MadTank

[madtank95]

Star Wars Fandom

One of the more frustrating aspects of Star Wars fandom is the obsession with Obi-Wan and the weird presumption that he can do no wrong. There are way too many fic out there that have Anakin drastically misunderstanding the Jedi Order and its teachings and blaming him for it while showing Obi-Wan as having not done anything wrong and being hurt by Anakin’s failure. If a student is not understanding a lesson the fault is in the teacher, it is not possible for Anakin to misunderstand Jedi teachings without Obi-Wan being a bad teacher to him. I will admit that I have a huge bias towards Anakin, he’s my favorite character and I get defensive over him so I do understand why people defend Obi-Wan, I just find this trend really annoying. I do like Obi-Wan as a character, I just hate Anakin being portrayed as in the wrong (in his pre Vader era) without any look back to where Obi-Wan holds some blame. The way I see it, Anakin’s Fall is the combined result of his poor integration with the Jedi Order, the trauma of his youth and from being a soldier, his lack of proper support network and healthy relationships, and Palpatine’s grooming. Out of these factors, Obi-Wan and the Jedi Order do hold a significant part of the blame (not that they deserve what happened to them as a result). Anakin was a child when he came to the Order, it is the job of the adults in his life to support him and teach him, and they failed him. Obi-Wan failed him.

[madtank95]

Weird Crossover Idea

I recently read a Star Wars fic set in the Buffyverse where Ahsoka is the Slayer, Anakin is the vampire with a soul and Obi-Wan is the Watcher. It was an Obikin fic with Anakin and Ahsoka being very sibling coded and it had me thinking of the Buffy characters meeting them. Buffy was 16 when she dated Angel who was physically 26. My idea is to take the Buffy crew from anytime post-graduation but preferably post-show all together where Buffy is solidly an actual adult and have the Scooby Gang somehow end up in an alternate version of Sunnydale with Slayer Ahsoka, Vampire Anakin and Watcher Obi-Wan. Ahsoka would be 16 and Anakin, like Angel, would be physically 26 with his actual age being whatever you want it to be. It can be Obikin or Anidala, maybe Padme is a local witch or college professor or something, or just fully platonic. The important thing is the sibling dynamic between Anakin and Ahsoka and for Buffy to compare that to her own dynamic with a certain vampire with a soul when she was a teenager. I just want Buffy to look into the weird mirror and see the more healthy vampire-teenager dynamic being reflected back at her and making her have to think about her relationship. This idea could probably be done with just all Buffy characters and just having, I don’t know, Dawn as the Slayer and Spike as the vampire with a soul but the Star Wars fic got me thinking about it and I like those characters. It would be fun to see them interact without the baggage of the Star Wars story, just a thought.

[madtank95]

Screen Time vs In World Time

R2D2 and C3P0 got introduced through the OG trilogy as being with Luke and if you think it though timeline wise, they’ve definitely spent more time with him and Leia than they did with Anakin and Padme in universe. But because of how much screen time we get of Anakin with R2 and C3P0 with Padme in the Clone Wars show, I always associate them with those respective pairings rather than Luke and Leia. It’s an interesting thought to how screen exposure works for audience associations.

[madtank95]

Star Wars Prequel Idea

I’ve been reading some forums where older Star Wars fans talk about what they thought of the Jedi and the Clone Wars before the Prequel Trilogy and apparently a common thought was that the big events happened at earlier points and more spread out over time. Like the clone wars were 40 years before A New Hope and the Empire rose a few years later and the Jedi massacre a few years after that with the Jedi Order being a lot less organized and integrated with the Old Republic which had me thinking about what a possible Prequel Trilogy could be like with that timeline and set up in mind. Like, I totally understand why all those events and Anakin’s Fall were condensed like they were in those movies and I love all of the material that’s come from that, in the Clone Wars show and other extended media but I find this an interesting idea to think about.

So what if the Jedi Order was a lot more secret and scattered with individual Jedi Knights acting largely independently across the galaxy but with a loose organizational structure for Knights to be able to rely on one another as needed. The first movie would be the tail end of the final Clone War, with the implication of there having been a long and brutal series of wars previously that caused chaos in the galaxy and had the Old Republic scrambling to maintain control, the wars were between several different planets over the use and nature of clones, with multiple armies of them being deployed against each other. Many Jedi Knight were dragged into the affair through their personal Oaths and Codes of Conduct, including a young Anakin and Obi-Wan, roughly in their early and late twenties respectively. This first movie has Anakin completing his formal training as a Knight and meeting Padme during the final days of this last war. The second movie would be about a decade after the first, maybe opening with Anakin and Padme being married. This marriage would not be a secret, it was just a thing that happened. This movie would cover the fall of the Republic and the rise of the Empire while Anakin is shown to be more and more disillusioned with the state of the Galaxy, setting up for his eventual Fall. During this movie he would end up coming into contact with Emperor Palpatine and he would be seen buying into his vision for the Empire. Meanwhile the Jedi, early of where the Empire is going, secretly start to form up in opposition. This would be a big deal because the Jedi aren’t known to come together in mass like this. The third movie would cover Anakin being fully seduced to the dark side and the Jedi revolting against the Empire which only ends in tragedy and sets up why no true opposition happened for another 20 years. Padme would be with the Jedi in their opposition and would run from Anakin, now Vader, to have her children and secret and set them up to be with their respective foster families. Padme would be personal friends with Bail and Breha while Owen and Beru would be Anakin’s actual family. I see it as Anakin leaving home behind to seek out his fortune as a teenager and not bothering to stay in contact. Maybe rather than Leia and Luke being twins, she’s a few years older so she is able to have an actual memory of her mother and Padme is pregnant with only Luke. She leaves Luke with Owen and Beru and fakes Leia’s death before clashing with Vader a final time before her own death. The Jedi insurrection and eventual massacre would be the backdrop of the family story.

I have no idea how this could actually feasibly work as a trilogy of movies but they were some ideas I’ve been playing with.

[madtank95]

Star Wars Fic Idea

So the big reason that Palpatine was able to set up his Galactic Empire so easily was because the Old Republic had degraded into essentially being the Empire already and he was in total control of both sides of the Clone Wars. So what if he lost control of the war? Before he succumbed to Palpatine’s manipulations, Dooku was pretty sincere about his beliefs so I imagine he could be talked back around. Since Palpatine has to stay in the shadows for his plans the real control of the Separatists lies with Dooku, if he decides to split from Palpatine, then the Clone Wars could very quickly become genuine. It’s just a matter of convincing Dooku that he’s being played, which would probably bes happen if he figured out earlier that Palpatine was grooming Anakin to be his replacement.

In terms of narrative my idea is that Anakin and Padme are on some kind of diplomacy mission that goes wrong and they end up trapped somewhere with Dooku. They need to be alone without Obi-Wan or another Jedi to influence Anakin and they need to all be on equal footing so it can’t be Dooku capturing them. The have to all be equally stranded and have to work together. I think Padme would be willing to talk to Dooku, she had her own doubts about the current Republic and has a strong moral compass that would be able to help course correct the Separatist side. Then if Anakin talks about Palpatine it would be pretty easy for Dooku to figure out his plans for him and what that would mean for himself considering the Rule of Two. The basic idea of the Separatists actually paints them in the better light, they just all what planetary independence away from the Republic. Considering the Republic is in many ways already the Empire in all but name at this point, I feel like that’s understandable. The real problem is that the Separatists keep doing evil shit at the behest of Palpatine and Dooku. I think it could be turned around into a proper movement. Palpatine would probably still end up turning the remaining Republic into an Empire but it wouldn’t be the same size and power as the original. I also imagine in this scenario that Anakin would defect from the Jedi Order and join up with Padme who would convince her Queen to have Naboo join the CIS. The two would then go public with their marriage. If this happens after Ahsoka has already left the Order then it would be simple for her to join up with them as well. I imagine these very public moves by them also have the potential to cause more Jedi who have their own doubts to leave and join up with them. I think there would be a proper Jedi schism. You would also eventually get clones defecting as well, up until Palpatine made use of their chips. Not sure how that would be dealt with, but I’m sure it would be messy. I think eventually the Jedi Order would also start putting planets under their protection separate from Palpatine’s Empire and the Separatists, leading to three big factions in the Galaxy. Obi-Wan would unfortunately probably stick it out with the Order rather than follow Anakin and Ahsoka, he’s always seemed too bound to them to truly consider leaving, especially if Satine is already dead. I think she might be the only way he would actually leave the Order. Anyway, those are my ideas.

Another fic idea I have would be having the movie canon versions of Luke and Leia somehow end up in a universe where all of this happened and meet their parents and versions of themselves raised by them in this universe, plus some younger siblings. I think Anakin and Padme would have had more kids after the twins if they could have. Just think that would lead to some interesting dynamics. Especially from Leia who I imagine is a total Daddy’s Girl in both worlds, but with very different fathers.

[madtank95]

ROTBTD - Old Idea

So I was re-watching Tangled the other day and it made me think back on the old Rise of the Brave Tangled Dragons fandom and this idea I had at the time. Now, seeing as this was before J.K. Rowling showed her true stripes, it was a Harry Potter AU idea, kind of. It was a pretty popular trope to have the characters from the movies in the fandom all go to Hogwarts as students, some did a better job integrating them into the Harry Potter world than others. One thing that was often pretty common was having Jack, Hiccup, Merida and Rapunzel be friends and/or couple up with each other while their respective supporting casts were all either kind of ignored or just not used well. Especially the love interests, poor Eugene and Astrid got shunted a lot. Anyway, I had this idea where the four from the Harry Potter world would be testing out some ritual or spell or something and accidentally bring their counterparts from their movies to their world.

In my mind, all four movies, or five if you want to include the Frozen gang, would exist in the same world but none of them would be friends or even really know each other. It would also make their world a super post-apocalyptic world where society at some point collapsed and then humanity eventually recovered but forgot their past and also magic became more commonplace. This would make Jack, like, a few thousand years old or something like that. Anyway, all the others would be pretty much as they were after their movies, minus HTTYD 3 because I wasn’t a fan and also I don’t think it was out when I had this idea.

The main idea for the fic was to just have the four protagonists from the fandom in their most fandomy setting interacting with their movie versions-ish. I ended up getting a little carried away with the inherent worldbuilding to make it works for the original versions to exist in the same world when Jack was in regular modern times. It would be easier to pull them all from their own worlds but I though it would be fun for the movie versions to have their own more antagonists if relationships with each other compared to their Hogwarts fandom counterparts. I also had the idea that their man supporting cast would be with them to mess with the interactions.

In a lot of the Hogwarts AU’s, Hiccup is ostracized by the other Viking teenagers and finds new friends in Jack, Merida and Rapunzel so seeing a version of himself who was actually close to Astrid, Fishlegs, Snotlout and the twins would be interesting.

Likewise for Merida and her three would-be suitors. I pictured Merida becoming friends with them after her movie as she got to know them, though she is still not romantically interested in any of them.

For Rapunzel, I think my original idea was that she would be close to the Frozen since she didn’t have a huge supporting cast. But now, we could have Cassandra, Lance and Varían. Or maybe some of the guys from the Snuggly Duckling. Seeing tiny Rapunzel surrounded by these huge ex-convicts and the interacting with the Hogwarts fandom versions would be fun. The main thing would be having her and Eugene be super romantic and sweet with each other while their counterparts barely know each other.

Then, of course, there’d be Jack, who I always pictured as being absolutely ancient to contracts with a very mortal teenage version of himself, I also often pictured him accompanied by feral winter spirits, and sometimes Peter Pan because I also had an idea at the time of Pan being a spirit.

It was a pretty messy idea and way too ambitious with all of the characters needing to be included and developed, especially since they’d be super different from who everyone knows. I don’t know, it was a fine idea back then but I’m not sure my explanation made any sense.

Oh well, just wanted to get the old idea out there.

[madtank95]

Sailor Moon Thoughts

So I get that the inherent tragedy in Sailor Moon is that unlike everyone else, Usagi has the most to lose in becoming a sailor senshi. She had a normal life and all the heartbreak she deals with comes as a direct result of her choosing to be Sailor Moon and fight. Meanwhile Mamoru and all the other senshi are gifted friends and community through being their hero selves where before, none of them really had satisfying lives. What always breaks my heart though is the fact that apparently Usagi is the only one to get reincarnated into a happy life, which feels like total BS. Minako, Ami and Rei all have distant parents that leave them pretty isolated and Makoto and Mamoru are just straight up orphans. I always feel particularly bad for Mamoru, he loses his parents and ends up with amnesia with only the dreams of his past life to act as any kind comfort. He also doesn’t ever get the chance to reunite with his shitennou, who never really got the chance to benefit from their new lives. It just sucks for them.

[madtank95]

Dragon Ball Fic Idea

So I’ve been reading some self-insert stories recently, not normally my cup of tea but they can be fun if done well, and I had an idea.

A person from the real world is reborn into an anime version of Dragon Ball where all of the filler episodes and movies are real… but they only read the manga.

[madtank95]

One Piece - The Hat

So it seems to be generally accepted that the straw hat represents, like, the will of River of something and while that definitely seems to be the case for Shanks in giving it to Luffy, I like the idea that that was not the case for Roger. We see Roger wearing the hat when he first sets out but I don’t think we ever see it when he’s properly a captain? He’s always in a big ole pirate hat. So I had this idea that Roger wore it for a bit but then he got a proper pirate outfit as time went on and he just ditched the straw hat but never really got around to actually getting rid of it. So for, like, years, it was just chilling in his cabin and he didn’t think anything of it. Then one day his two little cabin boys are playing around in his room and find it, Shanks just kind of pops it on his head and is like, mine now. Buggy isn’t interested, not flashy enough, but Shanks thinks it’s super cool. Then he later learns it was the hat Roger was wearing when he set out from Loguetown and that just sealed the deal for him. His hat forever now, at least until he meets a goofy little anchor who seemed to need it more than him.

So yeah, that’s my idea, let me know if it’s been disproven but I really don’t remember being told how Shanks got the hat.

[madtank95]

Dragon Ball Headcannon

DB’s Earth used to be more like our regular Earth minus the aliens and ki stuff but then Kami made the dragon balls and people started wishing for things like dinosaurs and animal people.

[madtank95]

Marvel Thoughts

My ideal Marvel world would have the O5 X-Men, Spider-Man and the Human Torch all be about 40 or so, give or take depending on the individual with the age order going Hank, Warren, Scott, Jean, Peter, Johnny, Bobby.

I want Jean and Scott to be married to each other, maybe it’s a slightly open thing but they are definetly together.

I also want Peter and MJ to be married and with a kid or two, give me Mayday and Annie I beg you.

I also want Johnny to be in a happy relationship with someone, maybe Wyatt? I don’t know, I just want him to be happy.

Bobby is figuring himself out, him being closer to 40 before his coming out I think really fits him and the best version that story goes for him. He needs to eventually find himself a nice boyfriend though, that would be great for him.

I’ll be honest, don’t know enough about Warren’s and Hank’s respective love lives to have too strong of an opinion but they’ve had a time of it, they probably still need to work on themselves or something.

Anyway, those are my thoughts. The original teen heroes of Marvel are how I center the sliding timescale of it all, and I think time just really needs to be added on to them to make it all fit.

[madtank95]

Dragon Ball Super Idea

So one of the problems with Super is that it’s set, like, seven years after the Buu Saga but none of the littler kids have really aged. Goten and Turnks should be 14 and 15 respectively, maybe a year or so younger than that but definetly in the teen ball park. I get that Super wanted some cute younger kids to have misadventures with but it’s just weird for Goten and Trunks to take that role and even weirder for Marron who is apparently still a toddler. I think they should have had Marron take on the role of cute young kid to do adventures with, she would have been perfect as the 10-year-old she was supposed to be. If they wanted a duo they could have given Yamcha a kid too, didn’t he always say he wanted a family? That would have been perfect.

Or if they didn’t mind going further away from DBZ canon, let Goku and Chi-Chi have another kid, Bulma and Vegeta too. It would make sense for both sets to have a kid right after Buu considering they went through some pretty serious emotional upheavals then that might have made them careless. Goku came back to life and Vegeta mostly finished his personal character growth. That might be getting into fanfic territory though.

My big thing is that Goten, Trunks and Marron had their ages all out of wack for Super and Marron would have been the perfect age to do cute kid stuff if she’d been closer to 10 like she was supposed to be.

[madtank95]

Dragon Ball Fic Idea

So a while back I reach a Dragon Ball fic where Future Trunks joined the time patrol and met an alternate Goten and the two fell in love. I thought this was a really neat premise but I wasn’t a big fan of the alternate Goten’s backstory. He came from a world that was mostly the same as the regular timeline up until the Goku Black arc where it was instead more of a Gohan Black situation, the idea of Gohan Black destroying the timeline is fine, I still like that, what trips me up is having everything else be the same as regular DBZ until that point. It just doesn’t feel quite right for Goten to get with Future Trunks when he already had and lost his Trunks. So I was thinking it would be better if Goten came from a world without a Trunks and instead his childhood friend was his cousin Daiko (or whatever name). In this reality Vegeta’s presence on Earth is essentially replaced by Raditz. So Goten and his cousin end up losing their timeline and joining the time patrol like Trunks and Mai lost their’s after the Goku Black arc and then they meet and Trunks and Goten fall in love. That’s pretty much it. I have some ideas for a more detailed background on how Raditz ended up on Earth instead of Vegeta, but that switch is essentially my big idea.

[madtank95]

Spider-Man Thoughts

I like the idea of Miles getting his own hero name that isn’t Spider-Man, I don’t mind him just also being Spider-Man but letting him get his own identity would be cool. He’s apparently going by Spin right now which is a terrible name, my vote would be to let him go by Araña since Anya switched to Spider-Girl. Miles is puerto-rican through his mom, so I would be a perfect fit.

[madtank95]

BNHA Massive Crossovers

I love the idea of a a crossover set in the My Hero Academia world where heroes and students from other countries are characters from other fandoms with their powers adapted to fit the My Hero Academia world. I’ve only seen a couple but it’s been really cool every time. Helps fill out the world and is just all together neat.

[madtank95]

Naruto Headcannon

So it seems pretty common in fandom for Kakashi to have some kind of dependency on his mask or for it to be this big thing that no one ever sees his face, but I’ve always thought it would be kind of funny if that actually wasn’t the case. Like, he wears it as part of his uniform because he thought it made him look cool as a kid (and maybe to make people take him more seriously considering he was a ten years old jonin) but he doesn’t bother with it when he’s in plainclothes. He only started making an effort into really trying to hide his face because Team 7 made such a big deal about seeing it. I know this is a little incompatible with a few scenes we’ve had of him alone in his apartment but whatever, I just think it would be really funny if Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke were literally the only people in Konoha who hadn’t seen his face and that messing with them was the sole reason Kakashi insisted on the mask being included on the Hokage Monument.

[madtank95]

Soulmate AU

I enjoy reading soulmate au fic, it can provide a fun twist to character dynamics. I was reading one recently where the two main characters were both men and one was dealing with some homophobia and it had me thinking. Would there actually be homophobia in a world that had concretely proven the existence of soulmates? I feel like most religions would view that as the work of what ever deity or deities they worship, so if your soulmate was the same gender as you, then it would have to decided as such by whoever you think decides that kind of thing. People will always come up with a justification for their bigotry so maybe not but I don’t know, it was just a thought.