#arkham verse
Well since watching The Batman I have rekindled my love for the Riddler so decided to draw different versions of him because why not
Chapter 12 of A Step Aside is up
I got myself a new graphics card so I could play one of the newer games but…is that a reason to play through all the Arkham Games again?
Yes, yes it is
I briefly became a Speedster myself, so have the next Chapter of A Step Aside!
Honestly, I don’t think we appreciate the Arkham Games’ writing enough. Like. Okay. Jason’s backstory here really does have him sort of at fault for getting caught; it says outright that he turned off his trackers with the intent of hunting down and murdering the Joker. Regardless of his motivation, that…is not smart. I mean. You know I love him to bits, which is why I say, earnestly, honey, no.
BUT. Not one time do the general narrative OR the other characters pull the ‘don’t be like poor, reckless Jason’ card. (Granted, he’s not brought up, really, but Dick does allude to him a time or two.) Neither the flashbacks nor Hallucination!Joker’s comments regarding him cast him as anything other than someone who did not deserve what happened. Even when he’s actively attempting to kill Batman (and if he does take you out, he’s not sorry.), Bruce’s response is to double down on trying to convince him to come home; he disarms him, which is reasonable (two hits! that’s all it takes, what the hell!), but despite having a ridiculous amount of ranged weaponry, the only thing the game will let you do to him is pop up and essentially try to hug him. It won’t even let you try the disruptor on his rifle, even though it will let you jam (but not rig to blow, due to fatality likelihood) the mini-guns.
…
…
Gee. It’s almost like Joker is responsible for his own actions, and that those actions include the torture and (faked) murder of a teenager.
I’M NOT DONE HERE HANG THE FUCK ON.
Now, granted, we’ve all seen the snarky, ‘why would you take a shortcut through a dark alley, Wayne Family’, but, really, at the end of the day, it’s a spot of black snark. That’s all. That said-and maybe this is my Female Narrative coloring my view-I’ve been told, since I can remember (and probably before that), that one’a the cardinal rules of life is to stay in well-lit areas. No alley shortcuts, that’s dumb and that’s how kidnappers will get you. It doesn’t matter if it’s an alley in the Nice Part of Town, seedy people lurk inside, don’t go in.
But, like…despite this being a realistically stupid choice that ended undeservedly badly, DC really doesn’t…care. It’s Joe Chill’s fault and that’s it, which is how it’s supposed to be, but…WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE. I’m so lost and confused as to how two grown-ass adults are not at fault for going, ‘yes, alley shortcut, this is fine’ and getting shot (RIP Wayne Family), but a kid is…somehow at fault for going ‘my mom says this is fine, okay’ and getting beaten half to death and blown up? How does this work? I suck at math, so maybe there’s some vital mathy thing I’m missing, but I am confused and also mad about it.
It’s all about DCs horrible framing to save their asses after the fact. If it was Bruce’s parents fault, he doesn’t have to be sad, but it has to be Jason’s fault because otherwise Bruce looks bad.
People forget that they got a lot of crap for DitF, and the guy who wrote it actually got fired, it made the editor change his whole approach. A lot of readers and even Frank Miller, who wrote the edgiest freaking Batman ever called it the ugliest stunt he’d ever seen in comics.
Of course DC had no more creative way to try and patch up the situation other than to try and retcon Jason into an excessively violent, bratty street kid who should be never have been Robin in the first place. And thats what people saw everytime the new “better” Robin brought up how as long as he didn’t act like the old “bad” one he wouldn’t die.
Because, it was, after all, all Bad Robin’s fault that he died for wanting to meet his mom.
It’s kind of like when DC made Leslie Thompkins known pacifist a murderer to try and absolve Bruce of Steph’s death even though Steph’s death was completely Bruce’s fault since he: emotionally manipulated her, isolated her from everyone who even remotely thought about supporting her, kept life saving information from her and still after all that Steph put her whole trust into Batman’s logic a thinking and believed in his plans which was the final nail in the coffin for her
DC likes to be edgy which leads to Bat dickery which leads to poor Bruce taking poor actions and then DC jumping over backwards to make it some other characters fault so Bruce can remain infallible
Most recent example is when Bruce left Alfred to die while he made out with Selina on a beach and then in Pennyworth RIP we learn the one receiving the most guilt and blame is a traumatised 13 year old who only ever acted on Bruce’s orders as per Bruce’s plan and was forced to watch his grandfather figure die
