#there is a difference between a cool villain with a good backstory and nazi they are backtracking into making sympathetic cos fans want him

[danganronpusassholefactory]

If you like Emet Selch get the fuck off my dash I've had enough of yall

[imperiuswrecked]

Tenoch has got me curious about Namor. Like a good curious. Yes he is a beautiful man, but now I wanna learn about Namor. I had a co worker say Aquaman and Namor came out at the same time, comics wise

Hello Anon! I can definitely talk about Namor XD it's my favorite subject.

Namor was actually created in April 1939 by Bill Everett, his first comic was in Motion Pictures Funnies Weekly which was a promotional thing to be given out in theaters his first story was then later reprinted and expanded in Marvel Comics (1939) #1 (November 1939). So he was actually created one month before Batman, and two years before Aquaman (November 1941).

So a lot of people compare Namor and Aquaman but they are actually different; Namor has always been born of human father/atlantean mother, his father is a Sea Captain, Leonard McKenzie, and his mother is Princess Fen.

Meanwhile Aquaman was totally human at first, his dad did some experiments on him to give him the ability to breath underwater, etc. (More Fun Comics (1941) #73) However later Aquaman would change to have the same backstory as Namor, human father/royal atlantean mother.

Marvel Comics (1939) #1

Namor is the first superhero in comics to fly, even before Hawkman, Shazam (captain marvel) and Superman, he is also the first comic anti-hero. Namor is also the first Marvel Mutant before the X-Men's creation. Fantastic Four (1961) Annual 1 published July 1963, that is still a couple of months before Uncanny X-Men (in September 1963)

Namor’s character is really interesting and unique, he is seen as a villain by the surface world, and a hero to his people. He is the protector of his people, Atlantis, and the seas. He has the blood of Neptune and is a descendant of him. Namor is a Prince who was caught between two worlds and never belonging to either world, his people saw him as too human, and humans saw him as too atlantean. So he is often mistrusted and betrayed by both the Atlanteans and the Humans.

Rise of the Black Panther (2018) #2

Not to mention that Namor and Aquaman both have very different personalities and morals, Namor tends to operate in a more gray area than Arthur does.

Sub-Mariner (2007) #4

Namor used to be a very popular character in the Golden and Silver age of comics but due to Marvel not handling his character well and canceling his comics, etc., he has been in a steady decline until recent MCU Namor news, although Namor has always had a small loyal fan following.

Origins of Marvel Comics: X-Men (2010)

In addition to being on several teams/starring in several books in the Marvel Universe, both hero and villain; X-Men, Fantastic Four, The Cabal, Avengers, Super Villain Team Up. He also co-founded some teams; Invaders, The Illuminati, The Defenders.

The Defenders art by Jorge Molina

Namor has a very long history, he fought in WWll against the Nazis. In fact he was the first Marvel character to be featured fighting against Nazis on the cover of Marvel Mystery Comics (1939) #4 even before Captain America was created. Aquaman’s first appearance years later would also feature him fighting Nazis, but Namor did it first.

Namor canonically has Mental Health Issues, his PTSD was finally acknowledged in Marvel’s Snapshot: Sub-Mariner (2020)

Namor has always been coded as biracial man in the comics. His first enemies were white people who harmed his people, the subamariners (what the Atlanteans were called in the Golden Age) are also coded as a indigenous sea people. Namor means “Avenging Son” in Atlantean. (Bill Everett wanted a cool sounding name so he wrote a bunch of names backwards and settled on Roman > Namor.)

Motion Pictures Funnies Weekly (1939)/Marvel Comics (1939) #1

Namor has had three major love interests in his life:

Betty Dean - a Human cop who was the first surface friend Namor ever had. They split up after the war as Namor had to return to Atlantis. She grows old while Namor stays young, but they reconnect as friends again later in life. Betty becomes the foster mother to Nita (Namor’s little cousin) and then later she dies after trying to protect Namor.

Lady Dorma - Namor’s first wife, an Atlantean Noble Woman who had been friends with Namor since they were young, both growing up in Atlantis. Dorma had been in love with Namor for years before he realized he had feelings for her too. She was murdered on their wedding day by Empress Llyra, when she tried to save Namor, she dies in Namor’s arms.

I had this gorgeous art of Namor/Dorma on their wedding day commissioned from  @pointdotiozao

Marrina Smallwood - an Aquatic Alien who was raised by humans. She and Namor meet many years after Dorma’s death and Namor falls in love. They were married and lived happily for a time until Marrina began to turn into a sea monster. She begs Namor to end her life before she takes another life as she was a very good kind person who could not stand the thought of hurting people.

If you want to read up more about Namor then I have a reading guide here

Namor is a very arrogant, proud, and emotional flawed character and under all his salty bitchiness he has a good heart. He isn’t afraid to stand up for people who can’t defend themselves and is often conflicted with his human and atlantean sides.

Art by Nick Robles

Also his catchphrase is IMPERIUS REX!

[thebestpersonherelovesbucky]

Falcon and the Winter Soldier: Ep. 4 Takeaway

Uh. No. No, I was not in any way, shape, or form prepared for that heart-wrenching opening. That raw emotion. The gut-punching fear. The devastation. The soul massive relief from under all that fear and pain. No, I was not ready.

“She’s just a kid.” This is why Sam should be Captain America. Look, no one can replace Steve Rogers. There will never be another Steve Rogers. But that’s not the point. Sam isn’t meant to replace anyone. He’s meant to be his own Captain America. A man who has the heart and soul of a person who doesn’t go looking for a fight. A man who will fight when it needs to be done. A man who reaches out with compassion first and fists second. Sam is the Captain America this world needs in these modern times and tbh it doesn’t deserve him.

“Those are our friends you’re talking about.” “The Avengers, not the Nazis.” Thank you for your contribution, Bucky. 😂 No, but, I really liked the our friends. Not just my friends, but our friends and Bucky concurring with that by pointing out who Sam means. 

Sam sharing the story about his TT. His family means so much to him as does community and I think that’s why he can relate to Karli and what she wants to do but also cannot condone how she’s going about it. 

Yes, if anyone wondered, Baron Zemo would sell out his family to the White Witch for some Turkish Delight. 

I do like Zemo stepping back into the more villainous role. While I enjoyed the humor from last episode, it never really sat right with me that they gave Zemo a “tragic” backstory. He was Hydra in the comics and it feels weird to me to change it in such a way. He was a supremacist so his new anti-supremacist ideals is...off-putting to me.  

“It wasn’t just one community coming together. It was the entire world.” Hence why Sam can understand Karli’s goals.

Sam assuming the leadership role so much in the episode. So much foreshadowing to what’s (hopefully) to come. 

When Bucky loses it with Zemo and Sam is like “Don’t engage. He’s just gonna extort you and do that stupid head tilt thing.” Not only is this more leadership from Sam it’s also showing how much he pays attention. He knows all their social cues. He knew Zemo was gonna do that probably before Zemo even did. In other words, Sam Wilson is remarkable. 

Sam calling Sharon for help. I wasn’t expecting her again so soon. Yay!!

As soon as John Walker steps on screen I want to punch something. 

“He’s dealt with worth. And he’s not my partner.” Look at Bucky backing Sam up while trying to play it cool. We all know you love him, Buck.

Sam talking to Karli. Coming to her from a place of understanding and genuinely trying to earn her trust because he does understand her pain. He’s filled with so much compassion and so much empathy and he knows how to employ both of them to better a situation and the world at large instead of coming in guns blazing. He gets it. And he wants Karli to know that he gets it. His approach to getting her to see that she’s going about it in the wrong way. But while she’s okay with acceptable loss, she in fact expects it, Sam is not. “No, it’s not a better place if you’re killing people. It’s just different.” Again, this is what makes him a good Captain America. 

“He knows what he’s doing.” Bucky’s faith and trust in Sam when Walker is literally itching for a fight. That...cold, obsessed look in Walker’s eyes was chilling. (I’ve given kudos to Mackie and Seb for their acting but I should also acknowledge Wyatt Russel’s chilling performance)) 

Thank you, John Walker, for coming in and making things better oh wait, no. Just come in a fuck things up. Super of you. 

Sam’s immediate “no” when Zemo asked if he’d take the serum if he was offered it and asking about Bucky being included in the “super soldiers cannot be allowed to exist.” “Blood isn’t always the solution.” Sam is just. I’m running out of words.

I’m now walking a thin line of patience with Bucky criticizing Sam over not taking the Shield. Like, yes, he’s right in that Steve’s wishes were not honored, but Sam is living the consequences wanting to do the right thing by giving the Shield to a museum. He did not and would not have ever handed it over to anyone to use, especially not a man like John Walker. Sam didn’t give it to him. The government did. The same way they’d’ve given the serum to a man like Gilmore Hodge. The same way they forced it upon Isiah Bradley and then experimented on him and locked him away. The same way they “agreed” that Sam was doing the right thing by turning the Shield over and then handing it to John Walker. This is not Sam’s fault.  

I could take hours of Ayo and the Dora Milaje kicking John Walker’s ass.

Ayo and the Dora Milaje. 

Did I mention Ayo and the Dora Milaje? 

I really want to know what Ayo said to Bucky there**. After everything the Wakandans did for him, I can understand why she did what she did. She helped give his freedom and his mind back to him. I know Bucky only intercepted in that particular fight because Sam asked him to and he didn’t (not totally) want them to hurt Walker but. They gave him this place of freedom and his actions (breaking Zemo out, getting involved in their fight) did disrespect them. 

The Dora stepping on and catching the Shield. SWOON.

“They weren’t even super soldiers.” Oh, boo freaking hoo. You don’t need the serum to be a superhero, dude. And the fact that you’re basing so much of this on that plus your obesssion to gt it just proves you’re not worthy of it. 

“Power just makes a person more of themselves, right?” Vs. “Because a strong man, who has known power all his life, will lose respect for that power. But a weak man knows the value of strength, and knows compassion."

Seriously, the expressions John Walker makes sends chills down my spine.

Karli calling Sarah. I actually thought she’d show up in person. Sarah’s comments about “Captain America” and her assurances that Sam is not working for Walker. 

Sam’s immediate protectiveness when Sarah calls him and Bucky’s worry on his behalf. Sam’s anger with Karli when they meet again and the fact that he didn’t argue with Bucky for him wanting to come rather than Sam going in alone. 

Sam and Bucky working together (anyone notice a lot less bickering??) is so amazing. I love them as a team. 

Sam’s face when he realizes that Walker took the serum. 

Quite honestly, if Bucky Barnes wanted to stab me with knives all night long, I’d let him. 

Not happy with them killing Lemar for white man pain. I’m sure there were other ways they could have had Walker rage out. 

That amazing parallel between Steve slamming the Shield down in Civil War to defend himself and Bucky and Walker killing a person who was just with Karli. 

Speaking of parallels, there was SO many in this episode. The serum vials being shattered. The bursting through the doors Shield first. The jumping out of the window with the Shield. Just wow. 

“The Whole World is Watching”. A quote from Black Panther when T’Challa did not kill Klaue, an actual terrorist. The title of this episode when John Walker kills a man who didn’t even incite his rage. 

And, of course, that final image. I’m still shaking over it. If there’s a better image for what America represents to the rest of the world, idk what is. I just want to cry after seeing what this man is doing with it. This is why he’s U.S. Agent who represents the “power” and “strength” and “might” of the United States. Not Captain America who represents the ideals and hopes of what any country can be. 

The acting in this is utterly incredible. The story has me reeling. My mind has been blown by each and every episode and I can’t believe there are only two left. 

**Edit: Got it now! Thanks to those who messaged/replied!! 

[maddiicake]

Why Both FMAB and FMA03 are good and should be treated as Independent Stories:

I will go on the record of saying that Appreciate and Love FMA as a whole and love both series for what they are. And while it may sound like a broken record saying things like this... there’s still hateful words against those who like one over the other. So, I’m here to make this post addressing that both FMA2003/03 and Brotherhood are great in their own way and should be respected as their own individual stories.

Also warning there will be obvious spoilers.

What I liked about the Original (FMA03/2003) Series:

I watched 03 before delving into Brotherhood, and even before reading the manga. Now, I know Brotherhood and Manga fans are the small minority of the fandom, while 03/2003 fans make up the majority. That being said, many of these people simply can't get used to 03 after watching Brotherhood.

However, for me, I was happy because: A) I got more FMA to watch, and B) The differences in 03/2003 simply made it even more fun to watch, so for it was no trouble getting used to this anime.

But if I were to be specific of what I liked, I’d say I liked the following about FMA03/2003:

Characterization of the Protagonists and all the 'good' guys: The show heavily focuses on the relationship and tragedy of Elric Brothers, and 03/2003 portrays it much better with such a deeper level. The relationship between both brothers is intimate, and it feels like a genuine sibling bond. I also enjoy the fact that the anime shows that even if Ed follows his ideals, he, like any human, can break away from them under severe pressure, which was beautifully shown in the 5th laboratory arc. As for other characters: Scar in this version is a total opposite of his Brotherhood counterpart. He is written realistically in the 2003/03 anime. His absolute hatred for the military is more legit, and he feels morally grey in this anime. Izumi Curtis for me was also portrayed better in this version. Meanwhile, other Characters like Roy, Winry and Alex felt the same to me throughout both versions--so, not much change there.

Worldbuilding: The 2003/03 anime does a fantastic job at portraying the widespread effects of war and politics, Alchemy, etc. and how it has affected the people of the FMA World. For example, in Episode 16, “That Which is Lost”, Ed meet, a guy who had lost his limb while working as a soldier and was reluctant to use an automail prostetic because he wanted to “retain his wound”. Now, this episode itself was more so filler and didn’t really matter to the main plot of the story in itself; however, I feel that it was added to series to portray the depth of the FMA World, and how everyone has different reactions to the events that happened in the 2003/03 anime. Also, many of the events and how they unfold in this anime seem to parallel the middle east, which just makes all this feel realistic and provides some occasional social commentary which is quite nice. I also like how the first few episodes take their time to slowly and, with great subtlety, develop their world.

Thematic Depth: FMA2003/03 is dark, grim and kind of realistic--more so compared to Brotherhood. While, both versions of the anime deal with some important and mature themes, FMA2003/03 takes it to the next level. The 2003/03 series focuses on the Law of Equivalent Exchange, and shows how putting blind trust in it is a terrible thing to do. The show also focuses on how obsession, a denial of reality, and the inability to move on can be a bad thing. Moreover, sometimes life just simply isn't fair, and we should accept it; however, always try to improve what we have. All in all, we have to understand the consequences of our actions. That life is uncertain, and sometimes we don't get everything, and even we pay a price for it. All of these themes mixed in with the meaningful dialogues and the dark tone, made me appreciate this anime. For example, in episode 48, when Roy and Ed talk for the last time, that’s the pivotal point that brings all these themes together.

A Good Start: The Show had a better start than Brotherhood, simply because 1). We have more time with Maes Hughes and Shou Tucker, and 2). The Liore arc. Despite BONES studio and it’s tendency to create anime too early *when the mangaka is barely halfway through their series), they made it work, and, with the material they had, the 2003/03 series was given enough time to bloom. The 2003/03 series was simply immersive and very emotional, especially during The Curtis Arc, as an example.

Soundtrack and The Art Direction: I feel like both are equally good. However, I will go on the record of saying that I don’t think “art style” is what makes a series, nor is it an important factor. It’s nothing more than glorified “eye candy” However, for the sake of argument (especially since the “art style” is the first thing that “03 Stans” mention) I’ll be adding it in here. Both the 2003/03 and Brotherhood series have some amazing and beautiful orchestral OSTs in their respective soundtracks; thus, it added to the immersion of their respective series. In FMA2003/03, the color palette is very unique, sometimes it feels dull but it just suits the dark tone of the series.

All in all, I am impressed by a lot of aspects of the 2003/03 anime series, but as much I love and respect it, there are lot of things this anime messed up and I will note that as well.

The antagonists were... Meh: While I really love and enjoy the direction and depth BONES Studio added to the Homunculi... some of the other antagonists could have been better (or just not added at all imo). For example, Frank Archer... he has no reason being there except for convenient plot device to the point it feels forced. Though, him becoming that weird cyborg always makes me laugh just because of how dumb of a character he became because of it. Speaking of which, him becoming a cyborg was just... weird. It was like the Studio staff were trying to make him “cool” by making him into some crossover of The Terminator and Two-Face from Batman, but it just failed. As for Zolf Kimblee... He is still sadistic and likes making things explode, much like his Brotherhood Counterpart. But... that was it. Other than that, he was just boring. Him and Archer were both just the staple 90s Kids Cartoon Villains; not much to them except “Muahahaha I’m evil”. Now Dante... I’d say that she’s a good villain to an extent. Her as a villain is very subjective within the fandom, depending on who you ask. While I believe that she could have been just as great a villain as Father, her character was rushed and her goals were a bit vague and unexplored. I like how, like with Father, she had ties Hohenheim; however, that backstory and those connections were introduced a little late. So, in the end, she just came across as more of the generic Vindictive Ex-Wife, and just a generic female villain. As for the Homunculi... I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I LOVED their portrayal in 2003/03. They were the “saving grace” of the entire team of the villains within the 2003/03 series. My favorite of the bunch were Lust and Greed--namely Lust, because of her ties with Scar. Envy came at a close second, but only seemed so because of a way to back up Dante as a villain, and the other Homunculi seemed a bit more underdeveloped as characters. 

The Plot's quality drops after episode 35- Okay don't get me wrong. The first 35 episodes for me were 100/100. After that? a 60/100. Why? Because everything after that point feels contrived and feels forced. It's as tho, they are trying to do everything they can, even if it doesn't weave in, to make the brother's life miserable. Archer doesn't die and pops up, with his automail? Alphonse is there to be turned into a bomb, and become a philosophers stone. Okay, but why does this feel so forced? Also, can we talk about Nazi Shit? Now, I feel the brothers being separated is the perfect ending to this anime thematically and I have nothing against it, but A Nazi gate? Why? It was so sudden and pointless. It was never foreshadowed. They just showed it to make it as tragic as possible, because they didn't know of any other way to twist the plot, without convenient and totally forced plot devices. Also, How can Dante make Gluttony Mindless? Why is Juliet Douglass's Secret so obvious, when it can be fatal if leaked? Plot- Holes, Also, why are the Homunculli named the way they are? It just doesn't make sense. Also, FMA's Plot has an air of mystery to it, but it doesn't execute properly. I don't hate the end, I just felt disappointed, because the buildup towards it was terrible.

Now, I give a bit of grace concerning how the plot sort of dropped off and felt rushed halfway through, as well as the characters being underdeveloped and rushed. After all, Studio Bones was making up the majority of the material and took it in their own direction. Some factors to all of these cons in FMA2003/03 could be because of the Studio’s lack of a budget to flesh the characters and plot out more. Or, they had created so much additional material for this series that it became overwhelming.

As a writer, I can attest to the fact that “Character Overload” or “Element Overload” can either make or break a series, depending on how you handle it. That being said, there need to be a balance when it comes to these factors.

However, FMA2003/03 ended around 2004-05, So what we got is what we have.

Now, with that out of the way, let’s get on to the analysis of FMA: Brotherhood:

Characters: There isn’t a single character in this version of the series that I can choose as a “favorite”. Because, honestly? I lile them all. They’re all well developed and lovable in their own way, and have their own demension of depth to them. No, they’re not as deep as they aare in FMA2003/03, but from a writer’s perspective, that helps keep a balance with the overall plot of the stories. Now, some minor characters were just outrageous, but not to the level of boring (like 03!Kimblee and Archer), for example...  Darius and Heinkel. There isn’t a vast difference in Brotherhood’s and 2003/03's cast of characters. However, if I had to note a difference, FMA2003/03′s characters were are more on the edge of realistic and Brotherhood’s were just... Loveable. However, that doesn’t mean that one counterpart of a character is better/worse than another. Both are quite memorable in their own way. Of course, in my opinion Brotherhood's villains are just better than 03's villains. Sure, the Homunculi aren’t given as much depth, but, they have redeeming qualities near the end of their time (i.e. Envy, and GreedLing). When Father was first introduced... his character made me think of how Dante started out, and I was worried that his character would end up just as rushed and he would just be the generic cliche Shounen villain. By the Promised Day Arc, however, I was surprised. Yeah, Father was still very shounen-y villain, but still a pretty darn good villain. I feel his backstory, and how he discarded all his human qualities which led to the creation of Homunculi was well put together, and I felt the concept how he created Alchemy in Amestris, while Hohenhime helped build Alkahestry in the east was well put together, and helped build the world of FMA (literally). To put it simply, his character was much more interesting than Dante, because it was fleshed out more. The Homunculi were awesome as well, Lust did her job, Pride and Wrath were simply awesome, GreeLing's development from an anti-villain to anti-hero was exceptionally well written and not the cliche anti-hero, which I can appreciate. Envy is the character you love to hate. And Gluttony and Sloth did their Part as Well. While I enjoyed 03′s portrayal of the homunculi, I felt like they only fleshed out some for that series (i.e. Lust) while others were just left to fall flat. With Brotherhood, all the Homunculi were evenly balanced out in their characters, not too much depth and not too little. Solf Kimblee was still the sadistic baster, but at least his entire personality was more explored this time, and I liked how they portrayed his psyche as an added affect to why he has his views.

Plot: Bortherhood’s plot was more fluid and weaved in seamlessly. As a lover of all things continuity... Brotherhood did it right, and every time I find an analysis of a teeny tiny subtle continuity detail (i.e. Ed’s gash on his forehead that lasts a few episodes), I get a writer-gasm! Sure, there were few plot devices and filler here and there. But the plot in gneeral wasn’t rushed or choppy, nor did it leave any holes in it. The way Brotherhood portrays it’s plot is to keep you as engaged as possible, adding some silly comic relief here and there to balance out the dramatic intensity every so often. Unlike 2003/03 where is was just one depressing and dark element after another, Brotherhood added in the comic relief points not and again to give it’s audience a break. And, that’s what I really appreciate, and think is a great story writing technique. All in all the Brotherhood series is literal binge-watch material

A Great Shounen: Many Shounen anime have their Arcs for the purpose of portraying the progress of a character, and keep introducing new villains; however, depsite this, there is rarely a sense of mystery, intrigue or a moving plot in a Battle Shounen Anime. What Brotherhood did was just that, except make it more digestible (and not super long like Naruto or One Piece), and added a great thematic exploration. For a shounen it was quite deep, the plot structure was more like seinen, and characters were awesome. In a way, we got everything we could in a Shounen anime that only lasted a little over 50 episodes: Depth, plot, characters in a shounen.

Thematic Exploration: Both FMA 2003/03′s and Brotherhood’s themes are the same, but Brotherhood makes it a bit more lighter. All the while, it also manages to raise questions on additional themes: revenge, truth, knowledge, sacrifice, worth of a human life, and many other things.

Soundtrack and Animation: Same as the analysis in the part of FMA 2003/03, and, once again... I will restate that I personally don’t believe that art style is what’s important to a series. It’s nothing more than glorified “eye candy”. However, for the sake of this analysis, I will be adding it in here. While Brotherhood’s art style and animation is more simplistic, it’s much easier to create those dynamic poses and expressions on an animation level. While FMA2003/03 did have it’s dynamic moments, it was mostly only during battle scenes or the really heavy moments in the series. Brotherhood maintains it’s art style through the series and keeps it a balance, so that some scenes aren’t too much animation but also not too little. And, both FMA2003/03′s and Brotherhood’s OST Soundtracks are beautiful orchestral pieces that really add additional effect to a scene that the respective series are trying to portray.

A sense of conclusion: A lot of Shounen Anime get prematurely cancelled, most Seinen end in a bittersweet manner. That’s why FMA2003/03′s ending with the fate of the Elric Bros was a bit more preferable for those who like a more realistic ending. But, I enjoy a story with a more conclusive ending that wraps all the plot points up together without leaving too many holes. Yeah, the “happy ending” of Brotherhood is cliche, but “happy endings” wouldn’t be “happy endings” if they weren’t. Not to mention, those types of endings are rare, because people really don’t want to write them, and, when they do, they’re rarely done well. Ed’s entire charcter arc wrapping up to where he swallows his pride as an Alchemist and gives up his Alchemy to bring his brother back is both wholesome and satisfying, because, through the show, it shows his progression and growth from beginning to end. And, having an arrogant character obsessed with Alchemy give it up and learn to humble himself because of it.. it’s really uplifting.

Now let's talk about the Cons within the Brotherhood series, they aren't a lot, but still, they did affect my experience quite a lot.

Overuse of Comic Relief: While the use is a nice balance to the already dark and dismal atmosphere of the series, it felt a bit overused. So much so that some emotional moments were inconvenienced by the use of that kind of humor. It was a bit much and created dissonance with the tone the scene was trying to portray. Now, it worked more in the Manga, because of the more visual gag of it, but, sometimes the visuals within the manga don’t translate as well to an animated one.

A Rushed First Half: While FMA 2003/03 began “In Media Res” with it’s first episode and then started a “flashback episodic arc” with the next handful of episodes.. Brotherhood just jumped right into it. While, yes, it was a better balance to not have the characters’ depth right at the beginning (slowly revealing it as the show goes on), the first half of Brotherhood was 0-100 through just the first few episodes. To the point it feels like the audience has to catch it’s bearings. But, once you get on the same page, it’s enjoyable from there.

So what’s the Point of this Ted Talk-esq FMA Post?

I’m sick and tired of seeing 03 Stans  and MangaHood Stans fighting each other over just the smallest detail, especially when 03 Stans decided to bring leftist politics into it for no reason.

Personally, I just appreciate the fact that both series exist, ever since I've got in the franchise, it has become a part of my life, and still to this day is part of my life. Sure, I’m forever going to be part of this fandom.. but, I still see the beauty that peeks through the ruins and ashes of destruction now and then. I appreciate both series. Sure, I do prefer Brotherhood more, and get called a “Nazi” just because of it (ironic considering FMA: CoS was the movie sequel to 03... -__- ) , but 03 was excellent as well in it’s own way. It was very involving while FMAB was engaging. Both shows are something which you can learn something from and get attached to.

All in all, comparing both shows is okay, that's what I did here, but having a debate over which one is better isn’t just inherently bad... it’s TOXIC. Both series have their pros and cons, and they’re starkly different from each other. They’re two sides of the same coin. But, most importantly they are extremely important and impactful, so Pls don't have death battles over which one is better, don't say bad things about any fanbase, be respectful, and most importantly watch both and try to appreciate them. Because trust me liking both is a pretty darn good feeling.

[him-e]

This trilogy was really developed as a list of concepts that sound cool on paper but had absolutely no narrative follow through. “What if instead of the father being on the Dark side, it was the son who was on the Dark side this time??” “What if Stormtroopers we’re brainwashed and one of them could break free??” “What if there was a desert-dwelling orphan with mysterious origins who was strong in the Force??” And then two directors, one deeply inferior as an artist, played tug-of-war over them

They did the same fuckery with Finn when he was apparently always conceptualised and planned as a straightforward heroic character that occupied a Han-ish Resistance fighter/comedic BFF role, as in that blonde guy “Sam” from the concept art, but they gave him a Stormtrooper backstory at the last minute and proceeded to have this impact his actual trilogy arc and personality in no way whatsoever. They didn’t consider how this decision would impact his story and how they should follow through

Two different (I assume) anons hitting the nail on the head. They put several interesting concepts together, then bailed out and refused to fully commit to them, while also trying to make up for their cowardice by adding a shitton of generically action-y unnecessary stuff. 

Finn being an ex stormtrooper? Quickly dealt with in the first ten minutes of the trilogy and never fully explored ever again. A (romantic) mystical bond between a darksider and a lightsider? Let’s make sure to never address how unique and potentially groundbreaking it is, what role the Force had in creating it, what it can create if fully realized, and for the love of God let’s never acknowledge it as the central plot of the trilogy. The First Order? Rose from the Empire’s ashes and represents the failure of the New Republic but let’s not actually explore that in movie canon, lol space nazis amirite. Ben’s backstory? Keep it vague, especially with regards to Ben’s actual personal motivations and political views, so he can be Schroedinger’s villain: evil enough to be Vader 2.0 and be the token bad guy of this trilogy and then die in the end, but good enough to be redeemed (ah, and let’s absolve him from every crime by revealing he never murdered a single innocent soul in comic canon but make it so the general audience never knows about it). Luke had an interesting old hero arc about failure, depression, guilt, healing and rebirth in TLJ? Screw that, and make him a generic benevolent force ghost in TROS. Rey’s darkness? Talk about it a lot but never actually show it, and ascribe it to Palpatine’s bad blood anyway, so you don’t have to deal with actually exploring her personality. Luke talks about how the Jedi failed in TLJ in front of a mosaic depicting the perfect balance between light and darkness? Not worth developing at all. Just forget it and make the final movie another good vs evil fight in which the good triumphs, the evil is destroyed but not actually resolved, and the tormented antivillain dies to save the hero.

[jorrmungandr]

Aesthetics and Evil

So, I’ve been thinking about something lately. It’s a bit hard to explain, having to do with a lot of sort of vague concepts that I am not particularly educated on. But I will endeavor to be as clear as possible.

This has to do with how evil is presented in fiction, and in media in general. Bad guys, acts of cruelty and violence, and those who perpetrate it. The power of aesthetics to shape the way that people view the world around them. The morality of using the finely honed skills of modern artists to push an ideological agenda, and what effect that can have even, and especially, when it’s unintentional.

I think that fiction warps the way people perceive the world, and makes them reach for easy, aesthetically-oriented answers instead of actually engaging with ideas. This isn’t to say that people are lazy, but the world is complicated and loud, and they’re going to take shortcuts whenever possible. It’s only human.

But that’s a bit heavy and dense. Let’s start with something simple: The Picture of Dorian Gray.

In this famous novel by Oscar Wilde, a young dandy has his portrait painted by a friend. He becomes obsessed with the idea of not growing old, but more importantly not having his appearance blemished by any sins he may commit in his life. And lo, a miracle happens and it comes true, the painting suffers the effects of his misdeeds, and ages in his stead.

In modern interpretations, it is often simplified into the painting aging while he remains young. But it is a big point in the original that for every horrible thing Dorian does, the painting is altered in some way. The idea being that the evil in his heart is externalized more and more as he indulges in it.

When I saw a stage version of this story at the Book-It theater last year, this really stuck out to me, because that’s not actually how it works, in real life. You can’t see a “curl of cruelty” on someone’s lip. Immorality is not necessarily externalized, and even in the modern media climate we have to learn this lesson over and over again. Bill Cosby didn’t get uglier every time he assaulted an unconscious victim. Louis CK didn’t have a shine of cruelty in his eyes even as he continued to victimize women. Evil thoughts and actions do not have an effect on appearance, actually.

Who do we have to keep learning this lesson? What is the cause of this cultural amnesia? We expect evil people to announce themselves through their aesthetics as well as their actions, because that’s the way it works in basically all fiction, everywhere.

Stories are crafted, by human hands and minds. They don’t spring fully-formed from the aether, people think about what they’re making, and the put a lot of work into it. There are all sorts of techniques of various sorts used to imply things subtly, to clue the audience in without saying it outright. The use of colors, shapes, tones, staging, camera direction, all sorts of different things, combine into what I refer to under the broad umbrella of “aesthetics”. This is what I mean when I say that “evil” is usually accompanied by appropriate aesthetics.

So, when you spend your whole life seeing this presented to you in media, that evil always warps the world around it to be presented a certain way, why, it’s only natural that you actually think that way. When you’re taught something, so universally if subtly, it can only affect the way you think!

This isn’t to say that this is universal, or absolute. I absolutely do not mean to say such a thing. It varies from person to person, and even then there’s the matter of taste, which is in fact the most dangerous and troublesome thing of all.

You see, the intentions of artists don’t really amount to a hill of beans when it comes to interpretation by the audience. When I was a kid, watchin’ cartoons and movies, I often sympathized with the villains because they were more interesting, visually and conceptually.

Let’s use a concrete example: I love the aesthetic of the Republic of Zeon in the Universal Century series of Gundam media. They’ve got the cooler-looking giant robots. They have cool uniforms. I like the idea of a group of space colonies declaring and fighting for their independence from Earth.

Also, Zeon is fascistic and unimaginably monstrous, according to the fiction of the series. But that almost all plays out off-screen. In the lead-up to the original Mobile Suit Gundam, one third of humanity is killed in a variety of atrocities committed by Zeon. Their leaders are horrible, power-grubbing monsters who fall to infighting, but they’re characters and they’re interesting. So, despite all that, I still like them.

Now, I happen to be aware of all this extra backstory, but there are an awful lot of fans of Zeon among the fans of Gundam, who are in it purely for the aesthetics of the robots and whatnot. There’s a lot of Zeon merchandise. There’s a lot of sympathy for these horrible fascists, who keep coming back and losing over and over again.

This kind of appreciation can start out as ironic, and morph into something more sincere with repetition and time. Or with the intervention of just the right kind of charismatic individuals. The appreciation for this kind of aesthetic is easy to co-opt, especially since it’s based on fascistic regimes in the first place!

The problem is that people will engage more with aesthetics than ideas, because media presents aesthetics as a shortcut to ideas. But it’s all open to interpretation, and people aren’t always going to take everything seriously.

This all goes back to an idea I’ve had rattling around in my head for ages, and I’m not sure exactly where it came from. A lot of different places, I suppose. But it’s this: it’s impossible for evil people to create good art. Anything they make is ugly. All art produced by Nazi Germany, for example, is actually ugly, because it’s promoting fascism and genocide and whatnot.

But that’s just not true. That’s sticking your head in the sand, and saying that the sky is green. It’s putting ideas ahead of aesthetics, which is all well and good when you’re talking hypothetically and engaging only with ideas, but in reality it falls completely flat.

Look, I’m not comin’ out here going to bat for fascists and murderers and rapists, saying you should give their art a chance. What I’m saying is aesthetics have no inherent ideology. Using aesthetics is just a skill, like any other. You wouldn’t say that a plumber must be bad at his job because he’s a racist. The evil of great art and artists isn’t something that’s just for you, personally, to confront, but to consider in a wider, societal context.

You can say that fascism is inherently ugly ‘til the cows come home, but I will still look at the fight between Norris Packard and the 08th MS Team and think he looks super fucking cool. If you teach people to rely on aesthetics for hints towards ideology, they will do it.

All I’m saying is... be aware of it.

[agentem]

Captain Marvel spoiler review

Ok. I give up on figuring out the spoiler cut on mobile. If you haven’t seen, please skip this!

Spoilers!

You have probably seen that I have been pretty defensive about Captain Marvel on tumblr. That is because I think she should get the same chance as a male MCU hero, not because i think she is perfect or anything.

One thing I was actively worried about with this film was the origin story. Carol’s origin is weird and complicated. There was an alien named Mar-Vell and he had powers and fought this bad guy. There was a machine called a psyche-magnetron that exploded and gave her powers. At least that is how it goes in the comics. But it is SO dated for her to literally get her powers from a man, especially if Marvel wants her to be their standout female character.

And it’s not easily summed up. To further complicate things, she is of two worlds. She is from Earth but had Kree DNA.

Watching the film, I thought about Thor. The first Thor movie also had two worlds and I liked the parts on Earth best, but the Asgardian world had a distinct look to it. I think Boden/Fleck were a bit hamstrung by the fact that the Kree were somewhat established in Guardians of the Galaxy. You see Hala and think “alien planet” but not like “wow, that is beautiful and different” if that makes sense.

It’s always interesting to see these films with my sister, because she doesn’t read comics or get all obsessed on tumblr like I do. When we got home she was looking at how the MCU films were ranked (not on RottenTomatoes but another similar site) and she was like, “this is wrong. It was better than some of these.”

We agreed immediately that it wasn’t as good as Black Panther. And I think it would be tough to be the first origin story to follow that one, because usually they are a bit wobbly and crammed with backstory. Certainly think it’s on par with other origin stories, like the aforementioned Thor.

I was also worried about Maria and Monica. For those that don’t know, Monica Rambeau is a superhero who was also Captain Marvel and she was before Carol was. She has since changed her name to Spectrum (and Photon, which was Maria’s Air Force call signal) which is confusing.

I wanted Monica in the movie—it felt right since she was Captain Marvel too—but I did not want her to feel like a sidekick, because Carol and Monica don’t have that relationship. I was iffy on “Maria” who is really just a name in the comics, and then Lashana Lynch came into the project late after the first actress dropped out and I was like, “oh no, what happened?” Is the script changing? What is this part?

But I liked Maria a lot. She does feel like “the black friend,” which we have already seen from Iron Man and Captain America: Winter Soldier. But Sam and Rhodey are faves of mine so I am not mad at it exactly. I just want more for characters of color. I was very glad that we got to see Monica do some flying and even take out a Kree of her own (though I was sad about which one it was) because she could have been in Carol’s place that day. Then she would have the crazy powers. Carol just got there first. I thought Lynch did a really good job and is someone to watch.

Plus, I feel there is a bud of hope that young Monica is a future star, not a supporting player. Though I am still worried she comes off a bit more like Kamala Khan than Monica Rambeau (again, neither of these characters are bad they are just different). But Kamala is a star too. Perhaps in the intervening years, Monica will grow into someone more like the character we know. Hopefully. (She would be in her mid-30s during the events of Infinity War.)

I continue to think they were smart to bring Sam Jackson back. You know I have missed him. I talk about it all the time. But here what is so evident is how he grounds a film so well. Like think about all the crazy shit Nick Fury has to make seem real. It’s astounding. I don’t necessarily think that Phil Coulson needed to be there. (In the theater, people cheered when he came on screen and the little boy next to me said, “who is that?” Which reminded me that The Avengers was actually a long time ago and that we are old.)

I read a review that said they wished Carol could retroactively show up in Avengers and, indeed, that does seem to be what the film builds toward. So seeing Carol pop up in the mid-credit sequence was the biggest cheer moment in the film, which maybe doesn’t speak that well of the actual film? I am not sure where I am going with this thought. Except to say it succeeds in that it convinces us there was a hole in the Avengers team this entire time and we didn’t know about it. Which is both cool and a bummer.

As for the cast, they did trick me with Annette Bening. I thought she would be Helen Cobb, Carol’s mentor from the Kelly Sue DeConnick (cameo in the train station! I saw her red hair!) run. Bening just looks like her. And I didn’t see the twist that she was Mar-Vell coming. Though perhaps it was obvious to some.

My sister said she thought Bening was miscast. And that got me wondering if they intentionally cast someone who looked like Helen. Sister said she wished Glenn Close had gotten this role instead of the throwaway in Guardians of the Galaxy. I am always in favor of more Glenn Close and do hope she might be in a “Nova” film because she was sorely wasted.

I think Jude Law is kind of perfect for the possible leading man but is really a dick turn. You almost believe him when he says, “I’m so proud of you.” Between this and Spy, I am starting to wonder if I missed the boat on Jude Law.

My real fave of the Kree was Min-Erva (Gemma Chan) and I really thought she would come back and be the main villain of the sequel so I was kind of devastated when she died. I loved how blunt she was with “I just didn’t like you.” I would love to see a head-to-head with her. Just two very different women.

Everyone loved Goose. I am still sad they didn’t call her Chewie. The biggest cliffhanger is WHAT HAPPENED TO GOOSE. Did she did? Do Flerken age like cats do? Has she just been in Nick Fury’s office all this time? No, she can’t be. She wasn’t in Winter Soldier.

Maybe she bailed after coughing up the Tesseract (which I did not know was going to be in this film at all. I thought Howard Stark found it and that was how it got to SHIELD. I think that makes Howard even lamer?) and she went to find Monica? I would love it if Carol comes back and Monica is like “bitch, where have you been? Your cat peed on my laundry.” (And somehow led Monica on adventures that gave her her own superpowers? A girl can dream.)

We need to cast someone awesome as adult Monica. I have been looking through IMDb. It’s a sickness. I like Spectrum. I like all lady heroes. We still need MORE.

Do you hear me, dumb fanboys? We were not done with female superheroes after Wonder Woman. We were not done after Jessica Jones. We are not done after Captain Marvel. And guess what, we will not be done after Black Widow either, so stop acting like babies and just get the fuck out of the way.

Because if you try to pull the shit that you pulled about this movie with Monica or Kamala or Storm? We will have to kill you. Full stop.

FINAL THOUGHT: Goose can hold the Tesseract. Red Skull died holding the Tesseract. Red Skull founded Hydra. Hydra was part of the Nazi Party. Goose is stronger than Nazis.

This is science.

[captainmazzic]

So every now and again I get a message in my inbox asking about what I thought about such-and-such a thing in new canon, or if I’m intending on writing any meta or analysis on a particular subject in Star Wars. And sometimes I keep those messages sitting in my inbox for months (one has been sitting there for a little over a year), because I think, maybe I will feel comfortable doing in-depth meta again and I’ll wish I’d remembered what this message had asked. But as time goes by I don’t think that’s going to happen.

Okay. Real talk for a minute here. Bear with me as I’m long-winded and I don’t really have a concise way of communicating this. Potential political views and personal opinions on certain points in cinematic history below.

Short backstory first. I’m an older Star Wars fan. I was a tiny child when the last of the original trilogy came out, and both my parents are sci-fi nerds so I was practically raised on Star Wars. They are also tabletop RPG nerds so I was also raised on D&D and the like. So naturally when Star Wars tabletop RPGs were floating around I snapped them up and consumed them like candy. The novels were a natural extension of the RPGs, and I consumed those just as enthusiastically. The Expanded Universe was my bread and butter, and to this day I’m very nostalgic and fond of it even if most of it is quite laughably terrible.

Where am I going with this? Everything is a product of their time. The original trilogy was created when George Lucas was a young liberal-minded fresh-faced director looking to change the world and make his mark. This was the 70s, war was awful, the government was evil, hippies and protests were everywhere, and the only thing that seemed to have any hope of changing the world were small bands of spunky misfits with a mission and a message. And that mentality is one that shows, in the original Star Wars films. Lucas designed the Empire as a representation of the United States circa the Vietnam War, just dressed up in the fashion and ceremony of Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. (Sources: Chris Taylor, How Star Wars Conquered the Universe, Pp. 87-88; Michael Ondaatje, The Conversations: Walter Murch and the Art of Editing Film, p.70) The message of the original trilogy boiled down to “the ability of a small group of people to defeat a gigantic power simply by the force of their convictions… no matter how small you are, you can defeat the overwhelmingly big power.” (quote: Walter Murch). He really struggled to get Star Wars onto the big screen, with a lot of setbacks and rejections, and many times when he thought it would never happen. But it did, and it was wildly successful. And I think in part it was because that message really spoke to people, and it didn’t hurt that it was wrapped up in a package with cool laser swords and explosions and space battles.

But then the 80s happened. And the 90s happened. And through that, what happened to Lucas is what happens to many people as they gain success, wealth, and fame as they grow older. The system started to work for him instead of against him. Suddenly the Powers That Be weren’t trying to suppress his ideas from getting to an audience; suddenly all those organizations that seemed so hell-bent on keeping him out were now enabling him to get and stay in, to conserve and gain influence; suddenly his opinion counted for so much it almost seemed god-like, especially in this galaxy far, far away that was unflowering under his direction and all-seeing eye. I guess the system isn’t so bad after all, eh?

And thus we have the Prequels. They can be a rollicking good time, but their message is muddled. Before them the books and the RPGs seemed to try as best they could to hold on to that earlier message of underdog vs. the powers-that-be (with the RPGs succeeding more often, imho), but they couldn’t continue in the face of their Ultimate Creator coming back in to make more SW movies. With the Prequels, suddenly the Old Republic is portrayed as noble and struggling instead of corrupt and dying, with a lot of hand-waving and “something something well actually” in regards to the role of the Jedi, the nature of the Senate, etc. There’s mixed messages where sometimes we get the old Star Wars back, with energetic groups of activists and freedom fighters trying to bring down the oppressors, but there’s also a lot of storytelling awkwardness where the audience is implored to trust the authorities and rely on the judgment of those with power over you within the same breath. This trend continues throughout the Clone Wars animation, and it is there that it becomes often so cognitively dissonant one wonders how you don’t get whiplash trying to follow whatever garbled message they think they’re communicating. And I think that’s where the Star Wars franchise really began to become a monster in its own right. Big businesses are hulking entities unto themselves, functioning like capitalist plutocracies within their host nations, and the Star Wars franchise is no exception. Whatever garbled message Lucas tried to send out with the Prequels grew amplified and even more confused with the Clone Wars, spread into the video games and the books, and continued to infect Star Wars as the franchise was turned over to the quintessential mega-plutocratic-empire, The Walt Disney Company.

And here we have the Sequel movies, the New Canon, and all of the disasters that come with them.

Disney walks a fine line between well-meaning family-friendly sugar and spice, and ruthless all-consuming hypercontroller of everything from arts and entertainment to food and clothes and government lobbying. Their bottom line is the dollar and the influence on – and power over – people’s lives that the dollar brings with it. Handing them a story whose original message was about people resisting the very kind of mammoth force that Disney embodies, and hoping that they will try to stay true to said original message, is hopeless and foolish at best and utterly disastrous at worst.

With the Sequels and subsequent movies, Disney pays good overt lip service to the original trilogy with things like Rogue One and the Rebels animation, which on the surface certainly do look like the same sort of message as the original trilogy. But scratch just below that surface and Disney is all about communicating that submitting to the authority of, say, higher Rebel command and following their orders even when it goes against your gut feeling (ex. Ezra Bridger in the Rebels animation), or that rebelling against an unjust government is only valid if it is done according to a strict but nebulous set of arbitrary rules and only if it is done in the service of a different unjust government that just happens to be slightly less evil than the one you’re trying to overthrow (ex. any iteration of the Old Republic ever, but I’m especially and particularly looking at you, Sequel-era Republic/Resistance and SWTOR Jedi/Republic).

And here is where I balk about ever doing meta on Star Wars again. I hate that this is the direction Star Wars is taking. I hate that New Canon feels like propaganda to me. I hate that I can’t enjoy any of this stuff if I take it for what it presents itself to be. I hate that the only way I truly can enjoy Star Wars now is by cherry-picking all of the tiny bits of window dressing that was pretty enough or interesting enough for me to want to look at it again, and very deliberately and consciously throwing out all the rest.

The experience of Star Wars that I create for myself is escapist and isolating, because it is so very tailor-made to what I can enjoy out of it now. When I go see a new Star Wars film or play a Star Wars game, I don’t actually see whatever story the franchise is trying to actually tell. I see bits and pieces that I can put together into something I can cope with better, something I can actually enjoy.

Examples include:

In Rebels, when the official franchise’s story killed off Maul. I cannot and will not acknowledge that, or function as though it happened. And I can’t really give my opinion on how not having Maul around will affect the future story, because I very literally do not care at all about any Star Wars where he is not in it.

In The Clone Wars, there are so many instances of Anakin Skywalker having agency and making decisions independent of the Jedi Council or without having their insipid code squarely in mind, where if he had made those decisions in a more realistic setting they would have turned out quite well, but what we get on screen is ominous background music and FoReShAdOwInG.

In The Last Jedi, I cannot fathom any reason why Yoda would be given the role that he was given, and find it a complete affront to Darth Vader/Anakin Skywalker, who had every motivation, every reason, every right to have that role instead. So I can’t see that scene without him in it. I just… I don’t see it. It didn’t happen that way, and I find I cannot discuss it as it’s presented on-screen. I have nothing to say.

In the Sequel media, both books and movies, Supreme Leader Snoke is portrayed as a one-dimensional Saturday morning cartoon villain whose intended role in the story is blurred as the story progresses, and his death is completely nonsensical in regards to the buildup of information that we as an audience have gleaned about him. We see pieces of evidence that he could have actually cared about Kylo Ren that go nowhere in the actual story, and he ends up just being a scapegoat that gets thrown away halfway through the second sequel movie. I choose to see more in his character than what we were given in Actual Canon™, and thus see him very differently than what common discourse would allow. Because of this, if I discuss Snoke in mixed company I know that I will be called out as someone who advocates for only the limited cardboard-character that is portrayed on screen, instead of for the internalized view that I have personally built for him.

I know everyone’s personal view of a character or characters is different, because we all have different points of view. But there is often some sort of vague common ground in their portrayal that the author or storyteller was originally going for, that most people usually pick up on and base their opinions around. But what if some of the key characteristics that make up a character are just… things you choose not to see or are incapable of seeing, and your own personal view of that character becomes almost entirely different from the “original”? Probably the most benign example I can think of is Hera Syndulla. If I take what I see of her in canon, she infuriates me with how she treats her crew. But if I just decide that such-and-such a conversation never happened, or her decisions on such-and-such a mission were different than the on-screen one, she essentially becomes an alternate-universe version of herself. Only that this version is one that I can tolerate, and it is the only version I see anymore.

How does one communicate that my entire experience of Star Wars is as an AU?

And on and on it goes. Discussing meta and Actual Canon Events™ as portrayed on screen and on printed page has become nothing but a migraine headache to me. I cannot engage in discourse, because I am very much not seeing what everyone else is seeing and talking about, nor do I care to. I just… I can’t keep talking about the same stupid things over and over again. I can’t keep screaming into the void about the unsustainability of the Sith or the Jedi, about the complete inequality and corruption that would have to be absolutely omnipresent in the Republic for it to even be remotely realistic even by cartoon standards, about the inevitability of the Republic turning into an Empire, about the weird dissonance given to the concept of the Force that would end up making both the Jedi and the Sith’s case baseless and weak, etc. etc. ETC. It’s exhausting, it’s stressful, and for something that I’m here to try to enjoy, it’s not even remotely enjoyable.

The very core of the matter is that I love the Star Wars universe. I love the worlds, I love the aliens, I love the ships and the droids and the technology and the concept of the Force. I love the characters. I love all of these things, and sometimes I even love the plots and stories (thank you Chuck Wendig and Timothy Zahn). But I just can’t enjoy digging into the meta of it anymore.

So if you like what I post of my own personal Star Wars-brand AU, by all means dig right in. But I don’t think I can do anymore general meta or discourse. I’m sticking with fanart and fanfic.

[aion-rsa]

Peacemaker: The White Dragon Has a Deep Suicide Squad Connection

https://ift.tt/t4nY2pl

This article contains Peacemaker spoilers.

Auggie Smith’s menacing racism somehow gets taken to the next level pays off in Peacemaker episode 7, as Chris’s terrible dad re-dons his White Dragon costume and gets to work. But…the White Dragon of Peacemaker is fairly different from the White Dragon in the comics. And for that matter, so is Peacemaker’s father. What are we talking about? Let’s break it down.

NAZIS. I HATE THESE GUYS.

In the comics, Christopher Smith was born in Austria to an American mother, Elizabeth Lewis, and a respectable German expat businessman father, Wolfgang Schmidt. Except he wasn’t respectable at all. He was Nazi garbage, the former head of a Polish concentration camp who fled when Germany’s loss became clear. And when that information was about to become public, Schmidt took his own life rather than face punishment for his crimes. Of course, being the piece of trash that he was, Schmidt killed himself in front of his five year old son. In his SS uniform.

This caused predictable psychological problems in Christopher, turning him into a vigilante supersoldier dedicated to peace through any means, including killing a whole bunch of people.

WILLIAM HELL 

White Dragon, on the other hand, has a long history with the Suicide Squad. Maybe longer than Peacemaker’s. While Smith didn’t become an official member of the Squad until DC’s current, Infinite Frontier era, as a member of the late ‘80s DC clandestine universe, Peacemaker and Task Force X had plenty of run-ins. Problem is, White Dragon was one of the first villains introduced in John Ostrander, Kim Yale, and Luke McDonnell’s definitive run, first appearing in Suicide Squad #4 in 1987. 

William Heller posed as street-level vigilante…uh…William Hell (he’s not particularly creative). Despite his costume making him look like a white supremacist Shining Knight, Hell would bust up crimes in Central City and hold the criminals until the grateful police would arrive and finish off the arrest. Only he wasn’t holding all of the criminals – just the Black and Latino ones. The white criminals he caught, he would send to the headquarters of the local Aryan Empire group. It should be noted that the cops were mostly cool with this arrangement – when the criminals the police were arresting tried to point out that there were other people in on the robbery with them, they were summarily ignored. Heller was an awful person, and he was exposed and brought down by the Squad. Later, he would return with a new identity and a new costume. The White Dragon first came back trying to kill the descendants of the Justice Society before himself being forced into the Suicide Squad. And like any good Suicide Squad member, he got blown up trying to rebel against Waller. 

In any case, as far as we know, he didn’t have any kids…and certainly none of them were Peacemaker. But White Dragon’s inclusion here is another way that Peacemaker showrunner James Gunn has found to honor that classic run DC’s Suicide Squad comics.

AUGGIE SMITH

The DCEU’s Peacemaker seems to be drawing a little from both sources for his backstory. Auggie Smith has a lot of William Heller in him – but between the shockingly comics-accurate costume and  the very American white supremacy, Auggie has a lot of William Hell in him.

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

But there’s a hint of tragedy in the way Schmidt’s death in front of his son traumatized the boy that the show seems to have grafted onto Peacemaker’s dead brother, adding a layer of pathos that doesn’t really exist in the comics character.

Don’t get me wrong: comics Peacemaker is still a monumental disaster of a person, and it’s very messed up that a five year old kid would have to experience that at all, even if his father deserved it. But shifting that burden even more firmly onto Christopher and making the person who died not objectively deserve it makes the already heartily cylindrical John Cena even more three dimensional.

DISTURBING THE PEACE

There’s one other dad Peacemaker had in the comics who we should probably touch on. Comics legend Garth Ennis took a stab, with Garry Brown and Lee Loughridge, at giving Chris a fleshed out origin story. If you’ve ever read an Ennis superhero book (besides Hitman), you can probably guess how deeply screwed up Peacemaker: Disturbing the Peace is. 

The book takes us from his parents’ murder-suicide, where a 10 year old Chris walks in on his folks hung and in an oven, with his siblings in the washing machine and the microwave; through his sort of kidnapping at the hands of Slinky and Skooter, the Bonnie-and-Clyde-on-oxy who kill his foster parents in a bank robbery and then become Smith’s first victims when he sics the cops on them; and then into his tenure in American Special Forces, where he takes it on himself to root out all the crooked colleagues who have the misfortune of serving with him.

Smith’s multiple father figures didn’t really factor into the dad on the show, though, as they’re more loose sketches than characters. The first one we find out about (who is later referred to as his stepfather but might just be an editing error) was apparently a disaster – constantly unfaithful, terrible with money, all of the broadly drawn bad Dad stereotypes you’d expect from an Ennis book. The second one was killed off panel by the third: Skooter, a Natural Born Killers parody who has the interiority of a sheet of paper.

The post Peacemaker: The White Dragon Has a Deep Suicide Squad Connection appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Comics – Den of Geek https://ift.tt/hfCseTX

[themeatlife]

The List - the Meat Life Reviews the Avengers: Infinity Saga

It’s back!  the Meat Life’s The List returns to rank all of the MCU Infinity Saga movies from Iron Man all the way to Spider-Man: Far From Home.

With the home release of Avengers: Endgame, I thought it would be a great time to revisit the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Two summers ago, after I had watched Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 and about a month before I got to watch Spider-Man: Homecoming, I ranked the MCU movies.  You can find that ranking here.  Now that I have watched what Kevin Feige describes as the final installment in Marvel’s Infinity Saga, I go through the movies again and rank all 23 installments including the last two --- Avengers: Endgame and Spider-Man: Far From Home. For the ones I ranked in the first one, I have included their old ranking in parentheses. And since Tumblr now limits pictures in entries to ten, I will include pictures of the new reviews.

#23 (15) - The Incredible Hulk (2008)

This is the second film in the first phase of the MCU.  The movie is mostly forgotten in the MCU, including by me.  It wasn’t a bad movie (certainly a marked improvement from 2003′s Hulk), but it felt like something was missing from it.  Of course, there is only so much you can do with a character in its own movie.  We find Bruce Banner (played by Edward Norton in this movie) being chased by General Ross, the man who spearheaded the project to create super soldiers that created the Hulk. Ross will become an important figure 8 years later in Civil War. And of course at the end of the movie we have a Tony Stark-building a team cameo and this was the intro of OG Avenger Bruce Banner/Hulk. Was the worse MCU movie in my initial ranking, and it remains there.

#22 (14) - Iron Man 2 (2010)

The weakest of the Iron Man movies.  They replace Terrence Howard’s Rhodey with Don Cheadle, who in the long run has better chemistry with Robert Downey Jr, but in this movie is just weird to see instead of Howard.  The villains are also probably the weakest of the MCU, with Ivan Vanko looking to exact revenge against the Stark family and Justin Hammer as the head of rival weapons manufacturer looking to take down Tony Stark. Totally didn’t notice the Elon Musk cameo until about the fourth time I watched it, a big inspiration for the Tony Stark movie character. The biggest contribution to the MCU/Infinity Saga is the introduction of OG Avenger Black Widow.

#21 (10) - Thor: The Dark World (2013)

Loki is one of the better villains of the MCU, and in The Dark World he is on full display. Is he good? Is he bad? In this installment, Thor must work with Loki to defeat the Dark Elves who are going after Jane Foster because she has the Ether within her. The cliff-hanger style ending makes it almost unfulfilling. The plot isn’t really as important as the introduction of the Ether, later known as the Reality Stone and the movie’s use in Avengers: Endgame.

#20 (9) - Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)

Although Age of Ultron was seen as a step back from the first Avengers, it is still a very solid film especially after knowing the full picture of the Infinity Saga. This is very much a set up movie, though.  We see Tony Stark accidentally create Ultron out of feeling the need to further protect the world (and also created Vision to counter). We see Hawkeye with a family and a Romanov-Banner romance.  We see the introduction of the Maximov kids, with Quicksilver’s death toward the end and Scarlet Witch joining the Avengers. And whilst on the run we also see some of the seeds of tension between Stark and Rogers as well as the leveling of the Sokovia that are important later in Captain America: Civil War. I also didn’t notice that much when I first watched but they introduced Wakanda as the source of vibranium and the vibranium poacher Ulysses Klaue.

#19 (13) - Thor (2011)

I did enjoy the movie, although I will say that this is one of the weaker entries in the MCU.  As the heir to the throne of Asgard, the arrogant Thor loses his hammer and must prove his worthiness before getting it back.  He bumps into scientist Jane Foster played by Natalie Portman (yes!).  He humbles himself and eventually earns back his hammer and has to fight the forces of his brother Loki. We see the first appearance of Hawkeye who will become one of the OG Avengers.

#18 (11) - Doctor Strange (2016)

Arrogant doctor Stephen Strange travels to Nepal in search of a treatment for his hands that were devastated from a car accident.  He gets trained by the Ancient One to reveal powers in how to access different dimensions and wield mystical weapons.  He has to harness these powers to fight Kaecilius, who has stolen pages of an ancient handbook to access the Dark Dimension.  Some of the mystical stuff might not be for everyone and I only stuck with it because I like Benedict Cumberbatch and I’m glad I did. I’ve heard Doctor Strange described as Iron Man but with magic, and that’s not wrong.

#17 - Captain Marvel (2019)

We see Carol Danvers, who has lost her memory of her origin and has an unrealized power, think she’s Kree, a sort of police warrior race. She eventually goes against them when she figures out they exiled Krulls and lied to her about her human origin. Along the way she goes to Earth in the 1990’s and does sort of a buddy cop detective case with the SHIELD agent Nick Fury to figure out who she is. It was cool to see how Fury loses his eye and seeing the old Tesseract/Space Stone. While Captain Marvel is not a bad movie, in my opinion this would have been a much stronger movie if they leaned more into her backstory of being held down and knocked down a lot more. Unintentionally, but in my mind this will always be measured against Wonder Woman, about the only thing in the MCU era that DC did better than Marvel.

#16 (6) - Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017) 

I had this ranked higher in my initial ranking but I must say after a while I liked some of the other titles better than this one. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 picks up where the last left off, mixing the right amount of humor and action and pulling on just enough heartstrings for you to be pulled right in.  The Guardians have to face against someone they never expected: Peter Quill’s dad.  We see the introduction of Mantis and her addition to the Guardians.

#15 (8) - Ant-Man (2015)

Ant-Man grew on me.  Marvel may well have a formula now with the mix of humor and superhero action, but it’s a formula that works.  Here we follow unlikely hero Scott Lang played by Paul Rudd, a former engineer turned petty criminal, training to break into Pym Technologies using Hank Pym’s old shrinking suit to take down the corrupted Pym protege Darren Cross.  Rudd’s humor, chemistry with Evangeline Lilly’s Hope van Dyne, along with humorous sidekicks played by Michael Pena and T.I. are the glue to this movie.

#14 (7) - Iron Man 3 (2013)

I think most don’t give the final installment of the Iron Man trilogy much credit.  We are reminded of why we love the Tony Stark character.  In spite of his arrogance there is a tremendous heart, and we see both on full display here.  Set after the events of the first Avengers, Stark is going through PTSD.  He tries to navigate through that while being attacked by new threats. And it was good after the large scale of the first Avengers movie to get something more down to Earth.

#13 - Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018)

We pick up after the events of Captain America: Civil War, where Scott Lang is serving the back end of a two-year house arrest for breaking the Sokovia Accords. Hank Pym and Hope van Dyne are underground and developed a quantum accelerator in the hopes of getting Hank’s wife Janet van Dyne out of the quantum realm. Arms dealer Sonny Burch and unstable phasing Ghost are after the accelerator. After the heaviness of Avengers: Infinity War, it was nice to have a little relief on a smaller scale. And Paul Rudd doing Paul Rudd things is always pleasant.

#12 - Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)

Picking up after the events of Captain America: Civil War (and apparently “eight years” after the first Avengers movie), we see Peter Parker filling his time being the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man under the distant watchful eye of Happy Hogan and Tony Stark. That is, until he finds The Vulture’s henchmen Shocker one and two selling weapons infused with alien tech from the Invasion of New York. We get a great sequence where Peter learns the night of homecoming that his love interest Liz is actually the Vulture’s daughter and all the tension that follows. With all due respect to Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield, Tom Holland fits the Spider-Man/Peter Parker role the very best. And at the end, we get something that rarely happens with Marvel villains...the Vulture lives and goes to jail.

#11 (12) - Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)

This movie has aged very well over time. Steve Rogers, a scrawny kid from New York, wanted to serve his country in the middle of World War II.  He was selected for experimental super soldier program and became the face of the US military, spending time raising money for the USO.  Then he starts hunting down Nazi science division Hydra and its leader Red Skull.  It ends with Rogers downing a Hydra bomber and crashing it in ice, preserving him until modern time. It also heartbreakingly separates Rogers from love interest Peggy Carter, SSR Agent who helped him through his WWII missions and promised a dance. This pays off later.

#10 (5) -  Iron Man (2008)

The film that kick started the entire MCU.  Here we follow Tony Stark and the origin of Iron Man, birthed from Stark being captured by a mercenary terror group and called to action after seeing his company’s weapons in the wrong hands.  This was a role ready-made for Robert Downey Jr, a great mix of arrogance, empathy, and quick wit.  And there’s plenty of action. And with that first movie we get the first post-credit scene, a now trademark Marvel touch, introducing Nick Fury the Director of SHIELD recruiting Stark into a “bigger universe.”

#9 (4) - Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)

I’ll admit, when Marvel announced Guardians of the Galaxy, I had planned on skipping out.  I knew nothing of the comic and it looked cheesy.  So yes, I had my doubts about a group that included a talking raccoon and a fighting tree.  But I gave it a chance and Guardians ended up being one of the stronger movies of the MCU.  We see the origin of Peter Quill, a.k.a. Star-Lord and how the Guardians came together.  This has that right mix of humor, action, chemistry, and 80s mix tape. And we see the introduction of the Orb containing the Power Stone.

#8 - Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019)

Eight months following the events of Avengers: Endgame, we get to see some of the aftermath of the world after “The Blip,” including a hilarious school news tribute video of our fallen heroes set to Whitney Houston’s rendition of “I Will Always Love You.” We see Nick Fury commandeer Peter’s summer class trip to Europe to initially help Mysterio battle what looks to be Elementals from another dimension set to destroy Earth. Little do we know that it’s all an illusion that Mysterio and a crew of technicians in an effort to destroy Tony Stark’s legacy and become the biggest savior of the world. That’s about as in depth I’ll go since this movie is still in theaters so I won’t spoil the fun. But I will say that this is probably the best version of a Spider-Man movie with all the awkward teen moments, his heavy weight of responsibility of being in line to be the next Tony Stark, and the sweet interplay between Parker and Zendaya’s MJ as well as bestie Jacob Batalon’s Ned. The MCU is in good hands post-Infinity Saga with Spider-Man on board. And there is a great surprise in the end credit scene.

#7 - Thor: Ragnarok (2017)

This Thor. Marvel finally figured out how to use Thor and Chris Hemsworth’s comedic timing. Right from the opening monologue you get that this is a different movie from the other two Thor’s. After Odin’s death, Thor’s half-sister Hela takes over Asgard as Thor and Loki disappear to the planet Sakaar. Thor is imprisoned as a gladiator-style fighter where he bumps into his “friend from work” Hulk. They all link up with Valkyrie, a former Asgardian warrior to escape Sakaar and save the Asgardian people from destruction. We see great comedy and chemistry between all the main characters, Idris Elba’s Heimdall get a lot of screen time protecting and hiding the Asgardian people from Hela, and hilarious performances from Karl Urban’s Skurge and Jeff Goldblum’s Grandmaster. In the end credit scene we see Thanos’ ship coming in for the events directly preceding Avengers: Infinity War.

#6 (3) - The Avengers (2012)

Director Joss Whedon pulled off what people once thought impossible...a superhero team-up movie. We see Nick Fury pull together Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Hulk, Black Widow and later Hawkeye for the first time to figure out and stop Loki’s plan to use the Chitauri warriors to take over Earth. The Avengers definitely is an action movie with some dramatic elements but the thing that sticks out about this is even with New York City in peril, the ride is great!  The chemistry of the entire ensemble is on full display.  Before Thanos, Loki makes for probably the strongest villain in the series.  When this came out, it was hard to see Marvel top this. And we see a glimpse of Thanos for the first time in a post-credits scene.

#5 - Black Panther (2018)

Marvel never stops amazing world building, a vibrant look at the fictional nation of Wakanda included. Black Panther picks up after the events of Captain America: Civil War, but to open we get a flashback of Oakland, California in 1992 that will impact the entire plot that follows. We then see Prince T’Challa get crowned king upon his return to Wakanda, following the death of his father T’Chaka in Civil War. Mysterious American Killmonger works with vibranium poacher Ulysses Klaue at first seemingly to steal more vibranium. As the movie progresses it is revealed that Killmonger is actually Wakandan whose father was killed in the opening scene in Oakland and is after the throne. Upon several viewings, there are multiple layers as there are in Ryan Coogler directed movies. This movie is part James Bond (with T’Challa’s sister Shuri playing the Q role), part family drama, part political thriller, and of course part Marvel movie. Black Panther tries to tackle political issues like inclusion, globalization, and immigration while also addressing how a family’s mistakes from the past can haunt and impact a family’s future. Michael B Jordan’s Killmonger is a top three MCU villain and there are wonderful performances from Lupita Nyong’o’s Nakia, Danai Gurira’s Okoye, Martin Freeman’s Everett Ross, and Andy Serkis’ Klaue. The end credit scene shows a relaxed Bucky talking to Shuri about his recovery.

#4 (2) - Captain America: Civil War (2016)

In this installment, the Avengers find themselves under hot water after an accident on a mission.  The UN votes to approve the Sokovia Accords that limits the Avengers decision making, splitting the team between those who support it who stand with Iron Man and those who oppose it who stand with Captain America. During the signing, we see an attack that initially looked like it was done by the Winter Soldier but is really carried out by a former Sokovian special forces soldier who is seeking to destroy the Avengers for indirectly killing his family. Civil War has probably the coolest fight scene of the series at a German airport.  The newbies Black Panther and Spider-Man are a sight to see.  And there is a twist ending that’s really heart wrenching that splits our two main Avengers in Iron Man and Captain America. 

#3 - Avengers: Endgame (2019)

I reviewed this a few months ago, so I’ll provide the link to my review here. What I will discuss here is how great this movie is. I almost put this at number 1. The storytelling and the conclusion to many of the main characters is so satisfying as a fan. It just felt so good to watch. I may rank this higher if I ever revisit the Infinity Saga, but for now I think top three at the very least is very very good. And it is the most satisfying ending to a movie series since The Dark Knight Rises. But I placed the other two above it for the reasons I will outline.

#2 (1) - Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)

Wow. For so long this has been my favorite MCU movie and probably still is. We see Cap and Black Widow running from SHIELD, out to hunt down the Winter Soldier for the assassination of Nick Fury. Out of all the MCU, this movie had a modern real world feel with its questions about how to determine whether or not someone is a threat. It kind of revisits a concept dealt with in Minority Report, whether someone’s free will determines their criminality or their preconceived conditions. It had great action sequences. And it defined the direction of the MCU with its revelation that Hydra was secretly controlling SHIELD for all those years. In this installment in the MCU, we see the possibility of how these movies can be dealt. There can be genre movies within the comic book genre. This was the political spy thriller of the MCU, in the same vein as some of those political thrillers of the 1970s. And as it pertains to the bigger Infinity Saga story, we find out Steve Roger’s old buddy Bucky is the infamous assassin The Winter Soldier. And we get the introduction of Sam Wilson, the Falcon.

#1 - Avengers: Infinity War (2018)

I never got to review this when it initially came out. This is basically a Thanos movie disguised and named as an Avengers movie. The best MCU villains have the most fleshed out backstories, and in Infinity War we get Thanos’ background, how his world collapsed and how he came about his reasoning behind wanting to eliminate half of the universe’s inhabitants. You see his rational, and even though he goes about things the wrong way (I mean, he is a villain), you get to see his reasoning and motivation behind his quest. For this alone, I felt compelled to rank it number one just because of how different the approach was and how effective the execution turned out.

Then, inter-spliced with Thanos’ story is the present day struggle. The beginning of the movie we see the destroyed Asgardian ship with Thanos and his disciples taking out most of the leadership, but not before Heimdall uses the Bifrost to get Hulk back to Earth. We see Heimdall and Loki die and Thor left for dead before Thanos moves on with the Space Stone and already in possession of the Power Stone.

The story builds toward two separate teams. The space team with Iron Man, Spider-Man, Dr. Strange, Nebula, and the Guardians minus Rocket and Groot defend the Time Stone with the ultimate face off with Thanos on the collapsed planet Titan. Before that, Thanos had a skirmish with the Guardians on Knowhere before ultimately obtaining the Reality Stone from the Collector, kidnapping Gamora in the process. Thanos killed Gamora on the planet Vormir to obtain the Soul Stone. Before the fight on Titan, Dr. Strange looks into the future and sees 14 million possible outcomes and only one where they win. The Earth team with Captain America, Falcon, Black Widow, War Machine, Bruce Banner, Scarlett Witch, Vision, Black Panther, and the Wakandan military protect Vision while Shuri tries to unlink the Mind Stone to destroy without harming Vision while battling the Chitauri and some of Thanos’ disciples in Wakanda with Thor, Rocket, and Groot dropping in toward the end.

The space team almost grabs the gauntlet from Thanos but ultimately fail (partly due to Peter Quill’s temper after finding out Gamora was killed by Thanos). Thanos then descends to Earth into Wakanda and some of the Earth team, in particular Captain America holds him off long enough for Scarlett Witch to destroy the Mind Stone, killing her love Vision. But Thanos uses the Time Stone to turn Vision back long enough to restore the Mind Stone and obtain the last stone he was searching for. Right before he is able to snap his gauntlet fingers, Thor drops down with his new ax Stormbreaker, thrusting the ax into Thanos’ chest. But Thanos is still able to snap his fingers, dusting half the population of the universe including some of our heroes: in particular Black Panther, most of the Guardians, Dr. Strange, and, in probably the most emotional scene outside of Endgame, Spider-Man.

If you were a moviegoer in a previous era and didn’t know they were already shooting Spider-Man: Far From Home, the impact of The Snap would have resonated so much more. Even in this era, though, the ending of the film was sharp, jarring, and effective.

—————

That’s my list! I may revisit years down the line, and some of these movies may age better than others. But I feel pretty comfortable about where these movies ended up. Let me know what you think! And enjoy the home release of Avengers: Endgame!

[aion-rsa]

Superman & Lois Easter Eggs are a Love Letter to Every Era of DC History

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

This article contains Superman & Lois spoilers.

Superman & Lois Episode 11

If you just tuned in to Superman & Lois episode 11, “A Brief Reminiscence In-Between Cataclysmic Events” a few minutes in, and perhaps without having seen the previous episodes, you might be forgiven for thinking that this is in fact the pilot episode for a brand new show about the Man of Steel. While every other Arrowverse superhero began life with a fairly detailed origin story episode (or season!), by the time we first met Tyler Hoechlin as Superman and Bitsie Tulloch as Lois Lane, both characters were meant to be well established in their world and careers. The actual first episode of Superman & Lois reminded us that these two were so “seasoned” that they’re already the parents of twin teenagers!

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

So there are still plenty of questions to be asked about the backstories of our title characters, and “A Brief Reminiscence In-Between Cataclysmic Events” is a big step towards that. But it’s so much more than a “how did Lois and Clark meet/Clark’s first time in costume/Superman getting established in Metropolis” episode. It’s a genuine love letter to both of these characters, and one that successfully encompasses the entirety of their 83 year history.

Oh, and it manages to do all of that while ALSO still moving the main story of the season forward nicely. It’s an incredibly versatile episode, and a fine piece of storytelling in its own right, making the well-worn beats of the Superman origin story feel fresh and vital, without losing sight of everything else the season needs to do.

Young Clark Kent and the Fortress of Solitude

The opening of this episode, with young Clark trudging through the arctic, carrying the sunstone and trying to figure out both his and its purpose, is the first of many nods to Richard Donner’s 1978 superhero movie masterpiece, Superman. Clark is even wearing a similar red check flannel jacket to the one Jeff East wore in a similar scene.

Jor-El

The concept of Jor-El as an AI that runs the Fortress of Solitude (as well as the Fortress itself stemming from a Kryptonian artifact) also traces its roots back to Donner’s Superman film. That was the first time we got the notion that Clark had to learn about his powers and alien heritage from the collected memories of his biological father and his people, and it’s updated nicely here.

Man of Steel

Clark’s first flight in the arctic, with Jor-El’s words ringing in his ears, well…again, Donner’s Superman. But specifically the way it’s presented here with Clark’s powerful takeoff and unsteady first moments it feels a lot like a similar moment in Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel.

The Fleischer Superman Costume

While we did hear Superman say “my mom made it for me” in the first episode, here we get to see more of why that actually happened. Clark’s current suit definitely feels like something slightly alien, perhaps the Kryptonian ceremonial wear it was hinted as being in Donner’s Superman (the first place to use the “S” as a Kryptonian house crest), Man of Steel, and recent DC Comics. But for the majority of Superman’s comic book history, it has always been the case that Martha made Clark’s suit for him.

Superman & Lois splits the difference, though, with Martha having made Clark’s first costume…one that happens to look exactly like the first screen interpretation of Superman ever: the classic Max Fleischer animated Superman shorts which first arrived in 1941. If you haven’t seen these, please do so. They’re gorgeous. Spending more time with that suit in this episode is a real treat, and it’s a perfect illustration of why “less is more” with superhero costuming.

It even kind of explains why the “S” on the original suit wouldn’t be the perfect Kryptonian symbol that Clark and Supergirl wear in the present day: Clark probably helped her design it from memory, since the first time he would have seen his family crest was when the Jor-El hologram appeared to him in the Fortress!

Also, this may or may not have been intentional, but Martha telling Clark “go save the world” before his first adventure also happens in J.J. Abrams never-filmed Superman screenplay, which despite it’s reputation, when it gets stuff right, it really gets it right. I wrote about that in much more detail here.

First Day on the Job

The episode cheats ever so slightly by reusing footage from the pilot with Superman catching the green PT cruiser and chatting with the citizens of Metropolis. But it’s worth repeating that this is a gloriously realized homage to the cover of Superman’s first appearance in 1938’s Action Comics #1. But everyone knows that, right?

But here we go one further, with the revelation that this wasn’t a random flashback, it was truly Clark’s first act in costume as Superman! Again, a nice little tribute to Action #1.

It’s a Bird, It’s a Plane…

Superman changes back into Clark in a phone booth. I’m not sure at what point in Superman history that the “changing in a phone booth” became such an accepted bit of pop culture lore. It did happen in at least one of the aforementioned Fleischer Superman cartoons, and infrequently in the comics themselves, and almost NEVER in live action. In fact, Donner’s Superman even had a quick sight gag about this, when Christopher Reeve’s Clark is looking for a place to change for his first public act in costume, and gives one of those “modern” (for 1978) non-enclosed phone booths a bemused look.

A passerby notes to Clark that Metropolis’ new hero flew “like a bird or a plane.” This of course nods to the famed narration first popularized by The Adventures of Superman radio show (more on that in a minute) and the Fleischer cartoons: “It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s…Superman!”

The Daily Planet

We don’t spend a heckuva lot of time at The Daily Planet on this show, but when we do it tries to capture the manic, bustling energy that we saw in Donner’s Superman (wow, that keeps coming up a lot…and with good reason).

Also, how good is Paul Jarrett as Perry White?

Lois Lane

Lois showing Clark the ropes at The Daily Planet is something that goes all the way back to their earliest appearances. I will die on this hill: Lois is slightly older than Clark, and is also the more experienced and better reporter. Even with “all those powers” (the real ones know) she’s at least one step ahead of Clark in the reporter game.

This one might not be intentional, but the montage of Lois and Clark on the job together reminds me very slightly of a montage page from John Byrne and Dick Giordano’s Man of Steel #2, where Lois, trying to track down Superman during his early days in Metropolis, keeps showing up just after he has left.

Lois and Clark staying late on the job has echoes of both the pilot episode of 1993’s Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman and the “rooftop scene” from Donner’s Superman. It is the former in that it’s the first indication of a romantic attraction brewing between them (and significant because up until that point in history it was ALWAYS the case that Lois was attracted to Superman and not Clark). But there’s also a hint of the latter in their playful but wary flirtation.

But that’s subverted further with Lois’ exclusive interview with Superman. Just as in Donner’s film, Lois lands the first exclusive interview with the Man of Steel (there it was in private for later print publication, here it’s on TV). But again, Lois isn’t interested in Superman, because she’s already in love with Clark. It completely eliminates the old “love triangle” where “Clark loves Lois, but Lois loves Superman, but Superman wants to be loved as Clark” which has been a staple of the legend for years. This isn’t a bad thing, mind you.

One more thing from that lovely evening scene with Lois and Clark working late: when Clark is getting ready to leave, Lois asks him “what’s your hurry?” In Superman II, when Lois was suspecting the truth about Clark, she asked him “What’s your hurry, Superman?”

Atom Man

OK, the inclusion of Atom Man is some next level stuff. The character first appeared in 1945 on The Adventures of Superman radio show. There, he was “Heinrich Milch” (hence the “Henry Miller” of this episode), a Nazi empowered by Kryptonite in his bloodstream.

We met a different Atom Man in the second Superman movie serial in 1950, the appropriately titled Atom Man vs. Superman. There, Atom Man was the alter ego of Lex Luthor. One of these days I’m going to get around to writing about Columbia’s Superman serials, but today is not one of those days.

The Atom Man we meet here is based on the visual design from Gene Luen Yang and Gurihiru’s EXCELLENT (seriously, I can’t stress enough how absolutely great this book is) Superman Smashes the Klan. That Atom Man was based on the “Henry Miller” version of the character, and thus the racist nonsense spouted by tonight’s villain is appropriate.

One other cool thing about the use of Yang/Gurihiru’s Atom Man? In Superman Smashes the Klan, Supes is rocking a version of his costume that looks very much like the Fleischer suit. The folks on Superman & Lois know exactly what they’re doing. One callback to the movie serial version? It seems that Henry Miller is bald and stocky, much like the very first screen Lex Luthor Lyle Talbot was in Atom Man vs. Superman. It’s like an Easter egg singularity!

Now FLY (do not walk) to your local comic shop to buy a copy of Superman Smashes the Klan which, in what will probably be my final mention of The Adventures of Superman radio show for tonight, is loosely based on a DIFFERENT adventure from the radio show. Anyway, it’s great and the best Superman story to hit comics in approximately a decade or so. Thank me later.

Morgan Edge, Tal-Rho, and Zeta-Rho

This episode continues and reinforces the “nature vs. nurture” debate around Morgan Edge that began last week. Here, the mirroring of his journey with Clark’s is made even more pronounced. Clark was given good guidance by Jonathan and Martha, and those lessons were only reinforced by Jor-El, while Tal-Rho just had those impulses amplified by Zeta-Rho in his desert fortress. Jor-El sent his only son to escape a dying planet in the hopes that he could help another one. Zeta-Rho sent his only son to revive a dying planet at the expense of a vibrant one.

The “headband” that Tal-Rho is using to insert himself into Superman’s memories (and Supes has a matching one) feels like a subtle nod to the fact that headbands were the height of Kryptonian fashion in the comics from the late 1940s until John Byrne’s reboot in 1986.

The apparently successful “turning” of Superman at the end of the episode had better be a red herring. This show has faked us out so many times in its final moments, I really can’t imagine they’re gonna do something as obvious as giving us an “evil Superman” for even one episode.

Other Cool Kryptonian Artifacts

When Clark returns to Smallville and tries to meet up with Lana, there are two films playing at the theater: one is an instalment in the Harry Potter franchise. The other is Friday Night Lights, the movie that inspired the TV show that has been a surprisingly strong influence on a lot of elements of Superman & Lois.

For the Smallville fans, there’s a “Teague’s” sporting goods store visible on the street, as well, possibly a nod to Jensen Ackles’ Jason Teague character from season four of that series.

Yes, Lois does indeed call John Henry Irons at the end of the episode. Steel is coming back!

Clark Kent is a Seinfeld fan! It’s canon! Why is this so significant? Jerry Seinfeld is a noted Superman fan, and on the famed TV show (the greatest TV comedy of the ’90s), there was a very visible Superman magnet on his refrigerator in many episodes. Wait…that causes reality problems that are going to make my brain hurt.

Was anyone able to catch the names of the books on Clark’s nightstand? They look like old sci-fi paperbacks, but I couldn’t tell for sure.

I didn’t spot any significant names in Clark’s yearbook, but I’m old and my eyes are going, so if you spotted anything, please let me know in the comments!

The post Superman & Lois Easter Eggs are a Love Letter to Every Era of DC History appeared first on Den of Geek.

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