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happy late halloween yall

prowls

So Tumblr ate my reply to this ask. I was able to save it because I got a "could not process post" warning and I knew the ask would be gone if I refreshed the page, but this does mean Anon won't be notified of my reply. So hopefully they come here often?

Anyway. Calling TF: One Prowl an asshole in the making because he wasn't jumping up and down is the most ludicrous evaluation of a character I have ever seen. And all the more so when you consider that he was jumping up and down.

If you wanted to read anything into him clapping instead of jumping, you could point to the way he moves after the jump and suggest he decided to stop because he lost his balance. Maybe he's a bit shaky because Sentinel has been working the miners too hard, or maybe he just doesn't have good balance in general. Maybe he didn't lose his balance at all and is just shifting his weight a lot because he's excited. Any interpretation makes more sense than "he's not emoting enough, so he's going to be a jerk when he grows up."

I would like to say I'm surprised. But considering the state of Prowl's TF Wiki pages, and the way people reacted to EarthSpark Prowl being hostile to Megatron, and the way people write Prowl in their fics, I am not. I am resigned to the fact that if canon doesn't give them a reason to hate on Prowl, they will find one or invent one.

*takes a deep breath; slams hands on table*

The primary purpose of a wiki is to archive and share knowledge. I don't expect every page to be free of mistakes, but I do expect the information they contain to be generally accurate and free of biases and unnecessary speculation. Prowl's pages, in particular the G1-based pages, fail this purpose at every turn by pushing one version of the character onto multiple continuities, creating conflict within the text and giving new fans a completely false impression of who Prowl is in most canon. Welcome to my TED talk.

So Tumblr ate my reply to this ask. I was able to save it because I got a "could not process post" warning and I knew the ask would be gone if I refreshed the page, but this does mean Anon won't be notified of my reply. So hopefully they come here often?

Anyway. Calling TF: One Prowl an asshole in the making because he wasn't jumping up and down is the most ludicrous evaluation of a character I have ever seen. And all the more so when you consider that he was jumping up and down.

If you wanted to read anything into him clapping instead of jumping, you could point to the way he moves after the jump and suggest he decided to stop because he lost his balance. Maybe he's a bit shaky because Sentinel has been working the miners too hard, or maybe he just doesn't have good balance in general. Maybe he didn't lose his balance at all and is just shifting his weight a lot because he's excited. Any interpretation makes more sense than "he's not emoting enough, so he's going to be a jerk when he grows up."

I would like to say I'm surprised. But considering the state of Prowl's TF Wiki pages, and the way people reacted to EarthSpark Prowl being hostile to Megatron, and the way people write Prowl in their fics, I am not. I am resigned to the fact that if canon doesn't give them a reason to hate on Prowl, they will find one or invent one.

i like his personality - isolated, brooding, calm, composed, mysterious, always on his own mind, playing his own games. a lone wolf. a hunter. ready for anything. in control of everything. i like the way he thinks, i like that we can finally get inside his head and find out how he sees the world. i like the way he behaves, the way he presents himself, the way he talks and reacts to everything that happens around him. i like his constant sly half-smirk, insightful gaze and tricky speeches

i like the way he interacts with others. i like that he's "two-faced", he thinks highly of his mates, he values teamwork, support and help from others, he cares about the crew and each of its members, but he doesn't let any of them too close to him or his business. i like that no matter how hard he tries to stay true to logic, no matter how much he tries to keep his mind pure, detached, collected, he can get attached and he can get hurt and he’s not always able to let go of feelings so easily. i like that he can get confused, lost and vulnerable, he could be gullible, could be wrong and could be outsmarted, despite all his skills, experience and intelligence there are some things he can't handle

i like that he doesn't want to be a leader. he will lead if necessary, but he understands perfectly well that it’s not what he was created for. i like how passionate he is about his real job, i like that he treats his duties both responsibly and playfully, that he gets naturally high from his work. investigating, searching, analyzing, questioning, manipulating - this is his life, his true purpose. i like that he’s good at it, damn good, and i like that he knows it

"disagreements" the disagreements in question:

Optimus: where did you get this gun??

Gun, in Megatrons voice: it doesn't matter

An updated amendment for all active personnel: If you’re going to fraternize with the leader of the Decepticons, make sure to do it while off the clock [and in private].

"It's funny though!"

It may have been funny before a ton of the fans started insisting that his character has always been like that and the fandom hadn't run the joke into the ground yet. Now though? It's tired and gone through 50 rounds of flanderization at least by this point. Do something else. Plus, a lot of folks have zero sense of nuance when his personality is "table flipping prick". Like, IDW1 Prowl was extremely traumatized and isolated, but heaven forbid the fandom acknowledge it! He was mean to [insert popular character]!

I think so much can be done with his character if they have him be someone who tries to make the tough calls that no one else would even if it means losing everyone

Idw prowls self destruction and isolation onto of how much he genuinely seemed to care about the autobkts even if he had a fucked up way of showing it genuinely makes me ache and I wish more people talked about it

Its a great way to show a difference approach on how war impacts people: prowls actions get more reckless in the name of what he thinks is logic because he WANTS to do good and his GUILT man his fucking guilt that they brought up in sins of the wreckers

I also feel like so much could be talked about his past as someone raised in a highly functionist town and being a friend of SENTINEL and how that impacted him but I think it was kinda overlooked in idw

Id say more but I already typed up a storm haha

Honestly, Prowl is such a fascinating character in IDW1, but it so often gets buried under rampant flanderization and writers not making up their minds on how to handle him. MTMTE, for example, couldn't make up its mind on how to treat Prowl because it does approach the fact that Prowl's mind has been violated multiple times, but one of the characters responsible for that gets to participate in mocking him with no push back plus it hyped up the concept of Prowl flipping tables which has then been flanderized to death.

There's so much to really work with, but IDW1 was something of a convoluted mess.

He's also a character that does resonate with me on a certain level. Being friendly to someone who then gets a little too obsessive (Tarantulas is also a fascinating character, but fans woobifying him when he is an evil and extremely creepy person and giving his life for Springer was the only good he did has ruined it for me), the self-isolation and self-punishment because you think you deserve it, underlying frustration and pent up emotions that you don't feel like you can communicate with other people, and the need to Be Right™️ and putting a lot of value in personal smartness. And I think a lot of people would agree that these deeper parts of Prowl would resonate with them as well... Except too many people just leave it at "Prowl is mean and flips tables!" and leave it at that.

So yeah! Fascinating character handled not very well!

While I don't particularly care for prowl the same way I do trailbreaker or thunderhowl I can acknowledge that he's a very well-written and intricate character.

If we're talking g1, he's an absolute sweetheart. I don't have much to say about that version of him atm. He's cute. They're all cute.

But if we're talking IDW... I adore how he's written. The fandom doesn't quite understand him. He's a guy who always thinks about the future and will do whatever he deems necessary to end the war.

But I think he is treated unfairly by fans. People use their disdain for him as an excuse to overlook his trauma. I haven't seen take into accountability that he had his brain tinkered with by chromedome or the whole brainwashing fiasco. It's always "Prowl is an asshole who has no feelings," but if you really pay attention to him in the comics, you'd notice that sentiment isn't true at all.

Can't say much about prowler from IDW2 because I haven't read it in a really long time, and forgot a lot of what I read due to how unremarkable the run was. Still, I love him and his little pet.