[this is kind of a messy ramble, sorry about that]
Demon Twins AU, except Danny is loyal to the League.
The League of Assassins is a “cult” for a reason. They know what they’re doing. Ra’s has been around for a very long time; he’s seen every trick in the book and then some.
So when his daughter Talia gave him two, near-identical twin grandsons, he had already planned out their lives by the time the sun had set on their first day living. He knew the plans weren’t perfect. Nothing ever went exactly how he wanted it to. But that was the joy of being absolutely fucking ancient. Ra’s adapted better than anyone. If something went wrong, Ra’s will simply work around the issue and live to see another day.
So the boys were raised as he wished. Ruthless, with sharp blades and even sharper wit. They matched each other in every way, blow for blow. Neither won more than the other, and Ra’s encouraged the competition between the twins. Eventually, the battle for title of Heir came, and Damian won that particular match.
Danny was fine with this. Thrilled, even, for his brother to earn the title of Heir. The boys were very close, and worked well to take down targets twice their size. Ra’s approved this, and granted Danny title of Shadow. He was to be Damian’s eternal shadow, a guard. Both Talia and the boys were pleased with this.
But then came the time for the boys to learn how to live without each other. They’d gotten too used to someone guarding their back. Too complacent and too confident in their roles. Ra’s knew it would happen, and so sent Danny off at a very young age to live with some sleeper agents in America.
The Fentons.
Damian would stay here, with Talia, to learn how to be the perfect Heir. He needed to learn how to fight without the assistance of his brother.
Danny would go to Amity Park, and be fostered by the Fentons. He needed to put his skills to practical use and learn how to live without constant orders.
This was their Test.
Damian did quite well, for a while. Until Talia sent him off to his birth father, The Bat. Reports on his behavior declined in quality after that, and Ra’s couldn’t help but feel dissatisfaction with how the Heir had been corrupted.
Danny’s reports were always immaculate, however. His mask never slipped, and he’d worked himself into the hearts of the townspeople. The sleeper agents, Jack and Maddie, had a daughter who was quite enthusiastic about the properties of the mind, and accept Ra’s instructions to teach Danny with ease. It was the ideal situation.
In Ra’s eyes, Danny was thriving. Damian was not.
And then Ra’s died. The League was in shambles. Damian was at peace with his family, away from the cult he grew up in. He assumed Danny had defected years ago, since their mother stopped giving him reports about his twin.
Then Danny showed up at the Wayne’s doorstep, decked out in full League attire, angry and hostile.
“Tell me, dear brother,” he spat. “Why did you not inform me that Grandfather had died? I had to find out through his spirit when it came to visit from the afterlife!”
Damian didn’t know what to say.
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Welcome to a series I'm calling:
Yes, that scene did foreshadow Mike's monologue was disingenuous
Because you'd be surprised how many times the show (even prior to s4) has poked fun at Mike's monologue in the most random ways.
The Bingham's Beautiful Performance
First we have Suzie's sister on the floor, bedazzled and sporting a veil all while her brother is filming. This is basically the kids attempting to present a tale of a romance ending in gruesome tragedy.
Our bride here is El. The edition of the veil could be a nod to the loud majority's series long assumption that Mike and El are going to end the show together, preferably getting married.
Unfortunately, this is the closest thing they'll ever get to it, with the acknowledgement of that possibility in and of itself being mocked.
This next shot makes the likelihood that these scenes are connected pretty much indisputable, that being the edition of the record player behind the bride's head.
The only reason they made a point of having Will push the radio out of El's way, was to subtly connect this moment in Surfer boy to the beautiful performance we saw at the Bingham's only a few episodes prior (scenes that are widely known to be filled with foreshadowing for the season's ending).
A few bylers have already talked about these parallels, so this isn't new knowledge per say. But I do know some have dropped it altogether as possible foreshadowing for whatever reason, while most fans outside of the byler fandom insist it only foreshadowed Eddie's death. However, I think there are too many details that equally, if not more connect it to Mike's monologue than to Eddie's death.
Some fans have also noticed how Will was missing in quite a few shots at the Bingham's, which is interesting, but not all that surprising. Especially in this case...
Will. Will is the director
Director Will: GET THAT RADIO OUT OF MY SHOT!
Will directed the monologue when he used his feelings to inspire Mike, with the reminder of it (literally in the moment) directing Mike to confess to El, just like Suzie's brother directed that beautiful performance. Both performances convincingly left its audience thinking that the performers feelings in that moment were believable and...
genuine...
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The way that Poseidon knows that Sally doesn't want to take Percy to camp, the way he wants Percy to be able to be as much like Sally as he can... Maybe he knows that Sally's goodness is paramount to Percy's ability to eventually save Olympus, or maybe he just wants his son to take after the woman he loves - a woman unlike any he'd met in a thousand years. Further, the way he so clearly wants to be there for them both but knows he can't. The way that's obviously killing him to not be a part of their lives, and so he takes this opportunity to be there for her, even if it hurts him to hear what she has to say. The way he encourages Sally to speak her mind and re-assures her that its' not fair, that she hasn't failed, that she's doing well by Percy, that she's raised him well, and he promises to be there for Percy when he can (and in his own way he has been when it matters).
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Fucks me up to think about how Legato's legacy in-universe after his death in Trimax (and presumably Tristamp) is probably gonna be how much he sucked and nothing else....
Like, nobody will like Knives but Vash will be long-lived enough to be able to eventually talk about his good qualities from when he was a child and his quasi-redemption in his last days. But who remembers Legato? Livio and Vash are the only living people with any extended memory of him and neither of them would have anything nice to say (and rightfully so). Neither of them probably knew he was a slave, either—as far as Vash can tell this dude showed up one day and hated his guts, for all he knows he's just another survivor from July! Outside of Knives, Elendira, Legato, and maybe Conrad, I don't think any other character knows his actual life story.
And to add on to that, there's no way of looking up that past either—he had no name or personhood before he was effectively rescued, so who could investigators or reporters or archivists track down for information? The human being that was Legato only existed for as long as he knew Knives, before that he was something to be kept and abused as an object. There's presumably no surviving family they can reliably contact, nobody to really say "yes I knew him, here's what his life was like, here's how we can prevent something like this from happening again".
His entire existence will be reduced down to "a human weapon that was freakishly loyal to public enemy #1" without any reflection on the mechanisms that made him the way he was because there's just no actual knowledge of his life.
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Чтобы ты почувствовал,
Что ты - живее всех живых
that one panel lives rent free in my head so of course i had to redraw it.
his character arc is something that is so special to me...............
also, progress square:
wild to see how different the sketch looks compared to even the first colored one. every fucking time
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