#bearritalks

[sstrawbearri]

basically the best thing a story can have is a woman who is doomed. massive points if she destroys the people around her in response.

[sstrawbearri]

the best part about dick grayson is the fact that his happy-go-lucky nature is a façade built on hundreds of micro-analyses of each current situation and his seemingly carefree expression is a very carefully calculated mask to make sure people in the vicinity are comfortable. when it breaks down it is not because he has suddenly Become Something Else - only that he has failed to contain what usually sits below the surface. also, he really is just unnervingly cheerful in odd situations.

[sstrawbearri]

okay iron lung fandom. we can stop crying about how simon was "never supposed to make it back" now. this is patently untrue and goes against most of the wishes and motivations of the other characters in the film, especially captain ava, who is acting in the explicit interests of the consolidation of iron and the continued survival of all of humanity. they didnt just send him down there with oxygen reserves, food, water, manuals and maps, expensive x-ray camera technology and a computer, not to mention a life vest, just to watch him die. not only is that unbelievably cruel in a way that nobody in that movie is intentionally capable of, it's just a plain old waste of resources. simon is not that tortured.

[sstrawbearri]

im all for "defending evil women characters" but most genuinely she was not evil. nothing she did was cruel or wrong. within the parameters of her story she was one of the only people acting both logically and with the interests of other people in mind.

[sstrawbearri]

"just remember [character] is actually a BAD PERSON!!!" okay 👍

[sstrawbearri]

aint she cute.

[image id: six photos of a handmade soft fabric doll of Captain Ava from the Iron Lung fim. the doll has blond braided felt hair with coloured yarn woven in, a scar over its left eye, a small felt bomber jacket and a jumpsuit over a black shirt. it has button eyes, the right one dark brown and the left one white. the rest of its face is drawn on with alcohol markers, felt tip pens and oil pastel. it is smiling slightly.)

[sstrawbearri]

one of my current favourite readings of Ava is as a woman trying very hard to maintain "favourite daughter" status within the Consolidation. She's fairly young, but she's been given her own crew, towship, and title of Captain. She's obviously aware to some extent that the things she is doing to provide the Consolidation with hope for the future are resulting in unacceptable loss of life, including her own crew. She doesn't appear to be doing anything with regard to her own survival: at every turn, it's "this is bigger than us", "this is more than us", and she does genuinely seem to mean it. Those words aren't just a slogan for her. Her immediate response to being asked to prove her loyalty to her own word ("you promise you'll get me out?") is to offer her own life in return ("i'll come get you myself."). To Captain Ava, it is worth anything, because the only thing she has is a place within a tiny faction that solves its problems by throwing bodies at them.

[sstrawbearri]

likely a lukewarm take but i do believe that a core part of babs' character is that she's intensely overbearingly controlling especially around things that are literally unable to be controlled because such a crucial part of her life was (in her eyes) taken out of her control with a very simple, preventable action. she has to have a finger in every single pie because the one time she didn't, she lost a whole lot more than she was willing to.