#running scared

(I don't ship these characters, mainly because I don’t do ships in general, but I can acknowledge the gayness of the situations that I see)

The first two panels come from Scott Snyder's Death of the Family arc where Joker makes his first reappearance.

The entire first panel I'm showing is meant to establish that Joker's pupils don't dialate, which is something Batman has noticed with the Joker. First off, Bruce, I know you love details, but why are you staring into people's eyes directly and noticing details in them?

Anyways, the next page I have after shows a contradiction to that earlier statement. One that Bruce reminds himself to ignore. How the Joker's pupils do dialate when Bruce stares into them. And how they dialate with love.

This isn't even subtext, this is Scott Snyder canonizing the fact that Joker is gay and Bruce is lowkey homophonic (joking on that last part, he's probably just really uncomfortable. I would too if the person who has stabbed me, briefly killed my son, shot my work friend's daughter, killed hundreds of people, and etcetera had a crush on me).

The next scene I'll point out was also written by Scott Snyder. It comes from Dark Nights: Metal. To give some context, Bruce has a cosmic-level problem and he thinks he should deal with it himself. The Justice League disagrees, Bruce runs, and when Superman thinks he caught Bruce (its actually Clayface in disguise), he says that he knows Bruce's heartbeat as well as Lois'.

I know he then later says "we're brothers" but like...Clark, buddy, you know the heartbeat of someone else as well as the person you married. That's a pretty bold comparison. And not familial in the slightest. Its at the very least platonic in a best friend way.

This entire arc.

That's it.

He looks so much like Castiel from Supernatural in this scene (it's the coat. And the hair. And the pleading look at the heavens).