One Last Prompt! How About Dad Shaw Being The Narcissistic, Manipulative, Abusive Bastard He Is, Trying

Pennyworth R.I.P. REVIEW!

The biggest flaw of Pennyworth R.I.P. is that it’s trying to be a character study without understanding the characters.

Character studies that suck at being character studies massively annoy me, because they can ruin the perception of the characters for lots of people that don’t know better, and that’s pretty much what this is.

Tim wouldn’t be happy to get a call to a funeral.

They ignore the disconnect between Jason and the Bat-Family when he still uses guns.

Alfred didn’t baby Damian.

And they might as well not have included Ric if he wasn’t gonna be Dick.

But I’d expect no less from James Tynion and Peter Tomasi. It went pretty much how I figured, because they always ignore Jason’s actual relationship with the Bat-Family, Tynion never understood Tim, and loves melodrama to seem like his work has substance, while Tomasi just babies Damian to pander to people, and forcing sympathy, just to force some likability out of cheap places for him.

This is shown best in this moment:

I just don’t feel like Jason Todd would do this. He’s not a jerk like this. He murders, he’d probably torture, he wanted revenge, but inside his heart is still that of a heroes (ignoring those ooc comics where Jason’s just a generic villain anyway), he cares about people as people, he should understand rushing in of all people. He isn’t a petty pisspants. Jason’s actually quite calm most of the time. He’s angry in very specific situations. Yelling at people like this, doesn’t feel like Jason’s style.

This reeks of Tomasi’s typical style of “Aww feel bad for Damian” in general as well as just making character’s be jerk to Damian randomly to make them look bad for Damian’s sake, and Tynion’s useless melodrama to at least seem like he can write drama, when it’s just cheap and over the top instead.

Damian being the only one there when Alfred died is already a traumatic experience. They didn’t have to make Jason out to be this unrepentant ass to show that. It reminds me all to well when Tomasi did the same thing to Tim to make Damian seem more in the right to beat him up. Except this just makes Jason all the more crueler given the context.

–

For some reason as well, Tim’s Red Robin when he should be Robin in a flashback.

So did they retcon that away AGAIN?

This is like– the, hmm, 1, 2, 3, 4,– 5th time they took Robin away from Tim in some manner.

This is ridiculous at this point.

–

It’s trying so desperately to be deep, but since no one really acts like themselves, it’s just forced. It can’t be actually deep in regards to the characters when the characters don’t act like the characters.

This comic follows the trope of remembering the best memory of the one that passed, and it just feels like a parody at some points, because of how ridiculous or forced it gets. That trope is a trope because it’s a natural thing people do, but they just tell these mostly random stories that don’t feel right because half of them are out of character anyways.

It is also completely ridiculous how it follows the trope of everyone acting out, because they get so pissed so fast it’s just idiotic. It’s so rushed, like the writers felt they had to get to these moments and raced to it.

–

I think Damian’s flashback is the worst when it comes to really forcing sentimentality, almost purely because it’s set in the beginning of Damian’s time as Robin with Bruce, and they just have Damian and Alfred act out of character to give them these cutesy moments that would be out of character no matter where in Damian’s character history.

But especially back when Damian was still barely not murdering people all the time.

Like can Tomasi stop ruining Damian’s character? He’s the most overrated writer Damian ever had, because he’s constantly just using pandering to hide that he isn’t that great. Damian is still learning to not be crazy here given the time in the flashback. Why is Tomasi acting otherwise?

Damian isn’t a normal kid and that’s the point.

What’s the point of his character growth when they act more and more like he didn’t need it? They always do that or have everyone ignore Damian’s actions half the time which makes him avoid proper growth. It’s tiring.

–

Tim’s is idiotic because it focuses on something so random when Tim and Alfred actually had sweet moments quite often. They played video games together, 

Alfred helped convince Bruce to buy (Tim’s then girlfriend) Ariana’s Family business so she could stay in town,

he even looked after Tim when Tim was forced to go to a boarding school by his dad Jack Drake,

Alfred freaking drove Tim around in a van to fight crime when Bruce was away even.

They had lots of sweet moments already seen, but they focus on something so less personal, and more just random.

Continuing some idea Tim isn’t that involved with the Bat-Family that much ever, an outcast he was even called once. When he used to be the Bat-Family’s heart.

–

Jason’s is the same way with it’s choice of story sort-of. His story is so random, short, and unemotional that I feel like it was just an excuse to have Alfred crash into a building with the Batmobile rather than tell a story with a lot of meaning besides a quick “aw” and “ha”.

–

Barbara’s is the best. It doesn’t feel too forced, mostly just figuring out where Alfred got the time is the only reason id feel that way, but it actually focuses on a sentiment that feel legitimate, like these characters would actually do this.

It actually feels like a story that she would bring up. Something the previous stories were lacking. This feels like a natural story to tell, and it makes it the best part of the whole comic. It’s emotional, sweet, and sentimental, in all the right ways.

–

Dick’s doesn’t really have a lot to do with Dick, but it’s nice. Not too much to say about it unless I missed something.

–

Most importantly of all Alfred’s death feels meaningless because DC’s habit of shock value takes away any emotion, and it shouldn’t have ever happened.

Alfred been a character that everyone recognizes as part of Batman for decades and decades. So loyal and iconic. A character everyone can write, and killed for a story that no one likes, and all he gets is a crappy one-shot that seems like it didn’t have the right thoughts put into it.

I would’ve rather have read an extended version of Barbara’s flashback, because it had class.

This is contrived mediocrity that tries so hard to convince you it understands the characters and that it’s deep, emotional, with all this substance, but without the tools it needed to make it work.

With such an unneeded death, this was never going to feel emotional or deep, but a lack of understanding of the characters only makes it worse.

Closest they get is Tim trying to step up and help Bruce, but it’s done in that typical Tynion style of “Look at how great Tim is”, and it just gets soiled cuz it feels pretentious. Tim’s a boy doing his best, but he doesn’t come off that way the way he gets written here. It’s a veil of past Tim, but it doesn’t have the right heart.

Alfred deserved better.

Ok, but Alastor being an old man that doesn’t know technology being boyfriend’s with a Victorian man that taught himself how to craft lasers and code *his own damn ship computer/pocket watch phone* is so damn hilarious. Pentious tries to teach him how to use a mobile phone and he either locks himself out of the damn thing or he presses too hard on the screen and ends up skewering the damn thing with his talons.

HONESTLY. HONESTLY in the sequel to CDIH I plan on doing so much with the fact that Sir Pent is keeping up and Alastor ain’t.

Like. Like just picture. Alastor gets dragged kicking and screaming into using ~modern technology~. Once he has been dragged into using ~modern technology~, by golly, he’s going to use it to have some fun! He’s going to decide he wants to watch music videos on YouTube, which is a web site that he has heard exists. He is going to go to the URL bar. He’s going to type in “http:\\www.google.com”, he’s going to look at it thoughtfully, he’s going to squint at the two different slash keys on the keyboard, he’s going to leave the room to ask somebody which direction the slash is supposed to tilt if you are trying to go to Google Dot Com—

“you’re sure that’s the direction the slash mark is supposed to tilt SPECIFICALLY to go to GOOGLE DOT COM?” “yes, I know what I’m doing,” “no, you don’t need to come help me,” “no, I am PERFECTLY capable of going to Google Dot Com without you holding my hand, I was the king of the airwaves back before most Americans HAD radios, if I could handle the radio I can CERTAINLY handle an overpromoted typewriter, THANK you”

—and then he’s going to go back to the computer and delete the entire URL by clicking “delete” 21 separate times, he’s going to retype it as “http://www.google.com”, and then he is going to click enter.

(And please… if this is how slow and difficult it is for him to navigate to google, imagine how much time and effort someone must have spent to slowly teach him how to turn on a computer, how to open a web browser, what a web browser is for, how to highlight the address bar in order to type in a URL, what an address bar IS…)

And then he is going to click in the search bar on Google Dot Com, and he is going to type in “Hello! How do I reach You Tube?” and he is going to puzzle over the little square that says “I’m Feeling Lucky” for a moment before deciding, no, perhaps he doesn’t feel lucky today, and he’ll click on the little square that says “Google Search,” and google is going to be like,

An actual link to YouTube does not appear anywhere on the first page of results. Alastor is lost. He’s adrift at sea with no sign of shore. He will never find his way to YouTube.

He looks at the little list of tabs up top like,

and he dubiously clicks on Videos, because yes, the You-Tube he has been shown had videos, that’s kind of its thing. And the results are like,

And he very dubiously clicks on the first one.

First it plays an ad—oh, he succeeded, he found a video!—and then it plays another ad, Alastor has no ad block, the concept of “ad block” does not exist anywhere within his understanding of the universe, and then it starts playing what looks like an old black and white movie like,

Oh it’s a picture show! He found a picture show on the Internet! How wonderful! He doesn’t recognize the movie but it’s in black and white, it must have been made in his time—

And then a minute and twenty seconds into the video it FINALLY starts playing music and he’s like I DID IT I FOUND THE MUSIC VIDEOS I WAS PROMISED. He pats himself on the back, he’s great at using modern technology, he’s got this all figured out.

He’s got a little yellow pad and pencil he keeps next to the computer to jot down the “Internet addresses” of songs he likes so that he can type them into the “Internet address bar” when he wants to watch them or listen to them again later. He’s found that you have to write them down fast, even though they’re very long, because when the song ends it will move right on to the next one—just like the radio when a song ends—so if you dawdle it will vanish and you’ll never find the song again!

Guess what feature Alastor hasn’t noticed exists and doesn’t know he can turn off.

Guess what other features Alastor doesn’t know about.

Making an account so he can save videos.

Back buttons to go back to a song if he missed the URL.

The controls on a video.

If Alastor likes a song and wants to hear it twice, he clicks on the search bar and types in the whole URL one letter at a time and clicks enter to get it to re-load and play again.

And he’s got no control over this mad unhinged machine that is the YouTube algorithm system, its autoplay is like a car with a brick held down on the gas and nobody holding the steering wheel, it’s just taking Alastor wherever the fuck it wants and if it starts ducking into weird fucking videos Alastor is just going to assume that that’s how YouTube works, it’s no different from the radio, sometimes you’re scheduled for music and sometimes you’re scheduled for ads and sometimes you’re scheduled for interviews or a talk show or news or whatever.

Which means eventually if he lets this untamed shambling A.I. behemoth keep careening around wherever it wants to go, it’s going to start meandering into the niche/weird stuff. EVENTUALLY it’s going to stumble onto something off of Sir Pentious’s channel, and he’s going to open up the video sounding like a Boomer trying to sound cool, like,

(I told the link to load at 5:33 but I think it’s not going to do that on tumblr, I know you all are capable of going to 5:33 yourself because y’all are five million times more competent with computers than Alastor is, just skip to that time ok cool thanks good job)

Video opens up on Sir Pent like that and Alastor is absolutely flabbergasted that Sir Pentious is on the You Tube and then Sir Pent’s like “so I broke into another church to take a joy ride on their pipe organ, per my last video this is the song all four of my followers requested for me to play!” and he takes off like,

and Sir Pent’s trying to sound cool, ends like “Sssmasssh those like and subscribe buttons if you’d like to sssee me illegally play someone else’s pipe organ! :>” and Alastor is sitting there going I HAVE NEVER WANTED TO SMASH ANYTHING SO MUCH IN MY LIFE BUT I HAVE NO IDEA HOW TO DO THAT.

He’s so completely shocked and awed to see a video with Sir Pentious in it that he doesn’t even remember to write down the URL, which means he will never ever find the video again.

So: Sir Pent is extremely embarrassingly trying to sound Hip & Modern while playing a 22-year-old out-of-date meme song and he’s only got four followers… but like, but like, he KNOWS the Hip & Modern lingo; AND he knows how to make, edit, and upload YouTube videos and curate a YouTube channel; and he knows how to read the comments on his videos, at least minimally engage with viewers, and keep up with who’s following him…

And meanwhile Alastor doesn’t even know the comment section exists.

Sir Pentious only looks behind the times and out of date until he is compared with the alternative.

"He slipped"

Batman (1940) issue 424

For someone who brags about their subtleness, precision, and finesse, the Shaw siblings are all show-offs and attention seekers.

They really are!!

When introduced, all the Shaws are shown to be the utmost badasses around!

But when we see them on screen, they're badass, but absolutely RIDICULOUS

Owen?

Monologues to Dom for several minutes and gets to live out his life time dream of being a melodramatic villain

Deckard?

Doesn't even manage to kill one member of the crew, but manages to bring down how many buildings? How many explosions did he cause?

Hattie?

Immediately gets a wig and fights a guy 2 heads taller than her, and 3 times her weight. And she keeps fighting! The whole time delivering quips!

These three can be excellent spies/criminals/badasses, but when it comes down to it, all three are attention seekers

When they know they have someone to flaunt to, they will

Usually to potential mates

So, basically.

The Shaws are peacocks

Loud, obnoxious, and extremely noticeable when they want to be

Au where Deckard and Luke are raising young Samantha together: Sammy learns her first bad word, Owen's laughing hysterically and Hattie's barely hiding her snickers, while Luke and Hobbs are trying to 1) find out who taught her that (spoiler: it was accidentally them) and 2) how to get her to stop.

😂 I love it!! And I love the idea of Sam being raised by the Shaws and her dad

~~~

Yawning widely, Owen stumbled towards the kitchen in hopes that Deckard had already made breakfast. He could hear several voices and assumed that Sam was just being fussy with her own food again

She had gotten to the age where throwing food was much more amusing that eating it

Owen remembered that age fondly

But, as he stepped into the kitchen, he was met with an odd scene

Both Luke and Deckard were standing in front of Sam, who was laughing and clapping her hands. She was innocently sitting in her high chair as they talked to her

Or begged, as it seemed

Hattie was leaning against a counter watching the whole thing and covering her mouth. But Owen could still hear her small snickers

"What's going on?" Owen whispered, sliding up next to her and watched the show

"Shit!"

Owen's eyebrows skyrocketed as his niece shouted the curse word

"Sammy, love, please don't say that word. It's a bad word, and we can't say bad words." Deckard explained and looked to tired to keep doing so to the toddler

"Shit!"

"Sam, that's a bad word." Luke weakly protested

Who knew their one weakness would be a two year old

Just the sight of the two strongest people Owen knew trying to convince a toddler not to swear was too much

Owen burst out laughing

"Hey! This isn't funny!" Luke barked. "Did you teach her that word?"

Owen took a gasping breath as he shook his head and continued laughing

"Hatts didn't teach her and Oh didn't, so where did she learn it?" Deckard huffed

"Probably from one of you two." Hattie drawled

"What? I don't swear in front of her!" Luke glared

"She's a sneaky little bugger," Owen pointed out. "You could have said it when you didn't know she was there."

"Bullsh-"

"Luke!" Deckard yelped

"Shit!" Sam happily finished for him

Deckard covered his face with his hands and let out a low moan of despair

"Sammy, if you stop saying that word, I'll give you some special chocolate." Deckard told the toddler with a defeated air

"Deck! You can't just bribe our daughter!" Luke scolded

"Got a better plan?" Deckard hissed

"Choco!" Sam whined and made grabby hands towards Deckard

"A true blackmail artist." Owen chuckled. "A perfect fit into the Shaw family."

Luke glared at him while Deckard left to retrieve a piece of chocolate from his secret stash

~~~

I hope you enjoyed friend!

(The evolution trigger is ✨Trauma✨)

Edit: since there seems to be some confusion about all the AU Jasons, here's a list of where they're from.

From Left to right Red Hooded Ninja: Young Justice cartoon Red Hood: Red Hood and the Outlaws (2016), DC comics Arkham Knight: Batman: Arkham Knight video game Red Robin: Death in the Family interactive movie Father Todd: Flashpoint: The World of Flashpoint #2, DC comics

Because @omnivorousshipper requested Naga Rowen!

Some Details:

letting myself be vulnerable for the sake of being honest with myself and others, to be authentic, and learning to let go of the fear of being seen and heard. this is who I am. I care a lot, I feel deeply, and I want people to know that I like them and I want to be there for them. I want to live my little life to the fullest even though my chronic illness often gets in the way and won’t let me do all I want to.

I will be patient with myself and accept that my vulnerability isn’t necessarily a weakness or something that makes me pathetic and that I should hide it. I’m too tired to give a fuck. I want people in my life to know who I am, and I want them to know I care about them, and maybe that will help them feel less afraid of their own vulnerabilities too.

I will be my imperfect self, and I will own it. I am soft, and sensitive, but I am finally letting go of worrying about how people will perceive this. I have found a lot of resilience because I love this world so much, I won’t be anyone else but me, and that’s how I chose to be a part of this place I love.

And it does make me feel a little afraid, but it also makes me feel like I am strong in my own way. It helps me feel I am living life to the fullest.

I care deeply. This is who I am. I am owning up to it. I am alive and one day I will be looking back to this time and I want to know I have lived it to the fullest by being authentic.

https://twitter.com/straydawgz__/status/1771938948450746683/mediaViewer?currentTweet=1771938948450746683&currentTweetUser=straydawgz__

De aged Fic Part 5

Part 4

Hattie scowled down at her phone when it rang loudly, interrupting the silence she had cultivated inside her apartment. It had been a difficult last few days, consisting of her having to eliminate several targets

She had finally arrived home, ate a simple meal and fell into bed intending to sleep for at least ten hours. But then her damn phone rang

Not recognizing the number, she had been tempted to not answer, but she knew he bosses would use burner phones

Answering, she growled

"Shaw."

"H-Hatts?"

Hattie blinked in surprise as a child's voice called out her name. Sitting up, she frowned and a cold shiver went down her spine

"Who is this?" She tried to soften her voice, but knew she still had a harsh note

"Hatts, it's me. Owen."

Hattie went numb

What?!

There was absolutely no way Owen had called her using a wobbly child's voice, on the brink of tears. There was no way he was that crazy

Right?

Took caught up trying to think how ridiculous her brother could be, Hattie didn't respond soon enough and prompting the child to go off on a tangent

"I don't know what's happening, Hatts. I woke up all wet and cold, and these people took me to a scary place. But this nice lady, Letty, gave me her jacket and then took me out for dinner. But then I saw all these weird looking things. I think they're phones? So I stole one and tried calling Deck, but he didn't answer, do you think he doesn't like me anymore? And I tried to call you-"

Finally, the little boy took a deep breath. But before he could keep going, Hattie spoke up

"Owen, where are you right now?"

"At home."

Hattie sighed. At least that made things easier

"Owen, listen to me. I want you to stay there and I'll come and get you. Do not open the door for anyone."

"Okay."

She didn't want to hang up, just in case he did something stupid. No matter what age he was, she knew he was capable of anything

It only took her twenty minutes to arrive at their old home. None of them had lived in it for years, but she knew their mother kept it cleaned for her own personal use and business

When she arrived, she used her own key to open the door and called out

"Owen? It's Hattie!"

She listened closely until soft footsteps came to meet her

Hattie felt as if she was slapped when she spotted him

The little boy barely even came up to her hip he was so small. His hair was shaggy and long, while his clothes looked far too stylish for his age. He looked up at her with wide, curious eyes

"Why are you so big?" He whispered in awe

"Because I'm an adult." Hattie said dumbly

"But I'm older than you!" Owen pouted and crossed his arms

Hattie blinked at him and felt a smile tug at her lips

"And you'll grow up to be taller than me. But right now, you're a small fry."

He narrowed his eyes at her, his pout still strong. Hattie met his gaze evenly, but inside, she was freaking out

What the hell was she going to do with a miniature version of her older brother?!