David Cain Rips The Humanity Of Being Someone From Cassandra Cain And Then Has The GUTS To Feel Guilty

the neurodivergent experience:

20% of the time: wowwieee!!! i love my passions and interests!!!!! they make me so happy i want to jump up and down!!!!! weee!!!!!!! :3333333333

80% of the time: this mind is a prison

Cass has no limit to her menu.

Something about the wizard dying right after giving Billy the title Champion of Magic hurts me.

Billy isn’t told what he’s supposed to do, he wants to help people with his new power and status, but no one’s telling him how because the only one who could died in front of him.

Now he’s stumbling blindly through life trying to get it right while everyone judges him because “clearly the old wizard Shazam picked another dud, this person isn’t doing anything he’s supposed to!”

GCPD Officer: You’re under arrest for attempting to carry three people on a single motorcycle.

Jason: Damn, Bruce is gonna kill- wait, three?

GCPD Officer: yes, three.

Steph: oh shit

Tim: Cass fucking fell off!

Cass, somehow hanging off the back off the motorcycle by her fingers with ease: no I didn’t?

GCPD Officer, surprised: Jesus Christ!

Steph, shaking Jason’s shoulders: quickly! While he’s distracted!

Jason, speeding off with Cass still hanging off the motorcycle: shit, now we gotta pay Babs off so she doesn’t show Bruce the CCTV footage!

Tim: *falls off 2 minutes later*

i do think it’s funny how cass’s parental issues are so insane that shiva wasn’t even involved in her life until she was an adult and was literally challenging her to death matches and Actually Killed Her Once but david has set the bar so fucking low that shiva still wins the better bio parent award on account of Not Showing Up

Hi. I'm not a canon purist and enjoy some fanon content very much, but I do think people in the fandom should at least familiarize themselves with the canon content and source material. It's easier to break the "rules" so to speak and experiment with canon when you know what that actually is. I've noticed a lot of fans that are only familiar with fanon criticise content that doesn't line up with what they believe to be canon but isn't. The Red Hood for example. I've seen writers who portray him as the violent criminal he is in much of the canon be completely decimated by Jason fans who only know fanon and the retconned version of Red Hood and completely deny canon even exists and refuse to even glance at the comics. Transformative works are important and playing in the sandbox is for everyone but fandom literally cannot exist without canon. Canon is important and people can do whatever they want with it but they should respect it enough to at least look at it.

Hi anon, I'm going to hold your hand as I say this, and I will say it as gently as I can: This is still a form of canon purism.

We can absolutely agree that readers shouldn't berate or abuse writers for how they choose to portray characters in fic, whether that's a more canon-faithful characterization or a popular fanon version. If readers don't like how a character is portrayed, we should encourage them to hit the back button instead.

I want to draw your attention to some of the words you used in your ask above: "should" "respect" "decimated" etc. Those are some strong words to describe how you think people need to behave, in order to exist in fandom. Of course, there is no fandom without canon source material -- I'm not denying that. But with such a wide and varied canon, the DC fandom has examples of the Red Hood you mention above, AND the "retconned" version you also reference. Both are canon, as in actually, officially, canon. WFA is canon, and that Red Hood looks very different from the Red Hood you describe.

Now, I think your issue is that you enjoy a certain version of canon, and you're frustrated that the fandom doesn't also, as trends ebb and flow, enjoy that canon as much as you do. Again, I want to acknowledge that just because a certain version is popular, it doesn't give folks the right to berate authors for writing a different version. But again, I don't think that's what we're really talking about here. From your ask's tone, I think you're suggesting that people should, in order to participate in fandom, read that older canon, that different version, or as you say, "glance at it" before enjoying or writing the fanon version.

Guess what? They actually, really, really, don't have to. It sounds like you have some issues with judging your fellow fandom members who don't read what you do or reference certain canon. But the magic of this fandom is, you can enter it at any point. We're a big pool, and if someone's entry point is the Lego Batman movie and that's it, that's still valid.

Fandom stems from canon, yes, but I almost never hear people talk about movies, or web comics, or other media when they talk about "required reading." It's always a comic. I really wish people would reflect on that before suggesting it as the one true path to being a fan.

The other thing I don't see asks like these reference ever is the reality that sometimes a fandom outstrips its canon material, and that that's an eventuality in some spaces. Fanon interpretations become popular, and people write about those specific characterizations or scenarios. They ebb and flow, like I mentioned, and some are more canon-faithful than others. Some completely reject canon, and again -- it's still fandom. It doesn't make it better or worse than a more canon-faithful fic. It's just different.

I had a couple asks about this topic a few weeks ago, and I'm assuming you haven't read those or you likely wouldn't have sent me this ask. But in them, I discuss how sometimes we need to suck it up and be unhappy that canon-faithful fics aren't as popular in a fandom at a specific time, and stop punishing fellow fans for writing and enjoying those fics. And we really need to stop shitting on them publicly on Tumblr.

Because often, what you're really saying is that you wish more people would write more canon-faithful fics, and stop writing ones about fanon topics you don't enjoy or think are accurate. And to that, I again say, there is nothing you can or should do to change that behavior from others. If you want to read it, write it, enjoy it, etc, do it yourself. Build the comic-faithful community here, write fics and promote challenges, create a discord channel and discuss your "required reading" there.

We are all writing and reading fanfiction at the end of the day. It is a great equalizer in many ways. My silly Lego Batman fic is just as valid as a canon-faithful rewrite of a certain Batman issue. One is not better than the other, or more deserving of respect. You will never get me to admit otherwise on this blog.

tl;dr: people should absolutely not berate authors who choose to write canon-faithful characterizations. however, there are layers of judgement and disdain many DC comics canon-faithful authors/readers have for their fellow fans that I think we need to examine critically in order to coexist respectfully.

in superman adventures #19, there’s a villain named multi-face who can convincingly disguise himself as anyone, even tricking dna tests and x-ray vision. Superman initially can’t stop him

and the only reason he gets caught is because multiface decides to disguise himself as, of all people, CLARK KENT i’m screaming

I prefer Captain Marvel cause it’s just such a fun concept that when he says this very particular word he transforms.

I think it just opens up a lot of different possibilities about how people fight him considering he’s nearly immortal. Like, if he can only transform saying Shazam if he wants to transform, then how do people force him into transforming back to Billy when they want to defeat him in combat?

It’s just more interesting if he can’t ever say such a specific word without either revealing his identity or becoming vulnerable (or both)

This is mostly a joke but uh

Every time someone calls SHAZAM captian marvel I mentally go "why are you dead naming him?"

I just came up with a really good idea for an angst filled Cassandra Cain fic but with how complicated it is it might be like 50k words or more and I’ve never even finished a fic let alone posted a fic before so it’s probably never going to happen.

Oh well, time to write a fic that will never see the light of day because of my perfectionism lol.