#btts

⠀ ⠀ ⠀ ⠀ ᣟ༷𝅘𝅥𝅮୧　in ꒱꒱ᣟ݂ 　𝑡he 𝒔𝒕𝒂𝒓𝒔 𓈒 ׁ ⊹ ݂

⠀ ⠀ ⠀

ROUND 1 — Match 13 of 138

Morgana Pendragon (Merlin)

Problematic because: "She starts as one of the only people in Camelot openly horrified by Uther’s persecution of magic, so her anger is extremely understandable. The problem is that once she turns, she doesn’t just go after Uther or the anti-magic system. She helps Morgause attack Camelot, hides a mandrake root under Uther’s bed to drive him mad, stabs a sentry who catches her, poisons him when he might identify her, and threatens Merlin into silence over what she and Morgause are doing. So yes, Uther created the conditions for Morgana’s fear and rage, but Morgana very much starts choosing “everyone in Camelot can suffer about it” as the plan. Then it keeps escalating. She tries to have Gwen killed by framing her for enchanting Arthur, takes Camelot with Morgause and an immortal army, has innocent citizens executed during her short reign, and torments Uther in prison because she wants him to feel exactly what his victims felt. Later, she kidnaps Gwen and uses mandrake-root psychological torture to turn her against Arthur, which leads into Gwen trying to help murder him. Morgana has every reason to hate Uther’s Camelot, but by the later seasons she’s recreating the same “my pain justifies your suffering” logic she once hated him for." Propaganda: 1. "Morgana apologist hours, sorry. Camelot spent years executing people like her, Uther lied to her, Gaius hid the truth, Merlin poisoned her instead of trusting her, and everyone acted shocked when she eventually decided the kingdom wasn’t worth saving. Did she go way too far? obviously. But I can’t pretend her villain era came from nowhere. She was terrified, isolated, betrayed, and then the only person who gave her answers was Morgause. If Camelot wanted a loyal Morgana, maybe it shouldn’t have made being herself a death sentence." 2. "she is SUCH a good character because she starts off right and then becomes worse and worse in a way that makes me want to scream. like she is right about uther. she is right that camelot’s laws against magic are evil. she is right to be angry that everyone around her keeps lying, hiding things, or treating her magic like a problem to manage instead of something she deserved support with. but then she starts aiming that rage at arthur, gwen, merlin, random citizens, servants, guards, basically anyone near the throne room, and suddenly it’s like girl your enemy is the system, why are we brainwashing your ex-best friend."

vs. John Doe (Batman: The Telltale Series)

Problematic because: "He's one of those “poor little guy” characters where the poor little guy is also actively becoming the Joker, so you do have to keep one hand on the fire extinguisher. He starts out as Bruce’s weird Arkham friend, and even then he’s already dangerous - he helps Bruce escape, but part of that escape can involve Victor Zsasz being pushed toward killing another patient. Later, in The Enemy Within, he gets involved with the Pact, a criminal group with Harley Quinn, Bane, Mr. Freeze, and others, and Bruce uses his friendship with John to infiltrate them. John is needy, unstable, desperate for approval, obsessed with Bruce, and very willing to slide into violence if nobody stops him - including urging Bruce to throw Catwoman under the bus when the Pact suspects a traitor. Then the route split makes him either bad or really bad. If he becomes Vigilante Joker, he’s trying to do the right thing in his own completely broken way, but he still kills Agency operatives, uses bombs, takes Amanda Waller hostage, and eventually tries to kill Waller and Tiffany because he decides his version of justice matters more than Batman’s limits. If he becomes Villain Joker, he goes full revenge spiral - he works with Harley, unleashes the LOTUS virus (a deadly bioweapon) at Wayne Enterprises, sets up bombs around Gotham, kidnaps people close to Bruce, forces them into a cruel game, and still stabs Bruce even if Bruce tries to save his life. Basically, John is sympathetic, lonely, and badly used by almost everyone around him, but he is also one Bruce Wayne friendship crisis away from making the entire city participate in his breakdown." Propaganda: 1. "He’s someone who could almost be better, depending on how he’s treated, but there’s always something jagged under the surface. You can be kind to him and still not fix him. You can guide him and still watch him misunderstand everything Batman stands for. His vigilante route especially gets me because he really is trying, in a way. He sees Waller doing corrupt, awful things and wants to stop her. The problem is that John’s idea of justice has no brakes, no patience, and no stable sense of proportion." 2. "this man should have been given actual help and not used as an undercover asset/friendship tool by like six different people. like yes, he is dangerous. yes, he becomes the joker. yes, even vigilante john is out here killing people and trying to make batman co-sign his murdery justice project. but also, look at what happens to him. arkham doesn’t help him. harley uses him. bruce can manipulate his feelings to get into the pact. waller tries to use or destroy basically everyone in the room. john is unstable from the start, but everyone keeps treating him like a tool, a lead, a liability, or a problem to point at someone else. he’s not innocent, but he is tragic in a way that feels specific to telltale’s batman. he wants a friend so badly, and then when it breaks, he breaks with it. awful man. genuinely sad. please get him therapy and also do not give him explosives." 3. "He’s baby. He’s a bomb threat. He’s your best friend. He’s your worst future problem."

For an example of that, I love pointing at the Telltale Series games. When you get the choice to save Catwoman from a sneak attack by some crooks or save Harvey from a giant spotlight crashing onto his skull, the game then offers a branching path for Harvey. Both paths end the same way (because he'd already been injected with a serum by the children of arkham that lowers impulse control and makes people more prone to strong emotional responses), but they develop his character in significantly different ways. I suppose I should be worried about spoiling this for people, but I personally like spoilers, so i'm not that bothered.

If Batman saves Harvey, then the drug still works it's magic and makes him a paranoid wreck, obsessed with consolidating power around himself. But it also makes him less bitter towards Batman. His darker side begins to idolize the vigilante justice aspect of Batman, and I believe he even creates a special police force modeled after Batman (I think). In essence, he becomes a fanatic obsessed with the strength of the bat. Elements of The Judge can be seen in how his paranoia makes him try to become a dictator.

So Two-Face without the scars is (if i remember correctly) a lighter shade of evil. He hasn't got the physical trauma to deal with, he's only got the mental stuff. And it's a little easier for him to manage one without the other. He still looks the same, so it's not like he's gotta be scared of being judged for his looks. So that might honestly help his sanity a tiny bit. I remember the scene where you see him in his office before his mayoral portrait is painted. Without the scars, he's paranoid and messing with his coin, but he's not angry and violent. He's more just paranoid and lashing out.

Meanwhile, a Batman who lets Harvey's skin burn and scar over ends up creating the Two-Face we all know. This man spends half the game hiding behind bandages, or phantom of the opera style face masks. He resents Batman, since Batman saved Catwoman and left him to burn! He can't even have a normal mayoral portrait taken, because one side of his face is red and covered in welts and scars! This Two-Face is so deranged that he can't even be reasoned with. Which kind of makes sense. I imagine it's hard to think when your skin is always pained and your mind is full of a drugged substance.

In either case, Harvey Dent gets put through the ringer. He gets drugged. He thinks his girlfriend cheated on him with his best friend. He potentially mauls a criminal to death with his bare hands. He has a psychotic break. But there's two different flavours of psychotic break. There's the version where he's obsessed with bringing batman style justice to the city, and then there's the version where he hates Batman and blames him for Gotham becoming a hellhole that he has to fix.

EDIT: ITS CALLED "BACKWARDS THROUGH THE SNOW" AND ITS AMAZING GO READ IT

Fic description below the cut if anyone wants to help me find it

Ahh ganz, ganz lieben Dank! Mein Buch heißt Melodie der Asche. Hier das Cover, Innenklappenillustrationen usw. 🥰 Hier gibt's das Buch übrigens signiert und mit gratis Charakterkarten. Alles selbst illustriert.

- And for my english speaking lovelies: This is the German version of BttS - my queer / mm high fantasy. 💕🥰 All Illustrations are painted by me (and there is lots of character art as well 🥹) I'm also including a picture of the cake, because a lovely queer reader, who’s a baker, made it himself and brought it to me at Leipzig Book Fair. He told me it was his first time ever visiting a book fair, and he came just to say thank you – because this book changed his life. 😭✨ I could barely hold back my tears. I’ll cherish that moment forever.

...for the simple reason that poor Donnie finally has some sort of deserved therapy.

Despite every other time something bad happens to him, the Don just... goes on with his life as if nothing really happened. We have no idea how he copes, if he bottles everything inside, we don't even know if his brothers are aware of his internal struggles.

So, props to Back To The Sewer for giving Donnie a needed moment of relief after yet another drama (namely, watching Splinter being disintegrated into Cyberspace right in front of him).

What I like the most is that the "lesson" Donnie has to learn is not to just save Splinter and make everything okay again, but to aknowledge the presence of his bros and friends and appreciate their care for him (which he kept ignoring or rejecting up until this episode).

After beating himself over and over for what happened to Splinter, seeing Donnie smile again is just what everyone needed.