reblog if ur kinda cold and pretty tired
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Is this a prank? What….
Edit: holy heck it’s real…
They might be able to help us…
holy shit
HOLY SHIT!
"The best thing we can do with power is give it away" - On the leftist critique of superhero narratives as authoritarian power fantasies:
The ongoing "Jason Todd is a cop" debate has reminded me of a brilliant brief image essay by Joey deVilla. So here it is, images first and the full essay text below:
"A common leftist critique of superhero comics is that they are inherently anti-collectivist, being about small groups of individuals who hold all the power, and the wisdom to wield that power.
I don’t disagree with this reading. I don’t think it’s inaccurate. Superheroes are their own ruling class, the concept of the übermensch writ large.
But it’s a sterile reading. It examines superhero comics as a cold text, and ignores something that I believe in fundamental, especially to superhero storytelling: the way people engage with text. Not what it says, but how it is read.
The average comic reader doesn’t fantasize about being a civilian in a world of superheroes, they fantasize about being a superhero. One could charitably chalk this up to a lust for power, except for one fact…
The fantasy is almost always the act of helping people. Helping the vulnerable, with no reward promised in return.
Being a century into the genre, we’ve seen countless subversions and deconstructions of the story.
But at its core, the superhero myth is about using the gifts you’ve been given to enrich the people around you, never asking for payment, never advancing an ulterior motive.
We should (and do) spend time nitpicking these fantasies, examining their unintended consequences, their hypocrisies.
But it’s worth acknowledging that the most eduring childhood fantasy of the last hundred years hasn’t been to become rich. Superheroes come from every class (don’t let the MCU fool you).
The most enduring fantasy is to become powerful enough to take the weak under your own wing. To give, without needing to take.
So yes, the superhero myth, as a text, isn’t collectivist. But that’s not why we keep coming back to it.
That’s not why children read it.
We keep coming back to it to learn one simple lesson…
The best thing we can do with power IS GIVE IT AWAY."
- Joey deVilla, 2021
https://www.joeydevilla.com/2021/07/04/happy-independence-day-superhero-style/
“Just this once, everyone lives.”
My Retro-Cartoon Ramblings, Part 6
We've hit a lot in the past 5 sections here. Its important to understand that TV at the time was, in general, more ridiculous. The only reason MASK was on Saturday morning in animation and Knight Rider was on in the evenings was a matter of budget. They sold us toys of both.
If they could have afforded to give KITT flip out wings and laser blasters on the FX budget from day one, you know they would have. They eventually did make the car fly, and it was boss.
(Can't show the good version of the opening song because its not on YT anymore, so here's the song, and a rare promo to show just a sample of the madness)
For complicated reasons I didn't get to watch a lot of cartoons on Saturday, and so a lot of what I watched came on Sunday, much of it thanks to Nickelodeon. This was one of my favorite shows. No one else I knew watched it. No one knew it existed.
(most of the English stuff is vanished from online, but here's a touch of the french version).
I would try and tell people about it, and they would ask if I dreamed it up. Because, it's about these two children who get lost in a cave and wind up in an underground kingdom, where they're found by the secret kingdom of legless undergrounders, whose star is slowly dying.
The children of this lost civilization, with the help of two ancient pangolins that may be robots or may be cyborgs create a legged goddess figure who, with Spartakus, who might be that Sparatkus but probably isn't, must save the inner sun from dying or all earth dies.
Throughout this, they are hunted by Radio Pirates who seem to be a Frenchman's stereotype of British hoodlums. Plus points: Body positivity, kickin' tunes. Bad points: they're slavers! (boo!)
If you feel like you've just been recruited into a cult, it isn't unjustified (and I should know), because while none of my peers or parents believed I'd actually seen this damn show, it presents its belief in the world of the sun beneath the sea with almost reverent sincerity.
The whole thing is a surreal dream-logic journey through a multi-layered inner earth, visiting historical figures and weird hypothetical alien landscapes. In one particularly harrowing episode, they visit what is implied to be the New York of the far future...
Inhabited by nothing but a lone, kaiju-like creature that thinks one of the party is a doll or pet, one that is implied be a future human mutated beyond recognition. The episode opens with slow, silent pans over the city with low wind.
I adore the show from my memories and few scattered episodes I've been able to find. I actually ordered a figure of MassMedia from France, but it came with what appeared to have been an intentionally broken arm. I was super-bummed.
The one in the pic isn't mine. Its in a box someplace waiting for me to get the gumption to try and fix it. I mean, in what other context does that character design get an action figure? She got multiple! Turns out the original Les Mondes Engloutis was HUGE in France.
It would make a beautiful open world RPG, provided it could be kept as bafflingly strange as the source material.
Also there's an episode where one of the kids escapes the pirates by unionizing the crew!
This might be the funniest picture I have ever seen.
...This is an always-reblog for me. :)
AU where the Justice League forms like usual, except Batman maintained his “totally a myth” status and has in fact been active for years before the JL forms. He’s very cautious about trusting them, but still joins, and the others sort of accepts that as long as they trust that Batman has a really hard time with trust, it will all work out in its own weird way
Then, one day, in the middle of a JL mission, the League gets in a tight spot. Out of nowhere, this blue and black blur swoops in and saves everyone’s ass. Maybe breaking some shackles that were proving very difficult, maybe disarm a bomb that the League was just a hair’s breadth too slow to reach without help, but whatever happens, the shadowy figure pauses just long enough to say, “Hey, Batman, you know you there are these things called cellphones now and you can just call sometimes, it doesn’t have to be this dramatic?” and bounds away after shouting ‘let’s do brunch! Bring your new friends!’
Batman is mortified.
No one lets it go.
The entire rest of the mission, the whole League is asking so many questions. Who was that? Do you know him? How do you know him? What’s going on? I didn’t know there was a vigilante in this area?? They don’t let up until he talks.
“That was Nightwing.” Batman is mumbling. The JL forces him to bring them to the Brunch. Brunch happens to be in a run-down apartment on the edge of a bad neighborhood, at five in the morning, in costume. Nightwing introduces himself as Batman’s lovechild with justice.
“I did not realize Batman had a child,” Martian Manhunter says, calmly enough that no one’s sure if he’s accidentally plucking a really loud thought out of the air or if he’s trying to make a joke.
Nightwing stares for a moment falling over laughing. He doesn’t get up. Batman starts trying to apply anti-Joker venom but Nightwing just kicks him and laughs until he cries. He keeps trying to wipe his eyes and his mask keeps getting in the way, so he asks everyone to leave so he can please get a hold of himself
He is still laughing when they leave. Everyone is confused. Batman is furious. Nightwing manages to breathe long enough to say, “We’re just so glad you’re socializing now, Batman.”
Superman turns to look at Batman very slowly. “…’we’?”