Whenever I read your posts about Bruce's plastic surgery and adjacents, I mainly imagine botox, fillers, and brow lifts. Instead of the partial face reconstructions. Neither of which are especially bad.
And it cracks me up, as well as unnerves me, to imagine Batman with his cowl highlighting his lips with migrating filler. I just don't think the fear factor would have the same effect.
I always say, the filler we notice is bad filler -- lots of celebrities get very tasteful, minimal filler in places we won't notice. Even the big stuff like a full face and neck lift can look terrible when overdone, and tasteful when minimally invasive (see Debbie Harry for a good example of this).
I love thinking about the world of reconstructive plastic surgery and how it applies to the Bats, so much so that I wrote that fic about it. I've been watching a ton of TikTok videos about it, and it's truly artistry -- when to add filler, when to add plates, when to go in and graft, etc. They're all very subjective decisions, and it generally is all done with the goal of looking as much like the previous version of yourself, not anything new. And with modern technology and practices, people can get pretty damn close these days.
But yeah, just a few rapid-fire things I could imagine Bruce getting for Batman and non-Batman reasons: Rhinoplasty (revision or reconstructive), fillers (age-related volume loss in cheeks and lips, but very minimal), laser resurfacing/etc (he doesn't spend a ton of time in the sun but this helps him look younger for the cameras etc), botox (eyebrows, he scowls way too much without it, and maybe the corners of his mouth), reconstructive surgery (one bad hit across a cheekbone shattered it, the orbital bone above, and maybe his jaw/a few teeth?), scar revision (long thin scar at hairline from almost being scalped by a shattered cowl; tabloids play it off as a bad facelift scar if they see it heh), dental implants (slowly but surely, all of his teeth are replaced with titanium implants to avoid losing them all with one bad hit), and maybe a hair transplant in his later later years (expected of a billionaire, good work is much more available these days, modern tech keeps improving; if not a transplant then he probably eventually uses meds/minox. unless he's lucky enough genetically to hold onto all of it into his 70's a la Alfred (Jeremy Irons)).
not to start drama but I think any and every of those plastic surgeons with millions of followers on tiktok who makes "haha I can fix this for you when you're 18! ;)" jokes or "here are my rates!" comments under all those videos of young girls beauty-checking themselves should get a ride in that Sicilian metal torture bull.
WHEN: Right Before Interviews
WHERE: Backstage Hallway (??)
...
That's it: Crane Crestfall is the bane of her existence.
It's been impossible to escape the giant's glare; her smile stuck still and pinned as if she was surgically altered to look that goddamn disturbing all the time. It's made an already stressful even even more stressful. It's stripped her completely privacy and if there's one thing that Fava needs, it's privacy, and she can't get a moment to herself at all. Crane even followed her to the bathroom. Twice. Just in case she needed help with her dress.
Which is horrible, by the way. Stripped of her personality too, Fava wears is the same neutral grey warned by the miners in her District, but it's all wrong. It's pretty and perfect and draping in all the right places, lacking completely in any edge or spark. She wonders if those around her can tell how much she hates the way she has to pick it up to walk so as not to fall flat on her face. (Damn these heels. She'll never get used to them.)
It is Hudson -- sweet Hudson -- that fakes a fashion emergency in order to give her five minutes to herself. She spends two of them walking as fast as she can to the area she was supposed to be at fifteen minutes ago. Aldera is already there, causing Fava to exhale in annoyance. "I'm sorry," she says as she approaches the victor. "I couldn't get away sooner." But that's neither here nor there. They have time together now. "Do you know what you're going to say?"
It feels like people from the outer districts never do. They're not given advantages.
do you think superheroes get plastic surgery? do you think that after constant media attention, fundraising galas, critical news coverage worse than the most rabid tabloid, and millions of dollars of merchandise with their faces and bodies on it, do you think after all that they get tired of seeing themselves? do you think they think they should look different? after getting your jaw or nose broken by a punch half a dozen times so that it's permanently crooked and misshapen, or alien acidic blood all over your face that scars like the worst acne you've ever seen, or seeing so much pinup art of the perfect version of you in and out of costume, would you pay to change yourself? just getting your skin smoothed out, straightening your nose, hiding scar tissue, that sort of thing. and while you're at it, why not smooth the wrinkles above your eyes, make your chest a little bigger (male or female), make your stomach a little flatter; why not? when you are the face of the free world as much as the president or the prime minister, when your face is analyzed and picked apart and commented on even more, do you think it would make you doubt whether your face was worth being looked at so much? of hanging on people's walls, being on their tshirts, on billboards and signs in times square? you have the money, so why not? most people with this much press are probably at least 50% plastic at this point, right? what is the right balance between gritty, authentic realism and the photogenic face of the ones people want to see saving the world?
I just saw those asks and wanted to chime in. I also hate my breasts and have been researching surgeons. For that I use google. For example, I will need reconstructive surgery so I googled breast reconstructive surgeons. Found some good ones. So google that shit girl.
Also, look into Care Credit. Most people use credit cards or loans to pay for plastic surgeries.
And the roundness you want is bc they probably had no breast tissue aka flat chested so all it is is the implant. that’s why they look perfectly round like that bc implants are perfectly round.
At first, it started with small comments that Kyuu didn’t even recognize to be those kinds of comments at the time. Ones where he was too young to know what the underlying subtext was that was being conveyed, a sweet compliment camouflaging the venom hidden beneath. Oh Minkyu, you're such a handsome boy, if only your nose was a little smaller. His mother would speak these words and pat him on the head, as if she was praising him instead of ridiculing him for a feature he’d likely inherited from herself.
These comments only continued growing up, becoming more and more frequent, words echoed by their father ( no doubt at the instruction of his mother ) and his aunt. Although, his aunt’s comments were more snide, even while she pretended she wasn’t bragging about the fact that she felt her own child didn’t need a nose job, unlike Minkyu. He was imperfect, and her side of the family was better. Depending on who you asked.
Once he became older and his parents started pushing him into auditions and tryouts for various different groups, labels, and sports teams, it was just another thing about him that wasn’t enough. Another thing to be improved ( his mother’s words ) upon. Although this thing couldn’t be changed with hard work, talent, or determination like she’d previously insisted was the key to any success. The only thing that could improve this problem of his, was going under the knife. It was something that she became somewhat fixated upon, young Minkyu’s mother convinced that if he’d have just a little ( if there’s such a thing ) nose job, the first company that had been auditioned for, would have been the last. His audition was good, but in her own words, he didn’t look the part.
Nevermind the disappointment and guilt he already felt for letting his family down. It was obviously very comforting for a young boy to know that his mother had never really believed in him in the first place.
With her mind made up, and his father being unable to care about it either way, the more that Minkyu was rejected for, the more his mother became convinced that this was the only answer. This was the thing that was going to pave the way for a high paying career for him. With this new nose, he could become a famous actor, or a television host, or an idol. So when the day came that her son turned seventeen years of age, her gift to him that year was a signed parental consent form, and an appointment card. Her gift to her son, was rhinoplasty. Regardless of how nervous and uncertain he felt about it.
The thought of going under the knife was terrifying, but after so many years of verbal abuse in regards to his looks, another just as terrifying thought was that the constant scolding from his mother and ridicule of his features would continue until the day one of them died. Another, even scarier thought, was that there was a chance Minkyu could go through with the surgery, and nothing would change. There would be no callbacks, or increased opportunities presented to him with this newly structured nose. Deep down, there was the worry that this was all his own fault, that he simply wasn’t good enough. It made him feel nauseous to think that the years of hard work he’d made himself sick over ( physically and mentally ) countless times, was for nothing.
With little verbal protest against his parents, roughly a month passed before he went through with the procedure. He was taken to the clinic, his mother only accompanying him as proof that the permission slip was signed by a real, legal parent or guardian, and then she departed. A quick kiss to the forehead was all she left her son with, telling him how excited she was to see his new nose when it was all over. Not him, his nose.
A hazy teenager woke in the foreign recovery room, scared and alone. Really, it didn’t hurt as much as he’d anticipated, but they’d also given him some very good painkillers. They waited until he was more cognizant before they gave him a drink and instructions, telling him when to change his dressings, how often, and with what. It also had recovery times, what he should be expecting, and where to contact if he had any further questions once he left the clinic. One of the nice nurses asked him when his mother was coming to see him, and the stern look that was barely visible beneath his swollen eyes contradicted the way his heart ached when he told her that she wasn’t, and asked if she could call him a taxi for him when he was felling better. If the expression across her own features was any indication, he likely wasn’t the first child to give her that answer, and he wouldn’t be the last.
The recovery process went well, and Minkyu diligently did as he was instructed. He went to all of his follow up appointments, changed his new dressings just like he’d been shown, and rarely took the additional pain killers that had been provided. With this, he noticed a steady improvement of the bruising around his nose and eyes as the days went by. One thing they hadn’t taught him at the clinic, was how to deal with his mother’s incessant questioning about when it was going to be healed, and comments about how they’d wasted her money, and if they’d even done anything, since the swelling was hiding a lot of the obvious change. Never mind the fact that Minyku had told her maybe twenty times, that it can take between six weeks and two months for it to fully heal. Maybe if she’d accompanied him to any one of his appointments, she could have asked the doctor this herself.
It was roughly a month after the surgery had fully healed when it happened. The audition for Summit Media. With how out of commission he had been with recovering, he’d worked harder than he likely ever had in his life to prepare for it, determined to show that something that was supposed to help him succeed, hadn’t secretly been a hindrance. When he received the call that they wanted to sign him to become a trainee with the company, it was like he could finally breathe for the first time in his life, a decade of grueling work, sweat and tears finally paying off for him. Excitedly, Minkyu immediately ran to tell his mother the good news, that he’d made it, that he’d made her proud. Standing from where she had been seated as she read through a magazine, she leaned forward, and at first it seemed as if she was going to hug him. Only of course that was too good to be true. Instead, she leaned toward, fingers gently reaching out to squeeze the tip of his now much more slender nose while she grinned at him. “I told you so.”
