Deadpool: brings a teenager with superpowers to help him in a fight
Tumblr: DEADPOOL!!. I love the interactions between negasonic teenage warhead and deadpool. Omg so cute. *billions of fanart*
Tony Stark: Literally does the same thing when his friends abandon him. Sends him home as soon as he sees a probability that he’d get hurt.
Tumblr: tony stark is a villian ™. I can’t believe he used peter as a child soldier :) :)
Look, okay, people giving Tony shit for recruiting Peter to be a “child soldier omg TRAUMA AND DANGER” is dumb, yeah–no one actually WANTED to hurt anyone else in that fight and on top of that the kid literally comes with his own personal panic button AND is strong enough to arm-wrestle the super-soldier with the METAL DEATH-ARM and win–but this is definitely an example of false equivalence, because COLOSSUS EXISTS.
Colossus knows what Negasonic Teenage Warhead is doing. Colossus is doing this WITH Negasonic Teenage Warhead. He’s her trainer and her teacher and he brings her along–he could totally have made the call to leave her at home while he helped Deadpool himself and she would’ve STAYED home and listened to death metal and eaten all his favorite snacks, probably, but she also had zero compunctions about coming along and kicking ass in the name of “yeah this is kinda our bad on the dude getting away, huh”.
May Parker, on the other hand, does not know where Peter is. Tony not only lied to her, he told PETER to lie to her. Like, yes, the peril is much lower in this situation than in Negasonic’s, but Tony still blackmailed and bribed a kid who’d already said “no” to rope him into fighting his fight–a kid whose personal philosophy of “with great power comes great NEED TO NOT JUST FUCKING SIT ON MY ASS AND LET GOOD PEOPLE GET FUCKING MURDERED” does not even SLIGHTLY jive with the Accords. Peter Parker would NEVER willingly sign that thing. Peter Parker knows DAMN WELL what happens when you ignore the problem and pretend it’s not your business.
(Also, like, unless I’m forgetting a throwaway line somewhere, we don’t actually know how old Negasonic Teenage Warhead is–she could easily be eighteen or nineteen and still using that name–but we DEFINITELY know Peter Parker is still a minor and he seems to be intended to be around fifteen or sixteen. So he’s not only less trained, less experienced, and less powerful than her, he’s also less developed and less mature. Seriously, a four-year age difference is a LIFETIME at that age.)
So, therefore, Negasonic Teenage Warhead’s long-term mentor who she has a stable working relationship with takes her along to clean up a mess they’re partially responsible for and help a dude with whom they had a pre-existing relationship save his innocent and uninvolved ex, a woman who has nothing to do with any of this at all and is gonna maybe die if they fuck this up. Meanwhile, Peter Parker’s random rich-and-powerful stranger lies to his aunt, blackmails him when he tries to say no, and then distracts him with shiny new toys to get him to clean up an in-house mess the AVENGERS are responsible for and help him arrest a guy who literally everyone in actual positions of legal authority in the movie straight-up laughs about the idea of giving a trial to–WHILE ALSO BRINGING ALONG BLACK PANTHER, who, I love you, T’Challa, but you are the only cat in this fight who is trying to actually MURDER someone, at this point in the movie you are still planning to kill a man in cold blood because you THINK he killed your dad. And, again: trial? What trial??
Like–tl;dr, but long story semi-short, Deadpool is trying to save an innocent person and kill literal superhuman SLAVERS with basically zero resources/backup and recruits two people with training and experience and an actual permission slip, and Tony has half the Avengers and all of Stark Enterprises and 117 governments on his side, but threatens a six-months-into-superpowers teenager into working for dudes who have already made it clear they would execute an untried man and want to arrest a bunch of people who have saved the world MULTIPLE times without even hearing them out on why they’re so vehemently against the Accords or even CONSULTING them when first DRAFTING the damn things. Like, that is the thing that is canonically happening here. That is the situation.
Also, Tony Stark is actually styled as a hero who believes he’s doing this for the greater good and is working with legal approval, restraint, and oversight. Deadpool’s goals are all personal and/or selfish and he has already spent his entire R-rated movie murdering people with extreme prejudice and refusing to answer to anyone. They should REALLY be held to different standards there, morally and narratively speaking, and yet Deadpool’s story STILL treats the involved teenager with more respect and agency than Civil War’s does Peter, while also not pretending she is a fully mature adult prepared to take on other super-powered people with zero formal training and about as much prep time as it takes to fabricate a spider costume in a super-scientist’s lab.
SO I CAN SEE WHY PEOPLE GET A LITTLE CHUFFED BY THIS STORY CHOICE, HONESTLY.
ageisia asked: CW Spidey is probably not even old enough to see the Deadpool movie without parental permission. How many jailbait jokes does Wade make, and how quickly does Tony Stark get a restraining order against him?
Friend, it’s Deadpool. Tony was like “here, kid, come help us have a fight in this airport and also sign this restraining order against Wade Wilson”. Peter’s all “???? is this about the Accords thing? who’s Wade Wilson, is he on Captain America’s side?” and Tony’s like “naw this is literally just standard practice in the superhero community”.
ok so this is something everyone on tumblr should know
imagine dragons was hired to write demo tracks for spiderman turn off the dark (aka the spiderman musical on broadway) in order to get people to invest in it and have enough money to hire someone more famous to write the musical
then the people who hired them thought, “hey, these are actually good songs we should make a cd of them and sell it”
so imagine dragons changed the words a little so they weren’t about spiderman and became famous
radioactive was originally about THE RADIOACTIVE SPIDER THAT BIT SPIDERMAN
are u fucking serious thats the best thing ive heard all day
But what if they just happened to cast Andrew Garfield as the boyfriend in Deadpool 2, and someone in the movie is like, “hey, you look just like Peter Par-” but Deadpool tackles them before they can finish and then just looks directly at the camera and is like, “this is my boyfriend, Pete Parkley, and he is definitely not Spiderman because that would be a serious breach of licensing rights.” and then he just grabs Pete and tows him away by the suspicious red spandex collar poking out over the top of his T-shirt
the most implausible thing about superhero movies is that these guys make their own suits, like seriously those toxic chemicals did NOT give you the ability to sew stretch knits, do you even own a serger
I feel like there’s this little secret place in the middle of some seedy New York business neighborhood, back room, doesn’t even have a sign on the door, but within three days of using their powers in public or starting a pattern of vigilanteism, every budding superhero or supervillain gets discreetly handed a scrap of paper with that address written on it.
Inside there’s this little tea table with three chairs, woodstove, minifridge, work table, sewing machines, bolts and bolts of stretch fabrics and maybe some kevlar, and two middle-aged women with matching wedding rings and sketchbooks.
And they invite you to sit down, and give you tea and cookies, and start making sketches of what you want your costume to look like, and you get measured, and told to come back in a week, and there’s your costume, waiting for you.
The first one is free. They tell you the price of subsequent ones, and it’s based on what you can afford. You have no idea how they found out about your financial situation. You try it on, and it fits perfectly, and you have no idea how they managed that without measuring you a whole lot more thoroughly than they did.
They ask you to pose for a picture with them. For their album, they say. The camera is old, big, the sort film camera artists hunt down at antique stores and pay thousands for, and they come pose on either side of you and one of them clicks the camera remotely by way of one of those squeeze-things on a cable that you’ve seen depicted from olden times. That one (the tall one, you think, though she isn’t really, thin and reminiscent of a Greek marble statue) pulls the glass plate from the camera and scurries off to the basement, while the other one (shorter, round, all smiles, her shiny black hair pulled up into a bun) brings out a photo album to show you their work.
Inside it is … everyone. Superheroes. Supervillains. Household names and people you don’t recognize. She flips through pages at random, telling you little bits about the guy in the purple spangly costume, the lady in red and black, the mysterious cloaked figure whose mask reveals one eye. As she pages back, the costumes start looking really convincingly retro, and her descriptions start having references to the Space Race, the Depression, the Great War.
The other lady comes up, holding your picture. You’re sort of surprised to find it’s in color, and then you realize all the others were, too, even the earliest ones. There you are, and you look like a superhero. You look down at yourself, and feel like a superhero. You stand up straighter, and the costume suddenly fits a tiny bit better, and they both smile proudly.
*
The next time you come in, it’s because the person who’s probably going to be your nemesis has shredded your costume. You bring the agreed-upon price, and you bake cupcakes to share with them. There’s a third woman there, and you don’t recognize her, but the way she moves is familiar somehow, and the air seems to sparkle around her, on the edge of frost or the edge of flame. She’s carrying a wrapped brown paper package in her arms, and she smiles at you and moves to depart. You offer her a cupcake for the road.
The two seamstresses go into transports of delight over the cupcakes. You drink tea, and eat cookies and a piece of a pie someone brought around yesterday. They examine your costume and suggest a layer of kevlar around the shoulders and torso, since you’re facing off with someone who uses claws.
They ask you how the costume has worked, contemplate small design changes, make sketches. They tell you a story about their second wedding that has you falling off the chair in tears, laughing so hard your stomach hurts. They were married in 1906, they say, twice. They took turns being the man. They joke about how two one-ring ceremonies make one two-ring ceremony, and figure that they each had one wedding because it only counted when they were the bride.
They point you at three pictures on the wall. A short round man with an impressive beard grins next to a taller, white-gowned goddess; a thin man in top hat and tails looks adoringly down at a round and beaming bride; two women, in their wedding dresses, clasp each other close and smile dazzlingly at the camera. The other two pictures show the sanctuaries of different churches; this one was clearly taken in this room.
There’s a card next to what’s left of the pie. Elaborate silver curlicues on white, and it originally said “Happy 10th Anniversary,” only someone has taken a Sharpie and shoehorned in an extra 1, so it says “Happy 110th.” The tall one follows your gaze, tells you, morning wedding and evening wedding, same day. She picks up the card and sets it upright; you can see the name signed inside: Magneto.
You notice that scattered on their paperwork desk are many more envelopes and cards, and are glad you decided to bring the cupcakes.
*
When you pick up your costume the next time, it’s wrapped up in paper and string. You don’t need to try it on; there’s no way it won’t be perfect. You drink tea, eat candies like your grandmother used to make when you were small, talk about your nights out superheroing and your nemesis and your calculus homework and how today’s economy compares with the later years of the Depression.
When you leave, you meet a man in the alleyway. He’s big, and he radiates danger, but his eyes shift from you to the package in your arms, and he nods slightly and moves past you. You’re not the slightest bit surprised when he goes into the same door you came out of.
*
The next time you visit, there’s nothing wrong with your costume but you think it might be wise to have a spare. And also, you want to thank them for the kevlar. You bring artisan sodas, the kind you buy in glass bottles, and they give you stir fry, cooked on the wood-burning stove in a wok that looks a century old.
There’s no way they could possibly know that your day job cut your hours, but they give you a discount that suits you perfectly. Halfway through dinner, a cinderblock of a man comes in the door, and the shorter lady brings up an antique-looking bottle of liquor to pour into his tea. You catch a whiff and it makes your eyes water. The tall one sees your face, and grins, and says, Prohibition.
You’re not sure whether the liquor is that old, or whether they’ve got a still down in the basement with their photography darkroom. Either seems completely plausible. The four of you have a rousing conversation about the merits of various beverages over dinner, and then you leave him to do business with the seamstresses.
*
It’s almost a year later, and you’re on your fifth costume, when you see the gangly teenager chase off a trio of would-be purse-snatchers with a grace of movement that can only be called superhuman.
You take pen and paper from one of your multitude of convenient hidden pockets, and scribble down an address. With your own power and the advantage of practice, it’s easy to catch up with her, and the work of an instant to slip the paper into her hand.
*
A week or so later, you’re drinking tea and comparing Supreme Court Justices past and present when she comes into the shop, and her brow furrows a bit, like she remembers you but can’t figure out from where. The ladies welcome her, and you push the tray of cookies towards her and head out the door.
In the alleyway you meet that same giant menacing man you’ve seen once before. He’s got a bouquet of flowers in one hand, the banner saying Happy Anniversary, and a brown paper bag in the other.
You nod to him, and he offers you a cupcake.
Have you read The Tailor? It’s a Batman fan comic by TerminAitor on Deviantart and it’s a fantastic little piece about the tailor who makes some of the costumes for the criminals of Gotham… whether he wants to do it or not. Great stuff.
The costuming thing in general seems like it would make for a great one-off or miniseries. Or a book of shorts including stuff like kyraneko’s seamstresses. Someone has to be making this stuff… and not breathing a word of it to anyone.
There actually was a comic in one of the Spiderman titles about the 90-years-older-than-dirt Jewish tailor who makes all the superhero and villain costumes, telling them how to update their look as he does so. So, yeah, it’s canon.
It’s also canon that every superhero and villain except for Spider-man (who yes, did painstakingly teach himself how to sew and mend spandex) knew about him. He sees villains and heroes on alternating days, and no one dares to break that truce or show up on the wrong day looking for a fight because they’re all afraid of losing his services.
