#yes i was rewatching the peter bits today
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Friends, I’m going to say something that might not be popular right now, but I think it has to be said. I love Rings of Power so far. I am frustrated hearing people say already that it’s no good. And my most annoying reason for them saying that so far is that there are too many questions, that things aren’t explained yet. I mean, today is just the third episode. This is a story arc that is planned for five seasons. Do they think everything is going to be explained and all characters introduced in the first two episodes of the first season? If so, they’ve never read Tolkien. Sorry. They’re having to tie in so many races and characters and cultures. It’s going to take some setup.
My second most annoying reason I’ve heard is that there are characters added in. I mean, yeah. It’s a huge world. It’s a huge story. And Tolkien really only included the very main characters. Of course there are going to have to be some to fill things out. But Tolkien’s main characters are there so far, and they are so well done! They are staying much truer to Tolkien’s personalities than Peter Jackson ever did. I mean, Aragorn scared to be king? Pfft, that was his whole motivation in the books! I’m not saying he was arrogant or entitled about it, but he was very determined and enthusiastic. He had to defeat Sauron, become king, and reunite the northern and southern kingdoms for Elrond to allow him to marry Arwen. ‘Break up’ with her? Never. Faramir beating Gollum and taking the ring? Never. Tolkien was probably spinning in his grave. He said Faramir was the character closest to himself, and he loved him.
Gosh, don’t get me started. I still love the LotR movies. I will not go into how much I hated the Hobbit movies, despite so many of my favourite actors being in them. Anyway, back to the point. Galadriel is well done, I think; her pride and determination are very well portrayed. To me the new characters don’t feel jarring. They fit right in with what’s going on in Middle-Earth and what we know is coming. And the scenery and costumes and music! That scene in the third episode (no spoilers!) of Galadriel riding on the beach was just gorgeous, and I think the fact that they included her joy in the moment was absolutely beautiful. I’ve been really looking forward to that scene after the glimpse in the previews. That dress in the wind! That horse! They have captured Tolkien’s love and gentleness so far! I love love love the fact that they are doing real cosmetics instead of CGI where at all possible. It has the real feeling of the LotR movies, and they throw in so many little things to tie the show to the movies, like words the orcs use or lines Galadriel uses.
But I think what has struck me the most has been how unflinchingly they have portrayed the evilness of the orcs without an ounce of gratuitous violence or ugliness. Yes, orcs would be ugly and scary, and I think they have a perfect balance on necessary vs. gratuitous, which is where the fantasy genre always fails for me but where Tolkien excels.
After watching the first two episodes last week I started doing a little bit of googling, and I think this show is in the right hands. Their love and respect for Tolkien shines in every second so far. I’m just going to withhold judgment and enjoy the ride with this show. Even if I didn’t care for it, it’s a gorgeous way to spend an hour in Tolkien’s world again without having to rewatch the movies for the 3,764th time. But being able to enjoy it is great!
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God bless Bernard and the Latin Spanish dub!!!
Ok here's something very interesting that I noticed while rewatching Spiderman 3 today, I watched the Latin Spanish version and turns out that in the dub version of the scene when Harry invites MJ to come over his place and tells Bernard that they're having a guest the dialogue is a bit different.
Harry: Bernard!
Bernard: Yes Sir?
Harry: I'm waiting someone, could you prepare something to eat?
Bernard: Someone?
Harry: Yes.
Bernard: Is it a man or a woman?
Harry: Just prepare something.
Bernard: As you wish Sir.
Then I watched the same scene but in English and in the original dialogue Harry says he's having a guest and Bernard asks "a guest "Guest" Sir?"
Any ways I find this hilarious because the Latin Spanish dub version of Bernard in that scene was basically the meme of the dog saying "I know what you are" with Harry.
Also because as a plus, in the scene when Harry comes back home after the accident and he still doesn't remember anything he asks Peter if he (Harry) has girlfriends and Peter answers that he doesn't know and then Harry asks Bernard the same question and Bernard answers "None, that I know of."
Bernard really was calling him "Gay Gay Homosexual Gay" in his face!!!!!
#harry osborn#raimi spiderman#spiderman#parksborn#raimi parksborn#raimi trilogy#peter parker#harry x peter#peter x harry#spiderman 3#raimi spider man#spiderman raimi#raimiverse
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Ok but do tell us abt the Italian dub lore, please.
ok so. ahfkajd maybe lore is a big word but its a series of facts that are HILARIOUS to me and my boyfriend lmfao. this is going to be long I Think
so! fun fact! italy is the first country that aired gundam 0079 outside of japan! in 1980 i believe. so we have this generation of boomers who grew up watching gundam and other mecha shows who are constantly complaining about Today’s Cartoons Being Bad. which is. okay whatever. but also…! i am pretty sure that the television channel who bought gundam had no idea what it is about. and so the translations feel very off and more often than not theyre wrong or just. its impossible to understand what is happening!
for example, out of curiosity i watched the first episode of vintage dub edition (which is on amaz*n prime. they removed the original series in japanese and left vintage edition there. ok whatever. explode).
i get to the first sayla and char meeting scene and. nothing about their interaction leads you to believe that theyre brother and sister. char calls her “blondie”. its just. what. i remember even seeing italian comments under gundam videos going like: “oh i recently rewatched gundam in japanese with subtitles and so many things make sense now! i had no idea char and sayla were related!”
and its funny to me. because as i said earlier this generation of mostly Men in their 50s believe everything thats not gundam or their other old mecha shows is shit. but they had no idea of what was happening in the show!!! i guess the message about war still came across but idk. its funny
the other funny thing is that italian television channels used to do this thing in the past where they would completely change characters name if they felt like they were too difficult for ita viewers. and thats how… we got Peter Rei! commander of the robot! (i’ll get to this quote in a bit.)
yes. amuro is peter. and char is scia (which is cute and kinda a pun bc scia means trail and comets leave trails!). sayla is pronounced seira like in japanese. mirai is flammet (???). fraw is mirka. haro is pallina!!!!! (little bouncy ball…….)
the dub is really bad. peter amuro sounds like an old guy. chars voice is kinda cute and fitting but everything else is a mess. but we got………… gundam italian opening!!!!! which is kinda a banger despite the lyrics being so. ???
heres the opening
the lyrics, translated:
“here we are, we are you friends,
and my name is peter rei!
there they are, assaulting us, never be afraid!
because there’s someone here who will think of you!
(gundam gundam gundam etc)
my friends, here i am, peter rei,
commander of the robot!
i am the guy who says No! to the enemies,
because no one else can!
(no one can defeat…. gundam!!!!!!)”
there’s also a longer version with other insane lyrics like Oooh here comes the indestructible guntank!!! which is. lol
ok, one last thing also
the episodes names are hilarious.
“gundam flies!” “garma dies!”
“good job flammet(mirai)!” ????
(theres some episodes missing obviously, but these are the names of the last episodes and its so funny)
gundam must win!
gundam wins again!
gundam is invincible
gundam’s enemies
BRAVO GUNDAM!!!!
no one is stronger than gundam….
lmfao really feels like grandpappy gundam is giving itself a pep talk for motivation. cmon gundy u can do it…
ok i think im done LMFAO SORRY maybe this is all irrelevant but its funny to ME
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What are your thoughts on the Sam Raimi and Marc Webb Spider-Man films?
Short answer? They’re… pretty good! Yeah, I feel comfortable saying that, they’re pretty good, that’s about it. Thanks for the question.
Ok, I do have more complex thoughts on them, but I do think that 2/5 of those are pretty good, which is better than nothing. Before I get into it, the cliff notes on my individual opinion of each movie are:
Spider-Man (2002): The original and the blueprint, not much more to say. It’s aged questionably of course with some of the fights, MJ stuff, tone and just a general sense of Raimi+co. not quite nailing down the formula more than anything else because this was (yes, even including X-Men and Blade, those are more 90's action movies that happen to star comic characters than full CBMs) the true first modern superhero movie as we know it today, so there’s a sense of retroactive genericness that’s unfairly part of it but it’s still very decent! That final swing still hits like catnip.
Spider-Man 2: It’s good. You know it’s good. I know it’s good. Even my grandma knows it’s good. Let's move on.
Spider-Man 3: When I was younger and up to quite recently I liked it as much as the others, and I still think it’s got some good bits in it, but something clicked earlier this year watching it as Multiverse of Madness prep, where I suddenly got why a lot of people dislike it. It’s just kinda... very annoyingly messy. Much like TASM 2, I now find the few good bits in it and rare genuinely inspired moments (like Sandman’s birth) worthy of praise, but not aching to put myself through the whole surrounding movie ever again. And though unintentional, it ended the universe with Peter and MJ together as Raimi clearly always wanted to be the endgame. That’s just kinda neat.
The Amazing Spider-Man (2012): I’m biased cus all the teen angst and tumblr-era vibe it has hit me good so I have fond memories of it. Revisiting it when I was older as recently as this week (which was mostly a coincidence) made me see that as neat as some stuff in it it, the flaws were also much clearer. Roger Ebert pretty much nailed it when he described it as "A reboot that's also a remake.", because it very much is just a retread of the first Raimi, down to copying a lot of it's exact beats/structure and doing almost none of it better. That said, I will bat for some of the stuff it does interestingly like how it modernizes the Ditko edge on Peter and his revenge origin. But yeah, overall unnecessary and just eh. Also Aunt May absolutely knows Peter is Spider-Man by the end and it's dumb the 2nd movie acted like she didn't.
The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Refer to the SM3 bullet point.
Ok, now onto some bigger thoughts. Mostly related to what each of these Mean to Me™️, and how I think they hold up in the current CBM landscape.
The Raimi movies (at least the first 2) are a bit dated but in kind of intentional ways that I don’t find necessarily flawed. Their big, awe-inspiring romantic Donner-tinted view of Spider-Man is pretty well executed and charming even if that’s not how you personally like to see the character. That said, there’s some stuff that gets worse the more time goes on (like MJ always being a damsel in distress) that I’m fine with leaving in the past.
However, imo their big lasting achievement (having rewatched them quite recently under the perspective of analyzing them for some film school stuff I was doing), is that compared to the current landscape where a lot of superhero stuff gets judged by fans and clickbait outlets on Easter eggs, cameos, universe set-up and the like rather than story, they’re still evergreen examples for how to intertwine goofy comic book shit with a foundation that’s still made up of An Actual Functioning Movie with like Themes and Character Arcs and stylized effective filmmaking with coherent Controlling Idea and genuinely well-crafted narratives.
I hate to sound like those people on Twitter (though sometimes I agree) but for lack of a better term they’re Real Movies™️, good ones at that. Spider-Man 2 in particular honestly still holds up despite how much it gets hyped up to oblivion by everyone online.
My recent rewatch actually made me appreciate it even more on a deeply personal level because, and I don’t think I would’ve realized this before the pandemic and my mental health issues, but even if it’s unintentional on behalf of the creatives, I’m now like 60ish% sure that it’s a movie about Peter dealing with undiagnosed clinical depression. Like yeah, everyone knows he's sad in it, but so much of the stuff in it on my last watch very explicitly made me think "Wait I think he has depression."
That said, and to be fair to Raimi and co. this is less to do with the actual contents of the movies and more with how fandom has co-opted them, but goddamn I wish they stopped being held up as the gold unimpeachable standard of How To Do Spider-Man Right™️ in movies. I have deeper and more esoteric thoughts about how Spider-Man 1 in particular is secretly the “Watchmen” of the modern superhero movie landscape (a topic for another time), but the short of it is that 20 years later these movies are still being used by a lot of fans to judge subsequent Spider-Man adaptations (as well as other superhero movies). And it’s getting old.
Be happy they exist, but just let those movies be old. Like I get it, I also think they’re good, but I don’t think the fandom should be beholden as much as it is to those movies and it’s vision of Spider-Man to compare everything else to just because it’s the ones they grew up with.
As for The Amazing movies, my thoughts are shorter. Even though the first one is extremely unnecessary in terms of it's story, there's enough half-good ideas in there that I can see being appealing. But the 2nd movie really just kinda ruined the whole take (even if I liked it on release as a pre-teen) in retrospect with all the stupid franchise set-up and I actively don't want a potential TASM 3. That said I’m glad that in the years since and mostly because of No Way Home people seem to have come around on Garfield’s performance (especially with how public he was regarding his disappointment with it all) and Webb’s directing. They clearly had their heart in it perhaps more than anyone else involved in those and it’s neat to see people acknowledge that.
But mostly I feel indifferent about that universe ending the more distance we get from it as much as I liked it at the time, and clearly the MCU do-over was much better received so it kinda seems like everything worked out in the end.
So yeah, the pre-MCU Spider-Man movies were pretty weird. If anything, I just think it's wild that they represent a different era in superhero movies where stuff got continually reimagined cus now Holland’s gonna be our Spider-Man for who knows how long (I like him though!) until Miles takes over, but now at least we have the PlayStation games and the Spider-Verse movies to give us a fix for non-MCU Spider-Man stuff to those who want it so it seems like everybody wins.
You know, almost everyone.
Man at least this one kinda got something. Sheen’s version didn’t even get a grave.
#spiderman#peter parker#raimi spider man#the amazing spider man#sam raimi#marc webb#andrew garfield#tobey maguire#marvel
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To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before vs. The Summer I Turned Pretty
When I found out there was another Jenny Han book adaptation I was beyond excited and headed over to Amazon Prime stat.
So which adaptation is the most enjoyable?
For me, it’s To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before hands down.
1. Chemistry
Can you really beat Lara Jean and Peter? I submit the hot tub scene as evidence. Belly and her three guys definitely made out more than Peter and Lara Jean but quantity doesn’t beat quality. Also, there was just a lack of development when it came to Belly and her three amors. Where was the build up and tension that I love? Cuz it was nonexistent.
2. Characters
To All the Boys... made all their characters so darn likable and well-rounded. Even the “enemy” earned some redemption in a sequel. The Summer...everybody was meh. The only person I really liked and rooted for was Taylor.
3. Tropes
Fake dating? Not a fan. Unrequited love? Yes, please. But somehow, To All the Boys.. made me a fake dating trope convert and The Summer...turned one of my favorite tropes into a room temp soup of meh-ness.
4. Tone
I think I started watching The Summer... with incorrect expectations. I thought it would be a romantic comedy like To All the Boys...when it was really a teen drama.
5. Cultural References
So there’s this new trend I’ve noticed in teen shows/movies from this last year (The Senior Year and The Summer...). In the 80s - 00s, the pop cultural references were music, celebrities, movies, etc., but recently the pop cultural references are more and more about politics/movements/politicians. That’s a bit too much realism for me. I know what’s going on in the world. That’s why I’m watching this show/movie...to escape it. So let me escape, please. To All the Boys.. had organic and natural pop cultural references. It kept the tone lighthearted and fun.
6. Substances/Alcohol
It’s a teen show so I knew there would be this kind of content in The Summer. What I didn’t expect was the quantity of scenes and how little it added to the narrative.
7. Watchability
True story...I gave up on the The Summer after 4 episodes. It was that much of a snoozefest. To All the Boys is highly rewatchable and I will likely watch it again soon. High odds for today. #PalateCleanser
8. Music
Ok, so The Summer does win on one front. The music was way better in this series than To All the Boys.
#to all the boys i've loved before#to all the boys netflix#to all the boys#the summer i turned pretty#jenny han
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My 2023 in Film
Part 3:
101-150
Am I starting to regret listing all of these on here? A bit, yes!
True to form I underestimated the scope of this project. Also true to form I made it more complicated than was strictly necessary.
But in my defense I nearly started out writing little reviews/thoughts for each one, mentioning notable actors/directors, and putting in pictures before finally acknowledging that all of that would have just resulted in me not finishing it at all.
Link to Part I
Link to Part II
* = rewatched
[++] = I loved it
[+] = I liked it
[=] = I am indifferent about it
[-] = Not my thing
[--] = I hate it
Click on the list number to get a trailer for it.
101.
Air (2023)
---Biopic Business Drama
A biopic about the man and the team that created the first Air Jordans. [+]
102.
Evil Dead Trap (1988)
---Horror
The host of a late night tv show receives what seems to be a snuff tape. In search of a good story she grabs a crew and attempts to track down where the video was shot. [-]
103.
Falcon Lake (2022)
---Coming-of-age Drama
A French family take a trip with their Canadian friends to a lake cabin in Quebec. While there their kids bond over a local legend about the ghost of the lake. [+]
104.
Ojibwa Warrior: The Legacy of Dennis Banks (2021)
---Documentary
A documentary about the life and legacy of native american activist Dennis Banks. [=]
105.
Terrifier (2016)
---Horror
A creepy clown kills people and generally gets gross about it. [--]
106.
Primal Rage (1988)
---Horror
A newspaper reporter got bitten by a monkey after sneaking into a university research lab and all he got to show for it was this infectious rage virus. [+]
107.
Horrible Bosses (2011)
---Crime Comedy
A group of friends all hate their respective bosses and concoct a murder-swapping plan to solve their problem. [=]
108.
Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping (2016) *
---Mockumentary Comedy
A mockumentary chronicling the life of a former boy band member turned solo artist as he tries to recover from a slump. [+]
109.
Antichrist (2009)
---Horror
A married couple go to a remote cabin to try and deal with the grief of losing their child, but things get weird and dark. [=]
110.
Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves (2023)
---Fantasy Adventure Comedy
A party of adventurers plan an epic heist in order to save the world. [+]
111.
First Love (2019)
---Crime Action
One night a boxer and a call girl become entangled in a dangerous knot of yakuza, drugs, and schemes. [=]
112.
Peter Pan & Wendy (2023)
---Fantasy Adventure
If you don't know what Peter Pan is about by now, then that's honestly kind of impressive, and you should consider seeing the play or reading the book. For everyone else, this one was directed by the same guy who did The Green Knight (2021). [+]
113.
Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986) *
---Comedy Adventure
A high school senior decides that today is his chance to enjoy one last day of true teenage freedom before graduation and he's determined to make the most of it. [++]
114.
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018) *
---Animated Superhero Action Adventure Comedy
Peter Parker (aka Spider-Man) narrowly stops a madman from inadvertently tearing New York apart with a device made for tunneling into parallel dimensions, but not before coming into direct contact with it. Now Spiders from different dimensions have been sucked into this world and it's up to a teenager named Miles Morales to save his dimension and the Spiders along with it. [++]
115.
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023)
---Animated Superhero Action Adventure Comedy
Miles Morales discovers a secret society of Spider-people, but soon learns that the cost of membership is higher than he's willing to pay. Now the effects of his meddling may have just destabilized the entire multiverse. [+]
116.
Parasite (2019) *
A poor family cons their way into working for a wealthy one. Now with a taste of a better life they are confronted with the reality of what the true cost of wealth may be. [++]
117.
Spider Baby (1967)
---Horror
Three siblings suffer from a rare condition that causes them to begin to mentally regress when they hit puberty. Cared for by their butler after the death of their parents, he has managed to keep their penchant for murder a secret. However, there's only so long one can hide a secret like that. [=]
118.
Terrifier 2 (2022)
---Horror
That murder clown is back! And this time there's actually kind of/sort of a plot. Also this time it's nearly 2.5 hours long for some reason. [-]
119.
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018) *
[see #114] Watched it with commentary this time.
120.
Moonlight (2016)
---Queer Drama
Over the course of his life a black man struggles to learn how to be safe, accepted, and happy in a world that seems determined to undermine who he wants to be. [++]
121.
Blackberry (2023)
---Business Drama Bio-pic Comedy
The story of men who created the Blackberry and changed the course of communication technology forever. [+]
122.
Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed (2004)
---Coming-of-Age Horror
Brigitte Fitzgerald struggles to keep her werewolf infection at bay, but a misunderstanding lands her in a rehab clinic. Between slowly becoming a monster, being trapped in this clinic, and being hunted by another werewolf, there's only so much a young woman can take before she snaps. [++]
123.
The Cow Who Sang a Song into the Future (2022)
---Magical Realism Drama
A Chilean woman comes back from the dead and tries to make sense of the world, but finds her presence affects her family in very different ways. [-]
124.
The Revenant (2015)
---Western Adventure
A frontiersman in 1820s America fights for survival and revenge after being left for dead. [=]
125.
Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning (2004)
---Period Horror
Two sisters in 1800s Canada try to find a safe heaven after their father and the rest of his trading party fail to return. Although they are soon to learn that monstrous things lurk in the hearts of some men and that things are not always as they appear. [=]
126.
All About Evil (2010)
---Campy Horror Comedy
A meek woman inherits her father's failing movie theater. But in order to keep it up and running she finds she has to embrace her dark side and create her own brand of horror movie. [-]
127.
A Fish in the Bathtub (1998)
---Relationship Drama Comedy
A testy 40-year marriage finally hits the breaking point when the husband insists on keeping a live fish in their bathtub. [-]
128.
Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (2010) *
---Action Adventure Comedy
Scott Pilgrim is stuck in a rut. But when he falls in love with the mysterious new girl in town he's going to have to defeat her 7 evil exes in order to have a chance with her. [=]
129.
Chile '76 (2022)
---Period Drama
During the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet an upper-class Chilean woman goes to her summer house to oversee its renovation. But when a chance encounter gives her an opportunity to do something meaningful with her life and skills, she learns that everything has a cost. And safety and freedom often do not walk hand in hand. [=]
130.
Mohawk (2017)
---Period Action Revenge
During the War of 1812 a Mohawk woman is torn between two lovers and how best to handle the war. But a mass killing will soon force her into the fight and one wrong move could have deadly consequences. [-]
131.
Shivers (1975)
---Horror
A man's quest to develop a parasite to free humanity from its prudish shackles has deadly results when it gets lose in an apartment complex. [-]
132.
Pusher II (2004)
---Crime Drama
Freshly out of prison Tonny wants to make a name for himself and impress his father. But when he learns that he might have a son of his own he begins to question his life's path, what kind of dad he wants to be, and if it's too late to change. [+]
133.
Slumber Party Massacre (2021)
---Meta Horror Comedy
An overly aware of itself sequel remake of the 1982 slasher movie of the same name. [-]
134.
Hot Rod (2007) *
[see #87]
[++]
135.
Calvaire (2004)
---New French Extremity Horror
I think describing this movie in a succinct way might be beyond my skills as it has a lot to say and a very dark and unusual way of saying it. Suffice it to say that it's about an entertainer who is traveling to perform at a Christmas special when his van breaks down in the middle of nowhere and...uh...some wild shit goes down. [+]
136.
Grizzly (1976)
---Animal Attack
I mean, it's essentially Jaws...but if Jaws was about a bear and didn't have Steven Spielberg-level talent. [-]
137.
Tremors (1990) *
---Queer Buddy Comedy Creature Feature
Two "business partners" in rural Nevada are all that stand in the way of a pack of monstrous underground worms that want to eat everyone. [++]
138.
Asteroid City (2023)
---Comedy Drama
In 1950s America an odd collection of characters gather in Asteroid City for a youth astronomical science competition, but are held in quarantine when the competition gets some unexpected guests...except not really. [=]
139.
What's Your Number? (2011) *
---Rom-Com
A woman reads a magazine article that makes her self conscious about the number of sexual partners she's had in her life and starts on a quest to investigate if any of her exes have matured since they were last together. [=]
140.
Elemental (2023)
---Animated Rom-Com
Water. Earth. Fire. Air. Currently the four nations kindofnotreally live together in harmony. Then everything changed when this fire lady fell in love with a water dude, which I guess had never happened before in the perhaps thousands of years these beings have been around? In any case it's all a metaphor for immigration and race relations. [-]
141.
Cat People (1942) *
---Queer Horror
An immigrant woman feels different from those around her. She tries to live a normal life in fear that giving in to her true impulses will result in her turning into a murderous panther. [++]
142.
Free Guy (2021)
---Sci-Fi Action Comedy
An NPC in a MMORPG gains sentience and tries to become a hero. [+]
143.
Wolf Creek (2005)
---Road Trip Horror
An Australian road trip goes awry when three friends find themselves stranded in the middle of the desert after their car breaks down. The good news? A local man comes across them and agrees says he'll give them a tow. The bad news? The man has a secret agenda of his own. [-]
144.
My Super Ex-Girlfriend (2006)
---Superhero RomCom
A man finds out that the women he's been dating is actually a superhero. But this makes things awkward (and dangerous) for him when he wants to break up. [-]
145.
Highlander (1986) [Director's Cut, baby!] *
---Fantasy Action Adventure
A Scottish highlander discovers he's an immortal and is destined to embark on a quest across the ages to be the last immortal left alive. [++]
146.
Unwelcome (2022)
---Folk Horror
A British couple moves to the Irish countryside. But when they fail to respect the local traditions they might wind up paying the ultimate price. [=]
147.
Johnny Mnemonic (1995)
---Sci-Fi Action
In a future of technology run amok a data smuggler might have bitten off more than he can chew when he accepts to carry a highly dangerous package. [--]
148.
Sound of Metal (2019)
---Drama
A metal drummer begins to lose his hearing and struggles to accept a future so different from the one he had dreamt of. [++]
149.
Vesper (2022)
---Sci-Fi Adventure
A 13 year old bio-hacker struggles to carve out a life for herself in a future where the environment has turned against humanity. [=]
150.
Werewolves Within (2021)
---Mystery Horror Comedy
A forest ranger has only just started a new job in a small town when he begins to suspect that a werewolf in lurking in the town. [+]
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Hey y'all!
Today I'm going to give an abridged review of a scene from a movie that is very near and dear to my heart. I'll be discussing the "where there's a whip, there's a way" scene from the 1980 animated adaptation of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.
Before we jump into it, I'll just say that this scene is a 10/10. Fucking brilliant. It is peerless, and nothing before or after will ever match its quality.
The scene starts with a relentlessly groovy synth bass line as we transition to a procession of singing orcs. For those of you weaned on the teat of Peter Jackson's trilogy, you might find singing orcs to be a bit befuddling. I did too, until I actually read the books and found out that they're chock-a-block with cunts singing about anything and everything.
Which brings me to a side tangent.
I hate the songs in The Lord of the Rings. Not that I'm against music, not at all, I'm just against songs in books. My issue is that I have to invent the melody I think best fits what I'm reading. And let me tell you, the melodies I invent are shit house. Everytime I have to read another one of Tolkien's songs I'm reminded by my own musical inadequacies.
Anyways, back to the regular scheduled programming
Skipping ahead a bit (the first minute and a half of this scene is just orcs whining about how they don't wanna go to war). We find our good pals, Frodo and Sam, sleeping on a rock. And boy oh boy are they fucked looking. Whoever designed the hobbits in these animated movies really went ham with these hobbits, creating some of the most foul creatures I've ever laid eyes upon.
I feel sick just looking at Bilbo. It's the eyes that really frighten me. Anyways, shock horror, the boys wake up to broad daylight and, oh no! The Lord of the lash thinks they're orcs and is getting them to march.
We're then treated to another solid 20 seconds of orcs singing the same shit. Then Samwise comes out with an absolute scathing remark, saying "I'd rather be singing a good old Hobbit song myself." Fuck yes Sam. Tell it like it is.
The orc army comes to a fork in the road at the same time as an army of Easterlings (I'm assuming they're Easterlings, I might be wrong). The Easterling general pushes over the Lord of the lash, telling him that men get to march before orcs. For some reason the Lord of the lash, instead of fighting back like orcs always do, gets all coy and submissive and is like "🥺👉👈 okay".
Then Sam, ever the shit stirrer, decides to take advantage of the racial tension between the orcs and men to goad the Lord of the lash into starting a fucking race war. He does this ostensibly to create a diversion so him and Frodo can slip away, but I can't shake the feeling that he did this out of some sick, sadistic desire to watch the world burn.
The scene ends with Sam and Frodo running away as we see glimpses of the devastation wrought by Sam play out in the background.
Well, that wasn't really a review so much as it was a retelling of what happened. I guess I'll give my actual review here.
I do really think the song is groovy as shit. It's catchy, the whip sound effect slaps, the choir sounds great. I think the mood of the song is a bit strange though; I never really thought of the orcs as resenting being sent to war. War kind of seemed like their favourite thing (to me at least). I'm also a fan of the voice acting for pretty much everyone, barring the Easterling general. Special credit goes to the whip master, fucking love that guy's voice. I do have to question why, in a movie so strapped for time, they decide to give this scene a full 4 and a half minutes to play out. I have to respect the choice, though, even if I think it's a weird one. Sam starting shit is always funny to see, so that's a big plus.
Once again, I give this scene a 10/10. I probably rewatch it about once a month, and I hope I've visible all of you to do the same.
#lord of the rings#lotr#lord of the rings animated film#samwise gamgee#frodo baggins#the return of the king#the return of the king animated film#the Lord of the lash#the return of the king 1980
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Everything You Want (Peter Parker)
Pairing: Peter Parker x Reader
Warning: Cursing, lots of fluff and cliches
Summary: When Y/n breaks up with her ex, she declares to her friends that she will never, by any means, fall in love again. To her surprise, Peter seems to take this as a challenge, trying to win her heart in a mere afternoon.
Author: Dizzy
A/N: I was on a bit of an unexpected hiatus, but I am here to stay. School and quarantine was kicking my ass and my family is moving halfway across the country so things have been very hectic around here. But, with Falcon and the Winter Solider and me rewatching all the Marvel movies to cope with this wack ass time, I am feeling inspired.
Masterlist Request Any Of These Peter Parker/Tom Holland Masterlist
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“That’s it!” You slammed your lunch tray down on the cafeteria table as you huffed and sat down beside MJ. “I’m done with men. I hate love. I’m over it.”
MJ looked over at you and sighed, rolling her eyes. She didn’t believe you, especially since the boy you’d broken up with was the boy you dated not even a week after swearing off men the last time.
“What are you talking about?” Ned asked before receiving a swift kick from MJ.
“Don’t ask about it.” The girl replied through gritted teeth as she fully turned on the bench to face you. “Y/n, you know I love you, but I can’t help but think you’re being a little rash.”
“Rash?” You scoffed. “You wanna talk about rash? MJ, you broke up with Ethan Brooks in eighth grade because he accidentally stepped on your foot at the winter formal.”
“I know you’re just being harsh because you’re heartbroken, but let’s be real, Y/n, you don’t hate love.”
“Yes, yes I do. I’m never, ever, ever going to fall in love. I’m not even going to think about it. I now will live in a world of tragedy and heartbreak because love does not exist.”
You stabbed your fork into your mac and cheese aggressively. Maybe MJ was right, you thought, you might have been being a little harsh and you were very heartbroken.
You had the unfortunate curse of being a romantic, loving the idea of love and anything having to do with a good rom-com. You couldn’t help but fall in love with everyone you’d ever had a romantic moment with. You just loved the experience that came with being in love.
However, now sitting heartbroken and eating your feelings in mac and cheese, you really really didn’t like the idea of falling in love and would have rather fallen off the face of the earth than like another boy.
MJ sighed heavily, reading your body language and knowing you wanted nothing more than to curl up in bed and watch a sad movie.
“Y/n, I know you’re sad, but look on the bright side, you have more time to hang out with us. We’re going to the movies after school today.”
You looked between your three friends, smiling shyly. “Thanks, guys, but I really just feel like being alone.”
“Oh, come on, Y/n.” Peter sighed, giving you a nudge with his foot. “I know you secretly want to pig out on popcorn and see that new horror movie.”
“I don’t think so, Peter. I really don’t feel good.”
Peter pouted, giving you puppy dog eyes. “Please, Bug, come on. You blew me off last week to go out with Brad and we’re best friends. You owe me one.”
“I thought we were best friends.” Ned spoke up, earning another swift kick from Peter. “Ow! What is with you guys and abusing me?”
You smiled, rolling your eyes at your friends. Especially at Peter, who seemed serious enough to use the only face you couldn’t resist and a nickname that always seemed to keep your attention on him.
“I’ll think about it.” You caved, taking another bite of your food.
“Don’t think. Just say yes.”
“Are you seriously going to be pushy right now, Parker?” You raised a brow at him. “I am heartbroken. Sick with sadness.”
“I’m just saying, the best way to get over someone-”
“Is to get under someone.” Ned stated proudly, cutting Peter off.
“Ew, no!” Peter gave Ned a light shove. “I was going to say that the best way to get over someone is to be around people who care about you.”
“Or burning his personal belongings before he asks for them back.” MJ added, stealing a fork full of your mac and cheese. “We could always burn Brad’s stuff and roast marshmallows over it.”
“I like MJ’s idea way better than going to the movies.” You agreed, pointing to the girl beside you while you locked eyes with Peter.
“We’re not going to burn his stuff!” Peter exclaimed as MJ frowned. “I’m pretty sure it’s illegal to burn someone else’s property and we already made plans to go to the movie.”
“Well, damn.” You frowned. “Now look who’s being harsh.”
MJ began to chuckle beside you as Peter began to frown.
“Harsh would be me forcing you to go to the movie.”
“Oh yeah, and badgering me to go isn’t forcing me right, Peter?” You raised a brow at him as you finished the last of your meal.
“At least I’m asking and not physically forcing you to go.”
“That is true.” You shrugged. “I guess I’ll come, but if I am having a terrible time, you have to take me home.”
“Always.” Peter smiled, nodding as he reached forward and grabbed your hand. “It’ll be fun, Bug. I swear.”
You shrugged, squeezing the boy’s hand as the bell rang loudly. You pulled away quickly, catching a glance at your now ex-boyfriend and the girl attached to his arm as he walked past your table. You cleared your throat, corralling your things together as you rose from your spot on the bench.
“I’ll-I’ll, uh, see you guys later. I’ve got to get to Chem. I can’t be late again or I’ll get a detention.” You stammered, feeling the tears prick at your eyes as you pulled your books in your arms.
“Let me walk with you.” Peter offered, noticing the sudden change in your mood as he rose from his seat and rounded the table to where you stood. “I have to get to Bio next door anyway.”
You nodded silently, surprised when you felt Peter’s hand press lightly against the small of your back as he guided you through the crowd in silence.
“You know, Bug, it’s okay to say things aren’t okay.” He finally said as you made it into the outer corridor of the cafeteria.
You bit your lip at his words, holding back the tears as you glanced over at him so he could finally see your eyes and cheeks red with pent up feelings.
“I’m fine.” You choked out, swallowing the lump that formed in your throat.
Peter pulled you aside, out of the way of the walking students. His eyes, you could see as he rested his hands on your shoulders and forced you to look at him, were full of concern.
“I know you’re not. You want to talk about it?”
You couldn’t help it, the warmth and care in his brown eyes caused your tears to begin to fall as your hand shot up to wipe them quickly.
“You must think I’m pathetic.” You laughed uncomfortably as you spoke, “I’m crying over some stupid boy and you have to watch.”
Peter shook his head, his expression clearly showing the confusion in his mind as he looked at you.
He never found you pathetic nor would he ever. On the contrary, he found you to be the most amazing person he’d had ever known, and not just because you were best friends. Watching you cry, he realized something he’d never wanted to take a good hard look at.
You were the girl he’d always wanted to be with and you’d always kept him on the sidelines. You were everything he’d ever wanted and yet you always kept him as the best friend, the shoulder to cry on, the boy who often kept you afloat.
For a girl so in love with romance and cliches, you’d never realized how much of a walking cliche the two of you were.
Not that Peter was upset. He would never be upset by that, especially when you still allowed for him to be so close by your side.
“Oh, Y/n.” He pulled you into a hug after giving you a moment to clean yourself up. “I would never think you were pathetic. You’re the best person I know.”
You sniffed, bringing your arms around him to embrace him back before pulling away and looking up at him.
“You really think so?”
“I know so.” He gave you a shy smile as he glanced down at you.
Your eyes traveled from gazing into his and looking to the spot on his shirt that you had now stained with tears and mascara.
“Even if I stained your nice white shirt with my make up?”
Peter pulled away, looking down at the shoulder of his shirt as he tugged at it to see the stain better. He sighed, chuckling lightly as he looked at you with a smile as warm as the look in his eyes.
“I have other shirts. I didn’t really like this one, anyway.”
“Peter, that’s your favorite one.”
Peter shrugged, letting go of the fabric between his fingers as he looked at you, wiping away the last remaining tear that clung to your cheekbone. “I’ll just have to find a new favorite then.”
You swallowed a bit, your hand reaching up and resting on his wrist as you smiled shyly, sudden feeling nervous.
“I should probably get to class.” You said softly, your voice barely above a whisper.
Peter’s hand fell from your face quickly as he became aware of the new energy between you two.
“Yeah, yeah.” He cleared his throat harshly. “I should get going too.”
You nodded, allowing for silence to fall between you two as you quickly rushed to class, giving him a small wave before walking into the classroom.
The rest of the day felt uneventful and monotone with spurts of sadness and confusion here and there. You could feel the heartache of your breakup settle in every once in a while, especially in moments in which you let your mind wander while watching your ex-boyfriend now flirt with the girl beside him.
When your mind wasn’t wandering with thoughts of pain and heartbreak, it was full of thoughts of Peter and the moment you shared in the hallway.
It wasn’t that you’d never had a moment like that with Peter before, you’d had plenty of moments in which he comforted you while you were upset and visa versa. You were best friends, of course you’d have your fair share of comforting moments, such as the time when you spent a week at Peter’s house after his uncle passed away.
However, while you sat in class with your pen between your lips as you watched and counted down the minutes to the bell ringing, you couldn’t shake the feeling that that moment in the hallway meant something more to you.
As the bell finally rang, you practically ran out of the classroom and into the hall, only to run into the person you were looking for.
You feel backwards and onto the floor, slightly shocked by your bottom hitting the ground as Peter’s hand shot out towards you as he bent over.
“Shit, Y/n, you okay?” He asked as you grabbed his hand and allowed for him to help you up.
You dusted yourself off before picking up your bag. “Yeah, I’m fine.”
“What were you running for?”
“I was, uh, looking for you. We’re supposed to go to a movie, right?”
Peter nodded, starting to walk towards the front entrance of the school, his hands shoved into his pockets as you walked closely beside him.
“Are you feeling better?” He asked after the silence between you felt too heavy for him to bear.
“I don’t know.” You shrugged. “I don’t know how I could really feel better while having to see my newly ex flirt with another girl not even 24 hours after our breakup.”
“I’m sorry, Bug.”
“It’s not your fault.” You shrugged, kicking a rock that sat on the sidewalk in front of you. “He can do what he wants. He’s a single man now.”
“I wouldn’t call him much of a man.” Peter admitted, taking a look in your direction.
You kicked the rock again as you approached it, watching it bounce and tumble down the sidewalk and into the grass.
“Are MJ and Ned going to meet us at the theater or what��s the plan?” You asked, trying to derail the conversation from the topic you had no interest in rehashing.
Peter pulled a hand from his pocket and rubbed the back of his neck before putting it back in his pocket. He should’ve known you’d ask about the other two people who were supposed to be in attendance to your evening out.
“MJ had to go to detention since she’s behind on her sketchbook work for art class. You know how she is, likes to draw people in detention for whatever reason. And Ned went home sick after lunch. He made the mistake of eating the meatloaf.” He lied, surprised he thought of something believable off the top of his head.
In reality, he paid MJ twenty dollars to refrain from going to the movie and to lie about her whereabouts, something she never had trouble at doing, and he promised Ned that he’d spend the rest of the weekend helping him build another Star Wars lego model even though Peter wanted to grow out of the habit of playing with legos.
You frowned a bit, having hoped you could’ve had some much needed girl time with MJ and wanting the funny commentary and banter of Ned during a movie that would normally terrify you.
“Oh. Well, that sucks, but it’s okay. At least we’re still going together.” You raised your frown into a slight smile.
Silence fell between you once again, leaving the only audible sound to be the wind and your heels hitting the ground in unison as you walked towards the movie theater.
“Don’t worry about paying tonight. It’s my treat.” Peter stated as the theater came into view on the horizon.
“Oh, Peter, you don’t have to.”
“No, I want to. Just let me treat you to a night out. I feel bad that you’ve been having a rough day, so it’s the least I could do.”
You reached out and grabbed his arm, stopping him in his tracks before you engulfed him into a hug with your arms tight around his neck and your perfume filling his nostrils.
“Peter Parker, you are truly my best friend and the love of my life.” You announced proudly, not realizing that the words warmed Peter in a way he’d never experienced before.
“I love you too, Y/n, but I cannot breathe with you choking me out like this.” He said softly, pretending to wheeze as you pulled away, giving him a shove.
“You are so dramatic.” You chuckled, starting to walk down the sidewalk once again.
“I’m dramatic?” Peter scoffed as he jogged to keep up with you. “Aren’t you the theater nerd?”
“Doesn’t mean you’re not also a drama queen.”
“I’ll have you know, I am very good at keeping my cool.”
“Tell that to Flash Thompson and your little rivalry.”
“Flash is an asshole.”
“I’m not saying he isn’t,” you argued, “all I’m saying is that you get a bit dramatic with him. I like to think he’s secretly in love with you.”
“Ew, gross.” Peter shook his head. “Flash is the last person I’d want a dramatic romance with.”
“I think Flash is the last person anyone wants to have a romance with.” You laughed.
Peter was glad that it seemed your spirits were lifting as you finally made it to the theater. He could feel his own spirits lifted by your bettering mood which left him not needing to worry as much.
He didn’t know whether it was the elation in mood he was feeling between the two of you or the instinctive urge to keep you close and protected that had him reaching for your hand as he opened the door to the theater to let you in first, but as you walked through the corridor, he grabbed it without thought or hesitation.
You didn’t know what possessed him to grab your hand either, but you found yourself refraining from questioning it, wanting to feel the warmth and caring touch of someone else. Though your spirits were lifted a bit, you still felt lonely deep down.
“Are you okay?” Peter asked, glancing down at you as he grabbed the tickets from the girl at the ticket counter and began to guide you towards the snack bar.
You nodded, unsure of what to say as Peter continued to watch you closely. You held your breath, suddenly nervous with his eyes on you before you were saved by his eyes travelling to view the menu far above your head.
“I’m thinking we get a large popcorn and two sodas.” He thought out loud as you frowned. “Unless, that’s not what you want?”
You blinked, shaking your head quickly as you spoke. “No, no, sorry. I got lost in thought. That sounds fine. I’m not that hungry, though.”
“How are you not hungry? You ate two bites of mac and cheese at lunch and then pushed it around on your tray.”
You shrugged, pulling your hand from his and crossing your arms over your chest. You were somewhat building up an appetite, but every time you did, you suddenly felt sick by your own intrusive thoughts about your heartache and break up with a boy you knew you shouldn’t have been crying over.
“I guess I’m not really in the mood to eat too much.” You finally said.
“Well, I’m still getting the large and if you ask for any, I won’t give you some. You already said no.” Peter teased.
“Oh, you would never say no to me.”
“You wanna bet?” Peter raised a brow as you reached the front of the short line.
“I’ll bet you a bag of overpriced M&M’s.”
“I thought you weren’t hungry.”
“I am always hungry for M&M’s.”
Peter smiled with a light eye roll. “Alright, but you can’t eat any until we determine who won.”
“Deal.”
You smiled as he turned away from you, ordering your snacks and you began taking each one from him before he carried the popcorn and his drink and you carried your own drink and the bag of M&M’s you were so excited to win. You watched your feet fall to the ground to his in unison as you two stayed silent, trying to navigate the hallway for the theater your movie was in.
“Hey, Peter?” You caught the boy’s attention as he walked through the open door of your theater, a fistful of popcorn in his hand as he looked at you.
“Yeah?” He began walking backwards as he faced you and tossed the popcorn into his mouth.
“Can I have some popcorn?”
“Yeah, sure.” He nodded as he spoke through his mouthful of popcorn and held the bucket out to you.
You began laughing, taking a few pieces of popcorn and popping them into your mouth.
“Why are you laughing?” Peter asked as you were giggling beside him now following him up the stairs of the theater before looking down at his bucket. “Oh. I guess you can have those M&M’s after all.”
“We just made this bet! How’d you forget already?” You chuckled, walking past him and into an aisle, picking the perfect seat in the middle of the theater.
“I-I don’t know! I got so involved in the popcorn I forgot.”
“I guess that’s one way of saying you want to marry a food item.” You teased as he rolled his eyes and took a seat beside you.
“You know, I’m not going to get mad cause you’re going through it, but when you’re over it, I will get you back for this.”
“How? You’re already a victim of premature Alzheimer’s. You won’t remember this by the time I get a new boyfriend.”
You reached over, grabbing a handful of popcorn and beginning to eat the pieces one by one as you watched Peter closely.
“You know, sometimes I hate you.”
“No, you don’t.”
“How would you know?”
“Cause you don’t even have a mean bone in your body. Flash bullies you mercilessly and you don’t even say anything back.”
“Is that a bad thing?”
“No.” You shook your head. “It makes you a good guy. And we need good guys in this world.”
“You think I’m a good guy?” Peter raised his brow as you nodded wildly at him.
“Of course I do.” You leaned over, placing a hand on his. “You’re not just a good guy, but a guy too good for this world, you know? You deserve the world, but the world doesn’t deserve you.”
Peter leaned in close to you. “Sorry, I don’t think I heard that.”
You could feel your breath hitch as he leaned in, his face a few mere inches from yours. It wasn’t that you were scared, but nervous at your excitement at the thought of him kissing you.
Peter could feel your anxious energy as he leaned in close, the urge to kiss you in the way he’d always wanted to growing strong as he moved his head so your lips were lined up to his ear. It wasn’t that he wanted to kiss you, but he didn’t want to take advantage of your loneliness in that moment.
You leaned in close to his ear, your nostrils now full of his shampoo as you spoke softly. “I said that I thought you were such a great guy that you deserve the world, but the world doesn’t deserve you.”
“You mean that?” He answered back, his voice as soft as your own.
He did dare lean back or move his head from the position it was in for fear that he’d kiss you so soon. The words you were saying were ones he always wanted you to say, but never thought would come out. He wanted to be everything you ever wanted, but your words now felt somewhat short yet so close to that sentiment.
“Of course I do.” You replied, your own urge to kiss him rising steadfast in the back of your mind.
You couldn’t tell if it was your loneliness or the sudden dimming of the theater lights that had you realizing that all you wanted was to cross the line of friendship with Peter, a line you never realized was made to be crossed when it came to your friendship.
Every touch, every sweet nothing, every thing about him you loved began to swirl around in your mind as you pulled away from him and gazed into his eyes before planting your lips on his, pushing him back into the armrest of his seat.
Peter was shocked by the gesture as he leaned into the kiss, his hands resting on your cheeks before you pulled away from him breathlessly.
“Y/n, I-”
“Peter.” You cut him off before giggling. “Go ahead.”
“Bug, I don’t want you to think I’m taking advantage of you and your feelings about your breakup even though I really like you and-”
You cut the boy off with another kiss, not wanting to hear what he had to say. You knew he was going to give you some speech about how you might not know what your feeling and so on, but you didn’t care. You knew that you kissed him and you liked it and that it felt more right than any date with Brad.
You pulled away, putting a hand over his mouth before he could speak as you began to instead. “Peter, I know how I feel. I like you too, okay? Now, can we just take advantage of the fact we’re some of the few people in here and just hang out?”
Peter nodded, pulling your hand off of him. “I think I’d like that.”
#peter parker#peter parker fanfic#peter parker imagine#peter parker x reader#peter parker fanfiction#spiderman#spiderman fanfiction#spiderman fanfic#spiderman imagine#spiderman x reader#tom holland!spiderman#tom holland#tom holland fanfic#tom holland imagines#tom holland imagine#tom holland x reader#peter parker imagines#spiderman imagines#marvel#marvel fanfic#marvel fanfiction#marvel imagines#marvel imagine
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Soul Bonded (Two)(Spideypool)
PART ONE HERE
SERIES MASTERLIST HERE
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“Oh hey, I know those guys.” Clint peeked over Pepper’s shoulder when he saw the video playing on her tablet. “How’d you get that video footage? Not even the Daily Planet manages that good of a look at them.”
“You know, I’ve learned not to ask where or how JARVIS comes up with surveillance videos.” Pepper took her eyes off the screen only long enough to kiss the other Omega’s cheek and to lay a gentle hand at the non existent bump of Clint’s stomach. “How are you and my next favorite niece and nephew doing today?”
“I dunno why everyone thinks I’m having twins.” Clint complained mildly. “We all see how big Steve is with baby James. If a super soldier can barely handle just one kiddo, what makes you think I can handle two?”
“Cos you already handle one set of twins so well!” the sweet Omega laughed at Clint’s disgruntled expression, and lifted her fluffy pink wings to brush against his darker ones. “Tony says the young mutant with webs is named Peter Parker and the bigger one is Deadpool. He wants me to try and get a hold of them and bring them by the compound.”
“Peter’s younger than Wanda and Pietro, and Deadpool’s real name is Wade, but trust me, he’s not the type to share his Omega.” Clint pointed out, and then immediately after, “Oh but with our Alpha starting to step aside with the Iron Man thing, he wants two more mutants on the team and around the family to keep us safe. That makes more sense than the other thing.”
“Exactly.” Pepper rewound the footage to the spot where the admittedly beautiful Omega showed off sheer jaw dropping strength as he shoved the Alpha off him. “They seem rough, together. I’ve never seen a pair wrestle like that before. Isn’t the Alpha worried about hurting his mate?”
“Wade’s mutation keeps him halfway to feral all the time, but Peter’s got some spider thing going on, so he channels predator half the time anyway. They’re fine. It’s like violent flirting, but best I can tell, neither one ever gets hurt.”
Clint pulled a chair up next to Pepper and snuggled in under her wings, soaking in every bit of the love she so readily gave. Tony might be the family Alpha, but Pepper was the family’s matriarch, kept them all together and fed and clothed and made sure Stark Industries stayed successful so Tony could afford to give their always growing family everything.
The pretty Omega exuded pure comfort right along with unwavering resolve and underlying steel that made her a powerhouse in both the business world and in front of the press. Simply put, Pepper was perfect and even with her layers of suppressants, she scented like home and like love and all good things so Clint curled in closer and purred low in contentment.
“Sweet Omega.” Pepper dropped a kiss on Clint’s head and ran light fingers through his feathers. “Have you started craving anything? Getting over tired yet?”
“Not too bad.” Clint promptly yawned and she laughed at him. “I’m only like three or four weeks out, you know? Tony figured it out right away so we are still ages away from me even starting to feel pregnant.”
“Hmmm.” she kept playing with the feathers closest to his shoulders and Clint sighed and relaxed into the familiar touch. “You called this Alpha Wade. You know him personally?”
“We have lunch together like once a month.” Clint mumbled. He was honestly lulled halfway to sleep right there on Pepper’s shoulder but he startled when she jumped and cursed. “Sheesh! What?!”
“You have lunch with him?” Pepper’s pink wings ruffed up in concern. “Clint! If our Alpha knew you were out there with such a volatile mutant, he would lose his mind! Deadpool is dangerous!”
“I think you’re forgetting that I can take care of myself just as well as anyone else in this compound.” The Omega said firmly, almost irritably. “Do you really think I’d hang out with someone I was scared of? Wade’s got a rough past, but he’s okay now.”
“Clint, that’s not what I’m--”
“Pep.” Clint pulled away entirely now, dark brown wings lifting above his shoulders as his irritation grew. “We live in the same building as the Hulk and I regularly share a bed with the former Winter Soldier and the stabbiest, scariest ballerina in the world. How is Wade any different than them?”
“Don’t be angry with me darling.” She tried. “It’s just--”
“Cos he’s a little closer to feral?” Clint interrupted. “Because his bad days are a hell of a lot worse than ours? Cos his wings aren’t pretty and perfect? Since when does anyone have to be pretty and perfect to fit into this family? You’re about the only one in this place with no blood on her hands, Pep. Don’t turn your back on Wade because the blood on his hands is a littler newer than what’s still staining--”
“Clint.” Pepper cupped the Omega’s chin and forced him to look at her. “Clint, I wasn’t going to say any of that. I was just going to say that if our Alpha found out you’d been meeting with someone so dangerous, he’d put an immediate stop to it until he could do some research and make sure Wade’s worst days are behind him. Tony never tells you no about anything, but he would say no to this until he knew you and the babies weren’t in danger.”
“...oh.”
“I love how quickly you stand up for everyone.” Pepper coaxed Clint back into her arms, put the tablet down and turned so she was facing him better. “You did it with Bucky when Natasha wasn’t sure about him, you stepped right in with Thor and Loki to welcome them to the family, and I’m not surprised you’re doing the same for Wade. But honestly, it’s weird enough that you have friends outside our family and it’s even weirder that none of us know about him.”
“And this isn’t about who Wade used to be, or what he’s done and good god, you know it’s not about his looks.” she continued. “It’s about making sure our loved ones are safe before bringing anyone home. Steve didn’t bring Bucky home until he was sure the Winter Soldier was gone. Thor came with Coulson’s personal recommendation and Thor waited to bring Loki along until he knew they were settled and had worked through some of their anger.”
“And now?” the Omega glanced pointedly at Clint’s stomach, then motioned upstairs where Bucky and Loki were napping with Baby Maria and where Thor and Tony were currently putting the last touches on Baby James’s nursery. “Now it’s not just a houseful of super powered or otherwise capable and scary people we’re thinking about. Now there are babies to think about too. Tony would want to meet Wade before he let the Alpha meet anyone else only because our family has grown to fourteen and soon--”
She patted at his tummy again. “Sixteen. Our Alpha will soon have sixteen people to look after. Finding out that you have been hanging out with one of the most astonishing and breathtakingly dangerous Alphas...well we all know what happened with Director Fury when Tony thought he was trying to recruit Bucky, right? The last thing we need is our Alpha going toe to toe with someone like Wade because his initial reaction to his mate spending time with Deadpool would be to go and rip Wade’s wings right off.”
“I guess I never thought to say anything.” Clint frowned, wings drooping, and Pepper immediately crooned at him comfortingly. “We used to run into each other when I worked at Shield, and I’ve told him to bring Pete up for dinner a few times, he’s just never accepted the invite. He’s a good guy, Pep. I promise. I wouldn’t bring anyone into our home who wasn’t.”
“I know you wouldn’t.” She reassured him. “But how about I break the news to Tony that you know Wade personally, hm? I’ll promise I’ll phrase it better than ‘your pregnant Omega regularly has lunch dates with someone who carries two katanas, three different guns and has the unnerving ability to regenerate everything’.”
“Fine.” Clint finally smiled again, leaned in and bumped their noses gently. “I’ll let you tell Tony about Wade.”
Clint cuddled up for another few minutes then wandered off to see if Sam would take him for ice cream-- the Beta was helpless against babies and expecting Omegas and Clint fully intended to take supreme advantage of it for the next eight months-- and Pepper went back to taking notes about the footage of Wade and his mate, Peter.
“JARVIS?” she called and the AI’s system clicked just once to show he was listening, a feature Tony had installed when he realized Bucky had a hard time with J just speaking out unexpectedly. “Let’s get some of the material ordered that Tony used to create Bruce’s room. Not the safe room below the laboratory, but his actual living quarters. Weighted blankets, the daylight lamps instead of the usual lighting, the higher security on the doors, all that sort of thing.”
“The Alpha Deadpool will need similar accommodations due to PTSD?”
“I’m not sure.” she admitted. “But it’s probably a safe bet, and even if Wade doesn’t need those things, I’d rather have it all on hand than need them and have to go get them. Turn on the systems in one of the adjoining suites like Wanda and Pietro have, one of the rooms can be for his mate. Order materials to construct some perches and higher up places for the Omega. Apparently he’s got a rather spidery inclination.”
“Ms. Potts, a rather spidery inclination doesn’t necessarily mean the Omega wants to sleep in the corners.”
“No, I suppose not.” the disapproval from JARVIS was nearly tangible and Pepper laughed softly, “But it couldn’t hurt, right? What if he webs up in the corner and naps?”
“Honestly, ma’am.”
“Order additional high protein foods as well. We’re already getting to the point of needing to raise our own food just to keep up with the soldiers, but the addition of two more metahumans will strain our pantry to about breaking.”
“Yes ma’am.”
“Thank you.” Pepper finally gave up rewatching the same videos over and over and went to find their Alpha, trying to figure out how to tell an increasingly protective Tony that his newly pregnant mate had been spending time with a mercenary.
She’d have to make sure he was holding Baby Maria just so he wouldn’t shout.
Sigh.
Their life was absolutely crazy.
************
************
School buses weren't supposed to blow tires and careen wildly around the freeway at sixty plus miles an hour and then plummet off the overpass into the traffic below, but that’s exactly what happened.
It could have been an error of judgment when the tires had last been filled, it could have been a less than motivated operator who rushed the vehicle inspection before the kids loaded on for their field trip, it could have been something unexpectedly sharp on the road that hit just right and sent the relatively calm day into chaos.
Whatever it was, it was terrifying and Peter didn’t so much hear the screams as he felt them clang around his head when his spidey sense went haywire. The Omega dropped to his knees with a quiet cry, hands over his ears and maroon wings wrapped around his body as he tried to limit the sensory input and figure out what exactly was happening.
“Pete?” Wade dropped to the ground right by the Omega, dark wings up and around them to fend off any prying eyes. “Hey baby boy, what’s up? What’s going on?”
“Something is really really wrong.” Peter gasped, scrambled for his mask and jammed it on. “Something’s wrong, Alpha. I gotta figure out what it is.”
He pushed away from Wade and bolted for an alley, shouted, “Keep an eye out for me!” then threw himself up the wall. Wade couldn’t do much more than watch helplessly as the Omega webbed his way towards the roof so he could try and see what was happening
“Oh shit.” Wade saw the bus right when Peter did, and he took off running for the nearby crowd, pushing people out of the way and shouting for the others to move.
“Get out!” He shouted, snapping his wings out to try and rush pedestrians out of the area, growling in frustration when people just glanced at him and glanced away. “Damn it! Move your ass there’s a goddamn bus heading this way! Fucking move!”
Peter as Spider-man jumped down into the crowd and the pedestrians panicked when he started simply webbing slower moving people and yanking them out of the way. Wade ran around trying to help, shoving Alphas and Betas off into the side alley’s, trying hard to gently but quickly force the Omegas off the street, both of them screaming for someone to call the police, to call an ambulance, to call for help---
-- the noise the bus made as it crashed through the barrier was unbelievable, the echo of screams inside horrifying and the Alpha had only a split second to register a flash of maroon wings --
--and everything came to a stop.
The world came to a stop and all Wade could see was his mate his mate halfway to crushed beneath the front end grill the bus, legs braced and arms straining to hold the weight and not for the first time the Alpha remembered that Peter wasn’t just pretty, he wasn’t just funny, the Omega was damn near supernatural.
And then Peter screamed, cried out because everything hurt and he might have been outrageously strong but he was still human and it hurt and Wade went scrambling to figure out how to take some of the weight off his Omega. He wrapped his wings around Peter’s slim frame and braced his arms on the underside of the bus too so Peter had at least a little bit of support. When the Alpha let his strength surge, he could take on close to half a ton which didn’t even touch the amount his Omega could hold, but at least it was something.
“I’ve got you, baby boy.” he hissed out between clenched teeth. “Let’s get this thing down, huh?”
“Slow.” Peter gasped, sweating through his mask, through his clothes, his honeysuckle scent burned bitter with fear and pain. “Slow, Alpha. I gotta-- I gotta move towards the back so it doesn’t crush when it lands. You got this part?”
“Not even a little bit.” Wade stated calmly. “But we both know I’ll regenerate from being squashed flat, and no one on the bus will, so you do what you gotta do.”
Christ it was excruciating trying to hold onto even just part of the bus as Peter inched his way further down the underside of it, holding it as steady as he could and having Wade scoot along behind him until the front wheels touched. It was easier after that without all twelve tons on their arms, but Wade’s arms were still shaking by the time they made it to the back wheels, his back aching and wings trembling with the effort of holding what his Omega made look so easy.
“Out.” Wade ordered when it was just him underneath the rear wheels. “Get out from beneath this thing and hold it from the other side.”
“I’m fine, Alpha.” Peter shook his head. “This could drop on you the second I let go and I’m not doing that.”
“I’ve come back from being splatted by far worse.” The Alpha said firmly. “One day I’ll tell you about my first run in with fuckin’ Colossus, but first you need to get out from under here. I’ll hold it for a few seconds while you get situated and if you have to vacuum me up and let me reassemble in the apartment, that’s just how it’s going to be.”
“God, you’re gross, some days I don’t know why I like you..” Peter’s feathers shook uncertainly as he tried to time the maneuver. “Okay, I’m only going to let go for like three seconds alright?”
“Get going before the kids start screaming again.” Wade retorted, so the Omega dashed away and for three endless seconds he really thought his back was going to shatter, he really thought his legs would give out or his arms would fall right the hell off. It was the longest three seconds of the Alpha’s life and just when he thought he couldn’t take it half a breath more, Peter was holding the rear bumper again, shouting for Wade to roll out from beneath it so he could put it down.
Freedom.
The kids inside the bus started cheering the second the wheels were down, but Wade wasn’t listening and even if he had been listening, he didn’t care.
All he cared about was the way Peter was looking at him right now. The Omega had set the bus down then ran for the shadows of the alley where he could tear his mask off and stare at Wade, chest heaving and feathers flutters and fingers pressing at the side of his neck where a bonding bite should go. When Wade met his eyes, the Omega tilted his head and parted his lips and dropped his wings submissive for just a split second in a clear invitation.
And a split second was all it took.
Wade’s entire body snapped to attention, and when his Omega turned and fled, the Alpha took off after him, tucked his charcoal wings back and tore through the shadows after his mate as Peter laughed and trilled and egged him on.
They headed east towards Peter’s apartment to get to familiar streets, and once they made it past the park, up to the roofs they went. It wasn’t really fair of Peter to use webs to get so high so fast but Wade would never complain about being able to watch his Omega fly, the beautiful body soaring through the sky, the wings stretched out and catching the sun as he swung between the buildings.
It wasn’t fair that Peter had webs, but Wade wasn’t complaining, and the Alpha just doubled his pace tearing up the stairs to get to the rooftop, bursting through doors and vaulting railings. His heart was pounding, scarred skin itching and veins crawling with feral rising red behind his eyes as Wade raced up and up and up.
His mate had almost died. His mate had almost died. My mate almost died---
“Omega!” Wade burst through the rooftop door of Peter’s building, dented the steel as he rammed into it and skidded to a stop. “Peter!”
“I’ve been waiting for you.” Peter jumped from the utility shed and landed with a light thump, tore off his mask and shucked his jacket and spread maroon wings open in an excited welcome for the Alpha. “What took you so long? Where have you been? I want you.”
Wade met him halfway across the roof, charcoal colored feathers hitching high and aggressive, eyes snapping scarlet as he grabbed for his mate and yanked him in for a brutal kiss.
“Where have you been?” Peter asked again, gasping through the kiss and scrabbling at Wade’s clothes, shoving his hands beneath the Alpha’s shirt to get to skin and moaning low, anxious when he could finally feel Wade’s heartbeat against his palm. “God, that’s good. I missed you. I know it's only been a minute but I missed you. That was incredible, we are incredible, you are incredible, I want to eat you alive.”
Peter was talking a mile a minute, walking backwards towards the wall and dragging Wade with him, crushing kiss after greedy kiss to Wade’s mouth and hissing in excitement when the Alpha’s teeth stung at his bottom lip. “Yes my Alpha, yes more of that. More of you.”
“Settle.” Wade rumbled, a damn useless word when he was no where close to settling, the liquor heady scent of turned on Omega like a shot of adrenaline to his heart, his soul, his cock. “Settle.”
“Make me.” Peter’s hands went sticky at Wade’s side and he grabbed too tight, too greedy as they kissed again and again. “Make me settle. Bite me.”
“Peter.”
“Bite me.” The Omega half purred, half growled, turning his head to bare his neck even as he used that ridiculous strength to shove Wade against the wall. “Bite me, you know you want to. You want me just as bad as I want you and we just did something incredible together and I’m half outta my mind needing you.”
“Settle.” Wade ordered again, dark feathers waving warningly in a display of dominance and a fight for self control that made the Omega whine in pleasure. “Slow down, Omega.”
“Make me.” Peters eyes were bright, his smirk nearly devious, but his honeysuckle scent twisted longing when Wade’s hands settled at his waist. “Make me settle, Alpha.”
“I—“ Christ, sometimes Wade loathed himself. “I’m not your Alpha.”
“The fuck you aren’t.” The Omega ran his tongue over his teeth, then tipped his head to the side to show off the line of his throat, lush and inviting and practically dripping with want and need and mineyoursmineyoursmate. “Bite me, you coward.”
“Bed.” Wade said, instead of saying everything else, instead of just jerking forward and cutting into the Omega’s neck to finally bond. “Bed. Now.”
“I shouldn’t let you knot me until you bite me.” Peter whispered, but he was already backing up towards the edge of the roof, already readying himself to web backwards and then twist into his bedroom window that was only a few feet below them. “I shouldn’t let you knot me until you say I’m yours but fuck, Alpha. I’m gagging for it. Gagging for you. So empty I wanna scream. Need you so bad. What we just did was incredible and I need you so bad---”
“Bed!”
*************
*************
It was always like this.
Always Wade wondering what he’d ever done to have such a sweet Omega, such a pretty perfect Omega curled up and purring on his chest, wholly content to lay over Wade’s heartbeat and rub his adorable nose over the myriad of scars on the Alpha’s skin. Always one hand resting low on Peter’s hips and the other buried in the ridiculously fluffy hair, breathing in Peter’s pure honeysuckle scent and letting it calm the fire in his veins.
It was always like this, always Peter straddling Wade’s waist and stuck tight on his knot, rocking that gorgeous body just lightly, just enough to keep the Alpha swollen so he could stay full as long as possible. Slim fingers tracing the rougher patches of Wade’s skin, the scars and ruined pieces, then drifting up to coast gently, almost tenderly through the feathers Wade had kept away for so long, and Peter breathed in deep and exhaled slow of his Alpha’s scent as it mellowed from brittle need to caramel thick possessiveness.
I love you. Peter thought, and he knew his scent must have changed when Wade shifted beneath him and murmured, “Pretty, perfect Omega.”
It was always like this.
Always so close to enough but just not quite.
“Clint invited us to dinner at the compound tonight.” Wade said a few minutes later when he thought his Omega was maybe drifting off to sleep. “You wanna go?”
“I feel like it’s going to do ridiculous things to your ego if I tell you I’d rather get knotted again than go have dinner with the Avengers.” Peter mumbled, and the Alpha’s wings shook with his laughter. “So I guess we better go. Clint’s been asking for months.”
“Yeah, he really has.” Wade smoothed his rough palm down Peter’s back and patted lightly at the Omega’s rear. “Should we put some clothes on?”
“Definitely not. Let’s definitely go naked to meet my personal hero Iron Man and his harem of demi-gods and super soldiers and non powered but still terrifying mates.” Peter yawned and snuggled in closer. “Definitely not putting pants on for that.”
“Brat.” Wade left a quick swat on Peter’s butt, but he couldn’t help an adoring rumble when the Omega only kissed over his heart. “...I guess we could be pants-less for a few more minutes.”
************
************
From the outside, the Stark compound upstate looked like exactly that-- a compound. Towering gray walls and not one but two different fences that ensured no one would risk a climb over or cut through without suffering serious electric shock and probably a dangling appendage or two. A deceptively grassy campus with a landing pad that came up from beneath the tennis courts, an underground tunnel system that led to the pools and a state of the art laboratory buried in a bunker that would withstand a nuclear blast. A security system that scanned Wade and Peter not once, not twice but three different times before they even made it through the initial foyer and to the bolted security doors that led to the living areas.
But past the foyer, past the security systems and uncomfortably prison like appearance, through the windowless hingeless doors that either slid back into the walls to welcome someone or slid shut on their bodies to crush them flat, past one more full body scan that ended with a palm imprint machine that collected fingerprints and most likely a trace DNA sample--- past all that, the Stark compound transformed into a gorgeous home full of the scent of happiness, of love and affection, and of family.
“Ho ho holy shit.” Wade breathed as they suddenly stood in an entry way that arched up at least thirty feet, beautiful windows and graceful, artistic architecture lines, and a running length of carpet so plush he sort of wanted to lay in it. “Look at this thing. Who knew Upstate Alzatraz was a posh palace inside?”
“This is crazy.” Peter picked up a picture from the mantle, wings lifting curiously when he saw Black Widow super spy Natasha Romanoff hanging off of Captain America, laughing and clearly drunk, wearing a ridiculously sequined tux for what was apparently the ball dropping party in Times Square the last New Years Eve. “This is Natasha Romanoff drunk with Captain America. This one is Air Force Colonel James Rhodes wearing the worlds ugliest Christmas sweater. Here’s Tony with the Winter Soldier and uh--”
The Omega peered a little closer at the picture, “The prettiest baby I’ve ever seen, look at her Alpha, she’s adorable.”
“That’s Maria, the prettiest girl in any room anywhere in the world, and the tiniest thing capable of bringing Iron Man, the former Winter Soldier and an actual God of Mischief to their collective knees with one gummy smile.”
Pepper Potts was ridiculously pretty as she hurried towards Wade and Peter, her pale pink wings surrounding her like a halo as she reached to shake first Wade’s hand, then Peter’s. “Honestly, it’s almost embarrassing. She rumbled in her diaper the other day and then laughed about, and I thought Loki was going to faint. You’ve never seen a Trickster God fumble to magic up a camera and take a picture so fast in your life.”
“Right.” Wade wasn’t sure if he was dumbfounded because of the unexpected information, or dumbfounded because Ms. Potts was just so elegant. “Sure that’s-- yep. Trickster god, cameras, that all makes sense.”
“It doesn’t make sense.” She corrected with a quiet laugh. “But stick around and you’ll see Lo and Bucky and Tony going absolutely ga-ga for Maria isn’t even the most unbelieving thing to happen on any given day with our family. Now come along, it’s just about time for dinner and you still have to meet everyone, come on.”
The beautiful Omega turned around on sky high heels and hurried down the hall towards the rest of the compound, and Peter and Wade trailed along behind her, eyes wide as they took in the myriad of family pictures on the wall, the intricate AI system control panels set out on a platform by a set of stairs, and as they neared what was apparently the dining room, Peter reached for Wade’s hand nervously as they drew closer to an astonishing amount of noise coming from behind the huge double doors.
“Don’t be nervous.” the Alpha sounded nervous even as he pressed at Peter’s palm. “It’s fine. Clint invited us, the apparent Queen right there seems to think we’re welcome so--”
“Any friend of Mr. Barton’s is welcome in our compound.” came a voice from the ceiling, and Wade instinctively grabbed for a gun at his waist, Peter instinctively clamped his hand down on the Alpha’s wrist so Wade wouldn’t fire at the hidden speakers, and Pepper turned around with a knowing smile and comforting trill of her tongue.
“Ah, sorry about that. JARVIS is just as much a part of our family as everyone else and if you aren’t listening for the click before he speaks, it can be quite startling.”
“Mr. Wilson I suggest you think twice about a weapon.” the AI continued, and the Alpha immediately put both hands up to show that he had reached for the non existent weapon purely out of habit. Peter had insisted on no guns and Wade never told his Omega no about anything other than heat, so he was here gunless and the AI needn’t need worry.
“The last person to pose a threat to my family died in quite horrible fashion, and in the time since my systems have been upgraded to be un-over-rideable.” JARVIS intoned, and Peter turned wide eyes towards Pepper, who only lifted one slender shoulder in a shrug. “Rest assured I will decorate these walls with you and your mate should you think to bring any danger those who reside here.”
“When Clint extended the invitation, he was very adamant that neither Mr. Wilson nor his Omega mate would bring a weapon to our home.” Pepper assured the AI. “But thank you all the same, J.”
“Christ.” Wade had to work hard to get his wings down by his shoulders again, the instinct to shove his Omega behind his back and outright challenge the machine for inadvertently threatening them hard to ignore. “I thought robot butlers were supposed to be polite, not homicidal.”
“JARVIS’s algorithm allows him to change and adapt to new scenarios that present themselves and with this family, a new scenario presents itself daily.” Pepper typed in a code and the double doors swished open. “With the recent addition of Baby Maria, the soon to be addition of Baby James and our Omega Clint so newly expecting, JARVIS is picking up on elevated stress levels from our Alpha and adjusting himself accordingly. He sprayed Thor with fire extinguisher foam the other day because the God of Thunder has one volume setting-- loud-- and Baby Maria was napping.”
“The AI sprayed the God of Thunder with foam because the baby was napping?”
“Tony has an Allowable Decibel Protocol and Thor is in constant violation. It wasn’t the first time he was sprayed and it won’t be the last.” Another one of those shrugs, and Pepper adjusted her always perfect hair and smiled, sweeping her arm out to encompass the dining area and living room of the compound. “Welcome to our home, gentleman. You’ll have to forgive our chaos, I’d say it’s unusual, but it’s really really not.”
“Uh--” Wade raised non existent eyebrows as an absolute beefcake of a blonde strode with golden wings strode by with a wing-less scientist at his side. “Sure?”
“Thor.” Pepper reached out and snagged the blond’s arm and tugged him back. “Thor, come here and meet a new friend of the family.”
“My Lady Pepper.” Thor was massive, purely Alpha from the incredible golden wing span to the lightning flashing in his eyes, but he was downright delicate as he bent and kissed Pepper’s hand. “How are you today?”
“Wonderful, darling thank you.” Pepper turned a little pink, then motioned to Peter and Wade. “These are friends of Clint’s-- the Alpha Wade Wilson and his mate, Peter Parker.”
“The one even Hel rejects, and the child with webs!” Thor nearly crushed Wade’s hand in an enthusiastic shake, his greeting for Peter quite a bit gentler but just as boisterous. “Of course! Our Omega Clint spoke highly of you! You must meet my love, Bruce.”
The huge wings flicked out and just lightly brushed against the scientist, who came forward enough to just nod at the two of them. “Mr. Wilson.” Bruce adjusted his glasses and took a closer look at Wade’s skin, then turned to Peter. “Mr. Parker. Tony showed me the video footage of your abilities. If you don’t mind, I’d love to ask you some questions over dinner.”
“Sure.” Peter was staring even as he took a step back into his Alpha and sheltered beneath Wade’s tattered wings. “You’re Bruce Banner.”
“Ah.” Bruce cleared his throat. “Yes, I am Bruce Banner. The uh--”
“I’ve read every paper you ever wrote on gamma radiation theory and particle physics.” the Omega blurted. “and when I first got my powers I actually used one of your equations to measure the absolute mass of my strength considering my relative size to that of several different spiders and the potential effects if could have on my metabolism and regeneration abilities. Your study into meta humans and mutations as a force of nature and not a mistake is incredible. I know you don’t tour and teach anymore, but now that you’ve set up virtual classes, I’ve subscribed to as many as I can afford at a time. You are incredible.”
“Indeed, my love is incredible.” Thor’s feathers flicked forward again, but this time it was towards Peter in gratitude, a hand over his heart and head bowed in respect to Wade as Peter’s Alpha so the gesture wouldn’t seem flirty. “I tell him in Asgard he would be worshipped as a deity of intellect, but he refuses to return home with me to find out!”
“It’s nice to be appreciated for more than ah--” Bruce adjusted his glasses again and sent another curious look towards Wade, his expression dimming towards empathy and sadness when he saw the ruined wings. “For more than my ability to level an entire city. Welcome to our home, Peter and Wade. I look forward to further conversation.”
“Thor, is there any word on when the Queen Mother will arrive?” Pepper queried, and the Alpha shook his head, let his wings out so they rested gently over Bruce’s shoulders. “I am trying to prepare, but to be honest I’m not sure how to prepare for the queen and goddess of Asgard and her Valkryie guards to touch down here in the compound.”
“My mother will arrive when she decides it is time to arrive.” Thor declared. “She was raised by witches, and her grasp of time eludes me. She knows the exact moment Steve will require her healing, and that is when she will arrive.”
“You’re no help.” Pepper sighed and blew them a kiss, then grabbed for Peter’s hand and pulled the pair further into the room. “Tony is absolutely beside himself with excitement to meet a Valkyrie. I’m still wondering if I’ll have to have a stable built for a Pegasus!”
“Right.” Peter sent his Alpha a disbelieving look. “A Pegasus. That’s normal.”
“Oh Bucky, my love!” Pepper waved and switched directions. “Come meet someone new.”
“Oh I think Bucky and I are fine knowing the people we know.” the Omega that spoke for the former Winter Soldier was shockingly beautiful, pale skin and jade green eyes, long black hair and a tunic cut clear to their navel. A deep voice and near sneer on ruby red lips, but oddly enough their expression was full on adoring as they stared down at the chubby baby in their arms, waving their right hand above the baby’s head to make snowflakes dance in the air. “Why would we want to meet anyone else when our entire world rises and falls with this beauty?”
“Be nice, Lo.” Former Winter Soldier and 1940′s super soldier Bucky Barnes was all soft smiles for Pepper, his left arm gleaming as he reached to pull her into a hug and accept a kiss from the other Omega. “We gotta teach Maria to be acceptin’ of others, you know that.”
“I know that I will raise her to be treated as a Queen and to accept nothing but pure adoration from the lesser, unwashed masses.” Loki sniffed, but their multicolored wings raised high in interest as they looked Peter and Wade over. “You must be Clint’s friends, then?”
“Where is the ol’ Bird Boy?” Wade wanted to know, quickly cataloguing any danger present in the two potentially volatile Omegas and just as quickly deciding that neither Loki nor Bucky were going to make any threatening moves. “He invited us up and now he’s nowhere to be seen?”
“M’sure he’s up with our Alpha gettin’ spoiled.” Bucky pushed shoulder length hair out of his eyes and tucked dangerous looking wings back out of the way before he shook Peter’s hand, and then Wade’s. “Good to know you. Clint talks about you alot.”
“All bad I’m sure.” Wade joked, and the big Omega’s eyes flickered with something almost irritated before he answered, “Nobody talks bad about anybody here.”
“He was kidding, Omega.” the newcomer to the conversation was one Beta Natasha Romanoff, tiny but unbelievably fierce, red hair and snow white wings that she brushed over Loki, over Bucky and then extended warily in welcome to Peter and Wade. “The Alpha was only kidding, weren’t you Wade?”
“Natasha.” Wade had ran into Natasha once or twice, events that usually ended with him getting his ass handed to him courtesy of the most terrifying ballerina in the world. If he hadn’t loved Peter so damn much, the Alpha was sure he’d be head over heels for the notorious Beta. Hell, maybe he was head over heels and judging by the smirk of Natasha’s perfect mouth, she was well aware. “Uh, sure I was kidding.”
“Pretty Omega.” Natasha’s smirk slid into a genuine smile as she opened her wings further for Peter, and the other Omega opened maroon feathers in a greeting as well. “Welcome to our home. The twins are excited to meet you, Pietro is crawling out of his skin ready to have another boy to talk to. Your company will give poor Wanda a break, she wants to dote on Clint all the time and Pietro is hilariously terrible about sharing any sort of attention.”
“Twins.” Peter repeated. “Right. Wanda and Pietro Maximoff--”
“--Barton Stark.” she finished. “And if you think the house is chaotic now, just wait till the Queen Mother arrives with her Valkyrie guard.”
“Yes, Natasha is very excited to meet the Valkyrie, aren’t you love?” Pepper’s suppressant muted scent lightened with teasing and happiness and Natasha play growled at her, ducking in close to kiss her full on the lips and murmur, “Never as excited as I am to kiss you, darling.”
Bucky just smiled at the display and with one last wondering look at Wade, led his Omega partner and Baby Maria away to find a place to eat.
“Pep, glad I found you.” Before Natasha had even pulled all the way away and before Wade or Peter could ask if the Trickster God and former Winter Soldier were honestly raising a baby together, United States Air Force Colonel James Rhodes came to join them.
The Alpha was a sight to behold decked out in military dress, royal blue wings held high as he bent to kiss Pepper on the mouth just as enthusiastically as Natasha had. Wade sent his Omega a curious look, and Peter just shrugged a little, but his smile stretched wide as the air soaked with happy Omega scent and protective, content Alpha as the Colonel rumbled something soft and sweet to Pepper.
“You’re leaving before dinner?” Pepper asked when they parted, and James sighed through an explanation of, “I have to run. I’m supposed to be halfway across the country right now, and I got caught up trying to help Tony string light in Baby James’s room. I’ll be home again tomorrow.”
“We spent all day yesterday stringing lights!” Natasha threw her hands and wings up and the Colonel only laughed, “Apparently they weren’t the exact right shade of not quite white, so Tony ordered more!”
“Of course he did.” Pepper sighed and patted at the Colonel’s arm. “Alright love, I’ll see you tomorrow. Text me tonight.”
“Of course.” Rhodey straightened back up, sent Wade a quickly discerning look but didn’t so much as tense up before offering Peter a smile. “Sorry to run out like this, I usually like to be home whenever someone new comes along but the world needs saving. Another time, Mr. Wilson. Mr. Parker.”
“Colonel.” Wade snapped a salute just because his days in Special Forces had left some deeply ingrained habits. “Another time.”
Pepper watched with an endlessly fond smile as Rhodey hurried out the door, and turned back to Peter and Wade with an expectant smile. “Shall we move on? This is only half the family.”
“So this is normal chaos for you?” Peter finally asked as they picked seats out at the huge table, and the other Omega just scrunched her nose and nodded. “So what’s un-normal chaos for you?”
“If you come by next week, you’ll find out when Frigga arrives.” Pepper reached for a bottle of wine and passed it to Wade to open. “She insisted on coming to be there for Steve’s labor and delivery. Baby James isn’t Thor’s child, but since that Alpha is hopelessly in love with the Captain, he’s been just as bad as Tony with fussing and preparing.”
“That was an insane sentence.” Peter said slowly, scooting his chair closer to Wade and snuggling in under the Alpha’s wings. “You know that’s an insane sentence, right? Thor the demi-god’s mom the Queen of Asgard is coming to help with Captain America’s baby even though it’s not Thor’s baby, it’s Iron Man’s baby and also, Bruce Banner the Hulk hangs out too?”
Pepper muffled an understanding smile. “Just wait till you meet everyone else. That isn’t even the weirdest sentence you can say about our family. Not even close.”
And the beautiful Omega certainly wasn’t kidding.
Dinner in the oversized dining room was the sort of crazy that usually only happened in holiday comedy films, with everyone reaching over everyone else, a truly insane amount of food and an even more insane amount of desserts.
The almost comically pregnant Steve was doted on by Thor, by Bruce, by Tony and Clint, and then Clint in turn was doted on by Natasha and the gorgeous Beta Sam, Tony and Bucky, who kept turning to make sure the mercurial Loki was settled and happy and playing with Baby Maria who was being snuck sweet treats by no less than half a dozen people, including the astonishing twins Wanda and Pietro and an elderly gentleman the twins affectionately called grandfather.
The Alpha Tony was handsome enough to make both Peter and Wade sit up and take notice, and even though the massive wings flickered curiously in Wade’s direction, Tony had nothing but smiles and welcoming words for the newcomers before he moved on to see his family.
The entire event was overseen by Pepper who quickly and efficiently dished out plates, made sure there was always a wine bottle open and plenty of water and juice for the expecting Omegas and in between doing everything, she also managed to answer each of Peter’s questions about their family, and also to assure Wade that they weren’t intruding, honestly this wasn’t even a full house for them yet, they should see it at Christmas time.
It was wild and chaotic and homey all at the same time. Almost overwhelming with all the combined scents but almost unbearably cozy too. Wade couldn’t hardly breathe through the scent of so many Alphas, but the sugar sweet contentment from the Omegas and the balanced but happy Beta’s lessened the deluge until he could finally relax his shoulders and take a few bites.
Peter was fascinated by it all-- by the expecting Omegas and their over attentive mates, by the way everyone looked to Tony for answers and approval while the family Alpha himself looked to all of them for guidance and opinions and help.
There was so much laughter, ringing around the room as they ate from each other’s plates. There was so much love, showing through every interaction and quick smile. And more than that, what brought Wade to almost uncomfortable and uncertain, wings fluttering and eyes flicking red if he wasn’t careful--
-- there was so much acceptance. So much acceptance and adoration between everyone at the table that it was almost too much.
Wade had been shunned his entire life, first by his abusive father and then by society in general when his tendencies ran towards feral. It had made him an excellent soldier but after Vanessa and after the accident that ripped his mutation out from beneath his skin and tore his wings to shreds, Wade was only an excellent monster, used to hiding in the shadows and turning away from too prying an eye.
He didn’t hide from Peter though, and when Clint finally did see them and came running over to excitedly sign through an also spoken conversation, Wade thought maybe he didn’t have to hide here either.
There was just so much acceptance and it showed through in thousand different touches between the family members. No one shied away from Bucky’s dangerous wings or silver fingers, no one looked twice when Loki magicked a knife out of mid air to cut the baby’s food into smaller bites. Thunder literally rolled around the room when Thor laughed at something Steve said, and in the same motion the huge Alpha shifted only the barest bit closer to Bruce who clearly was mostly touch averse.
Pepper was wearing suppressants, Natasha’s eyes flared wide in a moment of panic when wine spilled blood red on her hands but Sam grabbed a napkin and cleaned it up before kissing her gently, and where Clint lay snuggled up against the family Alpha, he kept one hand lightly over the blue reactor sat in Tony’s chest.
They were a family of misfits, of odd edges and unwanted souls but here gathered in the dining room there wasn’t a single person out of place.
Incredible.
“There’s room here for you and your mate.” The Alpha Tony found Wade sometime after dinner when everyone had helped carry dishes away and then the entire family made its way to the common area to relax. Wade was still brooding, still watching every interaction with narrowed eyes, his shoulders set and wings tense as if he was just waiting for the pin to fall, the other shoe to drop, someone to snap and start a fight because isn’t that what family’s did?
“If you’d like to stay, I mean.” Tony finished, and the other Alpha tore his attention back from watching the room.
“Tonight?” Wade couldn’t help shifting a step away from Tony, tucking his wings in closer out of habit and pulling his sleeves down a little further on his wrists. “Uh, thanks. I’ll think about it.”
Tony’s dark eyes flicked down to track Wade’s movement, then warmed in sympathy and before Wade could wonder why, the Alpha pulled his own shirt down a little and showed him the devastation over his sternum and around the bright glow of his arc reactor. “You know, one thing you’ll figure out pretty quick about this family is that we are all scarred. We’re all messed up one way or another but we don’t have to hide, alright? I’m sure there’s more years than I can imagine of you hiding your skin or keeping your wings away from people, but you don’t have to do that here.”
Wade’s eyes flickered red uncomfortably, and Tony shook his head. “I don’t mean to put you on the spot or anything like that, but my Omega mate Clint told me quite a bit about you and your mate and I just want you to know, you don’t have to hide here. Pepper might do that thing where she gets nosy and overly helpful and tries to find the perfect lotion to help with your skin, and Natasha gets super protective over the more vulnerable people in our family, but the last thing anyone is going to do is judge or stare or--”
Tony waved his hand idly. “--or anything like that. Thor’s mother Frigga is considered a great healer, he already suggested maybe she might help if you want. If you want. Or if your mate wants.”
“Peter isn’t--”
“I used to try and figure out how to change my feathers back to their original colors after my accident.” Tony continued on, brushing off Wade’s token denial. “But my Omega mates practically rioted over me changing anything about how I looked, so I let it go. They wanted me for who I am now, I’m sure Peter is the same way with you.”
“Uh--” Wade just kept staring, cos out of all the things he’d expected from dinner with the Avengers in their cult-compound-thing, full acceptance and quite a bit of warmth from Tony freaking Stark wasn’t really it. “---okay?”
“You still look sort of shell shocked, and I get it. We can be a lot to take in.” the other Alpha said mildly, then smiled and motioned to where Peter was talking excitedly with Wanda and Pietro, and laughed out loud when Pietro let his electric blue wings out and Peter fell off the couch in shock. “And I know Peter has his Aunt May as family, but I’m serious. You and your mate are welcome here. There’s room, plenty of room and if there isn’t room, I’ll just build on. It’s not a problem.”
“Th-- thank you.” Wade said slowly, and this time he meant it. “I dunno how I feel about your team, but I know Pete really wants to give this whole thing a try. He always complains about being a lone web slinger, so we could give it a shot. And at least if we start coming around, you guys will look out for him if anything happens to me.”
“According to the most recent rumours, nothing can happen to you.” Tony cocked a knowing eyebrow and Wade shrugged it off. “Along the same subject lines, I heard you and your mate caught a bus today.”
“Peter caught a bus.” Wade corrected. “I was just there to look pretty.”
Tony chuckled softly. “That’s how I feel half the time with my family. I feel like I’m only dangerous with my suit on, but everyone else is incredible. Even the non super powered members of my family are super heroes in their own right.”
And then softer, the Alpha’s scent warming with adoration, “It’s humbling to realize our mates could literally choose anyone in the world as theirs, and for some reason, they chose us.”
“Yeah, I hear that.” Wade ran his hand over his bare scalp self consciously. “Feels like that every day with Pete.”
“Clint says you don’t refer to Peter as your mate, but I noticed you haven’t really corrected any of us who assumed and Peter didn’t seem to mind.” Tony raised his wings curiously. “Should I spread the word that you have a preference?”
Wade nodded, then shook his head, then hunched his shoulders and cleared his throat, cleared it one more time before he managed to ask, “How uh-- how did you know it was time to make your bond official with your Omegas? I know you’ve got something with everyone in here, but your Omega mates specifically. How did you know it was time?”
“I don’t know how much you know about what happened to me in Afghanistan?” Tony paused, and Wade shook his head. “Well it wasn’t great. I went overseas one man, came back a different man and it took a long time to feel like myself again. I knew it was time to bond with my mates when I looked at them and saw home. Bonding with them was like Coming Home, and that’s how I knew it was right.”
“Coming home.” Wade repeated. “That easy?”
“It was that easy.” Tony said emphatically. “The day I looked at them and felt like I was home, I knew it was time to bond with them. Everything else after was just making it all legally official. Adopting the twins, drawing up beneficiary paperwork-- details. It was about finding our broken edges and fitting them together and calling it home and then everything was alright.”
“Huh.” Wade thought back to how broken he’d been after Vanessa, how his wings had shredded, his skin destroyed as the mutation progressed, how the darkness had crept in tinted red at the edges of his vision--
--and how meeting Peter had been like sunshine and fresh air and like home in the middle of a storm he used to pray would kill him.
“But.” Tony reached out and put a friendly hand on Wade’s shoulder, not shying away from the dark feathers, not flinching over the roughness of the other Alpha’s skin beneath his shirt. “You and Peter are clearly soul bonded, so there’s no rush. That Omega isn’t going anywhere, it’s obvious in the way he looks at you, the way his scent changes.”
“Soul bonded.” Wade tried for a smile. “Never thought I’d be taking mate advice from Tony Stark.”
“Trust me when I saw weirder things have happened.” The other Alpha raised his wings in response to Sam calling for him. “Think about what I said, alright? There’s room for you and Peter here. Clint knows and trusts you, and I trust him to only bring the right people to our home, so consider yourself welcome. I mean it.”
Welcome.
Home.
Acceptance.
The later evening found Wade in one of the recliners in the huge common area, his Omega half asleep on his lap as a movie played quietly in the background.
Tony’s unorthodox family was scattered all around the living room-- Pepper tucked into a sofa with Natasha, pink and white wings mingling affectionately. Thor took up an entire couch with Steve on his lap and only a few of his feathers resting on Bruce’s leg. Wanda and Pietro sat on either side of Clint, signing through their conversation and teasing each other like only siblings did. Tony was already asleep with his head in Sam’s lap, the Beta’s wings spread protective and close over the family Alpha, while Bucky and Loki lay on the floor so Baby Maria could crawl between them and babble and wave her fists at the television. Yinsen was working on his tablet, Colonel Rhodes was the reason Pepper’s phone kept lighting up with text messages, and the entire room was full of the scent of family.
Of home, of acceptance, of mates and love and open adoration.
It was…. beautiful… in a way Wade hadn’t expected to find, and the unexpected beauty gave him the courage to nudge his Omega just lightly, just gently.
“Wade?” Peter blinked those big eyes up at him, shifted so his maroon wings covered them both a little more. “What’s up? Are you ready to go?”
“No.” Wade swallowed hard and brushed his rough fingers over Peter’s cheek, melting to his very soul when Peter turned his nose into his palm and purred sweetly. “But um-- I’m ready.”
“Ready.” Peter repeated. “Ready for what?”
“I’m ready.” the Alpha pressed his thumb purposefully into Peter’s bonding spot. “Ready.”
“Oh.” The Omega’s honeysuckle scent flooded with pure happiness, and his voice was whisper soft as he answered, “I’m ready too Alpha my Alpha. Always.”
-- and across the room, Pietro elbowed Wanda sharply and hissed/signed, “Does this mean I have to listen to bonding sex through my wall!? Their room is right next to mine! It’s not fair! I won’t get any sleep at all!”
Wanda put her head in a pillow to muffle her laughter, and Pietro just crossed his arms and huffed at her.
This family was crazy.
*************
Chapter Notes:
It’s general canon that Peter Parker Spidey can lift between 10-12 tons easily, and a standard sized school bus weighs about 12 tons so that’s why I chose that particular scene. That and the scene in SM: HC where Peter complains about Tony treating him like a kid and Ned is like “you are a kid” and Peters like “yeah, one that can catch a school bus!” I just thought it was funny.
I will never not love Wade seeing whole hearted acceptance and unconditional love and finally realizing “I am deserving of this” and I will never not love Peter being so happy and willing to give Wade absolutely everything.
Also HEY Let’s talk about literally terrifying Jarvis! I feel like he’s been getting more and more human in my stories lately and I regret nothing. If this Tony was going to design an AI to protect his family, I don’t think issuing threats about blowing baddies’ brains out would be that out of character, yes? Yes.
SAY SOMETHING ABOUT THE FIC!
***************
@ships-galore @ceealaina @izziebladez @cwar1864 @hausoffro @tonystarkisanangel @multishippinglife @girlnic @iam93percentstardust @paranormalmoonlight5 @igotloki @moosette05 @wayward-student-philosopher @kaz-brekkers-gloves @atomicfandombomb @1fuckingshitup69 @agentlokii @livewire28 @tulipsnbigcats @kimstark @alex-stark-rogers @bibbarnes @heeeyitskay @goindownshipping @quietgayguy @nanita90a @justaniche
#ncts fics#spideypool#peter parker#wade wilson#abo dynamics#poly avengers#alpha wade wilson#omega peter parker#alpha tony stark#found family
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Easter TAG
@womble1 gift for @janetm74
Blanket
Precious
Crown
It was one of those days, one in/one out, a continuous rotation of Tracys coming and going. Virgil had just made it back from the arctic, scooping up Thunderbird 4 from its own mission on the way home. Scott and Alan glanced up from the desk where they had been conversing with John’s hologram. He should have seen it coming by the way their eyes adopted that concerned crinkling around the edges, really highlighting the similarities between the two of them despite the age gap.
“What?” his gaze danced from one pair of blue eyes to the other, “what’s wrong?” He glanced down at his shirt in case he had buttoned it up wonky or smeared something spectacular down it without noticing. Coming up blank he was back to requesting more info from those present
“Seriously - What?”
Scott stood up from behind the desk, his hands clasped in front of him like a politician about to deliver a tough message.
“Well don’t take this the wrong way but, well…” he dithered around the sentence as if not quite sure which way to best approach it.
“You look like Shit Virg!” Alan cut in, having no such qualms.
Virgil pulled his arms across his chest defensively, it was a bit harsh coming from someone who regularly slept in their clothes.
“Thanks, I love you too, you little scrote!” he scowled across at the brat.
“OK, language. Both of you!” Scott waded into the fray, holding his hands up to placate both parties. “But honestly Virgil, you do look like you could do with a rest.” this just got a derisive shrug and an unintelligible grunt in response. “You look frozen, are you coming down with something?” Scott advanced towards him, stretching out his arm to lay a palm on Virgil’s forehead, but Virgil saw it coming and side stepped away from the advancing hand.
“I’m fine, it was the arctic, it was cold, big shock, quit pawing at me.” Even as he said it, Virgil knew he was being needlessly snappy, but the damage was done and he saw Alan and Scott exchange a look.
“Ok, fair point. Alan and I were just on our way out, so why don’t you just take a seat while we go and sort this one out.” Scott was talking slowly, moving in carefully and steering Virgil to a couch like he was a scared animal that might bolt or lash out. “It’s just a little support job for a research station, we’ll be back in no time. Here, have a blanket, I can literally see you shivering.” blanket deployed, Alan and Scott backed away, while Virgil remained scowling on the sofa, muttering about how he was absolutely fine, but tellingly he didn’t move from his loosely constructed blanket nest. He must have zoned out slightly, as the next thing he was aware of was the familiar rumblings of Thunderbird two launching and he hastily pulled up the comms array over the coffee table to give Scott a piece of his mind as Gordon strolled into the room.
“Scott! You took my bird! What the hell?!”
“Hello to you too! And I think you’ll find they are all International Rescue vehicles, besides we need the Pods - and before you start, no, you were not in fit state to fly. Anyway, it’s a perfect chance for Alan to get some more flight hours in’’ as Alan’s face popped up alongside wearing a massive grin.
“Hey Virgil! The research station is in the middle of nowhere, there’s no way I’ll scratch it - I promise!” The little sod was enjoying winding his brother up far too much, they both knew he was a competent pilot, but that wasn’t the point. Virgil huffed and shuffled about a bit, wrapping his arms around himself, maybe he was a little cold but he wasn’t going to admit it. Too late though he had been spotted.
“Seriously Virgil, wrap yourself up, I can see you shivering from here” Scott's worry mode had been engaged, even as he got steadily further away, there was no escaping it. “Gordon keep an eye on him will you, I think he might be coming down with something”
“Sure think Capitano!” Gordon punctuated this with a sloppy little salute as the connection blinked out. “Come on then big guy, let’s get you tucked in nice and snug” he threatened as he advanced with malicious intent.
“For the last time, I am absolutely fine! But fine, look I’m using the blasted blanket!” he sulkily pulled the blanket tightly around himself until he resembled a giant burrito “Happy now!” he demanded with a scowl.
“O…..K, I’m going to leave you and your mood to get better acquainted, you want a coffee?” Gordon went to leave in the direction of the kitchen, barely resisting the urge to laugh at the image Virgil was presenting.
“Yes” came the somewhat deflated reply “……please” all the fight evaporating as quickly as Thunderbird ones vapor trails.
By the time Gordon had navigated Virgil’s needlessly complicated coffee machine and made his way back to the lounge, the blanket burrito had toppled sideways on the sofa and appeared to be asleep. Gordon began to think that maybe Scott was right about the predictions of ill-health on the horizon. He was just wondering if he ought to reposition the blankets a bit since he couldn’t see Virgil’s face and there was a distinct lack of the usual snoring, when a call from Lady Penelope came through on the central display.
“Ahh Good afternoon Gordon,” came Penelope’s clipped accent
“Howdie Lady P! What can we do for you today?” Gordon spun around, his blanketed brother instantly forgotten.
“Oh, it’s nothing urgent today thankfully, I was just……..” she faltered distracted by something “Forgive me Gordon, but I have to ask, what exactly is that behind you?
Gordon spared a brief glance back at the blanket pile that presumably still contained his brother.
“Oh that, Virg is just sulking because Alan took his ride and so he’s proving that he’s not cold…..yeah it makes sense somehow” he petered out.
“Oh I see,” Penelope takes this in her stride as she does all things, “Should it be glowing though Gordon?”
“Glowing?!” he jumps slightly “Oh no, he hasn’t” with no further preamble Gordon dived towards the fleece fortress, tugging at a corner. “Come on Virgil, hand it over, I know you’ve got it in there” He found a gap and plunged his hand inside the fabric, reaching towards the glowing epicentre.
“Noooooooo, gerroff!” it was muffled, but it was clear that Virgil was not going to give in quietly. “It’s MINE! My precious! You can’t have it!” He wriggled about madly thrashing to try and get away from Gordon, who scrapped as well as any younger sibling in history.
“Give it up Virg! They’re fine!” the “accidental” application of Gordon’s knee to unmentionable regions resulted in a muffled “ooof” and a sudden reduction in the amount of resistance. Gordon was able to extract his prize and held the remote piloting device up in triumph for Lady Penelope to see.
“He’s always like this when they take Two out without him, he just hovers over the remote controls, adjusting things. Alan thought Two was haunted the first time it happened, I’m not sure he doesn’t still partly believe it still is now.”
Lady Penelope hid a giggle demurely with one hand “Don’t you think you ought to check he’s ok in there, he doesn’t appear to be moving” she asked.
Gordon nudged the immobile lump with his knee “ you’re alright in there aren’t you big guy?” he asked, before sitting himself on top of the blanket mound with all the stately composure of a king ascending to his throne.
Theres an unintelligible groan before Virgil wriggled enough to free his head from the fabric confines “Stupid Fat Hobbit! Ughhh”
“Oh yeah, he’s fine,” Gordon confirmed, a megawatt smile breaking his regal composure “He’s just banned from any more Lord of the Rings binges.” Gordon turned to look down at his brother and affectionately ruffled his hair, making it stand out at all angles like a rumpled crown.
At this additional indignity, Virgil put all his remaining energy into a final abrupt wriggle that sent Gordon Toppling from his perch “Get off me pipsqueak!”
“Even the smallest person can change the course of the future!” Gordon proclaimed from his place on the floor just before a cushion was dumped on his head.
“Have you lost the plot Gordon?!” another pillow was dumped on him to punctuate the remark.
“Not all those who wander are lost!” could just be heard through the growing pile of cushions
They both seemed to have forgotten Lady Penelope's holographic presence floating above them. She coughed gently to draw their attention.
“On that note I think I will leave you both too it, I’ll call back later to speak to Scott,” this drew their eyes away from the developing pillow fight. She cleared her throat delicately once more, gave a little smile and said “Maybe I should quote Frodo Baggins and remind you “It is useless to meet revenge with revenge: it will heal nothing.” before you damage the soft furnishings any further.” and with that parting wisdom her image blinked out of existence.
“Did she just?….” asked Gordon
“Yes, yes I think she did” said Virgil, shaking his head slightly, either in disbelief or despair.
“What a GEEK!” snorted Gordon, still half-heartedly trying to free himself from the scatter cushion landslide. Then, resigning himself to his current location, he flopped back into the pillows, letting out a happy little sigh. “She really is perfect isn’t she?” Virgil decided the only sensible response to this was to deposit a final cushion onto the top of Gorgon’s head, with enough force to liberate a couple of feathers from its confines.
By the time Alan and Scott arrived back, with a thankfully scratch free Thunderbird Two, Gordon and Virgil had fallen asleep two films into yet another Lord of the Rings rewatch marathon. Gordon had nested on the floor on a mound of slightly battered looking scatter cushions and Virgil had reinstated the blanket burrito and only his head was free from the blankety confines.
#thunderbirds#thunderbirds are go#thunderbirds 2004#thunderbirds 1965#thunderbirds fanfiction#Scott Tracy#Virgil Tracy#Gordon Tracy#John Tracy#alan tracy#submission
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Farewell to Spooky Season, AHS Style: Lookbook no.12
Hi to anyone reading,
Happy belated Halloween!
I capitalise it because if I'm gonna recognise any day as sacred, it’s the spookiest one of the year! Halloween 2020 obviously hasn’t been as exciting as usual, parties and club nights being banned has meant there’s been far less opportunities to dress up, but I still managed to get out for the night before they announced the upcoming second lockdown and do a couple of spooky movie nights (and carve a pumpkin!)!
I originally intended for this lookbook to be last minute halloween costume inspo but I was lazy and didn’t manage to get it out on time-a lot of these looks minus the makeup and maybe an accessory or two could work on any day or night out so I thought I’d go ahead and post it now anyway. Celebrating the fashion moments of American Horror Story is something I’ve wanted to do for a while; it’s probably not the first show you’d think of for sartorial inspiration but Mr. Ryan Murphy has fucking fantastic taste in stylists and the first five seasons of AHS in particular, which I’ll be focussing on in this post, have given us SO many amazing looks. The man may be guilty of many things-subjecting us to the character of Will Schuester, trying to turn Richard Ramirez into a thirst trap, embarrassing everyone who raved about how good Scream Queens was when he wrote season 2-but costume related laziness is not one of them. We see more consistency in a Ryan Murphy character’s wardrobe than we do in their story arcs and I respect that because honestly, as much as I love joining in when it comes to ripping into his ability to cohesively bring an AHS season to a close when it airs, I’d probably be the same; if you put Lady Gaga in front of me and told me to write her lines I’d probably end up getting overly invested in what her character was going to be wearing in the scene too.
So! Enough Ryan Murphy bashing from me! I’ll get on with it! Starting with 3 season 1 inspired looks:
Murder House: Elizabeth Short, Tate Langdon and Violet Harmon
-striped jumper from caitlinlark on Depop, kick flare jeans from ellagray-
When it comes to reflecting on season 1 of American Horror Story, all I can say do is thank the internet overlords that Tumblr has moved on from the romanticising school shooters and wearing normal people scare me tops phase to instead collectively taking the piss out of the “GO AWAY, TATE!”, “YOU’RE ALL THAT I WANTTT! YOU’RE ALL THAT I HAVEEE!” exchange.
In terms of fashion *moments*, whilst season 1 doesn’t stand out as much as the seasons that come after, Violet and Tate’s wardrobes did give birth to a bit of a 90s grunge renaissance with their oversized knits and faded jeans and layering of textures. It did also give us good costumes in the form of Alexandra Breckenridge’s Moira O’Hara and Mena Suvari’s portrayal of the Black Dahlia, Elizabeth Short; unfortunately, I didn’t have a slutty maid costume lying around so I did the best I could at giving the outfit Elizabeth wears when she makes that fateful visit to the Murder House a modern, more party appropriate update.
In terms of season rankings, Murder House isn’t my favourite. It starts off really great but lulls a bit towards the end and I could never get behind Violet and Tate as a couple because you know, one of them is a school shooter who sexually assaults the other’s mum, and that’s a hurdle that I think most couples might struggle to get over irl. That being said, it was the season that started it all and showcased some of the most innovative writing and directing on TV, and it opened up a spot for horror on primetime television which as far as I know was kind of unheard of before then. Back when I first watched it, I had no idea what to expect not only because I’d never seen horror in a serial format but also because it seemed to be able to get away with the kind of storylines you’d expect network executives to fire people over. It introduced us to Jessica Lange and Sarah Paulson and Evan Peters and Denis O’Hare who would go on to make the show what it is today and more importantly, through Jessica’s glorious portrayal of Constance Langdon, provide us with an endlessly versatile meme format for this trying time.
Asylum: ‘60s Lana Winters, ‘70s Lana Winters, and Sister Mary Eunice McKee
-afghan coat from louisemarcella on Depop, red AA skater dress from julietramage, pink gingham co-ord from zshamim-
I think we can all agree: Asylum would’ve been a perfect series of television if it wasn’t for the completely unnecessary alien storyline. Like, I get that they fit in with the whole good vs. evil theme as a kind of non-biblical alternative to the idea of a higher, all-powerful being but there was already so much going on that it just wasn’t needed. Aside from that, I think the general consensus amongst watchers of the show is that Asylum has the best writing of any season and I think I’d tend to agree. It’s not my favourite because it’s too depressing to rewatch but if we’re talking the first time round, this is the series that had me hooked. Lana Winters?
Iconic.
Sister Mary Eunice? Iconic. The Name Game? Iconic. Remember when you couldn’t go a day on Facebook without seeing that one photo of Naomi Grossman as Pepper used as the go to “what I really look like” photo in one of those “expectation vs. reality” style posts on your newsfeed? Those were simpler times.
Because this season was mostly situated within the hospital, we didn’t get that many proper outfits but when we did, they were stunning; if I had to state my absolute favourite AHS character of the entire show I’d probably go with Lana Winters and the part her wardrobe played in her characterisation would 100% play a part in that. The late 60s/early 70s was such a wonderful period for fashion and through her character we get to see both of those explored a little. Of course there’s also *that* Sister Mary Eunice scene with the red slip dress and suspenders too which yes, could be a perfect halloween costume, but I also strongly believe should be a perfectly acceptable outfit for any day of the year.
Coven: Misty Day, Madison Montgomery, and Zoe Benson
-chiffon dress from rags_to_riches on Depop, pinstripe corset from hanpiercey, and tennis skirt from mollie_morton-
I hate to be a basic bitch but I have to say it: Coven is my favourite season of American Horror Story. Once you get over the complete waste of Evan Peters’ acting capabilities that resulted from the *choice* to have him play Kyle, the unnecessary rehash of the Evan/Taissa pairing from season 1 in what I can only assume was an attempt to capitalise on the popularity of the questionable Tate/Violet relationship, and the subsequent sacrifice of any interesting character arc we could’ve foreseen for Zoe Benson beyond her obsessing over a resurrected, non-verbal frat boy, it’s a perfect season. A supreme (heh) balance of horror, humour, and character drama, as well as the stunning aesthetics and forever quotable dialogue, make it my go-to season if I’m ever considering a rewatch. And if you disagree, let me jog your memory with the most mainstream (not to get all “normal people scare me” and suggest AHS is not a mainstream show, I literally just mean in the sense that even those who have never watched the show will have seen this) reaction GIF set any FX show has even spawned:
Buzzfeed employees had a field day, Emma Roberts enthusiasts (I mean me) finally saw her cemented as the pop culture icon Scream Queens has since showed us she deserves to be (because not enough people have seen Unfabulous, Nancy Drew or Scream 4) and the gays everywhere rejoiced at the year’s worth of meme fodder they’d been provided with. It was Madison Montgomery’s world and we were truly just living in it.
And the fashion! I mean, Stevie Nicks meets 21st century teenage witches! Come on!
Freakshow: Dandy Mott, Maggie Esmerelda and Elsa Mars
-olive green satin skirt from morganogle on Depop, headscarf from tonijordan, platform sandals from elliefewt, PVC skirt from bethpin_, corset top from sadieflinter, beret from house_of_erotique, flame detail platform boots from mad_rags_vintage-
When people talk about the declining quality of AHS, they usually point to Freakshow as the beginning of the end, but I have to completely disagree. I wasn’t a fan the first time round but on rewatch it’s probably the most emotional season of them all; no, there aren’t as many “horrifying” moments as in other seasons and Elsa is probably Jessica’s worst performance (which is still an incredible one by anybody else’s standards), however it makes up for it with the most sympathetic bunch of characters yet, and on the flip side, also one of the most amusingly depraved with Finn Wittrock’s Dandy Mott. Fans usually argue that the season went downhill once *SPOILER* Twisty the Clown was killed off but for me, he really primarily served as the catalyst for the far more interesting devolution of Dandy, who, imo, is the show’s strongest villain to date, rivalled only by Bloody Face. Then there was the episode Orphans too which made me cry buckets, the sole AHS episode to do so.
We got a lot of great fashion content in this season too: the theatrical opulence of Elsa Mars’ wardrobe, “Maggie��’s nomadic fortune teller costumes, and all those twee suits we saw Finn Wittrock in. Highly underrated if you ask me. It seems an odd choice for me to use Elsa’s Dominatrix look as an inspiration for one of my looks here when we have that Life on Mars performance outfit and all the extravagant robes Jessica got to waltz around in for reference buuuut I didn’t really have anything to do the vibrancy of either of those justice so I went with the black leather option which is much more me. Am I saying I moonlight as a dominatrix? Maybe. Lol, no. I wish. It’s not for lack of trying. WHERE ARE ALL THE GENUINE TWITTER PAYPIGS AT!? Your girl wants to insult creepy men and get some new clothes out of it xoxo
Hotel: Hypodermic Sally, Liz Taylor, and The Countess
-silk white bralet from xlibby_maix on Depop-
Hotel is another season that I liked a lottttt more upon rewatch, once I knew I was okay to tune out the (completely predictable and utterly nonsensical) Ten Commandments Killer storyline that so much of the season initially seems to hinge on. I love Chloë Sevigny but the fact that her and Wes Bentley’s wooden John and Alex Lowe are positioned as the protagonists at the expense of the far more interesting Liz Taylor, James March and Hypodermic Sally really does a disservice to what is an otherwise great season upon initial viewing.
The visuals this season are magnificent and I think if I had to pick one character’s wardrobe to steal from the entire cast of AHS characters, it would be The Countess (a toss up between her and Misty Day tbh, so I kinda just settle for low-key channelling both). No fucking idea where I'd wear any of her clothes to but I’d make it work. Liz Taylor and Hypodermic Sally have some amazing looks too-there’s just honestly so much to choose from; that being said, this post wouldn’t be complete without a specific ode to the vampire goddess Elizabeth Bathory, who is everything I want to be in life minus the murderous qualities:
Everything. EVER-Y-THING. LOOK AT HER!
Lady Gaga is really a fucking goddess isn’t she. And people were claiming before they’d even seen it that she couldn’t act? A patriarchal society doesn’t like women that can do it all. Just saying.
Anyways!
That’s it for now! I hope you enjoyed the post if you did read til the end! Sorry I couldn’t get this out before Halloween, I was typing and Picmonkey-ing madly from 2 in the afternoon on the 31st but I taking fucking forever to get ready and had to abandon all hope of getting it out on the day by 4PM. I’ve got so much content planned and it sucks because a couple of them are lookbooks which now feel completely redundant given we’re heading into a second lockdown, but maybe I should just do it anyway? The grunge inspired moodboard I just did seemed to get a good reception too so I’ve got some more of them planned.
As always, hope everyone is keeping well, and feel free to inbox me with any suggestions, queries or even just to say hi if you need someone to talk to! I check here quite a lot so I should see it. Lots of love to everyone in this time!
Lauren x
#american horror story#ahs#lookbook#fashion#fashion inspo#style inspo#style#styling#Ryan murphy#lady gaga#violet harmon#taissa farmiga#the countess#tv show fashion#Sarah paulson#70s fashion#lana winters#Emma roberts#witch aesthetic#finn wittrock#Jessica lange#style inspiration#fashion blog#misty day#Madison montgomery#boho#bohemian
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The Arachnoids: ROCK BAND AU [STARKER] - Chapter 9: WARY WORDS
READ “CHAPTER 9: WARY WORDS” ON AO3
Find the masterpost with all the chapters linked here!
Taglist: @crystallinecrimsonmoth & @staticwhispersinthedark (Let me know if you want to be added!)
-
Chapter 9: Wary Words
Tony’s gone.
That’s the first thought that crosses Peter’s mind when he stirs back to life after a short but good sleep. The room is empty and quiet, and it’s not just the man that has vanished. His bags are gone too and the sheets Tony slept under are neatly drawn up over the mattress. If it weren’t for the cologne lingering on Peter’s shirt, he could’ve sworn it’d all been a dream. It’s real, he reminds himself. It’s all real.
Peter doesn’t like the uneasy feeling that settles under his skin. He clamps his jaws together and blows into his cheeks, then letting the pressured air escape past his lips in a defeated sigh. He doesn’t know what to do. While it’s clear that something has to change for Tony, Peter wouldn’t know where to even start. He does realize it’s not his problem to solve, but he wants to help Tony however possible. It’s idle hope, though, to think the solution might come easy.
Tony’s gone, and there’s no sign of him until the live performance. It physically aches Peter’s chest to watch how freely Tony moves around the stage. No anxiety. No spiraling thoughts. Just Tony living through his music. The stage is Tony’s home. Performing is his home.
But after thanking his Finnish fans for supporting them today… There’s no trace left of where he could’ve gone. Tony’s hiding once again.
Latvia.
Poland.
Hungary
The next few days are all the same. No sight of Tony other than soundchecks and shows. No one knows where he is. And Peter realizes, horrified, that as much as everyone’s worried about Tony’s behavior, they don’t really care. Not truly. As long as Tony shows up to sing they seem awfully okay with it.
Austria
Italy
Spain
Peter still hasn’t managed to catch a moment alone with Tony. From a distance, he can see that the man looks paler. Tired. Lonely.
France
Belgium
Germany
Peter’s fed up with Tony evading everyone and he decides that he’ll do everything it takes to connect to him again. He will talk to Tony. As soon as he gets the chance.
Netherlands
-
“Hey, Stark!” Peter greets the man cheerfully as he finally finds the man by himself in the large Nijmegen venue. Tony’s leaning against the front barrier, looking up at the stage. “I’ve been thinking about your offer and I’ve decided to take you up on those guitar classes.” Tony tenses up and he grips the front barrier so tight his knuckles turn white. Oh no.
Slowly, Tony turns around to face Peter. Tony looks straight at him but Peter can tell it takes everything the man has, to not avert his gaze. Peter’s heart clenches at the knowledge that the man’s been hurting so much lately, that it's a habit for him to hide everything.
“Hi, space boy.” Tony sniffs once and straightens his shoulders, faking a wide grin. Peter frowns at that. Does Tony still have the feeling he has to pretend so much?
Tony continues talking before Peter has a chance to resume the conversation himself.
“Wouldn’t you rather do another one of those sleepovers? ‘Twas quite a messy night, huh?”
What?
“That makes it sound like we had an actual one night stand,” Peter says slowly, eyebrows raised. If Tony wants to approach it like this, Peter will try to play along. Tony huffs a startled laugh at that.
“That’s what happens when there’s only one bed,” he jokes. Tony’s smile falters soon after. He casts his eyes down to the floor. “I’m really sorry about that night, though… That… Wasn’t supposed to happen.”
“What wasn’t?” Peter asks, tilting his head. He kinda expects Tony to cut the conversation short and make a run for it, but surprisingly, he doesn’t.
“The panic attack- I never wanted to drop that on you. The hug…” Tony’s cheeks turn a little bit redder at that. He’s ashamed, Peter realizes.
“Is that why you’ve been avoiding me?”
Tony tenses at that once more. He blinks a few times, unsure of what to do. Peter swallows. The last thing he wants is to chase Tony away himself.
“Hey…” Peter speaks softly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.”
“No,” Tony pushes out. “You did. And you’re right, I guess. I have been avoiding you.” Tony glances around real quick to see if there’s no one else around. When he confirms they’re alone he sighs. “I’ve never been this vulnerable around anyone. I… don’t know how to deal with it.” Tony sits down on the floor to lean against the front barrier and he shakes his head. Peter carefully walks closer to him.
“That’s alright. It’s hard,” Peter breathes as he sinks down onto the cool metal plates as well. “I know my story isn’t nearly the same…” He continues. “But I was young when I lost everyone but Aunt May. I closed off. It fucking sucks when people watch your every move ‘cause they’re not sure what to do with you and your emotions.”
Tony looks up at that. His eyes contain the exact spark of recognition Peter had hoped to ignite.
“Sometimes, it’d be much easier if none of it ever happened - or if no one knows. So that you can pretend it never did, even if just for a few minutes.” Peter pauses, trying to figure out the right words to continue. “But- If you never allow yourself to be vulnerable, no one’s gonna understand why you keep pushing them away. Eventually, they’ll take it as rejection. They give up. And it leaves you lonelier than you were before.”
“Sounds familiar,” Tony mumbles quietly. Peter’s lips curl into a faint smile.
“Yeah... And I’m not saying you always have to talk about the shit that’s going on, but you can let people know you’re not okay. Confide in them. You need that sense of community, Tony. Especially when things are bad.”
They’re both silent after that. It’s not an uncomfortable silence. Not at all. At one point, Tony’s composure softens. He goes less rigid, and his left knee falls against Peter’s right one. Peter lets it happen without a single thought; perhaps he too likes the warmth coming from the other’s body. Someone who, even though the story is different, shares the emotions Peter knows so well.
“Thank you,” Tony finally breathes. “That’s… You’re right- I-...” Tony groans when the words don’t come easy. Most likely unconsciously, he presses his knee into Peter’s a little more. Peter doesn’t say anything to give the man his time. He does press his knee back, though. Hoping to comfort Tony. Tony swallows and slowly continues. “Talking to you makes me feel like I can breathe, even if just slightly.” The words cause a gentle warmth to spread through Peter’s chest.
“I meant what I said the other night, Tony. I’m gonna be here, alright?”
“You barely know me...”
“Isn’t that enough of a reason to get to know each other better? I mean, we already slept in one bed after all,” Peter says, trying to lighten the conversation with a small joke. It seems to work. Tony snorts.
“I think you’re my favorite one night stand,” Tony grins. Somehow, even though it’s obviously meant as a joke, it catches Peter completely off guard and he blushes. Tony notices and he grins.
“Ooooooh! You liked it too!” Tony teases. Peter growls in response and leans sideways to bump into Tony’s shoulder. The man laughs, actually laughs, and the sound reverberates in Peter’s chest. Is this the lighter side of Tony he hasn’t seen yet?
“Hey,” Tony mumbles once his snickering died down. “I have to go do this stupid interview. Harley will lynch me if I don’t show up.”
“Shouldn’t Bruce and Happy be the ones to do that?”
“They don’t really bother with me. They’ve given Harley the most prestigious task of babysitting me.”
“Harley seems nice though, isn’t he?” Peter tries. Tony hums.
“For sure. He’s a good kid.”
Tony’s silent after that and Peter bites down his bottom lip. He feels like the conversation isn’t over yet. He drops his head to one side to look at Tony. Tony raises his eyebrows.
“Will you be okay?” Peter asks quietly.
“I…” Tony sighs. “I guess? Interviews trigger my anxiety quite badly. Nat, Steve, and Harley know about the medication shit, though. They try to help me through. They just don’t know about… Morgan.” Tony’s voice wavers when he chokes out her name. “I’ll manage. I promise.” Peter smiles and leans into Tony a little bit more, trying to bring him some comfort.
“Alright. Promise me one thing though,” Peter whispers. “Or, two actually?”
“What’s that?”
“I want those guitar classes,” Peter states and Tony snorts, shrugging and shaking his head.
“Sure, what else?”
Peter hesitates and he clasps his own hands together, leaning forward onto his upper legs. From there, he eyes Tony carefully.
“Don’t rewatch it.” Peter takes a breath. “The interview. Answer their questions and then forget about it.”
Tony takes a few moments to think about that before he swallows and nods. His eyes sparkle when he raises his head to look Peter straight into his eyes.
“I promise.”
-
Peter mindlessly helps Ned set up his drums for tonight. Ned loves the new set, even though it’s not nearly the same quality as the one he has at home. It’s got a nice sound, Peter has to admit that. He doesn’t know enough about drums to give a solid opinion, but if Ned’s happy, so is he.
“So, what’s up with Tony?” Ned asks, fiddling with one of his drumsticks when Peter finishes tightening the last hi-hat clutch. Peter leans back, eyeing Ned curiously.
“What do you mean?”
“He seems… So… Nice? Today? I dunno,” he mumbles. “He’s not himself.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah, he-”
Before Ned can finish his explanation, the door slams open and Peter looks up startled. MJ comes rushing in and she throws herself into Ned’s arms. “Help!” She squeaks.
“Hey, hey! What’s wrong?”
“I- Harley, he- He asked me out,” she chokes out. “And my dumb ass said no. But when I ran off I- I realized I wanted to say yes and I don’t know what to do.” MJ groans and presses her lips together.
“Please, you gotta help me.”
-
Read the next chapter >> 10: Blossoming Bond
#the arachnoids#starker#ironspider#iron man#spider man#peter parker#tony stark x peter parker#peter parker x tony stark#tony stark/peter parker#Peter Parker/Tony Stark#tony stark#tony x peter#ironman#spiderman#rock band au#au#marvel#MCU#marvel fanfiction#starker fic#starker fanfiction#starker fanfic#fandom#fan fiction#fanfic#fan fic#fanfiction#AO3 fanfic#ao3#kimwrites
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Thank you. How did you know today’s my birthday?
Inspired by my 100+ lovely followers, @love-me-a-good-prompt’s “THANK YOU IDEAS” prompt list, and a recent rewatch of White Collar season one.
Summary: After a few months of showing him little aside from a bit of casual enmity, Peter’s niece realizes that Neal’s likely not going away any time soon and she might as well try to make nice with the man. There’s no better time than Neal’s birthday.
Featuring: Neal Caffrey and Alice Burke
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“You have a visitor,” June said as Neal came through the front door. It was near to seven o’clock, having spent a few extra hours after his time at the bureau wandering downtown. “They’re waiting upstairs.”
Neal wasn’t expecting anyone but he was getting used to it now, the random pop up visits. He was at the whims of the White Collar division, at the beck and call of Peter Burke and his team. Either that or it was Mozzie. One could never expect when Mozzie would just show up.
“She seems like a lovely girl, Neal.”
Neal raised an eyebrow, his head tilted just a bit as he looked to June but he didn’t bother with asking for anything more from the woman. He knew she wouldn’t tell him, not with the sly smirk she wore.
“Ace,” Neal said to the girl stretched out across two of his dining chairs, one of his books open in her lap. Chess Fundamentals. “You know when June said she let a lovely girl in to wait for me I—”
Alice set down the book. She tried her best to hate the nickname her uncle’s felonious pet bestowed upon her, but she just couldn’t. It was just too catchy, so catchy that even Peter started using it from time to time.
“You weren’t expecting me?” she asked.
“It’s not that you’re not a lovely girl, Alice. It’s just—”
“It’s okay, Neal. I know I haven’t been the loveliest towards you,” she offered. “But Aunt El said I should give you a chance.” She leaned down to pick up two bags from the floor beside her chair. “And I know today’s your birthday, so I just thought it was an opportunity to start fresh and try to like you. And I also know Uncle Pete probably forgot. He’d forget my birthday every year if Aunt El didn’t remind him.”
“I’m sure he wo—” Neal stopped himself. “No, you’re right. He absolutely would forget.”
“And he has,” she said. “Always forgot about it before Aunt El, always just gave me an envelope with an I.O.U. scratched out on the back of a receipt or something for whatever I wanted, an outing usually.”
Neal smiled at the picture of a six-year-old version of the girl in front of him giving her uncle an earful for that type of forgetfulness. The vision came to him easily because Neal couldn’t imagine Alice Burke would have trouble giving an earful to anyone at regardless of her age.
“But enough about me. It’s your birthday.”
Alice pushed two bags across the table, one a generic brown paper bag and the other a garish thing with glitter and balloons and colored tissue paper stuffed inside.
“I guess I should do this one first,” he answered, pulling the birthday bag towards him and moving aside the tissue paper. A smile graced Neal’s lips as he pulled the hat out of the bag and fit it over his head.
“One can never have too many fedoras,” he said.
“I think my uncle would disagree,” Alice answered.
“I think you’re probably right,” Neal answered.
“Okay, now this one is actually a gift for both of us,” Alice said, pushing the second bag a bit closer.
“Both of us?” he asked.
“El says it’s the absolute best…well, it’s...just open it first, I guess.”
Intrigued, Neal pulled out one of two small boxes and opened the lid revealing a piece of cake.
“The best cake from the best bakery in Brooklyn,” Neal said, recognizing it on sight.
“That’s what El says, anyway,” Alice added.
“Elizabeth is right.”
“Usually is,” Alice added from the kitchen.
Neal accepted the fork she brought over from the kitchen, not the least bit surprised that she’d cased his place before he made it home, finding whatever she would need ahead of time.
They both took their first bites at the same time, both sighing in the over-exaggerated way one does while tasting something truly divine.
“Thank you for this. It’s great,” Neal said, “but how did you know today’s my birthday?”
“My uncle has a file eight volumes thick on you, Neal. You think I’ve never read about you?”
“Not sure the bureau would approve of you reading their files.”
“Like you’ve never done something the bureau wouldn’t approve of,” Alice said, using her finger to scrape a remnant of frosting from the box and popping it in her mouth.
“Touché,” he answered.
“And if Uncle Pete didn’t want me reading them, he shouldn’t have left them lying around. He knows I have a curious mind. It’s his own fault.”
“Interesting logic,” Neal answered. “I don’t know if Peter would agree.”
Alice shrugged. There was a lot she did that her uncle likely wouldn’t agree with, but she had accepted that as part of growing up. They both had. She and Peter and Elizabeth had been in constant negotiations over what was and wasn’t acceptable for the better part of a decade.
“I have one last gift for you.”
“Another gift?”
“I want to play another game of chess. Well, more than one, actually.”
“Really?” Neal asked. “After you told me you’d never play me again?”
Alice nodded. “I won’t even be a sore loser.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes,” she answered, taking their boxes and forks to the kitchen. “Mostly because after you teach me a bit more, I’ll never lose to you again.”
Neal shook his head, chuckling. “Is that so?”
Alice nodded. “That is so.”
Neal put his feet up, leaning back in his chair and resting his hands behind his head. “Alright, but if you’re ever going to beat me, which you probably won’t, you’ll have to commit to us playing at least--”
“Weekly,” Alice interrupted. “I already had Uncle Pete agree to keep at least one hour a week free on both our schedules.”
“And he agreed to that?” Neal asked. “Just like that?”
“I can be very persuasive,” she answered. “And I may have cashed in an old I.O.U. from ages ago.”
“You brought me birthday gifts and used an I.O.U. for chess lessons with me? I think you might actually like me a bit already, Ace.”
“We’ll see,” she answered. “You’re currently on probation.”
“You know, I don’t care what people may say. You’re absolutely nothing like your uncle.”
Alice glared at him. “You might want to tread lightly there, Neal.”
Neal raised his arms in surrender. “Alright, fine. Chessboard is on the bookshelf, Bobby Fischer.”
“I prefer Judit Polgar,” she answered.
“So, you’ve done your research, then?”
Alice didn’t answer but smirked at him as she pulled the chessboard off the shelf.
#white collar#white collar fanfic#neal caffrey#peter burke#elizabeth burke#mozzie#alice burke#platonic oc#100 follower thank you
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Once Upon A Time Rewatch: 5x12 Souls of the Departed
Currently reading (well, listening) to The School for Good and Evil Series. It’s so good! It’s basically Wicked the Musical and has a fairy tale element like OUAT. Can’t recommend enough!
I had the weirdest dream last night that Ouat’s Gothel was hiding behind my bed at my old house trying to scare me. She stayed up all night with some blankets, waiting to pounce. Also, she was naked. Jesus Christ, wtf is wrong with my dreams?! I do not see Gothel in that way at all!! I was so freaking disturbed! @fairytalepsuedonym this is all your fault for putting that dirty hippie witch bitch on my mind lol xD! /jk
Also guys, we’re getting Disney+ today. I’m so excited! Let me know if anyone has any recommendations.
And you know what I just thought of? It looked like they were implying that Merida and Lord Macintosh were gonna be a thing (possibly? I think it’s up for interpretation) but he outright shot an arrow at one of her brothers and wanted the others dead too. Merida would never! Her brothers mean too much to her to forgive such a thing. Also, she gives me gay vibes. I don’t make the rules. Alistair makes all the rules.
Back to the rewatch.
Oh yeah! This is the 100th episode! The compilation for 100 episodes was so freaking epic!
Neal! Is that really him though?
She’s staring at his lips lol!
Omg! Emma would have come back for Neal if she could. That means she believes they were true love, and she could have split her heart with him, right?
So, he appeared to her?
Omg! The way Emma is stroking his face and is staring at him, you’d never know she was working on saving her boyfriend lol.
You know what would have been so much better? If the underworld was perpetually dark and foggy (within reason) like the sims 4 Forgotten Hollow. That would have looked so much cooler!
Here comes the red filter. As a gifmaker and even as a viewer I wanna scream every time I see it but at least it’s not the Dark Swan arc.
I said it before and I’ll say it again: they should have let Regina’s and maybe even Rumple’s victims confront them! That would have been interesting to watch play out. I know we got Regina’s dad and Peter Pan but give me a family of Regina’s slaughtered villagers. What would their reaction be to seeing her?
Eww. I hate the way she dips her finger in that pie.
Guys. It doesn’t matter that you have Regina surrounded, she has pyrokinesis and telekinesis! Y’all are screwed! She blew the flames out? She had the advantage! I’m glad she didn’t hurt them of course, but as someone writing a book that consists of characters with magic abilities, you’ve gotta know when a powerful character has the advantage and when to use it. Where was Snow dodging a fireball as one of her arrows flies at Regina and it pauses in mid air only to sore back at Snowing and their friends, but they manage to outsmart her somehow?
Woah. This is the boldest Henry Sr. has ever been. He’s really trying to help Regina out here.
Cora!! My love!! I missed you!!
I love the Blind Witch. Does she have a name? I enjoyed her in ‘Regina Rising.’ I remember she’s quite a bit older than Regina
The Blind Witch: “What can I get you? Do you like gingerbread or children?” Omg Snow’s like “what the actual f**k??”
James, why are you like this?? Get off her, dude.
Those key rings are cool.
Why the hell didn’t Emma just tell Henry she saw his dad? I can think of absolutely no reason why she would keep that from him.
Lately all Robin has done is make random comments pointing out the obvious. “It’s uncanny. It’s so similar yet so off.” Yes, Robin we established that 9 minutes ago. His next line will be, “Goodness, is that a tree over there?” or “Regina, you were the Evil Queen”, mark my words. Where has his personality gone? I was never a big fan but at least he was kinda arrogant and cheeky before, at least in season 2 and 3. Now he’s just a dude that points on the ground and tells you there’s a stone. And they have the chemistry of a banana and a cheese cracker.
“Her puny army of sweaty little child beasts.”
Are those black roses?
I may be wrong but wasn’t Cora trying to get Regina to stop hunting Snow White and find true love instead in 4x20 or am I making things up? And I wonder if this is before or after she appeared in 4x20.
I just love Cora so much.
Is that how she got to the EF in 4x20? Through a looking glass?
The fact that she could so easily cross realms suggests that she willingly gave Regina her space. Which is something! But it feels like she’d have ulterior motives for that. Also Jefferson and Rumple would be screaming if they knew it was that easy to cross realms.
Regina: “are you threatening me?” Cora: “No. Of course not, never.” But you literally are though.
Peter Pan! He was under-utilised this season. Come on! They could have done so much with him! I’m glad at least Cora and Cruella got decent screen time.
Imagine watching OUAT for the first time with this episode and you see this full-grown man refer to a teenage boy as is father. I would be so confused lol.
I wonder if Rumple / Rumple’s father hail from Dunbroch originally. You know, with the Scottish accent. I’m kinda thinking about headcanoning that now. At least, I think Malcolm had a Scottish accent?
That got me! I forgot Cora had glamoured into Henry Sr.! I thought Cora had shapeshifted into Snow to trick Henry.
Oh, so Henry Sr. contacting her was the reason Cora could walk through the looking glass. If only someone had contacted Jefferson. And I’ve just remembered that in 4x20, she said a white rabbit brought her to the EF.
Killian looks creepy as hell here!
Lol Cora, you let Henry wrap the heart? What did you expect to happen!
Why did Regina need Snow’s heart to kill her? She could have easily killed her without even touching her.
What the hell does Snow think is in there? She looks terrified.
Archie, wtf were you doing between Snow’s titties?! And what were you doing with a match? Gonna set some titties on fire xD? I bet she could never look at him the same again.
He doesn’t want Regina to kill Snow because he thinks it will make her dark forever? What about all the other people she’s killed?! That makes no sense!
Okay, given that Grace didn’t seem to physically age much between the flashbacks in 1x17 and the present day in 1x17, this probably happened after the flashback’s events in 4x20.
According to wiki, Regina’s birthday is February 1st. I’m only learning this now.
I’ve never seen Henry Sr. so bold and Adam end to help Regina.
Okay, so Regina shrunk Henry with her magic but she needed a mushroom to return him to his normal size?
Don’t lock him in that box omg!!
Cora: “when are you gonna get it in that thick head...” she’s so casually abusive.
Random thought but why is Henry’s surname Mills? It just seems like it’d be Cora’s surname. Maybe he took hers on but that seems strange for a Prince to do.
Cora, don’t!
Henry’s alright!
Aww. Henry got to meet his 3rd Grandpa! He’s so happy she named him after him.
I’m tearing up.
“Remember who you are, Regina.”
Henry, honey, you need to go home.
Is that Persephone?
Oh my God! I’m so excited for the Cora and Zelena stuff!! By far my favourite thing of the season! To hear Cora say Zelena’s name- the fact she knows her name- I’d waited for so long for this! It left open so many questions!
And Hades infuriated with Cora on the love of his life Zelena’s behalf!! He loved her so much and would do anything for her. I don’t ship it as much as I initially did because of how it ended but that man freaking loved and cherished Zelena. He wanted everything for her. She desperately needed that and it was an emotional experience to see her get it.
That’s like her worst nightmare, being a peasant again.
I can’t with the flame hair.
I forgot this episode was pretty good. I didn’t remember liking it but Cora saved it for me. I forgot she was in it because I have probably watch season 5 the least as I try to avoid it lol.
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A Ponderous Rewatch: Battle for the Planet and Cameos
You know, I keep trying to be minimal with the amount of images I put in these posts, but I think it’s kind of a losing battle…especially when it comes to episodes animated by TMS like the second one coming later on today. I can’t help it, some of the expressions and poses are just too good to not be shared.
In any case, let’s begin with one very small cameo appearance in “Space Probed”:
Our little duo have apparently found themselves abducted by aliens, only to be kept in lab conditions much like the one on Earth at ACME Labs. This is one of those times where I wish I could know the production order of these episodes and not just the air date order… Why? Well, because this small cameo could potentially line up really well with an upcoming episode. Just keep that in mind for now.
With that out of the way, we move on to our next full skit:
And we begin with the Brain expositing to Pinky about how he came up with the plan for this episode.
“Halloween, Pinky: 1938. Mercury Radio Theatre presented an adaptation of H. G. Wells’ ‘War of the Worlds’ that was so realistic, people actually fled the cities believing that creatures from Mars were attacking the Earth. It proved that radio was a powerful tool…and now, Pinky, the advance of technology has brought us an even more powerful tool. Do you know what that is?”
Before we move on, how many of you reading this have heard about this? And how many of you know that this is actually an incident that happened in real life? Yes, people actually fled their homes after hearing this broadcast. Not a lot of people, of course. Not by a long shot. Most just made panicked phone calls to their local police station or to the radio station itself to find out what was really going on. The incident also wasn’t nationwide or anything like that, it was quite local. If anything, the radio play caused much more outrage after the fact than initial panic.
Another amusing anecdote is that Orson Welles was the man who directed, narrated, and played a main character in the broadcast. For those of you who may not be in the know, although Brain was initially based on animator and writer Tom Minton at Warner Brothers, Brain’s voice actor Maurice LaMarche based his voice on Orson Welles. Or, well, as Mr. LaMarche puts it: “The Brain is 70 percent Welles, 20 percent Vincent Price, and I don't know, there's another 10 percent of something else in there. I don't know what. Some people think it's Peter Lorre. I don't know what it is.”.
Strong references aside, I’m betting most of you can see the massive holes in the Brain’s plan already. Hoo boy…
“Umm… The rubber band?”
“The workings of your mind are a mystery to me, Pinky.”
“Ooo! I love a good mystery, Brain!”
You know, this little sequence with Brain nonchalantly stretching the rubber band while walking away from Pinky and Pinky determinedly holding on until Brain lets go off camera and sends Pinky flying is… Well, I don’t know what it is about it, but it’s kind of cute in a weird slapstick way? Like, it’s hard to tell if Brain did that on purpose to send Pinky flying for not understanding his plan…or if he actually wanted Pinky to follow him and tried to lead him to where he was walking but Pinky thought it was some kind of tug-o-war game and Brain got exasperated and let go of the rubber band.
Either way, Pinky doesn’t seem to mind.
“Television, Pinky, is our new tool!”
“We will pirate the airwaves and stage a hoax like ‘War of the Worlds’!”
Brain, you’re very good with that lasso. I’m impressed!
“Three cameras, Brain?”
“Yes… A technique pioneered by the great Desi Arnaz. And with them we will scare the people of the cities, leaving no resistance behind. We will have taken over the world!”
Well, Brain, that technique first being used by Desi Arnaz is a myth (it was more than likely actually pioneered by Jerry Fairbanks around 1947), but I’m going to give you a pass on this because you likely couldn’t fact check this very well at the time.
I do have to give Brain credit for being as dramatic as possible while announcing his plan, though. He really does know how to put on a show.
“Egad, Brain, brilliant!”
And Pinky is, as usual, full of praise and extremely excited about the plan. Look at him clapping and hopping around, aww… I’m starting to think that half the reason Brain goes through with these long, expository explanations of his plans to Pinky despite Pinky not quite following along a lot of the time is just to impress Pinky. Brain needs reassurance and Pinky always provides.
“Oh! Oh, wait, no, no…”
“Why would they be scared of us? We’re so small and we’re practically the size of mice, Brain.”
“We are mice, Pinky.”
“Oh, right! Well, there you are, then. Eh heh heh…”
…Okay, so, Pinky also tends to deflate the praise a bit when pointing out potential flaws in the plan like this, but it’s the initial thought that counts.
Yeah, I know, Brain. I know. But Pinky really is trying to be helpful.
“It’s not a question of size, Pinky. It’s a question of scale! Watch the monitor.”
“*gasp* Zounds, Brain! You’re gigantic!”
“Television, Pinky: The Great Deceptor!”
“Narf~…”
No, you aren’t seeing things. Pinky just…just stands there in front of the TV looking at live footage of a close-up of Brain and sighs in awe and affection while clasping his little hands together. I don’t even think I need to make a “Fellas, is it gay to--?” joke here. All that’s missing is little hearts appearing around his head.
We cut to a little while later, where the duo has everything set up for their broadcast. It looks like Pinky must have done the lettering for their props, since it actually looks decent and nothing like Brain’s scrawlings. Yes, I’m going to continue roasting Brain’s terrible penmanship. It amuses me.
“How is my disguise, Pinky?”
“OH! Is that you, Brain?!?”
“You flatter me, Pinky. Now, throw the switch and let us begin…the Battle for the Planet!”
Title drop! Also, aww. To be fair, Brain, I’m not sure Pinky was intending to be flattering so much as he was actually unsure if that really was you or not. But the fact that you took it as flattery is very telling, I think.
Pinky throws the switch, and the plan is officially underway!
According to the Animaniacs wiki, these people bear a striking resemblance to Elmyra’s family. If that’s what was intended, this is quite the early omen for the horrible “Pinky, Elmyra, and the Brain” spin-off that was made after the regular PatB spin-off. I don’t think I’m going to fully cover that show in the far future. It’s not the fun kind of terrible…it’s just terrible.
Oh hey, they were watching Family Matters! Too bad this is many, many years before they could bear witness to Dark Urkle Tribute.
And there’s Ralph, enjoying coffee and a doughnut.
And…some TV station broadcast folks. It kinda bothers me that these two basically have the same model except for different hair colours.
“We interrupt your regular broadcast to bring you this important news bulletin…”
“What is that?!”
“Someone’s pirated the TV lines!”
“Scientists have just reported that a large, unidentified flying object seems to be heading towards Earth. There is no cause for alarm…”
“…But there probably will be.”
Subtle, Brain.
Oh, hi, Warners! You certainly picked a good time to escape tonight.
“We take you now to our satellite view of the planet, perhaps to catch a glimpse of this fearful courier of the unknown.”
Cue Pinky making ridiculous “shoosh” and “shoom” and “weee!~” noises. Very convincing.
“I’ve just received word that the UFO is about to crash land nearby. There should be a great explosion!”
“I said, THERE SHOULD BE A GREAT EXPLOSION!”
“Hmm? Oh! OH, right, Brain! Narf!”
Nice blep, pinky.
Somehow, people watching the broadcast are still terrified. I’ve gotta admit that I didn’t expect this plan to go this well for this long.
…Okay, maybe I spoke too soon.
“Sorry, Brain…”
“…We’ll go live to the crash site momentarily.”
He says before near-instantly cutting to the “crash site”, still in the same disguise. Brain, honey, I know you’re probably trying to reduce broadcast downtime so that the audience doesn’t start to question what they’re seeing, but you do know that quick cuts like this ruin the illusion of this being a live broadcast…right?
Oh, who am I kidding? Of course he doesn’t know that. As usual, Brain has tunnel vision and expects his plans to go one certain way, and any details that don’t fit his internal narrative are discarded or not even thought about.
Just let me slide on in…
“I’m reporting to you live from the crash site and I…I’m at a loss for words. Can we get a shot of this very frightening scene?”
He’s right. That’s the most frightening…ly obvious cardboard spaceship I have ever seen.
But okay, I love these tiny prop improvisations they had to do. The bare cardboard wings taped to some kind of spray can for the body of the ship, a stray water cooler cup for the cone, test tubes for the thrusters, random little sewing pins for some kind of antenna, a dirty beige blanket to simulate soil for the crash zone… It’s so hastily cobbled together yet so goddamn cute.
Ralph still seems convinced that this is real, though that isn’t saying much.
“I am now positioned close to the…well, I can only assume that this is a vehicle from outer space, its occupants here to destroy the Earth.”
“Oooo!~ OoooOOOooo!~”
“Wait! There is a strange noise emanating from inside. Something seems to be coming out of the ship!”
They made a glove into an alien space suit with a tiny peephole to accommodate Pinky’s face and they fashioned a little belt from something for it, aaaaa! This is so adorable! Look at Pinky trying to be scary! He’s just all >:B throughout this entire scene.
BUG FOGGER
WARNING
CONTENTS UNDE
EXTREME PRESS
GAS
I’m wondering why they couldn’t label it as “bug spray”. I’ve honestly never heard of it being called “bug fogger”. Is that an American thing? (Also: Tiny sandbag wall!)
“Oh my! It’s hideous! Ladies and gentlemen, I can hardly describe this terrifying creature before me, except to say: Run for your lives! Go on! Empty the cities! Leave everything behind!”
“I…I don’t know how long I can stay on the air. I’ll try to get to our aerial view in chopper five!”
Okay, it seems even Elmyra’s family and the broadcast folks are still under the impression that this is actually happening. And Brain instantly cuts again to the aerial view. Brain, I think you’ve been watching too many movies.
“Chopper five, high above the city. The horrible creatures from Mars…invading…destroying everything in their path! Oh, the humanity!”
Since this is a still image the impact is lessened but Brain is rapidly beating his fist against his side to simulate the sound of helicopter blades and it’s actually pretty effective. Well done, lil guy, I never would’ve thought to do something like that. Your foley work is great!
The milk carton buildings still have straws in them to make chimneys! There’s little Chinese takeout boxes as buildings, too! I’m so charmed by all these quaint ways they’ve made their props.
Also, the Pinky-alien has apparently grown to kaiju size now, somehow. Brain, you’ve got to make your hoax at least a little consistent!
“This is no hoax, ladies and gentlemen. I urge you to run for your lives while you can! We’re not making this up just so we can take over the world!”
Goddamnit, Brain. You are the worst liar in the history of forever.
“Oh no! It’s heading this way! Run for your lives! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!”
I just thought these cowering poses Brain did were funny and cute. He is so small and vulnerable…
So Pinky starts to menace the camera itself and—
—Oops. This isn’t going to go well.
Poor, poor Pinky.
“We did it, Pinky. Brilliant performance!”
Holy shit, sincere praise from Brain! I’m sure Pinky will treasure it.
“Undoubtedly, the population has fled in fear from their ‘terrifying enemy’, HA!”
Umm. About that, Brain…
“Let us make haste…to The White House!”
Brain, you may want to at least wait a little while so that people can actually—
Ouch.
WOW, who needs Twitter in this universe when the press is this fast?
“’Battle for the Planet is a comedy smash… World laughs together. Stay home for this one!’”
“Pinky, are you pondering what I’m pondering?”
“Well, I think so, Brain…but if we didn’t have ears, we’d look like weasels.”
“[sighs] No, Pinky… Our hoax…no one went anywhere! No one fled the cities! They found us…humorous.”
If it helps any, boys, I also found you incredibly adorable.
“Where are you going, Brain?”
“Back to our cage, Pinky. We must plan for tomorrow night.”
“Why? What are we going to do tomorrow night?”
I like how Pinky is at first concerned about Brain’s mood and then we he sees that Brain is just walking home to plan for tomorrow night he’s bouncing on his tip-toes after him.
“The same thing we do every night, Pinky: Try to take over the world!”
TO BE CONTINUED because apparently Tumblr finds this post too long otherwise,
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The Craft: How a Teenage Weirdo Based on a Real Person Became an Icon
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“We Are The Weirdos, Mister.” A phrase you’ll find printed over t-shirts, pin badges, mugs, earrings, tote bags, necklaces, and more all over the internet. It’s the most iconic line from The Craft, a film released 25 years ago that still has a rabid following today. For anyone unfamiliar with The Craft, it’s a line spoken by Fairuza Balk’s Nancy, an inferno in black lippy and sunglasses, the de facto leader of a homemade coven made up of outsiders who have taken the raw deal the world has given them and rejected it by learning to harness the power of nature. This line is everything. We are no longer going to be victims, it says. We will no longer be afraid. We reclaim our space, our power. That we are four teenaged girls will no longer mean we have to watch out for ‘weirdos’ – because it is us who are the weirdos. Mister.
“Nancy is the one everybody wants to be,” says Peter Filardi, the man who created Nancy, Rochelle, Bonnie, and Sarah all those years ago, chatting to Den of Geek from his home, an original poster for The Craft peaking out from behind him on the wall. Next to it is a poster for Chapelwaite, the series Filardi is currently showrunning with his brother Jason, based on Stephen King’s short story, “Jerusalem’s Lot,” a prequel to Salem’s Lot.
“Nancy is the one who is particularly put upon and who finds the power to get revenge or get justice and is going to do that with no apologies. I think it’s how we all envision ourselves or would want to see ourselves, I guess. Here we are 25 years later. Why do you think we’re still talking about it?”
It’s an interesting question because we very much still are talking about The Craft. With Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, A Discovery of Witches, His Dark Materials, and of course last year’s remake of The Craft, we appear to very much still be in the season of the witch, but none is quite as resonant and impactful as the original The Craft. Watching it back 25 years after its release, it’s still just as relevant.
The very first script that Filardi sold was Flatliners, the story of arrogant, hot-shot medical students who plan to discover what happens after you die by “flatlining” for increasing lengths of time. Filardi’s script prompted a bidding war and the movie became a big hit, starring Hollywood’s hottest: Kiefer Sutherland, Julia Roberts, and William Baldwin.
After Flatliners, Filardi had been working on a script about real life teenage Satanist Ricky Kasso, (“He was one of the first to really put the hallucinogenics together with the music and the theology and then sort of brew them all up into this really volatile cocktail,” Filardi explains), so when producer Doug Wick approached him about another supernatural project, Filardi was game.
“He said he would like to either do a haunted house story or something to do with teenage witches. And because I happened to be working on what I was working on I was pretty well-schooled in earth magic and natural magic and Satanism and all sorts of stuff. And we just started talking, and we hit it off, and we decided to develop and create The Craft together,” Filardi recalls.
At the time Wick had just two full producer credits to his name – for Working Girl and Wolf – but he would go on to produce swathes of heavy hitters including Hollow Man, Jarhead, The Great Gatsby, and win the best picture Oscar for Gladiator. Meanwhile, Andrew Fleming, director of The Craft and co-writer of the screenplay, had made horror thriller Bad Dreams and comedy Threesome, and would go on to make several comedy movies as well as many hit TV shows – he’s currently working on season two of Netflix’s popular Emily in Paris.
Filardi’s story was always going to be about women, and it was always going to be about outsiders, the memories of high school still fresh enough for him to remember the pain. “I’m sure it’s like this for every kid. You have memories from those high school years of horrible things that happened to people around you, or were said or done and just the petty cruelties,” he says. “I’m glad I’m an old man now!” (He’s not, he’s 59).
Rewatching and it’s certainly striking how much empathy you feel for the girls. Sarah (Robin Tunney), who is the audience’s way in to the movie, lost her mother during childbirth and has battled mental health problems, even attempting suicide. Recently moved to a new neighborhood with her dad and step mother, she is instantly the outsider at her new school, and is immediately treated abhorrently by popular boy Chris (a pre-Scream Skeet Ulrich), who dates her and then spreads rumors that they slept together. Rochelle (Rachel True) is a keen diver, subjected to overt racist bullying by a girl on the swim team, while Bonnie (Neve Campbell) hides away because of extreme scarring she has all over her body. Before Sarah arrives, the three dabble in magic and protect themselves as best they can from the horrors of high school by telling people they are witches and keeping them at arm’s length. It’s the arrival of Sarah, though, a “natural” witch with some serious power, that turns things around.
“I think that maybe traditionally Hollywood would have done a version where the women were witches like Lost Boys,” Filardi says. “The women were witches, and they had this power, and they’re the dark overlords of their school or something like that. And that’s exactly the opposite of what worked for me and how I thought magic works in general.
“Magic has always historically been a weapon of the underclass, for poor people… Think of England. People of the heath, who lived out in the country… The heathens, they didn’t have a king or an army or the church even behind them. They would turn to magic. And that’s kind of what I saw for our girls. For real magic to work, you have the three cornerstones of need and emotion and knowledge. And I hate magic movies where somebody has a power and they just do this and the magic happens. I think it’s much more interesting if the magic comes from an emotional need, a situation that really riles up the power within.”
These witches aren’t evil and they aren’t even anti-heroes. Instead, this is pure wish fulfilment for anyone who’s ever been bullied, or overlooked, or been dealt a particularly tough hand, and this level of empathy comes across hard in the film. Watching now and so many of the themes are so current with reference to issues of racism and the emergence of the #MeToo movement.
“I did not write it as a feminist piece per se,” says Filardi. “I really just wrote it as an empathetic human being, I think.”
There’s extreme empathy dripping throughout the script, but don’t mistake that for pity. The Craft deals in female empowerment and just plain fun. It’s here that one of The Craft’s enduring conflicts arises. Are you Team Sarah or are you Team Nancy?
The correct answer of course, is Team Nancy…
“It’s always harder to be the good guy or the good girl,” laughs Filardi.
After all, before Sarah shows up, the other three are doing fine – surviving, doing minor spells, and looking out for each other. The influx of power Sarah brings allows the group to up their game and together they each ask for a gift from “Manon,” the (fictional) deity who represents all of nature that they worship in the film. Bonnie wants to heal her scars, Rochelle wants the racism to stop, Nancy wants the power of Manon, but Sarah casts a love spell on Chris. Sarah is either taking revenge on Chris, or she’s forging a relationship without consent, and it’s a move which eventually leads to Chris’s death.
Meanwhile, Nancy is someone who just refuses to be a victim, despite the fact that of the four she’s clearly had the toughest life, living in a trailer with her mum and her abusive stepdad. Nancy won’t allow the audience to pity her. Nancy doesn’t let things happen to her, she makes her own choices, whether they are good ones or not. When newly empowered Nancy is running red lights, with Rochelle and Bonnie whooping in the back, and Sarah telling her it’s all gone a bit far, “Oh shut up, Sarah” feels like the right response. While Sarah might be technically correct, we are rooting for these girls to be allowed the pure joy of something they have created between them.
Nancy is an amazing creation, and Filardi says he couldn’t have anticipated how much the character would resonate.
“I did not envision the great look that Andy Fleming brought to her,” he smiles. “But Nancy was inspired by a real girl, whose older brother lived in a trailer in their backyard, and just had a hard go of it. She’s true to the one I wrote. She always embodied the earth element of fire. Each of the girls is their own earth element. There’s earth, wind, water, fire. And you can pretty much guess who’s who…”
We could speculate but it’s perhaps more fun to let the audience decide for themselves.
“Nancy in the beginning was always the constructive aspect of that element. She’s the light in the fire in the dark woods that draws the girls together,” he explains. “When she’s all passion and raw nerve, she’s very much like fire, but then when she crosses Sarah and gets overwhelmed with the power of her new abilities, she becomes the destructive side of that same element and burns the whole thing up. But she’s a fantastic character. I think that Fairuza Balk just elevated Nancy to a whole other level. I guess that’s what happens when you’re blessed with the right actor for the right part.”
Exactly who the true protagonist of The Craft is is something Filardi still contemplates. What is notable is that though, yes, Nancy, Bonnie, and Rochelle do at one point try to, um, kill Sarah and make it look like suicide, which isn’t a very sisterly thing to do, they never really become true villains. By the end, the only fatalities are sex pest Chris and Nancy’s abusive step father, and both deaths could reasonably be considered accidental. While Bonnie and Rochelle are stripped of their powers, they aren’t further punished, it’s only Nancy who gets a raw deal. Driven to distraction by her surfeit of power, we find her ranting in a mental hospital strapped to a bed.
Filardi’s ending was different, though he won’t be drawn on details.
“The original ending was different. I’ve never really gone into the detail of what the original ending was. Well, the original ending was just different…” he says, mulling over what he might say. “So, let’s see. Well, Chris always died… and it was just very different,” he hesitates. “I don’t really get into it because there’s no real sense. It is what it is. I always like in a movie… Having two different children and you love them both for different reasons, but I would have never wanted to be hard on the girls in the final analysis in any way thematically.”
One element of the script that saw slight changes was the motivation of Rochelle, after the casting of Rachel True.
“To be honest, I think she was the exact same character. She was picked on by the swimmers. There was an added element that she had an eating disorder. She used to vomit into a mayonnaise jar and hide it on the top shelf of a bedroom closet. But other than that, she was really the same character,” he says. “Andy Fleming and Doug Wick, I don’t know who came up with the idea, but they cast Rachel and she added this whole other element to it, the racial element, which I think it was great and I think totally appropriate.”
Though Filardi didn’t work on the remake and hasn’t actually seen it, he’s able to see for himself, first hand, how well the film has aged and how it continues to endure for young women – he has teenage daughters of his own.
“I see them going through all the same stuff that I watched girlfriends going through. And it hasn’t changed all that much,” he says ruefully.
“It’s funny. For years, they had no idea what I did for a living. I think they just thought I hung around in the basement. And one daughter was like… She was going to school with somebody whose father was in a rock band or something, ‘Nobody in this house does anything interesting. Everything’s boring.’ And it was around Halloween and they were showing The Craft at the Hollywood Forever cemetery. I took them to the cemetery and it was great. There were boys dressed in Catholic high school uniforms and women all in black and with blankets and candles and wine and snacks. Amidst the tombstones, they set up a huge screen and showed the film. So, that’s when they first saw it. And it was really fun. A really nice thing to share with my daughters.”
Things don’t change that much. High school is still horrible. Magic is still tantalizing. The outfits are still fabulous. And Nancy is still a stone cold legend. The Craft is an enduring celebration of outsider culture that we’ll probably still be talking about in 25 years to come. After all, most of us, at one time or another, feel like the weirdos.
“I think of it as the story about the power of adolescent pain and self-empowerment. I think of beautiful young people who are just picked upon or put in positions they shouldn’t be or don’t deserve to be, and having the ability to fight back and weather it and survive,” says Filardi when we ask him what he’s most proud of.
cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });
“I’m also proud of all the great contributions that the other talented people brought to the script. All I did was a script, but you have actors and directors and producers and art directors and production designers who just… Everybody seems to me to have brought their A-game. I didn’t come up with Nancy’s great look. Other people get all that credit. Like you said, you see her on t-shirts. So, so many people just brought so many things. I guess I’m just proudest to think that a bunch of strangers come together and connect to the message of the piece, and together just make something memorable all these 25 years later.”
The post The Craft: How a Teenage Weirdo Based on a Real Person Became an Icon appeared first on Den of Geek.
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