tony: i dont go down on women but i expect them to suck my dick and thats how KINGS live
thor a feminist:
this is fake news don’t EVER disrespect pepper like this
Didn’t he, like, canonically get pegged by gamora too lmaooooooo
Yes
Wait this was pegging? I HAD NO IDEA LIKE I WAS SO INTO THIS TONY GAMORA PANEL ALREADY AND NOW IT IS LIKE 5000000000000000 TIMES BETTER. AJSKALAKKAKAA.
I saw this and went: “Hang on now… I remember reading that. I did NOT think they were pegging.” Then I dug it out and had a closer look:
Panel two, bottom left corner — that is definitely a strap-on harness. This whole thing makes so much more sense now. I cannot believe I didn’t see that before.
Damn Gamora. Fierce.
Wait! Didn’t rdj also call tony a feminist in his interview!!!
Didn’t he also open a shelter and organization for women who needed help and let women run it because he knew as a man he (and other men) would never truly understand or help the right way? And we are talking about the same man who gave Pepper CEO of his multimillion dollar company?
Didn’t he like, okay trigger warning but didn’t he also take a teenage rape victim turned prostitute off the streets directly to the women shelter? Like…can we stop pretending that casual sex = misogynist when tony stark in canon has so explicitly addressed women’s issues? Has so explicitly supported women? Where’s that goddamn panel of tony giving vision dating advice about treating women like the whole entire individual they are and not like an enigma they talk about in dating magazines because that shit is relevant
I was just gonna ignore this post but it keeps coming up so let me add these:
And that was all before he quitted being a playboy, even as he lived his playboy life you never see him disrespect women and quite the opposite to what op is implying, he plays the role that serves and submits to his partner, and do I need to add how he is with pepper who he’s in a committed relationship with for more or less 8 years now:
Like I don’t care if that’s just a meme or joke but if you have to make it, make it accurate?? Praise Thor all you like, I stan him too, but trying to paint tony as a misogynist who disrespect women, I’ve got news for you.
y’all already handled the good fact-based commentary so I’m just going to chime in to express my shock that anyone has ever looked at Tony Stark and seen anything but a sub
okay but when i first watched this scene, i kinda wondered why tony only said 2 words. like “you’re alright” that’s it. even after he clung to him and started to cry tony didn’t say a word.
but then we learned that tom improvised that scene. So that was probably RDJ’s reaction. I don’t think he was expecting Tom to start crying to fall into his arms like that. Hearing him like that probably really fucked up RDj even if they were only filming. So that look on his face was probably RDJ dreading what Tom was about to do. Because he was going to make it incredibly painful.
The first thing a parent says to a kid when they are hurt or scared or sick is “You’re all right”. When your toddler falls, the first words out of your mouth “You’re all right” and this is before you even know if they’re injured. It’s probably more to reassure ourselves than our child. But the instinct is to say “You’re okay”. RDJ is a dad. The first thing he’d say if one of his kids said something was wrong would be “You’re all right”. It’s what parents do. So, it’s natural that he’d bring that to this scene if they’re improvising. It’s where he would have gone as a dad in real life. For the rest of the scene, he’d be speechless. In complete shock. There are no words. And he’ll probably berate himself later for not reassuring Peter. He couldn’t do it, though. Peter’s dying AND apologizing for dying and Tony, who fixes world problems on a regular basis, couldn’t help. And that is devastating on such a level. There are no words for him to speak. Even after, he’s just silent.
so i saw some people discussing how loki in ragnarok shouldn’t have been at all phased or subverted by dr. strange – which i agree with, but also, hey, it’s comedic and you can argue that he was taken off-guard, but upon re-watch, something stuck out to me –
there’s this moment when they appear at the bottom of the stairs and thor rolls down the last couple and stands up and he says
we could’ve just walked.
and it made me think of how magic works in terry pratchett’s novels, how (to paraphrase) the hard part wasn’t turning someone into a frog, it was not turning someone into a frog when you knew how easy it was.
like, the whole scene with dr. strange is just. all magic. all pointless magic. unnecessary magic, when, well. they could have just walked.
whereas loki doesn’t really rely on magic overmuch in the movie – he uses it as a tool, when he needs it, but if the job can be done with plain old non-magical trickery or a knife, he just uses those. he resorts to magic when he’s cornered by valkyrie, he uses it when his goals are most directly accomplished by using magic rather than by other means.
whereas dr. strange is using magic all over his scene, just to use it. just because he can. magic was unnecessary for ninety percent of what he did in that scene, the only time he needed magic was to whisk them away to norway. but he teleported all over the place even when he only needed to move a few feet, gave thor an ever-refilling beer that just spilled everywhere, floated around to make a show of how ~magical~ he was, when…
he could have just walked.
i mean, i’m very sure that the filmmakers intended it for comedic effect, but there’s also a layer there of dr. strange being much less comfortable with magic than loki is – loki doesn’t need to bust out the magic at every opportunity, it’s simply a skill, a tool that is completely under his control and at his disposal. whereas dr. strange (at least in his scene in ragnarok) is showing off, which reeks of insecurity.
i guess i’m thinking… if you take the magic away, loki is still a deadly, formidable opponent with many tricks up his sleeve, but dr. strange is just a guy in a cape.
okay, so everyone has set up the main rivalry in Black Panther as Killmonger vs T’Challa. And obviously that’s the main narrative structure of the story, not arguing with that. But I feel like from a purely character arc standpoint, the actual battle is Killmonger vs Nakia, and she obliterates him.
Erik Stevens is a CIA covert operative; basically, he’s a spy. So is Nakia. And when you look at their various actions through the lens of “who accomplished their mission better?”, it becomes pretty clear that Erik spent 20-some years preparing to destabilize T’Challa’s reign, including having inside knowledge and a birthright on his side…and Nakia spent roughly 36 hours successfully destabilizing his reign, in turn, with nothing but her incredible ability to network disparate resources.
Let’s just review her actions over those 36 hours okay:
– Gets the surviving members of the royal family successfully out of danger within seconds of the coup (aka the only living people with a competing blood claim to the throne aka the greatest threat to his regime)
– Sows enough doubt in the “greatest warrior in the country” about Killmonger’s ability to lead that when the time comes, Okoye and the entire Dora Milaje all defect (eventually saving hundreds of lives)
– Steals a heart-shaped herb from under his nose as he’s identifying it as the most important power resource in the country and trying to prevent it falling into anyone else’s hands, lol too late buddy
– Immediately identifies the person in the country with the best platform to mount a counter-insurgency (M’Baku), identifies what it will take to get him on their side, and casually resolves a centuries-long division in their country while she’s at it
– Correctly predicts Killmonger’s opening move of distributing vibranium to the war dogs, and assists in a comprehensive strategy that shuts it down cold–a strategy they wouldn’t have been able to use if she hadn’t gotten Shuri, Ross, and T’Challa all in one place with the right information at the right time
As soon as T’Challa is back she takes an immediate backseat again (she said it herself, she’s a spy, not the leader of an army), but, seriously, if you have to pinpoint the one person who took down Killmonger, it’s undeniably her. And she did it by clearly demonstrating that her skills as a war dog are miles ahead of his as a CIA agent (due in part, I’m sure, to being trained in a superior country, but also she’s Just That Good).
Yes! Erik’s real misfortune was coming up against a much better and smarter intelligence operative. She also gives the lie to the stereotypical spy narrative (embodied by Erik) that you have to be heartless and violent to achieve your ends. She is the moral center and touchstone of film, so filled with goodness it comes off her like a glow, but she kicks the ruthless Erik’s ass from Wakanda to Kinshasa.
Another thing Nakia was good at was identifying where the necessary resources weren’t, namely in herself. That was why she argued Ramonda out of the idea of taking it herself. It wasn’t self-effacement or modesty, it was a clear-eyed calculation of what it would take to win and the best chance was with M’Baku, not her.
And she did much of this while she thought the man she still loved was dead. She admits as much to Okoye, too. Think of how much sheer fortitude that took, to work through a grief like that to save your country. She is a hero and her heroism is no less amazing for not being flashy or center stage.
It’s also interesting and important to point out that, in moral views, she’s also a counter to Erik Killmonger. They contrast & compliment each other and are very much set up to be mirrors of the same cause. Killmonger believed in Wakanda using its vast & superior resources to liberate oppressed folk around the globe. He hated that a near utopian society existed while so many of their people and ancestors were left to suffer. This is what, in part, made Killmonger such a sympathetic villain. His means were wrong, but his ideas? He had the right ideas….W’kabi thought so too, thus why he took Killmonger’s side. It took Killmonger’s insurrection for T’challa to learn that lesson as well.
But it was a message Nakia had been preaching all along.
Let’s not forget that it was Nakia that first proposed the idea of ending Wakanda’s isolation. She refused to become a queen, she chose to remain a spy, because morally she couldn’t stand by while so many others suffered. In essence, Nakia and Killmonger mirrored each other in moral standing when it came to Wakanda needing to reach out and help their people. However, where Killmonger decided to kill relentlessly and take the throne, then find the solution in arming the oppressed to overthrow nations, Nakia valued life above all.
And you can say “Killmonger was right bc in the end, T’challa listened to him.” But did he listen to Killmonger, or did he finally listen to Nakia?
the fact that Loki’s death scene in Thor 2 was originally intended to be real & retconned later and the end where he’s alive was filmed during pickups has me SO fucked up because now I can’t choose between which headcanon I prefer re: his behavior in Ragnarok. like listen, okay, either:
1. loki was planning on playing dead the whole time and so his very sad death scene & everything he said therein was a calculated move and he was practically writing the theatrical version of it (starring matt damon as himself) as he went along
OR
2. loki really thought he was dying and every melodramatic word of his death scene was 100% heartfelt and then after he realized he wasn’t dead he fucking… woke up peaced out to go take over asgard (lol?) and several months later he was sitting on the throne and could remember every word of what he said to thor on that day and was like “wow im so fucking poetic. that should be a play. starring matt damon as Me perhaps”
Gotta be that Loki really got stabbed and thought he was dying. It wasn’t 100% clear before Ragnarok, but Ragnarok firmly establishes that Loki’s illusuary clones aren’t solid. Loki got stabbed as fuck, and even he can’t just shrug off a giant blade through the chest and immediately fold that into a clever death-faking plan.
^ Thisssss. His clones have never been solid in any movie. Read a theory somewhere on tumblr that Loki’s shapeshifting might’ve tried to turn him into whatever Kurse was as he got his blood inside of him and he “died” like that, but he deffo couldn’t have faked the stabbing. and then he woke up and was alive and thought the only person worthy to reenact the thing in a splendid play was matt damon.
I wonder if @genderfluid-loki has seen this yet? (p.s sorry if u have)
I saw Black Panther again last night and again I had instant chills in the scene where the Dora Milaje take on the Golden Jaguar and I think I finally realized that in my twenty-three years of movie watching (and being a bit of an action movie junkie) I’ve never seen a group of women fight before.
Frequently, we see the Black Widow/Atomic Blonde archetype: a woman takes on a fight solo, typically opposite a male (or maybe a very pretty female). Either way, the dynamic is often sexualized. And the throughline is that these women are just “so strong” they’d never let anyone else “help them” do their job. My wonderings ask if maybe because these action!female movies are more than occasionally directed bymen *clears throat disapprovingly*, perhaps the idea of a whole woman army never even occurred to them.
And maybe you say, “But Wonder Woman!” and to that, I shrug in your direction without looking up from my drink. Yes, that was an example of a woman army. But the difference is that Themyscira was exclusively women. Wakanda is not, but still it was women who governed their army and guarded their king.
Black Panther depicts women as warriors, full stop. Not seductive, not sexual in any way. All of the immediate surrounding characters supporting the film’s male lead are women; recognized first for their bravery, their wisdom, their creativity, or their strength. And they’re never once juxtaposed agaisnt each other.
Seeing women be tactical, fierce and together is a new leaf we’ve turned and there’s no going back.
I rewatched Winter Soldier last night (because literally what else am I supposed to do the night before I see Civil War)
And it was still great. Obviously. But you know what the best scene is?
None of the awesome action scenes. None of the Stucky fanfic fuel. None of the scenes with Falcon (somehow? Falcon’s so freaking awesome, I can’t believe I just said that he’s not the best part of a thing he’s in).
No.
The best scene is this one:
Remember this? Basically, Cap just told everyone over the intercom about Hydra infiltrating Shield, and how, if you’re not Hydra, trust no one, and fight back if you can.
In the speech, Cap acknowledges that “If I stand alone” (that is, if no one wants to step up, because, fun fact, guns are really scary), then so be it.
And then Hydra’s resident Mr. McMuscle Man Brock Rumlow up there walks up to this lowly Launch Technician (Cameron Klein is his name, played by Aaron Himelstein) and orders him to launch Project Insight (aka Hydra’s evil plans).
Five minutes ago, Cameron had one job, and it was to press a few keys and launch this thing. Sure, he’d heard about Cap becoming a fugitive, and that was weird (and sounded kinda sketchy), but hey, he works for the good guys, right?
But now the game has changed. Launching this thing is a bad idea.
Cameron pauses as Rumlow demands him to start it up. And Cameron refuses.
Rumlow pulls out a gun and points it straight at Cameron’s head. And Cameron panics; heck, he’s practically holding back tears already. But he still says no. “Captain’s orders,” he explains.
You know why this is the best scene in the movie? Because Cameron reminds me of someone. Someone that people watching the movie are already pretty familiar with.
Cameron is the guy who may not have the muscle or the skills to be a soldier or a spy, but he wanted to help make the world a better place, so he did what he could. He got a job at Shield, he followed the orders of people he thought he could trust, and when he realized the truth, he stood his ground and did the right thing. He hasn’t gone through any training, he has no powers or skills or suits of armor. He didn’t even know Sharon Carter was armed and would be able to get him out of harm’s way. He thought he was about to die. But he wasn’t going to stand by and let evil triumph.
And that’s despite the fact that Cap had EXPLICITLY given him permission to do so. That’s what he meant by “If I stand alone.” Cap was saying that if there’s a gun pointed to your head, it’s not cowardly to give up. That’s okay. It doesn’t make you a bad person. If a grenade gets tossed your way, you’re allowed to run away.
But Cameron chose to jump on top of the grenade instead.
I’ve heard people say “Steve Rogers is a hero with or without the serum,” and other people say that’s kind of a cheesy thing to say, but if you want proof of that statement, Cameron is it. In a 90-second or so scene, this movie perfectly emulated what it means to be a hero even if you have a desk job. Even if you don’t look like you take steroids. Even if nothing eventful has ever happened to you until one moment when everything in your life changes, YOU CAN STILL BE A HERO.
I don’t care if that sounds cheesy or hokey. This scene is incredible. Cameron Klein is incredible – so incredible, in fact, that he got a cameo in Age of Ultron on Fury’s Helicarrier.
Yeah, someone (I’m guessing Sharon) was so freaking impressed at his bravery that they recommended him to serve on Fury’s staff (and, after Winter Soldier, the amount of people Fury trusted could probably be counted on one hand). And he’s in charge of the evacuation – which was LITERALLY THE REASON Fury shows up at all. Not military backup, not surveillance. Evacuation of civilians. And Fury gave Cameron that responsibility.
Because that guy up there may be the face of a nerd, or a gofer, or a desk clerk.
But it’s also the face of a person who won’t back down. Even when his world is being turned upside down, even when his life is on the line, this is the face of a man who will always do the right thing.
This is the face of a hero.
Now, Marvel’s Damage Control is an upcoming TV show about the normal folks. The ones without powers who always seem to be in the background but may have a lot more depth than they let on.
And I’m gonna try not to be too upset if I don’t see this guy’s name in the cast list, but man I’m hoping I do, because Cameron Klein is a hero.
I HAVE BEEN FLAILING AT LENGTH ABOUT LOKI’S CHARACTER ARC IN THIS MOVIE AND POOR @5ummit HAS HAD TO LISTEN TO ME GO ON AND NOW IT’S EVERYONE ELSE’S TURN.
“You’re late.” “You’re missing an eye.”
I am just so delighted by how the introduction of Hela into the family shook things out of their rut and how it made everything that happened before feel necessary. Like, I think TDW was necessary because Loki needed that time to work through being the worst villain the family, the black sheep, to wallow in it to realize that it actually wasn’t satisfying at all. He had his time being WOE IS ME, he had his time being king of Asgard, and none of it really satisfied him. So, when shit goes sideways as it always does, when he went back to trying to betray Thor, it felt hollow, because Thor had accepted that that was a choice he might make, that Thor wasn’t bothered by it.
And then there’s Hela. Who takes the place of the worst Odinkid and Loki cannot really define himself by that role anymore, he’ll never be THE WORST after this. Instead, he’s somewhere in the middle. And I love that the movie seemed really aware of the gamut of this family, that Hela was on the far end of just deliciously, wonderfully violent and cruel, Thor was on the other end of how he had come through the fire and stayed good. And that these two children were each half of Odin, that he was a conqueror, but he was also a father who loved, that they’re the two sides of him. And Loki is that middle ground as well, he doesn’t have to be the best at being good, he doesn’t have to be the best at being evil, his siblings have that covered.
He can be something else, something more.
That’s why I loved that line so very much. It’s frustrating to want it to be more serious (but, then, wasn’t TDW serious enough for all of us?) but I think it kind of worked for me, in that Thor felt like he had really made peace with everything. It felt like Thor had MOVED ON and that’s what REALLY got to Loki.
So the idea that Thor might be indifferent to Loki is troubling for him, because that’s a defining feature of who his character is. I don’t belong in the family; my brother doesn’t love me; I hate my brother. The idea that his brother’s like, “Yeah, whatever,” it’s an interesting development. But the two of them, that’s what I kind of loved about Ragnarok when I first read it. The two of them are placed in such an extraordinary situation where everything is unfamiliar; that their familiarity, literally as family members, becomes important.
Loki, for all that he pushes people away and betrays them and stabs them in the back, desperately does not ACTUALLY want to be given up on. Thor making real peace with the idea that they’re going to go their separate ways? Thor’s indifference to Loki trying to scheme and plot?
That’s what Loki absolutely cannot stand.
And that’s what the past movies are about–Thor trying to reach him, Loki pushing him away (to see if Thor will keep coming back) but when Thor MOVES ON, when Thor is done mourning and finds his equilibrium again, when Thor says, all right, well, this is what you want, then let’s do it and he means it?
It leaves Loki with the choice to make himself. He can’t pin this choice on Thor or even on Odin. He tries briefly, “Funny how [Odin]’s death should split us apart.” and Thor’s just like, I loved you, but we parted ways a long time ago. You do what you want to do, Loki. Stay in your predictability or be something more, whatever you choose, you choose.
And when it’s on LOKI to make that choice, suddenly he can’t bear to be left behind. Suddenly he can’t bear for Thor to not care about him. Suddenly he can’t bear not to be something more than what he was, because there’s nothing to rebel against and instead it’s up to no one but Loki to make that choice.
So he chooses something more. (In the most Extra and dramatic fashion possible a;skjlakjslajks “YOOOOOUR SAVIOOOOR IS HERE!” oh my god.)
Do you know what’s another moment I loved about this movie? When Loki makes his grand YOUR SAVIOR IS HERE! entrance, this is Thor’s reaction:
He’s delighted to see that dramatic little shit!
It complements the moment that comes not too much later, when Thor finds his lightning powers again and comes raining lightning down on the bridge, Loki does this absolute fucking smirk:
THEY ARE SO DELIGHTED BY EACH OTHER.
After all the years we had to struggle our way through the breaking of their relationship, the losses they both suffered, the cracks to both their foundations, the bitterness and strife that kept wedging itself in between them, literal years of watching them break apart and break apart and break apart.
And this movie could have broken them for good. But instead it understood that they cannot go backwards, but that does not mean they cannot still go forward. That they can’t both be grow and change and find each other again.
The death of the last of their family might have split them apart, it almost did, but when it really came down to it, they both chose to move on, to be something more, and that allowed them to come back together.
It allowed them to smile when they saw each other again, genuine and real. After all that hurt–when Loki shows up again, their first reaction to the sight of the other is one of being glad to see the other, both of them.
I could’ve sworn I’d written about this before, but since I can’t find it (search function failing me again!) I guess I’ll just…go ahead and possibly repeat myself a little. Maybe I’ll manage to be more coherent this time.
Loki’s relationship with women, and specifically with femininity, is I think complicated by his own issues with gender and sexuality. I wrote (very briefly) about how Loki at his worst (i.e. in The Avengers) is performing a very “masculine” mode – he’s playing a warrior, which he…really isn’t. The rest of the time we see Loki as someone who does grandstand but not in the same way. Loki’s a fighter, but he’s not the kind of fighter he’s playing in The Avengers – which is, of course, where his infamous and (frankly) misogynistic aggression toward Natasha comes up.
Loki is, in terms of gender coding, more “feminine” than (for instance) Thor, but also most of the other (male) heroes in the MCU. (Also arguably coded as queer, which is another bag but I’d argue also related.) The dismissiveness with which Thor treats him, especially surrounding his use of magic, in the first movie, coupled with the values of Asgard’s warrior culture, argue that that “feminine” coding marks him out.
I’ve written about Asgard’s misogyny before, mostly visible in the way Sif is treated but also (both in and out of universe!) in the overall lack of women in significant roles, barring a) healers (a role classically designated for women) and b) Frigga, who is a Queen and therefore an exception. If the feminine is devalued on Asgard in the same way it is on Earth (which it seems like it is), then by implication Loki’s ambiguous status as a man (especially if you headcanon him as queer, which I do) is very much a problem.
That kind of sense of precarious status can, very easily, result in a difficult relationship with women, specifically a kind of misogyny (like that which crops up in gay men) and a need to dismiss and distance oneself from anything having to do with women. This is one of the reasons I headcanon Loki as never learning much healing, even though it would be useful – healing is associated with (female) healers, and he doesn’t need any more of those associations.
At the same time: Loki clearly has a very close relationship with Frigga, and while he baits Sif in the scenes he shares with her he doesn’t actually treat her any differently than the Warriors Three. Outside of his line (again, clearly baiting) Thor during their fight on the Bifrost, none of his dismissiveness toward Jane is gender-oriented – rather about the fact that she’s mortal. In Ragnarok he also doesn’t treat Valkyrie differently as a woman. And except for those remarks about Jane and to Natasha, he doesn’t say anything specifically sexual to indicate that kind of attitude. So his behavior, overall, argues that he doesn’t see women as lesser or inferior.
Then, contextually, there’s said speech to Natasha, which is half directed at himself (everything he says can easily be applied inward). As always, Loki lashes out when he wants to lash inward – like he does with the Jotnar, for instance. The desire to downplay and push off the aspects of himself he feels are shameful drives him to externalize that rejection. And that speech, I’d argue, is also complicated by the fact that it takes place in a context where he is both a) actively trying to play a role and b) actively trying to play a role that’s more ‘classically Aesir’ than he really is (the conquering warrior isn’t a mode that really fits, even if he were running on all cylinders.).
On a base level, I think Loki has a lot of respect for women, learned from both Frigga and Sif especially. But there’s also a defensive need, when he’s most insecure, to hold himself away from that in order to prove himself a properly masculine Asgardian.
Tasertrickslove 