InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "WITH FIRE AND BLOOD!!!!!!!!!!!"

kingrockwell (kingrockwell) wrote in scans_daily,
@ 2009-11-01 22:03:00

Entry tags:

char: azrael/jean paul valley, char: batgirl/cassandra cain, char: batgirl/oracle/barbara gordon, in-joke: context is for the weak

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	sistermagpie 2009-11-02 03:09 am UTC (link)
	Did Barbara give her that? (Reply to this) (Thread)

	kingrockwell 2009-11-02 03:10 am UTC (link)
	It's hard to get good presents in NML. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	manofbats 2009-11-02 03:09 am UTC (link)
	I am really glad that guy is dead. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	perletwo 2009-11-02 03:20 am UTC (link)
	Dude. So sorry. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	manofbats 2009-11-02 03:21 am UTC (link)
	Black Lantern = Still Dead (Reply to this) (Parent)

	kingrockwell 2009-11-02 03:22 am UTC (link)
	And now we'll never get hilariously awkward beats like this ever again. :( (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	bluefall 2009-11-02 03:34 am UTC (link)
	Oh, sure we will. There's nothing in JP's character, or... actually, in this dialog, to demand his awesome raged-out reaction face there. I think it's just a huge moment of artist!fail, and those can happen to anyone. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	kingrockwell 2009-11-02 03:38 am UTC (link)
	Except, well, his implied crush on Cass. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	bluefall 2009-11-02 03:45 am UTC (link)
	Given she's developmentally fourteen and he's just shy of graduating college when we meet him (which is some time before this, even with compression), I find any such implication both intensely squicky and frankly, pretty hard to even credit. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	akodo_rokku 2009-11-02 04:35 am UTC (link)
	To be fair, he was almost as fucked in the head as she is. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

bluefall
2009-11-02 04:53 am UTC (link)

Eh, that was the weird thing about JP, his personality varied wildly. When we first meet him he's a completely normal college student, and throughout his time as AzBats, he's steadily more and more homicidal and cult-y, but it's a completely adult psychosis - a totally competent, informed, deliberate rejection of society and its rules. He was fucked in the head, yes, but in the same way that, say, Scarecrow is. A normal man with abnormal values.

Then once he spun off as Azrael again and started getting costume changes and his own series, suddenly he was naive childlike raised-by-wolves boy who had a twelve-year-old's understanding of the opposite sex and no comprehension of the existence or purpose of perfume. Out of nowhere, he's a completely abnormal man with normal values... a male Cass, as it were.

But only half the time. The other half the time, he acted like a perfectly average American college student who'd suddenly gotten sucked into a bizarre world of superheroes and prophecy.

I mean, admittedly he did, explicitly, have a split personality, but that wasn't the split. The Jean-Paul half was supposed to behave consistently; the conflict was supposed to be between "normal good-natured guy" and "divine assassin," there really wasn't supposed to be anything fucked-up about "normal good-natured guy" beyond "periodically turns into divine assassin." Which is not a good match with Cass' fuckedupedness, which just makes her emotionally ten years younger than she physically is, all the time.

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	akodo_rokku 2009-11-02 05:28 am UTC (link)
	I agree on all points. But from a relatively shallow view (and lets be honest most readers -- hell most WRITERS don't put half as much thought into these things as SDers do) it seems like something they would grow together and bond over. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	pyrotwilight 2009-11-02 05:34 am UTC (link)
	Pretty much why I would've liked to see them together. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

pepperspray101
2009-11-02 12:01 pm UTC (link)

Same here. Though, I would love it if Cass found him alive NOW as she is (an older more mature adult) and they'd start up their friendship again and get close later on. Ya know, like finding an old friend you never would've thought to date, but suddenly seeing them in a new light or realizing you two are different people now after so many years and things actually work out well for you. The fact that they've been apart for so long helps here.

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	kingrockwell 2009-11-02 04:47 am UTC (link)
	And that just makes it all the more awkward! (to clarify, i'm not endorsing a JPV/Cass ship, but that issue really read that way to me. it was weird) (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	pepperspray101 2009-11-02 12:03 pm UTC (link)
	He's the only one who's never had awkward moments with her (probably cuz he's just as much of a freak as she is...compared to the other batclan members). He seems to take all her quirks in stride since he first met her. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	kingrockwell 2009-11-02 01:15 pm UTC (link)
	Maybe it not for them, but for anyone watching, like the reader, yeah it was hella awkward. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	pepperspray101 2009-11-02 01:42 pm UTC (link)
	lol. well yeah, that's part of their charm. XD They were clueless about eachother's weirdness. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	icon_uk 2009-11-02 07:13 pm UTC (link)
	I agree it would be weird, but developmentally in some area's he's not much better than she is (thanks to the training messing with his head). He mentions (in a Devin Grayson Gotham Knights IIRC) that he has absolutely no idea how to deal with women in a romantic way, and seems genuinely confused by the whole process. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	volksjager 2009-11-02 03:45 am UTC (link)
	Wow, awkward. (Reply to this)

	toasty_fresh 2009-11-02 03:48 am UTC (link)
	Okay I will admit that I laughed out loud at this. (Reply to this)

	pyrotwilight 2009-11-02 04:00 am UTC (link)
	Uh oh Sentry's angry. Kidding aside I loved the possibility of the Jean Paul/Cassandra pairing. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	yaseen101 2009-11-02 04:07 am UTC (link)
	Umm...she is 14 and he is in his early to mid 20's, of course this shipping and there are no exceptions. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	scottyquick 2009-11-02 04:12 am UTC (link)
	She's actually like 20 now. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	ex_darkblade992 2009-11-02 04:13 am UTC (link)
	and he's dead making shipping still akward. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	yaseen101 2009-11-02 05:07 am UTC (link)
	You are forgetting what medium you are in. Nobody stays dead in comics and Rule 34 of the Internet. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	yaseen101 2009-11-02 05:04 am UTC (link)
	Where does it say that she is 20? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	parsimonia 2009-11-02 08:14 am UTC (link)
	Actually she's 17 at this point. Early on in her Batgirl series, Babs says she's 17, so she would have been that same age during the NML story. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

pepperspray101
2009-11-02 12:10 pm UTC (link)

hm...that can't be right. NML happened quite some time before War Games/Drums, no? LIke a year or two? And at the start of War Games, it was hinted she was 18 at the least...(same age as Jason Todd who would've been starting college had he lived with Bruce). My understanding is that Cass had to be 15-16 when she first became Batgirl (during NML)...She's like...one or two years older than Tim, no? He was 14-15 during NML? (or when was it that they celebrated his 16th birthday?) guh...comic ages hurt my brain.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

	pyrotwilight 2009-11-02 05:33 am UTC (link)
	Like I've said before in another thread. They're the most awkward couple socially of the Bat Clan. Odds are they wouldn't even kiss for the first few hundred dates. Jean Paul is pretty much a little kid socially especially when it comes to women. Cass is well...Cass... Add that both were trained/created to be weapons and well... (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	yaseen101 2009-11-02 06:30 am UTC (link)
	Well I realize that you mean them as in they are the most socially inept/siblings/ friends sort of thing but it looked like you were trying to make them out as couples in your last post. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

pepperspray101
2009-11-02 12:23 pm UTC (link)

Well, they've been apart for several years now and Cass is an adult who can talk and read. Basically, she's a different person from the silent uneducated teenager that JP met back in the day. That's not saying that they'd jump into being a couple right away.

I guess it's like rediscovering old friends/acquaintances. After the catching up period ends, you start seeing them in a different light because well...they're different people now. People that you never would've thought to date back in high school (or middle school for some)...now years later, are very different individuals. So it's like meeting them for the first time and finding them more interesting.

I can see the age gap bothering JP more than it would Cass, actually. lol, eh, give'em time. Ten years from this, the age gap won't be such a big deal.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

	tacobob 2009-11-02 02:55 pm UTC (link)
	JP: "YOU SURE DO GOT PRETTY TEETH BATGIRL!" BG: FLEE! (Reply to this) (Parent)

	nagaoka 2009-11-02 04:15 am UTC (link)
	This is so great if read as an aside to the audience. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	stillawkward 2009-11-02 07:19 am UTC (link)
	HAHAHA. Good call. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	spiritoftherain 2009-11-02 12:00 pm UTC (link)
	Oh god, can't unsee. EXTREME YELLING CLOSE-UP AT AUDIENCE. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	tacobob 2009-11-02 02:56 pm UTC (link)
	that's because HE'S EXTREME! (Reply to this) (Parent)

	SHE SMELLS GOOD ALREADY, BARBARA!! 3goodtimes 2009-11-02 07:27 am UTC (link)
	Hahaha! Gear down, big rig! (Reply to this)

	parsimonia 2009-11-02 08:15 am UTC (link)
	I did LOL. (Reply to this)

arilou_skiff
2009-11-02 12:02 pm UTC (link)

Snerch.

I love stuff like that.

Reminds me of THe first ep. of Sora no Maniamani where this guy is screaming at his childhood friend (who used to drag him onto zany adventures that eventually got him hospitalized) about "I hated it and it was raining and terrible you always interrupted me and WHY DIDN'T YOU COME VISIT ME AT THE HOSPITAL!?"

Which just makes everyone kind of stop.

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	pepperspray101 2009-11-02 12:25 pm UTC (link)
	okay...I admit it. that made me curious about that series now. LOL! loves stuff like this too (Reply to this) (Parent)

pepperspray101
2009-11-02 12:29 pm UTC (link)

Bwa ha ha...oh JP, and oh art, you're too funny.

I really liked Cass and Azrael's interaction in this issue. Were they always this chummy? I recall reading about an issue where Azrael goes a bit off the deep end or something...and its up to Cass to save/stop him?

Or...he goes off the deep end and everyone has to fight to stop him, Cass included. I keep wondering how Cass reacted to JP when he lost it. Was she sympathetic or just treated it like any other mission of stopping a baddie. Was he just as mean to her as he was to the others?

ANYONE KNOW WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT? I want more JP/Cass interaction!!

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kingrockwell
2009-11-02 01:57 pm UTC (link)

I've only ever read the NML tie-ins, and they end up working together a lot once she assumes the Batgirl mantle. I dunno if they ever work together after that. He shows up in Officer Down, but only as a tank.

Doing some digging, she's discussed in #84 with no actual appearance, and she shows up in #94 while he's telling off the Batfamily, but hardly as anything more than a background element.

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	daningram 2009-11-02 07:42 pm UTC (link)
	What's he say about Cass in 84? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	kingrockwell 2009-11-03 12:58 am UTC (link)
	He and Oracle are talking about a meta he has to take down, and he doesn't think he can do it. Babs mentions that Cass recently won against a meta (it would've been in her series, but i dunno which issue without digging further, though the panel they show to ref it looks like a Damion Scott swipe), but he's still apprehensive, since he's hardly Cass. That's it. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	pepperspray101 2009-11-03 07:42 am UTC (link)
	Ah, I wanna see how they work together! hm...interesting. Thanks for the info! (Reply to this) (Parent)

	thebigapricot 2009-11-02 02:47 pm UTC (link)
	Cass/JP and Bane/Scandal double date? (Reply to this) (Thread)

	ex_darkblade992 2009-11-02 04:22 pm UTC (link)
	I think JP might not be so happy at such a social arrangement with Bane. (Reply to this) (Parent)