Kryptonian kara

They’re both very goofy!!! (And I believe that if they ever met in a comic, they’d just have fun making fun of Dick together, because I mean, they both do that anyway (roadtrip supergirl and robin is so funny)) We see this especially in Jaybin, and then whenever Kara is around family (her being simultaneously annoying younger sibling/cousin and older too is so nfjfjf) (but of course those aren’t the only situations in which they are)

NERDS!!! I think they both get sort of dumb downed by fans/readers and lot, and sometimes even writers, as just emotional but also repressed and just people that ‘act out’ and ‘don’t understand anyone’ or something, which 1- I think they’re both fairly emotionally intelligent (Jason grew up around stuff that he had to be aware of other people, and then him working through his own emotions when he’s older and through understanding himself kind of the dots connect about others, and he always cares when he thinks someone (especially kids) is scared. Then Kara I think is actually extremely empathetic which can be a struggle for her to deal with how deeply she feels (side note on topic of empathy, yes I love Raven too lol). Both within herself (because while she has a lot of emotion and especially repressed rage and depression etc, she doesn’t completely known or display an ability to cope), and she has a LOT of care for the people around her and the world. I mean, her motto is literally ‘hope, help, and compassion for all’ !!! But yeah, Kara I think feels things so deeply about her own life and the empathy when she sees what others go through, but she’s constantly reduced to this dumb loud mouthed blonde, which is just readers (and sometimes writers) being misogynistic!!!

2-Anyway back to the nerds thing. In terms of why I think people do it, is Jason is dumbed down because he’s lower class and brawly and emotional (although sometimes people act like he’s got no feeling behind his eyes and edgy for the sake of edge), and Kara because of all the misogyny rooted in the reception of her character as ‘a female superman for the sake of having a girl’ (which she is soooo different for him and I could write essays on that) and a lot of other things. My point, which comes from comic and show canons, is that they are both shown to be smart and passionate for learning even if they struggle. Kara is often shown to struggle in school on earth because powers and also it’s a whole new world and more than half of her life was somewhere else. But on Krypton she was destined for the science guild!!! She loved the science of her planet and biology and physics, and I loveeee when they write her to still have such a passion as well as high knowledge of science on earth. Also of course languages happen to be easy to pick up for kryptonians, but that’s cool too. Then back to the krypton science stuff for a second, she’s one of the characters who actually knows a lot about space and different aliens and planets and technology and stuff, which is both cool and also very useful; that knowledge can be vital in missions and all that. Now for Jason, we know he’s a literature fanatic. He probably does like other subjects too, but literature is the thing that’s always shown, suggesting it to be his favourite, and he actually has great comprehension of the novels and such that he reads. He’s not a stupid broody tough guy (which is lowkey just another harmful stereotype in the world), he’s a big nerd that actively enjoys reading and learning and analysing text. (Kara is also sometimes written as an avid reader, or more creative leaning.) I think that it’s really interesting how both of these characters who are reduced to things are actually quite passionate and knowledgeable.

Now is the angst comparative analysis time.

Kara effectively tortured by memories in the phantom zone, and Jason’s torture by the joker (whether it be those hours or days, or over a year in Arkham). After both of these things? They find themselves alive when they shouldn’t be. Kara’s people are all dead, except for the baby cousin that’s now in his mid twenties, and Jason is literalky brought back from the dead and crawls out of his grave (and this happens to both of them at early/mid teens). (Okay fun contrast of Jason crawling out of his grave, meanwhile Kara had to dig graves in Argo, and Jason has permanent physical scars, whereas Kara won’t even bleed. Both have constant mental reminders, but one has to see it in the mirror every day, and the other sees their clear skin as looking as if they are fine, reminded of the survivor’s guilt)

The ptsd. Both characters have experienced a lot of immediate and built up traumatic events, which have led to/are seen in the various manifestations of ptsd. They have panic attacks, avoid things that remind them, have particular fears, and are pressured and choked by memories (part of Kara’s tragedy is that she remembers every little thing about krypton as well as her first days on earth, the good and bad, every detail and moment and that it something to be thankful for, but she can never not associate a moment or fully enjoy with out what she’s lost calling out from the back of her head. She is the last daughter of Krypton) .  The attacks are unexpected but also triggered by relations to fears (explosions, joker, sounds etc); they can happen any moment because ptsd is like that, but there’s also a like 80-90% chance that if they hear or see or feel something as they did in those moments, that their hearts will race and heads will spin and memories and feelings will bombard, and that leads to avoidance and I know this isn’t really shown in their media but it has been and I need more of it. Kara and fireworks!!! It’s great writing when fires and explosions of sorts put Kara on edge, but I think something that’s rarely ever been shown is fireworks, which is a great example because they’re pretty and celebratory for everyone else, but for her the noise is too loud because of her superhearing and it’s too close to the sounds of krypton’s blow and the lights and pieces that spray from the fireworks in the sky look just like it. Part of their differences here is that Jason is shown to make light of this, he makes jokes about his fears and he laughs when Dick makes fun of the crowbar thing, and he turns it into his weapon of choice, meanwhile I don’t remember a moment where Kara does anything like that. Jason still clearly fears it though, and there are moments when his fears are used against him to weaken him in a fight or scare him. I think to write a proper analysis on each character’s ptsd and then to compare is something that would be better of in its own post because there’s more room to expand on little things and go piece by piece.

Both were in a sort of slumber or stasis for a period of time before respectively arriving on earth and coming back to life (then also coming back to the batfam). A lot of time was lost.

That partially contributes to how they’re both the odd one out in their families, ‘cause not only do their personalities and fighting styles and interests and the points in this post make them so or emphasise such, but they weren’t there for so much that they’re different and they’d feel that.

A big part of conversation around Jason is anger, regardless of whether or not people interpret it correctly, he has a lot and it’s a known part of his character. Kara has the same, but people forget that to the point of criticising it when she’s written to show it, yet it’s been such an integral thing to her for a while. This point isn’t going to be as long as it could be, as I’ve talked about it in posts before and inevitably will again, so in this I’ll try to only discuss the core parts of their anger, how readers see it, and the similarities. For each of them, anger is built as they grow; loss as children, growing up feeling like they aren’t understood, an increasing sense of justice thay they get to fight yet makes them see how there’s so much that isn’t given or fought for, betrayals, etc. Crime fighting basically becomes their outlet, and it’s good in the form of passion and motivating them to not back down, but others may see it as violently-inclined or aggressive (side note: batman has said things within this line of thinking about both of them). People try and stop them or hold them off because they’re ’worried’, but a lot of the time it seems that these people are more worried about what they might do, making them feel feared and thus fearing themselves, rather than worrying about why K&J have all of that anger, and the thing is- neither of them from my memory went on a rampage or caused grievous bodily harm from their anger (for J, at least during his time as Robin). The characters/and people around them should be trying to understand, support, and even nurture this, yet it seems that they rarely do, which only makes it worse for them. 

Neither bottle it too much, rather they may struggle to (well, I think Kara does both of those things), but I don’t think they fit the criteria for anger issues, at least in a diagnostic sense, because it doesn’t so throughly consume them as much as other things, and they both — yes, including Jason — are shown to manage, contain, and tame it, while still expressing it and even utilising it as ‘energy’ or motivation in a mission, fight, or longer term situation. While readers always acknowledge that Jason has anger, and often mischaracterise that to be his only trait, they often forget that Kara has it, because they simply don’t read her content or look past her moments, mischaracterising her to only ever be this stupid bubbly  teenage girl who could never be anything close to superman. The thing is, it is SUCH a part, and I might say it’s even integral to both of their characters, but it’s not all that they are and it’s not something that doesn’t exist, they both have it and for some reason people constantly misinterpret it (and when they do recognise Kara’s anger, all of a sudden she’s unstable???? Which they do to Jason too to be honest), while it runs so complexly in both of their veins and they do at some level know how to control it and understand why they have it. It’s nice to have characters that are angry about their lives as well as justice, who really do want to fight, who don’t want people who don’t deserve it to suffer, who are so mad at others and the system that they want to make sure that other people don’t have to feel that.

Another point that I made in the short post was that they both have difficult relationships.

Parents. For Kara, in some runs her parents are extremely loving, sometimes one dies early, sometimes they both get to see her off, sometimes she sees them die before, sometimes they’re still somehow alive and she never knew, and sometimes they could’ve fixed numerous things on Krypton including its death and she almost hates them for it. In these instances, it hurts so much for Kara because she looks up to and loves them so much, but she lost everything and they’re part of the reason. She doesn’t know what to feel about so many things because so much of her life is now a lie, and the biggest thing of all could’ve never happened, she could be with her people and culture and friends, if her parents hadn’t stopped people from saving the planet, hadn’t contributed to the warming of its core, hadn’t let their hubris get the better of them, or whatever the chosen storyline is. It is of course amazing when we get a Kara who’s parents love her so dearly and just wanted her to be safe and become a part of her compassion, but I also enjoy when it’s written like this because it just shows how much reason Kara has to be everything that she is not, yet she always remains this hopeful figure despite the tragedy of loss and then tragedy of the people she looked up to and who raised her betraying their entire planet, she no longer has them to look up to, she wonders if that’s why they sent her away, and somehow it just makes her feel even more guilty, but she still fights for hope.

For Jason, he has difficult relationships with each of his four parents. His birth father and who he believes to be his birth mother (aka stepmother in the end) neglected him as a child and were not good influenced. Now, I am NOT blaming this on their poverty, but they could’ve protected their kid from a lot of the things that he saw, and also just- still have raised him. His father is selfish and ends up being a criminal, leaving him with just his drug-and-cigarette-addicted mother, who he ends up having to care for and probably parent to an extent. But she doesn’t want help/recovery, seemingly leaves drugs and cigs within reach of Jason (but he knows not to take it as he’s seen the effects, although he does smoke for some time), and is also unfortunately encouraged, which gets Jason physically hurt when he tries to stop her ‘friend’ from dealing to her. She becomes one of the (many implied) people that die of overdose that he witnesses. These two parents? Jason cared for them and even wanted them, but they fail him and he loses them both. I’ll return to Bruce after quickly talking about his birth mother, whom he starts searching the world for due to a straining relationship with Bruce. Jason has so much hope for this woman because of the love that he craves, and yet she is willingly a part in him being manipulated and drawn to his death, and then yet he still appears to have this love for her, and even does the act of shielding her from the explosion in the slim chance that she might survive even though he knows that he won’t. Now, Bruce actively decided to take Jason in after seeing that other options were worse, but even if you see that as ‘a last resort’, it isn’t really, because for Bruce to chose that is for him to want the best for and thus care for this kid. He also refrains from making him robin, and then he does and he tries to support Jason’s education and him fighting and all these things — he loves and actively cares for him, but they clash because there’s not exactly a mutual understanding, and maybe they should’ve communicated more. So, to Jason it is clear that his dad Bruce loves him, but there are moments when he forgets that he’s just a kid and needs emotional guidance, and they begin to disagree more and clash more so their relationship strains as they get older, and Bruce more and more goes on about Jason being too aggressive and even dangerous, until Jason leaves at fifteen years old. When he comes back to life, he almost immediately understands why Bruce couldn’t save him, he knows in his heart that he wanted to, that he was probably right outside and was too late, he doesn’t hate him or blame him for that, it’s that when he finds that the Joker still lives after all this time and continues to cause harm, it’s unfair that there was no retribution. Jason knows that Bruce has the means to kill the joker, and yes he knows the no kill rule, but he wonders why the Joker isn’t an exception, because he broke them apart and has done so much to others, he is the worst of them, if Bruce couldn’t kill him for those people, why still not for Jason? Then Bruce hits him with the batarang, whether accident or not, and Jason sees that as him choosing the Joker’s life over his. Then Bruce fully hits him at some point which is wild, and 1- yeah don’t do that to your child, in which Jason very much takes that hit to heart and 2- he probably associates such behaviour with his birth parents. Jason eventually comes to understand Bruce’s reasons and such, and the two warm up and all is eventually well although of course it’s still got a lot to be discussed between them.

Siblings(or cousin for Kara). Both of these characters love their families. Kara sees Kal-El/Clark simultaneously as her baby cousin that she held in her arms and was meant to protect and grow with, as well as her older cousin/brother. She also seems to have a good relationship with Lois and her nephews that I guess the dynamic is more cousin-like because of the she’s but yeah, as well as her foster family. There’s good in the fact that Kal is both family and another kryptonian, and she gets to share her stories and language and culture with him, but a lot of the times in their media that doesn’t really happen. Kara and Kal aren’t shown discussing that stuff too much, and most of what Kal knows is from files and the fortress, so Kara is left with a part of her somewhat empty from that. There’s also some runs and digital media (arrowverse I’m looking at you…) where he straight up could’ve been a MUCH better cousin and person to her.  Of course they are family and she loves him so much, but in these medias he sort of just leaves her to figure out her powers on her own (and yes her scientist foster parents, but that’s just making her out to be a subject), as well as earth. She needs her cousin!!! Even sometimes when they’re older and she’s supergirl, he undermines her and still doesn’t help with her powers and joins in on describing her to be a danger, like I genuinely hate this writing and sometimes really do not want it to be canon let alone even exist, but when you have to think about it, it’s like DUDE, she needed and needs him and he’s never there. In the arrowverse I get that people liked his show and stuff, but I almost hated him in supergirl 1- way too quick to judge people and not open to critique 2- even in the damn sixth season he still did nothing like they practically don’t talk and I swear at some point in the show she fully starts giving up on reaching out to him. A major part of her being alive is to be there for him, and yet they write him to do practically nothing. Anyway that’s only sometimes in comics and shows/movies and it’s one of the things I dislike about the show even though I love the show.

Jason meets Dick and yeah they don’t have the PERFECT relationship growing up, but it’s still pretty good and it’s actually great that Jason gets to have an older brother. Then, despite whatever tensions there are, they clearly love each other, and Dick does not take Jason’s death well. He misses his little brother so much, and yes Tim comes into play and he loves him too, but he’s not a replacement. Tim and Dick do get on pretty well as far as I’ve read, and part of that probably is because Dick lost Jason and regrets some stuff and really fears losing Tim too. He hallucinates Jason often and lives with it because it’s something, and there is so much grief. Then, when he believes that the Joker killed Tim too, he fights and beats him up and is ready to kill him, and does it when Joker taunts him about Jason, even while Tim just manages to come in and show that he’s alive. Now, I don’t know if Jason has been made aware of this yet, but it’s important. A lot of this builds up to the two having a good and possibly even better relationship once reunited and Jason is in the family again, they make up for what was  lost. However, the death and what bits of resentment o Jason has for Bruce does lead him to at least initially not have the best relationship with Tim and Damian (I’m not too clear on how he is with Steph, Cass, and Babs, and honestly Alfred is probably fine (yes I know he’s dead)). There’s feelings of replacement, and the difficulties are kinda mutual particularly as Damian has a need to prove himself as the best of all of them, but things just take time. A lot of what’s needed in Jason’s relationships with others and himself is just time, in which there is communication and processing and bonding and healing. One second he’s got just Alfred, Bruce, Dick, and again I forget what it’s like with Babs (just with him, I know much more about her own and then with others), the next he’s dead and on his own, and then all of a sudden there’s like 10+ people in the family, as I said earlier, he lost a lot of time. Both characters did, and they need time.

Do they have a lot of differences? Yeah. I mean, even as a Red Lantern Kara had a lot of restraint, and she was so in touch with herself that she did the difficult feat of removing the ring. She was forced into such restraint the moment that she landed on earth, not necessarily the fault of her foster parents or Kal-El, just the world (although yes I could go on about how in some runs and media he could’ve been such a better cousin than he was, sometimes he could’ve done so much more for the scared and scarred child). Jason obviously at least at the start of him becoming red hood, as well as some time as robin, had much less restraint. There are other differences, and I love them so, but the similarities still stand and I think that when you put both similarities and differences side by side, the two characters become a very compelling comparison on trauma, anger, and being thrown into a world.