#batman being unimpressed by the drama

[igotanidea]

Rom-com, doubts and older brother complex : Dick Grayson x sister!reader

„Hey you, how was the movie?” Dick grinned with the brightest smile upon seeing his sister back from the cinema. Said sister however was far from being happy. “Y/N?”

“Yes? I mean, yes, sure, hi Dickie. It was fine, I guess.”

“Oh no.” he muttered

“What?”

“You got that face.”

“What face?!” involuntarily she glanced at the mirror just to check whether her older brother was serious or just trying to prank her.

“Please tell me you are not psychoanalyzing the movie.”

“Psycho…..? What? Me? Pfff, never.” She scoffed

“Mhm. Sure.”

“I’m sorry, what is your problem here, Grayson?” Y/N crossed her arms over her chest in annoyance. “Honestly I came home hoping for some peace and quiet and I feel so attacked right now.”

“Are you doing this… what was it called….?” Dick scratched his head searching for the right word “watcher insert!”

“IT’S READER INSERT!”

“Well, it was a movie, so definitely watcher insert. And you practically admitted you do.”

“I DID NOT SAY A THING LIKE THAT!”

“You didn’t have to. Like I said, you got that face.” He shrugged, absolutely not convinced and unimpressed by her yelling.

“Ugh! You are insufferable!”

“Part of my charm, you know that. Now come on, come sit here and tell me what got you spinning, huh? As a big brother…..”

“Please, spare me the talk about oldest sibling and all the duties that come with it. I can handle my own shit.” She hesitantly perched on the armrest of the sofa, but Dick was not satisfied with that and grabbed her by the waist pulling next to him.

“Come on, sis, don’t be stubborn” he pinched her stomach getting a slap on the hand in exchange “that hurt.”

“Serves you well!”

“Ok, I’ll stop. Jokes aside. Get out of that head of yours and walk me through it ‘cause I don’t get it. You went to the movie theatre to have some fun ….unlike someone we know….. and came back stuck in thinking and, let me put it simply, melancholic. Not really a normal reaction after a young adult movie. It’s young adult, right?” he frowned

“You got that one right.” She sighed “I … I don’t really know. I mean, this movie was as cliché as possible and only confirm my belief that it’s not for me.”

“How come?”

“You know… nice girl, A-grade student, not knowing the bad side of life changes the surrounding, most likely moves out of the small town.  And in the city, she meets a guy, a well-known trouble-maker and more often than not, a womanizer. Of course, she swears she wants nothing to do with him but after an hour or so, couple of fights and few misunderstanding they end up together, most likely in a X-rated scene. And after another half hour, some family drama or demons from the past emerges, but all ends well and you get those fucking singing birds, shining sun, doves and all that shit. I’m so too old for that. And I think I’m starting to get bored with such films.”

“Are you?” he looked at her carefully, voice turning soft not to startle her.

“Yes.” She made a face at him

“Y/n. You say you hate it, but …”

“Don’t you dare say it!” she jumped on the couch and jabbed his chest “Don’t. You. Dare.”

“I won’t. I’ll leave that to you. Come on, say it out loud so we can process that. No one else is here.”

“I’m sorry, since when are you my therapist?”

“Since Bruce provided all his kids with trauma and forgot to equip them with the specialist to fix it. Say it.”

“I wish I have a cliché love story.” She looked down and hid face in hands because of the embarrassment. “But I’m not exactly a material for it.”

“Why not?” Dick asked, grabbing her hands and making him look at her ‘is it because you have four vigilante brothers? That can go well in a movie.” He grinned “I bet Bruce would love a cinematic work of art about himself. Can you imagine the movie “Batman?” Two and a half hours of him brooding on the screen and saving Gotham, all while looking like a sad, tormented cat” he laughed and waved his hands around

“I got this at the manor whenever I want. And when I don’t want as well. So hard pass on that movie, thanks. Jason would love it though. It would give him an opportunity to point out everything wrong with Bruce. And Tim…”

“Nice try, but stop getting off the track. Why do you think you can’t have a love story?”

“Cause I can’t define myself.”

“I’m sorry, what?” Dick’s eyes widened in disbelief “you think you need to put a tag on yourself? My lovely, crazy, irrational, foolish sister…”

“Look Dick, I’m a mess, all right? I can do hundred different things, but cannot excel in one. I start so many projects I don’t finish. I am disorganized, got plenty ideas per minute and it’s extremely hard to keep up with me. I'm stubborn, hot-headed and always need to do things my own way. ”

“So?” he shrugged

“What do you mean by so?" Y/N frowned "I don’t have routine, and apparently I’m supposed to. I’m not the best version of myself, I hate motivational quotes and I’m not sophisticated or elegant or even close to it. Shit, I hate dresses and skirts, my make-up is limited to the most basic one and I don't feel like I'm woman enough.”

“Ok, stop right there.” He cut her off “that last one is bullshit and as for the rest, why in the world would you think that eliminates you?”

“I… It just does.”

“Why?” he insisted

“will you stop this interrogation! Let me remind you, you are not a cop anymore!”

“Old habits die hard.” He blew a raspberry.

“Be a brother Dick. Sock me for wasting your time or hug me, just don’t do this….”

“Do you need a hug?” he asked opening his arms

“Yes, please” she mumbled, diving into his arms and hiding face in his shirt, smelling that familar scent. “This feels nice.”

“Told ya! Oldest brother. Now, since we are taking the comforting approach to the problem… all the things you mentioned are those what makes you, you. All right, pumpkin?” he bopped her nose “you could adopt someone else’s lifestyle, but would you feel better then? Doing all those things that does not seem like they are yours?”

“No…” she muttered

“See? You just keep doing your thing, ok? Cause when you do something that makes you happy, even if it seems like you’re a mess, you’re just glowing and that is what makes you special, you know.”

“Example?”

“You were writing, last night, and you had that focus and spark in your eyes. Nothing but you and your ideas, put in words on the sheet. You were just beaming. That was you. You don’t need to put  a tag on yourself, believe me. It's not a competition or anything.“

"Really?" she pulled back and eyed him, raising one eyebrow "'cause you are absolutely not the one who would join The Bachelor, right?"

"That's irrelevant..." as much as he did not like it, her words made him blush a bit. (did she find that application form he hid under the bed?!)

"Let's agree to disagree" she grinned "I'll importune you for explanation on that matter later. And since we're on the subject, what about....?"

“Do you think me the role model on relationship advice?” he smirked, but a bit of sadness crept in “I made a lot of mistakes and speaking from experience, I can tell you just can’t hurry that. Just keep your mind open?”

"Did you just admit defeat in the romance matter, Dickie?" she mocked.

"Romance? Hell no! Just long-term relation..."

"Don't worry, big brother" she his his shoulder playfully "you keep my secret safe, I keep yours. But still, that’s the worst advice I ever got.”

“Maybe…” he tickled her tummy making poor girl squeal “think Damian would have better one?”

“He’s younger than me, sure as hell I’m not gonna ask him!”

“I’m serious, sis. Once you figure out who you are inside, even if it’s a bit complicated and come to terms with it, everything will fall in place.”

“Still the worst advice ever, but thank you for trying, Dickhead.”

“Doing my best for my little princess.”

“Ugh! Stop calling me that name!”

“You used to like it.”

“I was 7 years old!!”

“All right, fine, hold the fire” Dick raised his hands in surrender “Gosh, for someone who got so much fire inside, you suffer from too little self-value.”

“Four vigilante brothers can do that to a girl.”

“Y/N? I need you to promise me one thing.”

“Shoot.”

“When you get in a relationship you will let me act like big protective brother.”

“You may have to wait a while, but sure, it that’s your dream…”

“How about I play that role in a Nightiwng suit?”

“OVER MY DEAD BODY GRAYSON!”

#batboys x reader #batboys x batsis #batfamily x reader #batsis #batfam x batsis #batfam x reader #dick grayson #nightwing #robin dc #batboys x y/n #batboys x you #batfam x you #batfam #batfamily #dick grayson x reader #dick grayson x batsis #nightwing x reader #nightwing x batsis

[just-an-enby-lemon]

Oswald: You betrayed me!!! So as your final words I want to know why??? What was that Bruce Wayne had to offer that I didn't?

Jonathan: *sound unimpressed* You need to learn some calming tecniques, Mr. Coobleppt. The mind has a strong power over the body and stress can kill someone, specially someone with your age and occupation.

Oswald: STOP BEING STRESSED? STOP BEING STRESSED WAK WAK! DENT WAS MINE! YOU STOLED HIM FROM ME.

Jonathan: Between you and Bruce Wayne I should have noticed sooner Dent's inclination to join man who have an unhealthy obcession with him. It adds another layer for how easy it was to turn him into an obedient puppy. But I'll answer your inquiry, Mr. Cooblebot, Wayne had The Second Skin.

Oswald: He had a what now?

Jonathan: The Second Skin? *Oswald looks puzzled* Basil Karlo legendary last movie?

Oswald: *even agrier* YOU SOLD ME FOR A MOVIE??? With what I was paying you could've made your own movie!!!

Jonathan: I understand you don't have the finese to recognize the artistical importance of The Second Skin. There's only a single copy avaliable all the others were destroyed and the movie was never fully saw. It's said that on it's first and only exibihition all the executives watching put their own eyes out. It's a horror masterpiece.

Oswald: All I'm hearing is that you though a movie was worth more than the benefits of being loyal to The Penguin and for that you'll pay, Crane. Unfortunally my partnership with our friends from Santa Prisca won't help here as they are too occupied with bringing me both Joker's and Batman's heads right now but I found just the right monster to destroy you. He is new on the industry but weird creepy monster is an ever growing market here. CLAYFACE!

Basil Karlo: THE MONSTER IN YOUR NIGHTMARES CAME FOR YOU FROM THE BELLY OF THE NIGHT AND NOW IT'S TIME FOR YOU TO MEET YOUR DOOM!

Oswlad: We already talked about your antics.

Basil: But the artistic presentation is fundamental preparation for a good murder. Don't the victims deserve to feel the drama and horror before the final touch?

Oswald: *rolls his eyes* This type of non-sense talk reminds me of that Scarecrow fella who is still to respond to my generous offer about being only a manufaturer and paying me to act as distribuctor of his drugs.

Jonathan: Maybe he didn't respond because that's a shitty deal that ignores completly why he is on the trafic bussisness to begin with.

Oswald: Oh what do you know? Anyway I have things to do, Karlo, kill him.

Jonathan: *re hinding his secret fear toxin spray, pupils dilated in pleasant shock* You said Karlo? As in Basil Karlo? I did though this creature sounded a lot like him and the speech was from Dread Casttle... Are you also a fan?

Basil: A fan? I AM Basil Karlo. I merely evolved to being the perfect monster outside the screem as well.

Jonathan: Oh that's wonderfull! *genuinally confused for once in his life* But may I ask: why work for Penguin? You must have a fan cult to rivalize Joker's!

Basil: *sadly* That's not the case yet. But I'm new. For sure with time Gotham will recognize my superior talent.

Jonathan: As they should. Your movies changed my life! To observe the impact they had on people, the fear they inspired, it made me realize who I wanted to be!

Penguin: I should not be letting this go, I did pay for a long brutal murder and that's not it. But still I need to ask: you became a psychiatrist because of horror movies?

Jonathan: ... Sure. Let's go with that. Anyhow, can I have a final wish, Mr. Cooblebot?

Penguin: You can ask, but don't expect me to accept it wak wak.

Jonathan: Would you not take from Karlos pay if he first gave me an autograph? Nothing would make me happier.

Basil: *before Penguin could open his mind* Absolutly. Anything for such a dedicated fan.

Jonathan: *who may be planning to fear toxin everyone but also DOES have the biggest celebrity crush ever on Karlo and truly is his biggest fan* *squeaks happily* *does a tiny hroo hraa*

Basil: *who really likes still having fans and is less and less wanting to violently kill the first person who apreaciated him in ages* *also who keeps a pen on him waiting for this particular moment and was starting to doubt it would happen* Where do you want it?

Jonathan: *frantically looking into his pockets for some piece of papper* Shit, shit, I let my notepad with Wayne so he could read Dent's entreances.

Basil: Don't worry *takes a papper from a blank piece on Oswald's accounts book that's on the tabble, at this point Oswald is regreesting everything* For my biggest fan?

Jonathan: *almost jumping with excitmenet* Doctor Jonathan Crane!

Basil: I hope the fear I inspired stays with you forever. Here it goes.

Jonathan: *taking the papper in pure joy* Thank you!

Basil: Look, Cooblepot, I can't kill him.

Oswald: What because the FAMOUS PSYCHIATRIST is using the most basic manipulation tecnique? I bet he doesn't even know your movies.

Jonathan: Seriusly? We are literally here because I sold you out for one of his movies. Also I wouldn't go so low as to pretend to be a fan, is too easy, too boring. It tells me nothing about my target... patient... I didn't knew yet.

Basil: He does seems honest.

Oswald: No he doesn't. He isn't really your fan. But I? I'm proving it. I'm helping you recover your fame ain't I?

Jonathan: I'm sure Scarecrow would do the same except he would actually care about the art and not see it as a way to trick someone he only sees as a weapon and not an artist.

Oswald and Basil look confused at him.

Jonathan: What? He does little references to Karlo movies all the time, I bet he would adore a new movie to torment his subjects with.

Oswald: *raises and eyebrown*

Jonathan: In my professional opinion of course. : )

Oswald: Do you do this psychiatric party tricks with all of us, Mr. Crane?

Jonathan: I wound't call my doctorate on psychiatry wich by itself needs an M.D and my minor in psychology party tricks, but yes. Gotham criminals just as it's crime fighters are fascinating. It would be a waste not to try to understand their minds at least a little bit. You for once is completly obcessed with control likely from extreme bullying paired with high expectations that created an extreme fear of failure and a low notion of self that materialize in a quasi compulsive need to have the control you never before had so you can force the connections, love and adoration you long for Is sad if not pathetically clichê. Also your real laugh is normal you just thinks "wak wak" fits nicely with your presentation *Oswald opens his mouth* and now you will insist I'm wrong because you refuse to admit that as much as you loathe your nickname you do identify with it... Penguin. Again boringly clichê. Now if you excuse me, I have better things to do. *gets out as if Oswald doesn't have a gun and a Claymonster and a lot of determination to kill him* It was an absolute honor Mr. Karlo and I'll treasure your autograph with my life and while I'm not in any position of giving you life changing advice right now, I'm certain that Scarecrow would be extemely happy working with you and treat you waaay better than Penguin. *waves to a short circuting fumming Oswald cause he is extra*

#batman the audio adventures #i just need jon and basil to meet #also if two face's power is being a lawyer #jon's power should be a psychiatrist #he may be doctor mal pratice but he is stated as one of the psychiatrists in the wolrd and gotham's second best #so he knows his shit #doctor jonathan crane #jonathan crane #scarecrow #basil karlo #clayface #oswald cobblepot #penguin #i may be treating ozzie unfairly but I love him #making jonathan have a secret identity while being the most suspicous guy ever was a strike of genous from btaa #he isn't even trying lol #he may not necessarialy be easy to identify as Scarecrow but c'mmon my man has major evil person vibes

[justhaljordanthings]

#JustHalJordanThings -- Joining in with a good old-fashioned Green Arrow roast. 

#hal jordan #there's so much to love about this panel #diana's pissed off face #hal holding dinah back from whooping ollie's ass #batman being unimpressed by the drama #and barry's passive-aggressive smug little smirk #this panel is high art #barry allen #diana prince #batman #superman #black canary #oliver queen

[abizarreyodelingincident]

Braaaaaaains...

Jason Todd is legally – and biologically – dead. His family noted his lack of pulse at three in the morning, inside the cave, his body laid out on a table with medical instruments.

No, really, tell him something he doesn't know.

What else crawls out of a grave moaning and groaning?

Or, Jason thought his family full of the world's greatest detectives was smarter than this. Apparently not.

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

It had been an ordinary night. Calm. The stage for very little costumed crime and barely more regular, non-insane crime as well. Half the menagerie that made up Dick's loving ragtag bunch of younger siblings had even taken the night off.

Nothing should have make him arrive to silence this thick, to this faint echo of sniffling.

He sprinted after the noise.

Damian's fine, left before me. Duke didn't go out, nor did Steph. Babs spent the evening with Cass in the cave, Tim swept the bowery and said he was going to stop by Jason's place to-

He collided with a shaking, tear stained Tim right outside the medbay.

There was a body on the closest table. Others around it, crying, pacing, muttering in denial.

Dick couldn't look.

No, no, please, please no. I can't do that again. I can't!

Scarred skin, too pale – to be Duke or Cass – by death. His breath hitched. No. He. Fuck.

He knew those scars. Those arms. That chest and that fucking Y from navel to shoulders.

“Dick! Jason... he was...  I found him in his apartment. And I brought him to the cave... but... Jason doesn't have a pulse. He's... cold...”

Dick stumbled.

No.

No, no, no, that... that couldn't be real.

He caught himself on his little brother. Brought himself into a hug too tight, as painful as the arms gripping his ribs and back. A grip meant for a lifesaving light at sea. For a safeline over a ravine.

Twice. He'd lost the same brother twice. And this time, he didn't even have the excuse of inexperience and unstable situations. He... he patrolled the city whilst his brother was dead, completely oblivious to the fact. How could he? How dare he not know?!

“Shh, Tim, I'm here. I'm here.” But not for Jason, whispered a vicious part of him.

“What's all this?”

Dick's heart just about stopped.

Damian stood at the entrance to the lockers' room, uniform folded under one arm, hair slightly damp from a shower and Bat-themed pajamas worn without shame. His mild annoyance was proof he had no idea of the drama that had happened not twenty feet from him.

With reluctance, he let go of Tim, a gentle hand lingering on his shoulder, before he took a few steps toward his youngest, most vulnerable brother.

“D-Dami, I... ”   Damn it, he had to be the one to tell Damian about this. Because otherwise, the person to break the news would be Bruce, and-

Shit.

Bruce.

Oh God. How could they possibly tell him- ? After all their fights, the goddamned shattering that had broken the man he had been, and their last conversations even being more admonishment about protocols that Jason had flippantly disregarded. Bruce would never recover. That was it. The end of Batman.

...But first, God he hated himself, wanted to just curl up in a corner and forget everything, first he had a young brother he needed to talk to. One... one little brother less than just this afternoon.

“Jason... ” He swallowed, his throat tight, his heart in denial, the words so damning, but needing to be said. “Jason did not make it. He... he's dead.”

Damian stayed thoughtfully silent.

Not... not the tearful reaction he had expected, but Damian had grown up surrounded by so much death and horror that he would obviously be guarded. And oh, Dick's heart went to his baby brother, and he truly wished he could

“I do not understand. Why such theatrics for the zombie?”

Dick gasped, knowledge warring with the flash of anger.

“Damian! He's our brother!”

“Did he lose his head?” Damian demanded, and Dick's mind buckled.

“Huh, no, but that doesn't have anything to d-”

“Then, why are you acting so weirdly emotional, Richard?”

Before Dick's temper could catch up to his mouth, the longest and most painful-sounding gasp erupted from the medbay, where, to the general shock of all, Jason's gray-ish body shot upward with both his arms raised.

Electroshocks didn't make you jolt like that.

Electroshocks, in fact, remained in their kit on the other side of the medbay, unused. Because Jason had seemingly been dead long before he had been brought to the cave.

That was roughly the moment when Dick's brain caught up with the first of many hints. Latched onto it with a fool's hope.

“... Damian... When you were calling Jason a 'zombie', what did you mean?”

Damian's brows scrunched up together, a look he meant to be intimidating, but had more in common with a disgruntled kitten. “Exactly that, Richard. Do we not have files on zombies in the computer? Dead bodies walking about animated by unholy powers?”

Jason's not- Dick forced the half formed thought to a halt. For once, he rather wanted to be very, very wrong in how he perceived his family.

“What's with all the noise? Can't someone try to sleep like the dead without screaming?” Jason groused. “Should have gotten myself buried ag-OOF!”

“JASON!” screamed the hysterical teenager that had launched himself at a very lively dead body.

“Huhh? Hi, Timmy?” Jason said blearily, ruffling Tim's hair, eyebags suspiciously prominent. “... Fear gas?”

The blinking slowed, the fog of sleep drifting away as he silently begged the rest of them for an answer.

Happily provided by a still crying Tim. “I thought you were gone!”

“What is dead may never die,” Jason quipped, his mouth twisting in that cocksure grin from his Robin days.

And Dick wanted nothing more than to stop right there, pass out from the relief and joy of his little brother being alive and kicking, but...

But... 

That joke. One of many morbidly unfunny jokes and puns.

Bone-deep fatigue crushed his back. A bitter curse for whatever higher forces messing with them echoed strongly inside his skull, before he gave in to the inevitable and inhaled a few times for patience.

“Jason. We thought you were dead-dead.”

With prickly, hedgehog style affection, Jason pushed Tim back and stood up, stretching. “Come off it, Goldie. I wasn't even decapitated. I mean, if you were really worried, you could have just called a necromancer or something.” His expression hardened. “But if you ever call a necromancer on my ass, I'll shoot your perfect glutes.”

Yup, yup, yup, this is happening.

Tim finally wiped the rest of the tears away, helped by one of Stephanie's handkerchiefs, when he froze. “Wait. Your skin's still pale as a corpse.”

The flicker of amusement in Jason's eyes killed it for Dick.

God, how could they have all been this idiotic? If Wally ever learned about this – Shit, did Roy and Kory know before him?!

They were going to laugh their asses off at him.

Jason, unaware of the world recalibration happening in his poor big brother's mind, shrugged and rolled his shoulders – who creaked suspiciously loudly, more like rusty hinges than normal body parts. “Eh, I'm just a bit hungry. Nothing a meal or two won't fix and get some blood flowing back under my s-”

“You're a zombie.”

They turned toward him.

“Way to cross the finish line on time, Mister Rabbit,” Jason drawled.

Barbara, for once, looked completely unprepared. “A zombie,” she repeated, dazed.

Stephanie's nervous giggle died out when she noticed the lack of humor. “... No!”

Cassandra furiously looked down, muttering in her fist. Duke, by contrast, had the expression of a person stuck in a very awkward nightmare.

Even Jason's good-natured ribbing faded in when faced only with the distant screeched of bats. “... Hm, guys, bats, roostery, parasites and octopi? This is old news. What's with all the... ”

He vaguely gestured at their faces.

“Old news?” Tim rasped like he was being strangled.

“I came back from the dead years ago! Come on! Am I in a parallel universe? Hey, Demon Brat,” Jason called, baffled, “you knew, right? I didn't imagine that, right?!”

“Of course, Todd. Mother informed me of everything. Besides, Grandfather's interest in your state of being was of interest for a few weeks. How could I have been ignorant about your zombified state of being?”

In the corner of his eyes, Dick noticed Tim's, Barbara's and Cassandra's expressions all pinching in displeasure. In a way, Dick was reassured. He hadn't been the target of a family-wide hoax to discredit him as an attentive and loving eldest brother. No, he was just naturally blind, apparently.

“He knew?” Tim growled, like it was a personal failing of the fabric of time and space.

Damian's tone was the exact opposite. “And none of you realized...?”

Dick squirmed. “I... huh... you see...”

His baby brother eyed him, completely unimpressed, and for once after years of partnership, Dick felt he deserved every single ounce of it.

“I see... I shall reevaluate the value of this 'detective training' I've been given if this is the result then,” he said, the nearest thing to completely disavowing his older siblings without saying so.  

In other circumstances, perhaps the others would have demanded that Damian stay and explain, but he suspected the quelling look it would have deserved prevented them. Not one of them spoke until Damian had disappeared upstairs and the elevator doors had closed.

“Jason, since when have you been a zombie?”

Jason blinked, jaw hanging. Juuuust enough for some of the scar tissue on his face to stretch past normal. Why did Dick only notice that now?

“Wait, you're all serious? How could you not know? I told you guys!”

And there was Dick's pride rearing its ugly head, because no, no he had not been told and maybe his deductive skills needed a very complete overhaul, but his memory was still excellent!

“You never said that. Heck, we weren't even talking until two years ago!”

“I literally told you all that I crawled out of my grave by myself, groaning the entire time. No experiment, no Lazarus Pit, just a body waking up in its own coffin and deciding to breathe fresh air. Does that not scream 'zombie' to you?”

They cringed.

“Not the only one that returned from beyond,” Babs mumbled. He could see her pull up the mental list right there.

“I greeted you all last meeting with a 'What's up, my bat folks? It's me, your favorite zombie!'. What did you think that meant?”

“That you're an asshole with a morbid sense of humor?” Stephanie quipped, and Jason momentarily paused his indignation to high five her. Fair's fair.

“Okay, but what about that time I got shot in the chest and I told you all not to worry about it?”

“I just figured you were going to get stitched up by Leslie or yourself, you know, regular bat neuroses,” Tim confessed.

Dick made a mental note to keep a much closer eye on Tim's patrols for the next few months.

“From a bullet chest wound?” Jason asked with an incredulousness that was not at all earned, because he was a freaking zombie!

“I thought your armor had blocked it! The hole wasn't bleeding!” Tim protested, cheeks red and tone defensive.

“Well, yeah,” Jason replied. “I don't bleed. It's like some fruit pulp or something. Ain't coming out if you don't press. My heart's not pumping.”

That's a 'nevermind' on the smoothie I saved for after patrol.

“Well, I know that now,” Tim said.

“I feel like I should write it down on the plaque or something,” Jason still sounded amazed, and might have pinched his arm just to be sure he hadn't been daydreaming, “Like, 'a good soldier AND A VERY DISCRETE ZOMBIE!' in big flaming letters. With a spotlight. And a dictionary opened on 'Zombie' or 'Undead'. You know, just in case the next batbrat to come along needs a few subtle hints about my true nature. What'd you think, Dick?”

He could not have been blushing harder than he currently was. “I think shut up.”

“Of course. What about when I shoved my deadly cold toes at Tim under a blanket?”

“Cold feet.”

“Never eating around you guys?”

“Daddy issues with Bruce,” Barbara deadpanned, and got a sock thrown at her for her honesty.

However, Duke, poor kid, turned green. “Wait, so when you offered me some jellied brain... was that not a death joke?”

Dick's stomach spontaneously shrivelled.

By the grimaces and sharp inhales all around, that was a common reaction.

Then the worst possible thing happened: Jason grinned.

He strutted, all confidence and brashness, and viper-quick, snatched an arm around Duke's shoulder. “Narrows, Nightlight, my tiny bitsy bro, everything I do is a death joke. My very existence laughs at death.”

Inside the batcave, the groaning was long-suffering and shameful.

“But that was actually brains,” Duke countered.

“Yeah. Calf brains. It's a delicacy.”

Tim massaged his forehead. What a mood.

Duke narrowed his eyes. “It was purely for the joke, wasn't it?”

Jason patted him on the back so hard Duke faltered. “One tragically wasted on your obtuse mind. I prefer me some Tête fromagée instead. Less like grainy jello.”

Stone-faced, Barbara wheeled herself toward the batcomputer. There, upon a series of quick clicks, she opened up the Bats's files. “Alright, you had your fun. Do you need to eat brains or are you just the world's least funny meathead?”

“I'm the world's most misunderstood vigilante!” Jason loudly protested, milking their pain for all it was worth. And then some. “But yeah, I do. No grey matter in there” -- he tapped his belly -- “no thinking up here.” -- his skull.

“Need some better quality brains then,” Tim stage-whispered to Stephanie.

Cass pointed the finger at Jason. “No killing for brains.”

Jason's good humor flickered with a flash of green. “Ain't ever done it, never will. It's a matter of morals, not hunger, Cass.”

Dick swooped in that minefield before it exploded.

“Great! Proud of you, Jay! You're the good kind of vegetarian zombie,” he said, putting an arm around his ginormous little brother's shoulders.

Wait a minute...

“Hey, you're older than when you died! Zombies don't age.”

“No, I was thrown into a Lazarus Pit, and the evil waters cured the malnutrition-induced delay on my growth. Haven't aged a day since.”

“I just thought you had a weird babyface thing going on,” Tim said.

Jason's grin turned sardonic. “Quite the opposite, Timber.”

Dick put his head in his hands in some vain attempt to prevent his brain from leaking through his ears.  With his luck, his little brother would 'playfully' eat some of it. “There's no way you look this rugged at biologically sixteen! I refuse to believe that.”

“Can you imagine my power if I'd been allowed to reach my full potential?” Jason leered, eyebrows waggling like waves in a sea at storm. “So many heart attacks.”

Barbara and Cassandra exchanged a silent look, and, after a solemn nod, Cassandra reached up to slap Jason upside the head.

“Thank you, Cassandra,” Barbara told her. “Jason, never do such a thing again.”

The disgruntled groan that followed must have been on purpose, because Jay was indeed an asshole.

“Besides, it's not like the world will ever know,” Tim said, cutting, a smirk hiding by his hand.

Dick really thought his little brother was far too relaxed upon learning that Jason was one with the undead. Sure, they had all encountered various levels of zombies during their missions, from all sorts of oral traditions and cultures, alien viruses and hidden nanobots piloting meat puppets. It wasn't even classified as a nation-wide crisis to encounter free-roaming zombies. But since the chronically unalive individual in question was one of their own, Dick felt he was owed at least a whole evening of frazzled panic and incomprehension for once.

“Oh?” Stephanie instead asked, sensing blood.

Tim shrugged. “Well, you know, no pulse, no blood flow,” he said with an angled eyebrow nodding at Jason's crotch

Stunned silence followed, their expressions varying from disgust, horror, unholy glee and, from Jason himself, wide-eyed shock that his shrimp of a little brother had had the balls to assimilate the zombieness fast enough to mock him for him.

Dick prayed for patience. For fortitude. And for an alternate timeline where he was an only child.

Why, for all the love of cotton candy and professional uncriminal clowns, did Tim put THAT image of Jason inside their brains? What had he done, him, a loving model for all of society, to suffer like this?

Maybe if he asked nicely, Jason would eat the image out of his head. He owed Dick that much after this clusterfuck of a conversation.

“Ooooooooh,” Stephanie crooned, miming getting dunked on. With acrobatics.

Jason huffed. “Like I was ever interested in the first place. I ain't Dick.”

“Okay, no slut shaming or virgin shaming, in fact, no shaming at all, please. In this house, we accept all sexualities, but we don't give out raunchy details about any of it, I only have so much brain bleach.”

“Share?” Duke pleaded in a whisper.

Oh, I wish I could, you young innocent soul.

A few beeps turned their attention back to Barbara and the batcomputer. “Well, that's one long overdue update to Jason's files. Anyone else want to share their 'obvious' medical condition?”

“Excuse you, being dead is not a medical condition.”

“I will make you wish for the peace of the grave, Jason.”

Droplets dripped from nearby stalactites.

A few bats flew overhead.

Jason turned to them like nothing had been said.

“Right. That was fun. Best night of my month. Can't wait to tell the Outlaws.”

Dick resigned himself to a series of unflattering texts by the absolute dickheads that were his second family. He could already tell the messages would blow up his phone to the Moon. 'You didn't know your brother that came back from the dead is a zombie?!'

“Have mercy and wait tomorrow morning?”

That smile could have been great or terrible. “You're lucky I'm in a spectacularly good mood, Dick.”

He had lifted his leg over his bike's seat when Duke was struck by genuine worry.

“Wait. Does Bruce know?”

Jason barked out a laugh.

“Of course he does! God knows he's got some massive blind spots, but he's obsessive, paranoid and I find subcutaneous trackers on me every week. No way he didn't get the hint before now.”

But, as his gaze went over the rest of them, his good cheer dimmed, his grin slipping off his face as surely as a bit of decayed flesh.

“... Right?”

#fanfic #Jason Todd #Zombie Jason Todd #Dick Grayson #Batsiblings

[gamer2002]

Danganronpa - Review2002

Danganronpa is a mystery VN, where 15 high schoolers are trapped in a murder school, and in order to get out one has to kill another and frame somebody else for it. Observed and manipulated by the headmaster of the school, a sadistic robot-bear called Monokuma, our main character, Makoto, has to survive and not lose his hope. Because there is a lot of despair. And hope. Despair. Hope. Despair. Light. Darkness. Kingdom Hearts.

But we’ll talk about that later.

Despite all the murder thingy, the game is just an edgy shonen and is very animu. It’s not a bad thing, because it’s entertaining, and that’s what matters the most. Characters are mostly simplistic, often stereotypical, but are distinguish and memorable (aside from meh protag). What is good about the cast is how the group dynamics changes with each case. Thanks to that, the characters seem more alive, and the surrounding drama seems more impactful. And sometimes the drama is really good, though it’s dragged down by the meme writing. But about that later.

The trials, where we try to figure out the killer’s identities, are good gameplay-wise. Aside from the rhythm minigame. I get the creators wanted to demonstrate losing arguments by lack of confidence, but, until half of the game, that minigame had nothing to do with logic or deduction. Every other minigame was good or ok, though.

Comparing to Ace Attorney, the trials were more dynamic, with constant new arguments and questions. It helps that the equivalent of AA’s testimonies is briefer (as it’s on a time limit). Not to mention, the filled with moving camera direction really made non-animated and non-moving characters feel alive. The music was ok – it serves its purpose, but it isn’t memorable.

The gameplay between trials was ok. Investigations didn’t drag too long. The free time did sometimes, but that’s because I was collecting more coins than it was necessary. The coins are spent for presents, which we can give to other characters, in return for learning more about them and gaining upgrades for the trials. But, to be frank, some upgrades were “turn off the setting we put to make the gameplay purposefully shittier”.  

It’s an entertaining game with some good ideas, which earns 7/10 in my book. But there are reasons why this game doesn’t earn any higher, which I’m going to elaborate on. The subject is Kingdom Hearts Meme Writing, Monokuma being a letdown villain, the big revelation being a lot of nothing, and how the writers could’ve made the Hope vs Despair nonsense actually work. The last two are impossible to write about without spoilers, but I can explain the first two without them.

Despair. Despair. Despair. Despair. Do you get it? I hope.

I know this is a shonen, regardless how edgy it is, and the writers were pretty self-aware of this. But the despair/hope meme drags down the writing. Monokuma goes on and on about how he will turn all the hope into despair, and this is just as ridiculous as a talking cartoon bear that kills a man by literally blasting him into space can be. It’s a meme writing. A ham-fisted, forced meme writing.

Other examples of meme writing is Kingdom Hearts, with its light and darkness, or Ace Attorney, with its truth. We all roll our eyes over that. Characters are bringing up some concept in a melodramatic way, repeatably, with a ridiculous zeal that doesn’t just seem alien, but straight out autistic. But it’s okay, all those titles, including Ronpa, are still shonens. Kingdom Hearts is a battle shonen where you fight against forces of evil alongside Donald Duck. You can turn your brain off and enjoy yourself, no biggie. But turning your brain off is a bit harder in, you know, a murder mystery.

Yeah, Ace Attorney is murder mystery as well, and yet I give it a pass. That’s because “truth” is just an ideal of idealistic characters. Phoenix, Edgeworth, and the rest, are melodramatically motivating themselves by simplistically expressing their ideal. And  melodrama is part of a wrestling, and logic wrestling is what Ace Attorney boils down to. So, why this isn’t the same in this logic wrestling game?

The problem with hope/despair is that those are not just some concepts or ideals, but those are emotions. Emotions that the writing does attempt to make you feel, sometimes pretty successfully. Case 4 is an example of a beautifully set up tragedy, it’s the game’s emotional peak. The reveal is shocking and sad, and the dramatic confession is filled with genuine emotion. And then the confession has the word “despair” in it, and my brain is immediately going back to Monokuma and his antics. Good thing that the official translation team has realized that they would have killed the mood sooner, if they had included that word in an earlier appearing evidence. Same thing happens whenever the word “hope” appears – it just makes us recall the memes.

In my AI: Somnium Files I’ve explained to you the need of being explicit about what is supposed to make the player feel emotions. But you can’t be ham-fisted about what the player is supposed to feel. Turning hope and despair into KH’s equivalent of light and darkness is turning them into a material for jokes. It is a repeatable telling us what to feel, and that simply can’t work. If the game didn’t do that, a lot of good moments wouldn’t be dragged down by being a reference to something we joke about.

Monokuma is just the biggest kid tier villain

There are spoiler reasons why Monokuma fails at being a villain, but I’ll mention them in spoiler section about improving the whole hope vs despair conflict. But the basic problem with Monokuma is spoiler-free, because it all boils down to the game’s initial setup.

Generally, Monokuma is a recurring type of villain that mixes nihilism, cartoonish silliness and cruel sadism into one, disturbing package. Other examples of such villains is the Joker, or Killer the Butcher from Zambot 3. When you look at Monokuma alone, he is (aside from spoiler reasons) a good example of such a villain. He is over the top, entertaining, scheming, memorable, gets all the attention in every scene he is in, and is constantly disturbing. All his bases are covered, so all is good, right? But only when you look at Monokuma alone.

Character in a story isn’t just some element you can look at alone, it’s an element you see among all the others. Great villain needs a great hero. Great hero needs a great villain. If one is unimpressive, the other can’t impress us with their triumphs.

The reason why the Joker is a great villain is because he is a challenge for the goddamn Batman, creating a clash of an unstoppable force against an unmovable object. Killer the Butcher’s enemies are kids piloting alien giant robot with superior firepower. What makes the Bucher a good villain is that, regardless of his lost battles, he still succeeds at causing significant collateral damage, which constantly contributes to his stated goal of slowly killing all humans. And Butcher doesn’t just rely on his show reaching logical conclusions about consequences of battles between giant robots, the entire arc before heroes directly attacking his HQ is about him using a weapon they can’t fight with a giant robot – kidnapped people turned into living human bombs. The amount of sacrifices, losses and traumas that kids from a 70s (!) super robot show have to go through is why Killer the Butcher is an impressive villain you love to hate.

But Monokuma isn’t an unstoppable force going against an unmovable object. Neither he is battling heroes that are capable of beating him in a direct confrontation, forcing him to rely on different forms of accomplishing his goals. He targets fifteen uninformed kids, with like three giving him a reason to worry, and puts them in a situation where they can’t initially defy him at all. It’s not a spoiler to say that the kids initially can’t find any clues that would’ve allowed them to free themselves from Monokuma. Their exploration of the school is limited, and next areas are unlocked only after class trials. Meaning, Monokuma limits kids’ ability to gather information required to beat him, until the next killing occurs. If the kids don’t kill anybody, they can only hope to (hah) apathetically accept their imprisonment by Monokuma.

To sum it up, all that Monokuma accomplishes is making some confused kids kill one another, when they are in a situation where it’s their only option to free themselves. Wow, what an impressive villain, doing whatever he wants with helpless children and driving them to murder.

It doesn’t help that the actual conclusion of the conflict with Monokuma is underwhelming, and all his actions only make us respect him less as a villain. But more about that later, in the spoiler section. But not immediately, because first we need to focus on the game’s disappointing big revelation.

Who cares that the world is over?

All attempts to escape the murder school were pointless – the world has already ended! Play the laugh track.

To give the writers credit, Genocide Jill’s explanation of that was funny and played out as a dark joke. And that’s the only way this revelation could be played out.

When it comes for the twist being a twist, it’s okeyish. The twist itself isn’t hard to guess, by the end of the first trial, and it’s almost given away by the third one. On the other side, there are photos of kids that died in previous chapters, and you could wonder if they aren’t going to reveal that everybody lives and this all was a simulation, or something. It can be easily guessed, but there is room for speculation, and you may not know which route the writers will go. Even if those routes are “predictable” and “a disappointing backpedal”.

But even if you end up being surprised… it’s an emotional bunch of nothing. Makoto gets his answer to what could’ve happened to his family, and he still doesn’t even realize it. That’s how the writing poorly handled one way it could’ve made us care about end of the world – through Makoto’s reaction to it.

Makoto is such an uninteresting, purposefully average, and ultimately unimpressive main character. We know he has family, parents, and a younger sister, but one picture of them is all we got. We don’t know the dynamics of their relationship, and we don’t know why Makoto loves them. Just saying “they are his family” isn’t enough. When Superman and his family are written well, we know why Clark Kent cares deeply about them – Ma Kent is such a great mother, Pa Kent is such a great father, and each scene with them demonstrates it.

Through the game, Makoto could’ve flashbacks to his family, as an ongoing C plot. That way we would’ve been shown why Makoto cares about them, why he wants to make sure they are safe, why he could feel tempted about escaping via murder (leading to him rejecting that idea because his family wouldn’t want it that way). And then boom – yes, the world has ended, and they are probably dead.

But Makoto never ever connects the state of the world to the state of his family. And that’s a big mistake, because that was a way to spice up the ultimate clash between Hope and Despair.

How to argue that Despair can be better than Hope

Before I focus on the topic, let me first expand on the topic of Monokuma being a disappointing villain, by telling you why Junko is a disappointing villain.

Junko just pulls everything out of her ass. Ok, she happens to have a super soldier sister, who was capable of killing Academy’s entire adult staff, letting her to take over the school. This part is acceptable by shonen standards. It was the Acadamy that was responsible for sealing the building and setting its defense, ok. But then everything else is an unexplained bullshit. Endless Monokumas? She has them because the writer says so. Ability to take away memories? She has them because the writer says so. Hijacking all TV channels? Performing ridiculously complex executions? Securing supplies to the Academy in a post-apo setting? She can because the writers says so.

She simply isn’t a formidable villain. She is nothing more than a bored girl, that could’ve been successful as a normal person, but the entire universe decided to grant her everything to let her play a supervillain. She doesn’t accomplish any impressive feat by herself. Even taking over of the Academy was solely thanks to her sister. With her granted unfair total advantage over the cast, there was no other way for her to lose than keeping screwing herself. She can’t even gain respect as a formidable opponent from sticking to her rules, because she not only purposefully handicaps the most competent person in the cast, but also keeps breaking her own rules.

The second aspect of a good villain is understandability. And Junko is a stupid incomprehensible mess. She always feels despair, and that somehow makes her constantly bored. But she wants to prove that’s better than hope. For some reason, she is a sadist. She is also happy about facing ultimate despair in form of her own death, but she didn’t yearn to that enough to off herself before all her plans. Nothing adds up, and she just does whatever crazy shit the writers needs her to do at the current moment. This is the aspect where she just sucks as a Joker-type villain. Such villains, when done well, aren’t just twisted, wrong, crazy edgemasters. When done well, they are also, despite everything, still somehow understandable. That’s what makes them actually shocking. It isn’t just shocking that they do horrible things, it is shocking that they can argue that everything they do serves a purpose and is consistent with a coherent belief.

Joker (when written well) and Killer the Butcher do have nihilistic philosophy that is wrong and twisted, but does have some shocking points. Joker believes that normal life is pointless, because one bad day can drive you mad, so it’s better to embrace awfulness of the world as your entertainment. And this philosophy is consistent with him wanting to commit macabre crimes. Killer the Butcher believes that humans are ungrateful bastards and will even treat their saviors like crap. And this philosophy is consistent with him wanting to kill all humans. Even if you don’t agree with their believes (I hope), you understand why somebody with such believes would be doing what they are doing. This understandability is what elevates banal conflict against a bad guy that does a bad thing that has to be stopped, into a conflict against a personified idea. Batman doesn’t just fight the Joker, he fights a nihilistic view of a pointless mad world. Zambot 3 kids don’t just fight Killer the Butcher, they fight view of humans as unworthy of living and being saved. That is why those conflicts aren’t banal.

Meanwhile, Junko makes a big promise for a Hope vs Despair conflict, arguing that the latter is better than former, but...

What is “despair” anyway? Is it to give up from stuff like escaping the school, and accepting whatever you end up having, however shitty it is? But what does it have with Junko’s boredom and embracing her own death? What is the point of the over-the-top executions? Junko is gleefully sadistic, what about despair makes you sadistic? Did she want the cast and her viewers to embrace sadism as well?  How’s that better than hope? It’s incomprehensible, and fails to make any point. The blame lies pretty much on the out-of-place sadism that exists just to make Junko an edgelady.

Danganronpa is a murder mystery. And despite being an over-the-top shonen, it does focus, decently, on motives for committing murders. Every single killer in this game is understandable. Their actions were wrong, but you understand why they did everything they did. There is just a sole exception to this rule – the games’ main villain.

During the final confrontation, Junko was arguing that futile hopes of previous murderers drove them to committing murder. That alone does make a good point. Then she offered everyone safe peaceful life, if they acknowledged her belief and abandoned all hope. Ok, that’s a good dilemma. Surprising that with such a good prepared dilemma Junko bothered to handicap and eliminate Kyoko, when she could just guide the cast towards Junko and this dilemma faster. Still, Junko does make a point about despair being better than hope, and does make the cast face a dilemma, in a way that is consistent with her belief. But then she adds she wants to punish someone for lulz, and that person has to be our bland player character.  

And how killing Makoto proves that despair is better than hope? It was a yet another act of Junko’s pointless sadism, which only made it more difficult for other characters to agree with her. Anyway, Junko is ultimately unimpressive, because she loses to Makoto just saying “let’s have some hope, guys”. All that buildup of understandable motives of past killers lead to a rather banal final conflict with a completely banal resolution.

Things would be different, if Junko didn’t forget about Makoto’s family and did bring them up during the final argument. I still think that trying to kill Makoto was counterproductive, but I understand the need of putting MC’s life at stake. But Junko could single out Makoto for execution because he was pushing for the idea of everyone leaving the school, despite the revelation about state of the world, and she could accuse him for selfishly risking lives of others, just for a hope of reunion with his own family. Imagine that being the payoff of flashbacks to Makoto’s family and his wish to reunite with them. Sure, here, Makoto has proved he wouldn’t directly murder anybody over it, but would he willingly disregard safety of others? He can’t really refute that, without giving up on leaving the school.

And that’s how Junko could undermine Makoto and make her point. Living trapped in the school and abandoning all hope for the outside world was bad, but it could be worse. At least it was safe, peaceful, and they had food plus entertainment. Looking for anything better outside was risky. Hoping for anything better was risky. Hope was bad. The state of despair, where you no longer hope for anything better than what you have, was good. Unable to accept this Makoto was spreading ideas that were dangerous for the well-being of others. How Makoto, willing to selfishly drag everyone else into a dangerous hell-word and risk their lives, was that much different from every other killer? Sure, they killed others directly, but at least none of their victims had a slow and painful death. Makoto was willing to potentially doom others to that. And this is why he had to be put down, like all the other killers had to be, regardless of their understandable motives. In the current state of the world, any reckless hope is a dangerous thought crime.

Here, the final debate could be more complex. Makoto could’ve pointed out that, even if he could be accused for having a selfish hope, it was the same with others. Everyone else wanted their situation to improve, and giving that up for hollow safety wouldn’t do. Hope is better than despair, freedom is better than safety. The future of post-apo is libertarian, and if we can’t live with the freedom to pursue our hopes, then we won’t live at all. No more lockdowns!

You don’t have to agree with such a statement, but at least it is some statement. Here, we have a clash of hope that accepts the risk against despair that is unwilling to accept any risks. Unlike what we got, where despair is somehow tied to sadism, and hope simply rides on the power of friendship.

#danganronpa #video games #video game review #story review #review #visual novel #vn #murder mystery #story #writing tips #writing #review2002

[anchinoe]

Daggers of The Tongue

Also available on AO3. 

This is the sequel to I Am Not a Robot. 

.

The Justice League meeting room was filled with its members, a soft chatter between them while they waited for the only member that wasn’t there yet.

Flash, who was scanning the room, getting a grasp of all the different conversations going on, noticed an extra chair with a Batman logo on it. He cocked his head and turned to the only person in the room who could have any idea of what was going on.

“Superman, is someone else joining us today?” he tilted his head towards the bat-stamped chairs at the head of the table. Slowly, his teammates quieted down and looked at Superman with curious gazes.

“Uh, well, I…” the Kryptonian scratched the back of his head, glancing at the chairs in confusion. He fell silent mid-sentence and furrowed his brow, clearly listening beyond the walls. A small smile formed on his face and they all relaxed. It wasn’t a threat.

“What?” Diana asked when their teammate turned to her and arched his brows in delight.

That’s when everyone heard the voices outside the door. Muffled but audible.

“I still think this was unnecessary.” A distorted voice complained.

“Hnn”

“You could literally have told her in private and save us both from this situation.” The voice kept on. There was a couple of seconds of silence and then Batman answered in a soft voice.

“I meant what I said to you.” More silence. “I trust you. And I would never be ashamed of you.”

“Whatever, old man.”

“Aren’t you going to take off the helmet?”

“It’s a hood.” The voice sounded offended. “I’ll take it off when you take off your cowl.”

They barely heard a sigh before the door opened. They all straightened and looked anywhere else.

“We are sorry for our tardiness.” The gravel voice was back as Batman walked to his seat at the table, facing the door.

A man followed him. He was bulky and tall, maybe just as bulky and tall as Batman. He wore cargo pants and a leather jacket, a red bat on his chest and a crimson hood covered his entire head. He hesitated for a second, faced with the world’s mightiest heroes before following the caped vigilante towards the head of the table.

The newcomer didn’t acknowledge anyone as he walked slowly but confidently past them. Until Wonder Woman got up and faced him. Everyone tensed, unsure, but then she smiled brightly and flexed her fingers, as if she wished to grasp something. Someone.

“Jay,” she whispered. Her voice was soft and happy. Her body language was relaxed and welcoming. Completely trusting. The man froze in place, in shock.

Then his shoulders sagged, the tension leaving him. He took another step towards her.

“Aunt D,” though distorted by the hood, his voice was soft. As if that was what she was waiting for, Diana wrapped her strong arms around him. She must have used a considerable amount of strength because a surprised oof escaped her declared nephew.

“Hey,” the young man circled his arms around her as well and Diana beamed. Had anyone been looking at Batman, they would have noticed how he was trying to suppress his smile.

Diana stepped back still smiling and put her hands on his shoulders. He cleared his throat when she let him resume his walk towards his seat between her and Batman.

That’s when the attention shifted from him to the Dark Knight.

“Thank you all for coming to the meeting.” He stopped, waiting for the hooded vigilante to take a sit. “This is the Red Hood. He is my…”

“Associate.”

“… son.” They looked at each other when everyone raised their brows.

Hal Jordan whistled mockingly somewhere in the room. Red Hood turned his head slowly in his direction, cocking his head and managing to look thoroughly unimpressed. Batman grunted.

“I’m here to help with a case.” Red Hood drew a lazy circle on the surface of the table. “I’ll leave y’all big guys with your super-secret society as soon as I’m done.” He gestured to the whole room, ignoring Batman’s pursed lips.

There was some silent tension between father and son, they all saw it, but Batman gave in and proceeded with the meeting. After discussing the latest intervention of the Lanterns in Central City and Lex Luthor’s last scheme, Batman turned around to his left to face Wonder Woman and his son.

“As some of you might know, Wonder Woman has been working on a case of human trafficking.” Batman said out loud. “My…” he cleared his throat when he felt Red Hood’s glare through the helmet, “Red Hood has important information about the organization.”

Everyone turned to the young man. Red Hood adjusted his posture a little on his seat and activated the Watchtower’s computer with his voice, putting up several files and footage of what seemed to be the trafficking ring in question.

“I had some of my guys tell me what they were up to,” he explained, zooming on one of the pictures. “I would have gone myself if hadn’t known Wonder Woman was running the case.”

“And what did you discover?” Wonder Woman asked, eyeing the holograms.

“Well, it caught my attention because I suspected the League of Assassins may be involved.” He raised a hand when he felt Batman opening his mouth. “But, after some investigations, I’ve discovered that it all connects to Bane.”

“Bane?”

“Yes,” Jason said. He straightened in the chair and cleared his throat. “My contact in the League confirmed they’re not involved. But their agents caught on whatever Bane’s got going on.”

“Your contact.” Bruce’s face was blank, his tone controlled, but the other members of the League recognized the steel underneath the words.

Red Hood ignored it.

“Yes, my contact. They shared their information. Turns out Bane is trying different alternatives to Venom, but he’s not willing to try them himself. Hence, the abducting.” He gestured to the footage of people being shoved inside vehicles.

No one said anything for a whole minute.

“How reliable is this contact.” It was a question, but Batman didn’t bother to make it sound like one.

Red Hood’s shoulders tensed.

“Very reliable,” he gritted.

It was remarkable, Clark thought, how they seemed to have a staring contest when they weren’t even looking at each other. He winced from his chair at Bruce’s other side.

“We can’t remove the League of Assassins from the suspects list just because she told you to,” Batman’s jaw did that violent thing that always made Clark afraid he might break some teeth.

Red Hood turned very slowly to look at Batman. Something dangerous in his body language.

“You have to be kidding me,” he softly said, contradicting the barely contained rage.

“You’re biased.”

Red Hood let a humorless laugh out.

“I’m not the one dragging our family drama into work.”

Green Arrow squirmed in his seat, a few places over.

“I trained you,” Batman said through his teeth, “to be a detective. Your responsibility is to investigate every possibility, more so if one of the suspects is the leader of a terrorist organization.”

“Yeah, well,” Red Hood said, “we can all agree to leave the paranoia and prejudice to you. Some of us need to trust people from time to time so we don’t jump off a cliff.”

“Oh?” Bruce’s voice trembled. Clark had never seen him restrain himself like that when he was this angry. “Is that what you were going for when you killed those other international terrorists?”

There was a blur of movement, a loud clank and a labored breath. Red Hood was standing very still, looking ahead to the door. His heavy chair had fallen to the floor with the violent movement.

The silence was deafening. The League members were holding their breath. Not one of them had ever seen Jason and Bruce going at it. And, from what Clark had heard from Dick and Damian, this wasn’t even among the worst ones. Clark knew there had been guns and knives at one point. Punches and grenades.

Even knowing this, he looked at Jason closely. He noticed the deep and sharp breaths, the fingers at both sides of his legs, twitching for the holsters. Clark knew Diana was about to come between them, but Jason beat her to it.

“You know what?” His tone was casual as he circled the chair and put it upright, as if nothing had ever happened. “You’re completely right. It makes zero sense that I would trust the person who risked her life and position to save my life while my Dad was having a chitchat every other Friday with my murderer.”

He wiped the non-existent dust form his pants. He didn’t look back to see Bruce’s reaction. He looked at Diana, whose eyes were teary and whose lips were pursed. He rested his hand on her shoulder, the lightest touch, and Diana put her strong hand over his and squeezed when he whispered something into her ear. She nodded once.

All of them saw Red Hood walk out the meeting room, shoulders tense and fists clenched, not bothering to close the doors behind him.

“This meeting has concluded,” Diana announced.

There were two seconds of complete stillness, and all of a sudden every member of the League wanted to get out of the room as soon as possible.

“Dinah,” Diana called out, eyeing Bruce. He hadn’t moved since Jason lashed out. “Could you please stay?”

Dinah looked from her, to Bruce, to Clark, somewhere at Bruce’s right, trying to talk to him. She nodded and Diana sighed in relief.

She had a nephew to spar with.

  ᴥ

  It wasn’t until he hit the floor for the fifth time that he spoke. He knew tomorrow he’d be peppered with bruises and scratches. He already felt a bruise forming in his jaw from Diana’s kick.

“Is he okay?” Jason asked, looking at the floor.

He was beyond mad, and yet, the only thing he could think about was Bruce’s stillness. His lack of fire. He’d seen it before. He hated knowing how miserable Bruce was probably feeling after their fight.

“I asked Dinah to stay and help,” Diana said, offering a hand for Jason to get up.

He took it and grimaced at the ache in his ribs. Diana gestured for him to follow her to the bench near the entrance.

“Do you want my advice?” she asked, handing him a bottle of water.

Jason swallowed half of it and sat down next to her.

It was strange, how close they had become since the very first time they met. Jason wasn’t even six when he had started idolizing Wonder Woman. A fierce and strong woman who stood up for the weak. A heroine who could bring an entire army to their knees.

Very early on in life, he knew he wanted to be as strong as her. He wanted to protect women and children and give back to the world everything good his Mom had done for him. Willis said he shouldn’t like a “girl hero” and threw away Jason’s Wonder Woman shirt. His Mom had given it to him for his birthday.

When Bruce took him in, he had been too preoccupied surviving to keep up with whatever his favorite superhero was doing. He’d had other good role models, like Leslie. But when he first saw her in person, almost hiding behind Bruce’s cape, it was like looking at the moon for the first time.

She was so beautiful and unlike anything Jason had imagined. Her muscles could compete with Bruce’s. Her lasso hung from her belt, glowing. And there, on top of her head, she wore the royal tiara. Jason realized he was in the presence of a princess. A warrior princess.

He had gaped and looked at her with wonder when she crouched in front of him, ignoring Bruce’s arched eyebrow. And Jason was so afraid to reach out and touch her, or even speak. She was a goddess.

“And who might this little one be?” she asked with the kindest of smiles.

“This is Robin,” Bruce explained when he remained in stunned silence.

It was the familiar voice what brought him back to his senses, making him talk before he could even regret it.

“The Boy Wonder,” he whispered. In his mind, it was imperative that he stated his other title. He was proud to share even the tiniest thing with her.

“Boy Wonder, huh?” She ruffled his hair. It felt like being blessed by the gods, at the moment. “Seems we already have much in common.”

And she had grabbed his hand, nonchalantly and started asking questions about the cave. Jason had looked back at Bruce, not really believing any of it was true.

It took her a long time to convince him not to call her Princess, or Ma’am, or Miss Prince. But Jason couldn’t wrap his head around calling her just Diana, like everyone else. It was when she took him out for ice cream once that he remembered his Mom’s best friend, who had always given him cookies and smiled when she saw him.

“Can I call you Aunt Diana?” he had asked, almost too shy to speak above a whisper.

It was the first time he saw Diana Prince caught off guard. He had felt anxious, thinking maybe she didn’t like the idea, maybe he had read the situation wrong. But then she had given him a blinding smile which Superman would have been jealous of, and just said:

“Yes. Of course.”

  “When have you ever kept any piece of advice for yourself?” Jason retorted playfully.

“I give you nothing but the best.” She smirked, letting the friendly silence settle down between them. “Be a little patient.”

“It’s hard to be when you have a paranoid bastard throwing all your past mistakes at your face,” he said bitterly. He really had thought they were past all that shit.

What a fool.

“I know,” she squeezed his shoulder, “I’ve worked with him for years. But your control will make you the better man. And you’ll win the arguments without feeling guilty, afterwards.”

He buried his face on his hands and groaned. He hated knowing that she was right. He hated that he knew how Bruce’s mind worked. He hated that he knew, when Bruce asked him for a second chance, that it would not be easy.

“I’m so angry right now.”

“You have the right to be angry.” She commented.

“Not really, though,” he sighed. “I want to be angry because he doesn’t trust my word on Talia. But I know this doesn’t have anything to do with me.”

He brought his fist down, frustrated. Diana hummed.

“Talia kept two of his sons hidden from him. She’s tried to killed people he cares about on multiple occasions.” Diana stated. “It’s going to be a long time before Bruce trusts anything that comes out of her mouth.”

“Yeah, but I know her, D.” He ran his fingers through his curls.

“Maybe,” Diana conceded. “Or maybe you know the parts of her she wants you to know. You vouching for your Mom isn’t going to change the past.”

“She’s not my Mom,” Jason said petulantly.

“She gave you life. In my culture, that makes her your Mother.” She flipped her hair over her shoulder. “But then again, you are just too prone to idolizing women around you.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“It can be,” she looked serious, “if you’re willing to look past all their flaws.”

Jason clenched his teeth, not willing to admit the truth. He knew he’d have to talk to Bruce and set some boundaries, talk things out. He was probably in some dark corner, blaming himself for every catastrophe that happened since his birth. Jason was overwhelmed, realizing how wrong that made him feel. They really were a fucked up family.

“So.” He cleared his throat. “As your nephew, I feel obligated to visit Themyscira sometime. Meet queen Hippolyta. Be trained by badass Amazons. You could brag about how cute I am and everything.”

She stared at him a couple of seconds and burst out laughing. She wiped a tear and smiled.

“You really have a death wish.”

#batfamily #fanfic #jason todd #bruce wayne #diana prince #clark kent #talia al ghul #fanfiction #side blog #writing

[violetsmoak]

Pieces of April [6/?]

AO3 Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21099044/chapters/50202530

Summary: On the anniversary of his death, Jason’s second life takes an abrupt new turn and he’s faced with a challenge that neither Batman nor the All-Caste prepared him for.

Rating: PG-13 (rating may change later)

Warning(s): Past Jason/Isabel, kidfic, minor canon character death (pretty sure you can guess who, not either of our boys!), I’ll add more warnings/tags as I think of them.

Canon-Compliance: Takes place in between the two RHATO series, so after Roy and Kori and before Artemis and Bizarro.

Author’s Note: In which baby gets a name, and Tim is a bit of an arrogant rich boy (and gets called on it).

First Chapter

________________________________________________________________

Technically, they can both leave.

It’s not as if they can take the baby from the hospital until the paternity test results officially come back. Which is probably a good thing, because Jason’s clearly going to need a little more time for all this to settle, judging by the way he’s sitting in front of the baby’s crib. He’s watching her like he’s waiting for a sign this is all hallucination.

If his brain doesn’t move past ‘reaction mode’ soon, there’s going to be a problem.

Especially since the longer they hang around the hospital, the more likely they are to attract attention, baby or not. Someone’s bound to notice Tim Drake-Wayne wandering about, and that’s usually enough to get Vicki Vale’s attention; she’s never really given up on trying to out him as Red Robin, even after a year of moving about on crutches.

Add an apparently secret relationship and baby to the mix...actually, that’s an important point.

“Short-term or long-term, we can’t just keep calling her ‘the baby’,” he points out, once more breaking the heavy silence while firing off a round of texts to his team.

‘Won’t be back for a few days. Maybe a week or so. Bat drama.’

“I’m not naming her,” Jason says immediately. “That’s how you get attached.”

“I think that only applies to pets,” Tim answers dryly. “Besides, legally, you can’t leave the hospital with her unless she has a name.”

“Legally, I’m dead and this whole situation shouldn’t be happening.” Jason scowls, and when Tim raises an eyebrow at him, he huffs in reluctant agreement. “Fine. Any ideas?”

“You’re asking me?”

He tries not to let his amazement show through the surprise. Tim can’t remember the last time—if ever—that Jason has sought his opinion on anything. He wishes this was a topic he knew more about, so he wasn’t floundering for an answer.

He spares a glance at his phone (Cassie has texted back, ‘when isn’t there bat drama?) and then offers, “We could call her…April. Since it’s, you know, April.”

“Fuck no,” is the immediate response. “That’s so cliché I’m ashamed of you. And considering everything I know about you, it takes a lot to do that.”

“Well, it’s nice to see your winning personality is making a comeback. Must be the shock finally wearing off.”

“There’s no wearing off when it comes to this kind of shock.”  

“Well, if you’re able to make snarky comments about name ideas, you’re not in enough shock to—”

He is interrupted by a sudden commotion outside the receiving room. It sounds like the nurse from earlier, arguing with someone—another woman, sounds like—and it’s getting louder and closer.

“—Ma’am, you can’t go in there—”

“Just watch me!”

“—it’s family only—”

“I am family, I don’t care what—”

“—already called security—”

Jason tenses immediately, hand reaching for the sidearm Tim’s been pretending he doesn’t know about, and Tim automatically puts himself between the baby and the door. The infant in question merely shifts and frowns in her sleep but doesn’t wake.

A second later, the door swings open—not hard enough to hit the stopper, thankfully—and an unknown woman enters, tailed by the frustrated looking nurse.

The stranger is petite and young, maybe late twenties or early thirties, and wears a hijab; her eyes are snapping with anger and desperation, fists clenched as she takes in the scene. When her attention falls upon Tim, she appears to startle, the way her ire falters, but it’s back in an instant.

“Why is he permitted to be here?” she demands of the nurse. There’s a hint of an accent in her words, familiar to him only because Damian has a similar way of speaking. She also seems to be overenunciating. “You let a stranger in here just because his family owns the hospital and half the city?”

“That’s really none of your business, ma’am if you could just—”

“No, I can’t just.”

“What’s going on here?” Tim asks coolly, motioning for the nurse to take a step back from the stranger. “And keep it down, the baby’s sleeping.”

Some of the wind is taken from the woman’s sails, eyes flicking to the crib. A fresh flicker of pain pinches her expression, and with an effort she meets Tim’s gaze.

“What’s going on here is that you are not the baby’s father and should not be here,” she replies, quieter but with no less venom. “You barely look old enough to shave, let alone father a child.”

Tim bristles, and there’s a snort that draws their attention, and they look at Jason, who has straightened up and is no longer reaching for his gun. “You’re right about that, at least. Not too sure about everything else.”

The stranger purses her lips, eyes roving over the larger man, and then crosses her arms. “You, however, are exactly her type. You are Jason then.”

What.

“You know me.”

“I know of you. That you existed. Isabel would mention you on occasion.”

Tim perks up at this; finally, they might be able to get some answers.

“You knew Isabel,” Jason says, all his attention on the woman. “Who are you?”

Tim’s already got his phone out, thumb hovering and ready to key in the woman’s information to assess her threat level. She looks like a civilian, but he’s had too many encounters with the League to leave this sort of thing to chance.

“My name is Safiya Amin. I am Isabel’s…I was Isabel’s friend” She swallows as if around a lump in her throat. “I live next door to her. And I’m the one who’s been there for her this whole time. I even drove her here while you, you deadbeat, were nowhere to be found.”

That’s directed at Jason, the woman’s anger returning. However, now that the surprise of her arrival is fading, it’s less intimidating. It has also, seemingly, roused Jason, who is glaring at her and taking a step away from the crib.

“I can’t exactly be around if I don’t know I’m supposed to be,” he snaps back as Tim’s search for the woman’s information starts up. “I’ve known about this for a grand total of two hours.”

The woman—Safiya—seems to have a retort on her tongue, but as his words sink in, she pauses, confused. There’s some rapid thinking going on behind her eyes, and then her lips part in realization.

“She didn’t tell you.”   

“No shit.”

The woman’s shoulders slump. “I told her she needed to tell you. That she shouldn’t be doing this on her own. I can only do so much and she… She told me she had, and that you weren’t interested.” She puts her hand to her forhead as if sensing a headache coming on. “That was five months ago. She refused to tell me the details, and I never brought it up again.”

“Months…” Jason repeats.

Several files are popping up on Tim’s phone screen, everything at a glance seemingly normal. Birth certificates, social security number, high school, and university diplomas.

No immediate threat, then, but it’s only an overview. Enough to get rid of our unwanted audience, at any rate.

“I think we have a lot to discuss,” Tim says politely. He turns to the nurse, and the two security guards that have manifested behind her, and frowns. “Is that completely necessary?”

“We weren’t sure if she meant harm,” one of the men mutters.

“Maybe if you’d taken the time to listen to her,” Tim replies icily. “If someone brings another chair for Ms. Amin, then I might not mention this to HR on my way out. There should be better protocols for this sort of thing, especially in a city like Gotham.”

The three staff members are quick to leave then.

Safiya gives him an unimpressed look. “'Might’? Is that how you run your hospital?”

“Technically it’s not my hospital, we just fund it. But I’ve already sent an email about it,” Tim replies, waving his phone.

“Can we get back to the important stuff?” Jason interjects. “Like how apparently Isabel went out of her way for me to not be involved, but somehow I’m still on the hook for an entire human being?”

As if to remind them that she’s there, the baby gives a piercing whine, her little face grimacing as she smacks her lips. Her eyes are still shut, but Tim’s not sure if that actually means she’s asleep or not.

All Safiya’s prickly demeanor vanishes, replaced with a look of such grief Tim finds himself losing any major doubt about her story.

You can’t fake a look like that.

The woman takes a step forward, and then pauses, glancing at Jason, before grudgingly asking, “Can I…?”

Jason’s eyes dart at Tim like he knows the checking up he’s been doing since Safiya showed up, and Tim nods. No actual threat here.

“Yeah, sure,” Jason says, and they watch her move over and pick up the infant with ease.

I wonder if it’s a woman thing, that they just inherently know how to do that.

Safiya holds the baby with care, and the anger fades from her again; tears well in her eyes now. “She is beautiful.”

Tim will take her word for it; all babies kind of look like wrinkled potatoes to him.

Safiya murmurs quietly to the infant, rocking her in her arms. No doubt she could stay here indefinitely doing that, but they don’t have time for that.

Jason appears to think the same, because he asks, “You were close to Isabel, then.”

“I’ve been friends with Isabel since she moved into the building,” Safiya agrees. “She is—was nice. One of the only people there that doesn’t look at me like I’m about to pull a bomb out of thin air.” She glowers at them as if expecting the same look from Tim or Jason, but when none comes, she continues, “We’re both used to keeping odd hours. Her flights come in at any time of day, and I’m a grad student at Gotham University.”

Tim half expects Safiya to keep hold of the baby as she sits, but something pained flickers across her face and she carefully places the infant back in the crib.

“I was there when she learned she was pregnant—or rather, when her boyfriend walked out because he figured out the child wasn’t his,” she says. “Once Isabel decided she was keeping the baby, I helped her out when I could. It’s a lot of work, getting ready for a baby.” She looks like she wants to glare at Jason again but holds back now that she knows it’s not his fault. “She only ever said you were a former passenger. And that she couldn’t take the stress that came with your lifestyle.” Safiya studies him as if that will give her a clue. “I assumed you were a mobster or something.”

This time it’s Tim who snorts.

That’s actually pretty close to the truth.

“And you still barged in here looking for a fight?” Jason asks.

“There aren’t many things left in life to scare me,” she dismisses, which is a bit puzzling. “I’ve been going with her to her birthing classes, and I drove her here when she went into labor. It happened so fast—she’d been having the false contractions for two days, but we thought that’s all it was. She wasn’t due for another two weeks.”

“Where were you when she…?” Tim trails off.

This time, Safiya does glare.

“I had to park the car. I dropped her off at the Emergency and they took her in a wheelchair. By the time I got back and found my way around this awful maze, she had already delivered. It was so fast…” She clenches her fists. “No one would tell me anything. I found a doctor, but he said there were…there were complications. That Isabel had passed.”

There’s a long beat of silence, grief evident on both Safiya’s face, as well as Jason’s.

“I asked after the baby,” Safiya says eventually. “I wanted to know if she was alright, and they said she was fine. In good health. I wanted to see her, and they said I wasn’t family. I could see her through the glass if I wanted, but that was it. And when I tried to see my friend, to say goodbye to her, they told me I had to wait. That the birth father had been contacted.”

Her eyes snap with anger again.

“Because apparently a man not even in her life has more rights to say what happens to my friend than I do. And every time I tried to speak to someone and explain the situation, they passed me off to someone else. They said someone would speak to me with information eventually, but that was hours ago. Apparently, there’s something about me that makes people nervous.”

Sarcasm drips from her words.

“That’s unacceptable,” Tim says. “I’ll look into it personally. If you can remember the names of the people who spoke to you, I can deal with it right away.”

She looks doubtful about this.

“How did you know we were in here?” Jason asks.

“I was watching her through the window, but then the nurse came and removed her. I heard them say the father was here, and so I followed. But then I saw you,” she concludes, indicating Tim, “and thought something wasn’t right. Why are you here?”

A question I’m still asking myself.

“I’m with him,” Tim replies, electing not to go into detail.

She raises an eyebrow but doesn’t say anything to that.

“You said Isabel was preparing for this,” Jason says. “Was she…did she want to keep the baby?”  

“The baby has a name, you know.”

And that’s news.

“Which is?” Jason prompts.

“Isabel decided on Luisa,” Safiya informs them. “After her mother.”

Tim recalls the name from his earlier perusal of Isabel’s file, and that at least makes sense.

“Luisa,” Jason repeats, staring down at the baby.

“Would you happen to have contact information for her relatives?” Tim asks.

“She has none. No brothers or sisters and her parents died when she was young.”

Which is the same story Jason gave him.

“Of course,” Tim sighs. “Well, at least there’s some good news, she’s not entirely alone if she has you, Ms. Amin.”

“Yeah,” Jason agrees, hope causing him to perk up. “I mean, if you’re here to ask to take her, we could—”

“Hold on a minute,” she interrupts, holding a hand up. “I think you’ve misunderstood my intentions. I’m not—I can’t take her.”

“Why not?” Jason blurts.

“Isn’t that why you’re here?” Tim asks at the same time.

“I’m here to ensure my friend and her daughter are taken care of properly,” Safiya says, aggrieved. “If I could, I would take her in a heartbeat. But I have health conditions which make caring for an infant…difficult.”

“Health conditions,” he repeats, realizing he only skimmed her records quickly. An oversight, it seems. No matter. “Whatever your situation is, I would be willing to pay for help.”

Jason’s nodding along.

Safiya gives them both an unimpressed look. “It’s not about throwing money at the problem, Mr. Wayne. I was diagnosed with Juvenile Huntington’s five years ago.”

Tim’s heart sinks.

“Life expectancy for that is about ten years,” he says faintly.

No wonder she’s not scared of a potential mobster; she’s living with a death sentence.

Safiya nods. “I’ve been lucky, so far. It has not been aggressive and most of the time I’m still able to function. I can still drive, for example, though based on my last assessment I won’t be able to for much longer. But there are days I’m so fatigued, I can’t muster the energy to get out of bed. It’s true—assuming the courts get over their phobia of letting a single woman of color adopt—that I could take care of her, as long as I had help. But in a few years, I won’t be able to. And then there will be a small girl having to bury another mother. I would not wish that on any child.”

Both Jason and Tim flinch at that; they both know what that’s like.

“I told Isabel I would help however I could on my good days,” Safiya continues. “But I can’t commit to anything more than temporary care.”

Damn. There goes that option.

“Do you know anyone in her circle of friends who might do it?”

“She mentioned some friends more than others. I can give you their names and find you their contact information, but to be honest, outside of our friendship, we didn’t move in the same circles. I only just met a few of them when she had her baby shower last month.”

“She had a baby shower,” Jason repeats, strained. “She really was planning for all of this.”

“Yes,” Safiya confirms and then grows sad. “She was not planning for death. I don’t think she even had funeral plans.” She hesitates. “I would like to make sure her body is treated properly, but the staff here…”

“I’ll make sure they don’t give you any more trouble,” Tim promises. “Out of anyone here, you probably know what she’d want more than we would.”

Safiya purses her lips like she’s holding back saying something, and then tilts her head to consider Jason. “What do you intend to do with Luisa?”

Silence hangs heavy in the air.

“That’s the question of the day,” he replies wearily.

Next Chapter

______________________________________________________________

Your feedback matters! I want to know what you think of my story, so feel free to leave kudos, a comment or as many of these emojis as you want and let me know how you feel!

❤️️ = I love this story! 😳 = this was hot! 💐 = thank you for sharing this 🍵 = tea spilled 🍬 = so sweet and fluffy! 🚔 = you’re under arrest! the writing’s too good! 😲 = I NEED THE NEXT CHAPTER 😢 = you got me right in the feels

#jaytim #jaytim fanfiction #babyfic #accidental baby acquistion #enemies to lovers #tim drake #jason todd #baby!todd #original character #angst #drama

[youleftme-clarke]

What are some of your favourite bellarke fics ?

I don’t know about the NSA agent monitoring my computer, but these are some of my favorites.

(As a rule, none of these are smut fics. If you’re looking for smut recs, just ask!)

Wife Pro Tempore, Rated T, 15,070 words

Bellamy’s in kind of a jam. His new department head has been coming on to him and he hasn’t been able to get her to stop, so he’s invented a wife. But now something’s come up and Bellamy needs to produce that wife. Will he be able to persuade Clarke, his roommate and best friend, to help him out?This is one of my new favorites from BSV18. 

The entire Followers series, Rated T, 21,319 words

As acts of rebellion go, Clarke knows that getting a tumblr is both minor and pathetic. But it’s her secret, her own tiny, online space where no one knows she’s Clarke Griffin, Hollywood A-lister. She’s just some nobody with like five followers and opinions no one cares about.

And then she makes a friend.

I’ll always wear the crown that you gave me, Rated G, 26,255 words

It’s later that night, back in their apartment, that she crawls into Octavia’s bed, feeling so sure and so lost, all at the same time.

“I’m in love with your brother,” she says quietly, picking at the corner of one of Octavia’s pillows. Her best friend wraps an arm over her shoulders and tucks her under her chin, and Clarke doesn’t know why, but a few tears slip from her eyes.

Octavia rubs her knuckles across her back, voice quiet and solemn when she says, “Yeah. I know.“

Sometimes Lightning Strikes Twice, Rated M, 2,557 words

It was ridiculous. He didn’t even know this girl’s name. All he knew was that she was pretty, that she was trying her best to be a good sport about being here probably just so her friends had fun, and that she was maybe a little bit shy. Well, and he also knew that every time she looked at him he got flustered and repeatedly messed up the blocking.

It was official. Bellamy Blake, part-time stripper and full-time overthinker, developed a crush on some blonde bride.

OR the Strip Club AU no one asked for, where Bellamy meets Clarke Griffin while working her bachelorette party, and the poor guy doesn’t have the first clue about what to do about it.

In the Skylines up Ahead, Rated T, 19,338 words

He can’t help it, he scowls. “Wow. You know, for some Jiminy Cricket, moral compass bullshit, you’re kind of rude.”

That pulls a sputtering noise out of her, the noise distinctly disbelieving. “You think I’m your conscience?”

Bellamy’s pretty sure that hearing voices in his head is bad enough, let alone the fact that it’s coming from his supposed soulmate. (Or, a bellarke soulmates au, basically.)

Married at First Sight, Rated T, 3,747 words

The concept of the show is this: a panel of experts will pair him with someone, he’ll meet her at the altar, and after a month of living together, being married, they’ll decide on national TV whether they want to stay married or get divorced.

Historically, arranged marriages are a lot more common than love matches. Bellamy kind of thought he knew what to expect out of the whole thing.

He didn’t expect Clarke Griffin.

Just the Fax, Ma'am, Rated T, 4,945 words

Bellamy would not have expected his favorite work relationship to start with someone trying to fax paperwork to his landline, but somehow, here he is, involved some sort of bizarre, retro, fax-based flirtation with one of the new doctors.

Or, You Could Always Google It, Rated T, 16,518 words

**According to AO3, I’ve read this fic 7 times, but I absolutely love it!**

“You know,” Bellamy muses, grin wide and a little conspiratorial, “you’re robbing our legions of fans here. They’re expecting a showdown and you’re being perfectly cordial towards me.”

“Right,” she nods, pursing her lips to keep from smiling. “Well, it’s not too late. I could always pitch that glass of water down your shirt.”

Someone really should have warned Clarke that the first step to becoming internet famous would involve acquiring a nemesis. (Or, Bellarke as rival YouTubers, basically.)

Things We Shouldn’t Do, Rated T, 92,654 words

Clarke is at the bottom of a downward spiral and Bellamy is riding an all-time career high when they’re cast as the leads of Marcus Kane’s newest drama. The entertainment world expects a blowup of immense proportions between the two feuding actors but get a hard to explain romance instead. 

Or: a fake dating celebrities AU.

Look who failed Flirting 101, Rated T, 5,159 words

In Bellamy’s defense, he and Clarke only know each other through their YouTube videos and emails. That’s probably why he didn’t realize she was flirting with him.

More Like The Emperor, Rated G, 4,015 words

Based on the prompt: "you give me a different fake name every time you come into starbucks and I just want to know your real name bc ur cute but here I am scrawling “batman” onto your stupid cappuccino” but Bellamy’s a nerd so Roman emperors instead.

Must Be Love (On the Brain), 3,986 words

Is she grateful for the distraction that is Finn Collins? Sort of.

Does that make her want to punch his teeth in any less?

Hard no.

Or, the one where Clarke Griffin wishes the annoying boy who always sits next to her in class would shut up and let her listen to her professor. Her professor also happens to be really pretty.

The two things are mutually exclusive.

i (love)d you, Rated M, 14,352 words

A relationship that only lasted five months and ended four years ago shouldn’t still be affecting her, but…it wasn’t just any relationship. It wasn’t just any breakup. It wasn’t just any ex.

It was Bellamy.

Knowing Me, Knowing You, 7,213 words

In hindsight, staying in the apartment he shares with his ex probably isn’t the best idea Bellamy’s ever had.

Probably not his worst either, to be fair.

Or, the one where Bellamy and Clarke break up and, instead of moving out, somehow find themselves in a heated prank war.

There’s A Nap For That, Rated G, 6,722 words

Based on that post: “If you both agree to take a nap instead of going out, it’s a date.”Or: The one where Bellamy and Clarke keep taking naps together. You know, platonically. See also: Let Them Rest.

*

“We usually end up on the couch with takeout, unless he cooks. Sometimes we nap.”

“I’m sorry,” Raven interrupts, “sometimes you nap?”

“That’s not weird!”

“Depends on how often sometimes is.”

“Like,” she stops to think, “three times a week, tops.”

Raven looks supremely unimpressed. “I honestly don’t know what to say about this except that you guys are like, whatever the nap version of friends with benefits is.”

Clarke glares halfheartedly. “So like, just friends, you mean?”

Three Months, Rated M, 84,189 words

Clarke moves to the big city for her residency and rents a room from Octavia Blake. What was supposed to be a 3 month rental agreement turns into much more as she makes new friends, struggles to move away from her past, and meets one very grumpy soldier.

internet friends are people too, Rated T, 6108 words

Clarke and Bellamy have been internet friends for years. They just don’t know it.

Or: Clarke and Bellamy are friends on Tumblr but not friends in real life.

Kill Them With Kindness (or something like it), Rated G, 3,814 words

Clarke thought subletting Miller’s room for the summer would be a perfect solution: convenient, affordable, and it comes furnished. Unfortunately, it also comes with his roommate, who for some reason, hates her.

#bellarke #bellarke fanfiction #bellarke fanfic #fic rec #youleftme clarke #Anon

[duhragonball]

In your X-Men read-through, did you read Grant Morrison's run? If so, what did you think? It's actually my favorite run, but it's quite polarizing. In particular, what did you think about "Dr. Sublime" and his true identity?

Oh yeah, I bought his run back when it came out, but I only read the first third of it at the time.    This was around the time I had trouble keeping up with comics I bought, and once I fell out of the habit of reading them as I bought them it became hard to stay caught up.  

Honestly, I think the later half of his run isn’t quite as good as the early stuff with Cassandra Nova.  The X-Corporation franchises and all the school stuff were things that made a lot of sense for the characters to do, but I had trouble buying into them as lasting changes.   In 2002, I could tell this was stuff that later writers would toss aside.   Morrison made a big deal about ditching the costumes in 2001, and then Joss Whedon had Cyclops declare that was a stupid idea and they were going to bring the costumes back.  Meanwhile, the X-Men really don’t look that much different before and after, and the other X-books never dropped the costumes in the first place.   I am somewhat surprised to see the school stuff has apparently carried on into 2018.  It seemed like a pretty radical thing at the time, but now it’s the status quo for the X-Men to have dozens of mutant kids underfoot. 

All the X-Men fans I knew at the time pissed and moaned about Morrison run for some reason or another, but they all hated the last three creative teams that preceded him, so maybe it was a more traditional run than I realized.    Certainly, now that I’ve read the comics that led up to New X-Men #114, it all feels like a pretty smooth transition.  

I think what rubs people the wrong way about Grant Morrison is that he’s pretty good about distilling things down to their essence.   The X-Men, especially at the time, were reliant on tons and tons of lore and soap opera bullshit and callbacks to older stories, etc.   You don’t need that cruft to cover the core themes, but in the 90′s all the writers were comfortable with it, and the fans came to expect it.    Morrison pared the roster down to six and a handful of supporting characters, and managed to pull off the same drama in half the space.   Then he used the rest of the space to fill with hyperbole and explosions. 

Like, to pick on Chuck Austen one more time he had like two or three love triangle deals going on in his run on Uncanny X-Men.   A lot of Lobdell comics would focus on romantic couples being “on the rocks”, while a couple of X-Men would angst about losing their grip on humanity, or not living up to their full potential.  And Professor X would wonder if his plans were really working or not.  That sort of thing, only spread out and repeated across several dozen characters, often referring back to storylines from a decade prior.  

Morrison could cover same ground much more efficiently.   Scott and Jean’s marriage was in trouble.  Beast was worried about becoming more animal than man.   Beak was insecure about his appearance and unimpressive powers.  Emma Frost has a reluctant redemption arc.  He didn’t need to pull in other characters to duplicate those features.  We don’t need Iceman and Angel doing the same arc as Beast and Beak.   We don’t need Rogue and Gambit having love problems in parallel with Scott and Jean.   I think the only reason that sort of thing happened in the Lobdell Era was that they honestly felt like they had to give every X-character some screen time, because they were all so insanely popular.   Morrison was willing to make the tough call, and it wasn’t really that tough, since you could just shunt all the other characters into the other books.

I remember something he said when he was writing Batman, and he explained that he didn’t want to have to many Batman allies running around in his stories, unlike most of the Batman comics of the 2000′s, where the Batfamily became an institution unto itself.  He said the problem with characters like Huntress and Nightwing is that they have to distinguish themselves from Batman in some way, and if there’s too many of them in one place, Batman ends up with no room to stand out.   If Nightwing’s the lighthearted guy, and Huntress is the violent, ethically challenged one, then it makes it harder to depict Batman as light or conflicted when he needs to be.   I think the X-Men had a similar problem.    You have to purge the rolls at some point, not because you don’t like the characters, but just because you have to make room for the characters you want to focus on.  Morrison knew how to do that.   He only used Bishop and Sage in his run when he had a storyline reason for them to get involved.   Other writers would just waste a page reminding the readers that Bishop still lives here, even if he’s not doing anything. 

I will say that one of the things that frustrates me about Morrison work-- and this goes for just about all of his work, not just New X-Men-- is that he’s sometimes too clever for his own good.   I didn’t understand what he was doing with Sublime, and the reveal in the last issue sort of made sense to me, but I still didn’t really understand it until I read the Sublime article on Wikpedia.  If I have to have a third party dumb it down for me, then your story probably needs work.  Morrison doesn’t seem to have much patience for exposition; he’d rather just roll out a big concept and run with it, but big concepts demand a full explanation.   If you can’t get your reader to buy in to your idea, then it doesn’t matter how impressive it is.   But it’s not a dealbreaker.  He’s definitely one of the best X-Men writers of all time, if only because the field is kind of weak as far as I’m concerned...

#ask duhragonball #indecisive-grenadier

[definitelynotaminion]

# 8 for the valentines day prompts - jaytim + dic being overprotective

So, and this is really wild, but I think this might be one of my first JayTim or even Robins things which is, you know, patently absurd? Somehow I don’t write them much at all. Wild.

Anyway, happy late Valentines Day, fam. :D

Confronting both of them at the same time probably wasn’tthe best idea, but it’s not like Dick was thinking with anything like his entire brain once he’d foundout his little brother—little brothers??—were having sex.

On the one hand, hot.

On the other hand, no,brain; not hot.

Jesus.

It’s not like their family needed any more drama. And to make it worse, he wasn’t sure which one he wasgiving the shovel talk to! Especially since he’d confronted them both.

At the same time.

Like an idiot.

It was hard to explain why it was a bad idea for one to be with the other without, you know,disparaging the other to his face.

Fuck.

“I know he’strouble but I don’t care,” Tim said primly, lips drawing tight and eyes slit,full defensive—right as Jason barrels through with, “I fucking know he’strouble but I don’t fucking care!”

He—He’s trouble,nice and vague pronouns, had been his earnest attempt to make them freakingthink about this, about all the reasons why putting your dick—heh—in yourbrother was a bad plan.

Not that Jason and Tim had ever been brothers and thethought hurts.

Not as much as the thought of Jason and Tim fucking eachother. Without him. No, brain! At all.Fucking each other at all.

Okay, so, past his initial shock and continued convictionthat it was going to end in disaster, Dick didn’t actually mind. He just felt like he should. Story of his life, right? Andnow here he was, trying to explain the obvious. I mean, it was obvious, right?

“Tim. Timmy. Timbo. He literallyslit your throat.”

“Jason—you literallyslit his throat. You hate Tim. Hate him.”

“We fucking made up, you giant sack of elephant shit!”

Jason looks not amused, actually, and fuck but Dick had beengenerally on the game plan that they shouldn’t try to alienate the Red Hood any more– than they already had, hemeans, okay, Bruce?—because it was Jason and he was alive and you don’t spit in the face of goddamn miracles.

Fuck.

“Jesus, Dick.” Timsnapped, which went straight to Dick’s—well.

“I hate both of you.” Dick covers his face with his hands.

“Our family doesn’t needthis kind of drama. Don’t you think there was enough drama? We’re kind of thedrama-central, here. Keeping up with the Bats. The real vigilantes of Gotham.”

Tim looked unamused and unimpressed. Jason just snorted.

“Look, B’s got the new fucking kid so he doesn’t care what we get up to. Just let it go,Big Bird.”

“Not on your life, little wing,” Dick responds, pureinstinct, then blanches. All the color leaves his face. Literally. He getsdizzy for a second.

Jason looks shocked, then delighted.

Tim rolls his eyes.

“Yes, go for the lowest hanging fruit, we’re ready.” Hemakes a complicated little flourish that manages to radiate sarcasm. Dick would be proud, but.

“Fuck you, replacement, I didn’t die and come back for thiskind of treatment.”

Tim groans.

Dick wishes Jason would stop joking about his own death,though honestly if anyone had a right to. Was it crass to say he wasn’t there, at the funeral? Because he was,but not really. Jesus. How can you berate your little brother for mocking thegrief when he did, in fact, literally die.

Dick had nightmares sometimes about “I’ve already clawed outof my coffin once, thanks, I’d rather be cremated next time.”

Privately, Dick thinks that next time he’s going to dunk his little brother in the fucking Pithimself, fuck Bruce and fuck everyoneelse, like hell he’s going to let Talia do it first and keep him from them for another threeyears.

“Look, can we just—Can you wait until I’m out of the—No, youknow what? Can we wait until I’m off-planetbefore telling Bruce you’re shacking up?” Dick asks plaintively.

Tim and Jason’s heads both swivel around to look at him,oddly incredulous.

Dick feels an itching stitch of dismay crawling up hisspine.

“You think he doesn’t already know?” Jason snorts, right asTim earnestly deadpans in disbelief: “He’s Batman.”

“I was Batman,”Dick reminds, and ignores Jason’s “Ugh, don’t fucking remind me.”

“You don’t automatically know everything about everyonejust from putting on the suit.”

Tim’s eyebrows have flown up. Both at once, because he neverreally figured out how to raise one without the other drawing taut awkwardly.

“He’s Bruce.”Jason and Tim both say, Jay spitting it out like a curse and Tim like a plea tohigher logic that’s getting ignored.

Dick had come to Gotham for—something. Other than this shit.He’s pretty sure. Now he doesn’t want to go back to the Manor at all. He wonders if he can get away withheading back to New York without Bruce ever knowing, then has his own It’s Batmanmoment, complete with his eleven-year old self’s horrified disbelief and hissixteen year old self’s erstwhile certainty in the man, the myth and theasshole of a legend.

Dick sighed.

“I hate both of you.”

Tim, unexpectedly, laughs.

Jason pecks his boyfriendon the temple and comes over to throw a hand onto Dick’s shoulder.

“Cheer up, Dickiebird. This is what you get for being the good son. Now run on home and deal withthe fallout.”

“I really, reallyhate you right now, Jay.”

Jason snickers, because he’s first and foremost a brat and his miraculous resurrectiondidn’t change that.

Tim smiles, angelic. It looks slightly murderous.

“Actually, I think I’mthe good son.” He pauses. “Brother-fucking aside.”

Jason howls with delighted laughter and Dick moans ingenuine horror.

Dealing with Bruce is going to be awful.

#tim speaks #vday prompts #jaytim #robins #my stuff

[cloppyreads]

So Power Rangers 2017 sucked... which should surprise no one.

The sad part is, it’s not even laughably bad, like the Schumaker Batman movies, or even Dragon Ball Evolution. It’s the kind of bad where it works in some parts, and kind of tricks you into thinking it might be decent, but then rushes through everything that you were hoping for and leaves you disappointed. 

Okay so the first few minutes of the movie are actually really cool, where they show Zordon as a Power Ranger himself banishing Rita who was also a Power Ranger before he dies. And you know what, that actually makes sense. I like that these two beings who were TEN THOUSAND YEARS old in the show actually wielded that power in their previous lives, that’s good expansion to the lore. 

Cut to the five teenagers, who all have no personality past their one-dimensional quirks. We’ve got Jason, the jock who’s destroyed his future as a football star, Billy, who’s a genius with autism (because having a mental disorder is a personality is a character, right?), Kimberly, who is... a girl... Zack, who’s just weird for the sake of being weird, and Trini, who is... also a girl... and weird... and maybe a lesbian?  Look, I’m not saying that the original teenagers of Mighty Morphin had great personalities, but for the most part, the TV show knew we weren’t here for the teenage drama, we were here to watch fights with putty’s, guys in rubber monster suits, and mech fights. This 2 hour movie has basically 1 and 1/2 hours dedicated to showing these teenagers interact with their cardboard personalities until the last 20 minutes before the credits (which we’ll get to in a bit). 

When we actually see Alpha and Zordon, believe it or not, they’re actually pretty intriguing. Alpha kind of has a bit of that spastic personality with a bit of annoyance to it, but it actually feels a bit... human. Like the things he’s saying are thing you could imagine a real person saying (you know, if they were an intergalactic robot who’d been trapped in a spaceship for millions of years). His voice actually sounds like a person instead of squeaky ear rape, and he just seems so excited about everything that’s happening around him.  Zordon is the exact opposite. He’s impatient, demanding and just unimpressed with what’s going on. When the five teenagers show up, he doesn’t think they’re cut out for; he says something along the lines of “How could the coins be entrusted to these... these children?”. And to me, that makes sense; I’d think that a million year old being would definitely doubt that a bunch of teenagers were capable of mastering these cosmic powers and defeating a creature of pure evil that they just don’t understand.  In fact it goes a step further than that. Zordon has so little trust in these kids that it’s revealed he’s only teaching them to morph so he can use the energy to revive himself and defeat Rita on his own. It actually gives Zordon a little bit of depth that he has no faith in these guys at all. Of course it comes full circle when one of them dies, and they say some “blah blah friendship” stuff, and Zordon gets his chance to come back, but uses it to bring the dead ranger to life. Yes, it’s cliche as all hell, but I think it’s a cliche that works well in this instance. 

Speaking of Rita... Rita is awful. When she first shows up, she just acts creepy and weird in a way that’s awkward to watch. She looks less like an evil empress and more like a henchwoman for an empress. The way she chews up golden necklaces just feels like she should be muttering “Yessssss... YESSSSSS... More gold for MASTER! MORE GOLD!” Later in the movie she starts being more articulent (it’s like the scriptwriter got bored with having her be creepy and needed her to talk like a human for plot convenience, or something), but even then it’s not very intriguing. She says some creepy evil stuff, threatens to kill someone if she doesn’t get her way, yadda yadda yadda. Oh, and her big monster she’s trying to resurrect is Goldar. Yup. Big dumb winged henchman of the show is no longer her henchman, it’s her ULTIMATE WEAPON. And when he’s completed, he doesn’t even look like goldar, except that he’s... gold... and has wings. 

Speaking of Rita, the movie decided to pull a bait and switch on me by making me think we’d actually get to see Rita fight. All the rangers surround her in an abandoned warehouse, and the camera swoops around them in that way that gets you hype. Then they start swinging at her, and she knocks them away with her staff, and I actually felt myself getting a little excited, until -- oh, let’s just skip to the part where they’re tied up and defeated, that fight scene lasted five seconds, nobody wants to see fighting! We need more silly teenage drama, that’s what everyone wants!

Alright, so after an hour and a half of this bullshit, they finally learn how to morph, and their suits look pretty neat. Not as good as the show, but I’m willing to be lenient, they look decent for a :modern take”. So after all that crap, maybe this will be like Godzilla 2014 and we’ll get some satisfying action at the end?

Ha ha... no. When they fight the “putty’s” the whole fight feels rushed, like it’s on fast-forward. They show Jason throw a kick and a punch, then switch to Zack throwing a guy over his shoulder, then Kimberly’s doing a spin kick. Then it all ends with Zack summoning his zord and bulldozing all the minions away. I think the whole “fight scene” was over with in less than a minute. 

Zords... look awful. I mean, the CG was good, to the point that they looked pretty real, but the designs were just very messy. The first time they appeared, they actually blended in with the rocks to the point I didn’t recognize they were there at all. When they finally started moving, I actually had to squint my eyes to recognize “wait, that metal mess is a triceratops, I see it now”. They all pretty much fly around and fail to beat Goldar, and it looks like they’re gonna get burned alive in fire, until “something something TEAMWORK” and then a metal hand reaches out of the fire, and the megazord was combined under all that fire to the point we couldn’t watch it combine, seriously, no combining sequence? Fuck you. Also, the megazord just looks like a giant robot power ranger, seriously, just take one of the power rangers and make it into a 20 story robot, and that’s the megazord. Double fuck you. 

The fight with Goldar is disappointingly short. There’s one minute spent with them going “wait, shit how do we work this thing?” and then as soon as they figure it out, they kill him. And then they bitch-slap Rita into outer space, and that’s it. That’s the end. 

There’s also a slew of “how do you do fellow kids?” meme-bait references and trendy songs and slang throughout the movie. I was pretty mad when they played Hand Clap during the training sequence, and they played some Kanye West song during another action scene ( I forget when exactly, maybe the Zord scene? I don’t know, but it took what little hype there was out of it). The part that killed me was after Rita was defeated, and all of the townsfolk were looking at the megazord in awe, the rangers made it do a hip-thrust dance. I just cringed so hard seeing that. Oh, and the actors for Tommy and Kimberly were there among the townsfolk, because OH MY GOSH GUYS EASTER EGGS YOU NERDS LOVE YOUR IN-JOKES WITH THE WINK-WINK AND THE NUDGE-NUDGE XD

I knew this was gonna be bad. I’m not trying to be pompous and say “I told you so” or anything, I’m saying in the sense that I knew it was gonna be bad, and was still disappointed. It wasn’t so bad it was funny (like Terminator Genisys, which I was rolling laughing at). This was just aggravating. I’m sure a year from now I’ll look back at it and laugh with friends over it, but right now, it just feels obnoxious. 

Bottom line, do not pay for a ticket for this movie. They’ve got six sequels lined up, so get the word out about how bad this movie is and make sure they don’t even get to finish filming the second one. I mean if it does happen, whatever, I’m not gonna lose sleep over it, but I feel like it’d be nice if this cringe-fest just got nipped in the bud. 

#power rangers #saban's power rangers #review #rant?

[zhumeimv]

The Weird Jared Leto Joker Situation Just Keeps Getting Stranger

The Weird Jared Leto Joker Situation Just Keeps Getting Stranger

Date: 2019-10-23 01:00:01

[aoa id=’0′][dn_wp_yt_youtube_source type=”101″ id=”EIQEoOGLE2c”][/aoa]

David Ayer would like to be left out of this whole Joker mess, thank you very much.

The Suicide Squad director took to Twitter to defend himself in the wake of a report that Jared Leto’s role as the Joker in Suicide Squad was severely reduced because Ayer was unhappy with his performance. It’s just…

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[delayedcritique]

WORST OF 2016

“Based off the films I have seen this year, here are the ten worst.”

BY COLLIN DE LADE

              Disclaimer: With my limited time and budget this year, I have not had the chance to see every single theatrical release movie in 2016. Many well-known bad movies will not be on my list this year since I did not have the time or money to purposely see every bad movie out there.

10. The Girl on the Train/ The Accountant

              Both films tied for the number ten spot due to the boredom and mediocrity these two movies share. The Emily Blunt thriller tried way too hard to recapture the audience that enjoyed the Ben Affleck drama, Gone Girl, that was released two years prior. Speaking of Ben Affleck, 2016 was not a great year for him with the release of the disappointing Batman v Superman and his attempted at being an action hero with The Accountant. Just like Girl on the Train, The Accountant is a failed attempt at copying the same elements of another popular set of movies. Both films do have their redeeming elements that prevent them from being unwatchable. If it wasn’t for my limitations this year, The Girl on the Train and The Accountant would have simply been two mediocre movies that I would never think about again.

9. Jason Bourne

              Remember how I said The Accountant was trying to imitate another popular set of movies? Well, it was the Bourne series, and the fifth entry, Jason Bourne, is even worse than the Ben Affleck movie. I am not a fan of any of the Bourne movies, but I can at least see in the original three films why people enjoyed it so much. Jason Bourne, on the other hand, is a complete mess. The story was mediocre at best, the action was shot terribly, and it adds absolutely nothing to the series. This was meant to be a triumphant return of the character of Jason Bourne, but now all I wish is that he would go back into hiding.

8. Ride Along 2

              While I don’t consider the three films above terrible movies, the rest of this film are absolute trash. Ride Along 2 doesn’t even deserve to exist. The first film was alright, but I doubt anyone was anticipating the continuation of Kevin Hart and Ice Cube’s characters. The movie was painfully unfunny and it made me question the talents of both leading actors. I completely forgot about this movie until I had to make this list because it didn’t leave any sort of impression on me. Unlike the other comedy on this list that I will discuss, I can’t remember anything about this movie besides that it was a waste of time. What’s even worse than Ride Along 2 is how there’s going to be a Ride Along 3.

7. Gods of Egypt

              Known as the biggest joke of 2016, Gods of Egypt looked terrible from the very first trailer. The effects looked bad and the actors were overacting their asses off. What makes me puts this lower on my list is how much enjoyment I got out of this garbage. Sitting in an empty theater as this train wreck of a film was playing was a bit amusing. Gods of Egypt is terrible in the best way possible. If you ever see this on cable or Netflix, check it out and see just how horrible everyone says it is.

6. Assassin’s Creed

              Why can’t anyone make a half decent video game movie? The effects and the lore are present in Assassin’s Creed, but the poorly written script, the terrible direction, and the awful camerawork makes this film a complete failure in my eyes. If this was the first video game movie to come out, the many flaws might have been forgiven as it looked like the video game and it had mindless action. However, it’s been over thirty years and there hasn’t been one single worthy video game movie to come out. You were meant to be the chosen one Assassin’s Creed; you blew it!

5. The 5th Wave

              I hope The 5th Wave is the last young adult apocalypse movie because that genre is getting old. Just like the Divergent and the Maze Runner movies, The 5th Wave adds nothing new to make it relevant or worth watching. All the acting in it is terrible, the effects are not exciting in the slightest and the story was garbage. I completely forgot about this movie and I will never think about it again after this entry.

4. Independence Day: Resurgence

              I saw Independence Day: Resurgence as a double feature with the first film. I was very impressed with how exciting it was to watch the first one in a theater. I cannot say the same thing about its sequel. While watching the movie, I was trying to have fun with all the goofy and over-the-top action. The second those credits rolled, I started to dislike it more and more as I thought about it more. Like most of the middle entries on this list, I barely remember anything about this movie besides it was very unimpressive. Let’s hope we don’t make this series a trilogy.

3. Brother’s Grimsby

              If this doesn’t ruin Sacha Baron Cohen’s career, then nothing will. This is a complete embarrassment for everyone involved. When the big joke of the film is the two leads stuck inside an elephant’s vagina as its getting raped by another elephant, the filmmakers really need to rethink their decisions. What this film has that the other two doesn’t is how that gross out scene stuck with me throughout the entire year. I really wish I could forget what I saw in that theater, but at least I remembered something about it that I can barely say with the next two entries on this list.  

2. The Legend of Tarzan

              The Legend of Tarzan was so close to being number one on my list. I absolutely hated everything about this movie. The acting was dull to downright terrible, the action was completely cliché and forgettable, and there was zero chemistry between Tarzan and Jane. The only reason this is not number one is because of one scene involving Samuel L. Jackson being face to face with a gorilla. I won’t ruin the joke, but I laughed very hard at that one scene. That one joke saved this movie from being number one on my list.

1. Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

              With every other entry on this list, I can at least say one positive thing. I have nothing good to say about Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. There is not one memorable scene, not one good actor, and it’s a pain to sit through. With a goofy premise like this, it takes itself way to serious. I can’t stand this movie and I hope it is the death of crappy zombie movies.