We’ve recently seen some age-swap and role-swap AUs floating around the DP fandom. The most common of these are the direct reversals, where Vlad is the teenage protagonist and Danny is the adult villain.
Now, I’m not the hugest fan of the straight-swap versions because it’s not particularly interesting or in-keeping with the canon characters. If Danny becomes the amoral villain and Vlad the plucky protagonist then you basically just have the original Danny Phantom again, except with the characters wearing each other’s skins.
However, a version of the age-swap that keeps the characters closer to their canon personalities has great comedy potential.
Young!Vlad is a disaffected but highly intelligent freshman whose ‘genius’ is seemingly unrecognised by everyone in town. Pretty much everything sucks for him - he’s bored at home because his parents are always away on work, he’s bored in class because he finds the material too easy, the school’s head jock and posse make a policy of ruining his day, the student body president is ‘inept’, and - despite Vlad’s intelligence and apparent ability to analyse people - he never seems to make it into the spheres of the influential or popular classmates. He’s aloof and vaguely disdainful towards everyone around him, except for his two best friends; the naive and eccentric but occasionally brilliant Young!Jack, and the beautiful and sharply intelligent Young!Maddie. He hangs out with them partly due to their mutual interest in the paranormal, but also because Maddie is the only person in town he sees as an equal and he really wants to date her (too bad she’s always making eyes at Jack).
[If you’re looking for a reference he’s basically a cross between Sue Townsend’s Adrian Mole and Velma Dinkley from Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated]
Like in the original series, the three of them attempt to build a proto-ghost portal as a step in their research. This one goes even worse (after all, it was built by teenagers) and Jack rushing to activate it gets Vlad blasted with way more ectoplasm than in canon. Just like the original it lands him in hospital for a bit - but in this case only a few months. On coming back to school he is very resentful (mostly towards Jack though he’s a bit miffed that Maddie didn’t come to visit his room while he was awake) both for the accident and the Danny-like power-problems he’s experiencing. Although in Vlad’s case he hides them from his friends and outwardly acts like everything’s been forgiven.
As he gains controls of his powers, Vlad decides to put them to use ‘correcting’ some of the ‘wrongs’ in his life; serving disproportionate comeuppance to the jocks, subtly embarrassing Jack in from of Maddie, scheming and manipulating his way through the school’s systems, and generally messing with people to alleviate his boredom.
It basically turns into a Deathnote-like moral situation, in which Vlad is a nominal ‘hero’ on the best days and an entitled, arrogant person at worst. He may be the protagonist but he’s sure not the ‘good guy’ of this story.
(He still makes himself a vampire-style suit and goes by Plasmius in ghost-mode because despite being highly intelligent he’s also a dumb 14-year-old who unironically thinks it looks cool.)
How does Danny get involved?
While Vlad is still in the nominally-heroic part of the story (dishing out retributions to people who actually had it coming, chasing away some minor ghosts that were attracted by the portal explosion, manipulating outcomes that fix genuine problems etc.) he starts to notice an older person hanging around and following him. At first Vlad’s concerned - has someone caught on? Is it an enemy ghost? A rival trying to take out the competition? - until Phantom introduces himself. Danny’s a lot of things but subtle is not one of them.
Older!Danny is in his early 30s. His parents were some of the first modern ecto-scientists and successfully built a working portal (the source of the accident that gave him his powers) but because the hauntings stayed localised near the portal (never spreading beyond his own hometown) their ecto-research didn’t reach mainstream science beyond a few ‘professional ghost-hunters’, paranormal aficionados and an obscure branch of government that mostly just makes messes bigger in their attempts to ‘contain and study all unauthorised ectoplasmic entities’.
Despite his unease, Danny is honestly happy to meet another half-ghost. He might have reservations about actual teaching (“I’ve got an Engineering degree, not a Dip. Ed.”) but he genuinely wants to help this new kid through what he remembers being a tough period of power-adjustment and guide him to use his abilities productively.
Unfortunately, Vlad is having none of it - who is this condescending fool to tell him what to do? In his eyes Phantom is either trying to recruit him so that he can use his power (after all, that’s what Vlad would do) or he’s an idiot for wasting such potential. Actually, he must be an idiot either way because who else would try to manipulate someone of Vlad’s intelligence?
Eventually this devolves into a cat-and-mouse game in which Young!Vlad uses his brains and abilities in attempts to manipulate his way into Maddie’s affections, positions of influence and possession of powerful items, with Phantom having to step in and ‘defeat Plasmius’ before someone gets hurt. Unlike in canon, where Vlad mostly toys with Danny to demonstrate his superiority, Young!Vlad learning techniques from their fights is intentional on Older!Phantom’s part. Phantom really wants to give this kid a chance to turn things around, and figures that letting Plasmius experiment with his powers in a relatively safe space might help Vlad get under control and avoid the temptation to do something truly stupid. Unfortunately, all this actually does is teach his accidental-arch-rival to be a more competent villain.
Vlad deliberately creating dangerous situations so that he can impress Maddie by ‘dramatically rescuing’ her from the ‘evil Plasmius’. What he forgets is that, under her pretty face, Maddie is a top-tier asskicker - at least a third of the time the love of his life hands his ecto-hide to him long before Phantom can intervene. He’d find it attractive if it wasn’t so humiliating.
Jack also proves disturbingly competent with his ‘anti-creep stick’. It’s literally just a baseball bat with a cross-stitched handle and the club logo sprayed on the side but Vlad still makes a point of stealing and destroying them whenever Jack makes a new one..
Maddie concludes that Plasmius and Phantom are both evil and working together.
Vlad: “Of course, but as the older and stronger, Phantom is clearly in charge. If we get rid of him then surely Plasmius will leave.”
This results in Vlad doing a very careful dance whenever he and Danny are in ghost mode while Maddie and/or Jack can see them.
In attempt to ‘eliminate the competition’ Vlad considers alerting the Guys in White to Phantom’s status.
Danny: “Look, kid. Vlad. If you go to them with that intel they’re going to wonder how you got it. I might survive - my company holds the patents for a lot of their tech - but you’re a high-schooler. You really want to risk outing both of us?”
This is one of the few things they eventually agree on: Under no circumstances is anyone to intentionally involve the GIW.
Vlad tries to recruit other ghosts in attempt to keep Phantom distracted.
This mostly consists of him failing to intimidate Skulker with his scrawny teen stature, then flattering him into it because “surely as the first and strongest of his kind Phantom would be a much worthier prize for such a skilled hunter.”
He has more luck with the resentful Yiddish vultures, although they can’t do much beyond being a nuisance.
The Box Ghost offers his services. Repeatedly.
Vlad travels to Amity Park in attempt to steal ecto-tech from Fentonworks. On arrival he is horrified to see just how haunted the town is due to its permanently active portal. He beats a fast retreat after getting cornered and resolves to come back with better plans.
Vlad returns to Amity Park in attempt to recruit more minions from the thronging masses. This is somewhat successful, but a few rogue ghosts follow him home - forcing him to try to contain the situation while hiding it from Maddie and Jack.
Youngblood starts messing with Vlad’s schoolmates (interfering with some of his social schemes in the process). As an adult Danny is incapable of seeing him, and Maddie and Vlad’s tendency to act older than their age means that Jack is the only one with a real handle on the situation. Eventually (to his intense horror) Vlad has to do things Jack’s way to solve the problem
Jack: “You know what V-Man, I’m glad to have you back. You’ve been so serious these last few months, I was worried you’d forgotten how to have fun!”
Vlad: *audible teeth-grinding*
Vlad refuses to swear because he thinks it’s a sign of inferior intellect and therefore beneath him. Danny doesn’t swear because he’s desperately trying not to teach this kid any more bad habits.
Vlad makes a deal with Technus to steal some software for use in a financial scheme. Too bad that they make this arrangement in the same week that local Information Technology rising-star Tucker Foley is invited to speak at the school’s career day.
Vlad’s plans failing because his ‘superior intellect’ leads him to over-engineer excessively complex schemes.
Danny: “You know you could just have done this, right?”
Plasmius later tries Phantom’s suggestion and Danny is kicking himself because darn it I was trying to get him to knock it off, not give him pointers.
Vlad attempting subtler social schemes (e.g. overshadowing staff and student council members to make changes). These sometimes work but other times Jack messes up the plan with his overenthusiastic support for his ‘best friend’.
Danny eventually recruiting one of Vlad’s classmates Red-Huntress-style because look, I’m running my parents company, volunteering at the observatory and trying to keep the ghosts under control. I can’t be constantly flying to another town to make sure Plasmius isn’t bringing on the ecto-apocalypse.
Out of respect for Vlad’s privacy Danny doesn’t reveal the secret identity thing. Instead he asks them to keep Plasmius under control and also look out for Vlad Masters because the ghost might be interested in him.
What Danny didn’t notice was that this kid really doesn’t like Masters and has a pretty big grudge against Plasmius after being on the receiving end of one of his schemes. What should have been a simple recon job instead ends up with them aggressively pursuing an intense rivalry with both of Vlad’s halves. They also get overzealous in their ecto-hunter task and start going after Phantom as well. So now Danny has two problems.
Jazz Fenton (a qualified and practicing psychologist in this AU) takes a job as the school’s councillor.
While there she works to convince Vlad of the benefits of altruism, tries to wheedle him into confessing his connection to Plasmius (Danny told her everything) and attempts to foil his social manipulations. The first two aren’t met with much success but she does get in the way of the third a few times.
For his part Vlad tries different schemes to get her fired or make her leave so that he can continue plotting without interference.
Vlad sneaks into the Ghost Zone in attempt to steal a powerful item (Ring of Rage, Pandora’s box, the Fright Knights Soul Shredder etc.). This goes about as badly you’d expect. Unlike in canon, where Vlad bails and makes Danny deal with it, Older!Phantom drags Young!Plasmius back by the ear because you made this mess so now you’re going to help clean it up.
Phantom: “So, did we learn anything today?”
Plasmius: “I should do more research before handling powerful objects.”
Phantom: *aggrieved sigh* “You know kid, I honestly thought you were smarter than this.”
Whether Young!Vlad eventually learns his lesson or keeps spiralling until he becomes a canon!Vlad level criminal chessmaster is something that could go either way.
What I’m getting at is: Can someone please do a version of the age-swap AU where Vlad Masters/Plasmius is an intellectually snobbish, overly theatrical, entitled adolescent ‘mastermind’ (who isn’t quite as bright as he thinks) and Danny Fenton/Phantom is the well-intentioned and experienced adult hero (but poor teacher) who really wants to give this kid a second chance but is getting more and more done with all the villainy nonsense.
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