Things I've Always Wondered About In Keeper Of The Lost Cities: Part 2

Things I've always wondered about in Keeper of the Lost Cities

Foxfire's school hours. It's well established that elves live across the globe, and with light leaping it's not hard to travel, but like, if they live all around the world, they all live in different time zones. So some kids would go to school when it's dark at home. How do they decide when? It's not talked about at all in the books and this annoys me a lot. Is there Elvin Standard Time?

I know that they make a big point in the books that they have no Human prejudices but I think that clearly they do. Everyone's a little weirded out by the fact that Sophie wears pAnTs and doesn't like dresses or glitter (which is scandalous and totally not common for millions of girls around the world) and clearly they don't have any boys who wear dresses or girls who shave their heads. All the girls and boys conform to stereotypically gendered forms of beauty. No muscular girls. No fat characters. No short boys. No feminine girls. No trans or gender neutral characters. What's up with that?

On that note it really feels like Shannon Messenger is becoming J K Rowling just a little. There are no openly gay or queer characters after eight and a half books so something smells a little funky there.

The crystal palaces. Where do they get all that crap from? There's a reason these are precious stones.

The nobility. Everyone acts like it's super exclusive but like, there has to be one mentor for each kid at Foxfire, because classes are individual, and there has to be hundreds of kids. So there's hundreds of nobility whose only job is to teach kids. Not even go on missions or emissary work or whatever.

This is just edition one everyone strap yourselves in.

I thought this was such an interesting post and I think it's always good to hear both sides of the story when it comes to both Tony Stark and Peter Parker. Because they're flawed characters. That's the point of them. We wouldn't like watching them if they were perfect and made good calls all the time.

I totally agree with your point about the MCU trying to backpedal and make Peter a hero of the people instead of some kind of untouchable hero on a pedestal. Because people love Spider-Man because he could be them. He could be anyone. And he doesn't walk away on Queens. He's happy just helping people. Not saving the universe. And every time there's a scene with ordinary people supporting spiderman, my heart absolutely melts.

But I'm not sure Homecoming was a total disaster. I haven't watched it in a while, so correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought it was very human, and very normal of Peter to have big ambitions and dreams and chase the kind of glamorous, super, shiny, lifestyle Tony was offering. Because that was what he thought success was. That's what he thought being a hero was. As humankind, we are kind of collectively enthralled by the lives of the uber-powerful.

The reason I quite enjoyed Spider-Man Homecoming was because Peter realized that success as a superhero wasn't about flashy suits. He realized that the lifestyle he was chasing wasn't what he wanted. He realized all the fancy stuff doesn't make you a good hero or a good person. It just makes him miserable and anxious. And if we look at Tony, that's kind of what happens to him in a lot of the time. He's pretty miserable from the lavish lifestyle, and ultimately recognizes that it is because of it that he is all alone. "You're a man that has everything and nothing."

I think Spider-Man homecoming was about him coming back to his roots in a way, and rejecting the billionaire superhero stuff Tony has. And I enjoyed Peter and Tony's relationship, not necessarily in a father-son kind of way, just because I think in the end, Tony was the one who was inspired by Peter. Which I don't think he is by any other character.

Overall, I think it's great that we have these kind of posts on tumblr because they're so thoughtful! I loved some of the ideas put forward in this post.

Also I'm sorry this is so long, it was originally going to be a comment but I had too many thoughts.

mcu peter sucks, im sorry

in terms of the spider-men/women/pigs, i don’t really have a favourite. however, i do have a LEAST favourite, and that is the MCU Peter Parker portrayed by Tom Holland.

The integrity of Spider-Man comes from that fact that he is a working-class hero, fights for the little guy, and his origin story.

and all that was destroyed once the MCU got involved.

why did they not use his origin story? does oscorp exist? harry osborn?? what?? who tf is ned? why does he have powers? why does this movie suck so much? Why are there zero stakes?

-on the ‘who tf is ned’ point, to clarify, i know who he is. ned leeds, the abusive husband of betty brant. then they make this OOC Ned date this OOC Betty. Huh?

where did ben go? why is stark here? why does he like stark? why didn’t he make his own suit? 

why is he everything spider-man is not?

the writers obviously noticed the problem, because in nwh, they rapidly back-pedaled to him being poor, making his own suits, and not having a billionaire on speed-dial to bail him out of his problems despite the billionaire still being a manipulative jackass and treating him like shit, while representing everything he stands against.

also, i did NOT like the idea of ‘mj’ being a collective spider-man gf term and just changing up the name. zendaya could’ve been mary-jane watson. michelle jones just…

i don’t even care about the fact she’s not a comic character - it’s just the fact they made her mj instead? when mary-jane is mj? idk i just didn’t like that. there are SO many comic characters he could’ve fallen in love with. it didn’t need to be this oc mj. i know people hate sam raimi mj, but she was still cool with sexist writing. comic mary-jane is such a badass. why did they not replicate that? why not ask zendaya to play original mary-jane? ‘cus she’s not white? that shit ain’t a ‘homage’ to the og mj, it’s just awful.

irondad as a concept needs to die already. please. im so done. peter is manipulated and ignored - CONSTANTLY - by Tony. that’s not acting like a father, it’s acting like a jackass. and he HAS  parental figure - aunt May. and he had a father figure - uncle Ben. irondad is creepy and reeks of grooming.

plus, they stole a bunch of concepts (for nwh too, but im not specifically talking about that) from miles morales and itsv. they copied the spider-men meeting each other, and copied miles’ personality for mcu peter. and somehow, miles is STILL more likeable. i miss the days when you could scroll through the peter parker tag without seeing tom holland and r*bert d*wney jr.

but also, literally every other spider-man would’ve been team cap. plus, andrew also said so. they’re working-class heroes. to argue against that is to be wrong. i don’t blame tom!peter for being manipulated and blackmailed. i blame the writers for being assholes, and most importantly, robert downey jr for his 15 million dollar profit off of 8 minutes of mediocre (at best) acting. -(also, saying - he’s such a good actor, he’s tony in real life! - literally makes him a bad actor with no range. someone reviewed dolittle, saying that it was so bad that it seemed like rdj was trying to sabotage his own movie. and i agree.) peter was manipulated and misinformed into being team tony. there is no variation of spider-man that would EVER be team iron-man. unless they’re fckign crazy.

also, tom holland said that if peter parker could bring anyone back from the dead, it would be tony st*rk. no btich.

also howard stark was really hot i just feel like saying that

tobey’s and andrew’s are actually ACCURATE spider-men, and the mcu needs to take notes.

this quickly turned into a tony hate post, but he is the root of mcu peter’s main issues, so.

anyways, stan miles morales

a true icon.

Christmas is fun because life is normal but now I have the added stress of buying presents I’m not sure people will like and all of a sudden I no longer like Mariah Carey.

*sheldon voice

Queen Elizabeth sleeps while I play bongos!!

every single channel is airing news of the queen's death except E4 which refuses to interrupt reruns of the big bang theory

Me: *picking up an old book because I feel obliged to read the classics*

Old book: Have some R A C I S M

Me: hold on-

Old book: How bout some ye olde S E X I S M

Me: what no-

Old book: Sprinkle in some hOmOpHoBiA

*Puts down old book*

"A cynic is a man who knows the price of everything but the value of nothing." - Oscar Wilde

But I read this fantastic article that pretty much said the opposite, so I'm torn between a 19th century gay romantic or a Scottish philosopher.

Aeon

In these dark times, the virtue we need is hopeful pessimism | Aeon Essays

We must keep the flame of pessimism burning: it is a virtue for our deeply troubled times, when crude optimism is a vice

This is late but Happy Ides of March everyone!

“Oh Mr Sheffield!” - Fran Fine

Gorgeous

not mine, found on pinterest

Ye Olde Contraception

Me: …

Ye Olde Doc: …

Me: sir keep your herbs away from my hoo-ha