#endgame critique | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

Visit Blog

Explore Tumblr blogs with no restrictions, modern design and the best experience.

Fun Fact

Average visit duration of Tumblr.com is 10 mins and 25 secs.

exclusivelyirondad · 8 months

Text

"Cap & Tony had to fuck off out of the picture and die (we had to find a convoluted way to kill people who were nowhere near the end of their lives and had much ahead of them even if they did retire in the present--we can't use our imaginations to place them into supporting/activist positions because you're practically useless after you turn 40 and Marvel *is* military propaganda, after all--)"

#mypost #not irondad #endgame critique

20 notes · View notes

afterschoolcrewz · 28 days

Text

the writers have to hate malakai like his ex boyfriend is literally insane and threatening him while also dating and being obsessed with his ex girlfriend that he’s still in love with he can never win

#heartbreak high #heartbreak high spoilers #malakai mitchell #edgy bold font i will protect you #people critiquing malakai for getting pissy with amerie is so funny because if i saw my exgf making out with my exbf i would be mad too!#please please please bring this man back for s3 and give him a nonevil bf as endgame

635 notes · View notes

amarriageoftrueminds · 2 months

Note

hopefully short rant:

I'm tired of pretending that Sam is in any way an interesting character. And I'm not just talking about he consistently spends most of his early pre-CapCrowning appearances in every medium as a mixture of a Magical Negro trope and the wise-crackin' Black BFF trope who says things in a "funny" way at key moments — most of the time the humor is just derived from the Black character suddenly using Ebonics dialects for a white audience and by white writers, which has centuries' of history in racially voyeuristic media tropes, but i digress. — But even Post-CapCrowning, the basis for his character is to bring down existing central characters to make this NPC Sidekick *** seem interesting by comparison like the proverbial Industry Plant, as if that's ever been compelling except to the newcomers who started with the Industry Plant character

And before *** *** savefacers try to insist this isn't true: How come hyping up Sam and his rise to prominence means that Steve gets turned into the backwards fuddy-duddy stuck in his ways old-timer, to the point that they break the rules of time travel to age Steve into a geriatric?

Why did Bucky have to be labeled as culpable/morally damaged/dangerous due to being tortured by Nazis in order to make Sam seem like a more moral and better character and Bucky evil/duplicitous/disposable in need to be put in check by compariso?

Why does Steve get rewritten as someone who somehow made his allies' lives harder and someone with moral deficiencies and a ghost of an inadequate predecessor to make Sam look better/slighted by the former guy?

Why did Bucky get his portrayal changed from the only other old supersoldier who's not only comparable but even strong than Steve and beat him in a fight twice, to a character who's just regular human-strength so that he could get a bunch scenes of being mogged by characters much weaker than Steve, just so that Sam can get a million more wise-crackin' quips about both of them being logged by the same opponent?

Why did both Buck And Steve have, in the movies, their screentime chopped and their storylines effectively cut short/placed in unresolved limbo after still not getting a sequel to the only, rightfully so, critically successful Cap installment whose story left off with a cliffhanger/promise for future development, only to get backburner-ed by half a decade of intrusive crossovers and a pandemic?

To be fair to Sam I guess...🙄.. a lot of these problems would've happened anyways with the combination of 1 · Marvel's refusal to let the story develop beyond circling around thr same Cap flag-wavin' ad nauseum to let Steve and Bucky move beyond that & 2 · a slew or creators in both mediums that all but admit that they hate Buck & Steve and would've/have watered down their characters to hype up a different proverbial industry plant instead. But still… not once but twice these changes keep happening just to hype up Sam and render the other 2 into unrecognizable Flanderizations at best, McGuffins at worst

Why should I have to like him? Even on his own merits, he's a loser, but also his presence exacerbates the aspects of the franchise that negatively affect characters I do like. And beyond that, his entire character on a larger scale is about the historical settler-colonial process to bring about an image of Patriotism for the settler state whilst donning a colonized face. His whole thing rebranding the USA's genocidal imagery with a Black face, the same reason Hollywood drastically over-represents Black cops & military on-screen to push the colonized subjects to sympathize for organizations that systematically engineer their deaths. The same reason why bringing in Sabra is consistent ideologically with the thematic purpose of Sam's character: to launder empire with a familiar face.

His character's purpose as propaganda is meant to target me, but I'm not swayed just on the mere basis of morals & politics, but also just as a character he pisses me off bc detracting/redirecting focus from storylines I was invested in to try to get me to like the character that stole that focus from my investment... that will never work on me, I will always hate on the industry plant character the writers are trying to force me to like, just like I hate on **** *****, duh, and also *********** from ******* ******

ok it wasn't a short rant, but in my defense it sounded only 3 sentences long when I said this to myself out loud

Posting under cut 👇👇👇

the wise-crackin' Black BFF trope who says things in a "funny" way at key moments — most of the time the humor is just derived from the Black character suddenly using Ebonics dialects for a white audience and by white writers

There definitely is a recurrent problem of black characters only being allowed to appear as comedic sidekicks in white-lead movies, which is cast into even starker relief by the comic book movies that simply avoid doing that altogether. (Thinking of the animated Spider-Mans). Even when the MC isn't white... but is lighter skinned? (see: Kevin Hart as the Scrappy-doo to The Rock's- err- Scoob??)

I think CATWS did a pretty good job mitigating those issues with Sam's unique-to-him skillset / intelligence and plot-importance, from the off (admittedly I am biased cuz I love the movie).

Though it would've been further mitigated if they hadn't also had the only other black guy in the movie getting yelled at for not doing enough to stop Nazis.

(Victim-blamey, even if he is the only authority figure available to yell at, which Captain America should always be doing IMO. 😌)

Kind of bizarre to have the confluence in CACW where you suddenly have more black characters than white. But only because the main white heroes have brought their black sidekicks along. 😬

Why couldn't their Spidey have been black, too? 🤔

Hell, why stop at that, switch the genders too! They already have Zendaya onboard!

At the same time there is an opposing problem where black characters are presented in a way that is totally divorced from blackness. As if they're just white people who happen to be black. Like the writers wanted the cache of diversity but only, ugh, a very mild hint of chocolate in an otherwise vanilla concoction.

It can be a delicate balancing act, for a white writer to avoid both these pitfalls- PSYCH. No it's not. Just hire someone who can do their fucking job, Disney. Even, god forbid, hire black writers who can do their job!

Let black characters do and say and reference things white viewers won't understand and don't have to because it's not for them!

(Could even provide a nice teachable moment where Steve could ask about it only to be told to mind his business, and take it good-naturedly?)

🌈Imagine! ✨

I feel like MCU Sam had potential to be a good character, with unique qualities... but we really haven't seen That guy since CATWS, AKA the best Cap movie.

(In fact, it almost feels like they cherry-picked the worst traits of CW Sam, kept only those, and then exaggerated them with each subsequent appearance. It's like they think what made Sam unique was... his wing jetpack. I was genuinely surprised when TFATWS had Sam go and talk to Karli/Flagsmasher, alone... because up until that point they had done absolutely fuck all to portray him as a man with empathy or counselling skills??)

A whole show of Sam where there's no mention of his pararescue experience, losing Riley, disillusionment with the military-industrial complex, medical training... only 2 weak uses of counselling skills...

(One where he espouses fuckin horeshoe theory, and the other where his advice to Bucky is villainizing / victim-blaming, disastrously dangerous, as seen in CW, and comes immediately on the heels of him saying... Bucky shouldn't be looking to other people for input... and yet he keeps talking??)

...Probably something else I've forgotten?

They stripped away 99% of the things that made him non-basic. 🤦‍♀️

TBH I think, a lot of the time, the reason we find a character annoying is because they're being written annoyingly. What we perceive as annoying is actually the weakness of writing working on us. They grate on our nerves without us really being able to put our fingers on why... 🤔 Funnily enough, I was just talking about this re: a female character in my other fandom, Hannibal. Of course, anyone who is conscious of this and actually dares to mention it is labelled a m-🤐-ist by the 'it's not that deep' casuals. Sometimes it feels like people on twitter have an instinctive distrust of cleverness. Very Elon Musk of them…

This can be fixed.

But Disney seems to actively seek out writers who don't understand very basic tenets of writing, and have no familiarity with the characters (and don't intend to acquire any). Since they have no skin in the game, they won't have inconvenient Opinions about how said characters should be properly written, or any power to enforce them.

There's a definite correlation between what you're saying and the way Peggy is written, too, where the writers don't seem to be aware that you can't make a character look competent just by making everyone else around them incompetent.

Or: you can't make a character look like the best person for a job if they are literally the only option in a pool of one (1).

Having Steve only hand over the shield once he's too old to physically carry it himself... is not a compliment.

In the comics, Steve handed it over while still young himself, because Sam was the best guy for the job (not just the only guy), even when Steve himself was still around.

He would even correct people who called him Cap, to point out that Sam is Cap, and he's just Steve Rogers.

Now that's a compliment!

Sidenote: I must point out, Steve definitely wasn't character-assassinated into an old guy (who abandons his entire characterisation), for the purpose of making Sam look good. It was definitely for the purposes of force-feeding us a comphet ending / burying the gayness of Steve and Bucky. But, it definitely feels like they saw Steve's physical incapacity to continue to be Cap as a perk, rather than a problem, when it came to him passing on the shield. (They are bad at their jobs.) The fact that the writers chose not to have young!Steve be the one to hand over the shield. That definitely was a deliberate ignorant snub to Sam. Sadly, Bucky being villainized and treated like shit (by Sam and others) predates tfatws, and was definitely more about making Steve look straight, making the 'has Bucky blown up the Accords??' subplot seem feasible, and making Spider-Man and T'Challa look good. Not about making Sam look better than him. (Which it didn't, anyway, since him being a dick just makes Bucky more sympathetic). Only the nerfing of Bucky in tfatws was about making Sam look good, IMO. And probably about setting Bucky up for whatever rancid clusterfuck of a characterisation they have in store for Thunderbolts. 😖

Villainizing and nerfing Bucky doesn't actually make Sam look better than him (as any halfway competent writer would know.) 'Better than a weakass villain' does not equal 'good.' It just equals 'average'. (Also why bringing Batroc back was pointless.) It's like the anti-Worf Effect.

(So you're saying Sam would only look cool relative to Bucky if Bucky was made drastically worse?? Wow. Okay...)

In fact, if they had portrayed Bucky (and/or Agent Whatsisname) as a person who also has the qualities that could make a good Cap... That, would've made Sam look great; since he was chosen not only over one great guy, but over multiple great guys!

(Ditto with Peggy: introducing multiple great potential female love interests for Steve would make her look good for being chosen. But having no other female characters allowed near Steve when she's around. In fact, not allowing Steve to even mention his own mother as an important figure in his life?? That. Does not.)

Perception is relative, but if you have someone who's a 5 out of 10, you can't make them an 8 just by making someone else a 4.

All that accomplishes is making a 5 who's still a 5 but who now looks very slightly better if the 4 is standing next to them. Which is just pathetic.

Including Isaiah in the way they did also does a massive disservice to both him and Sam.

Firstly, because they erased crucial aspects from Isaiah's story in the comics.

Those weren't just done for no reason -- those were important. (Of course, inept writers wouldn't recognise that!)

It actually was necessary, for example, that comics!Isaiah have mental disability. Because it explained why he wasn't just turned into another Winter Soldier like Bucky, why Hydra didn't re-develop serum decades ago, why Isaiah didn't appear in the public eye post-escape and seek vengeance for himself, etc etc.

It was important!

And, ironically, the very criticisms that the comics came under fire for, which were proven unfounded when the comics did the job properly... have now been proven correct of this version of Isaiah, because the writers erased all the fixes.

(They're like untrained construction workers, ignorantly knocking down internal structures without understanding what the term 'load-bearing' means. 🤦‍♀️)

Secondly... Isaiah's inclusion is a problem because they didn't even adapt that comics run (Truth) properly, but half-assed it in a way that A) makes Isaiah (a main-character) now subordinate in his own story, B) makes Sam subordinate in Isaiah's story, and C) makes Sam look less righteous than comics Steve.

Comics!Steve found out about Isaiah and waged absolute warfare on the people responsible.

But TFATWS Sam didn't get to do that.

(Instead he just. Arranged a statue and got to save a bunch of status-quo-protecting politicians in suits. Oyvey.)

Maybe that will be the plot of the next Cap movie...

But if so, they ought to have introduced Isaiah in Cap 4, and not in TFATWS, because the net result is Sam just Not getting to do the cool and righteous thing that comics!Steve got to do immediately.

Thirdly, how could any other black character compete with Isaiah's story?? It kicks the leg out of any other story that isn't as powerful.

It feels like the writers just wanted to give Isaiah a cool speech. and were so wrapped up in the idea that they could they never stopped to wonder whether they should.

In practise, all they've done is written a Sam-as-Cap show where Sam's first Cap speech isn't even the third best speech of the show. (Isaiah's preemptively blew it out of the water.) And where they've introduced a black Cap, only to immediately introduce a second, much more compelling black Cap.

Way to undermine, guys!

Fourth, they completely erased Faith; a cool black 'hijab-wearing-cuz-fuck-you-post-9/11-America' Muslim character from the comics. She was a professor and the wife of Isaiah, responsible for getting Isaiah free after campaigning for it for decades.

What even was the point of this erasure??

And they replaced her with... nothing. Just a reference to a character type lazily ripped off from the Luke Cage show. 🤦‍♀️

. Sidenote: It was also poor writing to reduce Sam and Isaiah's connection to one, singular, similar dimension of life experience, rather than many. Eg. they were both voluntary soldiers, from the south, both defined by rescuing other soldiers (Sam was pararescue, the-show's version of Isaiah risked it all to rescue soldiers) and protecting others at personal cost as civilians / outside of a warzone (both forced to become fugitives). They have much more to connect on, and that should be recognised, AS WELL AS (not 'instead of') how important being black also is to their experience. That is deeper, intersectional characterisation. Meanwhile, Bucky, literally the only person on earth of the same-ish generation as Isaiah, who was also forcibly injected with superserum by Hydra, and then tortured, by the very same people as Isaiah, and they're both punished / demonized by the state and get no credit for doing the right thing. But none of that connecting trauma is allowed to be acknowledged because Bucky is... white? Victim-blamed? Huh?? On the surface, Isaiah hating Bucky on sight, as a kind of PTSD surrounding whiteness, is a plausible characterisation choice. A prejudice based on conflation of Bucky with his abusers, (both inside and outside of Hydra, personal and institutional) albeit incorrectly, since Hydra are not Bucky's people. It doesn't have to be changed or fixed. Characters don't have to be nice to each other to be good characters. 🙄 But: 1) don't pretend it isn't incorrect, in Bucky's case. 2) It's still ill-conceived. Because it's a very basic, first-step level interpretation of how Isaiah would think. Yes, of course, 'A' black guy of Isaiah's generation could have this kind of whiteness-triggered PTSD response... But Isaiah isn't supposed to be just any old black guy. He's supposed to be Different. Made of Special Stuff. It's the difference between characterising him as being a generic black guy for his generation... or a T'Challa. So he shouldn't act the way just any old black guy would react. Just as Sam, of all people, as a counselor of vets, should be the most likely to empathise with Bucky, not mock or demonize him. So should Isaiah, of all people, be the last to judge a person by their race, because of the horrifying effect that that very thinking has had on him, personally, as an individual, arguably even more than on an ordinary black man of his time. (Here they fall into the plothole of MCU's refusal to overtly portray Hydra as fascistic. Can't acknowledge that that was why they didn't make Isaiah a WS, to 'represent' them... which then opens up the further plot hole of 'so... why didn't they make this non-disabled spare supersoldier a WS??') So IMO Isaiah should've felt connected to both Sam and Bucky (the only other man on earth to survive the exact same thing as him!) because he has so much in common with both of them. It shouldn't have been treated as only an either/or. (And if you meant Isaiah's stance on Bucky as a white-and-therefore-white-privileged man to be seen as based, don't have Bucky pulled off the street by the comically 'harmless' police, ffs. It undermines the assertion that his circumstances are different/better than the black man's, because he's white, if Bucky is immediately experiencing the classic black man's treatment in America. Your obvious 'switching the oppressors around' power fantasy has got you acting stupid, screenwriters... 🤦‍♀️) Btw, what would the writers have done if it was Gabe Jones all this had happened to, instead of Bucky? What would be the basis of Isaiah's hostility, then? 🤔 (Oh, yeah, that's another thing: how are you going to do a story about black Captains America and not even mention Gabriel Jones??)

There is another glaring issue with the way they write Isaiah which is, funnily enough, echoed in how the MCU has written Sam and Steve.

Isaiah said he didn't want to be brought out (i.e. made public) because he'd be dead in a day if Sam did that.

And then Sam just. Ignored that. And did it anyway.

And Isaiah for some reason acted as if he was happy about that, when he specifically warned Sam he didn't want it because it was dangerous to him.

Now he's a footnote in Steve's Captain America exhibit and doesn't even get to be mad about his own story any more cuz Happymontage Ending! ✨🌈🙂

The parallel?

Well, in AOU, Steve specifically said he didn't want the white picket fence life that hetero-conformist Tony (mouthpiece of the writers??) assumes he must want.

(Steve, in fact, never expressed any interest in that life at all in the first place, which makes it absurd that he had to claim to've moved on from wanting it. It's so heteronormative, that it's just treated as a foregone conclusion that Steve must have wanted a suburban apple pie life with 2.5 kids and a dog, when he never said anything about that, anywhere. Instead, his canonical longing has always been for home -- which he always defined as Bucky and New York. Just because Steve belongs to the same Generation that white-fled to the burbs, that doesn't mean Steve is like Them?? (Echoing my thoughts on Isaiah again.) He's not like anyone typical from his own time! That was kinda like... the Point? 🤦‍♀️)

But Endgame just... Ignored that. And did it anyway.

In AOU, Sam specifically told Steve that he wasn't interested in Avenging because that was Steve's world.

And then at the end of the same movie. They just. Ignored that.

And had Sam as an Avenger anyway.

(Why did he change his mind? Did he, in fact, change his mind? Was he happy to be there, or was he a reluctant convert? If he was reluctant, why did he stick with it? How can he take on this new job when he was supposed to be the one chasing up Bucky leads? Does this mean Steve just gave up on that, or took it on himself??)

(Hey writers! There appear to be several fucking scenes missing?)

To me, it feels like they were never really committed to the idea of SamCap and so didn't do their basic due diligence in showing the progression from 'I don't want to be an Avenger' to 'I want to be an Avenger' to 'I would pick up the shield.'

Sam's characterisation on this issue is so inconsistent it makes him look fickle -- first no (AOU), then yes (AOU), then yes (EG), then no (TFATWS).

Which is fine, if they actually fucking address his zig-zagging instead of ignoring it.

(Or, what's worse, simply not knowing about it, since that would require actual familiarity with canon outside of some shitty scenes in CACW.)

Even in TFATWS it seems more like Sam is only picking up the shield to stop a worse person having it, and not because he's enthusiastic about doing the right thing himself, or temperamentally incapable of not doing the right thing (like Steve until EG.)

It echoes CATFA's inept attempts to give Steve a motive that the male writers think makes him more relatable.

(ie. not fighting Fascism because he's enthusiastic about it, but because being 'one of the guys' will finally bag him a girlfriend. Which he must want, right guys?? with a white picket fence?? RIGHT??)

fellas is it gay to want to punch Nazis??

"he pisses me off bc detracting/redirecting focus from storylines I was invested in to try to get me to like the character that stole that focus from my investment..."

That is certainly annoying.

It definitely did feel like CACW was trying to make sure Steve and Bucky were never truly alone together.

(Their reunion is rushed, with no great emotion as it warrants given its importance in the 2nd film, and Sam's voice is constantly intruding over Comms so they have no privacy. Scenes where they are in the same place, Sam (or someone else) is always there too. They're kept physically far apart in the same room (or even in car parks ffs!) while Bucky is excluded from conversation. Sam and Bucky rush off in the same direction during the airport fight, when that makes no sense cuz Bucky is supposed to be trying to flee with Steve, and Sam has already been a dick to him. The only protracted period where Steve and Bucky were alone together ..... they just cut the entire fucking scene out, etc.)

But outside of those instances👆

I don't think it's accurate to describe Sam as stealing a disproportionate focus, from Bucky in particular because:

The same people who brought you Steve's amazing homophobic vomitorium of an ending were never going to let Steve and Bucky be alone together for any length of time, anyway. There was always going to be someone intruding to make sure that never happened.

Sam as Cap was always going to happen. It was always going to be the natural progression of the story as soon as he was introduced in the MCU. WBK.

he's supposed to be the co-lead of TFATWS.

In practise, he didn't actually get much focus?

(And neither did Bucky).

Because other characters did. Ones the writers transparently wanted to write more than him and Bucky. Characters they could be given free reign to write, since Madam Hydra, WalmartCap, and Zemo are new-ish, and/or not particularly precious. So the Execs Upstairs have no reason to interfere about them / and we don't care (much) if Zemo is suddenly a comic relief white supremacist mansplainer. The problem is, they fucked with Sam and Bucky's characterisation as if they, too, were not beloved characters and put them through this creepy 1980s toxic-masculinity locker room homophobia filter. 😬 (Based on said shitty scenes in CACW.)

It's been well-documented that ingrained unconscious prejudice means people will perceive certain groups as taking up more space than they actually do, just because they're present. (IE. 40% women in a crowd is perceived as 75% or sth like that; women are judged to be talking too much because they have spoken at all (measured against silence), whereas men are only deemed to have spoken too much if they've spoken more than other men.) Dislike of any character just Because is valid. But it's also possible that you / we / I / anyone might perceive Sam as taking up more space than he actually does, just because he's taking up... any space at all. 🤔 I guess it wouldn't be possible for me to know...

Really, when it comes to tfatws, it's squabbling over crumbs because neither Sam nor Bucky really got to eat.

Which in turn makes every tiny speck of screen time seem even more precious, and worth jealously guarding. 🤷‍♀️

Ingrained bias aside, Anon, I bet you wouldn't perceive Sam as taking up too much focus if Bucky got a load of focus too.

"Why should I have to like him? "

You shouldn't. You shouldn't have to like any character.

Nothing kills character quicker than a sense of obligation; when you feel as if 'liking X' is a compulsory rule you must obey, enforced by a rabid fandom police. Just because they are, for example, female, when female characters are under-represented and poorly written.

coughPeggycough

Ends up making you feel like you've the lone person in a fandom who must have taken crazy pills not to like X character.

"Even on his own merits, he's a loser."

Okay, that is not canon.

When we meet him he's a good guy: smart, good-natured, empathetic (albeit not to Bucky but logically there are reasons for caution, at least in CATWS.) He has his shit together. Has his own house, has accomplished things in life (see meta here), he has a steady job, helping people, etc., even if he does ditch it pretty quick.

And becoming an Avenger, helping to bring down Hydra, and taking up the mantle of Cap aren't the acts of a loser.

It would be wildly hypocritical of me to like Steve (who did a lot of that) and Bucky (who, also did a lot of similar things to Sam) as much as I do and call Sam a 'loser.'

If you are going to dislike Sam (which is allowed!!) it should be on the basis of what he actually is, and what he actually has done. Not on the basis of headcanons.

(For me, if I'm going to dislike him it'll be for his double standard in how he treats blorbo 99% of his screen time. Not some imaginary traits.)

I do think it would be very easy to write Sam out of this unfortunate rut. *fingers crossed for Cap 4? Like, one scene (lampshading previous writers' ineptitude) of Sam, eg. recognising the fucked up-ness of past behaviour -- even if he didn't apologise for it -- would be so much more complex characterisation. Giving him x negative trait for an actual character-arc reason in order to show him outgrowing it, etc. Better than just keeping him as the 'person who quips about Bucky being a braindead murderer' guy. 😬 As a stucky mono-shipper(?) I usually avoid fics where Sam is a part of the romance. But one of the most impressive fics I can recall re: Sam was one where he was Steve's ex before Bucky. And it actually addressed the fact (!!) that part of Sam's resentment of Bucky was based on jealousy / hurt over being passed over by Steve. 😱 Brilliant! A black sidekick who isn't happy about it?? Immediately fixes some of the problems of that trope! Much more interesting than flat two-dimensional persistent unprovoked dickheaded-ness. When it's Steve who should be apologising for -- perhaps -- unwittingly giving Sam false hope? (Not to mention abandoning him to handle everything, which is so exactly and precisely OOC for Steve that it's hard to believe these writers have seen a single fucking Steve film.🙄) The way Bucky was made to apologise for Steve's behaviour in tfatws... That is a nonsensical, blood-boiling writing choice. The sheer lack of self-awareness in the writers. It was so cringey. Like something Generic White Guy would do in a Key and Peele sketch. (Hmm... Perhaps it was self-aware??)

Also: a character being a loser doesn't mean they're unlikeable.

Look at Luis in Ant-Man. Ex-con with nothing to his name but a van, when we first meet him. Or Ant-Man himself. Ex-con who can't keep a job at Baskin Robbins (those bastards.) Or, shit, even in Cap movies you've got Aaron the Apple Guy! Or Thor in EG! You can't any of those guys of being unlikeable!

And being-likeable does not equal you having to like them.

"His whole thing rebranding the USA's genocidal imagery with a black face, the same reason Hollywood drastically over-represents Black cops & military on-screen to push the colonized subjects to."

I can't speak to the veracity of this in the comics because I haven't read them.

The only thing I can say is that... tfatws does have Sam fighting against the black-run ethically-based Flagmashers (yet another black-progressive villain for Disney) to shield status-quo-protecting white politicians in suits.

Which is antithetical to what Steve's Cap got to be about, even in the MCU, where Steve goes against the authorities in every movie (broke the law in like his third scene, even!)

Outside of one scene in CACW, where Sam correctly deduces that the State will abuse the Accords to lock them up like criminals without trial, he doesn't get to proverbially yell ACAB the way Steve did. 😟

It feels like Disney is too scared of BLM to let him do that, as a black man. That's something only the Killmongers get to do.

In a similar vein, the Sam who grimaced when he asked if Steve misses the 'good' old days... didn't get to be like 'dude, seriously??' when Steve contradicted himself to go and live in the past.

Instead he endorsed it.

So, yeah, you could say that is Disney 'using' a black character to paint a stamp of approval onto, for example, a rigidly comphet / amatonormative conformist ending that annihilates Steve's characterisation by pretending the 1950s (of all times!?) was some kind of Eden.

Pretty insidious... 😬

It reminds me of the way Fury is used as the front-facing black face of SHIELD, and the only authority figure who gets called out for its infiltration by Nazis, despite him immediately taking steps to fix that when he found out.

And when Peggy is right fucking there??

(This interpretation of mine is not canon, but: Fury coming from Huntsville, Alabama -- AKA, Nazi rocket scientist central -- smacks of him being groomed (without his knowledge) to one day take over SHIELD, and be the assumed-trustworthy face of a Fascist organisation. Alongside totally-lesbian second in command Maria Hill.)

But here we bump against the problem of tfatws -- the same problem you often see when people discuss Steve Rogers, without knowing anything about him other than what he looks like.

They see the stars-and-stripes suit, and assume that Steve Therefore must be the physical embodiment of American Imperialism.

But that isn't the case, and never has been.

(It annoyed me beyond belief that the show writers make this same basic casual-fan's comprehension error, banging on about what the shield represents as if it has a problematic history when, no, bitch, AMERICA has a problematic history, that shield's history is that Steve Rogers used it for twatting Nazis on the head.)

In Steve's case, Cap is the representation of what America should be, not what it is. (As I'm forever pointing out: the 'Captain' in 'Captain America' is a verb, not a noun. A doing word.)

Or, as another famous immigrant to America put it:

"America is what you do [ ... ] America is what we choose to make it."

Sam may have been given a speech where he says he believes 'America' can do better... but so far he hasn't actually got to 'do' yet.

But he has been used as a public face for something he shouldn't be seen as representing -- in a way that Steve wasn't made to, and Nick Fury was.

(Because Steve is white, and Nick is black? 🤔 And anything a black characters say is treated as disproportionately more 'political' than when a white character says it. In fact, a white character would be practically Canonized for doing the same basic good thing, and not called out at all for doing a Much Worse bad thing. Again: Peggy. And this is something they could have lampshaded and addressed in the show: by eg. possibly acknowledging that Sam isn't being as leftwing as Steve, because he feels as a black man he cannot afford to / Steve's white privilege let him get away with being radical but being perceived as merely moderate, whereas Sam doesn't have that luxury, etc? 🤔 If they wanted to keep Sam more milquetoast - which, egh, whatever - this is one way they could've done it, better?)

Hopefully all this will change in Cap4, but the inclusion of Sabra doesn't exactly inspire confidence. 😬

(Again: they erased the Muslim wife from Isaiah's story but inserted Sabra for Cap4. Fuck me. Read the room guys??)

Based on what has gone already, I don't think we're ever going to get to see a Hobie Brown-esque 'fuck the police' style Sam-Cap that he ought to have been. 😥

It's a damn shame!

#antisam #antitfatws #tfatws critical #antisambucky #cacw critical #antiendgame #mcu meta #toAyourQ #hey nonny #dat's me #endgame steve is a skrull #mcu #meta #tbh anon this message scared the shit outta me #because ppl are NOT nice when you critique this character #yet each man queues the thing he loves #antipeggy

22 notes · View notes

quenthel · 5 months

Text

like my final bg3 take is that im glad they included earnest weirdo shit in the game (durge, emperor kissy, the torture freak, lz and gale being into sweat, raphael opera moment) bc i was not expecting that kind of shit from a AAA DnD game at all. im glad they at least had that little wiggle room bc everything this high budget gets so fucking sanitized all the time you cant feel the love through it at all. like it could have bene better but also materially i feel like they would not have managed it bc of the pressure of appealing to the widest audience as possible (and most people are normies) so they simply did not have the freedom of a smaller indie project. i was expecting it to be just okay but instead it was pretty good.

#quenthel special #capitalism kills all art including the art of making interesting games but larian somehow managed to sneak some good stuff in #and im glad for it... just wish most of the criticism wasnt fucking stupid #and instead we critiqued them about what actually matters (like how they did wyll's story a bit dirty by endgame or how unpolished act 1 i #despite it being the one that spent the longest time in the game or act 3 having such poor performance #or the rushed ending... yk... )

10 notes · View notes

thewhizzyhead · 2 years

Text

heyo this is your resident rambler bringing you updates from sapphic filipino twitter: darlentina has been featured on the "for sapphics" twitter account twice and both posts are racking up a lot of views and likes. it's been a week filled with a rollercoaster of darlentina content and we're already breaching the international sapphic stage that is the "for sapphics" twitter account. even more clips and shitpost edits outside of that are amassing hundreds of thousands of views. everyone, this is our pinoy queerbaiting era ala supercorp except that through the power of sheer gay spite, we are very rapidly pushing the production crew to a corner in the hopes that international queer pressure will make them drop the dude cop love interest in favor of what could be one of the most revolutionary twists in philippine mainstream media: making darna and valentina, canonical archenemies, the main romantic pairing and partners in crime in fighting against very thinly-veiled allegories to philippine political corruption

#i am all in for this truth be told #like WE ARE MOST PROBABLY HEAVILY QUEERBAITED NOW BUUUUT #tv shows in the ph have changed the endings and the endgame parings before based on what the fans want #so with all of twitter pushing the production team to a corner with international queer fanfare and exposure #alongside the actresses and writers themselves liking and engaging with the darlentina tweets #i believe that there could potentially be a chance that this might actually happen #i mean THEY ALREADY ARE HEAVILY CRITIQUING THE GOVERNMENT AND POLICE FORCE HERE #SO WHAT'S ONE MORE CONTROVERSIAL THING RIGHT? AND IT'S ACTUALLY A GOOD AND REVOLUTIONARY CONTROVERSIAL THING! so pretty please #also in the long run it really wouldn't do well to pursue the love triangle with the cop #because...copaganda...and given how shitty the police force is here...and given that regina (valentina's civillian self) points that out..#yeaaaaaaaa i hope they pull a korrasami #like i'm still being very wary of being queerbaited here because This Is The Philippines And We Don't Get Mainstream Queer Romances #BUT I'M HOPING. ALSO THE PRODUCTION CREW POSTED THEIR OWN CLIPS AND USED THE DARLENTINA SHIP NAME TOO. SO. PRETTY PLEASE.#darna #darna 2022 #darlentina #jane de leon #narda custodio #janella salvador #regina vanguardia #abscbn #philippines

112 notes · View notes

indigosabyss · 2 months

Text

I've looked at Gwen Poole and her powers from a couple of different angles. And with every fic of her, I want to touch on something different regarding her relationship to the fictional world she resides in.

Specifically, with QPR Gwentin Takes On X-Men First Class, I want to talk about the impact specific superhero media had on her in her real life.

Unlike the comics, here she is experiencing a plot she knows beforehand, instead of a world of characters she knows sort of with a whole different path. This is a retread.

Gwen was 18/19 when she was dragged into the comic world in 2016, meaning that X-Men First Class in 2011 was likely the first X-Men movie she saw in theaters. Unless she lied about her age to watch X-Men Origins: Wolverine two years before that. Which. Listen there are better movies to be Your First In-Theater X-Men Movie. But what do I know, I watched Captain Marvel for my first in theater marvel movie.

Either way I want to focus on how she felt then. Her rapidly increasing interest in comics. Her parents' confused support. I want the joy, the excitement, the sparking high of a good movie. To bring it back around to the heroes at the core of it. The happiness she got from them, which she lost herself so completely to.

Because media doesn't mean a lot to us in a vacuum. It is the associations around it that really make it meaningful. And I want to highlight that for Gwen.

#obvs theres the escapism and the power fantasies and the all around awesome #but fandom has been a big part of my life for the past four five years #and im assuming for gwen its been an even bigger part #and superhero media has defined major parts of my life and changed how i think of it #teen titans was how i learnt to pirate shows #my sister came w me to watch captain marvel and that's why i still remember it #avengers endgame was the last movie i saw at my at-the-time best friend's house #I remember a booktuber critiquing i think that Edward POV of twilight?#where Meyers wrote long lists about what Bella liked to combat her lack of personality #and they said smth like 'saying what someone likes isn't as important as explaining WHY they like it'#and i think no one has really done that w gwen #she's a fan. that's her thing. we don't need a why for it. except i DO #gwen poole #gwenpool #x men first class

6 notes · View notes

alltingfinns · 2 years

Text

I think I’ve cracked the code of what makes a Marvel Cinematic villain interesting or annoying.

Very oversimplified there are two extreme directions you can take a villain. Either they’re so sympathetic that they become a tragic hero of their own story, or they’re just unapologetically evil and hamming it up.

The Marvel Cinematic universe’s best villains have been one of either extremes. Prime examples are Erik Killmonger (hero in his own story) and Hela (evilly hamming it up all over the stage). These villains are interesting because they either compel us to reconsider the morality of the story or simply entertain us.

One may be more highbrow than the other, but both are generally memorable and interesting, and will work very well in elevating the right type of story. (Killmonger’s role greatly deepened the character of T’Challa, who otherwise would have come off as a bit too perfect in his own movie. Giving him doubts and new matters to consider. Hela played a similar role of lifting up the sins of the father, but she also showed how bad things get when someone of her power doesn’t give a shit, contrasting both Thor’s royal responsibilities and Bruce’s concern with Hulk.)

Then there are the forgettable villains that fall somewhere between the extremes, they’re neither really made to be sympathetic nor allowed to go overboard. They’re there to antagonize the protagonist, and as far as that is concerned, they can do a pretty decent job.

But the real problem, the villains that are memorable for all the wrong reasons, is trying to put both extremes into one character.

Thanos is the absolute prime example of this.

He is simultaneously “Ahahaha! Look at my evilness and despair!” while also made out to be the “hero” of his own story.

Several beats in Avengers Infinity War make it clear that we are supposed to sympathize with him. That we are supposed to think that he’s “only doing what he thinks is best” and that we only disagree because of a different moral view on the sanctity of life.

First and foremost; no.

His whole deal about population control falls apart even in his own argumentation. But that’s beside the point.

Because they still intersperse it with hammy villainy.

The most glaring dissonance coming when he “sacrifices” Gamora. Because in just a few scenes earlier, he had been pushing Peter Quill to kill her. While roughly holding her head in his hand.

It doesn’t matter if the reality stone kept her safe. He was still demonstrating a huge disregard for her safety and well-being, only keeping her alive for the info she had.

The “sacrifice” felt empty because we had no real reason to think he really loved her, in a twisted way or not.

Because they wanted him to be as villainy as possible, as he destroyed their hopes of stopping him.

So you get a character for which there is no consistent thread of emotional investment for the audience.

Are we supposed to hate him? Understand him? Want to bonk sense in him? Should we bask in his success or in his potential downfall? Are we supposed to think he’s right “from a certain point of view”? Or that he’s wrong not just morally, but like logistically.

(Not to get into it since it’s tangential to my point, but: if you can divide a populace into rich and poor people, is it really the whole population’s fault that resources are dwindling? Maybe try redistributing the wealth first, you fucking Malthusian genocidal asshole! Also why half? What arbitrary mathematics lead to 50% being the perfect “balance” of population?)

In short:

Sympathetic villains = good

Evil villains = good

Neither = meh

Both = stop, no! Please don’t.

#marvel #media critique #anti thanos #marvel cinematic universe #anti avengers endgame #avengers endgame #erik killmonger #marvel meta

14 notes · View notes

exclusivelyirondad · 6 months

Text

People who are like us wouldn't have abandoned this universe. People like us LOVE to circle back to things, revisit them. But for people like us, needlessly killing off a longstanding, beloved character is also emotional annihilation, and severs our ability to connect with that world. Marvel shot itself in the foot when it presumed it could thrive the way it used to without us.

#there's no functional difference at present bt MCU & DCEU--the former is directionless and untethered #not irondad #endgame critique #mypost

9 notes · View notes

aparticularbandit · 9 months

Note

What do you think would differ in the climax to CACW if everyone on Team Cap made it to Siberia with Steve and Bucky? As in, what if Sam, Clint, Scott and Wanda were in Siberia with Steve and Bucky instead of locked up in the Raft?

*It has been a while since I've seen this movie, so I did check plot summaries to make sure what I thought was correct. I don't tend to see MCU stuff more than once because, for me, at least, I just. don't like them that much. (Sometimes I go back to fact check stuff for fanfic, but like. probably not as often as I should, tbh.)

Well.

For the rest of Team Cap to be there, that assumes one of two things: 1) that they so completely defeated Team Iron Man that they all got to Siberia unimpeded or 2) Team Iron Man didn't make it to the airport in time to stop them (for any variety of reasons, which I don't want to get into because not necessary).

In either case, it assumes the rest of Team Iron Man chases after them, unless they got so beaten they couldn't follow for whatever reason, so like. let's be real, Disney doesn't want to pay that much money to do TWO mega battles, but we're having fun thinking things through here, etc. etc.

The first case means Team Cap doesn't get there quickly enough to save the Super Soldiers. The second supposes maybe they do. It also supposes that Tony doesn't end up finding out that Zemo framed Bucky (which he did post-airport fight. according to my plot summaries. because why would he have fought them in the first place if he'd known that. so).

We could go a really unfun route and assume that Tony and Team Iron Man see Steve and Bucky releasing the other Super Soldiers for rehabilitation purposes and battle over it, but I don't think Vis would go with that - and I honestly don't think Tony would go for that at this point either, which would really just lead to whether or not they listen to Steve and Bucky about Zemo - which. T'Challa is the one most likely to not listen at this point because revenge is his bag in this movie, but Vis could do some searching - or maybe did on the flight over - to figure things out. At which point, Wakanda would probably take Zemo and the Super Soldiers maybe, but you lose the whole punch Zemo wanted of Bucky killing Tony's parents and the betrayal of Steve knowing, which is really the crux of that last battle.

So I guess they wouldn't have much of a battle here, but it doesn't feel like a climax the way it should and would be not great story telling, if I'm honest. Also means this option - option two - would have no big battle between the two sides at all, unless we suppose the Super Soldiers activate immediately for whatever reason - maybe Zemo barks out the codes while the others are arguing - and then they fight them, but like. then you can get the shot from Tony in about this is why you wait and get all the info first with a quip back from Steve about how they hadn't been doing that in the first place - and it still doesn't feel like what the audience is paying for, which is the big fight between the two sides.

BUT if we're going more far-reaching consequences, they're all still together when Infinity War comes around, instead of scattered because half of them are fugitives, which would probably have helped with the whole Thanos thing. (Because Vis wouldn't have been offline! But then you don't have Vis clearly wanting to choose Wanda, the fugitive, over what he's supposed to be doing - and you also lose that he's still aiding and abetting a fugitive - like, you lose some of the weight of his decisions in their relationship because there would be no reason to be keeping their relationship secret, etc. etc. BUT also if they were all together, maybe he would have made it to Wakanda earlier and gotten the Mind Stone removed from him, so maybe he would have survived that, even though he likely wouldn't have survived the Snap. But that's me spitballing.)

Option One assumes that things progress more similarly to the movie, only Tony can't find out about Siberia from Sam because Sam's, you know, gone, so Vis would maybe have to try to track them, which means Vis at least would be with him (maybe), and like. at that point, even with the reveal about Bucky killing Tony's parents, there are too many people who could restrain him from that.

But you'd also have four people who have lived through their family being killed for no reason as a result of someone else in the room - Wanda, Zemo, T'Challa, and now Tony - so there's a possibility when it gets personal like that that Wanda, understanding where Tony is, might understand his desire for revenge and immediate want to kill Bucky, but like.

Again, you lose a lot of the weight of the moment. It's possible that Tony splits from the Avengers as a result of everything but that the rest of them continue as they had been, so you still have some semblance of a split while Tony mentally goes through some stuff, but that's different than the scattering we see at the end of canon. I still see his arc playing out roughly the same in Infinity Game, but you might get the added benefit of maybe Vis still gets to Wakanda early enough to not die - a lot of the Vis/Wanda differences you see as a long effect of Option Two would likely still play out here.

#musings #breckstonevailskier #bandit answers questions #mcu #cacw #me spitballing here #not super theorizing #just general ideas #i'm not huge into analyzing and critiquing the mcu for the most part #because i do not have that depth of knowledge of everything #and mostly i just don't care #unless i get really interested and invested in something for fanfic reasons #but the mcu didn’t get me interested in writing fanfic until dsmom #so like #i'm very focused on that and wandavision in terms of things i actually wanted for fanfic purposes #-shrugs-#...well also a bit of the first doctor strange movie for the ancient one #and their appearance in endgame #but that's. different.

1 note · View note

apas-95 · 5 months

Text

honestly for as radical as 'how to blow up a pipeline' is it really cannot conceive of organised action.

the arguments the characters have are arguments between incrementalism and adventurism, and every time a character says 'this might be impressive and flashy but it doesn't actually do anything' the only rebuttal they have is the propaganda of the deed; of a never-before-seen type of spontaneous mass action spurred on by people Seeing That It's Possible. ultimately both sides are making arguments that are 'within the system' - the stated endgame for the activists is that widespread terrorism makes specifically petroleum unappealing to the capitalist market. that is as much of a solution as the mythological reform is, and is ultimately underpinned by the exact logic of 'raising awareness' as the positions they critique - positions they critique specifically for their *speed*, not for the fact that they are impossible.

the driver of climate destruction is capitalism, not any given resource. without a support network; without connections to the labour movement which can exert ultimate power, and bring the economy to a halt unless its demands are met; without a fighting organisation built from the support of the people; without bail funds and legal support; the only hope is that you can Make A Statement when you get imprisoned, and that, with no support from the outside, nobody ever talks.

if you want to destroy a system, then follow the example of the millions who have succeeded at that before you, learn from their experiences, and build a movement that creates guerrillas and victorious revolutionaries, instead of martyring lone terrorists

513 notes · View notes

redrosesandraindrops · 2 years

Text

Saw someone try to defend the original Disney princesses (the ones from Walt's time, basically) by pointing out supposed double standards between the way fans praise the newer ones and critique the older ones.

And one of their examples was people praising Tiana for being a GirlBoss™️ with her own cooking business, but shunning Snow White for cooking and doing housework for the dwarves.

Like...you really don't see the difference between those two situations? lol

#i like the older princesses but in some ways they are products of their time #looking thru that person's blog and reading their critiques of newer heroines #they come off like they think people are too mean to traditionally fem heroines #as well as disliking newer heroines for...not being as girly or not having an endgame relationship #and describing the latter as 'nlogs' for that 🙄#rrard speaks

1 note · View note

bonefall · 5 months

Note

while i do agree with the sentiment that bloodclan should be more nuanced as an entity i still believe it is wrong to portray them as the necessary "response" to clan injustice (haven't read the books in years but i am pretty sure that bloodclan started with no connection to the clans) / an opposition to the clan's flaws. some of the thing scourge did was out of selfishness and bloodclan isn't the other colour of the black and white debacle with the clans. the clans are heavily flawed yes, but it isn't realistic to completely say that their structure had no redeeming qualities altogether and that all outsider groups is fundamentally better than the clans.

all clans and groups are flawed in their own way and i believe we shouldnt brush past the things that other groups (the sisters and what they do with their toms *cough cough*) did solely to be able to degrade the clans and their culture.

Buddy, you're setting up a strawman. I promise you that if you look into the reduxes I've made of BloodClan, Guardians, The Sisters, and the Tribe, you will see that I don't make any of them a "flawless" alternative to Clan life.

Nor do I say that the Clans have no redeeming qualities. In fact, you can browse the "Clan Culture" tag to see the various expansions I've made to show how these traditions, values, and technological advances make Clan life so alluring.

The overarching theme of BB is that the nature of culture is change. For better AND for worse.

With respect, I think there's something insidious in the wording of "the things the other groups did." We're talking about fan responses to a work that consistently demonizes and degrades foreigners to make the Clans look like the "best way to live," justifying xenophobia. These are not real groups, they are writing choices.

In the franchise with some pretty extreme examples of misogyny, the authors said "What if bizarro world where women rule and have no men... woag..." and only includes a single Clan-alligned member of this culture, with a BAD opinion of them, who can't even do his diplomatic job because he HATES them so much.

In the same franchise that shows Fireheart getting bullied, facing prejudice, and fighting a murderous tyrant who publically executes a mixed-race character, their endgame villain is an outsider, like him, but this one IS a godless heathen who HATES love and friendship and banned families.

In the VERY same franchise which made its first non-malicious group barely able to get through an arc without needing to be saved by Clan cats, totally unable to defend themselves, framed as "whiny" for not wanting their clearly 'inferior' culture to be forcefully changed.

And I'm re-stating all this because, again, no offense to you in particular Anon, but I've been seeing a few people with a sentiment like yours lately. Complaints into a vacuum that don't make targeted critique of anyone's fanworks, gesturing at this broad "woobification" which is apparently out there somewhere over the rainbow, saying things like "well Scourge is selfish" or "well Moonlight abandoned her 13 year old" as if we haven't BEEN knew.

As if we're not all directly responding to these choices. As if I haven't written ESSAYS on this topic.

Since this was about BloodClan in particular though, and you admit you haven't read the books in years, please go back and actually read Rise of Scourge before trying to make critique of the ways fanon rewrites its origin. It's EXPLICITLY a response to the Clans, in the text, that the Erins wrote, it is canon that fanon is working with.

And you want people to take that out and approach it a different way... why? Because it's so incredulous to you that a nation forms in response to a threatening neighbor? That a common enemy through invasions is a way that people might choose to unite, and encourage their new culture to value brutality? Because you don't like the idea of Clan Culture's XENOPHOBIC BATTLE CULTURE affecting surrounding communities??

Could YOU, maybe, be doing this "woobification" thing I keep hearing about? Can I play this stupid game too? What's our stupid prize? Can it be a lollipop? Do we get stickers

TL;DR, ok.

#bone babble #Warrior cats analysis #Warrior cats fanon #Bloodclan #''Ok yes scourge is practically cold war era xenophobic stereotypes and i understand that is a part of canon you dont like.''#''But have you considered. Hes mean''#Yes. Yes i have considered it.#If I get another take like this in my inbox im gojng to fucjing add a scene where he kisses babies and looks at the screen and says #'Mmm wowow thank u for the babygirl juice fire star :)'#JUST to annoy them #People gonna be funny to me? Im about to be Hilarious.#Also ANON just to be clear im annoyed because like. Ive been seeing this around.#Sadly today you are the Genocide Frisk to my Angry Sans u.u #I am taking ur ask and turning it blue and smashing it against walls #Man it would be cool to have bone themed powers... i am a bone guy...#But anon you're fine. Just like. Think about what I said ok?

187 notes · View notes

bylrlve · 3 months

Text

Warning! Potential spoilers for Stranger Things 5!

To recap, Alex received this dm on 13/2/23, seemingly confirming mileven breakup

She received this message on that day, which states that mileven are still together and happy. However it’s also instantly debunkable bc they’re absolutely not going to do the Hopper-Mike feud bs again. That is beyond clear.

On this past Tuesday, 20/2/23, she received a second message outright stating Mileven breakup.

Finally, on Wednesday, 21/2/23, she received this message full of pretty plausible statements, with mileven breakup included as fact. Interesting.

This person claims it’s all fake, with no rationale or alt info - what, is Will not important now?

Worth noting: Millie is currently doing promo for Damsels, so she’ll be out of commission re: filming for a few weeks. Early March is probably when she’ll come back, but Finn will be be busy with his Ghosbusters 2 promo.

Two conclusions:

1.) there will be no mileven scenes filmed for a few weeks. Filming schedules are very tightly planned to accommodate other actor commitments, so it doesn��t seem like this posed a massive issue. Hm.

2,) Millie will likely be doing any scenes she has with Sadie and Caleb, aka Max and Lucas, when she gets back. As this message says.

This person is probably just smart and well-informed enough to figure this out, but it’s interesting.

There has been some very intriguing activity on a stranger things set a few days ago - red UD ligthing, castle Byers.., and Will Byers. Will’s plotline for season 5 seriously looks like everything us Will stans have been dreaming of in terms of plot relevance, emotional catharsis, etc. This pic dropped yesterday, and the spoiler acc seems to have confirmed it’s Will:

Lastly,this also dropped today:

(Credit to @1987byler on twt)

Very strange framework, here. If the goal is to set up Will being rejected gently by Mike, but understood and accepted, why not focus on that? Why not have Vecna say ‘you’re afraid he’ll be disgusted by you. You’re afraid he’ll see you as the disgusting, broken boy you are’ or something like that? Elsewhere in the game, it’s being reported by players that Will is being taunted about how his friends are all ignoring him, and how Max fits into the group better than he does. This is canonically a sore spot for him - not so much the Max part, but the general point. So why not emphasise his fear of Mike’s rejection, rather than his hurt at Mike picking El over him?

Maybe because, if this is carried into s5 and we get scenes of Vecna taunting Will about Mike choosing El, it’ll be certain that Mike will indeed pick Will. Maybe this is a means of hinting that?

(Side note: at this point in the time line, El was really just a concept to Will. The one time he met her, it was for barely a minute as a delirious, dying child. By s4, it’s very clear that they’re close and loving. I’ll hear no critique of him for apparently not wanting her to come back - it’s very obviously Vecna twisting things, as he did with Max in s4 to make it seem like she actively wanted to murder Billy.)

Also worth noting: the best Mike can say about the girl he supposedly loved at first sight, after a whole week with her, is that she’s ‘cool’, ‘different’, ‘awesome’. Very lacklustre. Compare to how Lucas would describe the comatose max to a newcomer in s4.

Finally: Will quite literally utilises a never-seen memory of Mike and him in Castle Byers as his happy menory, his safe place. You know,like the Snow Ball and those other memories of good times with Lucas that Max clung to in s4?

Credit to @will80sbyers

This post by @nebulousfishgills reports Vecna saying that Will is ‘the key’, manipulating Will’s memories, and directly saying “You’ll finally matter to someone, Will.” Byler kind of has to be endgame, right? For this to make any sense as a narrative? ‘We can still be friends’ won’t cut it, not if, as the messages Alex is getting make out, Will is still so achingly in love post-time jump that he’s staying by Mike’s hospital bed after everyone else leaves and kissing his forehead (a). Not if they’re still emphasising that Mike is his safe place, his home, his light, in (technically) pre-season five promotional material.

All of this is… interesting, to say the least.

I’ll leave off by sharing the posts made by the wonderful @solgmorell on the set leak (x) and the VR byler stuff (x, y).

(a)

ETA: two of the previous dms Alex has gotten state that Will struggles with his friendships with the other party member this season due to being closeted. This game touches heavily on Will’s feeling disconnected from his friends, at least partly bc of his sexuality…. One is above, the other is here:

#byler #mike wheeler #el and mike #stranger things season 5 leaks #st5 leaks #look away if you want to stay a spoiler Virgin #will byers #is slaying #noah schnapp

90 notes · View notes

Last Seen Blogs

arqdecor

ArqDecor.Shop

orsonzedd

Orson Zedd

heediberry

groundzero.

soulinkpoetry

My Soul’s Ink

happygirlare