Latest Posts by moaloves - Page 4
Is it worth it to spend $10 on shipping on one tiny little comic but it’s Red Robin 2009
Something about the young justice core four (and young justice in general)-never quite living up to the others-always striving for more-just wanting to make a NAME for themselves something that was just theirs-finding a home in one another and finding people who loved them without seeing the ghosts of others
I just love found family troupe and young justice at its core fits it <333
More of old work, it'll take a while before I get to my most recent comics andna
They are just silly
Part 1
For as much as I love Animorphs, I’ve never actually read it in order all the way through. It was always scattered entries, whatever I could find at the library or buy at garage sales. There’s even a small handful I haven’t read at all. That’s why, for my New Year’s resolution, I plan to reread the series in its entirety. However, I know how my brain works, and I’m afraid I might lose motivation and quit too soon. That’s why, after each book, I will add to this post with, in my opinion, the most fucked-up part of the book, as well as the silliest part (because anyone who’s read these books knows that those are the two main tenets of the series). That way, I’ll have a publicly available record to hold myself accountable to if I start slacking, plus a nice thread of propaganda to hopefully suck more people in. I plan to read one mainline book a week, starting with:
Somebody mentioned in a tag on one of my posts the scene where Marco Animorphs is showering after antmageddon and he finds an ant stuck to his hip by the pincers where it presumably was trying to bite him in half when he was an ant and then it died from him becoming very big very fast and I feel like that scene, and the scene where Cassie finds a sliver of a sentient person’s flesh between her teeth while she’s flossing and then flosses until her gums bleed, really deserve recognition in the literary canon. Applegate deserves an award. There should be a TV Trope named after whatever the fuck that is. Like fridge horror but diegetic. Bathroom horror. Your bedtime bathroom routine as an opportunity for personal confrontation with the violent detritus of the dead which lingers in and on your body even after you have ostensibly stripped yourself of weapons and healed over all your wounds.
Michael Dickman, (2011), Copper Canyon Press, Killing Flies, Flies
animorphs is funny because the kids spend almost the entire series turning into birds of prey to fly in virtually every scenario while complaining about how they have to space themselves out so it doesn't look suspicious that all these rare raptors are grouped together, about how birds of prey often have to do a lot of hard flapping work to fly in some situations they're not meant for, about tiring out easily, etc. to the point where it starts getting weird and confusing that they literally always use those bird morphs instead of thinking to turn into e.g. migratory geese for certain situations as per their general capacity for pragmatism. and then in literally one of the last books in the series some of them turn into geese to fly long distance and spend the entire time going "wtf this is great why the fuck didnt we do this earlier holy shit." and also the answer to that question is at least in part "one of the animorphs is just literally on all levels including physical a hawk that gets snooty about bird species he thinks suck and would have been really annoying about it"
there's something to be said about the choice to use "prince" as the main signifier of military rank for the andalites. because it kinda obscures the truth of the situation, doesn't it? a group of kids getting magic powers from an alien prince sounds whimsical and delightful. a group of kids getting pulled into a war by an alien colonel sounds tragic and horrible. the slow reveal of what "prince" actually means over the course of the early books is perhaps the most underrated twist of the entire series, because it fundamentally recontextualizes the entire premise of the series without the reader even consciously realizing it.
Cassie Animorphs really spoiled me for all future pacifist characters. Like, I didn't love her when I read the series as a kid, but as I've gotten older, I really appreciate that she's the moral center of the group, the one who's always trying to find non-lethal solutions, AND she regularly kills her enemies(and their human shields). Because she understands that if violence is going to happen, then keeping HER hands clean doesn't stop the violence. That sometimes, the only way to keep an attacker from hurting others is to attack them yourself.
And so she does the right thing. Always. And sometimes the right thing involves violence. And she regrets it, but if she's the only one who can save lives and that requires killing, she will. And she'll go right back to arguing that they should be looking for a path to peace while standing in the pool of blood.
Compared to how some series will have a pacifist character who relies on their friends to do all the violence while condemning them for it, or a series will find a loophole/change the rules to allow the pacifist to not kill when it would otherwise be 100% necessary, it was a nice practical situation to have Cassie dedicated to peace while being willing to kill to achieve it.
The dynamic of Cassie and Rachel is making me insane. What if someone was your conscience but also you resented them for making you feel like you were a bloodthirsty monster? What if your friend had the courage to do what you couldn't but made you feel weak and stupid for sticking to your morals? What if you went shopping at the mall together about it?
Animorphs really has a way to turn every scifi trope on its head. "Why do alien invasions always start in America?" Actually the body snatchers first landed in a Middle Eastern farming community where they kidnapped the first guy they saw, read his mind, and concluded that, since he was terrified of the US soldiers who had brutally destroyed everything he knew and loved, the US would be the ideal place to center their invasion. This is revealed in the spin-off "Visser" which is an excellent stand-alone book that can be read without any prior knowledge of Animorphs. And you can read it for free and with the author's blessing right here:
https://files.animorphsfanforum.com/ebooks/pdf/Visser.pdf
so like, what if you were the last surviving animorph but it's been canonically established that you still had your best friend's DNA in your body
The song "Soldier, Poet, King" by The Oh Hellos is perfect for these three.
Had to draw the three of them happy because they go through too much
Three boys named Hiccup, three sea dragons with scars over their hearts
“save young justice!” “bring young justice back for season 5!” NO. give me a comic accurate young justice show. i want punk conner kent. i want robin breaking into government facilities and coming up with ridiculous aliases. i want bart to adopt the super cycle and annoy red tornado into reactivating. where is the tiny clone of lobo or team leader wonder girl. let me see them play baseball for the fate of the planet and illegally invade a country full of supervillains and also kill santa.
*Jason walks into the living room to see Tim flopped on the couch sniffing*
Jason: “Oh. my. gosh. What could you possibly be crying about now?”
Tim *looks up and sniffles*: “I miss the supercycle… you know, my beloved sentient vehicle who used to fly me and young justice around… ”
Jason:
“THE WHO-”
thinking. and. there’s a very specific kind of bond you get with. friends raising friends, you know? like i always say that yj had huge parts in raising each other vs the original titans who had already been raised and who really . discovered who they were beyond that within each other and like. MAN. there’s of course the trauma and messy relationship of a parentified sibling and whatnot but the messy dynamics of a group of friends raising each other is also so very complex
i do think to some degree the titans helped each other but it wasn’t. raising each other it was carving out a home for them all in each other and whatnot but yj were really just kids and that bond is So Very Strong especially with the core four who continued to go on helping each other become people
not enough people talk about how much work the titans had to do to even be recognized by the league also. and they had to like. basically fight? tooth and nail? against their own mentors to be recognized as something in themselves and not just additions to their mentors. and they only had each other for that!!! dick grieved jason with the titans!!!! donna went through some of the most traumatizing self identity ass shit with the titans!!!!!!!!!! raven found a home with the titans!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i’m so
i just have lots of thoughts about friends raising each other + friends helping each other heal from the way they were raised
that’s also why i think it’s important people know the difference between the kind of teams the titans are + young justice was
with the titans. they were the originals! they built themselves a name, a safe space, a reputation and a family with each other. but they were the original younger heroes. while what they had was special to Just them, they also wanted to make the titans a safe space for all the younger heroes who needed a home and a family like they did. they looked back at their history and decided to try to help other young heroes avoid it. they added BRANCHES of the team. the original titans wanted to do everything in their power to prevent other young heroes from making their mistakes. what they have will always be special to them, but they’re willing to open the doors to what they built to every other young hero. they don’t have to, but they will. dick grayson, donna troy, roy harper, garth and wally west (and eventually, raven, garfield, kory and vic) built the kind of team that’s a legacy that many, many other young heroes can add to over the years. they’re not the league, but they can be and ARE mentors for young heroes, whether they’re personally involved in their lives or not.
with young justice? they raised each other. they depended on each other and trusted each other in ways they didn’t even realize. they bonded through it all. that’s not to say the titans didn’t, but it’s very different. whether it’s because of the people or the ages, it’s different. the titans have become a legacy with different branches but young justice was never going to be that. the core four are what’s left of young justice and they’re holding it too closely to their chests for there to ever really be another young justice that really involves them. greta’s not a ghost, cissie’s not a hero, slobo is gone and anita is basically gone. the four of them are all that’s left and whether they realize it or not (which i believe they do), they don’t WANT another team without those people. they can work with them, but it will never be like it was. the titans are a legacy, but young justice was just a family.
and like. i’m not saying the core four are wrong for that! i think they can be dicks about it but they aren’t inherently wrong for wanting to protect something so dear to them. tim isn’t dick, cassie isn’t donna, bart isn’t wally. they aren’t interested in building up a network of teams based on what they went through. they just aren’t. people have titans for that, young justice is for them. and i think that’s SUCH a solid difference in characterization for all of the characters involved. and it’s not like they’re selfish for it?? i’d argue they’re valid for it. the titans are also valid but man. it just. phew. things were so very different. i think the titans might have done it anyway, but if things were different, if there was another team and the roles were reversed (i.e young justice came before titans), they would be a little more hesitant to open up the titans to others.
that’s why in reverse robin aus where tim comes before dick and he has yj and it operates as essentially the titans, it doesn’t really work, imho. I JUST HAVE LOTS OF THOUGHTS
imagine the “Robin meets the JL while Batman is away” trope but it’s inverted. instead of being funny and interesting and extroverted all of the Robins just bolt. bolt, hide, or fight. B told them not to ever let themselves get cornered and to run if a meta sets eyes on them. so they run, they hide, and they fight back with a tiny shard of holdout Kryptonite B had embedded in their gauntlet. they dig their boots in, clench their fists, and prepare to be immovable at <100 lbs.
Bruce, full Batman mode: We don’t kill
Dick, beat the joker to death with his bare hands, Grayson: You got it
Cass, literal assassin for most of her life, Cain: 👍
Jason, shoots first and asks questions later, Todd: Sure old man
Tim, definitely killed multiple of Ra’s operatives, Drake: Yeah definitely B
Duke, more likely to cause property damage than anything, Thomas: Yeah???
Damian, also raised an assassin-tried to kill Tim multiple times, Wayne: Of course Father
It's raining nonstop where I am so I'm just picturing the Batfam during a flood.
Red Robin uploads a TikTok from the safety of a roof saying "watch him go!" As Red Hood keeps trying to drive his bike against the current. A big wave comes by and he's slowly dragged downhill. The caption reads "don't drive during floods".
Batman and Robin are on the ground helping civilians out of cars when the intensity doubles and in minutes Damian goes from wading knee deep in the water to swimming. The emergency batfloaties get triggered and he floats away as Bruce fails to grab him by half an inch. "Robin serenely drifting in the current" becomes a meme.
Someone takes a picture of a very flustered spoiler trying to squeeze the water out of her cape. The second she lets go the weight of the water makes her fall ass over backwards. Black Bat ends up giving her her waterproof cape.
Signal makes mirages of sharks in the water to scare the shit out of any criminals. Oracle uploads the recordings with Benny hill as background music. Bludhaven escapes the worst of the storm and Nightwing sends pictures to the group chat patting the barely wet concrete just to rub it in. He still slips on a puddle and eats shit, Barbara sends that to the group chat.
I can’t remember which issue but there’s a robin comic where he tells Tim to get some rest and then wakes him like 2 hours later and I can’t help but think any normal 14 year old would have had a fit.
I got two new monster high dolls in today and I’m obsessed with them! One is a 28 inch tall monster high doll whose eyes change color when you press the button on the back of her neck and the other is a two headed mermaid!!
I got a target ufo lamp to put mini figures in !!!
I was not expecting cannibalism to happen TWICE in season of one of tottmnt but here we are
I’m back on my bs (yuzuru hanyu inspired Tim figure skater brain rot) he occupies my mind 24/7
