And That's Why We Love Her

A typical thug conversation in Gotham…

The goons rating the bats and birds in Gotham.

Batman: 4/10 beats us up and leaves. He talks to us like he’s better but we don’t go flying around beating people up in a furry suit.

Robin: 5/10 talks like the 1800’s and has a sword.

Red Robin: 6/10 we like that he’s smart. Plus he got sued by the restaurant and broke Two Face out to represent him so that was iconic.

Spoiler: 4/10 terrible jokes.

Red Hood: 6/10 he shoots us but treats his employees well.

Nightwing: 2/10 terrible jokes and sometimes gets really angry.

Signal: 6/10 the only day bat and he’s pretty nice but absolutely terrifying when he does that power thing and it looks like he’s a shadow.

Batwoman: 2/10 is mean.

Batgirl: 5/10 was smart but not a great fighter so it was fun. Don’t know where she went but she’s back so yay kinda.

Black Bat: 7/10 is terrifying and doesn’t talk but is kinda gentle and is an angel when she does talk. Also she holds back a lot, we can see with her other fights. And we don’t see her a ton.

Huntress: 2/10 shoots us with arrows and is rude.

okay so post epic odyssey where odysseus and Penelope have surfaced from their room finally and he and diomedes are catching up I'm imagining the conversation going something like this

Odysseus: so then I gave up being merciful and became the monster.

Diomedes:....you tried being merciful?

Odysseus: Yes?

Diomedes: you did? You tried being a good merciful person? You?

Odysseus: Yah okay fuck off it was polties dying wish. I had to try.

Diomedes:.....90% of the war crimes in the Trojan war were suggested, planned out, and carried out by you. We literally stoned to death the guy you had a personal grudge against. We framed him for treason and stoned him to death. 70% of why Athena liked you was because she thought she knew all the ways to kill someone and then you'd suggest something insane and I'd see her taking notes. You literally gave Ajex a psyoctic break just being yourself.

Odysseus: shut up

Diomedes: I'm not wrong. Did you tell Penelope about your attempt to be a good person?

Odysseus: What? Of course I did. I told her everything.

Diomedes: did she laugh?

Odysseus:...shut up that's not the point

Diomedes: she did didn't she!!!

Odysseus: ANYWAY eurylochus wasn't appreciative of my return to monsterhood and he started causing problems so I

Diomedes: killed him? Yah saw that coming. No shit. I'm so shocked.

I felt the need to make this.

non-gotham locals think the most prolific bat-villain is the joker, or scarecrow, even the riddler — or any of their assorted highly dangerous deluded rogues.

but a real gothamite knows how big a pain in the ass condiment king is, in fact, urban legend says that the bat kids have formed a pact to not tell batman if condiment king just happens to turn up… at the bottom of gotham harbor.

Jason: The eternal victim. The murderer.

Cass: The eternal murderer. The victim.

(TRIGGER WARNING FOR SA, KIDNAPPING, AND UNALIVING YOURSELF)

Okay I loved Circe but HATED how they made Odysseus out as some kind of villain and not a victim.

Sure, he did terrible things, but it was all to get back to his family. He technically ‘cheated’ but if he didn’t then he would have probably been killed.

I’ve only read Circe and watched Epic so far, I’m reading the Greek Odyssey tomorrow when it comes, but in Epic he doesn’t cheat.

I haven’t read that part of Circe in a while because I took a break, but I’m pretty sure she made him sleep with her, not outright forcefully but it was heavily implied he and his men would die if he didn’t (if I remember correctly). She was way more powerful than him and the roots could only hold up against her for so long, he barely had a choice, so it was technically consensual, but it was still barely his choice.

Calypso trapped him on her island for seven years, I heard he cried for his family every night, and in Epic (maybe also the Odyssey) he wanted to unalive himself. It was also very similar to Circe, where she was much more powerful than him, and this time he had no help or defense, even if for a limited time, it came only when he escaped. He had no where to go, a goddess who was in love with him and had never seen another living person before, he was defenseless. I don’t know if that was technically consensual or if she forced him but he still had little to no choice if he did say yes.

Many forget he is a victim because he is a man or haven’t read the Odyssey, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen, he may have done horrible things but for a reason, for many people who do those things don’t have.

I agree he probably changed and was more guarded/on edge, but from what I’ve seen and read, I don’t think he would call his son a traitor. He loves his wife, and talks about her more in Epic, but he still longs to know him. I don’t think what Telemachus did would make him not want to form a relationship and try to know him. Because that is his son who he’s longed to know for 20 years, I think only strong evidence that he was a traitor would make him act that way at all.

I also didn’t like how Penelope told Circe the act to try and get out of war was fake. Sure, he is a genius, a master manipulator, even left his bow behind when he is a great archer to become the Best of the Greeks. He cares about his title and legacy. But he spent 10 years trying to get back to his wife and son.

In Epic he sacrificed his friend’s lives, he turned into the monster he feared he would become, he even made Poseidon call him a monster.

He could have spent the rest of his life with Calypso in ‘paradise’ but he was miserable there, wanting to see his family, wanting to be with his people.

Anyways, I thought most parts of the book were great, I may be a little bit biased because I love Odysseus and can’t wait for my Greek Odyssey to come, but I think I made some strong arguments.

Thanks if you made it this far. Also, is the Song of Achilles worth it if I like Odysseus this much but people say he’s not a good person in it? Please comment your thoughts!

Okay I’ve been thinking about the Parallax retcon again cause god do I hate it. I’ve done some meta on it but I’m gonna focus on what it did to Hal. Earlier to day I said there wasn’t much build up to Parallax but that’s not exactly true because I wasn’t considering the frame work of Hal’s headspace.

So back after Crisis, Hal Jordan wasn’t doing so hot. His best friend had died. Carol was possessed by the Star Sapphire and committing all sorts of crimes to fuck with Hal. John and Guy weren’t that close with Hal back in the 90s. John and Hal fought over a ton of shit Carol did while possessed.

Hal was pretty isolated at this point. He tries to go to people he thought were his friends and they all wave him off or openly tell him to get over himself. Some of them were down right malicious about it. Hal wasn’t in a good place.

Then Coast City is destroyed. And Hal wants to try to fix it. He tries with the rings and the Guardians tell him no. Hal is so completely isolated at this point no one even notices that he is running to take a swan dive off the cliff of sanity.

Hal goes to Oa. He steals the rings of the other Lanterns and leaves them in Space to die. He kills Sinestro. He kills Kilowog. Then Hal steps into the Power Battery. He kills every single one of the Guardians minus Ganthet here.

And his plan? Reset the universe. Hal wants to put everything back to his it was before Crisis. When Coast City wasn’t rubble. When Barry Allen was alive.

Now the heroes step in. They look at this man who they turned away, who they ignored in his grief, in the aftermath of the destruction of his city, and they call him a villain. Then they act surprised he doesn’t wanna hear what they have to say? That he maybe doesn’t care about their opinions on him because they certainly couldn’t be bothered with him before this.

In the end Ollie shoots him in the chest. And Ollie thinks he killed Hal but he didn’t. Hal and Kyle just ended up on Oa.

And the heroes wipe their hands clean. They were then absolved of any guilt around Hal because he was clearly a bad guy. They couldn’t have stopped him. But that’s not true. Anyone at all offering a hand out might have stopped him.

By the time Hal attacks Kyle in New York he’s desperate. He has no other plan than try Zero Hour again. He wants the Green Lantern ring. He wants to be a Green Lantern. That’s all Hal. Hal is there and he’s been practically screaming for help for years.

And Kyle oh hopelessly naive Kyle is the first one to tell Hal what he’s doing isn’t heroic. Everyone else declared Hal himself a villain.

Kyle was the one who saw the hero in Hal. Kyle went to the Source Wall to ask for Hal’s help in restarting the sun.

And only once Hal had died did the others look at him like a hero again. And with a bittersweet taste nonetheless.

Kyle set up Hal’s funeral. He made the memorial. He wanted everyone to know that Hal was a hero truly and fully.

But they turned their backs to Hal. They decided he wasn’t worth their time. What good are they to decide who’s a sinner and who’s a saint to paraphrase Hal himself.

And then the retcon. That it wasn’t Hal at all. It was Parallax.

That is their wipe away for everything that happened to Hal. It cloaks his depression, his anger, his loneliness in some supernatural fear bug and we can all just move on.

It means when Hal tells Barry about it that Barry waves it off as not Hal. As if nothing Hal was feeling then matters. As if Hal didn’t exist at all. Just Parallax.

This means the other heroes don’t have to feel bad at all, as if they would, for abandoning Hal because his emotions were being influenced. Nothing at all could have been done.

Except then they fucked up again when Kyle was possessed by Parallax. Hal held out a hand and he helped Kyle break free. Which means yes they could have helped Hal. But they chose not to.

The Parallax retcon is a massive cop out so the writers didn’t have to address a characters actual mental state. Because it’s easier to draw a smile I suppose.

But even with the retcon it shows how the others dropped the ball. Hal wasn’t suffering in silence and they “couldn’t have known” he was asking for help. He needed help. And they turned him away.

TL;DR: Hal Jordan needs some better friends

This was inspired by @pulsar-1919 thank you for that reply about The List. I forgot how much of a dick everyone was to Hal. I knew about Bruce in the robe being a jackass but that’s par for the course for Bruce tbh.

dick grayson (5’10” with the body of a gymnast): this is my baby brother!

jason todd (6’3” brick wall of muscle): …hi

***

cass wayne (5’5” with the body of a dancer): little brother!

jason (almost a whole foot taller than her): hiya cass

the “we don’t need main canon helena wayne bc Bruce has a daughter in Cassandra” crowd is so stupid bc what do u mean he can have five sons but we have to cap it at a one female child minimum 😭 shut uuup!