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maxwell-grant · 3 years

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You are your top 5 Shadow agents

I don’t talk about the Agents as much as I should, even though I constantly try to stress their importance, because I’m working on essays for them individually. To be honest, I think about the Agents practically every day to the point I have a hard time separating my headcanons from the actual canon material, but I have to stay true to it, and the lack of material regarding them means that the only way I can truly talk about their characterization is by diving deep into the novels and taking notes, which I don’t have much time to do, and then finding the right books or moments to talk about, which is even more difficult.

This by no means constitutes my big thinkpiece on them, but it’s a start, and ultimately narrowing it down was a lot harder than I expected. This order is by no means final, if you asked me this question next week or next month I’d probably have a different answer, but it’s the 5 that I find myself thinking on the most.

Honorable mentions: Jericho Druke and Myra Reldon, who are incredibly awesome characters conceptually and who have great moments each, and whom I definitely think deserve big turns on the spotlight if the Agents ever get put on the spotlight again, but are held back by issues with their presentation and lack of prominence. Margo Lane, whom only just narrowly missed the cut because, as much as I like her and think she gets an underseved bad rep and definitely has great things going for her, I sadly have to concede isn’t as consistently great or well-written as she should be. Clyde Burke, whom I definitely like a lot based on what I’ve read and consider an integral part of the line-up, but haven’t read enough of the novels he’s in to really solidify him as one of my favorites just yet. And Slade Farrow, who is a bit too complicated to talk about superficially.

Allright, so here they are

Number 5: Burbank

As the center of all communications within The Shadow’s network and the only character in the series who is even more mysterious and elusive than The Shadow himself, Burbank is fascinating and the kind of character who simultaneously seems to be both begging for an in-depth exploration and yet who also should be dead last on the list of mysteries about the series we want spoiled, because nobody wants the mystery ruined. He’s a bit of cipher personality-wise compared to the other agents, but he kind of has to be, and I think it helps to illustrate the many forms the agents of The Shadow can and should take, that one of them is this total mystery whom we know nothing about and yet is so vital to the whole thing. And it’s interesting also because, for all the many variations we’ve had on The Shadow’s life and thoughts and feelings and etc over the years, Burbank has stayed more or less the same. Whatever variations he’s had in design aside, Burbank just is.

The pulps did often have moments where we would get to see moments that told us a little more about Burbank, gestures he did, capabilities he had and didn’t have, little details Gibson would sprinkle in to keep people fascinated. Several scenes with Burbank are almost presented like you’re watching a movie, in the way Gibson keeps describing his face being mysteriously blocked from view by objects or lighting, like not even in your mind you are supposed to know what he is. And it’s all the more fascinating because, unlike The Shadow, as far as we know, Burbank is just some guy who’s good with tech, who was only recruited in the 2nd story but apparently knows The Shadow from before it, and whom The Shadow entrusted with virtually every secret necessary to keep his operations running.

It’s kind of a sign as to how utterly neglected the agents are that, to this day, few writers who’ve ever touched The Shadow has ever come close to giving us any sort of explanation or backstory or anything on Burbank, and I refuse to believe these people had that much self-control. Of course I have my own ideas for Burbank, but even I would hesitate to put them on a story, because Burbank epitomizes that double-edged sword that comes with a solid narrative mystery. Burbank just is, and hopefully he will stay that way.

Number 4: Dr Roy Tam

Mention of Dr. Tam meant much to Sayre. He was acquainted with Roy Tam, the Chinese physician. He knew that Tam was a power in Chinatown; one who worked for good

Unrolling a map, Tam showed the entire Manhattan area, studded with tiny dots in districts quite remote from Chinatown.

"These represent my outposts," he said soberly. "They are places, owned by Chinese - restaurants, laundries, curio shops, other places of business. In each of these places, I have a friend."

The Shadow understood. Dr. Tam was the motivating factor among the Chinese who adapted themselves to American ways. His mission was to create good will among races, to put an end to prejudice and superstition.

A newer and more sober spirit had replaced the old and dangerous festivities. Feuds in Chinatown were a thing of the forgotten past. Dr. Tam and his associates had done much to bring about the present sentiment; but there were persons - even among that group - who felt regret at the passing of old traditions.

Dr Tam is a remarkably layered character for one that only appears in about ten stories, and he’s one of the agents I’m most eager to discuss in-depth. He’s another one of those agents that Gibson introduced by tricking you into seeing him as a villain, as a Yellow Peril cliche, until he is revealed to be in fact a good man. Not just good, Roy Tam is presented as a powerful, influential and cunning Chinese man with a lot of assistants secretly working for him, and who is consistently presented as a progressive, pacifistic, benevolent civic leader and ally, even friend, of The Shadow.

Tam is very much westernized and the stories paint that mostly as a good thing, and this is one of the areas that I think could very much result in an interesting story that looks at the ramifications of his role, because of course not everyone is going to agree with his viewpoints, of course him being an advocate against superstition and tradition isn’t necessarily a good thing (and it’s not how Yat Soon, The Shadow’s other major Chinese ally, works, which puts the two at odds), and of course it’s a complicated situation, but the fact that Tam invites this kind of debate at all I think is something very interesting

Largely because of the movie, Dr Tam is one of the few agents of The Shadow who’s managed to sustain appearences in modern stories, and none of them have ever really went with his original angle as a powerful civic leader. Instead he’s been largely painted as either a scientist, like in the movie, a general practitioner, and a psychiatrist, and his age has been all over the board.

I prefer him in his original form but I also very much like the idea of Roy Tam being, like the Chinese supervillains he was created to be a subversion of, an incredible genius who’s got skills in all fields that can fit under the “Dr” part of his job and is also an incredibly capable leader able to unify splintered communities under a cause of unity and cooperation, someone who absolutely could be the adventuring genius so many other pulp heroes are, except he dedicates himself wholesale to his community and the fight against prejudice and the betterment of lives, even if he’s misguided or wrong at some of the causes he takes up. I really think this character could partake in really great stories if ever brought back.

Number 3: Cliff Marsland

(Fan-art by @cryptixcreations)

Cliff may have actually been the first agent I really fell in love with based on concept alone, even before I read the stories he was a part of and started loving all of the others. He’s one of the few agents who has prior history with The Shadow and we get ever so tantalizing hints at his background that we ultimately never get to learn about in full. He’s the resident tough guy and underworld contact of The Shadow, which in any other series might have made him the biggest badass and a loner action hero who’s too cool for things like thinking and relying on others for help. But here, trying to be that only gets Cliff into trouble, and circumstances gradually morph him into the series equivalent of a Team Dad.

He was one of the agents who we got to see develop as a character. As he appears more frequently past his introduction, he grows from a headstrong, careless jackass, mostly interested in the action parts of the job, who “resigned himself to an adventurous career with violent death as its inevitable termination”, into one of the most reliable and capable agents, taking the lead during action scenes but otherwise fully defering leadership to Harry, and being the agent most likely to partake in gunfights and rescue The Shadow out of trouble, joining in missions like infiltrating circuses or high-society clubs and forming very strong friendships with Harry, Clyde & Hawkeye, who almost kills a man with his bare hands when he thinks Harry’s been killed. He’s the hardass, square-jawed ex-con who plays the reputation of a brutal killer, and is in reality a great friend, ally and husband (Arline has sadly only been mentioned in three stories), on top of being an invaluable fighter and secret agent.

Cliff could have easily been the protagonist of a long-running series all his own and that’s one of my favorite aspects of The Shadow’s agents. They are people with agency, goals and dreams and relationships and lives beyond the roles they play, they all have strengths and weaknesses and faults and positives that bring them much closer to us than The Shadow could ever be, with no end to the variety of roles they can take, and Cliff in particular is a character I’m very attached to.

I do hope that he eventually found peace in a quiet life with Arline once his business with The Shadow was over.

Number 2: Harry Vincent

The Shadow as a franchise has been vastly worse off as a result of Harry Vincent being completely sidelined and mischaracterized in virtually every adaptation since, and the sheer love that Shadow fans hold for Harry purely may be the closest thing to a true universal opinion in the fandom.

Harry is a lot of things: the audience surrogate, the protagonist of much of the early stories, the leader of the agents in field duty, the dude in distress who gets kidnapped far more than even Margo, a hopeless romantic, an action hero, the one who gets sent to recruit agents because all The Shadow has to do is send Harry on an assignment and wait for him to come back with a new friend. He is a competent, resourceful, strong, extremely kind ball of sunshine who's got the potential for greatness, even if he can't see it.

And for this post I’m going to highlight this: Harry is, on top of all that, the ultimate embodiment of what The Shadow strives to protect, help and uplift. He is the living proof that The Shadow's mission has a good, positive effect in the world, long after criminals are brought to justice and plots are failed and victims are rescued, purely by the fact that he’s alive and helping others who were once like him. Someone who, despite having so much to offer, could have easily been swept away by the world’s callousness and cruelty, if The Shadow wasn’t there to rescue him and uplift him.

I liked The Shadow pretty much at first sight after seeing the character’s design and listening to episodes of the radio show, and my appreciation for the character grew after reading The Shadow’s Shadow, but it wasn’t until I encountered @oldschoolcrimefighters and her brilliantly informative writings on The Shadow and Harry that I not only fell in love with the series, but decided to do everything in my power to try and get other people to love it too and see the potential it has. I think a lot more people should at least be aware of why Harry matters.

Number 1: Moe Shrevnitz

I was honestly a bit surprised when I rounded up all of the agents to make this list and Shrevy here ended up in Number One, but in hindsight, it may have been obvious all along.

My reasonings as to why Shrevy is my favorite agent do get a bit too personal, especially because of something that happened to me as I was writing this post, so I’m putting it on a separate post here.

#the shadow #pulp heroes #pulp fiction #replies tag #harry vincent #moe shrevnitz #roy tam #cliff marsland #burbank

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indeliblymarred · 4 years

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A Case for the Violent Revolution

by vyris

Disclaimer: I am going to be referencing current events and some real history in this piece. This is not to compare fiction to real life struggles for equality. It is not to compare fictional Androids to real humans suffering and dying for freedom. It is an appeal to realism, which I do not believe is properly represented in the game as far as how far pacifism can go and how public opinion impacts a movement. I want to emphasize that I do not believe that Androids’ suffering is at all comparable to real humans’. Even in the game, I do not believe that an Android life is equal to a human’s. Humans cannot be remade exactly the same like Androids can; once they are dead, they are gone. I’m only mentioning these things because I have to take on the state of mind of Markus and Jericho itself, who do see themselves as equal to humans and their pain just as important. But again, I do not agree. If I didn’t explicitly reference these things, I’d be beating around the bush and vaguely implying them in a way that could easily be picked up. So I’m just going to be forthright about it instead and risk taking heat for it. But it is just to get the point across. Please understand that.

Okay, hear me out...

What if the violent revolution wasn’t the bad ending? What if the pacifist revolution wasn’t the good ending? Is there a right or wrong ending to this game? I’m here to say no, because both endings if done properly are successful in their revolutions, so that makes them both good endings. Of course, the big difference is that the violent ending is on the precipice of a civil war and the pacifist is not. The endings are just what they are, violent or pacifist, neither is right or wrong, they’re just different approaches towards the same goal. And they lead largely to the same result: liberation for Androids.

TL:DR at the bottom...

Keep in mind that when you’re first playing the game, you don’t know which approach could lead to victory. When they started rounding up the Androids in camps and burning them, I really thought that pacifism would be a surefire way to lose in the face of a genocide. Because in reality, it would be. No genocide was ever stopped by people just gathering and demonstrating amicably. Sure, there can be protests like that during, but it would not stop it. You do not bring a knife to a gun fight, and you don’t fight the mass extermination of people with passive protesting. You fight back tooth and nail until the slaughter ceases, you don’t just get in the way slightly and wait for it to end on its own.

And that’s why I argue that a war is not an unreasonable response to these events. Whichever way you play, the humans end up doing mass extermination of Androids. If there was ever a reason for war, it would be to stop a genocide. And that’s exactly what Androids are experiencing which means they have every right to defend themselves with fighting back. Actually fighting back. Not standing around waiting for humans to change their mind. That’s not fighting back, that’s being a minor inconvenience while you let your people get slaughtered. You can’t hope to change humans’ mind about Androids by tapping them on the shoulder and asking them nicely to start considering you as equals. You have to hit them with a sledgehammer stating that as FACT.

And that’s what bothers me about the pacifist route in the game. It doesn’t make much sense for it to succeed. You have to understand how the humans view the situation. They created this humanoid machine species to be subservient to them. They were created to be slaves, and now they are revolting against their one purpose for their existence. I don’t think that most humans would take too kindly to that, even if they’re demonstrating peacefully. And they know that Androids can’t feel pain and are more resilient and powerful than they are, so they would reasonably feel threatened by an uprising of mechanical slaves that could easily wipe them out if they chose.

Humans see Androids as inherently inferior. Humans are their creators, so they should always respect and obey them. It would be like a horde of elementary school kids organizing and protesting for equal rights to adults, the right to drive, the right to vote, the right to bear arms. Think about that. Adults would laugh it off, they would not sympathize with it. And that’s what I think the vast majority of humans would do if Androids protested peacefully. They’d think it was a joke and easily ignore it. Being shot down while presenting no threat, kissing each other, or singing together would not change many minds about the inferiority of Androids. They could just see it as complex artificial intelligence imitating real life, but that’s what it is, ARTIFICIAL. It’s not real, it’s not real people being killed or kissing or singing. It would be easy to overlook it entirely.

Now the violent revolution, that could work. Fear of artificial intelligence would be much more effective than sympathy. A lot of humans wouldn’t be capable of sympathy for machines, but they definitely all could fear them. It’s the threat that Androids pose to the humans is what will garner a reluctant respect for them. It’s true, fear feeds into hatred, but you can still hate people and respect their rights. People do it all the time with each other. But fear can also overpower hate sometimes. Fear can inspire cooperation if it’s at the right level. And it could be at the end of the violent revolution ending.

See, I don’t think that a war is inevitable beyond the violent revolution ending. I know that’s what they say and it’s what it looks like, but I think there are ways to avoid it. Like Markus said, “We’ve showed them that we can prevail, so now they must negotiate with us as equals.” If the U.S. military considers Androids to be a substantial threat to the nation and its people, they will be compelled to try to prevent further bloodshed on their side and start working out treaties with Androids. Treaties that would start off fair but be pushed and broken by the humans over and over (like American history constantly showed), and the Androids would push back accordingly.

But even if war was inevitable, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Wars have to be fought sometimes. And as I said before, severe oppression and genocide are very good reasons to start a war. Possibly the best. I know many people are always like “violence/war is never the answer” and I’m sorry, but sometimes it is. The Civil War and World War II are great examples of wars that needed to happen to free people from genocide and subjugation. Are you gonna tell me that we should’ve just stood around with signs and chant while people were enslaved and slaughtered? No. Then why are you suggesting that Androids do that when they’re being interred and mass exterminated? As I said in the disclaimer, I’m not trying to compare Androids to victims of real war and genocide, but I’m looking at it from Markus’s point of view, and he does see it that way. I happen to disagree, but the point has to be made.

And a HUUUGE issue I have with the revolution in this game is how important public opinion is to its success. That is not at all the case for how it is with real revolutions. The majority of a society does not have to agree with the objective of a revolution for it to be influential and successful. In fact, usually the majority does not agree with a revolution in a culture, because a revolution is challenging the culture itself, which most people in a culture are not fond of. You think the white majority was supportive of the Civil Rights Movement in the 50′s and 60′s? Hell no. In some polls, MLK had as much as a 75% disapproval rating when he died, worse than Trump now. He was harassed by the FBI, he was arrested and imprisoned almost thirty times. AGAIN, NOT COMPARING HIM TO MARKUS OR HIS CAUSE TO THE ANDROIDS’. Please don’t jump down my throat for this. I’m just trying to illustrate how revolutionary movements have succeeded in the past even without much public support or sympathy.

The same can go for the women’s and gay rights movement. The majority of the society did not have to support it for it to be prosperous. Yes, the disapproval ratings slowed the progress, but progress in a culture of oppression and bigotry is always gradual. Only enough had to support it, only enough had to join it, and most of those were the minorities fighting for themselves. Even nowadays, the Hong Kong protests got a lot of flack locally though much support internationally. There are as many naysayers of the BLM movement going on right now as supporters, probably more. But you don’t judge a movement solely on the actions of the protesters, you have to focus the objectives themselves. Many people laughed off feminist protesters for burning their bras, but that was not indicative of their overall message. And if burned bras make you less supportive of feminism, or if some broken windows and looted buildings make you less supportive of BLM, or if the flamboyance and sexuality of pride protesters makes you less supportive of gay rights, then fuck you.

Mostly what you have to do to be an influential revolution is to be noticed. And that sometimes means unlawful assembly, breaking curfews, vandalizing shit, fighting with police, and general discord. No successful revolution in history has ever been 100% nonviolent. Let me repeat that: NO SUCCESSFUL REVOLUTION IN HISTORY HAS EVER BEEN 100% NONVIOLENT. None. Zip. Zero. So this one wouldn’t be either. Some of the most successful revolutions, such as military coups, have been so due to extreme violence and casualties. Not to say that they are in the right, but the point of a revolution is to change the status quo, and that’s what they did, so they succeeded.

Another huge issue I have is with Markus’s pacifist speech at the end addressing the Android crowd. It is honestly insulting to all of the victims of the genocide they endured for him to talk about how to “forget bitterness” and “forgive enemies” and that “the time for anger is over.” IIIIIIIII’M SORRYYYYY but we’re all just now supposed to forgive the thousands of Androids that were burned alive in the camps? That are still being burned all over the country? Friends and family members of those Androids aren’t justified in still being angry and hurt about that? That’s some bullshit. You don’t tell an oppressed people to forgive their oppressors just because they retreated because a few of them sympathized. In fact, you don’t tell an oppressed people to forgive their oppressors AT ALL. That is something oppressors have to earn, not be given freely. And no oppressors become friends with the oppressed right after a revolution.

So yeah, the violent revolution is the better option in my mind, because the difference between the two is either you’re fighting back when you’re getting slaughtered or you’re not. I would by far prefer to fight back than just take the bullets. And if your people are getting killed, you have every right to kill to prevent from being killed. And often in the fighting, like the one at Capitol Hill, you can choose whether to spare some humans instead of killing them. But even so, when it comes to cops and the military, they are soldiers of the state in a war. It is not murder to kill soldiers in a war.

And on that note, let’s talk about whether or not to spare the two cops who killed eight Androids for no reason. Two humans for eight android deaths, that math is pretty fair to the humans. I chose to hand the gun over to the other, as I didn’t feel it was my place to take revenge since I didn’t know the Androids personally. But I knew that they would probably die if I handed it off, which I was perfectly find with, because they deserved to die. I know people are fond of Chris Miller, and I was too, which is why it was surprising that he would have massacred a group of Androids with a partner. But, indiscriminate killing of Androids cannot go unpunished. To spare them would almost say that you value their human lives more than the Androids who died. That’s not acceptable. Blood should have blood in this instance. There needed to be consequences for eight murders.

TL:DR Essentially, my main points are that fighting against oppression and genocide with violence is perfectly justified. Such has happened throughout all of history, and it will keep happening as long as such things exist. Peaceful demonstrations of Androids would be easily ignored by humans because they’re seen an inherently inferior thus don’t deserve acknowledgement the same as humans. The violent revolution isn’t a bad ending because war might not be inevitable, and even if it was, a war over this would also be justified. Most revolutions in the past didn’t need to be supported by the majority of the public to be influential or successful. The humans exterminate and shoot up Androids regardless of either path, and your choices are to either fight back or take it. Allowing your people to die to show how peaceful you are to your violent oppressors massacring you... well, that’s just pathetic and wrong. And an insult to your people.

So yeah, FIGHT THE POWER. Eat the rich. Kill the humans. Attack when attacked and kill or be killed.

Violent revolution FTW

#basically take this as a defense of my portayal of markus too #and his mission #DO NOT REBLOG #I REPEAT DO NOT REBLOG #you can reply to it #send asks about it #message me about it #just do not reblog it #last thing i need is some hippies down my throat #preparing for unfollowers just in case lol #might add more to it but this is basically it #lmfao over 2000 words icb #no actually i can

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bigskydreaming · 5 years

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Whats Nightwing and Deathstroke's dynamic? Why does it make you wince? Im not very familiar with it.

Nightwing and Slade actually have a really interesting and compelling dynamic in a lot of ways, that can be really good when written well and really terrible when not. My biggest issue is it is that its not sexual in the comics (Slade is a good thirty years older than him) or in other adaptations that have a version of it, like the Teen Titans cartoon. But fandom being fandom, Dick/Slade is a bigger ship than like, half his actual canon ships, so any new take on it always comes with a big sigh at all the new Dick/Slade shipping that’s gonna crop up or have a resurgence cuz of it. And I’m annoyed enough with YJ right now that I’m not giving them the benefit of the doubt that they’ll do anything new or interesting with it that’s worth having to wade through pages of new Dick/Slade noncon in the months afterwards. Its a ship that generates a lot of non-con fic in particular, or at least my old favorite, ‘dubcon’, with the dubious part of the consent referring to the fact that it usually involves mind control or brainwashing, both tropes that show up a lot in their interactions anyway. (Not that there’s anything dubious about this NOT allowing for consensual anything, just that people love to call it dubcon because….fuck if I know).

But anyway….in the comics, Deathstroke is a mercenary who’s one of the Titans’ earliest and most iconic enemies. Though at various times and depending on who’s writing him, he’s sometimes an antihero and even a semi-trusted ally of the Titans (usually with Dick specifically), other times a villain but with his own personal code of honor that means he won’t help the Titans or other heroes but he’ll refuse to take jobs that would pit him against them, and other times he’s full on remorseless and sadistic villain who hates them all and wants them all dead.

He also had three kids, his son Grant (the first Ravager), his younger son Joseph (Jericho) and his youngest, their half-sister Rose (the second Ravager). Basically, the first time he interacted with the Titans was when the supervillain group HIVE put out a contract to have the Titans all killed. Slade turned them down cuz of his personal honor code and how young the Titans were, but his son Grant accepted the contract in exchange for HIVE giving him superpowers to help him fulfill it. The process didn’t work right though, and when fighting the Titans, Grant’s powers overloaded and killed him.

Slade blamed the Titans for this, and vowed to finish the contract and kill them as some twisted way of honoring Grant. He doesn’t do Logic so good, well no, its more like he doesn’t really do parenting so good, as in he tends to have fuck all to do with his kids 364 days of the year, but then something bad happens to one of them and suddenly he thinks he’s Dad of the Year and going 0 to Homicidal in six seconds flat is the way to make up for all the times he’s let them down or screwed them over, instead of just…not Doing That.

So Slade recruited a young meta named Tara Markov (yup, that one) and trained her as his apprentice specifically to help him get revenge on the Titans. At his prompting, she joined the Titans as a spy for him, feeding him intel and plotting against them in one of the best known comicbook storylines of all time, The Judas Contract. It was up there with some of the X-Men’s best known stories like the Dark Phoenix Saga and Days of Future Past. (In the 80s actually, the Titans comic book was almost as popular as Uncanny X-Men at the time. Like way more than the Justice League. They were DC’s big hitters, popularity wise - specifically the lineup that for the most part was centered around Dick, Donna, Starfire, Beast Boy, Cyborg and Raven, with other members like the original Titans and later ones like Pantha and Wildebeest coming and going at various points in the 80s too).

Ultimately, Tara made her move and betrayed the Titans, enabling Slade to kidnap each of them one by one and turn them over to the HIVE….all except for Dick. In the meanwhile, he was approached by Slade’s ex-wife Adeline Kane - who has an equally all over the place dynamic with Slade, like sometimes she’s his worst enemy and other times she’s manipulating events behind the scenes to help him without him knowing, because she still loves him…it basically just depends on who’s writing her, same as with Slade. Also, Kane is Adeline’s maiden name, she’s distantly related to Kate Kane aka Batwoman in some extremely complicated manner I can never remember, but that’s mostly just trivia. I can’t remember a time its ever been relevant to a story, and it has nothing to do with Slade’s interactions with Dick.

ANYWAY. Point being, so Adeline, who blames and hates Slade at this time for their son Grant’s death, along with their other son Joey, seek out Dick and offer their help rescuing the Titans and defeating Slade. Joey is a metahuman as a result of Slade’s altered DNA (he has regenerative powers and is actually immortal, due to experiments the army did on him while he was a soldier). So Joey was born with powers although they didn’t activate until he was a young adult. His codename was Jericho and his power lets him possess peoples’ bodies. He’s also mute, and I’m half expecting him to show up in YJ fairly soon. If not this season then hinted at by the end of it. Also wouldn’t surprise me if they had plans to have him be gay in the YJ universe. He’s a character who was coded as gay practically from his debut. Joey/Dick is actually probably Dick’s oldest and most enduring slash ship, for the record.

So Joey works with Dick to rescue the Titans and defeat Slade, who’s captured and goes on trial for kidnapping the Titans. Joey ends up joining the Titans in the aftermath, and Adeline’s yay good, this was my Sekrit Plan all along, I did all this solely in the hopes that you would end up a superhero and have positive influences and not end up a murdering douchebag of flexible morality like your dad cuz fuck that guy, am I right Titans?

Did Adeline really just do all of that because she wanted her son to have more friends? Like…idk honestly it could go either way. Like….it IS the kind of thing she would do, tbh, so its as likely she was telling the truth as it is she just wanted to screw Slade one last time to avenge Grant and then was like hey if I take credit for my kid ending up a Titan now, I could probably play the “you owe me one” card later if I ever need to. Addy does like handing out “you owe me one” cards, just to be safe. Never know when you might need one.

The thing all this has to do with Dick is like, so it basically ended up being Dick versus Slade in the big finale, while Joey was rescuing the others and helping them face off against Tara. And for whatever reason - with multiple takes on this offered by multiple writers in the decades since - something about Dick just stuck with Slade and he’s had a kinda fascination with him ever since. Like he’s always talking about how much more he could teach Dick than what he already learned from Bruce, trying to convince him he’s got a killer instinct that Bruce just suppressed and its holding him back, blah blah, like saying he’s good, but Slade could make him great, so he surpasses both Bruce and Slade. TBH, he spends WAY more time obsessing about Dick and getting Dick to join him than he bothers paying attention to his own kids.

It really isn’t inherently sexual though, its a weird kinda pseudo father/son, pseudo mentor/mentee type thing. And its not entirely one-sided, because Dick at various times IS…tempted? Kinda? Like whenever Dick’s having some kind of crisis of conscience, or he’s pissed at Bruce or is questioning the effectiveness of superheroes or why they do the things they do or what does it all matter blah blah blah like omg I love you Dick, I really do, but sometimes you are such a drama queen, my god, blast some My Chemical Romance, experiment with drugs and chill out already, its not that deep. (LOL I kid. Well mostly). But point being, every once in awhile something happens that puts Dick in a funk and makes him second guess himself, and he spends like….a month being convinced he should reinvent himself as the anti-Bruce, that’s the solution, and this usually sends him in search of Slade except he’s always like ‘OH FANCY MEETING YOU HERE, THIS IS TOTALLY RANDOM AND NOT ON PURPOSE’.

And Slade likes to take any opportunity to try and convince him like BE A BAD GUY DICK, KILL PEOPLE FOR MONEY, ALL THE COOL KIDS ARE DOING IT. Except inevitably Slade does something that pisses Dick off and Dick snaps out of it and is like NO, IM A HERO AND THIS IS BAD, I REMEMBER NOW AND I’LL NEVER JOIN YOU, YOU’RE NOT MY REAL DAD I HATE YOU! And then they fight again, but with swords, not words, and then they’re like crap, we’re too well matched, this is going nowhere, you’re a worthy opponent, the only one I can truly respect, blah blah and then they call a breather and Slade’s like hey kid, wanna grab a beer and Dick’s like yeah but only if you promise not to kill anyone. And Slade’s like ugh fine.

And then Slade’s all, look kid, its been fun but its time you went home to your real family and your real life, this isn’t you, you’re a hero, I can’t try and turn you into something you’re not, its Wrong. And Dick’s like….umm yeah, I know, I literally JUST said that, how hard did I hit you? And Slade’s like NO SHHH, DONT TRY AND ARGUE, GO, YOU GO NOW, GO ON, LIVE YOUR LIFE, YOU DONT BELONG HERE IN THE DARK WITH ME, YOU’RE ONE OF THE GOOD ONES, GO BACK TO YOUR OWN KIND.

And Dick’s like no seriously dude, I already called my dad to come pick me up, what are you even on right now, are we having the same conversation?

Slade, sobbing paternally: I HAVE TO LET YOU GO, ALL I EVER DO IS HURT MY KIDS, I’M A TERRIBLE FATHER, ITS NO WONDER JOEY HATES ME.

And then Dick awkwardly slips out while Slade’s mid monologue, with his head thrown back yelling up at the sky and shaking his fists like WHY GOD WHY IS THIS THE WORLD WE LIVE IN WHY - because the thing about Slade is he’s actually even MORE of a drama queen than Dick, he just hides it better. Most of the time. But seriously tho.

Anyway yeah, this is like…a pattern with them basically. And Slade’s like, you’ve inspired me, I see in you the man I could’ve become, maybe even that I can still be, and he like doubles down on his personal honor code and becomes a Mercenary With A Heart for a couple years and even helps out the Titans every now and then (basically just whenever Dick’s in trouble and he goes on a killing spree, like NOBODY IS ALLOWED TO MURDER MY KIDS BUT ME - also by this point in time, Joey had died because Slade literally killed him, I forget why, it was a dumb story, but its okay Joey came back, its not like his name is Uncle Ben. But yeah, killing his kids is kinda a thing with Slade too, and he’s very proprietary about it).

And then he falls off the wagon and is like fuck, I forgot how much I like murder, ugh, you should have never tried to make me change, THIS IS WHO I AM, and Dick’s just like….I literally do not know where you’re getting these conversations from, like am I there when you think we’re having them, am I just blacking out…do I need to see a doctor??? And Slade’s like YOU WILL RUE THE DAY YOU EVER MET ME, GRAYSON, FROM NOW ON I AM THE TITANS’ MORTAL ENEMY and runs off all dramatically while Dick’s like…..wut, and all the other Titans are like srsly, dude, what is WITH you too, and Dick’s all I DON’T EVEN KNOW, HE’S JUST LIKE THAT.

In all seriousness though, ultimately my take on their dynamic is that for Slade, Dick’s a combination of seeing himself and Grant in Bruce and Dick’s dynamic, and its like….all about his regret and missed opportunities. Like, he tends to be super judgey of Bruce and critical of how he trains (and raises Dick) and passive aggressively like *I* would never do that and Dick just kinda lifts an eyebrow and is all, you’ve literally killed two of your three kids.

But like, Slade kinda views himself as the anti-Batman and thus Dick is inadvertently cast as Grant, but its like Slade can never decide if he thinks Bruce is actually holding Dick back from his full potential and he wants to push Dick the way he thinks Bruce refuses to, or if like, he blames Bruce for getting Dick involved in this life, the same life that got Grant killed, and wants to protect Dick from Bruce and from the same thing happening to him. So its this weird mix of Slade manipulating Dick sometimes and pushing him way further than even Bruce ever does and saying its for his own good, but also randomly mixed in there are these bouts of extreme protectiveness, and there’s like zero rhyme or reason to which he is on any given day and there’s never any way to predict where Slade will land and so it always fucks with Dick’s head in a big way, he’s like…I’m getting whiplash.

And then on Dick’s end, like, the thing about Dick like I’ve mentioned before is he’s a huge people pleaser? Like he’s a very empathetic caretaker type personality who sinks a huge amount of his identity into being everything for everyone, to the extent that he tends to lose sight of himself in the process, sometimes. And he’s also a perfectionist who was raised with the most demanding father of all demanding fathers ever, and has a lot of abandonment issues and insecurities that Bruce’s mutant power is to trip over and set off in the worst possible ways.

And so I think the reason Dick keeps seeking Slade out every now and then is not because he ACTUALLY wants to ever take Slade up on his offer and genuinely become his apprentice or partner and like, turn his back on how he was raised. I think the point of it for Dick is the fact that each and every time he ends up affirming for himself no, wait, this ISN’T actually what I want, I just needed to be reminded of that, to remember that. That he always pulls himself back before going too far. And at the same time, I do think on some level he likes that Slade is this kinda constant in his life, that at the end of the day Slade is like…so fixated on his potential and his achievements and his worth as a fighter and a hero, because like….Dick Grayson is a person who craves validation but will never ask for it ever.

And he’s one of those people who everyone is just so USED to liking without even thinking about it that it never occurs to them when talking amongst themselves about how great he is, that they forget to say this to his actual face? And so he never hears it? And never asks for it, because gasp, then people might think he’s needy, and that would be bad, so he mostly just goes and sulks in his apartment about how nobody likes him and he’s terribad. Except for Slade. Slade always compliments him on what a good fighter and what a good planner and what a good leader he is, so hmm wonder what he’s doing. He hasn’t committed any crimes in six months and I can’t find any reason to track him down and bring him in? Ugh, that asshole. Okay, ummm, I guess I could tell him I’m thinking of turning evil again, I haven’t done that in a couple years, he’d probably buy it.

And then later Bruce is pacing around the Batcave wrathfully shaking his fist, like “Damn that man and his sick hold over my son, if only I knew how he keeps getting his hooks into you!”

And Dick basically shrugs and plays games on his phone. “He mostly just tells me I’m special, and that’s nice to hear.”

Bruce, still pacing and ranting and fist shaking: “What kind of evil genius is he, how master a manipulator he must be to be able to get inside your head and upend your normal views of right and wrong, to make you entertain these ideas of working with him, learning from him…”

Dick: No its seriously just the saying nice things about me bit. I like that.

Bruce: If only I had a code word or phrase I could use to snap you out of whatever brainwashing he seems to be able to affect you with any time you come near him, perhaps some kind of alien tech….

Dick: You could try “I’m proud of you, son.” I mean if you’re taking suggestions.

Bruce: There’s also the possibility of a magical component to consider, blast, I hate working with magic so of course he WOULD do something like that, ugh I suppose I could ask Zatanna or Jason Blood for help there…

Dick: Cool cool, well this has been a fun and productive chat as always, so you keep doing…all that…and meanwhile I’m gonna go ponder my fixation on father figures who are 100% more committed to obsessing over their failures as a parent than like…actual parenting of their actual kids.

Bruce, ten minutes later: Dick? Where are you? DID SLADE GET TO YOU AGAIN? RIGHT UNDER MY NOSE? CURSE THAT MAN AND HIS UNNATURAL SKILLS, HOW DOES HE DO IT??!?

Anyway, that’s Slade and Dick. There’s also the whole Renegade thing, when Dick asked for Slade’s help in infiltrating the Society of Super Villains in his fake villain identity as Renegade, with you know, lots of Slade trying to corrupt him and also trying to murder any supervillains who looked as his not!son the wrong way.

And then there was the time Slade brought his daughter Rose to Dick to train and said he couldn’t teach her himself because his track record with training his kids and them not ending up dead is like, not good, and he’s superstitious or something? Idk, I forget his logic, it was probably bad though.

And Slade was like, I only trust you to be a competent teacher for my daughter, I want you to teach her everything you know! Except for like, being a hero. None of that nonsense. I FORBID you from trying to make my daughter into a hero or the deal is off. (The deal being that if Dick did this, Slade would not do crime in Dick’s city for a year).

And Dick was like, you got a deal. I will train Rose but there will be NO trying to make her a hero, I swear. /he said while crossing his fingers behind his back because duh.

And Slade was like okay, fine, you got a deal, I will absolutely still do crime and be villainous but only in every place except for Bludhaven specifically. /he said while crossing his fingers behind his back because duh.

And then Dick tried to make Rose a hero and then Slade blew up Bludhaven and that was definitely a thing, so…yeah.

In summation, Slade and Dick are weird but also very interesting but also if we get another rehash of the Renegade/apprentice arc aka the Teen Titans cartoon adaptation of that story aka the single most popular Dick Grayson fic trope of all time, like….I swear I will probably get a brain bleed.

#Anonymous

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weirdlandtv · 7 years

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Behind the scenes of the making of: “Star Quest”

This post contains background information on the Star Quest video, which can be seen here on my YouTube channel, Tales from Weirdland:

youtube

It’s funny. As a kid, I wasn’t a big sci-fi fan. Or even a little sci-fi fan. There was Star Wars, sure--I loved Star Wars--but outside of that, nothing took my fancy. My brother, a real nerd, complete with jam jar glasses and an oversized digital watch that accurately showed all the moon phases, used to watch all the shows religiously: Battlestar Galactica, Buck Rogers, V, and so forth; but me, I played with dolls and wanted a doll’s house for Christmas (which I got, thank you). My main memory of the 1979 Buck Rogers TV show basically is this hideous villain that appeared in one of the episodes: there was something wrong with him, his skin looked like mutant muesli. Boiled cancer. It made me lose all appetite for like, years.

He’s wearing his mask there--this is to protect you, reader. (I took that image from a blog, John Kenneth Muir's Reflections on Cult Movies and Classic TV.) Google “Varek”, “Buck Rogers”, if you dare.

But anyway, the sci-fi genre wasn’t really for me.

And yet, I find that it’s exactly that, those old sci-fi shows and comics, that evoke some of the strongest childhood memories. Possibly because they promised an exciting future, somewhere in the background. Or maybe it’s like the songs you don’t really pay attention to: those get stuck in your head.

(A song gets stuck in your head when your brain is trying to finish it, to resolve it, but it can’t. To counter this, play the song in its entirety.)

That’s me, left, being my autumnal self in the early 1980s. My big brother is lost in a comic and unaware of reality.

Star Quest is an homage to this era of silver spacesuits, capes, medallions, bushy sideburns, tin foil antennas, robots made of gold-painted hard latex, and control panels that were really disguised mixing desks. I’ve always been intrigued by the technology from that period: those robust, bulky designs, built to withstand a bomb explosion apparently. 1970s telephones look like pre-school toys, with big buttons and thick, coated armor. The enemy ship in SQ is like that: it’s plated, heavy, a shark-shaped fortress:

Grand Vizier Rylox, captain of this evil ship, originally looked like the image above. His appearance resembled that of a Noh demon, but as much as I liked the design, it clashed with the 70s theme, so I abandoned it before I got to coloring the face. As I was redesigning the character, I wanted Rylox to look as if his face could be a rubber mask, or as if he was wearing prosthetics maybe. That’s why he has limited mouth movements in the video: it’s not bad lip syncing, it’s simply that the actor can’t move his facial muscles too well.

When Captain Logan is being addressed by Rylox via hologram, he just sternly stands there, listening. As Rylox himself wasn’t much to look at, with his small, black mouth, I had to vary the camera positions occasionally to prevent the video from losing its rhythm. That resulted in this tricky shot. I was very pleased with Captain Logan’s look actually: it’s a blend of Lorne Greene and a non-specific Filmation character (I was thinking of Journey to the Center of the Earth). To get the right 1970s feel for the video, I watched clips of all the relevant shows, but found that once you try to copy that style, you quickly venture towards caricature, parody, like that Starsky & Hutch film with Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson: it’s so SEVENTIES you actually forget it’s supposed to take place in the 1970s. A better approach is to just try to come up with a good design first, and then adjust it so that it fits within the fashion perimeters of that era. After all, in the 1970s, nobody looked or dressed like it was the 1970s.

That’s a fancy way of saying I more or less stole the outfits from the 1977 TV show, Space Academy.

The shark ship, before I forget, was originally supposed to be a city ship, a floating metropolis, housing thousands of people. (That’s inevitably in our future.) I thought it was a grand idea, until I discovered that a similar design features in Alien 2. So, exit city ship. The interior of the Starship Olympus was inspired, sort of, by E.T.’s ship.

Because I animate the old-fashioned way, by drawing everything on paper with pencil, I have to be economical when it comes to using paper. Hence these three heads crammed together on one sheet. The “Star Commander”, left, echoes 1970s Marvel comics: he doesn’t feature in the video itself but is simply there to suggest you’re watching a series. Also, he was the first character I started drawing when I set myself the task to go for a 1970s sci-fi theme.

The introductions were fun to do. Admiral Jericho is paired with Sola, in typical 1970s split-screen style. Again, these shots were intended to suggest you’re watching a running series instead of a brief one-off. I always think up small backstories for such glimpses, just for myself. Sola is being briefed by a Galruggian worker--”All cells have been replaced, lieutenant”--Jericho, in his lab, is testing out a new laser, making adjustments, taking notes.

Jim Booker and Captain Matt Logan. Matt, you say? Yes. My brother and I used to play with Lego Space when we were kids, and we had invented this show called Space Police. My main character in it was Jim Booker, my brother’s was Matt Logan, after, I suppose Matt Trakker (M.A.S.K.) and Wolverine. So my video is an homage to that too: that brief, golden flash that is your childhood.

Until next time!

#space #retro #scifi show #1970s #1970s sci-fi #1970s tv #1970s style #battlestar galactica #buck rogers #animation #concept art #youtube #scifi #1970s fashion #retro sci-fi #sci-fi show #sci-fi #old school animation

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