Stormwatch #12 - It's all about the Chinspike

[kirke_novak]

Frist of all, I liked this issue. Awe, shock, horror; I know!
Second of all, they finally decided to explain Midnighter's chinspike and the story goes like this:



Seems like Jonn's been MINDTAKING! whooooeeeeeeoooooo, erasing the fact that he exists from the memories of the members of Stormwatch.
But who cares about that, Apollo and Midnighter are flirting again!



Ok, since when it's MIDNIGHTER who's ashamed? It's always been Andrew Apollo that had a problem with people knowing, Midnighter was always a slightly more bloodthirsty Kurt Hummel when it comes to being gay. Oh well...

Despite Midnighter's efforts, MM manages to MINDTAKE! both of them.





Yeah, I'm not buying it since the chinspike has ALREADY BEEN THERE, so someone (Midnighter) already put it there BEFORE the fight. Now I wish MM would had erased that memory, that was such a perfect opportunity that may never return...

Comments

[mrstatham]

Yeah, the chinspike might've already been there, but Midnighter's actually justifying it's use as a weapon to Apollo. He only had his life saved because of the chinspike on that occasion, which implies he MAY have thought it was stupid before hand, but he's keeping it now because it saved his life. I don't see the problem.

[darkknightjrk]

Plus he could say later that, "Yeah, it looks silly to you, but it intimidates the crooked freaks that I faced every day before I met you and this team." I think it's definitely a similar case to Batman where in bright lighting and he's just standing there, he looks like another guy in a superhero outfit--but in the dark, and he's pounding into you, it'll look pretty scary.

[mrstatham]

Pretty much. It's just another offensive weapon, really. It might look dumb - but then as you say, a superhero's costume could look dumb in the wrong light in general. Midnighter's not alone there.

[darkknightjrk]

I think it actually works in that context in the pages--in panels where there's a light behind him and we don't see a lot of his face, the spike gives Midnighter an elongated face that makes him look a touch inhuman. It just doesn't immediately give that context because he's relaxed with his would-be boyfriend.

[sir_mikael]

"but in the dark, and he's pounding into you"

:D

[darkknightjrk]

...Walked right into that one.

[darkknightjrk]

On Midnighter being the one that's more uncomfortable--I think if we're going with the idea that these two are analogues to Superman and Batman, it would make sense that the one who's analogous to the more open and free hero would be more comfortable and the one who'a analogous to holding in emotions for the "good of the mission" wouldn't. Of course, it could be more interesting when there's little twists like that, but that doesn't mean it doesn't make sense.

Besides, with what happens in the story, you can say that Midnighter recently got over that (which makes sense, considering that he was without a doubt the most forward of the two from the beginning) and Apollo just doesn't notice J'onn or consider him a threat at all, because he doesn't have a powerset like Midnighter and he's still somewhat new to the game.

But yeah, it was a good issue--I thought the scene with J'onn and Jenny was really well-done and sad, showing how awful of a violation J'onn is doing to the team, and also showing that J'onn really doesn't want to do this--he likes the team and respects them, but in his mind, he has to go to further his plans. Makes me very curious to see where he'll pop up next.

[kirke_novak]

They had numerous scenes where Midnighter would openly flirt with Apollo, during the missions and in front of people, while Apollo was be the one shying away. They did a complete 180 on that, without any explanation - I call it an inconsistency.

[darkknightjrk]

Well, I guess you could say that there's a subtle difference between being the one flirting and touch and then being touched and flirted on. Midnighter was always the one in that flirter position, and Apollo doing it has a different connotation to his mind.

And yeah, sure, it could be a case of mild inconsistency, it just wasn't such a huge one that I couldn't find a way to figure it out in my head and didn't take me out of the book, if that makes sense.

[shadowpsykie]

why is MM going all minktakey?

[darkknightjrk]

It seems like J'onn has a long game mission to protect the Earth from a threat unknown to us. He's been going through different places, immersing himself into different teams (like what we saw with the Justice League) in order to get them ready for it.

[shadowpsykie]

that;s actually what i thought. that's really intruiging. but why again with the erasure>

[darkknightjrk]

Because he doesn't want anything traced back to him. I guess he figures with the League it either wasn't a big enough deal if they knew, or maybe he DID mind-wipe them, but not to the biggest extent that he did with Stormwatch.

[shadowpsykie]

Midnighter was always a slightly more bloodthirsty Kurt Hummel when it comes to being gay. Oh well...

oh god... can't unsee this now... quick internets! Fan art!

[kirke_novak]

I'm torn, part of me thinks Kurtnighter would NEVER wear a chinspike but then I think "oh god, oh god, HE TOTALLY WOULD!"

But then, I haven't watch Glee in a year, god knows what they did to these characters in that time...

[shadowpsykie]

he'd do it as a fashion statement :D

[kirke_novak]

I can only hope he'd ~~~~~accidentally chinspike Will, Finn and Blaine. Repeatedly. While twirling his sais. In their faces.

Yes. Yes. The fanfic is forming...

[shadowpsykie]

then apollo has to be Karofsky :D

[dewinged]

So Apollo's a bully who assaults Kurtnighter cries some croc tears and is all too easily forgiven?

[shadowpsykie]

croc tears are false tears, those were genuine tears. Yes, Karofsky was a bully, but he was also a scared kid. Not everyone can grow up like Kurtk, being accepted by his friends and family. Sometimes our parents are religious and tell us gay people are going to go to hell. Not everyone can cope like Kurt did. Some people, alot of people, go to a very dark place before they can even begin to accept themselves. and yeah, he went there.

but to reduce his character to nothing more than that, when the actor who played him did an excellent job displaying the emotional complexity in this character is a shallow interpretation at best.

to clarify, he wasn't "easily forgiven" Kurt was polite, but always wary. Santana kept him on a short leash, Finn... well Finn is Finn, and Rachel was one of the ones most protective of him and for one did not welcome David back with open arms. Just because they didn't have an episode dedicated to "everyone hates karofksy, but then works his way back to thier good graces" did not mean it was absent.

[dewinged]

And I'm okay with that. it was a half-assed attempt on the writers to try and force their audience to be sympathetic to a character that up until that point was unlikeable. Even when all the crap went down against Karofsky, I did not feel bad for him.

There is also a subset of the fandom that went right for the shipping the moment he forced the kiss on Kurt. As a gay man, I find that extremely fucking problematic on a personal level. Because 1) That's not hot. At all. And 2) Not all bullies are secretly what they bully and need a hug. Sometimes they're just assholes.

[kirke_novak]

Not all bullies are secretly what they bully and need a hug. Sometimes they're just assholes.

coughsPuckcoughs

[shadowpsykie]

i was going to go with Azimio, he seems the more Legit Ass

[auggie18]

*cough cough* Santana *cough*

"Oh, I'm going to verbally abuse everyone constantly, physically attack a foreign kid until he bleeds, threaten to out a closeted gay guy unless he does what I say, and try to break up my best friend and her boyfriend so I can trick her into sleeping with me, but it's okay because Finn will be a dick and out me and everyone will forget all of the horrible things I've done!"

[shadowpsykie]

again a nother character i love, sympathized with, but who's coming out story did not recieve the same amount of... sensitivity as Kurt's (David is the other) ironically they were each other's beards.

Trigger Warning: Self Injury/Suicide

[shadowpsykie]

Then how is the kiss different than when a guy and a girl who have been at each other's throats ssuddenly kiss in the middle of the fight? most times the "Kiss-ie" melts into it. This scenario played with that in that most of the time there is palatable sexual tension between both characters, in this case it was onsided. it was "WTF!" it was a case of "Slap, slap, kiss, kiss"

as a gay man myslef, I don't think the kiss itself or the shipping after was problematic, if it was (at least for me) it was only slightly so (in the way that all kisses in that trope walk the line of disturbing). It became problematic (in my opinion) when they CONTINUED to ship them after Karofsky escalated the bullying.


I sympathise with Karofsky because i know what it is like to loathe and hate yourself so much for who you are, and what other people think of you. My parents are not like Kurt's. In fact they are almost exactly like Karofsky's. I never once resorted to bullying,and I never would, but that self loathing had to find an outlet, so i DID Self Harm.

Unlike Karofsky I DID have friends i could turn to and who accepted me, and who figuratively tore the razor blades out of my hands.

I am not now, nor will i ever endorse bullying. I have, and sometimes still do, expirience that. Any shipping on my part is pre-escalation and Post "reform" while he was actively bullying and showing no remorse I didn't, all i did at those points was hope the character would come to accept himself for who he is and stop hating himself.

all this of course is just my opinion and you don't have to agree with me at in or in the slightest.

so yeah i agree with you on several points though:
Not all bullies are secretly what they bully and need a hug. Sometimes they're just assholes
Yes i agree with this, but in this case he was NOT just an asshole, he DID need to learn how to accept himself. His buddy, Azimio WAS.

I also agree that it was half assed. They could have spent more time legitimately trying to show HIS story too, then the sympathy would have been more natural, instead of forced in. The writers throw too many balls and storylines into the air instead of focusing on character development of the side characters, or any other character for that matter.

Re: Trigger Warning: Self Injury/Suicide

[salinea]

Then how is the kiss different than when a guy and a girl who have been at each other's throats ssuddenly kiss in the middle of the fight?
Because Kurt was genuinely terrified of him.

Re: Trigger Warning: Self Injury/Suicide

[shadowpsykie]

ah. okay. yeah there is that. (honestly its been so long since i've seen those episodes, and wasn't sure if at that point they had gone beyond annoyance ot actual fear.

that said, like i said. i liked that story line and i sympathized with both his and Santana's situation. I don't agree with what they did, (and i don't like how the writers decided to let all the "development" happen "backstage") but i still look at them more than just bullies. (azimio is just a straight up ass, he admits to doing it because he likes it) it could have and should have been handled better (Finn outing Santana was deplorable to me, and the fact that he got off with only a slap from santana was wrong. at LEAST have Kurt be pissed off telling him that it's wrong to out people like that... i mean Kurt of all people should have been on Finn's ass for that!)

Re: Trigger Warning: Self Injury/Suicide

[salinea]

I stopped watching Glee very soon after that because I was finding it triggery and I assure you, unlike other forms of bullying which had been framed in a very light and comedic way, this was seriously shown as Kurt being terrified.

I'm a big fan of hate/love pairings, so intellectually, I can understand why some people would ship it. But the mood in that scene was such, and my history with bullying is such that I also could admit nothing but being creeped out by the thought of the pairing. That's a personal feeling, though, and I'm sure you're right about sympathy being deserved because of the complexity of the situation (I had stopped watching by the time they went deeper on those two characters though).

Re: Trigger Warning: Self Injury/Suicide

[shadowpsykie]

sorry it was triggery. but it was actually a really really good story line. it got really intense yes, but they actually went about it respectfully.... from Kurt's side. Karofsky's development was only tangental with Kurt's... i think they TRIED to be respectful of that too, tried to show that it was self loathing that brought him there... but alot of that had to do with the remarkable acting of Max Adler (the actor playing david)

to be honest, i think how he was treated as a character in Kurt's story is similar to how women are typically treated in comics.

If you were going to use him as a plot device, keep him as that. don't try and develope him further.... but the development they did with him was half assed and only salvaged once again by the nuanced acting from Adler. They did TRY with him i think, but like a previous posted said, it ended up feeling shoe horned in. again imo this was only at all sucessful because the actor playing the role knew what he was doing

but the main Bullying story line was handled very well. i have friends who had been bullied that said it really touched them. I also read about people who were bullies who stopped to examine thier actions after watching this.

not trying to convince you to watch it, i am an out and out Gleek so i am in for the long haul, i am just saying that IMHO the story line had its faults, and it was in fact very intense in some episodes, but as a whole i think it was well executed.

[kirke_novak]

Karofsky in white tight spandex outfit... I'm simultaneously terrified and aroused.

Mostly terrified.

[shadowpsykie]

i like bear-ish guys and he is :D

[lucky_gamble]

I've seen that man up close and he is gorgeous *swoons*

[jlbarnett]

Yeah, I'm not buying it since the chinspike has ALREADY BEEN THERE, so someone (Midnighter) already put it there BEFORE the fight. Now I wish MM would had erased that memory, that was such a perfect opportunity that may never return...

I'm not much for Stormwatch at all, I do think the spike looks dumb, but the story is just as easily him saying, I thought it would be useful and I have had actual fights that showed me I'm right.

I will say one thing. No one without invulnerability is punching him in the jaw with that thing

[lieut_kettch]

All this does is prove Apollo right: Nu!Mindy has no taste at all, since the chinspike started out as an accessory.

[blackruzsa]

Well to be fair, depending on the size the artist goes with, the chinspike is okay in the dark.
In the dark.
In the dark.

[sir_mikael]

I demand fanart of Mentok in the Martian Manhunter costume! It would even be in character for him to do stuff like that.