardrobe to frame narrative (pt 1)

author’s note: this began as a personal observation on the use of cool tones for AC-12 and warm tones in opposition to AC-12, and evolved into a spreadsheet tracking most every outfit 3 of the 4 leads wear in every episode (through 6). 

Why Jo, Kate, and Steve? 

Jo: This is ultimately a rumination on Jo and her character, and the non-textual ways the show indicates Jo’s feelings, actions, and allegiances.

Kate: Jo’s major emotional connection in the series. Kate’s wardrobe often mirrors Jo’s in both style and color, and Kate’s wardrobe also gives hints to Jo’s true identity, while also reminding the audience of her allegiance with AC-12 (in both principles and action)

Steve: As the face of AC-12 in many ways (especially in this season, whereas past seasons that would’ve been Kate), Steve’s wardrobe is the control. He is firmly planted as an anti-corruption officer, is an ally of Kate, and he acts as Jo’s foil.

Why not Hastings?: Lord knows I love Ted, but the man really only ever wears his uniform (which is an entirely different essay about his views of the police force, ‘bent coppers’, and the ‘bad apples’ view of addressing police misconduct)

Some of the colors folks wear are difficult to quantify - I note circumstances where a shirt or sweater could be interpreted as multiple colors, and some instances where I believe that open interpretation is intentional. To be incredibly simplistic for how I coded the colors, cool tones are the good guys, and warm tones are the bad guys. Where possible, I have included reference images for the outfits I’m discussing (low quality screencaps ahead). 

It took me some time to choose the organization of this essay, but ultimately there’s only one way to really do it - scene to scene. So buckle in, cause this is a doozy. I’m posting just episode 1 today, and then plan to post analyses breaking down the other episodes through Saturday. Essay under the cut.

DISCLAIMER: I’m American, so there’s likely something about the UK that I miss here. Alas, we’ll persevere. I barely edited this because I’m no longer a student and don’t have that kind of time. Also, I already wrote one dissertation and I refused to admit I wrote another one. 

METHODOLOGY

To kick off, I went through and looked at every outfit worn by Jo Davidson and Kate Fleming, and most worn by Steve Arnott, in series 6. Steve acts as my control because he begins and ends my sample as a working member of AC-12, which for the purposes of this narrative represents police who are not corrupt. He is exclusively shown in cool tones in every scene I discuss here. Kate serves to bridge that gap in analysis between Jo and Steve - she is anti-corruption through and through, but she is no longer a member of AC-12, and she also has a close relationship with Jo, which is clearly romantic in tone. Kate often wears cool tones and white, but the occasional brown, orange, and green pop up (hold that thought on green). Jo is my main focus of my analysis, because I believe her wardrobe is most clearly impacted by the struggle between internal desires and external pressures. She wears a range of colors, but most frequently it is a combination of warm and cool tones. For the purpose of this analysis, black is considered a warm tone, white is both cool and absent allegiance, and grey is considered a cool tone.

THESIS

Since the first episode of series 6, Line of Duty has used color to indicate that Jo Davidson is not bent by aligning her with the tone of AC-12 as a whole and Kate Fleming specifically. TL;DR: The show has used wardrobe to tell us that Jo is not (intentionally) bent from the beginning.

Jo isn’t ‘bent’ in that she doesn’t want to be corrupt, but she’s forced to be. Surrounded on all sides by the OCG because of her uncle/father, Tommy Hunter, Jo therefore has no choice but to follow OCG orders for fear for her life. The show works to show us this visually in a few ways. Cool tones, representing ‘justice’ through AC-12, are seen throughout her screen time, but they are often peppered with warm tones, representing corruption and the OCG. This is true of her wardrobe overall, but is perhaps most succinctly demonstrated in her apartment. Keep these thoughts in mind as I break down each outfit. 

EPISODE 1

There are points where the wardrobe informs us of things that the text directly contradicts. For instance, in the opening scene of episode 1, Jo arrives at the Hill wearing a black coat over a dark grey turtleneck, and is shown talking to Lomax about a new lead in the Gail Vella murder investigation. She is then shown talking to Buckells about this lead, an unknown CHIS who claims to have spoken with a man named Ross Turner who claimed to have killed Gail. The interaction seems innocuous, and Buckells denies permission for a raid on Turner’s home, but look more carefully at the dialogue here. Jo is manipulating Buckells by presenting him with information about the source, including that he was a sex worker and speculating on his potential drug use. These two factors are what makes Buckells hesitate, and he ultimately stops the raid from being carried out that night. 

While Jo in this scene seems to push Buckells to give permission for the operation, Jo’s dark wardrobe is telling the audience that something else is happening on another level here. We learn later that Jo would take advantage of Buckells baser instincts and desire for upward advancement in order to manipulate him, which is what she does in this scene. She specifically mentions the CHIS’s sex work and the potential drug use because she knows Buckells will worry about the reliability of the witness and want more to go off of, hence cancelling the operation. Jo’s dark clothes hint at her manipulation of Buckells while the audience is not yet clued in.

The next time we see Jo during the team briefing about Ross Turner is also the first time we get a hint at the fliration between her and Kate. Jo’s “dirty stop-out” line and Kate’s “glass houses, boss” response, coupled with Jo’s smile that she hides by looking down show a clear shift in tone. The black jacket is removed, and she’s wearing a grey turtleneck. Jo is slightly more at ease here, enjoying the easy banter. Meanwhile, Kate is wearing a cream/light brown sweater, our first visual clue of her separation from AC-12 and her connection to Jo. 

Note here that Jo’s black jacket was on top of her grey turtleneck, and could be removed. The turtleneck, a very modest and in some ways restrictive top, also serves as an armor Jo wears to brace herself against her own actions. 

When the operation to arrest Ross Turner is approved, Jo again dons a black jacket under her body armor, while Kate wears a green coat under her body armor. Jo putting on the black jacket is symbolic of how she is about to waylay the team with the staged armed robbery at the bookie, allowing time for the OCG to replace Owen Banks with Terry Boyle. Kate’s green coat is symbolic of her mixed allegiances between AC-12’s blue and Jo’s yellow.

Later, when debriefing the operation with Lomax and discussing the importance of learning the CHIS’s identity, Jo and Kate are back to the grey and cream sweaters they were wearing earlier. Their banter is also back with Kate’s “great minds” line, demonstrating their comfort and also telling the audience these two women are in sync with one another. 

Immediately after this series of scenes, we see Steve for the first time. His first scene is at AC-12, wearing a grey suit, white shirt, and red tie, when he is notified that Farida Jatri is there to see him. We learn in the next scene, where Steve is in a blue suit with a blue shirt and blue tie, that Farida brought her concerns about Jo to AC-12, particularly about the odd armed robbery that Jo spotted. He asks Hastings for permission to look into it further, which is granted. The all blue outfit on Steve represents his desire to root out potential corruption in this complaint. He continues to wear this outfit for most of the episode when dealing with the investigation and MIT.

(Note: there’s an interlude scene here of the MIT crew in crime scene suits at Terry’s, but I’m not including that here.)

We next see Jo with Lomax, interrogating a frightened Terry Boyle, while Kate watches the video feed of the interview. Jo is wearing another grey turtleneck, but this time is wearing a grey jacket, while Kate watches on with a cream oversized sweater. The interview with Terry goes nowhere for the most part, as he refuses to comment, which seems to be to Jo’s relief. Kate, however, clearly isn’t done.

Donned in a green mockneck and navy suit, Kate visits the crime scene at Terry’s apartment again. This green top still aligns her with both AC-12 and Jo, but the navy suit serves as a reminder that she doesn’t think the MIT has the full story on Terry Boyle. 

Later, we see Kate in the same outfit debriefing Jo on the new information at the crime scene, namely that there is no new information because it’s been wiped clean. Jo is wearing a grey suit jacket, brown sweater, and a white shirt. Both agree that Terry isn’t a solid suspect, and want the ID of the CHIS in order to confirm that he’s the man identified as Ross Turner. Jo’s layering here is interesting - cool tone, warm tone, cool tone. She agrees with Kate externally, she knows Terry is in the frame for Vella’s murder, and she doesn’t feel comfortable pursuing Terry as a suspect she knows is innocent.

They then visit the CHIS’s handler, who refuses to give up his informant’s ID, but reveals to Kate that he is concerned about the CHIS’s welfare. Kate is wearing a long navy coat, while Jo is wearing a long grey coat with a blue and orange scarf. Kate wants to know the CHIS’s ID to genuinely pursue justice, hence the blue, while Jo wants the CHIS’s ID for ostensibly the same reason, but for her, pursuing justice with the CHIS would also clear Terry’s name. Jo doesn’t want Terry to be punished because he’s innocent, but she also knows a negative ID on Terry will lead to trouble for her with the OCG.

We see Jo in the same outfit minus outerwear in the next few scenes - when she is called into Buckell’s office and convinces him to put pressure on for the CHIS’s ID (while Kate watches), and later when Kate informs her that there was a surveillance gap on Terry Boyle’s flat due to the wrong authority being sought. Jo pushes Buckells and manipulates him to reveal the CHIS’s ID, and also blames him for the gap that she’s responsible for, hence the warm coloring of her sweater. Kate, meanwhile, is showing her allegiance to Jo by telling her about the gaffe, the green of her shirt being the visual representation of that act. 

Next we have a scene of Steve looking at CCTV of the armed robbery, and their suspicions are raised about the speed the convoy was traveling and the likelihood that Jo could have actually spotted it. Again, Steve is in an all blue outfit. 

Back to our favorite murder investigators, Lomax, Jo, and Kate arrive on the scene of a murder victim which turns out to be their missing CHIS. Jo is dressed in a long grey coat, green sweater, and light blue shirt, while Kate is rocking a long navy coat, navy suit, and an orange and navy striped turtleneck. Later at MIT, Kate and Jo discuss the CHIS further, lamenting the loss of the only witness who could ID Terry as Ross Turner. Throughout this scene, Jatri is watching the two of them interact. Jatri then calls Steve, in a grey suit with a blue tie, and tells him she can no longer be an informant. 

Round two of interviewing sweet Terry begins, with Jo in the same outfit and Kate watching on video, again in the same striped turtleneck. They all seem to think Terry is hiding something, but Kate seems taken aback at some of Jo’s lines of questioning (Vicky McClure, expert reactor) but is mostly saddened by Terry. Later, Steve meets with Kate outside of Hillside and they discuss his inquiry into Jo. She refuses to help, but gives him the name Carl Banks as someone to look into. 

We then see Jo arrive at Farida’s house with a suitcase, moving out her final belongings after their breakup, where they have a row over Jo’s refusal to introduce Farida to her nonexistent family. After, Jo returns to her own apartment with its 18 dead bolts. Nearly the entire place is blue - the walls, the furniture, even the refrigerator. However, those warm tones pop up throughout - lemons on the counter, golden pillows in the living room, gold lights framing the picture of her mother. Jo at her heart is good and believes in justice, but she has been groomed and manipulated by the OCG into acting against her nature in the name of self-preservation. She is blue, but the pops of gold and yellow of the OCG catch the eye. 

The following scene shows Jo getting chewed out by Buckells in the briefing room in full view of the rest of MIT, again in the green sweater and blue shirt. Kate looks on in concern, still wearing the orange and navy striped sweater. Buckells storms out, and Jo rushes into the hallway. Kate follows quickly behind, asking after Jo, who vents her frustrations with the pressure to charge Terry with murder because she knows it isn’t right and wants to find real justice for Gail. The color choices in this scene are clear. Kate is wearing orange and navy, highlighting both her connection to Jo and her pursuit of justice. Jo is wearing green, combining the blue of her heart and the pollution of OCG yellow, with a light blue shirt, again highlighting her true self and alignment with Kate.

This also highlights something we don’t learn until episode 6 - Jo wanted Kate on her team to keep her in check and be a barrier to the things the OCG was asking her to do. This includes the arrest of Terry Boyle. Jo specifically identifies several odd things about the recent evidence - and tells Kate that something doesn’t add up, essentially encouraging the DI to look into these inconsistencies further. This is her way of looking for help when she still feels trapped in many ways. 

Of course, no analysis of this scene would be complete without mentioning the hand grab and subsequent hold. They’re gay, kids!

The final scene shows Jo watching as Terry Boyle is released and remanded to police bail, a look of relief on her face. Because yeah, she’s done a lot of bent things, but Jo isn’t bent.

And that’s where the episode wraps.

Stay tuned for more wardrobe analysis tomorrow!

[amysteryspot]

All I want for Christmas is you - Thomas Shelby x Fem!Reader

Request: hiii! can you do modern! tommy and reader spending christmas? thank you!!❤️

Requested by: Anonymous

Fandom: Peaky Blinders

Pairing: Thomas Shelby x Female Reader

Summary: (Y/N) is staying with Tommy during the lockdown and, inevitably, the holidays, but he has plans to make her stay last a little longer.

Warnings: Swearing, Modern!AU and more fluff than what you're all used considering my history with angst.

Word Count: 904

A/N: I know, I know, in theory “Highway to Hell” was supposed to be the last Christmas related fic, but @caelys​ made my heart grow three sizes today, and I’ve received a request for Modern!Tommy, and I miss writing Modern!Tommy, so here we are. I’m sorry if it sounds too OOC, but I was just going with the flow.

Also, I saw that both @blinder-secrets​ and @pollyrepents​ were feeling a little down, so I’m going to dedicate it to them and anyone who is feeling a little low today in hopes that some Tommy fluff can get you all a little better.

Feedback is more than appreciated, especially during the holidays.

(Y/N) = Your Name | (Y/L/N) = Your Last Name

English is not my first language and this wasn’t proofread by a beta. If you want to be tagged in my stories, just send me a message.

“Stop complaining and help me put this up,” she said, making Tommy huff.

“I don't know why you're so keen on it,” he complains but gets up to help her settle things on the table, reserving a space for the tablet so they would be able to do the videoconference with the rest of their families.

They wouldn’t be able to visit their relatives because of the lockdown. They weren’t even supposed to be locked up together, it just sort of happened. (Y/N) had been passing more time at his flat than her own, when the new lockdown was announced, Tommy said that it was easier if both of them were in one place together. She said nothing but counted the unusual request as a small victory.

“I just like to have everyone together, Tom. We didn’t have much of that when I was growing up.”

Tommy looked up at her, probably recognizing the hint of pain on her voice, and was quick to walk to her, sneaking his arms around her waist from behind and placing soft kisses on her neck and shoulder.

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs after a while.

“Don't be,” she answers, smiling.

Her family was... Complicated. She grew up almost without contact with her uncles and aunts, or her grandparents. It was only her brother, their parents, and her.

When she and Tommy started dating the prospect of being near them all gathered together excited her to no end, much to his dismay. Most of the time all he wanted was some time away from his family, even though he loved them dearly and made everything in his power to give them a better life.

“Christmas just lost a lot of sense for me after my mom died,” he confesses, in a low tone as if there were more people in the room and he only wanted her to hear it.

“Do you want to talk about it?” (Y/N) asks, turning around in his embrace and pecking his lips quickly, cradling his face between her hands.

Tommy leans in, kissing her more deeply, swaying with her from side to side for a moment, and then pressing their foreheads together.

“No, I just want you,” he said, bringing her in for another kiss, his hands wandering down her body.

“Tommy,” she warns weekly as his lips trail down her neck, and then before (Y/N) can say anything, the song of a videocall being received rings in the room.

They both look at the tablet to see who it is and Tommy groans, cursing.

“Fuck, why it’s always John?”

Laughing, (Y/N) pulls away from him and goes to answer the call, murmuring a ‘behave’ for him before answering the request.

Despite his complaints, Tommy did enjoy himself during supper. Their families were such a wild contrast: the Shelby’s were all loud and outgoing, the (Y/L/N)’s, calm and collected. (Y/N) always questioned herself why the both of them ended up together.

After midnight, when everyone disconnected and (Y/N) was putting the last things into place, having already changed into her sleeping clothes, she walked into the living room to find Tommy laying on the couch. The only source of light in the room being the Christmas lights and the light from the streets that seeped into the room through the thin curtains.

“Common, let’s go to bed,” she called, walking to him and picking up his hand to pull him off the couch.

“No, let’s stay here,” Tommy pulled her down to him, making her fall onto his chest.

They both giggled, as he rearranged the blanket to cover them both, making her rest her head on his chest, their legs intertwined.

(Y/N) thought that she couldn’t love him more than she already did, but when she looked up and found him already gazing back at her, the glimmer of the Christmas lights on his eyes, and that little smirk on his lips, she knew how wrong she was.

She kissed him, and then snuggled closer to him, in an attempt to pick up some of his warmness. They stayed in silence for what seemed like forever, the feeling of his hand gently moving up and down her back made (Y/N)’s eyes grow heavy, and she was already dozing off when she heard him say,

“I think you should move in,” he announced, simply, making her eyes go wide.

“Well, I think I already did,” she chuckled, with all the intention of going back to sleep.

“No, I mean permanently.”

Leaning on an elbow, (Y/N) blinked the sleep away as she stared back at him.

“What are you on about, Tommy?”

“I don’t want you to go back to your flat after this is over. Want you here, all the time. I want to wake up to you every day and go to sleep with you in my arms every night.”

“Tommy,” she called when he moved to pick up something from the side table.

“You asked me what I wanted for Christmas,” he said, opening the little velvet box in his hands, making her gasp and cover her mouth as her eyes filled with tears. “It’s you. You’re all I want for Christmas and the rest of my days. (Y/N) (Y/L/N), would you give me the honor of being my wife?”

“Yes,” she answered, unable to contain her tears anymore as she brought their lips together. “Yes, yes, a million times yes.”

.

Taglist: @stressedandbandobessed7771​ @captivatedbycillianmurphy​ @internalmess3​ @giowritess​ @theshelbyclan​ @peakyxtommy​

[frenchphobic]

long fucking post on why a c!dream is a shitty person and probably should not have a redemption because it is unpog

honestly i just want to refute dream apologists thats why im making this post. i think that dream as a villain is interesting but i think that trying to make him out to be secretly a good guy is just bad ngl. also /roleplay and all

tw for abuse and mentions of suicide

dream as a villain

dream is a villain. he is chaotic evil according to wilbur, deliberately does not stream to appear less sympathetic (and yet), and is set up as an antagonist to tommy who bears the title ‘hero’. dream is not a good person, no matter how you look at it or try to justify his actions.

‘but he wants to unite everyone to be a big family :((’ the ends dont justify the means believe it or not. having a vaguely positive goal does not excuse the actions you’ve done. it also goes hand and hand with saying dream is correct for punishing tommy the way he did because he acted up. if i socked you across the face and then suddenly said ‘sorry there was a roach on ur face’ does that make it okay? probably not i still punched you, enacting an unnecessary amount of violence. thats a very simple analogy i will admit and there are more complex comparisons. another example off the top of my head is say a child just scribbled all over you walls with crayons. would hitting them be a justified answer? if u said hes thats really fucked of u go seek help u loon. violence as a punishment is very toxic, just because it gets the job done does not mean it is okay. at the end of the day, you still committed this act and the harm you caused is real, having a good motive doesnt suddenly make it okay.

‘but tommy causes all of the conflict’ the disk war wasnt even caused by tommy, it was sapnap and then tommy got involved. and the reason why tommy even caused conflict was because of the discs, because he wanted them back. and most of the time there was a level of antagonism from another party, such as schlatt exiling him, dream taking the disks in the first place, dream threatening l’manberg. and if dream wanted to end the conflict so badly, why didnt he just give tommy back his disks? tommy upfront said everything started with the disks, so he wants them back so he could end the conflict. notice how after tommy got his disks back he has been staying out of conflict, apologizing to everyone, and the only bad thing hes done is try to scam people but everyone does that. this would have been the most peaceful option, yet dream chose the path that would further antagonize tommy which then draws everyone else into conflict. why did dream need to have leverage over tommy so badly? why did he want to hold power over tommy so badly? its because of control, and that’s ultimately dreams end goal. sure he wants a big server family, but would said family have a free will?

‘but dream is sad’ the thing is dream is completely at fault for everything that happened to him. he pushed away sapnap (and george ig). he tried to take control over the server and their possessions. literally everything that happened to tommy. literally everything involving ranboo. villains can be sympathetic, i am not arguing against that. but it does not mean that they should be left off the hook. that doesnt mean u should ignore the shit theyve done because ‘oh no theyre sad’ because it doesnt make anything better. dream had this shit coming for him.

now people also skirt around calling dream an abuser. which is fair ig, its a very loaded word. its much easier to say manipulated. that being said, dream can classify as abusive. and no, tommy is not abusive. abuse is about control and a power imbalance. dream has power over tommy, but tommy does not have power over dream, at least not in the way dream does. he’s taking back power to stand up for himself, dream uses power to control.

the reasons i listed for why dream is from the Domestic Abuse Intervention Project so if u want a source on that, there you go.

using coercion or threats: dream often threatened tommy, such as the pit thing and often employed violence on him. while normally this could be attributed to Normal Minecraft Player Go Smack. minecraft mechanics cannot always translate to real world since violence is pretty normal in minecraft however we also need to consider the context of the scene. dream gave an order, tommy refused, dream applies violence, tommy submitted. thats why its a threat, it has tangible effects that can correlate to real life.

using intimidation: dream blew up logsteadshire as a punishment. dream also destroyed tommys items anytime he visited. dream also hit tommy with his axe i believe. he killed mushroom henry, one of tommys pets.

Using Emotional Abuse: dream guiltripped the shit out of tommy for just hiding things and pinning the blame on tommy for just wanting his own private items. he definitely played mind games on tommy, pretending to be his friend. honestly i probably dont even need to go as in depth because it was so obvious.

Using Isolation: putting him in exile in the first place. destroying the bether portal so no one could visit tommy anymore. i really dont think i need to expand upon that.

Minimizing, Denying, and Blaming: dream in tommys stream when he got trapped said that exile wasnt that bad. he does shift the blame onto tommy for logsteadshire being blown up, even though dreams reaction was entirely unjustified for not listening and hiding.

Using Economic Abuse: see this is where i attempt to parallel minecraft mechanics to real life. obviously, there is no monetary system in place, so when i mean economic, i will use valuables such as armor, food, etc in place of currency. the idea behind economic abuse is to limit the victim’s resources so that they are dependent on the abuser and cannot escape. dream only really allowed tommy to have the armor he gave him while not giving access to armor so he does not regain a sense of power, and in the prison stream, dream holds all the potatoes which puts him in a position of power over tommy. this argument is more ambiguous i feel cause the whole minecraft mechanics thing is kinda weird so u don’t necessarily have to take this part in.

i feel like i need to emphasize this very strongly because dream is not a good person. abuse cannot and should not be a response to someone. its an awful mentality to have. i just want to prove the point that dream is not a good person, his reasons absolutely do not justify his actions.

what makes a good redemption

redemption arcs are tricky. when done right they are great. when done poorly, its a slap in the face. rn im going to establish a formula to what makes a good redemption with an example.

the most well known example of a good redemption is zuko from atla. first, its the magnitude of what theyve done and why. zuko did commit some shitty actions, since he was in a position of power in the fire nation but its because he is a child being abused and wanted to regain honor. zukos real awful acts was season 1 and the whole betrayal thing. thats not to say that zukos actions suddenly are okay, he did shitty things. but its something that can be traced to a higher entity or seem less malicious then the other villains. the thing also about the magnitude of actions is that there is a certain point of atrocities that there is no redemption. some people simply cannot be redeemed because the actions they commit are so ingrained in their character or the action itself has serious moral issues that it would just be wrong.

the next is acknowleding what they did was wrong. a genuine reflection on the self and analyzing what they did and why it was not okay. zuko realized what he did to uncle iroh was bad for example. he turned his back on his father, realizing he didnt and shouldnt seek acknowledgment from someone as heinous as him. its pointing out your actions and going ‘hey, this wasnt right i should not have done this’ and not even excusing ur actions. its also going straight for the root of the problem and figuring out to stamp it from the source. just because a character is sad does not mean they are reflecting, sometimes they are attempting to garner pity. it has to be direct and clear acknowledgement of the injustice.

and finally, an important part about redemption arcs is the actual redemption part. its when you make amends. zuko made amends with katara by trying to help her get revenge, he fought against the fire nation and tried to make things more peaceful in his rule. he apologized to iroh. an important part of the amends section is that it does have to be a genuine desire to change and become a better person, not to change a person’s perception of you. the thing is u cant expect a person youve hurt to forgive you. you cant expect people to be sympathetic towards you nor should u attempt to make urself sympathetic. u shouldnt be expecting a pat on the back or an award. redemption is about internal and character change.

why dream should not be redeemed

ive already established the key points to a good redemption (imo) but heres where dream falls short. his actions are extremely heavy so redemption may not even really be possible. abuse is not something you can wave off so it does cross to the point of fucked up. acknowledgement of what he did was wrong? all he said was that he changed, yet never explained why he changed or was too vague. he needed to label specifically what he did and bring it up. attempting to make amends? he’s been doing the exact opposite in fact he continues to manipulate tommy and ranboo. its not a genuine change. he is still repeating the cycle and has given no indication of ceasing. at the moment he does not have any signs of redemption.

and the thing is most of the attention around a dream redemption comes from either justifying his motives (which i do want to emphasize does not make anything suddenly okay) and because he is sad in prison sad face. these are not good reasons. its gonna pain me severely to bring this up but snape from harry potter does have some form of sad character ig yet he very much abused his authority to bully children as old as 11 just because he said ‘aight gonna die’ doesnt suddenly make his general bigotry and abuse suddenly okay there is a threshold. again im so sorry for using harry potter as an example none were coming to mind and i needed a popular one i do not like harry potter please dont say i do i would pass away.

and the last thing to consider is the audience. keep in mind that the audience is composed of minors and while yes there are adults, minors are the main component of the fandom. keep in mind that there are quite a few people who can relate to tommys character because they might be in the same position or have gone through his experiences. tell me what kind of message does it send to that audience that abusers can be redeemed. this is not a narrative u should push to this audience in these situations and the writers are seemingly aware of it. remember how in exile tommy spiraled into a suicidal mentality? consider how fucked of a message it would be if he just committed suicide instead of escaping abuse and attempting to recover from his experiences. tommy did an excellent job in not going that route and having a message of ‘it will not get better’. its the same thing here. victims are not obligated to care for or forgive their abuser, and portraying an abuser as sympathetic might fuck with the message a lot, even change their perception in that ‘oh, maybe my abuser was right, maybe they had a reason for treating me the way they did’. this is not to say that every victim watching this will internalize this message, but people also look up to these characters. there can be a degree of influence from the story onto oneself and thats the dangerous part.

conclusion

all in all dream is a shitbag asshole and probably shouldnt get a redemption because it would not be pog thanks for coming to my ted talk.

[raywritesthings]

Bird in a Storm

My Writing Fandom: Arrow Characters: Laurel Lance, Oliver Queen, Tommy Merlyn, Athena, Roy Harper, John Diggle, Thea Queen, Quentin Lance, Ted Grant, Moira Queen, Walter Steele, Raisa, A.J. Diggle, Felicity Smoak, Female OCs, Male OCs Pairing: Laurel Lance/Oliver Queen Summary: The confrontation between the Hood and SWAT on the roof of the Winick Building goes differently, altering the course of Laurel’s career, relationships and efforts to save her city forever, the shockwaves of such an altered path making themselves felt throughout her family and friends. *Can be read on my AO3, link is in bio*

John had only just dropped A.J. off from their morning in the park. He’d given his nephew some pointers and shot a few hoops with him, then sat him down on a bench to finally tell him about how the cops had caught the bad man who took his father away. It was a simplification, maybe, and when A.J. was older, he would get the full story. But John wanted his nephew to know that justice had been done.

A.J. had listened raptly, then asked, “Did the Hood help them?”

John had smiled. Ever since his mother had been saved first by the Hood and then later by Laurel’s vigilante persona, A.J. had become rather enamored with Starling City’s unconventional protectors. If he only knew his uncle was right in the thick of it. “Yeah. Yeah, he did.”

He had turned the radio on upon getting back in his car for the drive home, only to find not music, but a news bulletin playing across the airwaves.

“An anonymous source delivered the blueprints to the bomb being developed at Queen Consolidated’s subsidiary Unidac Industries to this station as as reportedly to the police. Eyewitnesses outside the SCPD’s downtown precinct say they saw who appeared to be Moira Queen, the current CEO of Queen Consolidated, being led inside by officers over an hour ago.”

John had sat there, stunned, only able to listen as the news report continued on. Oliver’s mother stood accused of sabotaging the Gambit to kill her husband, having her second husband kidnapped, hiring the Triad assassins to kill Malcolm Merlyn and commissioning a bomb to be set off underneath the Glades.

That last one chilled him to the bone. He had plenty of experience with bombs going off in cities, destroying buildings or cars, killing handfuls of people here and there in an unpredictable pattern designed to cause terror and paranoia. But from the sounds of it, this device at Unidac Industries was so much more than that. No one had been meant to learn it was even a bomb.

Now we know why their symbol was the subway map, John thought grimly to himself.

Something was missing from the news report, however. Where was the rest of Tempest in all this? What about the man Moira had been talking to that night John had spied on her? The man whose voice had been too indistinct to make out on the recording?

“Oliver and Thea Queen have reportedly left the precinct,” the reporter announced, breaking John out of his shock. If Oliver had been at the precinct, then he knew more about what was really happening than the news was telling. And John had a feeling that as long as his friend and Thea were in the spotlight like this, they might actually need a bodyguard.

He called Oliver’s phone and got Laurel, though she quickly filled him in on where they were headed. John drove as fast as he could to the base, made difficult by the number of people out on the streets. Some were shouting, others just wandering around with their mouths hanging open like they just couldn’t believe what they were seeing and hearing. A restless energy seemed to hang in the air.

He parked and let himself in the back, entering the base to find Oliver already grabbing his suit to change and Laurel in her own clothes that she wore at night, minus her jacket.

“Where’s your sister?” John asked when Oliver caught sight of him.

“She’s upstairs with Roy. I need you to stay with them while I track down Tommy.”

John frowned. “What’s Tommy got to do with this?” He knew Oliver was in something of a silent feud with the man, however reluctantly, but it felt like that should be further down the priority list.

“Everything,” Oliver answered simply.

“According to Moira, Malcolm Merlyn was the real leader of Tempest,” Laurel elaborated, causing John’s eyebrows to rise as high as they were able. Their city’s supposed great humanitarian had been planning a terror attack? “She had him killed, and Tommy swore he was going to find out who did it. He would have had access to everything his father had on this device and the Gambit and everything else.”

“So instead of having her killed, he’s taking her down publicly. Setting his father up as a martyr, too,” John realized. “He probably told them your mother had Merlyn killed to stop him from going to them.”

Oliver’s fists clenched. “It’s an easy story to sell.”

“Does your mother have some kind of dirt on Merlyn she can use?” John wasn’t particularly fond of Moira Queen; the woman had been a party to this plot in some capacity or another. But she didn’t deserve to go down for the whole thing. Not when it wasn’t the truth.

“The Dark Archer took it,” Laurel said with a scowl.

“He’s still out there? Oliver, if he’s working for Tommy now, then I need to come with you. I can’t let you go into that kind of battle alone again.” He didn’t want to rub his friend’s defeat at the other archer’s hands in his face, but he would gently remind him if he had to.

“John, I appreciate that, but right now there is a whole city of people who think my mother is a domestic terrorist, and there are some who are going to be angry. If they can’t get to her, they will try to get to me or Thea. If I’m gonna fight the Dark Archer again, I need to know that she’s safe.”

As much as he didn’t want him to be, he knew Oliver was right. John looked to Laurel. “What about you?”

“I’d be pretty outmatched against that kind of fighter,” she admitted. “And that’s assuming I could even get up close to him. Besides, I’m gonna be needed in the Glades tonight. People are panicking. That never leads anywhere good.”

“Alright, you might actually be crazier than he is,” John decided. “The best thing anyone can do is hunker down tonight.”

“But a lot of people won’t be, and people are going to get hurt because of it. I can’t sit down here watching it happen when I started down this path to stop it.”

Oliver was frowning but held his tongue. Either they’d already been over this privately before John arrived or he was keeping his thoughts to himself. He couldn’t imagine it was easy. John had often found himself worrying about Lyla whenever they had run separate missions in Afghanistan. Sometimes he still worried.

Laurel took her wig off the table and bent over to fit it onto her head. She rose quickly, the blonde locks falling down her back. She shrugged into a jean jacket resting on the back of a chair. Then she turned to Oliver, placing one hand to his cheek.

“Be careful.”

“And you.”

Oliver bent his head to meet her lips in a kiss, one hand at the small of her back pressing her closer. John looked away, having no desire to intrude on their moment. This was hard enough for them both already. Then she headed out to the back where she kept the motorcycle Oliver had bought.

John joined his friend by the computers as he brought one of the monitors up. “How are you planning to find Tommy?”

“One of the things I had to do on the island was learn from example. The more I observed, the better off my chances were.”

“Which means…?”

“Which means that thanks to Felicity, I know how to ping a phone.” He stood back up to his full height after clicking and typing away in a far more serious manner than their temporary teammate had done. John wondered what she must be thinking about all the news. At the least, she was probably safe since her small townhouse was outside the Glades. “I’ll change and then run it. You should get upstairs.”

“Alright.” He held out his hand and Oliver clasped it with his. John placed his free hand on the other man’s shoulder. “Good luck.”

“Thank you.” Oliver didn’t need to tell him the thanks was for more than a simple well-wish.

John headed up to the club area of the Verdant, finding Thea and Roy sitting at the bar watching the news on a low volume.

“Mr. Diggle? Where’s Ollie?” Thea asked as he joined them.

“Still downstairs. He’s trying to take care of some things regarding your mother.”

“Okay, what about Laurel?”

“She went back out,” John answered, not missing the spark of recognition in Roy’s eyes. “Said she needed to make sure her home was secure ahead of what’s shaping up to be a pretty rough night.”

“I, uh, I should probably do the same thing,” Roy said, standing up.

“Wait, what? Roy, no,” Thea said, standing with him and taking his hands. “It’s dangerous out there.”

“I’ll be fine. But this is my home, Thea. I gotta do something. Stay here with your brother’s bodyguard. I’ll come back.”

“Roy!”

But the young man hurried out the front door. John went over and locked them behind him.

Thea stood there a moment before sinking back into her barstool. She looked terribly lonely and afraid.

“I know this isn’t easy, Miss Queen, but the best thing we can do is stay out of the public eye right now.”

“They’re really gonna blame me and Ollie for this?”

He looked down. “The truth will become clear eventually, but people aren’t interested in truth right now.”

She said nothing, and he took the time to send a text to Carly, checking that she and A.J. were at home and planning to stay there. The news continued to play in the background, and he tuned it out but for a few snippets here and there.

“Chaos as protests break out outside Alderman Blood’s office. The alderman himself appears to be leading them.”

“People are storming the local groceries, taking food, water and other essentials, many refusing to pay.”

“As you can see below, traffic is backed up several blocks as some look to flee the Glades. Mayor Altman’s statement that the Unidac device is in police custody doing little to calm a public fearing a Biblical reckoning.”

“Susan, is it true we have sighting of who folks have taken to calling the Woman of the Glades?”

John looked up, but just then a pounding started up at the front door.

“Open up, Queen!” A voice called, some muffled jeers accompanying it. “Your mom’s sending us all to Hell, and I want a drink first!”

John shut the TV off. “Sit down behind the bar,” he said in an undertone to Thea. She nodded and hurried to do as told. John crouched down behind a table with his gun drawn, waiting for any sign of the door caving in.

This was going to be a long night.

—-

Tommy surprised himself at times whenever he recalled how little time had really passed since his life had changed forever. Even if he started counting from the day Oliver had come back home and brought the Hood with him, it hadn’t even been a year.

He reflected on this past year as the chauffeur drove him and Athena to the airport. He had finally made a bid for the heart of Laurel Lance, only to find hers would always belong to another. He could only think of their time together with scorn, now. To think he hadn’t needed to throw fundraisers or offer to better himself at all; Laurel’s tastes had and always would be for the bad boy, and seemingly one who used his might to get his way. He wondered how she might feel once Tommy completed his training with Athena. Would she realize what she could have had?

He had been cast out of his inheritance, forced to face the reality that he was a grown man, and what sort of man he wanted to be. While his anger had once burned towards his father for what had felt a rejection, he had realized what his father had felt he needed to do. Tommy’s life had not held much meaning before that; a part of him had always felt life itself was meaningless when good, honest people like his mother were gunned down for nothing. Now, he was the head of Merlyn Global and the last, best hope for both his parents’ legacies.

His life had been placed under threat over and over again in the very neighborhood his mother had lost hers and even in the safer sections of downtown. Starling was diseased, was the only conclusion he could draw, and he felt a smug satisfaction that now the whole city could see it, too. It wouldn’t change anything for the better, of course. They would sooner destroy each other than work towards a common good. Just like how Oliver claimed to work for the good of the people and yet was little more than a killer.

Oliver. His oldest friend and someone he once called a brother. He had always been jealous of Oliver in many ways; he had the loving parents, an adoring sister, the heart of the girl Tommy yearned for and the ability to bed countless others. He had always tried to tell himself that jealousy was irrational and a part of him he needed to suppress. Now he could see it for what it had been: a warning of what was to come. That his supposed friend was really his enemy.

In many ways, Oliver had caused these changes in his life to happen. His sudden return had had Tommy anxious to try and secure an exclusive commitment out of Laurel, only for that to fail thanks to Oliver enchanting her with vigilante theatrics. His attack on his own mother had caused her to take action against Tommy’s father. His dad’s convalescence in Starling General had brought Athena into his life and opened his eyes to what was really happening in their city. So perhaps, in a way, he ought to be grateful to his friend and brother.

He wasn’t.

His thoughts were interrupted as the car slowed to a stop once it passed through the gates to the private airstrip.

“Sir, there’s someone — I think it’s the Hood standing on the tarmac,” the chauffeur called into the back, bewilderment lacing his tone. Athena’s perfect posture somehow straightened up more, but Tommy wasn’t worried in the least.

“Stop the car here and start loading the rest of our things. I’ll deal with him.” It didn’t surprise him that Oliver had tracked them here. His old friend clearly had or knew someone with tech capabilities who would be able to get a look at the flight manifests of Starling International.

Tommy let himself out and walked about ten paces away from the other man decked out in his costume. Athena followed, her hand hovering by her belt where she kept her knife.

“What do you want?”

“For you to tell the authorities the truth about Tempest,” Oliver said, a growl in his voice even if he had realized using that modulator of his was pointless.

“Why, so they can prosecute a dead man? Face it, Oliver, if you were serious about wanting to save this city, you would have needed to turn her in anyway.”

“Don’t pretend this is about saving the city. All you’ve done is caused a mass panic,” Oliver accused him.

“Good,” he replied, watching the shock play out across what he could see of Oliver’s face. “I never said I wanted to save it. And really, all I’ve done is shake them out of their apathy. Funny how an innocent woman can be bleeding out in the street and no one lifts a finger, but even suggest a threat against any of their lives and suddenly it’s riots in the streets!”

His old friend eyed him sadly. “What happened to your mother was terrible. It shouldn’t have happened at all.”

“For once, we agree.”

“I know you are better than this, Tommy. What about CNRI? The firefighters benefit. There’s a desire to do good in you in a real way. Not the posturing Malcolm was hiding behind.”

Tommy sucked in a breath through his teeth and released it, smiling as he said. “Funny you should say that. Getting involved in charity work was actually Thea’s idea. Said I should act like I was interested in the things Laurel was. What did Laurel call it…? Oh yeah, my annual attempt to get back in her pants.” He spread his arms wide. “Have to say, it worked for a while.”

He thought he heard the creak of leather as Oliver’s gloved fist clenched around the bow in his hand. For once, his friend could know exactly how he had felt watching him with Laurel all those years.

Tommy couldn’t possibly stop himself from adding, “You know she went down on me after the firefighter benefit? But I’m sure that’s nothing compared to what she lets you do every time you come swinging in to rescue her—”

With a snarl, Oliver drew an arrow and loosed it point-blank at Tommy’s chest.

Athena slashed it out of the air with her knife where it clattered to the ground before he could do more than blink in shock. A rope sprung harmlessly out of it a moment later.

His confidant went on the offensive, lunging towards Oliver, though he blocked the attack with his bow. The two traded blows while Tommy watched, wishing he actually did know this stuff already.

“Uh, Mr. Merlyn?”

He jumped in shock, having pretty much forgotten the chauffeur.

“The plane is ready.”

“Great. You can head back now. Don’t bother calling this in,” he added, holding out a one-hundred dollar bill. The man took it and dutifully went back to his car. “Athena! Let’s go.”

Athena was on the ground but had just swept Oliver’s legs out from under him as well. He gave an exaggerated wince as his once-friend went down like a ton of bricks. She jumped back to standing and came to join Tommy at the stairs, only for a second arrow to come flying and wrap around her.

Oliver had risen onto one knee and held another arrow in his hand ready to aim and loose. “I can’t let you leave.”

“Actually, you can.” Tommy smirked. “Because there’s something I know that you don’t, and after the year we’ve had, Oliver, that’s a pretty good feeling.”

Oliver stayed silent, waiting rather than give him the satisfaction of asking.

“Your mother was too hasty to get her revenge. Walter Steele is still alive.”

“You’re lying.”

“I’ll send you the address myself,” he offered. “Once I’m in the air. But if this plane doesn’t take off with me on it, the other men at that address will be ordered to finish the job. So what’ll it be, Ollie? Keep me here or save a man’s life?”

He could see the conflict that warred on Oliver’s face, knew the moment that he decided when his bow lowered just an inch.

Tommy nodded to himself. He’d known Oliver would have to choose Walter Steele and that he wasn’t really risking anything by offering the choice; how else could his old friend pretend he was a hero? “Just like you couldn’t beat my father at Christmas,” he said, watching Oliver’s eyes widen. “I’m going to learn everything he knew. Maybe once I have, we can settle this.”

He took the knife Athena had managed to work into her hand and cut her bonds for her, then turned his back on Oliver Queen and boarded the plane.

Once he sat down, he took out his phone in preparation to make good on his promise of revealing Walter’s location. Athena sat beside him, perfectly composed once more.

“How long will my training take?” He wondered aloud as the plane finally began to taxi down the runway.

“That depends on the dedication of the student. Your father completed his and rose to become one of our leader’s most trusted within two years. Another girl from your city has also excelled in her training, though she did so by seducing our leader’s heir.”

“A girl from Starling?”

“Yes. I believe she was called Sara Lance in her former life.”

Tommy froze, then a smile stole slowly over his lips. It truly was nice holding the most cards.

—-

Roy ran home as fast as he could, getting his gun and a knife out of their hiding places. He wasn’t going to try and use them tonight if he could help it, but he didn’t want one of his old crowd breaking in to take them and use them instead. With both tucked out of sight in his pockets, he grabbed his hoodie and pulled it down over his face and went back out into the night.

Laurel was going to be out here trying to restore peace to their streets. Why wouldn’t he be doing the same?

There wasn’t much point to jacking a car; the streets were packed with honking vehicles, people trying to leave like they thought the bomb was still going off. Roy couldn’t really blame them.

A block down the road, he saw two men with beers in hand grabbing the arm of a woman trying to go the other way. “Let’s have some fun before the end of the world, baby!”

“Let go of me!”

Roy charged down to meet them, slugging the first man across the jaw as he made a grab for the woman’s chest.

“What the fuck, dude?”

“World’s not ending, so get lost or get put down,” he declared, breathing harshly through his nose.

“Think you’re the Hood, big man?” The second man asked. He surged forward, only to stagger back with a howl as the woman sprayed him with a can of mace. “Shit!”

“Thanks for the help,” she said, and Roy nodded back. She turned and hurried to keep heading wherever she was going. Roy hoped she made it okay.

A wail caught his attention next, and his heart lurched as he noticed a toddler wandering dangerously near the curb, arms reaching up in a plea to be held. Roy ran and scooped the girl up, looking around wildly. Where the hell were her parents?

“Steffi? Steffi! Someone help me find my daughter!”

“Hey, that kid’s got her!”

Roy was grabbed roughly by the back of his hoodie and hauled around to face a potbellied man with a clenched fist.

“I wasn’t taking her—”

“Right, just a Good Samaritan, are ya?”

“Wait! Wait!” It was the grocer, Khan, who cried out. He rushed between them. “I know this boy. He would not hurt a child.”

He noticed who he assumed was Steffi’s mother standing just a few steps back, and Roy slowly lowered the little girl down to the ground. She was still sobbing, and he wasn’t sure she knew how to stop.

“I saw her near the road. I just…”

The man who had nearly decked him sagged while the mother gasped and hurried around him, picking up her daughter and shushing her.

Khan patted his shoulder and Roy looked down at the ground. All the times he’d stolen bits of food or dumb knick-knacks from the guy’s store, and he’d rushed to his defense.

“You should get home, Roy.”

“I’m alright. What about your store?”

Khan’s smile looked strained. “Ya Allah! It will wait until morning.”

“Okay. Okay, I’ll come check on you,” he promised. Roy took off running again.

He passed a number of smashed storefronts and people running in every single direction. He still saw no sign of Laurel or even the Hood. Where was the Hood? How could he save Roy’s life and not show when countless others needed him? How did he decide which battles he fought?

Roy stopped for a moment, panting. He took out his phone. Five missed calls from Thea. But a quick check of Channel 52’s webpage gave him at least one answer: Woman of the Glades escorts legal aide office workers to safety amid riots

Of course, her old coworkers. Roy turned and cut across the bumper-to-bumper traffic, hoping to head her off before she got too far. 

Several blocks later, a police cruiser was stuck in the middle of the street unable to make anymore progress. A garbled voice blared from its speakers. “Return to your homes. I repeat, return to your homes.”

“Hey, fuck you!”

“Yeah, fuck the man!”

A couple of teenagers in designer ripped jeans and spiked hair threw a couple rocks at the car. Their buddies all laughed.

“Stand down. Return to your homes.”

They weren’t even from around here, he realized, watching another one in the group filming it all. How much of this rioting was just people from outside the neighborhood taking advantage of all the chaos?

“Hey, get the hell out of here!”

A couple of the kids turned in his direction.

“Do you want to start a shooting?” He gestured towards the car. “They’re not gonna throw rocks back.”

The ringleader of the group stepped up and pushed at his chest. “Mind your own business, asshole.”

Roy shoved him to the ground.

“Hey!”

They were on him in seconds, and even if Roy could hit harder than any of them, he was finding it hard to fight his way past so many. He hit the ground, blows landing on his back while he brought his arms up to shield his head.

The whistle of metal through the air preceded a number of grunts, and the punches and kicks let up. The other boys all staggered back nursing arms, legs and backs as Laurel stood there in her wig and mask, seething.

“Get out of my part of town.”

The boys ran off, and she reached a hand down that Roy gladly took.

“We should get you back to the club.”

“I’m good,” he said, rubbing at his ribs.

“Put the weapon down and surrender with your hands up!”

The both jumped at hearing the command. One of the officers had gotten out of the car and was unclipping his gun.

“Come on!” Roy kept Laurel’s hand in his and ran, ignoring the stabbing pain in his chest. Of course the cops weren’t interested in lifting a finger when some rich kids were beating up on him but when someone showed up to actually do their job.

They worked together, helping some who had stumbled and fallen or breaking up fights. There were shouts from a building where smoke streamed out, but when Roy raced forward, Laurel snagged him by the arm.

“You’re already having trouble breathing. Wait here.”

She kicked the front door open rather than chance the handle, waited a moment as an initial plume of smoke billowed out, then rushed inside with a hand pressed over her mouth.

Roy waited, hands twitching at his sides. He’d give it five minutes. No, two. Damnit, how long was someone able to go inhaling smoke?

“Hey, boy!”

He turned at the call, spotting an older Black woman two doors down. She was watching the smoking building with fear in her eyes.

“I have a hose. I don’t know if it’ll reach.”

Roy hurried over to the side of her house, grabbing the hose and yanking it as far as it would go in the direction of the building. “Turn it on!”

Water trickled and then spurted out, hitting the front of the building and getting in through the door. It wasn’t like TV; the smoke didn’t immediately start dying out. He couldn’t even tell if it was helping. But he was doing something, right?

Shadowy figures appeared through the smoke, then were spluttering as well as coughing when they were hit with the spray. Roy hastily moved the hose.

“No, it is good!” One man exclaimed, his Russian accent not nearly as thick as some of the others. He gestured for the hose, and Roy passed it to him, watching as the man drank straight from it. He offered it to each of his family in turn, each of them thanking the woman whose hose they had borrowed, a Mrs. Ross according to what they were saying.

The last ones out were Laurel and a woman with gray in her hair who clutched a necklace with wooden beads and crosses. “You save my sister on the buses, you save my family, you are saint.”

“Come inside, all of you,” Mrs. Ross insisted.

“Sorry, I can’t,” Laurel replied, her voice raspy with the smoke. She bent double, hands on her knees. There was a streak of something black on her cheek and the wig she wore looked frazzled rather than silky.

Roy moved by her to indicate he was staying with her. The Russian family took up their neighbor’s offer after many rounds of thanks, and soon it was the two of them left on the street.

“You okay?”

“Yeah, just let me… let me breathe.”

He knew how she felt. Roy had no idea how long they’d been at this by now, but the streets seemed to stretch before them with no end in sight.

Eventually, Laurel straightened up. They exchanged a nod, and then were off running again. There was nothing in his head but the pounding of his heart, the whirring of helicopter blades as the news documented their struggle while never stepping in, and the buzz of his phone as Thea kept calling and probably worrying out of her head. It was stubbornness that kept him going, stubbornness and a sense of duty, but he wanted nothing more than to curl up in her arms and sob out his exhaustion.

Several minutes later, Laurel gasped and sped ahead of him towards a car wreck right on the main road. It was a pileup, and it looked nasty.

Some of those who had been involved had seemingly already gotten out of their cars. Blood stained the pavement beneath a few of the cars, indicating where more serious injuries had occurred. Roy saw a group of people gathered around a body that had been dragged to the sidewalk.

But the front of one man’s car was totally dented in, and the doors had crumpled up as well. The driver sat inside unmoving, a cut on his forehead oozing blood.

On the far side of a car, two kids who couldn’t be older than ten or twelve were crying. “Daddy! Daddy!”

He and Laurel each took turns yanking on the door handle. Roy went to the side door and opened it, crawling into the backseat to see if he could pull the man out that way, but he was wedged up against the steering wheel too tightly.

“Smash the window,” a gruff voice suggested, and Roy looked out of the car to see a man all in black with a mask on. He wasn’t the Hood, but who was he?

“Wildcat,” Laurel said warmly, a spark back in her eyes. She took her staff and did as requested.

Wildcat stepped in closer, his teeth grit together as he braced one hand against the inside of the driver’s door and used the other to pull the handle. There was a series of pops and crunches. The door finally opened with a great screech of the hinges.

The man’ kids came running around to their side, but Wildcat cautioned. “Easy, easy. We need to move him slowly.”

Together, the three of them managed it, gently laying the man to rest on the ground. Roy was relieved to see him breathing. 

“How do we get him to Glades Memorial?”

The roads were too backed up even if they had a working car to drive him. Shouting and the occasional scream continued to rip through the air. They were surrounded by people, and yet no one seemed to care for anyone else around them.

Laurel’s face took on a pinched look for a moment before she suddenly started scrambling up onto the hood of one of the cars. “Hey!”

Roy exchanged a bewildered look with Ted, backing up a little when she whacked the roof with her staff. He noticed a couple people look up or around their way. Most of them didn’t.

On the roof of the car, Laurel was ripping one of her gloves off with her teeth. She shoved two fingers in her mouth and let out a whistle that had both Roy, the two kids and this Wildcat clapping their hands over their ears.

“Hey!”

It didn’t go completely silent. The whirr of helicopter blades still filled the air, and distant honking and sirens sounded on other streets. But every eye that Roy could see was now fixed on the Woman of the Glades.

“What we learned today is beyond words,” she began, her voice seeming to ring in the sudden stillness around them. “That there are some who consider human beings nothing more than collateral to pave a new parking lot over our graves. It makes me angry, too. It’s enough to make you lose faith in humanity.

“But we are more than they think of us! We’re better! We don’t step on each other’s necks to get to the top. We help each other.

“I was inspired by the Hood to take to the streets, yes. But I was inspired by this community to imagine the better world that might come if everyone was a little kinder, a little more like a family. Because that’s what I found here.

“So we can take out our rightful anger and fear on these buildings we aren’t allowed to own ourselves, or we can stand up tall and prove to those watching from the safety of their comfortable homes—” One hand pointed straight up to the helicopters still circling the sky. “—that we have our humanity even if they don’t. What’s it gonna be?”

Roy held his breath as he watched the faces of the people around them. Some stood slack-jawed. Others were nodding slowly, determination set in their shoulders and jaws. Still more simply watched, tears still leaking from their eyes.

“I need people to help me move this man,” Wildcat declared in the wake of her speech. “He needs a hospital. Someone to look after his children, too.”

“We can help.” Two men, older than Roy but not by much, came forward. “And my brother can watch the kids.” A teenager hurried to join them.

“I need a phone to call my son,” a woman called out, and her request was soon answered. As Wildcat led the group escorting the unconscious man and his kids away, Roy watched in wonderment as, little by little, the harsh shouts and screams of anguish turned to offers of aid and shared tears. It wasn’t as if a switch had been flipped. He had, he realized, seen brief moments of kindness all night even amongst the panic and boiling anger. But Laurel was making them all see it now.

On the hood of the car, still, she seemed to sag a little in relief, a tired smile rising on her lips. At least until a spotlight suddenly landed on her.

Roy shielded his eyes, heart sinking as he realized one of the helicopters hadn’t been for the news after all.

“Police! Remain where you are.”

Before he could act, a figure in dark green swooped down on a line, grabbing Laurel around the waist. She tucked her legs in, and they landed beyond the abandoned pile of cars in the shadow of two buildings. The Hood slowly let her back down, though their foreheads remained pressed together for a moment. Then the pair slipped away before the police’s searchlight beam could find them again.

Around him, people quickly helped each other make evacuation arrangements. None of them wanted to be around whenever the cops sent boots on the ground to canvas the area. Yet Roy stood there another long, stunned moment as his mind could only process one thing: the Hood was Laurel’s boyfriend. He was Oliver Queen.

Roy staggered back a step, then started running again. With a record like his, he couldn’t afford getting picked up by the cops on some trumped up charge to make them look good for doing something. And he wanted some things answered far more than he wanted to be sitting in a holding cell.

Good thing the one place he was guaranteed to get those answers was the one place he really wanted to be right now. Even if Thea was going to kill him.

—-

Oliver was exhausted even as he pushed on, Laurel running at his side. From confronting Tommy and being forced to acknowledge his friend had chosen a dark path to travel down all in the name of his murderous father, to the drive out to Bludhaven to rescue Walter and back again once he had made sure his step-father would be seen to by the local authorities there, he couldn’t actually believe it had been less than one day since his mother’s arrest. Since the city had turned upside-down.

He had arrived home to a Glades in chaos. Oliver had done what he could here and there, noting the shock on the faces of those he helped. He was known for beatings and killings, after all, not tying tourniquets around people’s legs to stop the rush of blood from a gunshot wound or ferrying them to the hospital. Oliver hadn’t stayed with any one person too long, partly to keep his identity safe and the rest because he was desperate to find Laurel.

And then he had heard her voice.

“We don’t step on each other’s necks to get to the top. We help each other. I was inspired by the Hood to take to the streets, yes. But I was inspired by this community to imagine the better world that might come if everyone was a little kinder, a little more like a family. Because that’s what I found here.”

Listening to her, seeing her standing there with a run in her leggings and her wig a disheveled mess of blonde, she had never been more breathtaking. She wasn’t just trying to save the world; she was doing it.

Just as things had calmed and taken a turn for the better, the police had caught her in their sights with a searchlight. Oliver had quickly jumped into action, swinging with her out of their view and hurrying away through the streets. In silent agreement, they were each putting off whatever questions they had for the other until they returned to the base.

Only there looked to be a slight situation developing outside it when they arrived. A number of men were gathered outside the Verdant’s locked doors, which had been painted in incredibly rude graffiti and negative sentiments towards his family. Every so often, one of the men would knock and holler something, a majority of them sounding half-drunk.

“C’mon, Queen! Open up, open up.”

How long had they been here yelling? Thea was inside, probably terrified out of her mind. Oliver reached into his quiver, but Laurel placed a hand on his arm. Then she stepped forward.

“Hey.”

A few of them turned, some slower and less coordinated than others. “Hey, that’s the lady — Shit, the Hood!”

Some small part of him couldn’t help being pleased at his reputation in this particular instance, and he knew he was smirking.

“The cops are coming through and probably looking to round up any troublemakers,” Laurel told them. “Go home, okay?”

“Or we can leave you here for them to pick up,” Oliver offered. She looked back at him with a raised eyebrow.

The men seemed to get the message, however, and they quickly scurried off, empty drinks and spray cans left behind.

Oliver led them around the side, sniffing the air in disgust at the scent of urine that permeated the alley. Laurel’s face had scrunched up as well. They quickly made their way to the back door to the base, relieved to step into the far cleaner facilities.

For a moment, they stood there, the weight of everything, the aches and pains from battles fought, the weariness that set into their bones overwhelming. But Oliver caught Laurel’s eyes, and suddenly nothing mattered more than being close to her.

They surged together, Oliver’s hands smoothing up her back beneath her jacket and Laurel’s hands gripping his face and knocking his hood back. He took a moment to pull the wig off her head and place it on a nearby table, his other hand coming up to massage her scalp. Laurel moaned against his mouth, and it shot straight through him.

“I’m sure that’s nothing compared to what she lets you do every time you come swinging in to rescue her,” a snide voice whispered in the back of his head. Oliver shook it off with a growl. He wasn’t going to let Tommy and his jealous words poison this. Laurel did what she chose with who she chose, and he was grateful that he was who she had chosen in the end. That was all there was to it.

A loud pounding on the door that led to the club upstairs had them both looking up sharply.

“Ollie, what is so important down there?” Thea’s voice called, a little muffled.

“Be—” he cleared his throat and shouted louder, “Be right up!”

“We gotta get you cleaned up first,” Laurel muttered, displaying her hands, the fingertips of which were all smeared in greasepaint.

She helped wipe his face off, then Oliver changed and hurried upstairs alone. Laurel wasn’t supposed to still be here, after all.

His sister was fortunately distracted from his entrance and didn’t even get a glimpse of what lay beyond the door as she was busy laying into a tired and worse for wear Roy Harper. “—can’t believe you stayed out there, you could’ve gotten killed!”

“I know, sorry, I just—”

“You were trying to find the vigilantes, weren’t you?” Thea accused.

“Yeah, and I did.” Oliver’s stomach dropped when, for the briefest moment, Roy’s eyes flickered in his direction. “But the cops chased them off.”

“And that’s probably a good thing,” Oliver added, making Thea jump and run to him. John sent him a questioning look over her shoulder, to which he gave a single shake of the head in a negative.

“You were down there forever. Did you not hear any of those guys that were lurking around outside?”

“Uh, no. Sorry, I was on the phone. The, uh, the police in Bludhaven, they…” he had no idea how to break this gently. “They have Walter.”

Thea’s eyes went wide as she backed up. “They found his body?”

“No,” said Oliver, and he saw Diggle’s expression turn shocked now as well. “He’s alive. The guy the Feds found, he was tricked. He heard a shot and assumed, but he was wrong.” Alonzo had been wrong which meant Oliver had been wrong. And in telling his mother bad information, he had set her on a path to bringing Tommy’s wrath and the law crashing down on her. Oliver had done this.

His sister, meanwhile, gasped. “Oh, my God. When can we see him? When- when does mom get to see him? What’re we gonna do?”

“I don’t know, Speedy,” he answered truthfully. He had put off all those questions before because he had thought if he could just get Tommy to go back to the police and tell them the whole truth, things would be better. But now Tommy was gone. His mother was still on the hook for a conspiracy to destroy an entire city neighborhood. What did the future look like?

“What’s it like out there, Roy?” John asked, and Oliver was grateful to his friend for taking the focus off him at least for a few moments.

“Not great. And the cops are gonna be crawling all over. They could probably get you home,” he offered to Oliver and Thea.

“I’m not leaving you here alone tonight,” Thea declared, gripping his hand in hers.

“We’ll stay here,” Oliver decided. “It’s best for us all to stay in a group. Unless, John, do you need…?”

“Carly texted me a half hour ago. Bunch of the mothers at A.J.’s school have made the gym into a big sleepover area. They’re staying there until the morning. You’re right, there’s strength in numbers.”

“Ollie, what about Laurel?” Thea asked. “She lives alone.”

“I’ll call her,” he said slowly. “See where she’s at. Um, John, do you want to come help me look for blankets or something? I guess some of us can use the booths to sleep in.”

His friend nodded and followed him back behind the bar. Laurel was listening at the top of the steps, the door cracked open slightly, but she waited until they all headed back down to the main floor of the base to say anything. “Walter’s alive?”

“Tommy told me. I- I had to choose between bringing him in or saving Walter.”

“He was going to have him killed?” Laurel looked aghast.

“It’s what he said. Maybe he was bluffing. But he left on a plane to learn everything his father knew… everything the Dark Archer knew, because apparently they were the same person,” Oliver revealed. “And I let him go.”

“You had to, man,” John insisted. “Whether he was bluffing or not, you made the choice to save a life. Tommy will have to come back sooner or later. We’ll get him to give up the full story then.”

“It’ll be sooner than later,” Laurel added. “He’s the key witness, so whenever your mother’s case goes to trial, he’ll have to show.”

Oliver smiled softly. “I almost wish you were representing my mother instead of Jean.”

“I’m not sure the police would be happy with that kind of conflict of interest,” Laurel pointed out, though a pleased smile played at her own lips. “They didn’t fight it in your case because most of dad’s superiors were convinced he had no case. Ironically enough.” She reached out and took his hands. “But I am here to offer you and Thea any legal advice I can.”

“Speaking of your sister, we should head back upstairs,” John reminded them. “You gonna come in through the front, Laurel?”

“Probably would sell it better.”

He and John grabbed a couple of the hoodies and towels they had down here to use as makeshift pillows or blankets, then went back up to the club. Thea had gotten out the first aid kit that sat under the bar and looked to be touching up some of Roy’s smaller cuts and scrapes while he rested in a booth.

“Laurel’s gonna come stay with us,” Oliver announced as he offered Thea her pick of their meager supplies. It occurred to him they were all running on little to no food, but there was nothing he could do about that problem. He knew he at least was used to sleeping on an empty stomach.

Not two minutes later, Laurel knocked on the front door. Oliver let her inside quickly, locking it behind her and cutting off the wail of distant police sirens. Thea was busy getting Roy situated for the night, so Oliver simply led Laurel back to their own booth.

“Are you actually going to be able to sleep tonight?” She asked quietly.

“I don’t know.”

“Okay.” Laurel pushed him to sit back in the booth first, then crawled in after him, resting her back against his chest and her head under his chin. Oliver brought his arms around her, gladly soaking up the comfort of her presence.

A thought came to him. “What happened to your bike?”

“Had to ditch it behind CNRI,” she muttered out of the corner of her mouth. “The roads were too backed up.”

“We’ll get it tomorrow. If it hasn’t been taken to sell for parts.”

“I’m sorry, Ollie.”

He shook his head. “A bike’s just a bike. You, you were amazing out there tonight.”

She snuggled a bit closer and closed her eyes. “I love you.”

Oliver’s breath caught in his throat, and his eyes felt as though they were burning for a moment. “I love you, too,” he finally managed, kissing the top of her head.

A hush settled over the nearly empty club as, one-by-one, the five of them all dropped off to sleep.

In the early light of dawn Oliver’s phone rang, and he answered it with a groggy, “Hello?”

“Oliver?”

Instantly, he was wide awake. “Mom?”

Was it possible the police had released her? That they had discovered the truth on their own?

“Are you and Thea safe?” Her voice sounded shaky, like she had only just managed to pull herself together.

He sat up, causing Laurel to stretch and yawn as she woke fully. “Yeah. Yeah, we’re both fine. Where are you?”

“Still in the holding cell,” she told him. “They’re reluctant to move me given how riotous the situation was last night.”

“But they haven’t released you,” he said, disappointment resettling in the pit of his stomach.

“No. I’m just being allowed my phone call, finally. Two phone calls, really. You see, Starling General phoned me this morning. It seems Walter is alive and was transferred to their care late last night.”

Oliver’s eyes squeezed shut. His mother would have been notified first as next of kin, but had no way of getting to her own husband. “Mom, I’m sorry.” Sorry she couldn’t see Walter; sorry she had spent a night in a holding cell; sorry that he had been wrong, and because he had been wrong she had lost everything. The last he could never tell her, no matter how guilty he felt.

“You shouldn’t feel sorry for me,” she told him. “I played Malcolm’s games instead of doing the right thing, and I’ve paid the price for it. I only hope you, Thea and Walter will be safe now.”

Oliver swallowed once, feeling Laurel slip her hand into his empty one. “We will be.”

“If I can ask you to do one thing for me, sweetheart—”

“Anything,” he promised right away.

“Could you go to Starling General? The doctors think it would do Walter good to have some visitors given how long he was alone.”

“Thea and I will go, mom,” he answered her request.

“That’s my beautiful boy.” The warmth in her tone threatened to undo him. “They’re signalling me that my time is up.”

“But Thea—” His sister was still sleeping and wouldn’t even have a chance to talk to their mother.

“Look after her. Look after each other. I love you both so much.” His mother said quickly. The line disconnected before he could reply.

It was quiet for a moment. Nothing but the sound of his own breathing and Laurel’s hand in his. He turned his face into her hair for a moment, hiding from the day and all it would bring. A city in turmoil, his mother imprisoned and who knew what else. He just needed a few moments more before he could face it.

Once he felt in control again, Laurel let him out of the booth, and he went to where Thea lay, one arm hanging off the booth she slept in across from Roy. “Hey, Speedy. You gotta get up.”

“Five more minutes…” Thea groaned, and it was such a familiar, innocent sight his heart ached for a moment.

“We can see Walter at the hospital.”

His sister shot up, blinking and rubbing her eyes. “What? Where? Oh,” she said, taking in the surroundings. Her face threatened to crumple for a moment as yesterday’s events no doubt reasserted themselves in her memory.

“Come on, they think seeing some familiar faces might help him.”

“Is he even gonna want to see us? What if- what if he thought mom was the one who had him kidnapped?”

“Even if he did, he’d know you have nothing to do with it,” Oliver assured her. “Walter loves you, Thea.”

Roy was sitting up, one hand pressed over his ribs. Oliver frowned.

“You need looked at?”

“I’m fine,” Roy said immediately, though it didn’t have the defensive air it ordinarily did. Rather it almost seemed like Roy was hoping to impress him with his answer.

“We’re going to a hospital anyway, so you may as well come.”

“Need a lift?” John had gotten out of his own booth and looked about as well as could be expected for a man of his size having squeezed himself onto a small cushioned bench for the night.

“We have the car. And your family should see you.”

“Would you mind dropping me at my place, though?” Laurel asked, smiling in gratitude when John nodded.

Their group split up into two, Oliver navigating the roads still littered with debris and the odd abandoned vehicle here and there. It was eerily quiet after the night the neighborhood had seen, and the amount of damage done was a lot to take in.

“Why would they trash their own stores and homes?” Thea wondered aloud.

“It’s not theirs,” Roy said shortly. “No one in the Glades owns anything.”

“They couldn’t, thanks to Tempest,” Oliver added on a sigh. His sister shrunk down in her seat, looking sorry she had voiced the question.

They arrived at the hospital and saw Roy off to a specialist. Oliver told them any treatment would be covered by him. Then they were shown to Walter’s room.

They both paused in the doorway. Despite what Oliver had said, he was a little nervous to see his step-father as himself again. What did Walter know? What did he guess?

He was sitting up in his bed, the television playing what looked like grainy cell phone footage of Laurel from last night. Oliver was relieved to see she was unrecognizable. Indeed, the caption on the lower third simply read Who is the Woman?

“Walter?” Thea asked timidly.

He started, then turned his head. A smile rose to his lips, though his eyes were sad. “Thea.” When he opened his arms, Thea ran forward and hugged him.

Oliver entered more slowly, reaching the bedside and saying, “It’s damn good to see you, Walter.”

Walter had the grace to laugh. He picked up the television remote and shut off the screen. “I’m very happy to be back in civilization. I can’t imagine how you went without it for five years, Oliver.”

“From the sounds of it, you didn’t have it any easier.” Of course, Walter may not have been physically harmed, but he had seen the room the man was being kept in with his own eyes, and it was tiny. At least on Lian Yu he had had freedom of movement more often than not.

“We’re so sorry, Walter,” Thea said.

“You’ve nothing to be sorry for,” their step-father told them. “Moira’s choices are her own.”

“You don’t really think…” Oliver said, wincing slightly.

Walter sighed. “No, I don’t believe she ordered my abduction. If Moira had been behind the whole thing, there would have been little point in keeping me alive. But I can’t say I know who I was being held as collateral by.”

“Mom says it was Mr. Merlyn,” Thea told him darkly. She looked back at Oliver. “Would Tommy know about it? Why haven’t we heard from him anyway?”

“His secretary said he left town,” Oliver lied, though it was technically the truth. “He might just want to process this alone.”

“It’s not a terrible idea, regardless if what your mother is saying about Malcolm Merlyn is true or not,” Walter said. “As much as I’m sure you both wish to be there for her, no one would blame you for wishing to get away from all this, at least for a time. Even if it’s to pursue higher learning,” he added with a look at Thea.

“I never actually applied to colleges,” his sister muttered.

“But maybe you should,” Oliver said. “Walter’s right, Speedy. We have no idea how things are going to turn out for mom or the family. The more you can learn and develop your own skills, the better off you’ll be.” Oliver truly didn’t know what he would do if the worst happened. He had no work experience outside barely running a club, and his only skills would out him as one of the city’s vigilantes.

“One thing that is certain that I should tell you both in advance is that I will be filing for divorce,” Walter told them, and he and Thea both looked down. “I wish things had been different, but I cannot remain married to Moira after this, not when I offered to help her find a way out of her situation before it came to something like this. But there simply isn’t trust between us. I’m not sure there ever was.”

“We understand, Walter.” Oliver said quietly.

“That doesn’t mean I wish to see either of you out of my life,” the man added. “When I married your mother, I consented to making Thea, and later you, Oliver, part of my family. That won’t change.”

“It won’t change for us either,” Thea promised, and he nodded along.

Oliver’s phone started ringing once again. “Excuse me,” he told them both before stepping out into the hall to answer it. “Hello?”

“Oliver? It’s Ned Foster,” said a voice he vaguely recalled. The COO of Queen Consolidated. Oliver felt a headache coming on. “I’m hoping to have you come into the office so we can discuss what things are going to look like for you and your family.”

As much as he wanted to just put it off, Oliver knew it would only make things worse in the long run. “Okay, yeah. I can do that. Is it fine if it’s just me?” He didn’t want to have to pull Thea away from Walter so soon. And given that Roy was still being seen to, she would need to stay for him as well.

“Thea will need to sign some legal documents, but your family’s attorney can deliver those papers to her.”

“Okay. I should be there in about ten minutes, then.” Oliver hung up and ducked his head in to let Thea know where he would be going and to call him if anything came up. Then he went back down to the visitor’s garage and drove over to Queen Consolidated.

There were paparazzi stationed outside the building probably hoping he or his sister might turn up. Oliver shielded his face with a hand and marched through the shouting crowd to the front door where security turned them away. Inside the elevator to Ned’s office, he could reflect on some of their questions. Had he known his mother’s plans, what did he think of them, what was going to happen to the company and the Queen fortune. That last question was about to be answered for him.

Ned shook his hand when Oliver was shown into his office. “Thank you for coming by so quickly. I can’t imagine it’s an easy time for your family.”

“No,” Oliver agreed quietly.

Ned grimaced as he sat down. “It’s also not an easy time for the company. You see, the authorities have determined your mother a flight risk, so they’ve frozen her assets. This is a document for you and Thea to sign that will protect the assets your parents left to you.”

Oliver read over the whole thing before signing. He had known this was the case, but the lack of mention of the manor did not speak well to their chances of keeping it. Ned took the paper back and placed it in a folder.

“Now, the trouble is the company. As it stands, the board has voted to remove your mother from the position of CEO. They’re also not open to accepting your or Thea’s candidacy.”

“That makes sense,” he replied, even if his heart was sinking. This was his family’s company, and it was being taken away.

“You have to understand that the board is doing what they can to get out from under this media storm. The stock has taken a serious nosedive, and that threatens the livelihoods of countless employees here and at our various international branches. As it stands, we’ve already made the decision to try and sell off Unidac. We’ll see if anyone takes it.”

“Right. Right,” he agreed. It would be selfish to hold onto the company if it was just going to cause people to lose their jobs. “What, uh, what do we do about income?”

“That’s not really something I can tell you one way or the other, Oliver.”

He thought for a moment. One thing that worried him more than all the rest about losing the company: his base. He had beta sites, of course, but it would be inconvenient to lose his main one.

“What about the Verdant property? Could I purchase it from Queen Consolidated? Most people associate it with me, so it’s probably not something the board will want to hang onto. And it can’t be very valuable compared to the other holdings.”

Ned sat there a moment or two. “That is not an unreasonable request. Let me talk to the board and Legal, see if we can work out a sale. I’m glad you’re thinking ahead for you and your sister, Oliver, and I do wish you both the best of luck through all this.”

They stood and shook hands again, and soon Oliver was descending in another elevator. It stopped on a random floor, and he nearly hit the close doors button — except Felicity Smoak had just walked in, head buried in her tablet. Before she could blindly reach out for whichever floor’s button she needed, Oliver pointedly cleared his throat.

She jumped, eyes widening at the sight of him. “Oh! Uh, hi.”

“Hi.”

“Sorry about your mother,” Felicity said, then immediately added, “I mean, I’m not sorry she was caught. Someone had to do it if you couldn’t — though I can understand that would be a tough position to be in. And obviously this is a really bad position for you to be in. Um… what are you doing here in this specific position?”

“Getting my family’s affairs in order, the best I can,” he told her. “I guess you were right about me ruining lives.”

Felicity winced.

“Walter’s alive,” he added conversationally.

“I know. I was reading about it, actually,” she said, gesturing with her tablet. “The Hood rescued him.”

Oliver hummed.

“Thank you,” she said in an undertone. “And I hope that, you know, you and your girlfriend’s hobby works out for the best.” She blinked and said. “That really sounded dirty, but I meant—”

“Felicity, I know,” he interrupted. The elevator doors opened on the lobby, and he stepped out. “For what it’s worth, I wish you the best.”

“Thanks.” She smiled shyly, and the doors closed on her like that.

Oliver sighed and left his old teammate and his family’s former company behind. If his years away had taught him nothing else, it was that people and places came and went. So long as he held onto what was most important in his heart, he could make it through.

—-

Having not actually gone home the previous day, it was a little jarring to pull up outside her place and find her windows boarded up. So were Anita’s and Jerome’s.

“You need me to stick around?” John asked.

“No, I’ll figure it out,” Laurel said slowly, opening her door and stepping around bits of trash strewn around the yard from her can, which had apparently been knocked over. She would get around to it later. First thing first was seeing if she could even get inside.

Her key worked, and Laurel couldn’t honestly spot a thing out of place. Before she could think on it too much, there was a sharp rapping on her front door. Laurel checked the peephole and smiled as she pulled it open.

“Anita,” she said as she hugged her friend. Anita hugged her back. She was honestly relieved to see she hadn’t been hurt, not having seen her all the last day.

“Was starting to worry you weren’t coming back,” Anita said when they pulled apart. “Jerome did your windows anyway. Soon as we heard the news yesterday, we knew it was gonna get crazy, and we had some extra boards in the back.”

“Thank you so much. You both were safe last night?”

“Yeah, we just stayed put. No way was I letting him go to work last night. Your dad came by around two-thirty, though. Probably woke the whole street up hollering outside your door.”

Laurel winced. She had a number of missed calls, most of them from him. Anita had tried once and Joanna as well, though the latter hopefully didn’t realize she’d seen Laurel last night. “Sorry about that.”

She shrugged. “Can’t blame him for worrying. I was, too.” There was something heavy to the weight of Anita’s gaze on her, but her friend changed the subject. “Jerome’s helping clean up the main street, and I’m making a bunch of the volunteers some food. You wanna help?”

“Yeah. Just, um, just let me clean up my yard and I’ll be over.”

Laurel got all the trash picked back up and back in the can, and by the time that was done Anita had finished most of her cooking. It was probably for the best. Laurel assisted her in carrying it the several blocks where they found a card table had been set up to host what looked like an impromptu potluck.

“Take what you need,” Mrs. Ross was telling a mother with her three kids. “Anita, put yours down on that end. We got paper plates and napkins set up on the other.”

“Laurel!”

She turned at the sound of Raisa’s voice, smiling at the sight of the other woman. “Raisa, hi. How’s your family?”

“We could be worse. The building, someone threw a- a—”

“Smoke bomb.”

“Yes. There is some damage, but we still have our home. I only saw it this morning. The staff at the manor, we remained at the house last night. No one knew what to do after Mrs. Queen…” Raisa looked down, and Laurel patted the woman’s arm in sympathy. “But I wanted to ask, have you seen Mr. Oliver or Miss Thea? They never came home.”

“Oh. Yes, they are both safe. The police actually found Mr. Steele, so they’re visiting with him at the hospital.”

Raisa gasped. “Mr. Steele is alive? Oh, that is good news. If only…”

“Yeah.” Laurel bit her lip, then asked. “Raisa, is there anything you might have heard Mrs. Queen ever discuss with Mr. Merlyn about all this?”

The housekeeper slowly shook her head. “I never intruded. But I always suspected he made her uncomfortable. She would request a glass of her favorite red after any of their meetings to calm her nerves. Was he involved with this Tempest?”

“I’m not sure how much I can say,” Laurel admitted, to which Raisa nodded in understanding. She looked around. She wasn’t much use at the food table accept for eating it. Laurel snagged a couple sandwiches for her empty stomach, then approached Jerome and a few more men tacking tarp up over missing windows. “What can I do?”

She was directed to help another group sweeping out storefronts and setting displays and other furniture back to rights. They were headed to 17th Street, and Laurel took the lead, anxious to check on Pam and her job.

The windows of Green Glades had survived, but every last pot and planter out in front had been smashed. “Oh, Pam.”

Her boss was using the push broom, and Laurel quickly took possession of the dust pan. “It’s to be expected. People want something to control when they feel like they’ve lost control of their own lives. I was perfectly safe upstairs.”

Laurel helped Pam to set everything to rights, then spent a little time at the other storefronts with the group she had joined up with. Someone had brought some kind of speakers, and the music and food helped create something of a lighter atmosphere. Back on the main road, Anita had coaxed Jerome into dancing while he and his group were on a food break, and Laurel smiled as she saw kids skipping around on the sidewalk. People were complicated things, but she thought so long as there were times like these, they could weather through the bad.

“The hell you doing showing up here?”

The angry shout had Laurel turning sharply. A few men had intercepted Oliver, Thea and Roy. The Queen siblings, both changed into what Laurel knew were their less nice t-shirts and jeans, looked unsure how to respond to the harsh greeting, if it could be called that.

“We- we just want to help,” Thea offered timidly. “We’re so sorry—”

Laurel cringed and hurried forward.

“Sorry?” One man repeated with a sharp laugh. “Sorry doesn’t cut it. What your mama did—”

“Isn’t what they did,” Laurel interrupted, coming between the two groups. “They didn’t know.”

“Yeah, they both work in the Glades,” Roy added. “How dumb would they have to be to do that if they were in on it?”

Most of the street had stopped what they were doing to watch this unfold, even a few of the children abandoning their game to stand and stare in confusion. Jerome had pulled Anita close, half-shielding her from the Queens and frowning at them. Raisa had a hand over her mouth, clearly worried for her charges.

“Thea and I were ignorant of what our mother and her associates were involved in,” Oliver agreed quietly. “Ignorance also isn’t an excuse for what could have happened had it not been exposed. What we hope is that we can atone for the things our family has done to yours if you will accept it.”

Laurel stared the men down, making it quite clear that if they chose to reject that offer with anything other than words, they would be going through her.

“They’re right.” A man in coveralls with a receding and graying hairline stepped forward. “Queen isn’t his parents. I heard you try to give Derek and his family a fresh start last fall, before that horrible business at the bank.”

Oliver swallowed once, not seeming to know what to say to that.

“We’re better than them in their mansions. We’re not gonna judge. You wanna do the work? Then do it.”

At the tables, Mrs. Ross gave an affirming hum. Anita patted Jerome’s chest, and her husband looked away and nodded.

“Innocent till proven guilty,” Hank shouted from where he was serving his usual wraps free of charge today. Laurel felt her lips twitch despite herself.

Gradually the small group that had gathered in front of the Queens slowly dispersed, some less happy than others, but Laurel let out a breath in relief. 

She turned to the Queens. “I’m really glad you guys came out. It’s not going to be easy, but the more people see the real you, the more they’ll understand why you shouldn’t be tarred with the same brush.”

Raisa joined their group, hugging both Oliver and Thea. “It is a hard time for you both.”

“It’s not just for us. Raisa, the accounts… things aren’t looking good,” Oliver admitted to Laurel’s dismay. She’d known the Queens were going to take some kind of hit over all this, but she had no idea how this might affect Oliver’s ability to operate as the Hood. “We might lose the house. I’ll have to call the staff together for a meeting, but it can wait. This is more important.” He briefly pressed his lips to Laurel’s temple before heading over to Jerome’s group since they were getting back to work. The men grudgingly set him to work, though Laurel thought she saw some of their distrust melt away to grudging respect when it quickly became apparent Oliver was no slouch when it came to manual labor.

“Maybe we could offer to keep an eye on those kids?” Thea suggested to her boyfriend. “Roy has bruised ribs,” she added in explanation.

“Then something like that would be perfect,” Raisa agreed. “Come.” She led the young couple off, only for Anita to join her instead, looking smug.

“So, giving billionaire boy another shot?”

“Shut up.”

The next several days passed in a strange haze. No one quite seemed to know what happened now that the world hadn’t ended. Oliver was busy constantly between getting the outside of the club cleaned up and handling his family’s affairs. Laurel kept herself occupied with cleanup efforts and checking in on her friends and neighbors, both old and new. That had her climbing the steps to her old office building one afternoon and stopping at a desk buried under paper.

“Have to say, kind of glad I was fired before all this,” she remarked.

Joanna’s head shot up. “Laurel! Oh, thank God.” Her friend got up and pulled her into a tight hug which Laurel readily returned.

“I texted you I was fine,” she pointed out with a smile.

“Yeah, well fine for you could mean anything from you caught a cold to your house is burning down.”

Laurel held up her hands in surrender. “Well how’ve you been? Lot of new cases?”

“Like you wouldn’t believe. Even Anastasia’s moving her butt now. There’s probably going to be a class action suit brought against the Queen family. Anyone who lives in the Glades is entitled to compensation if we win,” Joanna told her. “But that won’t be on the docket for a while. Her assets are tied up right now because of the criminal case.” “I know.”

Jo winced. “How are Thea and Oliver taking it?”

“As well as can be expected. I think they’re just relieved the bomb wasn’t actually, you know.”

Joanna nodded. “Considering how crazy it was the other night without the bomb, I agree with that completely. Have you, uh, heard about the Woman?”

“The one in the mask?” Okay, Roy really had had a point, she should have thought of a name before starting all this.

“Yeah. She showed up that night, helped me and the others get out of the Glades since there were people outside the building.”

“Wow,” said Laurel, hoping she sounded surprised.

“Yeah, I kind of felt like you a bit. Don’t tell my mom,” Jo added with a laugh. “She doesn’t want me getting anywhere near vigilantes after what happened to you.”

Laurel smirked. “Oh, it hasn’t been so bad.” On the inside, she was relieved; Joanna definitely hadn’t recognized her that night. Her friend would’ve demanded answers by now if she had.

She left Joanna to her work soon after, thinking back to that night. It had been exhilarating and exhausting all at once racing from one end of the neighborhood to the other, first on her bike then on foot. Roy’s company had been a comfort when she had found him, and Ted’s appearance a welcome surprise. And part of her had just known Oliver would find his way back after facing Tommy, that he wouldn’t leave her to face it all alone.

It was strange, though, walking down streets and hearing bits of her own words played back at her. It didn’t really sound like her. Part of that was because it had been captured on somebody’s cell phone, and it didn’t seem like their speakers were the best quality. Another was that, for maybe the first time, Laurel felt like she heard a sense of command in her own voice.

She hadn’t been planning to make some kind of speech that night. Yet she had needed to reach people, some way, any way. And to her own amazement, she had. That was the real power that being a vigilante gave; a voice that was listened to.

By the end of the week, she was back to work at the flower shop. And that was where her father finally caught up to her.

It was startling seeing him enter the florist’s. He seemed so out of place and knew it, too. Pam opened her mouth to start her customary greeting, but Laurel said, “That’s okay, Pam. This is my dad.”

“Oh. Well, what a delight to finally meet the man who helped bring my lovely assistant into the world,” Pam said, and if Laurel wasn’t mistaken, seemed to be at least somewhat serious about it.

“Yeah, uh, good to meet you, too,” her dad mumbled. “Listen, can I talk to my daughter for a moment? I’ll be quick about it.”

“I suppose,” Pam agreed. Laurel had been sort of hoping she would say no. But she squared her shoulders and came around the counter to join him outside.

“Stopped by your place that night of the riots,” he began.

“I know.”

“Where were you? Where did you go? You know how badly I panicked when I realized you’d left the station?”

“Dad, we’ve talked about this. I’m living my life, my way now, you know?”

His shoulders slumped, and his head shook from side to side. “Look, I’ve accepted that you’ve made a life here in the day-to-day. But riots are different.”

“It’s not different for any of my neighbors and friends who have nowhere else to go,” she pointed out.

“But you weren’t even home!”

“I was at a shelter,” she lied, and thought she was more convincing than even with Joanna. Laurel had practiced this one because she’d known it was coming. “One of the local schools was letting people stay in the gym and needed volunteers to help keep things organized with all the kids. I was too busy to notice my phone at first, and my battery died overnight so I couldn’t call you back.”

He paused, scrutinizing her. “So you weren’t out there that night?”

“Why would I be?”

Her dad studied her another moment, then pulled her close. “I just worry about you, honey. You know I- I’m used to knowing everything about what you’re up to. I miss that.”

Laurel looked down. “I know those times made you feel better, but they weren’t what I needed.”

He blew out a breath. “I know.” A rueful grin rose on his lips. “You know, it’s funny. I keep going back over what she’s told us so far, how it was all for her kids.” He didn’t have to clarify which her he meant. “Her kids never would have wanted her to do it.”

Laurel blinked. Implied or not, that was one of the nicer things her father had had to say about Oliver in a long time.

“Maybe we all just kid ourselves. Maybe we don’t know what our children want, cause we don’t ask them or we think we still know best long after they’ve grown,” he continued. He cupped her face with one hand, thumb brushing the corner of her lip that had only just finished healing from that night she’d gone toe-to-toe with the corrupt SCPD officers. “But how’s about you keep me in the loop just a little from now on, eh?”

Laurel smiled, though she hoped he didn’t think it was sad. There were parts of her life now that she knew she would never share with her father. He just wouldn’t be able to take it, and it had the potential to destroy his career. “Yeah. A little.”

With a one-armed hug avoiding her dirt-smeared apron, he let her get back to her shift.

At night, she and Oliver patrolled together which more than made up for the time spent apart during the day. The nights were busy given that after the crackdown on the riots, the police had once again retreated back out of the Glades. They didn’t talk much about what was going on with his family, though she knew he had been to see his mother at least once more.

She also knew the day of Mrs. Queen’s hearing to determine if she would be allowed bail. It was a closed session given the possible danger to Mrs. Queen’s life if someone with revenge fantasies like the Savior had had decided to show up, so after her shift, Laurel went to the Verdant to wait, Roy keeping her company when he wasn’t needed to wipe down the scant few tables that were occupied.

When Oliver and Thea entered with morose expressions behind John, Laurel didn’t need them to say that Mrs. Queen would be spending the time before her trial behind bars. She stood from her stool and offered each of them a hug.

“We knew it wouldn’t happen,” Oliver said in monotone. “It just…”

Laurel squeezed his hand, unable to say the words he really needed to hear with Thea and Roy present: this wasn’t his fault.

Oliver gave a small shake of the head. “We need to talk about the future. Thea… I really think you should consider Walter’s suggestion.”

“I’m not just leaving home,” Thea said immediately.

“What’s this?” Laurel asked.

“Walter thinks it would be a good idea for Thea to take some time away from Starling while she considers her options regarding higher education or a career. You don’t have the guarantee of an easy life anymore, Thea. A college degree is something you might need someday.”

Thea scowled but had no argument.

“Look, all I am suggesting is that you take a vacation for a few months while the worst of this dies down a little. Take some online classes to improve your transcript, write a few college essays in preparation to apply.”

“While you stay here?”

“I have to stay here. I own a club, and I can’t afford a new manager.”

“What if you and Roy went together?” Laurel suggested.

Roy blinked. “Me?”

“What?” Oliver immediately demanded.

Laurel rolled her eyes. “Thea does not want to be separated from everyone she cares about, so if you’re staying here then her boyfriend is the next best option. It’d be good for Roy, too, let him see some more of the world.” She doubted her younger friend had had a vacation in his life. “And as long as they promise to behave themselves, I don’t see why it’s a problem. They’re both adults, and we went on trips together at their age.”

“We didn’t behave ourselves,” Oliver murmured in her ear, and Laurel smirked.

Thea, meanwhile, seemed to be warming up to the idea. “So Roy and I could take a trip together so long as I fill out some applications? Okay.”

“I want you to take this seriously, Speedy.”

Thea waved a dismissive hand, already getting out her phone to start looking at vacation hotspots. She grabbed Roy’s hand, but he stayed put.

“Find a table. I’ll be right over.” Once Thea was our of earshot, Roy said, “I can’t leave right now. The city’s a mess.”

“Roy,” Laurel said.

“Look, I figured it out. You’re — you know,” he said to Oliver after a furtive look around. “I want to help you. I helped Laurel the other night when things were crazy.”

“And you were hurt pretty badly,” Oliver pointed out. Roy looked about to argue, so he held up a hand. “Take the vacation to heal and to think about what you’re asking for. This kind of life is not easy, and sometimes, it takes more than it gives. If you come back and are still committed, Laurel and I will discuss it with you then. That fair?”

Roy didn’t exactly look happy about it, but he seemed to realize it was the best offer he was likely to receive. “Fine.”

“Good,” Laurel said. “Now go plan your trip with your girlfriend.” Roy left the bar for Thea’s table, and Laurel turned her attention on her own boyfriend. “Now we need to talk about you.”

“Me?”

“You’ve been sleeping downstairs, man,” John said, coming forward now that the discussions surrounding Thea and Roy were over. “And not even on a real bed.”

“The island didn’t have real beds,” Oliver deadpanned.

“But you’re not on the island anymore. And you shouldn’t have to feel like you are,” Laurel pointed out. “If you needed a place to stay, you could have asked one of us.”

“One of you?” He repeated with a raised eyebrow.

“Figured you’d like having options better,” John explained.

“And I know better than to assume we’re living together,” Laurel added lightly.

Oliver’s face fell. “Laurel, you didn’t assume anything. I told you we could do it even when I knew I wasn’t ready.”

“And now?” She asked.

“Now I would love nothing more than to be with you,” he told her. A smile spread across her lips, which didn’t stop him from leaning in to kiss them. “I’ll bring my things over tomorrow.”

“My day off. Perfect.” It was far from perfect, she supposed. Instead of a spacious downtown apartment with a five minute emergency vehicle response time belonging to a lawyer and the heir apparent to a Fortune 500 company, they would be sharing a cramped one-bedroom on a forgotten street in the poorest neighborhood as a florist and the owner of the least popular club in all of Starling City. But it felt, in a funny way, far more them than the children their parents had tried to raise them to be, and in a way that was its own perfection.

That morning, she was in the middle of her workout when a knock came at the door. She hadn’t actually expected Oliver this early, but she called to him, “One second!” before grabbing her towel and heading over to unlock it. Her eyes widened in surprise. “Ted!”

Her old teacher nodded at her. “Morning. Mind if I come in?”

“Sure.” Laurel grabbed her tank top off the couch and threw it on as well, noticing that Ted had stopped by the heavy bag she had only just been working at. “What’s up?”

“Oh, nothing. Just was thinking, I might need this back,” he explained, gesturing to it.

“Oh,” Laurel said, her shoulders drooping.

“Seeing as you’re welcome to start lessons back up any time,” he added, turning around to look at her with a sheepish smile. “Turns out you were right and there’s, well, still stuff we’re needed for out there.”

Laurel grinned. “I knew there was still fight in you.”

“Wouldn’t be much good at teaching it if there wasn’t. I’m not kidding about the bag, though,” he added, but Laurel just shoved at his arm which had him smirking.

Ted stayed for a moment or two longer where they hashed out a schedule, both for her lessons and for nighttime. He wasn’t so keen on getting to know the Hood just yet, and Laurel knew it was something she would need to talk to Oliver about first anyway.

After her teacher left, she thought about hitting the shower before Oliver arrived, but there was another knock at the door. Laurel pivoted on the balls of her feet. “Coming!”

She checked this time to find Anita waiting rather than her boyfriend. Laurel opened the door and showed her friend in. Anita carried a bag with her, which she held out for Laurel to take.

“Finished this last night,” her friend explained as Laurel lifted out her black leather jacket. She smiled. She’d been using the jean jacket at night for now, but it just hadn’t been the same.

“Thank you so much,” Laurel said, running her finger over the arm where the tear had been. “Hopefully by Christmas I’ll have made something all by myself to pay you back.”

“Yeah, well look the whole thing over before you thank me,” her friend said.

Laurel did, puzzled at first, with her eyes widening as she turned over the jacket to see the back.

“I should have asked before I did it,” Anita said. “But I kept thinking about that photo you’ve got of the thing in its cage and how it wouldn’t shut up, and I thought it was sort of like you, you know? Trapped in a shitty situation but not gonna go out without a fight. But that’s why I did the wings spread,” she added, stepping forward and smoothing her fingers over the yellow embroidery thread. “It symbolizes freedom. And that’s what you are now, Laurel. You freed yourself.”

She stared down at the outline of a bird with wings spread, a strange sort of lump sticking in her throat.

“I mean they’re probably gonna call you the Bird Lady or something stupid now,” Anita muttered, and it shocked her enough that Laurel looked up to meet her friend’s eyes.

“I—”

“You don’t gotta explain it. I won’t say a thing more about it.”

Her eyes watered and spilled over as she moved forward and wrapped her free arm around Anita in a hug which she returned. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. You don’t hate it?”

“I love it. Really.” She sniffed once and let go, stepping back. Laurel hugged the jacket to her chest, smiling.

Yet another knock on her door had her quickly tucking the jacket back in the bag even if she suspected who this finally was. Laurel let Oliver in, her smile widening at the sight of the bag he had slung over one shoulder and one box tucked under his arm.

“Hey, everything okay?” He asked, reaching out and wiping at her cheek with a calloused thumb.

“Yeah. Come meet or re-meet one of your new neighbors, Anita.”

Anita’s eyebrows shot straight into her hairline. “Billionaire boy’s living here? This is one for the books.”

“It’s uh, Oliver,” he said awkwardly, holding a hand out.

“Well, welcome to the neighborhood, Ollie,” Anita greeted as she gave it a firm shake. Laurel stifled a laugh behind her hand. “I gotta head out, so have fun unpacking, you two.”

“See you,” Laurel told her. The door shut, and she spread her arms a little, turning one way and the other. “Well, make yourself at home.”

“Thank you,” he said, taking the box and setting it on her counter. “This is for you.”

“Everything you own fits in one bag?” Laurel asked dubiously. “Also you really don’t need to be getting me presents right now.”

He shrugged. “I missed your birthday.”

“You paid to fix my front window.”

“Well it’s our window now, so it doesn’t count. Anyway, I really want you to have this.”

It clicked, and Laurel reached for the box. “Is it—?”

She opened it to find a rather sleek ensemble in black and dark blue. Laurel couldn’t identify the material it was made out of, but she imagined it was sturdier than her leggings. A brand new wig and mask sat underneath.

“It’s amazing, Ollie.” She felt far less guilty knowing he’d already paid for it before his financial situation had become precarious. Laurel dove for the bag and her jacket, holding it and the undershirt of her new suit up to see how they might look together.

“Is that a… bird?” Oliver asked, eyebrows furrowed as he peered at the design on the back.

“It’s a canary,” Laurel answered. She set both items back in the box, smoothing the jacket down so the embroidered image rested face-up. Then she went to him, wrapping her arms around his neck. “And it’s what I’m going to start calling myself out there.”

“The Hood and the Canary,” he said. “Doesn’t quite go together.”

“You could always pick your own name for yourself,” she offered. “Instead of letting everyone else decide it for you.”

“Maybe. If it weren’t for you going out there, the Hood probably wouldn’t even exist anymore,” he admitted, and Laurel tilted her head in an unspoken question, her hands sliding to his shoulders. “I became the Hood to fulfill my father’s mission. And in a lot of ways, I failed because I was playing my parents’ game. Sticking to the shadows, paying more attention to the wealthy than the victims suffering from those with wealth. Starling City is going to take a long time to get better, and it has to start here.”

“That all sounds good to me,” she agreed. “And now that you’re doing things your own way, without all the family secrets, I think we really can make a difference. Whatever’s coming, we’ll handle it together.”

He smiled down at her. “Then let’s save the world.”

Laurel met him on her tiptoes for a kiss to seal that promise.

[coll2mitts]

#88 Tommy (1975)

The Who’s well-loved 1969 rock opera album Tommy has been adapted for the screen, and is almost the furthest thing from a feel-good picture that you can get.  Who knew that the sound of childhood trauma could be so goddamn catchy?

When I was a young girl, my father would play the album Tommy, he really liked the band.  Tommy was one of those albums I played on repeat when I was elementary school-aged.  My dad had copied the album to a cassette, and me and my yellow Walkman would head to the bus stop every morning blasting “The Acid Queen”.  I’ve mentioned before I was an obnoxious kid, and one memory that has unfortunately stuck with me for like 25 years is this guy on the bus asking my sister to tell me to stop singing out loud to “Pinball Wizard” because it was annoying.  I sunk into my seat as if he had punched me straight in the gut.

Being young, my understanding of the plot was pretty basic, and oh boy, the movie translation of this was um... I was not prepared for the ride I had boarded.   Even as someone who is unbelievably familiar with the source material, this was a rough watch.

Tommy begins during World War 2, and England is getting bombed by Nazis.  Tommy’s mom and dad are on their honeymoon, and when they return, Tommy’s father is sent off to war and is presumably killed in action.  Tommy is born on V.E. Day and never knows his biological father.  His mother (Ann-Margret) hooks up with a dude she met on vacation, Uncle Frank, and when Tommy’s father returns unannounced 6 years later, her lover kills him by hitting him with a lamp.  Dude lived through a plane crash, and its the bedside lamp that finally gets him.  Tommy witnesses the murder, and Uncle Frank and his mom plead with him not to tell anybody.  The trauma of this event triggers psychosomatic deafness and blindness in Tommy.  His parents are understandably concerned about him, even though they are the whole reason this happened in the first place.

His mom is weirdly fixated with his salvation, and takes Tommy to church to see if a supremely uncharismatic Eric Clapton and statue of Marilyn Monroe can heal him.  The congregation, in a very classy move that is not at all disparaging to Marilyn Monroe’s legacy, downs alcohol and prescription medication as communion.  The healing goes about as well as expected.

After this, his Uncle Frank takes Tommy to a prostitute, who drugs and presumably rapes him, thinking it might snap him out of it.  When that doesn’t work, his parents then leave him with one babysitter that beats and tortures him, and another that sexually molests him, so... fun times.  My notes perfectly illustrate how glad I was to watch this series of events unfold.

Realizing Tommy can entertain himself just by looking in a mirror, his parents get loaded on the couch, leaving him alone to wander out of the house.  He stumbles upon a pinball machine in a junkyard.  His parents discover he’s really fucking good at it, and introduce him into the very financially lucrative world of pinball competitions.

My favorite scene in this movie is watching Elton John play a keyboard attached to a pinball machine while wearing the largest shoes I’ve ever seen on a human.  They hinder his movement so much he can only point with his left arm over and over again to show his enthusiasm.  When Tommy wins the Pinball championship, a pack of Waldos haul away Elton’s defeated body.

Now that Tommy’s family is rolling in dough, his parents buy a mansion and a yacht, and Ann-Margret tries to bury her guilt surrounding Tommy’s condition through retail therapy, and literally smothering her grief with chocolate pudding.

I swear to god, Ann-Margret is the only person who actually knew what kind of movie she was filming.  She’s crazed, dramatic, and her voice is so fucking awesome (unlike some of the other actors they cast...).  Still, the disservice of making her swim in a sea of baked beans... which, FUN FACT: sent her into the ER because part of the broken champagne bottle rocketed out of the television when they were pelting bubbles at her and cut her hand large enough that she needed 27 stitches to close it.  She came back to film the next day because she is a fucking queen.

Tommy’s parents take him to Jack Nicholson putting on an haughty accent to see if he can fix Tommy, and all he succeeds in doing is putting the moves on Ann-Margret.  She takes Tommy back to the house and dances him into the mirror, which sets him free to swim and run shirtless across the country without shoes on.

It’s around this point of the movie that I realize Ann-Margret and I have *a thing* for young Roger Daltrey, and I don’t know what to do with this knowledge.

Seriously, she’s only like 3 years older than him and she’s supposed to be playing his mother.  The film industry is so fucked up.

Tommy tells his mother than she needs to relinquish all her material possessions, baptizes her in the ocean, and forms his own pinball-based religion.  His followers treat him like a messiah, looking for him to provide the path to salvation.  He invites them onto his compound, puts his child molester Uncle Ernie in charge of a bunch of children, and Uncle Frank in charge of recruitment and merchandising. 

His campers are fairly pissed they’re being milked for every dime they have, but Tommy is all, “I haven’t handed out my syllabus yet, wait until you hear what the curriculum is going to be!”  When they discover it’s about turning off all distractions and only playing pinball, his congregation are all like, “Fuck that!” and riot, murdering both of Tommy’s parents.  Now that his oppressors are dead, Tommy is truly free.  He runs through literal fire, jumps into a lake in jeans, and climbs a slippery waterfall AND a mountain in bare feet, making me wonder what kind of insurance they had on this picture that they allowed Roger Daltrey to do all of that and hang glide into a sea of bikers. The 1970s were an unencumbered time.

I watched several interviews with Peter Townshend to understand where the idea of this rock opera came about, and holy shit, this story is just based in his own traumatic childhood experiences.  From his perspective, after WW2, the people in England who had lived with the constant fear of sudden death internalized all of their associated trauma.  They had children they weren’t emotionally equip to parent, leaving them to be vulnerable to people who wanted to exploit them.

Tommy’s constant plea in the movie was to be seen and heard by those who were supposed to protect and care for him, only for them to be ignorant to the affect their negligence was having on him.  Tommy tries to save other broken people who need to feel safe, only for them to revolt, take the only family he’s ever known away from him, and abandon him.  This is an unbelievably depressing movie, and the fact it resonated with so many people, I just... I don’t know how to process that, because it’s heartbreaking.

So, yeah, this movie is weird as shit, but it does try to impart that people who are exposed to repeated stressful events will only hurt themselves and those around them if they try to repress those experiences.  I’m not sure the movie effectively communicated what The Who was trying to convey in the original album, however.  I think the message is overshadowed by the strong aesthetic.  

I suffered with intense anxiety as a child (still do, although I have mechanisms now as an adult to help manage it) and my parents didn’t know what the fuck to do with me.  I would say 90% of the time they’d treat my anxiety like I was personally trying to inconvenience them, and the other 10% they’d make fun of me for it.  So there I’d be, trying to hide my anxiety attacks and feeling like I was going to die (or if I was lucky, just vomit) because they’d get angry or tell me to suck it up if they knew what was going on.  I did not have a happy childhood.  I, like Tommy, just wanted them to understand me and show any amount of compassion.  However, watching this movie, I somehow did not find myself relating to his story at all.  I was too distracted by Marilyn Monroe-dressed nuns, a 2-story tall Elton John, child abuse and molestation played off as a joke, and Ann-Margret drowning in bean syrup that I completely missed the intention.  I also think 1970s religious movements had a tendency to be rather exploitative, and I have listened to far too many My Favorite Murders to not see Tommy’s fans and think, “You’re in a cult, call your dad.”  It’s hard to be automatically empathetic to the abused when they lead others to be victimized by their abusers.

I would 1000% recommend Tommy the album.  This movie is worth a watch if you like The Who, but even as someone who loves the original music, I’m probably not going to put it in my constant rotation.

That concludes rock band movie musical week!  The orchestra nerd inside of me is excited to move on to Carmen Jones next.

[myvisionlistinc]

WandaVision: How Scarlet Witch and Vision's children could change the MCU

Marvel Studios upcoming Disney Plus streaming series WandaVision seems to be placing a focus on adapting the torrid comic book romance of Wanda Maximoffthe Scarlet Witch and Vision.

Some of what that entails has already been seen previously in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, through their star-crossed affair as an Infinity Stone-enhanced human and a synthezoid who must overcome his own destruction – but one of the more off-kilter aspects of their comic book history may also take center stage in the series: their twin sons William and Thomas.

If you re wondering how an artificial man without human biology can father children, the answer to that and the implications of that answer may be at the heart of the conflict in WandaVision, as it was in the show s comic book source material.

As in the movies, Vision and Scarlet Witch developed a complicated romance in the comic books culminating in their wedding, which led, naturally, to Wanda s desire to build a family and have children – a prospect stymied by Vision s lack of human reproductive material it s been implied he has human-like reproductive physiognomy, so sex is possible but reproduction isn t.

Enter Agatha Harkness, a powerful witch who has served as Wanda Maximoff s mentor over the years though she was first introduced as a nanny for Franklin Richards in Fantastic Four. Though she d later take Wanda under her wing, the pair first met in a noted haven for witches, New Salem, Colorado, facing down a coven of magical villains named Salem s Seven; a group comprised of Harkness s grandchildren, fathered by her son Nicholas Scratch.

When Salem s Seven are defeated after burning Agatha Harkness at the stake, she enters an astral form and imbues Wanda with massive amounts of magical energy from the Seven – magical power Wanda uses to form her twin sons William and Thomas, who become the consummation of sorts of her marriage to Vision.

Though William and Thomas are infants and appear as human children, seen swaddled in blankets in the WandaVision trailer, they are not actually flesh-and-blood in comic books. Instead, they re magical manifestations of part of the soul essence of the demonic Master Pandemonium, one of the many guises of the devilish Marvel Comics villain Mephisto, working through a human agent. 

Unfortunately, the timing of this revelation couldn t have been worse for Wanda, who was still reeling from the corruption and destruction of her husband the Vision, who had turned evil, tried to conquer the world, and rebuilt as an emotionless husk. All of this is too much for Wanda, whose sanity is threatened by the series of events.

To end the madness, Agatha Harkness reabsorbs the twins back into Master Pandemonium s soul, and erases their memory from Scarlet Witch s mind. But the memory of her children returns when Wanda is rescued from the real culprit behind the entire thing – Immortus, one of the many guises of the time-traveling Kang, the villain of Ant-Man to reportedly be played by Jonathan Majors.

Years later, Wanda finally loses her grip on reality and attacks her own teammates, the Avengers - leading to the temporary deaths of Hawkeye, Vision, Ant-Man, and more in a story-arc titled Avengers: Disassembled. And of course, that story led to House of M – an even more complex reality-bending story that had its own easter egg in the WandaVision trailer.

The defeat of Mephisto and Immortus and the disappearance of the magically created William and Thomas wasn t the end of the twins story. The human portion of their souls, created from Scarlet Witch s power and Mephisto s dark magic, were reincarnated as the human children Billy Kaplan and Tommy Shepherd who, despite being born and raised separately, each developed mutant powers; with Billy able to alter reality through spellcasting like his mother Scarlet Witch, and Tommy able to run at super-speed like his uncle Quicksilver, Wanda s brother from comic books who perished in the MCU in Avengers: Age of Ultron and who had a more central role in Fox s later X-Men films.

Taking the codenames Wiccan and Speed, Billy and Tommy reunited as Young Avengers - teen heroes who stepped in following the dissolution of the original Avengers in the aforementioned Avengers: Dissassembled and who have connections to the classic team.

As part of the Young Avengers, Billy and Tommy discover their true heritage as the reincarnated children of Vision and Scarlet Witch, and embark on a quest to find her, encountering Quicksilver and Magneto – who was then believed to be Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver s father it s still kinda up in the air. 

They all discover Wanda is hidden in Latveria with Doctor Doom, who plans to marry the now amnesiac Scarlet Witch as part of the culmination of a longterm plan to manipulate her and harness her reality-altering power – a scheme that goes all the way back to Avengers: Disassembled, which is revealed to have all been influenced by Doctor Doom s dark magic as part of his plan to control Wanda.

Wanda and Wiccan are reunited, with Wiccan using magic to restore Wanda s memories, and confirm that he is truly her reincarnated son. The two reluctantly agree to help Doctor Doom cast a spell that Wanda intends to restore the powers of the mutants she depowered on M-Day, in the wake of Avengers: Disassembled and House of M.

But Doom seizes her reality powers instead, forcing Patriot of the Young Avengers to interrupt the ritual, leading to the death of his teammate Stature as in Cassie Lang, Ant-Man s daughter who has appeared in the MCU alongside her dad, but not before she s able to use Iron Lad s time-travel technology and Wanda s powers to rescue her father, Scott Lang, from his death in the past.

With Cassie dead she too, got better – and the vision board online destroyed in the final battle of the Avengers against Doctor Doom – the Young Avengers resolve to move forward.

Notably, since then, Wiccan Billy has gone on to marry his longtime love interest and Young Avengers teammate Hulkling, and become the official consort of Hulkling s combined KreeSkrull empire – as seen in this summer s cosmic comic book crossover Empyre.

With ties to Doctor Doom and Kang, the story of William and Thomas and their parents Scarlet Witch and Vision seems to be a possible bridge to the next era of the MCU. Considering both are canonically mutants in comic books, and the WandaVision trailer has a House of M Easter egg that may tie into mutants introduction into the MCU, it s a potential eventuality that Wiccan and Speed, their young adult alter egos, could factor into the emergence of mutants on film.

And then there s Agatha Harkness – who may actually appear in WandaVision. Though she hasn t been named, it s been hinted at that Kathryn Hahn s mysterious character may in fact be Agatha Harkness herself, perhaps one of the villains of the show. She was previously described as Nosey Neighbor seemingly an homage to the nosy neighbor Gladys from Bewitched and subtitles for the first trailer identify her as Agnes - not so different from Agatha, and perhaps a misdirection - after all, it s not like folks don t use fake names in the MCU all the time.

Remember it was Agatha Harkness who originally imbued Wanda with the dark magic that let her conjure her children, and who altered her memories of it – something for which she later paid the price, dying at Wanda s hand she came back to life, something she s been capable of doing multiple times.

Considering the roles Doctor Doom and Mephisto played in the original story of Scarlet Witch s children and their mother s downfall, could Harkness be an agent of either of these two notable villains?

And of course, that original story also included some involvement from Immortus, who wanted access to Wanda s ability to alter time through her reality-warping powers. Immortus is an older version of Kang, again reportedly the villain of Ant-Man .

Remember, Ant-Man died in the original Avengers: Disassembled and was resurrected thanks to the time-travel technology of Iron Lad – another of Kang s identities. Could that storyline be adapted into Ant-Man – and if so, what could it mean for the fate of Cassie Lang, who was aged to teen years in the five-year gap of Avengers: Endgame?

And since Cassie, Billy, and Tommy are all big parts of the Young Avengers - themselves likely candidates for an MCU film down the road - this could all be building to the assembly of that team as well, perhaps spread over several films in the tradition of their adult predecessors.

All of these connections through William and Thomas, along with that House of M Easter egg and Wanda s role in Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness seem to add up to WandaVision being a crucial chapter in setting up the next epoch of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

WandaVision will debut on DisneyPlus later this year, following some updates to the streaming service s MCU schedule.

[papermoonloveslucy]

K.O. KITTY

“The Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse” ~ November 17, 1958

Produced by Bert Granet, Quinn Martin

Directed by Jerry Thorpe

Dances and Fights staged by Jack Baker

Written by Bob Carroll, Madelyn Davis, Quinn Martin (story)

Synopsis: Los Angeles dance teacher Kitty (Lucille Ball) is delighted when she learns that she has inherited a boxer from her late Uncle Charlie. But the boxer turns out not to be a canine, but a prize fighter named Harold Tibbetts (Aldo Ray), a muscle-bound country boy.

Cast

Desi Arnaz (Himself, Host) was born in Cuba in 1917 and immigrated to America as a youngster. He was a musician who married Lucille Ball in 1940 after meeting her on the set of 1939’s Too Many Girls, which he had done on stage in New York. In order to keep him ‘off the road’ Ball convinced producers to cast him as her husband in a new television project based on her radio show “My Favorite Husband.” The network was convinced. In 1951, Arnaz and Ball began playing Lucy and Ricky Ricardo, roles they would be identified with for the rest of their lives. The couple had two children together, Lucie and Desi Jr. In 1960, Ball and Arnaz divorced. Desi became a producer, responsible for such hits as “The Mothers-in-Law” (1967-69). He re-married in 1963. Desi Aranz died in 1986, just a few years before Ball.

Lucille Ball (Kitty Winslow) was born on August 6, 1911 in Jamestown, New York. She began her screen career in 1933 and was known in Hollywood as ‘Queen of the B’s’ due to her many appearances in ‘B’ movies. With Richard Denning, she starred in a radio program titled “My Favorite Husband” which eventually led to the creation of “I Love Lucy,” a television situation comedy in which she co-starred with her real-life husband, Latin bandleader Desi Arnaz. The program was phenomenally successful, allowing the couple to purchase what was once RKO Studios, re-naming it Desilu. When the show ended in 1960 (in an hour-long format known as “The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour”) so did Lucy and Desi’s marriage. In 1962, hoping to keep Desilu financially solvent, Lucy returned to the sitcom format with “The Lucy Show,” which lasted six seasons. She followed that with a similar sitcom “Here’s Lucy” co-starring with her real-life children, Lucie and Desi Jr., as well as Gale Gordon, who had joined the cast of “The Lucy Show” during season two. Before her death in April 1989, Lucy made one more attempt at a sitcom with “Life With Lucy,” also with Gordon, which was not a success and was canceled after just 13 episodes.

Most sources list Kitty's surname as ‘Williams.’ Her last name is clearly spoken twice in the teleplay as ‘Winslow.’ 

Aldo Ray (Harold Tibbetts, below center) was born as Aldo DeRe and nicknamed 'the Rugged Romeo'. In 1964 he worked again with Lucille Ball in Bob Hope's “Have Girls, Will Travel” (1964). His career waned in the 1970s. He died in 1991.

William Lundigan (David Pierce, above left) was a genial 'B' movie and TV actor. His career began in 1937. His last television role was in 1971. He was a good friend of William Frawley (Fred Mertz) and served as pallbearer at his funeral. Lundigan died in 1975.  

Harry Cheshire (Mr. Brubaker) did three films with Lucille Ball between 1947 and 1950. He played Sam Johnson, a Texan who sells Lucy and Ricky “Oil Wells” (ILL S3;E18) in 1954. His best-known role was as Judge Ben Wiley in the TV series “Buffalo Bill, Jr.” (1955). He died in 1968 at the age of 76.

Jesse White (Barney Snyder, below right) is probably best remembered for playing the lonely Maytag repairman on TV commercials airing from 1967 to 1988. A busy character actor, White subsequently starred opposite Lucille Ball on a 1972 episode of “Here's Lucy.” He died in 1997.

Sid Melton (Louie, above left) also appeared on the “Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse” as a bellboy in “Lucy Goes to Alaska” (February 1959) and as a construction worker in “Milton Berle Hides Out at the Ricardos” (September 1959). He played one of the jockeys in “Lucy Wins a Racehorse” (February 1958). He later played Charley Halper on "Make Room For Daddy” (filmed at Desilu) and Alf Monroe on "Green Acres” (aired on CBS).   

Frankie Van (Himself, Referee) was a stand-in and background performer whose more than 50 credits are nearly all as referees in films and television shows about boxing. Fittingly, his last screen credit was as a referee in Rocky (1976).  

In this script, Van is called by his real name.  

Freddie Beshore (Tommy Thompson, uncredited) picked up boxing while serving in the United States Navy during World War II. During his career he was the Heavyweight Champion of the Pacific Coast. During the late 1940s and early 1950s he was a top heavyweight title contender.

Norman Leavitt (Policeman, uncredited) appeared with Lucille Ball in the 1950 film A Woman of Distinction as well as The Long, Long Trailer (1953). The character actor also appeared on three episodes of “The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour” and two episodes of “The Lucy Show.”  

About “The Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse”

After the end of the half-hour “I Love Lucy” episodes, Desi Arnaz convinced CBS to purchase an anthology series titled “Desilu Playhouse” which would feature different hour-long dramas every week along with monthly stories of the Ricardos and the Mertzes, something begun a year before. 

Thirteen hour-long “I Love Lucy” adventures were eventually made and sold to syndication as “The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour,” ten of which were produced under the Westinghouse sponsorship. The appliance company paid a then-record 12 million dollars to sponsor the show. 

Desi Arnaz hosted the show and introduced the stories. Desi, Lucy, Vivian Vance, and William Frawley, were often involved in the lengthy studio-filmed commercials, with Betty Furness spokesperson for the Westinghouse products. Although it wasn't around long, the show gave birth to pilots for “The Untouchables” and “The Twilight Zone.”

In the summer of 1958, in anticipation of their partnership, the cast of “I Love Lucy” played themselves in an industrial film (known as “Lucy Buys Westinghouse”) that toured the Desilu Studios, promoted “Lucy Goes to Mexico”, and highlighted Westinghouse appliances. The film was never in theatrical release or broadcast, but only shown Westinghouse dealers and corporate clients.

The Desilu Playhouse was also an actual little theatre on the Desilu backlot which hosted classes for actors and put on workshop shows for agents and industry insiders. When Lucille Ball joined RKO in the 1930s, the program was headed by Ginger Rogers' mother, Lela. Lucy wanted to continue the tradition. It was depicted in both “The Desilu Revue” (December 25, 1959) and “Hedda Hopper's Hollywood” (January 10, 1960).  

About “K.O. Kitty”

In the title, “K.O” is boxing term short for “Knock Out,” when a fighter has hit his opponent so hard that he hits the mat and cannot get up again.

This is the first time that Lucille Ball acted on television not playing Lucy Ricardo. Lucille Ball was supposed to do several more non-Lucy Ricardo roles on the series, but this was the only one that ever materialized. The series ended in 1960, along with the Arnaz marriage. “The Desilu Playhouse” went into syndication, minus the Lucy-Desi Comedy Hours. In 1962, Desilu sold those 13 shows back to CBS for $750,000.

Quinn Martin (Producer / Story) was married to “Lucy” writer Madelyn Pugh Davis from 1955 to 1960. His production company was later responsible for such hits as “The Streets of San Francisco” (1972-77), “The Fugitive” (1963-67), and “Barnaby Jones” (1973-78) earning him four Emmy nominations. He also produced nine other episodes of “The Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse.”

Like “I Love Lucy” and “The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour,” the episode uses a laugh track. Unlike most of those shows, there was no studio audience. “K.O. Kitty” followed “Lucy Goes to Mexico” (October) and was followed by “Lucy Makes Room for Danny” (December), a cross-over episode with “Make Room for Daddy.”  

Earlier in 1958, boxing made the cover of Life Magazine when Sugar Ray Leonard beat Carmen Basilio.  

Boxing had been a major attraction on television, the highlight being the “Playhouse 90” presentation of “Requiem for a Heavyweight” in 1956 on CBS. It was directed by Rod Serling (”The Twilight Zone”) and starred Jack Palance.  

A country boy out of his element, Harold Tibbetts (Aldo Ray) is reminiscent of when Tennessee Ernie Ford visited the Ricardos on “I Love Lucy.” Like Cousin Ernie, Harold has an enormous appetite and can't return home because he has no money. He also tends to speak with homespun wit.

Harold also resembles another visitor to the Ricardo apartment, Mario (Jay Novello), the “Visitor From Italy” (ILL S6;E5). Like Harold, Mario had no cash to and had to go to work – in his case making pizza.

But “K.O. Kitty” most closely resembles a 1967 episode of “The Lucy Show” titled “Lucy, the Fight Manager” (TLS S5;E20) starring Don Rickles as a washed-up boxer named Eddie who Lucy Carmichael decides to train at home. Lucy dubs herself 'Killer Carmichael' and even jumps rope in tandem with Eddie, a stunt she learned to do for “K.O. Kitty.”  Despite being by different writers, both scripts contain characters named Louie.  

Lucille Ball also played characters named Kitty in the films Follow the Fleet (1936), Without Love (1945), and The Facts of Life (1960). A name featuring two-syllables ending with 'y' made reminded the listener of 'Lucy'.

Eight months later “The Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse” did another story about prizefighting titled “The Killer Instinct” starring Rory Calhoun and Janice Rule. It was based on the career of ex-boxer Joe Barnum.

The Episode

Desi Arnaz introduces the program, noting that it is a special episode because it stars “his favorite redhead” Lucille Ball.  

The story opens with Kitty at work, teaching dance. She is trying to get Mr. Brubaker (Harry Cheshire) to do the Cha-Cha.

Kitty: “Your feet are doing the cha-cha-cha but your hips are back in the rumba class.”

During the dance lesson, we learn that Kitty is engaged to an up-and-coming lawyer named David (William Lundigan) who won't marry her until he gets a partnership in his law firm, Abbott Parker and Jones. She tells Mr. Brubaker that he is dancing with an 'heiress' due to her Uncle Charlie dying and leaving her a diamond stick-pin, a gold pocket watch, and a dog – a boxer, to be precise.

David (William Lundigan) tells Kitty he is going away on a business trip to San Francisco for a week. During their romantic dinner, there is a knock on the door and the boxer arrives – Harold Tibbetts, professional prize fighter. Tibbetts admits he's not really from Ogalala, Nebraska, but from Crockett – just “a hoot and holler” away.

Harold: “I'm so hungry, my stomach's a-growlin' like hound dog's just smelled a weasel in a hen house.”

Overcome with a sense of loyalty to her Uncle Charlie, Kitty agrees to manage Harold. She arranges for Harold to fight the impressive Tommy Thompson, a powerhouse that no one wants to go up against. Kitty cannot afford the gym fees so trains him at her apartment.  

The name Tommy Thompson was also the name of a producer who worked extensively with Lucille Ball starting in 1964. In 1958 he was on the Desilu lot working as assistant director on “The Danny Thomas Show” 

Kitty sends Harold off to the store to buy training supplies while she stays behind at the gym to observe and pick up some pointers on boxing. First, she indulges in a little shadow boxing. Next she tries to use a punching bag, but it punches back – right in her face. Remembering how to jump rope from her childhood, she jumps into a boxer's reps keeping time with a schoolyard rhyme. These are all prime opportunities for Lucille Ball to indulge in some of her well-hone physical comedy skills.

Back at the apartment, there is a montage of scenes of Kitty training Harold. He knocks the punching bag out the window, shatters a mirror while shadow boxing, and crashes to the floor while jumping rope. Kitty decides that the best training for klutzy Harold would be dancing lessons.  

They begin lessons by dancing to “I Can't Give You Anything But Love, Baby” by Jimmy McHugh and Dorothy Fields. The song was introduced on Broadway in Blackbirds of 1928. 

The dance lesson scene is nearly identical to when Lucy Ricardo taught awkward Arthur Morton (Richard Crenna) to dance in “The Young Fans” (ILL S1;E20) in 1952. 

David returns unexpectedly from San Francisco to find Kitty and Harold in a carefree clinch. Kitty attempts to explain what is going on but it devolves into an argument and David storms out.  

Using Kitty's dance steps and her singing “I Can't Give You Anything But Love” from ringside as inspiration, Harold surprisingly wins his bout against Tommy Thompson.  

He then wins a second fight.

And a third!

With a fourth K.O. under his belt thanks to Kitty, he eyes the title!  

Barney Snyder (Jesse White) and David conspire to get Kitty out of the fight game – for both their sake. Snyder and Louie (Sid Melton) show up at Kitty's apartment, guns drawn, to convince Lucy that they are crooks, and that the fight is fixed.  

Meanwhile, back at the gym, 'Two Step Tibbetts' (as he's now called) is waiting for Kitty to arrive knowing he can't win the fight without her singing ringside while he spars. David arrives to tell Harold the bad news that Kitty will be detained. He learns from Harold that earlier that day they decided that this would be his last fight. David offers to sing instead of Kitty, but Harold can't remember the name of the song – except that the word 'love' was in the title.

Still at gunpoint, Kitty watches the match from home on TV. When Barney and Louis become engrossed in the fight, Kitty hides in the closet. This is very reminiscent of “Ricky and Fred are TV Fans” (ILL S2;E30) where Lucy and Ethel manage to evade the police when they can't take their eyes off a televised boxing match. 

Meanwhile, back at the ring, Harold is taking a beating while David rattles off the title of every 'love' song he can think of, including a few bars of “I Love You Truly,” a traditional wedding song.

Barney and Louis confess to Kitty that they made up their story about being mobsters. Their guns are actually cigarette lighters! They spill the beans to Kitty about their plans. In order to get to the stadium as fast as possible, Kitty pretends she's going to have a baby and gets a police escort. Kitty and David rush to the ringside in time to sing the song, which everyone in the stadium joins in.  At the final moment, Harold lands a knock out punch and wins the fight. David and Kitty make-up with a kiss as the program ends. 

Ringside With Lucy

Lucy Ricardo and Ethel Mertz ended up at the fights in the last scene of 1951’s “The Girls Want to Go to a Nightclub” (ILL S1;E1), the very first “I Love Lucy” episode ever aired.

Everyone but Lucy and Ethel seem to be watching the fights on television in “Ricky and Fred are TV Fans” (ILL S2;E30).

This Date in Lucy History ~ November 17

"Lucy and the Used Car Dealer" (HL S2;E9) ~ November 17, 1969

[classic-rock-roller]

1. Randy’s left on tour with Ozzy and you’re up in Northern California with Crue recording an album with them as a featured artist. You’re with Nikki in a store picking up energy drinks when he comes up to you with a magazine. “You may want to see this.” You look at it and it says that there’s been speculation from an ‘anonymous source’ that Kevin and Bonham are having an affair while you and Randy are away. Do you believe the article and how do you respond?

Of course, I don’t believe the article. I know Kevin and Bonham. Their close friends but not romantically attracted to each other, plus Bonham loves Randy too much to ever cheat on him. “I don’t believe it plus its the Inquirer you can never trust those guys they just print crack.” 

2. You’re working on your collaboration with QR, and you are sitting with Bonham, Randy, and Kevin, trying to work out the solo section. Randy and Bonham are talking about where to have tension and release in the chord progression and at one point Kevin says, “Mm, sexy. I love tension.” Randy ignores him and Bonham rolls her eyes. How do you respond?

“Could you stop your stupid sexual comments all the time? It’s fucking annoying. I had to grow up with it and I don’t feel like hearing it at work.”

3. You’re staying in a terrible hotel on a road trip with Kevin, Randy, and Bonham. You’re coming out of the shower and you see Bonham hiding under a blanket, Kevin shouting out the window, and Randy on the phone with the front desk. What happened to cause this mess and how do you respond?

I look on the ground to find a gun and what I think to be a hand but I’m not sure. “Jesus fucking Christ. What the fuck is that?!” 

4. Your band is in a meeting with your manager after the GNR tour to try to decide your next move. Your manager knows how badly the tour went, and that you have received crazy death threats from Axl. The first suggestion out of his mouth is for you to have just Axl return and appear as a featured artist. You’re sitting in stunned silence but Bonham just says, “Are you high or just incredibly stupid?” How does your band and the manager respond?

Manager: I am neither. I’m trying to find the best way to make you money.

Me: That’s also hazardous to our health. Did you not see the message he sent to my house? Where my one-year-old son is?

Erik: I don’t like him. No. 

Linus: We’re ok. We don’t need that much money. 

Daryl: I don’t know I could use that much money. 

5. Your band is out with Crue one night to celebrate the conclusion of your collaboration album, and Kevin and Randy stayed home because you got tired of Kevin hovering. Nikki’s been nothing but nice to you, which is good. You’re mostly talking to him, and Bonham’s become good friends with Vince. He’s been buying her drinks all night, and you notice her acting funny. She says to you, “I want to go home, I don’t feel right.” Nikki responds for you, “Just a minute, I’m right in the middle of a story.” She kind of nods and sits back down, but once Nikki finishes his story, she and Vince are nowhere in sight. You ask Mick where they went and he says, “She wasn’t looking so good so I think Vince was taking her home. I’m not really sure though, but I know they’re not here.” What do you do, and how do Nikki and Tommy respond?

Me: “I don’t trust Vince in a car. He’s been drinking.”

Nikki: “They're fine. I promise.”

Tommy: “Yeah, he didn’t drink too much.” 

I go out t the parking lot anyway to find Bonham and Vince and tell Vince I’m taking Bonham home. 

6. Kevin’s said a million times that he hates your cat Nikki, but one day you come home and he’s cuddling with him. “I thought you said you hated the cat.” How does he respond?

“Well, the fucking cat sat on my chest and wouldn’t leave and then he started purring and he’s just so fucking cute.” “Mmmhmm, yeah you hate him soooooo much.”

7. Your sister and Axl keep seeing each other even though literally everyone is explicitly against it. You haven’t talked to either one of them because you don’t approve for about a month when you get a phone call from your sister. You hand the phone to Bonham. “I don’t want to deal with her, you do it.” Bonham answers the phone, and the conversation sounds serious. Once she hangs up, she says, “Your sister said Axl got her pregnant. She hasn’t told anyone because she doesn’t know what they’ll say and she doesn’t want him to leave her.” What do you do?

“I’m going to fucking kill him.” After Bonham talks me down, We go see my sister and we talk options. She wants to keep the baby and she decides to tell Axl. She does and before he can say anything I say, “Now you look. I may not like you, but you made me an aunt. So you best be taking care of my sister and your kid or so help me god I will hunt you down and make your life a living hell.” 

8. You and Kevin are watching a movie with Bonham and Randy. Bonham is eating chips when Randy says, “I love you so much.” She doesn’t even look up and she says, “You should I’m a damn miracle.” Randy laughs and says, “You’re sure confident.” How do you and Kevin respond?

Kevin, gagging: God do you two ever stop flirting?! 

Me: Oh stop, it’s cute. 

9. Kevin’s sick of you hanging out with Nikki, so to try to make you jealous, he starts to hang out with Bonham a lot. She’s a little oblivious to what exactly he’s doing, so she just kinda goes along with it. Randy takes notice and immediately goes to you. “I don’t know what you told Kevin, but he’s been all over Bonham and she can’t see it, so what are we going to do?” How do you respond and what happens next?

Me: “He’s like that because he’s jealous of all the time I spend with Nikki and he’s too blind with jealousy to know I only love him. We’ll just let Bonham down easy that he’s doing it to make me jealous, which is childish and pisses me off.”

We tell her and she gets annoyed with Kevin and then Kevin and I have a serious talk where I tell him he has no need to be jealous. I never liked Nikki in that way and never will. 

10. After the bar is finally closed and the gentlemen who were playing have left, Randy is talking to the sax player and they won’t shut up. After a while Kevin shouts out, “Come on, Randy, we gotta go!” Randy’s response to that is to say to the sax player,” We’re on a road trip and we’re about to go up to Wyoming, you wanna come with us?” How does she respond and what do you and Kevin say?

Sax player: Of course, that sounds awesome! 

Me: Great! It’ll be fun having you on our adventure...Bonham. I’m calling you Bonham from now on. 

Kevin: Why Bonham? But it’s great to have you aboard. 

11. You’re working on a song for your collab with Crue, and Bonham asks if she could sing for this song. “I’m not trying to steal your thunder, BabyCarrot, I just really like this one, Nikki’s good at writing.” Before you can respond, Tommy says, “Yeah right, funny joke Bonham. You couldn’t sing to save your life.” He’s just making assumptions to be a dick. How do you respond?

“Tommy, stop being a fucking dick. And don’t snicker it’s not funny.” 

--------------------

1) You and your singer have signed your two sons up for soccer. While at their games, you, Randy, and your singer always sit on the grass and watch while Kevin runs ups and down the field. “Come on, Mal, Will, pick up the pace! Make that goal! Steal the ball! Go, go, go!” Many of the other parents give him looks. How do you, Randy, and your singer react and how do your kids usually react?

2) You and Kevin take your kids back to school shopping. Your singer usually does it with you but she has to work the day you had it planned so Kevin comes with instead. He didn’t realize it took this long and halfway through goes, “Oh my god, why do they need so much stuff? They don’t need this much fucking stuff for school. A notebook and a pencil should be fine.” How do you respond?

3) Mal decides to take up an instrument but your singer and Kevin don’t tell you what until you come over for dinner one night. When you get there, you can hear Mal practicing the recorder. Kevin goes, “Oh, we love the recorder!” Your singer adds, “It’s so loud!” How do you and Randy respond?

4) You and your singer take Randy and Kevin to a PTA Meeting for your kids' school. It’s extremely boring and about halfway through Kevin jumps and screams, “Who the fuck cares about any of this unless it directly affects the children's education? I don’t really want to hear how you installed a new crosswalk in the parking lot or a new lightbulb in the gymnasium.” How do you, Randy, and your singer respond and what does the rest of the PTA say?

5) You’re celebrating your birthday with Randy, Kevin, your singer and four-year-old Mal and two-year-old Will. You’re just about to blow out the candles when Mal asks to join you. You, of course, let him and your singer gets a really cute picture of the two of you. After you blow them out, Kevin jokingly says, “Oh, we forgot to tell you Mal’s sick.” How do you, Randy, and your singer respond?

6) Your singer has brought you, Randy, and Kevin to a family picnic to meet her family. You’re sitting at the table with her uncle and a few other people and her uncle says, “After losing all that weight I can finally see it again.” Your singer’s face screws up and she says, “Eww, I didn’t really need that mental picture right now...or ever.” How do you, Randy, and Kevin respond?

7) You, your singer, Randy, and Kevin are walking along the street and you and your singer are eating ice-cream. Your ice-cream falls off your cone and you say, “Oh fuck me.” Randy says behind you, “At least let me take you out to dinner first.” How do you, your singer, and Kevin respond?

8) Your singer’s neighbors are over at her family’s picnic and she’s holding their eight-month-old son and dancing around with him while his mom is eating. You’re sitting next to Kevin and Randy and your hear Kevin whisper, “God, she’ll make a great mother to our kids one day.” How do you and Randy respond?

9) Your singer brings her sister and Axl’s baby to one of your recording sessions with Crüe because she’s babysitting him. She’s holding him and singing Ten Seconds to Love to him, and Nikki leans over her shoulder to look at the baby. You look over at Kevin and if his look could kill, Nikki would be dead. What do you say to Kevin and how does he respond and how does Kevin react to Nikki being that close to your singer?

10) Your singer Dj’s one night a week at her old college radio station. One day she takes you and Kevin with her to the station and says, “Ok, even though it’s after ten, you can’t say fuck, cunt or another word I can’t remember. Otherwise, the station gets fined and I may be taken off the air.” How do you and Kevin respond?

11) Your singer is dreading her high school reunion. She doesn’t want to go, mostly because you have a concert right after, but you make her go anyway. You dress for the concert before going to the reunion. Your singer is super nervous but the minute she goes in she takes her name tag, places it on, flips everyone off and says, “I was here. I am now leaving. Have a good night!” Before she turns around and leaves the ballroom. How do you and her class respond? 

@osbournebemydaddy   your move Bonham, love       

[orbemnews]

History & Hope: Author shares story of family's role in Montgomery bus boycotts This month, Hearst Television is celebrating Black history by having courageous conversations. The fight for civil rights and justice goes back generations and has looked different each decade. We’re speaking with community leaders, elders – those who have lived through victories and troubled times, to talk about their experiences, and compare them with what we still struggle with today.Karen Gray Houston was a little girl when her hometown of Montgomery, Alabama, became a focal point in the civil rights movement of the 1950s.One day, her mother dressed Houston and her brothers in their “Sunday best” attire to go on a bus ride to sit with children in the front of the bus.Little did Houston know that the seat was something her family helped fight for — and planned from inside her family home.Houston talked with Hearst Television about the role her family played in the historic Montgomery bus boycott and what she’s doing to honor some unsung heroes of the time.Houston’s father and uncle were leaders of that protest.“It was the protest that really kickstarted the civil rights movement,” she said. “It was the first direct, mass action protests.”Her father — the late Judge Thomas Gray — was a boycott organizer.Her uncle was Fred Gray — a renowned civil rights lawyer of the time.“He represented Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King and a young teenage girl named Claudette Colvin, who was also involved in the movement,” Houston said.Colvin was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a segregated bus — nine months before Parks did the same thing.But it was Parks’ arrest that sparked the Montgomery bus boycott, which led to the integration of the city’s bus system.“What happened in 1955 gave a lot of Black people courage to engage in some other movements that made a difference in history,” Houston said.At 4 years old at the time, Houston said she was too young to fully grasp the magnitude of her family’s efforts.“My family wove a little cocoon around me and my two brothers — Tommy and Freddy,” Houston said. “They didn’t want us to have to see the ugliness that they were confronting.”Decades later, Houston, a retired television journalist, documented the role her family played in the historic push for change in her book, “Daughter of the Boycott: Carrying On a Montgomery Family’s Civil Rights Legacy.”“I discovered lots of stories about unsung heroes and heroines — stories that people didn’t know about (and) stories that are missing in the pages of history,” she said.She documented stories from the past that are just as relevant today.“Here’s what fascinated me: The fact that my book came out in the spring of 2020 when the country had erupted in all this social protest,” Houston said of the demonstrations that stemmed from George Floyd’s death and the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement. This month, Hearst Television is celebrating Black history by having courageous conversations. The fight for civil rights and justice goes back generations and has looked different each decade. We’re speaking with community leaders, elders – those who have lived through victories and troubled times, to talk about their experiences, and compare them with what we still struggle with today. Karen Gray Houston was a little girl when her hometown of Montgomery, Alabama, became a focal point in the civil rights movement of the 1950s. One day, her mother dressed Houston and her brothers in their “Sunday best” attire to go on a bus ride to sit with children in the front of the bus. Little did Houston know that the seat was something her family helped fight for — and planned from inside her family home. Houston talked with Hearst Television about the role her family played in the historic Montgomery bus boycott and what she’s doing to honor some unsung heroes of the time. Houston’s father and uncle were leaders of that protest. “It was the protest that really kickstarted the civil rights movement,” she said. “It was the first direct, mass action protests.” Her father — the late Judge Thomas Gray — was a boycott organizer. Her uncle was Fred Gray — a renowned civil rights lawyer of the time. “He represented Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King and a young teenage girl named Claudette Colvin, who was also involved in the movement,” Houston said. Colvin was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a segregated bus — nine months before Parks did the same thing. But it was Parks’ arrest that sparked the Montgomery bus boycott, which led to the integration of the city’s bus system. “What happened in 1955 gave a lot of Black people courage to engage in some other movements that made a difference in history,” Houston said. At 4 years old at the time, Houston said she was too young to fully grasp the magnitude of her family’s efforts. “My family wove a little cocoon around me and my two brothers — Tommy and Freddy,” Houston said. “They didn’t want us to have to see the ugliness that they were confronting.” Decades later, Houston, a retired television journalist, documented the role her family played in the historic push for change in her book, “Daughter of the Boycott: Carrying On a Montgomery Family’s Civil Rights Legacy.” “I discovered lots of stories about unsung heroes and heroines — stories that people didn’t know about (and) stories that are missing in the pages of history,” she said. She documented stories from the past that are just as relevant today. “Here’s what fascinated me: The fact that my book came out in the spring of 2020 when the country had erupted in all this social protest,” Houston said of the demonstrations that stemmed from George Floyd’s death and the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement. Source link Orbem News #Alabama #author #blackhistorymonth #BlackLivesMatter #boycotts #bus #busboycott #daughteroftheboycott #Familys #fox5dc #history #history&hope #Hope #karengrayhouston #MartinLutherKing #Montgomery #montomgery #NBCNews #role #rosaparks #shares #Story #WTOP #WTTG

[aion-rsa]

The Secret Origin of Superman Smashes the Klan

https://ift.tt/35GYiuk

Superman Smashes the Klan may be set in 1946, but it's incredibly timely today.

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We currently live in a world where powerful bigots “fan the flames of a racial fire” instead of stoke violence with their savage racism. Where everything shy of uttering a racial slur in anger is merely “denounced by some as racist” or “racially charged.” So it’s easy to be concerned, when you hear about a new comic project about Superman taking on the Ku Kux Klan, that the story might be so slathered in euphemism as to be rendered entirely inert, even when it’s written by one of the sharpest minds in comics. So when we had a chance to talk with Gene Luen Yang about his new book, Superman Smashes the Klan, it was one of the first things we asked about. “I feel like we do go at it hard, but I also feel like modern storytelling sensibilities require more nuance than you can get away with in the 1940s,” Yang tells us. “You can't set up cardboard villains anymore. And while I'm not presenting that ideology as a good thing, I do hope that there is a little bit of humanity in the bad guys in our version.”

“Their version” is this new project, with art duo Gurihiru, updating a story from the classic The Adventures of Superman radio show, “Superman vs. the Clan of the Fiery Cross.” The original radio drama, available through Archive.org, was groundbreaking. Everyone knows that it was the Superman radio show that introduced Jimmy Olsen and Perry White and Kryptonite, but this is also the adventure that helped expose the real Klan. Stetson Kennedy was an author and human rights activist who had infiltrated the Klan back in the ‘40s. He worked with Drew Pearson, an NBC radio host, to name names in the Georgia KKK, and he connected with the producer of The Adventures of Superman, pitching the storyline that became “The Clan of the Fiery Cross.” 

They included secret information to break the mystique of the Klan, but most of the damage they did with Superman was through ridicule. The “Clan of the Fiery Cross” and its members were garbage. Superman called them garbage. Perry White called them garbage on the front page of the Daily Planet. Even the Klan’s own leader called his membership garbage at the end, mocking the members as rubes while he criticized the show’s villain for taking their racist schtick too seriously, instead of just fleecing the rank and file like he was supposed to. And the wild thing about this fearlessness from one of America’s greatest fictional heroes is that it worked. Klan recruiting actually dipped noticeably in the wake of “Clan of the Fiery Cross” broadcasts.

This was one of the first things that jumped to mind when Yang was meeting with Marie Javins, DC editor and all-time great comics colorist, about new projects. "This is one of the most important Superman stories and it's never been told in his native medium. It's never been told in comics,” he said to her. So he got to tell it.

read more: New DC Universe Timeline Explained

Joining him on the book is Gurihiru. The art duo (Chifuyu Sasaki and Naoko Kawano) have worked with Yang before, on the generally outstanding comic expansions of the Avatar: The Last Airbender universe. Their style is much cleaner and cartoonier than what’s common in superhero books today. One might even say they skew more all-ages in their artwork, but what is “all-ages” as a descriptor of comic art than a way of saying that the art is more in line with the target audience of Superman back when the radio show was on. “Marie and I talked early on about how we wanted the art to look like a blend of manga and those old Fleischer Superman cartoons,” Yang said, “and I feel like Gurihiru has absolutely nailed that.” 

Part of their job was to punch up the action. The radio show was a lot of things, but one of the unfortunate descriptors might be “stationary.” Just by virtue of it being a radio program, there was a lot of time spent describing action to the listener, a lot of scenes that took place with dialogue and narration that worked well in radio, but would be a fundamental failure as a comic. “I think we give Superman a little bit more dynamism,” said Yang. “Gurihiru, they're amazing artists. [I] want to give them amazing action to draw.” So the Superman of Superman Smashes the Klan races down power lines, blasts the ground with his heat vision so hard it pushes him into the air, and shatters a wooden baseball bat with his barrel chest, instead of the static “So Superman flew to the river” scene changes of the radio program. “[Gurihiru was] my top choice for this project. As soon as Marie and I began solidifying the details of the project, I mentioned that I wanted to work with them again,” Yang says. “Every time I would get an email from them, whether it was with thumbnails attached, or with inks attached, or with colors attached, I was just astounded.”

read more: Batman/Superman and the Secrets of Evil DC Superheroes

Better action isn’t the only change to the story Yang and Gurihiru introduce. While the comic is set in 1946 just like the radio show, the creators make a couple of tweaks that make this new version really sing. The most significant is how they expand the roles of the Lee women. Dr. Lee is still the new chief bacteriologist at the Metropolis Health Department, living in a new Metropolis neighborhood with the rest of his Chinese-American immigrant family. Tommy is still the new hot starting pitcher for Jimmy Olsen’s Unity House baseball team (displacing Chuck Riggs, who ends up getting roped into the Klan by his uncle). But new to the cast is Tommy’s sister, Roberta, and Roberta and Tommy’s mother sees her role much expanded from just scenery in the radio drama to a pivotal character in the comic. The men are much more the public face of the immigrant experience. They speak English, join baseball teams, and work in local government. By contrast, Roberta gets homesick. Her mom talks about how wonderful Metropolis’ Chinatown is. And it’s through the Lee women that we see our best connection with Superman. 

Kal-El has always been a metaphor for the immigrant experience in America, and it’s Roberta who interacts with him the most in the first issue. She’s the one who finds Superman after her brother goes missing at the end of the issue, and she’s the one who tells Clark Kent her mother’s philosophy about new homes. It is the single best Clark Kent moment I’ve ever read in a comic, one that is so perfect I wouldn’t dare to spoil here, but it is simple and elegant in how it draws parallels between Superman’s experience and the Lee’s, and one that lampshades his secret identity as a reporter beautifully. This was no happy accident. “By playing Superman, who is an immigrant, against the daughter of immigrants, I felt like I was really able to bring that out,” Yang told us. “I was able to explore something that I've been wanting to explore since I started working on the character.”

read more: Inside the Return of the Justice Society of America to the DC Universe

And while these changes take an already great Superman story from the radio program and turn it into one of the best Superman comics of recent years, Yang tells us that the frame was always there. “I listened to parts of it with my 12 year old daughter, and I thought that she would be like, ‘Oh, can we please listen to something else?’ But she was really caught up by that story,” he says. “She would ask for the next episode, even when I wasn't ready to listen to it. I'd be still taking notes on the first episode, and she'd be like, ‘Let's listen to the next one.’ So I think the spine of the story, the bones of the story are all there, you know? That's one of the reasons why we just kept all the bones.”

The end result, at least after the first issue, is a book Yang seems destined to have made. Superman Smashes the Klan brings Superman back to his immigrant roots, makes him a source of inspiration for working immigrant Metropolitans; their overwhelmed kids; and the scared but ultimately good kids of the rotten Klan adults as well. But Yang’s also bringing Superman back around - he’s had a go at the character once before. As the New 52 was winding down, DC tried some radical changes to their characters. Batman became Jim Gordon, Wonder Woman stopped being Diana, Robin turned into an Occupy flash mob, and Superman lost his powers and his cape and went back to a t-shirt and jeans. “Early on in that ten issue run on Superman in the Prime Universe, I wanted to explore his immigrant side,” Yang says. “The fact that he's actually from this other culture and, in a lot of ways, he has to navigate between Kryptonian and American culture. I feel like I didn't get to really do that there, and I get to do that now. I get to do that in Superman Smashes the Klan.”

He does it exceptionally well.

Superman Smashes the Klan is on sale now.

Read and download the Den of Geek NYCC 2019 Special Edition Magazine right here!

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Feature Jim Dandy

Oct 16, 2019

Superman

DC Entertainment

from Books https://ift.tt/35GalIo

[ramajmedia]

Wu Assassins: 5 Things It Did Well (And 5 Things That Could Have Been Better)

Wu Assassins is the story of how Kai, the new Wu Assassin, must restore the balance of the universe by taking the wu from Wu Warlords. The Wu Warlords each hold one of the elements: wood, fire, water, metal, and earth. This makes them powerful and dangerous.

RELATED: Wu Assassins: 10 Questions We Have After Season 1

To help or hinder Kai on his path are his childhood friends (Tommy, Jenny and Lu Xin), an undercover police agent (CG), his father (Triad crime boss and Fire Wu), and 1000 monk faces and powers. Season 1 just aired on Netflix this August. Here are five things it did well and five things that it could have done better.

10 Did Well: The Fight Scenes

These are well-choreographed and exciting fight scenes. Nearly each character has martial arts skills, and it was fascinating not only watching those skills, but how their characters were revealed through the fighting. For instance, Jenny appears to be used to being underestimated by most opponents. When she saves Tommy, she doesn't fight until she has to, and she uses many low-to-ground rolls and skills. Her opponent assumes he has bested her, but she has him just where she wants him. She uses her petite size and their narrow-mindedness to her benefit.

9 Could Have Been Better: The Role of CG and the Police

CG goes undercover to try to bring both Alec's Russian crew and Uncle's Six's crew in. She works for Lu Xin initially to gather data, but also to find dirt about him. Occasionally, we hear from the other police who are trying to keep the peace between these two warring fractions. However, as CG gets pulled into the Wu world, her initial role falters. The police present a subplot that never truly developed. While we like CG and consider her useful, her story feels spotty at best.

8 Did Well: The Earth Wu

The Earth Wu is barely in the show, but makes a big impact. Seeing that his son is a disappointment and shouldn't inherit the Wu, the Earth Wu kidnaps potentials in order to interview them. If they pass the interview, they would receive the Wu. If they don't, the Earth Wu kills them. All have been killed so far.

The Earth Wu is very connected to his element and protecting nature. His story is interesting in that his use of power is more grounded in helping the earth, rather than in what power he can get from it. While very eccentric, even he knows not to buddy up with Alec, the Wood Wu, and cautions Kai to keep away from him. The Earth Wu is unique and surprisingly well-developed even in his short screen time.

7 Could Have Been Better: Water Wu

The Water Wu is played by the fantastic actress Summer Glau, but she feels quite under-utilized. We know little about her besides the fact that she follows the Wood Wu and has had a romantic relationship with the Metal Wu (regardless of the body he is in). True, the Water Wu is beautiful and dangerous, but what else? Her sole purpose seems to be assuming the role of the sexy one, leaving her character flat.  She is like the Sleeping Beauty of the Wu Warlords — on the screen, but only passively active. While she does kill a man, she kills him for the Wood Wu, not any motive unique to herself.

RELATED: 10 Best Sci-Fi Shows on Hulu 

6 Did Well: The Childhood Friendship

Kai, Lu Xin, Jenny and Tommy have been friends since Uncle Six took Kai in as his own. We see them together as teenagers: getting tattoos, eating and goofing around.  The scenes from their youth help show their history and chemistry. Kai comes across as more reserved than the other three, and they come across as protective of him. This continues into adulthood. However, when they dine together at the end, they seem less connected than before. This suggests that the tight friendship between them may have some challenges in the next season.

5 Could Have Been Better: The Monks' Faces and Powers

1000 monks gave their powers for the Wu Assassin (Kai) in order to successfully fight the Wu Warlords, restoring balance. In addition, when Kai needs to hide his identity, a monk's face appears as his own as a way to protect him. While we see a couple of the monks' faces, we don't see others. We don't know if each monk had a unique power that Kai comes to possess. Basically, we know little about their story.

RELATED: MCWho? 10 Shared Cinematic Universes 

Also, people find that Kai was the Wu Assassin pretty early, so the masks of the monks' faces become of little use.

4 Did Well: Family Struggles and Loyalty

In this series, we have multiple examples of family. We have Tommy and Jenny, a tight-knit sibling pair trying to live up to the high expectations of their family. Then there is Zan of the Triad who has no family and envies Jenny. We also have Alec the Wood Wu, who began his game just so he could go back to his family. Even CG talks about her father and how he led her to the life she has now. Then there is the Earth Wu and his talk of passing the Wu power down generation to generation. Last but not least, we have Kai and Uncle Six, who share a strong bond.

In each of these narratives, family or the lack of family is important. It determines the characters' values and what they are willing to do to protect those close to them. Zan, the one without a family, seems to be searching for hers. Instead, she chooses power and betrayal — both of which will probably not give her the sense of belonging she wants.

3 Could Have Been Better: Lu Xin's Shame and Anger

Out of the four friends, Lu Xin is the one who was burnt and harmed by the fire when they were teens and trapped in the building. His face and ear were scarred, and it is something he is sensitive about, thinking people treat him differently because of it. However, until other characters mentioned the scars, we didn't really notice much about them. On the screen, they seem minimal. The actor who plays Lu Xin, Lewis Tan, is a very handsome man, so Lu Xin doesn't come across as the rejected/judged outsider. He's also joyful. For the scars to have affected him more, we should see them manifest in the way Lu Xin views himself throughout the full series, and not just towards the end.

RELATED: Ranking The 10 Best Fight Scenes From the Marvel Netflix Universe

2 Did Well: Kai and Uncle Six's Relationship

Uncle Six seems only sincere when he is with Kai. While we doubt many things about Uncle Six, we never doubt his love for Kai. Even though Kai may be angry with Uncle Six, he also loves him. Uncle Six notes that Kai doesn't use the expensive knife Uncle Six bought him, but Kai also doesn't throw it away. This symbolizes their relationship — while Kai doesn't adhere to all of whom Uncle Six is, h also doesn't throw away his love and teachings. This relationships shone and it allowed us to see Uncle Six's softer, more noble side.

1 Could Have Been Better: "I Am Not a Killer"

A key part of Kai's personality is that he is not a killer. Uncle Six likes this about Kai and considers it a strength. Ying Ying tells Kai that as the Wu Assassin, he will need to kill. Kai answers back that he isn't a killer. However, when it comes time to kill, Kai does this easily and without much struggle. In contrast, another MCU superhero, Daredevil lives by the code of not killing, and struggles not to cross that line. Whereas, Kai just accepts that he has to kill with little to no inner struggle.

NEXT: Daredevil 10 Questions That Will Never Get Answered Now That It's Cancelled

source https://screenrant.com/wu-assassins-netflix-strengths-weaknesses/

[womenofcolor15]

Stars Align To 'POWER' Up At MSG For Season Finale Premiere + 50 Cent & His Rumored Boo Make It Red Carpet Official

Every person who ever starred on "Power" made their way to Madison Square Garden for the season finale premiere in NYC. Go inside for the bittersweet event...

  Last night, STARZ celebrated the highly anticipated sixth and final season of “POWER” at Madison Square Garden in New York City. And it was LIT!

Everyone who has every starred on the show came out to celebrate along with several other celebrities who hit the stage to perform.

The event included a celebrity filled red carpet and exclusive screening of the season premiere episode, ahead of the first episode that will premiere on August 25th at 8pm on STARZ.

The all-star POWER cast, including Lela Loren, Naturi Naughton, Omari Hardwick, LaLa Anthony, and Joseph Sikora snapped up alongside showrunner/executive producer Courtney A. Kemp on the carpet before the turn up.

And look who else hit the carpet...

"Power" producer 50 Cent rolled up on the carpet with his rumored boo Cuban Link (aka Jamira) have seemingly made it red carpet official. Fif must really be feeling her since he brought her as his date for the huge night. She also was with him during his Tycoon Pool party a few months ago.

Rapper-turned-actor Ice-T and his wife CoCo were in the mix, snapping it up with Fif and his woman.

"Power" star LaLa Anthony put her curves on display in a tight silver plunging neckline gown.

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                  Power Premiere

A post shared by ℒᎯ ℒᎯ (@lala) on Aug 20, 2019 at 5:22pm PDT

  Eat your heart out Carmelo Anthony.

Single lady Naturi Naughton looked bomb on the carpet as she snapped it up with her on-screen husband Omari Hardwick:

Omari also linked up with his co-star Joseph Sikora. For the last season, their characters Ghost and Tommy are going to face off after some type of huge betrayal goes down.

Omari's real-life wife Jennifer Pfautch was also in the mix.

"Power" star Lorenz Tate came out to celebrate and nabbed a photo-op with rapper O.T. Genesis.

Former "Power" star Donshea Hopkins popped up on the scene in some colorful wiggery. We all cried our eyes out when her character Raina was killed off the show.

Rappers Snoop Dogg, Lil Mama and O.T. Genasis also hit the carpet before rocking the stage. 

Watch clip below to catch the "Power" gems the cast dropped on the carpet:

Uncle Snoop and R&B crooner Trey Songz joined 50 Cent for electrifying performances:

Lil Mo and her floor length braids hit the stage.

Other performers included Fabolous, Davido, Case, A$AP Ferg, Casanova, G4 Boyz, YFN Lucci, Keni Burke,  and Alicia Myers.

            View this post on Instagram

                  My favorite human being in the whole galaxy. Nobody and i mean nobody has my heart like you outside of my blood. and i mean that it the most humblest way. And I’ll come out my body for you. My brother. My A1!! Day 1. For you to see me smile and acknowledge that you see me happy means the world to me. Because you was there for me when i was bout to lose it. And you always told me pray. and get some rest. Priceless memories to the GOAT. @myfabolouslife we the dynamic duo. Untouchable. Unstoppable. The FAMILY. For LIFE. You know the vibes!! #MSG

A post shared by Lil Mo (@thelilmoshow) on Aug 20, 2019 at 8:42pm PDT

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                  Cool kids!! HeardJUUUU @treysongz and i at #MSG #powerpremiere

A post shared by Lil Mo (@thelilmoshow) on Aug 20, 2019 at 8:32pm PDT

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                  Power Premieres and stuff. #POWER тнe вronх х вrooĸlyn х нarleм

A post shared by (@kodaklens) on Aug 20, 2019 at 7:08pm PDT

  Peep a few clips of performances below: 

  Davido performs at the world's most famous music venue, Madison Square Garden during Power Season 6 premiere event. 50 Cent brought him out as a special guest. pic.twitter.com/vPWOjNcqjZ

— Africa Facts Zone (@AfricaFactsZone) August 21, 2019

    2/2 - Power Premiere at Madison Square Garden. pic.twitter.com/0lQDwph63j

— mel (@melirdgzz) August 21, 2019

    Finnally Got To See My Favorite Artist @YFNLUCCI Perform! #PowerPremiere pic.twitter.com/OyfNQTbQ61

— #ICANROLL (@TiltTheG) August 21, 2019

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                  POWER PREMIERE @50cent @snoopdogg #PowerAtMSG #Power #PowerPremiere

A post shared by Thisis50.com (@thisis50) on Aug 21, 2019 at 12:02am PDT

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                  #POWERTAKESMSG #powerpremiere @thelilmoshow you doing thing momma vocals A1

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  TV personality Terrence J was tapped to host the event.

Also, TJ will host a "Power" after show for the season finale. 

After hitting the stage, Fif was all boo'd up with Jamira/Cuban Link.

TV personality Bevy Smith hit up the afterparty, snapping it up with "Power" star Lela Loren.

Singer Jeremih posted up alongside Fab and Trigga during the afterparty. 

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                  At the Power After Party In NYC with my handsome Mr. @mrrichardlawson

A post shared by Tina Knowles (@mstinalawson) on Aug 20, 2019 at 9:16pm PDT

  Mama Tina was in the mix with her hubby Richard Lawson. Well aren't they cute.

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                  Tonight at the POWER afterparty! With two of the Actors on the show , state prosecutor Cooper Saxes (far right ) Shane Johnson and Keily , and His fellow procecuter (far left) Jerry Donovan ( Ty Jones ) @mrrichardlawson ,

A post shared by Tina Knowles (@mstinalawson) on Aug 20, 2019 at 11:46pm PDT

  Fun times!

"Power" returns August 25th at 8pm on STARZ.

Photos: Courtesy of Starz/WENN/Splash

  [Read More ...] source http://theybf.com/2019/08/21/stars-align-to-power-up-at-madison-square-garden-for-season-finale-premiere

[nilority-blog]

Here we are still trying to get over the death of Kanan (Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson), and two more bodies fall in this penultimate episode of season 5. One of them has been on the kill list for some time now so, we’re not too surprised by his death but, boy was it interesting to watch how it all went down.

Finally, the lines of communication are open and the right people are speaking to the right people to find out who the snitch is among us. So who’s the snitch? Well, the one who gets clipped at the end of this episode is Tony Teresi (Willam Sandler). But of course we know there’s way more snitching going on. Sadly, Tommy (Joseph Sikora) has to be the one to pull the trigger to exterminate the main rat.

A lot happens before we reach that point, so let’s talk about how we get here. Diego’s head was found in the freezer of the hotel that Dre (Rotimi) manages. Once Alicia (Ana de la Reguera) finds out, she’s pissed although she wanted her brother dead anyway. She goes off on Dre for his management skills or lack thereof, so she orders Cristobal (Matt Cedeno) to take over as head distro.

This doesn’t sit too well with Dre so when Angela (Lela Loren) approaches him to give up some dirt on Alicia, he’s all in. (Another snitch in the game)! He tells her where Alicia is scheduled to be later on that night, which just so happens to be in a hotel room getting real cozy with Cristobal.  Angela takes that information and runs with it, straight to Alicia’s hotel with the FBI in tow, and arrests her.

Angela is real ballsy now after making that arrest. She tells Alicia that the DEA agent Steve Tampio can’t save her this time. Then she gets real brolic with Mak (Sung Kang) and demands he identify his informant. Mak easily gives up Tony Teresi which should have been the clue he was setting her up but we’ll get to that in a second.

So what does Angela do? She runs straight to her Jaime (Omari Hardwick) to let him know there’s a snitch among us. She brings pictures and everything so he can handle the problem.

Meanwhile, Sammy thinks  Tommy is the snitch and tells Teresi that he should give him up to the Feds. Teresi tells him that this is exactly what he’s been planning all along. But plans change quickly when Sammy overhears Teresi on the phone with Saxe (Shane Johnson) saying he has nothing on Tommy but can give him everything they need on Ghost. The two argue and Tommy walks in unexpectedly. When Tommy asks what’s going on, Sammy looks angry enough to tell him the truth so – stab, twist, stab right in the gut. Was Teresi really coming around to some love for Tommy or was he just trying to save his own ass? Guess it’s up to us to figure that out, since Teresi won’t be talking.

With the new info on Teresi confirmed with pics, Ghost meets up with Vincent (Joe Perrino) to ask him to tell Tommy that Teresi’s a snitch. Vincent asks why can’t he handle it himself and Ghost tells him that Tommy won’t believe him. (TRUE) IVincent calls Tommy in for a meeting, pulls out the pictures and tells him that his father is a snitch and he has to handle it.

Poor Tommy. Just as he’s starting to get close to his father, he finds out he’s been betrayed.

  Meanwhile, another father and son relationship that’s quickly unraveling is the one between Ghost and Tariq (Michael Rainey Jr.). Tariq is out of control. He really wants to be a drug dealer. He even tells his father straight to his face – “Teach me the MF’ing game Ghost.” (WOW!)

He admits to his father that it was his plan to frame Kanan (Curtis ’50 Cent’ Jackson) He tells Ghost, Tasha (Naturi Naughton) and his uncle Tommy that he knew Kanan wouldn’t go down without a fight. He expected him to be killed when the police pulled the car over. He thinks he fixed the problem. Now he’s walking around trying to be a baby Kanan with the drugs Kanan left behind, and setting up meetings with Vincent to get him to move the weight. He even gets a fake I.D. made. Not so he can get into the club or buy alcohol. No, this young stunna gets a fake I.D. so he can pose as Kanan’s relative to get his ashes. (This boy is all the way messed up.)

And speaking of all the way messed up. Let’s talk about how Mak and Saxe have Proctor (Jerry Ferrara) wearing a wire. (WTF)

They want him to get Ghost to confess on tape that he and Angela conspired to have her crooked former boss, Mike Sandavol, killed in prison.

Proctor has a plan,  though. He can’t do Ghost dirty that way despite the risk to his own family as Mak has threatened to help his daughter’s drug-addicted mother gain custody of their daughter. He writes on a napkin that he’s wearing a wire and gets Ghost to answer questions without implicating himself or Angela.  After he unplugs the wire, Ghost still almost throws Proctor off the club’s second floor.

Which brings us back to Angela. She’s about to go down.

Mak tells her that telling her Teresi was their CI was a setup. Once he gets killed, they knew she was the one leaking information.

So, Mak, Saxe, Tameika (Quincy Tyler Bernstine) and Blanca Rodriquez (Monique Gabriela Curnen) are cornering Angela into being the next snitch. They know she’s connected to their most wanted drug dealers –  they just need the proof.

So will she roll on the crew to save herself or will she try to find a way of the mess for everyone? She has 24 hours to figure it out.

We may soon see Angela curled up in the fetal position crying her eyes out just like we saw Tommy with his mother, who, despite all her issues, was on the money about Teresi from Day One.. He’s still a G though! (Thugs cry, too!)

PHOTOS: Starz

Kill List: Dre

 Quotable: “I will be the son. Even though you could never be the father” -Tommy

READ MORE STORIES ON BLACKAMERICAWEB.COM:

‘Power’ Recap Season 5, Episode 9: ‘Fathers And Sons’

St. Louis Apartment With Kitchen-Bathroom Combo Creates Stir

Aretha Franklin’s Family Offended By Eulogy, But Rev. Jasper Williams Doubles Down

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Go to Source ‘Power’ Recap Season 5, Episode 9: ‘Fathers And Sons’ Here we are still trying to get over the death of Kanan (Curtis “50 Cent”