Marvel Shit of All Kinds

Vampire Tony taking a bite out of America's peach 🍑 for @marveltrumpshate 2024 for @fohatic and pod!

This is the main course, but save some room for dessert. (Third link below private until Halloween ;))

Luxuries such as blankets

Extra bedding that's there for comfort, such as double pillows, soft ones or plushies

Warm baths/showers

Food that tastes good just because

Clothing in bright colors

Music

A door that locks from the inside

Clothing that favours comfort over functionality/protection

Pets

Floor time

Books

Pain medicine

Lazy days where you can just take it slow instead of being always at a strict and unforgiving schedule for maximum efficiency always

Rio: …Tall

Aaron: …Miles…I love you, and I am proud of you…but you are somehow the smartest and dumbest boy I have ever known.

Miles: Says the man who used his big brain to become a criminal when he could’ve been a black Tony Stark with that gear he made. And thought working for the Kingpin, who everyone knows will throw his minions away like tissues, was a good idea!

Peter: He makes a good point, babe, you did kind of mess up first–

Also people in the comments:

Boys Problems, 519 words

How to Marry Your Fake Husband from Another Dimension (speedrun), 5008 words

I like high chances that I might lose, 8373 words

You’re a Sunflower (I Think Your Love Would Be Too Much), 14 827 words

Scared of the Unknown, 15 217 words

How Did We Get Here? 46 926 words

Alright. V took the first part of this ask (and I agree with everything she said!) but now I (Emily) have gotta go to bat for my girl Darcy Lewis.

I understand if you didn't mean to come off rude, but it kinda feels like you threw that 'self-insert' comment in just to be hurtful since nowhere in any of our ranting has our love of Darcy Lewis had anything to do with how we feel about RDJ.

Dr. Darcy Lewis is not a self insert character. She is a whole character and she has been since at least Thor: The Dark World. She was never meant to just be Jane's snarky best friend/assistant. If anything, Kat Dennings was hired to create this character because there was not enough humor in the original Thor script and Kenneth Branagh liked her sitcom work and thought she would bring a little bit of levity to the world he created. And he was right! But in the first Thor, Darcy is still her own character, albeit one that's there for more comic relief than plot momentum. She's funny, yes, but she's also compassionate and resourceful and dedicated to the mission of the film once she understands the stakes, despite not being a scientist.

Moving on to Thor: The Dark World where, if you don't remember, she managed to bring Jane's focus back to the science that defined her career, investigate gravitational anomalies and see the similarities to previous atmospherical conditions, AND when Jane disappeared, she took it upon herself to get Erik out of the hospital when she realized she was out of her depth with the whole alien-invasion thing.

That's not self-insert behavior. Nor is that "just snarky best friend" behavior.

Fast-forward to WandaVision where she is now DOCTOR Darcy Lewis, Astrophysicist in her own right and requested specifically to investigate the Westview anomaly. Where she is the one who decodes The Hex and figures out at least part of what is going on with the world Wanda created. Where she also locates Monica, and then works with Monica and Jimmy Woo to break the spell and get everyone out safely (as well as drives a truck through Hayward's escape plans and helps get him sent to prison).

Again: NOT self-insert behavior.

Yes, she has computer skills and is mentioned to have some hacking capabilities but she's much more than that. She does appear in the comics, but my favorite appearance of hers is the Marvel YA novel CosmicQuest Vol. 2 - The Aftermath. That's where she literally drives across the country (multiple times) after The Snap to pick up the pieces of everything Jane and Erik were working on and gets everyone back on track with saving the planet. Again. All while being snarked at by a know-it-all teenager underestimating her every step of the way.

My time in Darcyland has introduced me to some of the most talented artists and writers I've ever met. And not because we're all projecting ourselves onto some empty husk of a character. There's a fairly robust fanon collective understanding of who she is as a person, regardless of who you ship her with. She's almost always portrayed as funny, always kind and compassionate, she goes out of her way to help people and be part of a solution rather than a problem, she's frequently Jewish, consistently brilliant, and usually a decent baker. <- These are all traits that we've collected through a decade of loving this character and watching her through films, tv, comics, and novels, as well as listening to Kat Dennings talk about her portrayal and the things she loves about being Darcy.

So yeah. *exhale*

Put some respect on my girl's name.

but in order to buy him actually going back. after everything. at that point at that stage. knowing everything that he knows. like i would have to ALSO buy that he does NOT care about anybody else in his life and this makes me feel insane to think about

he wasn't ready for dating he can't find anyone with shared life experience and he is fundamentally just Not That Same Guy Anymore, but at the drop of a hat he WILL be fine to retire and go marry this woman and have kids and live a ""Normal Life"" knowing everything that he knows about the future. knowing what will be in that moment happening to bucky. his wife is working with arnim zola and he's fine with that, hydra is infiltrating his wife's organization and he's fine with that, bucky is being tortured and is going to kill howard and maria and steve's.........what, having christmas dinner at their place no thoughts head empty everything's fine??? howard found this weird cube in the ocean the other day steve isn't that something. is the government leaving him alone???? like he's a supersoldier and they're doing awful shit to isaiah is steve retired Without Governmental Harassment what is going on

and it's not even like everybody he's leaving behind in The Past is okay and set up for success and there's nothing to help with and nothing to do like i just

man out of time

Don’t get me wrong, any “Steve is a godawful boyfriend” headcanon should still start from the baseline of Steve being a good person who cares about Doing The Right Thing and treating people decently. But Steve is also:

- married to his job - kind of emotionally constipated - quick to anger - prickly about receiving comfort, and awkward about giving it - blunt and plain-spoken - prone to expecting a lot of the people around him, and to being openly disappointed/unimpressed when they don’t come through - going to put duty ahead of personal attachments most of the time - withdrawn and socially isolated - reckless, stubborn, and the kind of prideful that answers anything that can be taken as a challenge with “wanna bet?” - a lifelong dweeb who has never been in a romantic relationship and has no experience in how they work

Which is a set of issues that could range anywhere from “highly manageable, if you aren’t afraid to go toe-to-toe with him and don’t expect him to be available 24/7″ to “un-dateable human disaster.” Going by my fairly limited experience with comics, there is precedent for the “un-dateable human disaster” option; MCU doesn’t have to follow it, but it wouldn’t be out of the blue. And let’s face it, MCU Steve could use some better-developed flaws. 

And oh my lord, Godawful Boyfriend Steve Rogers. Swears he’s not trying to set a record for number of consecutive dinner dates he’s bailed out of halfway through to go Avenging. Fails epically at normal emotional boundaries–is cagey and withdrawn about the weirdest shit, but overshares about his Dead Best Friend Feelings on the first date. Goes abruptly from zero to full commitment once he decides he’s found the Right Partner. Guilt-trips like a pro, and sometimes forgets how fucking intimidating he is when he’s pissed off.  Takes an “if you get killed, walk it off” approach to almost all life difficulties.   Will always come through with material and moral support in an emergency, but clams up and flees rather than be a shoulder to cry on. Wouldn’t know work/life separation if it clocked him over the head.

Which actually leads right back into flaws and sources of conflict, because it affects how he views others, not just himself. Steve Rogers believes in people; the other edge of that double-sided sword is that he expects a lot of them. Even when it’s completely unreasonable, his tolerance for admitting defeat or rolling over without putting up a fight is about negative three on a scale from one to ten. Not that he’ll be mad if you don’t step up to the plate every time. Just disappointed. (Okay, that’s a lie, if he thinks it’s your job to step up to the plate he’ll be mad as hell at you for shirking.)

So yeah, I’m not sure his PTSD would come out as terror and hiding when there’s fireworks–the guy’s fight-or-flight reflex is like 99.8% fight. But I can see it manifesting as him being always on–wanting to be able to relax and enjoy the birthday fireworks on the 4th of July, but unable to let his guard down, always primed for a fight he might have to throw himself into, reflexively drawing one arm across his body at every explosion even when his shield is in the other room. (Despite the general fandom backlash against exaggerated pre-TWS fanon, I think there’s plenty of truth to Steve being an uptight stick-in-the-mud–not out of prudishness, but out of duty-mindedness + inability to turn off. The sad part is that he doesn’t want to be.) I mean, at this point I’m barely even headcanoning, just spinning variations on his nightmare vision in AoU–the fear that he’s broken for any life except violence and combat.

And he does want a life outside fighting. That’s the thing. Steve prizes being tough in the sense of never giving up no matter how much he’s hurting, but he resists being tough in the sense of callous or unfeeling or never giving anyone a chance to hurt him. All those scenes of numb disconnection in TWS and the cut scenes of Avengers–he looks miserable about it. He’s an increasingly guarded person the more shit life flings at him, but he still keeps making himself take his guard down. TWS was all about the raw courage it takes to trust people in a world where some of them can and will betray you: Steve’s strength lies, not in invulnerability, but in the vulnerability of trusting others come through for you and yourself to absorb the damage when they don’t. Despite his loss and grief and difficulty forging human connections, he keeps trying–striking up a conversation with that cute jogger on the Mall, letting himself be a tongue-tied dweeb about asking Sharon out, maintaining his fraught relationships with Fury and Natasha. The SHIELD team he’d been training and fighting with for two years turned on a dime and stabbed him in the back and turned out to have been Hydra all along, and he went right back out and reconvened the Avengers with Tony. 

And ugh, feelings. Steve is my fandom bicycle and I multiship him with just about everybody, but you will pry my awkward-virgin headcanons from my cold dead hands, because if that boy wasn’t saving himself for Peggy Carter I will eat my laptop. They were waiting until after the war–because they are both fierce and duty-minded souls who didn’t need the distraction, yes, but also… keeping it separate gave them the prospect of a future where the war was over. One tiny guarded part of themselves they could keep tender and uncalloused, protected from all the horror and killing. That. That’s what Steve keeps struggling towards no matter how much it hurts, because that’s what he’s afraid he’s lost. (And yes, I am pre-emptively rolling on the floor crying over CEvans’ remarks about how much it means to Steve that after a lifetime of putting duty above self, he finally gets something purely personal that is just about him and Bucky and their connection and oh my god Cap 3 is going to kill me.)