I Love You Batman, They Could NEVER, Make Me Hate You.

I love you Batman, they could NEVER, make me hate you.

I am. So fucking tired of Batman being portrayed as a bad parent and a toxic person. And it’s so goddamn widespread. Fuck, it might be as bad as the whole “Superman being a kindhearted Boy Scout is boring” take.

I get it, the man’s not exactly stable, he watched his parents get murdered in front of him and spent years of his life training to fight crime dressed like a giant scary bat, of course he’s not perfect.

But to say that Bruce Wayne isn’t caring, isn’t empathetic, to call him abusive…it just misses the point of who the character is to me.

Why do you think he fights crime? Yes, part of it is because he’s bitter and sad because his parents were cruelly ripped from him as a child, and he’s lashing out against the corruption of his city. It’s arguably the focus of his earlier years. But he learns to become more than that. He learns to bring hope, a chance to be better.

Harleen Quinzel is the Joker’s right hand lady, but she’s also a victim of an abusive relationship and a woman with a surprisingly strong moral compass and a love for animals, and wants to get better. That’s why we see time and time again that he has a noticeable soft spot for her, because he knows that she’s a good person at her core.

I Am. So Fucking Tired Of Batman Being Portrayed As A Bad Parent And A Toxic Person. And It’s So Goddamn

Harvey Dent is a man who will decide someone’s fate on a coin toss(and a pretty inaccurate depiction of DID), but he’s also Bruce’s close friend who clearly needs help learning to live with his condition, rather than try to get rid of it, and someone who he still goes out of his way to visit, even after everything, because he recognizes he’s not just a criminal with a weird gimmick, he’s a man who is struggling with a condition that he’s mishandled his whole life.

Victor Fries is a cold, emotionless man who will callously discard allies and blame them for being careless, but he’s also a man who’s either lashing out because he had the love of his life taken from him, or just desperate to make sure she isn’t taken from him, and is willing to do anything just to guarantee her survival. Of course Batman would understand, his whole life was defined by having people he loved taken away from him.

Even the Joker, arguably one of the most morally bankrupt characters in all of fiction, is someone that Batman has offered a chance to. After the guy shoots the daughter of his friend, a girl he cared for like she was his own kid, and paralyzes her from the waist down, he tells the Joker that he doesn’t want to hurt him. He wants to get him help. He looks at this monster who has taken countless lives and says “You don’t have to be alone.”

For fuck’s sake, he sat with Joe Chill in his last moments so that he wouldn’t be alone. Joe Chill, the man who murdered his parents, who took so much from him, the person responsible for all of the misery and suffering he’s gone through. And he sits with the man to comfort him while dies. Do you know how much emotional intelligence and maturity that must take? To comfort someone who arguably ruined your life?

And you’re gonna tell me the man who did that would abuse his kids?

That he’d hold up the young man whose death was his greatest failure, the boy he grieved, and say this?

That he’d look his goddamn son in the eyes and say this to him?

Why the FUCK do you think he took in Dick Grayson in the first place? It wasn’t because he saw the kid and thought “Ah. A potential soldier.”, it was because he saw a boy experiencing the same heartbreaking loss he had so many years ago, and wanted to make sure he didn’t end up as bitter and miserable as he was.

Why do you think he smiled when Tim Drake presented him a broken watch for Father’s Day? Because he was just happy to see the boy alive and safe.

DAMIAN LITERALLY POINTED AT A COW AND SAID “I’m keeping her. She’s Bat-Cow.” AND BRUCE JUST WENT WITH IT. DIDN’T EVEN NEED TO ARGUE WHY BRUCE SHOULD LET HIM KEEP HER. HE SAID “this cow is my pet now” AND BRUCE SAID “aight, bet”.

The thing about Batman is that he wants to make sure nobody else ends up feeling the way he does. That’s not just about stopping a mugger so a boy’s parents aren’t gunned down. It’s about giving his loved ones the support and care that he couldn’t have, because it was taken from him. It’s about comforting someone who just went through a traumatic experience and letting them know that they’re going to be okay. It’s about going to someone locked away in a cell who thinks that they’re a lost cause and a burden to society and telling them that he wants to help them get better. It’s about EMPATHY and COMPASSION.

That’s what makes him a HERO. He’s meant to inspire us, to show us that we can have that same empathy for others around us, that we can turn our suffering into hope for a better future.

I just wish more people at DC would start recognizing that. But I might as well follow that example myself. Maybe through this struggle of having to see this hero mistreat the people around him and act like a grade-A jackass, people will start to recognize that missing compassion, and slowly but surely, it might come back. After all, what is this post, if not trying to bring attention to the matter in the hopes of fixing it?

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batman red hood dick grayson damian wayne bruce wayne tim drake red robin dc comics dc jason todd robin nightwing

The Weirwood Files: Rhaewin (Rhaenyra x Harwin)

Subject: A defense of Harwin Strong and an analysis of his relationship with Rhaenyra.

I want my first real post to be a deep dive into the beautiful relationship that is Rhaenyra x Harwin, a relationship that team green considers shameful, while team black (mostly staunch daemyras), finds it shallow and boring. I believe both interpretations are incorrect, as even with their limited screen time together, Emma and Ryan managed to tell a beautiful love story, even in just the way they looked at one another. With a single look, so much was said without a word being spoken.

One thing that Rhaewin has begun to get criticism for lately, is the idea that Harwin is no better than any other man in Rhaenyra’s life, that he too has groomed and taken advantage of her, that perhaps he is no “saint” as he seems to be treated by the fandom.

The truth is, there is nothing within the canon to suggest this. The first moment we get between them is when we see Harwin giving Rhaenyra an encouraging look after she returns from killing the boar. Nothing here implies he is lusting after her. Instead, Harwin merely just stands out as being the only one at the hunt to look at her with admiration while everyone stares in confusion or judgment.

The next two scenes we are given of them also definitely don’t have any hint of predatory behavior from Harwin. He runs into her after she snuck out with Daemon and presumably decides to keep her secret, and the one after that he carries her away out of the chaos during her wedding after being given permission by his father, the hand.

There is no canon evidence to support Harwin groomed her. Grooming implies a pattern of behavior over time that we do not see from Harwin. He and Rhaenyra have no pre existing relationship before they conceive Jace, Harwin does not even put himself forward for her hand during her marriage tour. Harwin does not commit any predatory actions towards Rhaenyra.

This quote by Sara Hess is the closest we have to an official canonical description of Harwin, and while granted, Hess has said her fair share of questionable things in the past, there is nothing in the canon that disputes what she said.

“He’s one of the more unambiguous characters, he’s just a good dude. You don’t see him off doing morally questionable things, which almost everybody else is doing. They’re so flawed and human and messy. He was able to be a paragon of decency and generosity and handsome strength. He’s one of the guys you could just love and feel great about loving and then he’s ripped from you too soon, before he does anything that could fuck that up for you. He’s our perfect angel.”

With this settled, I want to move on to their actual love story. We know they did not have much time together before they conceived Jace, considering the timeline of events. What we can put together at least, is that Rhaenyra was in a vulnerable position with Laenor. After they tried several times to conceive and failed, she needed to secure her position quickly and found solace in Harwin, who proved himself to be one of the only trusted figures she had in court.

The next time we see Rhaewin is after the time jump. They have already had two beautiful sons together and another has just been born. Despite this implied intimacy, they have to hide their affections, only able to give each other coy smiles and a playful line here and there. Harwin holds their newborn son and Rhaenyra looks at the sight with adoration, yet also a hint of sadness, as if she is thinking of a world where they could be open about their love. In the night, they are in each other’s arms and make sons, princes of the realm. Yet in the day, these stolen moments are all they can afford.

The Weirwood Files: Rhaewin (Rhaenyra X Harwin)

The next time we see Harwin, he points out Criston Cole’s lack of care in his son’s training. He attempts to teach Jace as distantly as he can, and it is very clear he is increasingly frustrated with only being able to go so far in his son’s teachings. In the end, Cole still provokes him, and Harwin unleashes his anger on him. All the pain and frustration of only being able to love Rhaenyra and their children from afar is let out in the form of this beatdown on Cole.

It would not follow without consequence however. Harwin is ordered to leave his position as Commander of the City Watch and go back to Harrenhal, away from Rhaenyra, away from their sons. Ryan Corr does an amazing job in this scene and you can just feel his utter devotion when he says one of my favorite lines from the show “you have your honor, and I have mine”.

In a world where conceiving bastards is considered sinful and shameful, Harwin sees their union as one of love and honor. His sons are not treacherous reminders of sin and lust, but worthy princes born of love.

Rhaenyra and Harwin’s final scene together is one of the most heartbreaking scenes in the show. Rhaenyra is losing one of the only trusted figures she has in court, the man she sought comfort in and who fathered her three sons, and Harwin is losing everything that means the most to him. And once again, despite the privacy, despite the fact that this is their last moment together, they still cannot be open about their love. There is no final kiss goodbye, not even a hug. There is only a single look between them that says all we need to know, and a hopeful promise that Harwin will return.

One of the most tragic things about this scene is that Jacaerys picks up on everything between them. He sees the looks shared between them, the desire for a hug or a kiss, he sees it all and he knows what it means. His mother and father have a love story that they can never tell anyone about, not even their own son.

TL;DR: Rhaewin is a beautiful yet tragic twist on the knight and princess love story trope. Those that see this relationship as shameful have had their brains rotted by team discourse who buy into the “bastardphobia” present in universe (despite the fact that that is constantly criticized by the narrative itself), and wave it away as a “mistake”. There is nothing at all shameful about their relationship, and their sons were not made of sin, but of love. Rhaewin is also far from boring or shallow, to say this is to insult the work done by Emma and Ryan. There is a very beautiful, and rich love story between these two characters for those that have eyes to see it.

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hotd house of the dragon rhaenyra targaryen fire and blood harwin strong rhaenyra x harwin rhaewin rhaenyra targaryen x harwin strong

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notme2001

6 months ago

Fanfiction should be a fun writing experience... For everyone else, if my fanfic isn't perfect I'll throw up :D

At some point "fanfic can be as good as professional writing" became "fanfic should be as good as professional writing" and that's caused major damage to fandom spaces.

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writing fanfiction fandom fandoms ao3 archive of our own

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notme2001

7 months ago

My wife <3