Mechanical Heart

Tags

captain america: the winter soldier, fanfiction, hot cocoa and candy canes, lindsey stirling, song-related fiction

Okay, I was planning on posting something entirely different today, but then… The Winter Soldier barged in. And there were snowballs, and hot tea, and candy canes. The candy canes came in first. (Yes, I attacked the Winter Soldier with a candy cane. *glares at audience*) But then, I kind of had a “I need a Lindsey Stirling fix” moment and went on YouTube, which led to a thought of hey, this could be Bucky, so here you are!

Partially inspired by steampunk genre, partly inspired by the various marvelous “Ready Aim Fire” Captain America: The Winter Soldier tributes, and partly because “Shatter Me” would make such a perfect tribute for Bucky.

Enjoy!

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Mechanical Heart

                It’s all clockwork, really.

Cogs and springs and soft, soft ticking that never goes away.

It’s there when he gets up, when he trains, in exact rhythm with his pounding heart, breathless with exhilaration.

And then he lies down again, and his heart is silent, and his breath is gone, and there is nothing but the slow, soft ticking. Click-click, click-click, sometimes a squeak as the motion hitches momentarily, and then moves on.

Over time, he comes to rely on it. And then, he can hear other people ticking. Hearts and breaths are slowly silenced, fading out of his world as it turns all into clockwork.

Until one day.

There’s a man on the bridge, and there’s a sudden pounding that is not mechanical, a rush of chilly air that he should not be able to feel.

They’re flung forward, at each other, as if they must fight, star-crossed, fated from the beginning of the world, leaping into battle. The heartbeat flies faster, faster—until his own heart—he’d forgotten he even had one—is chiming in perfect time with the stranger’s.

They take him away, they take the stranger away. The man on the bridge. I knew him. I knew him!

There is no more clockwork after that. At last the heartbeat bursts free, ripping toward the surface, gripping something unknown; the man he used to be.

He fights. It’s all he knows. But then, when it’s over, he runs.

It’s all too much.

Something else is breaking free. He’s not sure if he likes it. He’s afraid. The clockwork is all he knows. It’s all he knows. But then, he knew the stranger too.

It was all clockwork, but now something else is free for the first time.

He was a machine.

Maybe he doesn’t have to be a machine forever.

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The Soldier’s Prayer

Tags

captain america: the winter soldier, fanfiction, marvel, oops i did it again, poetry, the avengers

Because I could not stop at one post today and Iris is not currently near a computer to read my email and I’m flailing around waiting for The Winter Soldier.

Enjoy!

The Soldier’s Prayer

Red star for death, silver for light.

The pale ghost stands against the knight.

Pawns hover on the sidelines screaming,

Broken from their complacent dreaming.

No fear, no pain, no dreaming grace;

Seeking, finding, another place,

Hope rises to be crushed by an iron fist,

Terrors rise by chaos kissed.

I can’t forget, I must relive

Once more pour out all I can give

But once more it may not be enough

And I can’t see what a diamond is in rough

I want it back, wish I had died

Worthless all the tears we’ve cried

We could imagine, we could pretend,

But this path only leads to the end.

Red star for death, silver for hope,

Teeth gritting, against a straining rope.

I won’t back down, I will not bow

Only God holds this solemn vow.

Red star is dying in the night,

Self-destructive terrifying sight,

But will another replace it tomorrow?

All future sight is veiled in sorrow.

We could imagine, we could pretend,

But I’m not blind to this desperate end.

Red star for death, silver for light,

Please Heaven don’t let me fail this fight!

…okay, that started as a commentary on how a red star is a great metaphor for Communism, since a “red” star is a dying star, and Communism as a political system is inherently flawed and self-destructive, but then Steve stepped in and turned it into a more emotional thingummy than just a philosophical musing. *punches Steve in the arm* Thanks a lot, I really do like you but sometimes you just do unexpected things to me! Like throw a wrench in my perfectly good plot outline… *sigh*

“Why Would Anyone Love Me?”–Drabbles, and Character Studies

Tags

baroness emma orczy, brian jacques, c.s. forester, characters, creative writing, drabbles, fanfiction, flash fiction, horatio hornblower, inspirational stuff, marvel, redwall, star wars, story dynamics, the avengers, the scarlet pimpernel, writing

Okay, today’s post is in two parts. The first is a sort of drabble series. The second is a character study and some answers for a rather-important question.

Okay, here we go!

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I

                Why would anyone love me?

I’m a monster without morals, a beast without feeling. If I slip up, I could end up destroying everyone and everything around me.

I always end up destroying everything I love.

I was a scientist, a “successful” one. All that was taken from me. Now I wonder… did that matter? Did the accident maybe push me into doing something better?

It doesn’t matter. I’m still a monster.

Why would anyone love me?

II

                Why would anyone love me?

I’m a success that still failed. I’m a martyr who didn’t actually die. Why would anyone care about me?

I’m the soldier who lost his cause, the one-off science experiment that caused people to keep on trying even though it ended up destroying them.

The only thing that ever made me special, and I don’t even know who to trust enough to show it to any more.

I never sold my sword, but I’m still fighting for a cause I’m not sure I believe in. I’m the misfit who found my place, and then lost it again. I don’t belong here. No one cares about the man behind the superhero. To them, I’m only a name.

Why would anyone love me?

III

                Why would anyone love me?

I’m purely not lovable. I have no heart. I would stab anyone in the back in a heartbeat if it meant saving my own skin or finishing a mission.

I’m a weapon, and you can’t love a weapon. All you can love is the feel of it between your hands as you use it to slay your enemies. Anyone you name your enemy, really. All you can love about a weapon is results.

All your love for a weapon is mere sentiment. You can cast a weapon aside, and sooner or later, you will.

I’ve got red in my ledger, demons in my locker. I’ve killed before, and I know I will begin. My hands are stained, and I know I’ll stain them again.

Why would anyone love me?

IV

                Why would anyone love me?

I’m obnoxious, self-possessed, and am obviously—obviously—don’t correct me, Rogers, respect your elders—though that sounded weird—not a team player. I don’t talk about my feelings, except when I do, and then it’s always shallow. I’m selfish.

I’m not a hero. Or at least, I wish I wasn’t one. Being one of the good guys is stupid, sometimes, because you don’t go all the way you can or will or should. You don’t get that same satisfaction as you do before you’re “reformed.” It’s always a temptation.

I’m selfish. I have baggage. I’m annoying.

Why would anyone love me?

V

                Why would anyone love me?

I killed. I reshaped history—in the service of the wrong guys. I betrayed my best friend, and even if he insists that it’s not on me, it still is. I made him bleed. How is that forgivable?

I’m a sniper. I kill from a distance, when I can. I’m an assassin. I’m despicable by nature. I’m a coward. I don’t have half the heart that my best friend does, and I never did.

I’m jealous of him, sometimes.

Why would anyone love me?

VI

                Why would anyone love me?

I’m a veteran, part of something that never made it to the next level. I don’t exactly have a place. Once you’re a part of something, it changes you, and you’re never the same.

I look at people’s heads. I try to help them. But how can I help them when I’m still sick myself?

Some people just… inspire loyalty. And then, more amazingly still, they don’t misuse it. That’s not me. I’m just a lowly soldier, not some superhuman. I’m just one man, nothing more.

Why would anyone love me?

VII

                Why would anyone love me?

I’m a traitor. I helped the enemy.

I shot at allies. At friends. Without hesitation.

Even before that, I was a smart aleck with a bad past, a mere punk with nothing to prove and everything to prove it on.

Why should anyone like me, let alone love me? I’m broken. I’ve had all of me pulled out and something else stuffed in. And then had some sense knocked back into me, but for what?

Why would anyone love me?

VIII

                Why would anyone love me?

I nearly started not one, but two, wars, before I learned humility. I had to have everything taken from me before I understood what a gift I had been given freely.

My parents lied to me. My brother betrayed me. And I—I let him down. He slipped into the void. And then, not long after, I failed him again.

Why would anyone love me?

IX

                Why would anyone love me?

I became the monster I had always feared and hated. I knew what was happening, but I didn’t stop it. I forgot humility and compassion. I craved power and revenge.

I expected people with flaws to be perfect and looked for flaws where there were none.

And then, I played people as if they were pawns on a chess board. I let them fight against each other, I let them harm each other, I let them bleed, I let them die… just to prove that I could.

I have only proved what a monster I could be.

I hate myself.

Why would anyone love me?

And yet… there is love still.

FIN

(The Avengers+Falcon+Winter Soldier+Loki. Anyone care to guess which one is which? There should be enough clues. 😉 )

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Characters must be relatable. They must be lovable. It’s a dichotomy, because on some level, that which is lovable is hard to relate to, while that which is relatable also tends to be despicable.

To be lovable, the character must have some good traits that make us root for him or her. To be relatable, the character must also have flaws. (A character without flaws? Not fun to read. Also known as a Mary Sue/Marty Stu/Gary Stu. Look, there’s sexism right there! The guys have two names while the girls only have one! Or does that mean that male Mary Sues are a lot worse than female ones? Bwahahaha.)

Sometimes this is as easy as having the character be a good person (or want to be,) but still be fighting something that wants them not to be.

Sometimes, it’s not that simple.

Let’s take a look at some examples.

Sir Percy Blakeney is a brilliant man. He’s able to routinely outwit one of the most diabolically clever men in Europe. But he matches that with a tendency not to trust people and neglects to tell his wife about his secret identity, nearly getting them both killed.

Horatio Hornblower is a consistent victim of self-hate. He knows his flaws very well; he struggles with them daily. He doesn’t understand why people follow him (the reasons, objectively, are: he’s a good leader and loyal to his men, and he leads from the front, besides he has a sort of charisma that is both baffling, and draws people in at the same time), but he tries to do his best as a leader. He’s terrified, though, that one day he’ll fail as a captain, get his men killed through a miscalculation, or even betray their trust.

Martin the Warrior is a natural leader. However, he sometimes looses it in the midst of battle and goes berserk, leading to people on his own side not being covered properly and dying (spoilers would be the case in point.)

Tony Stark… do I even need to start with him? He’s as off-putting to people as Steve Rogers draws them in. He can be rude, obnoxious, etc. But he cares about Pepper (actually, this is my OTP… sort of?), and he tries to be a hero. Redemption value? I think so.

Steve Rogers–some people hate him because he’s supposedly the definition of all things perfect. This is a complete and total misconception. Dr. Erskine said it all: “Not a perfect soldier, but a good man.” He’s good at heart, but still flawed. Oh, yes, he does have demons. He’s failed people before and knows he will again. He messes up and people die, and he doesn’t let anyone “console” him, for a good reason. He sometimes pushes people away. He isn’t fearless; indeed, I think it’s a safe bet to say that he was terrified to die alone. He has lost everything in a very tangible sense and yet he still goes on, forming new friendships, even though he knows he could lose it all all over again. People follow him because he means what he says and cares about his team, and he’s terrified that one day he won’t live up to their expectations. Since when is good boring?! Good is awesome. Bad things happen to good people and what they do with that makes an incredible story–do they turn bad, or do they try to pick up the pieces and move forward? This is the good stuff. Seriously, who needs antiheroes?!

The thing is, the heroes sometimes have to deal with unpleasant truths. They pick the lesser of two evils and it keeps them up nights. They “compromise” when they could do otherwise and people suffer. Fundamentally good people in a flawed, sometimes cruel world, how they deal with it, how they don’t. That’s what it’s all about. The same is true of life. On some level, we’re all unlovable, yet there is Love still.

Hopefully this is helpful to all the writers out there. 😉

Thanks for reading, and God Bless!

Authorly Bucket List Tag

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author, authorly bucket list tag, blog events, blogging, j.r.r. tolkien, new tag, practice makes perfect, story dynamics, tags, the lord of the rings, worldbuilding, writing

Okay, I’ve seen tags going around and I had an idea for a new one. (So sue me.) (And please tell me why that quote seems so familiar, too. 😛 )

So, without further ado… The Authorly Bucket List Tag!

Otherwise known as the Stuff-I-Need-To-Practice-More-Slash-Stuff-I’d-Like-To-Be-Better-At Tag. (Partly inspired by this post. Also this one.)

Basically, the idea is to list a few things you’re not very good at, and a few things which you’d like to try. Three to seven of each should be a good number. So here we go!

Things I’m Not Very Good At

1. Holding points of view through a scene. It’s a bad habit of mine–I go omniscient sometimes, or I jump heads. Big thing that needs editing. You know. That’s part of the reason why I started writing fanfiction–it helped me learn a little bit better how to hold a point of view in a scene.
2. Detachment to objects. I’m not very good at leaving stuff behind, partly because my characters are so often either not very well off (and thus need to hold on to whatever weaponry they have), or are on the run (which needs no explanation, frankly–what is wrong with me?!)
3. Certain character types. I’m very good at blatantly and manipulatively evil characters, stern characters, etc. What I am not very good with is the chronically irritating character who just gets on everyone’s nerves, the clever clown, some kinds of traitors, the double-blind traitor, and so forth. I can write a charismatic leader. Not so much an outcast who is outcast through some fault of his own.
4. Finding out the middle bits of a plot. I don’t always have a direct path through the plot, and thus I tend to occasionally write myself into corners, or lose my inspiration, and have no idea how to proceed to the next plot point that I am sure of.

Things I Want To Try

1. Dystopian, Urban Fantasy, and/or Contemporary Adventure, as well as Science Fiction. I sort of have a few books in the works, but Fantasy is my strong suit, and I know for a fact I’m not very good at writing romance, and I can’t–simply can’t–write horror. I can’t watch it, can’t read it, can’t write it. And I’m better off that way. I’m better at psychological drama and character development. (This one is mostly because I love varied and strongly-differentiated worlds in fiction.)
2. Characters who are flawed. Characters who freeze up and there are consequences. Characters who are imperfect. (Besides, your own flaws are a much better reason to angst than things that you can’t help, such as your past, things that were not your fault, and such, don’t you think?)
3. Meals that are not just soup. I think I’m mentally reverting to soup because it’s homely and hot and that’s all travelers want after a long day on the road, right? I need to figure out other meals, sometimes even less appealing.
4. Better McGuffins to tie up loose ends with and hold the story together (in the Redwall series, it’s Martin’s sword; in The Lord of the Rings, there are several, such as the phial of Galadriel or Arwen’s tokens to Aragorn.) I need to learn how to write them well into the plot.
5. Small repeated cues from a character, things that recur through a story, color scheme, etc. Anything that shows up more than once in a story, even if it’s just an Easter Egg, is really rewarding for a reader; it makes them feel good that they were paying enough attention to recognize those. Especially if it’s important to the plot. The mark of a good book is that you see new things in it every time. I want to make my books that good.

So, that’s my list of things that I wish I could do better as a writer. What’s yours? Feel free to pick up on the tag, even if you’re not on the nominations list. 😉 Just make sure that you link back to this post on my blog, and to give me a link to your acceptance posts; I want to read them. 😀

I now hereby nominate:

Sarah of Light and Shadows

Tara Therese

Portergirl at Secret Diary of Portergirl

Rachel Carrera

Proverbs31teen of The World of the Writer

IcedMocha34

Liam of This Page Intentionally Left Blank

Erin (the other one!) at Laughing at Live Dragons

Rosalie at Against the Shadows

Shiekah of Dark Link/Light Link

Amy of The Monday Heretic

Bessie Lark of Firefly

Iris at The Road Goes On

Well, that’s everyone I could think of, anyway. 😉

Thanks for reading, and God Bless!

Two Short Stories and a Rant

Tags

completed stories, fanfiction, marvel, out of character syndrome, short stories, sudden expedient character defamation syndrome, the avengers, writing

Today, for your approval, I have two short stories that parallel each other. One is called “Expendable”, the other is called “Dauntless.” It’s kind of a mental monologue on the parts of two different characters in one situation, my first experimental attempt at two points of view that are mirror-image. Please tell me what you think.

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Expendable

                There’s one thing that terrifies Steve. Not just one, but the only one that terrifies him.

It slipped out at one of the most inopportune moments in a twisted reverse algorithm, confused and writhing like a mass of leeches.

Sometimes there isn’t a way out.

Because there just isn’t, sometimes. The truth is that sooner or later, they won’t have a choice, someone will make the ultimate sacrifice, and the Avengers will lose a teammate.

They’ll have to bury one of their own.

And that, Steve knows from experience, is one of the most painful things of all…

He can’t lose anyone again. He can’t. He’ll break.

Because he sacrificed his life, but instead of Destiny, the Fates, whatever, just accepting it, they handed it back to him.

And took everything else instead. All that he knew once, the people who he was friends with, even the ones he had never liked and who had hated him—gone.

He lost everything.

Inexplicably, he found a new team, new friends. (He didn’t know how—he didn’t deserve to be given a second chance.)

The one thing he knows, raw, sitting like a stone at the back of his deepest soul, is that he simply can not lose someone again. Anyone. Not the man who hates him, not the people who despise him, not even the utter stranger, and certainly not one of his team. Because it will be too much for him and he will break, and once you’ve been a hero you fall hard, and maybe you don’t get up again. Maybe, you even fall, and stand up a villain instead.

And that’s why he plans ahead. That’s why he snaps at Tony when Tony disobeys his orders again. Because on the day that he doesn’t have a plan, when there isn’t a way out, when there is no way to cut the wire—he can only hope it’s him. Because that will hurt less than failure. Again.

He was supposed to die that day, crashing into the ice. But apparently there was something he was supposed to finish. He only hopes he’s done it. And why shouldn’t he sacrifice himself? Among the gods and geniuses and the men with superhuman abilities and the women who can change destiny, he’s only one man, he’s only human. Expendable.

After all, it’s not like they need him.

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Dauntless

                In the months since New York, Tony has come to know and dread that look.

Because the captain is thinking. Again. And that never bodes well to someone. Sometimes to multiple someones.

Or is that when Capsicle plans? Tony shrugs. Whatever is going on in Steve’s mind at the moment, it’s dangerous to someone, or something, even if it’s just to something as useless as Clint’s peace of mind, for example.

They nearly lost today. Worse, they nearly lost lives. And that’s why Cap is thinking—thinking, because Steve Rogers does not brood.

When an Avenger goes out, it’s not quick and painless. Nothing is painless for them. They’re kind of gluttons for punishment, which is masochistic but not intentionally, and they can’t seem to stop it.

The thing is, now Cap is not-brooding, but Tony can’t help but think how much worse it would have been if Captain America had not been there. After New York, Tony had become the heart of the team, but if Tony had become the heart, then Steve Rogers was the soul. They have a team now, and no part of that team is expendable. They might be able to go on without one member, but it might tear the rest of them apart as well.

And it would be especially hard to go on without the man who called the shots, who was always able to construct the perfect plan for the situation.

Maybe Tony would be able to step into the gap Steve would leave, but things would never be the same. Maybe the team would stay together, but there would always still be that one empty seat, no matter how many new members they could recruit.

After all, no one is expendable.

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And now, for the rant.

Part of this is because there seem to be Howard haters all over the place, but the character really isn’t quite like people love to portray him. (Why do people prefer tragic backstories to genuine character development? Gah. I have one character whose childhood was especially unpleasant–she was trained as an assassin from childhood, was apprenticed to a few uncaring “masters”, and she even ended up killing a few of the wrong people for goodness’ sake! Like one of the heroes we will (hopefully) get to love! And yet she’s not an unbearable angster, but a young woman who is matter-of-fact about it and goes on with it, all the same. I’m more impressed by characters who overcome their past than those who whine about it all the time.) Howard Stark was certainly not the ideal father. He was distant, and alienated his son thereby. However, he did not “hate” Tony, nor was he abusive. From the movies, I gained the impression first of a young man who was cynical due to the fact that everyone wanted something from him, since he was wealthy, but hid it under a sort of bravado and flash. He was dubious that Erskine’s program would work, but his work probably saved Steve Rogers’ life–I doubt that Steve was expected to live until he was thirty–and while he remained, for a while, dubious about Rogers’ ability to lead a team, he ended up becoming friends with the captain, who probably puzzled Howard, since Steve really didn’t want anything from him, unlike almost everyone else Howard had ever known, and was not jaded either. Then, at the tail end of the war in Europe, Steve sacrificed his life to save thousands of innocents. Howard had lost one of the few people he ever really cared about, and that made him wary of ever letting anyone else in. When Tony came along, Howard was scared to spend time with his son, because he was terrified of losing Tony as well and didn’t want to get attached. Added to that, Howard was probably nearly destroyed by Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as in the Marvel universe he probably worked on the Manhattan project, and never imagined that his tech would be used in such a way (similar to Tony in the first Iron Man movie.) When I think of Howard Stark, I think of a very human person, flawed, but not evil. Howard loved Tony. Howard didn’t know how to say it. However, most people just ignore that and prefer to portray him as an abusive, neglectful man, rather than the distanced but loving father he really was. Sudden Expedient Character Defamation Syndrome.

Also, when Tony says in Iron Man 2, “Dead so many years and he’s still taking me to school,” it was my impression that he said it fondly, like he loved his father back and was really hurt by the fact that Howard distanced himself, and that’s why he was so bitter.

Thoughtful fans are the best kind.

Rant over.

Setting the Stage: Color and Mood

Tags

captain america: the first avenger, captain america: the winter soldier, color, j.r.r. tolkien, lighting, marvel, movies, peter jackson, setting a scene, story dynamics, the avengers, the lord of the rings, tricks and tips, worldbuilding, writing

Color is a tool.

Watch any well-made movie, and you’ll see what I mean. Some movies (such as Star Wars) use color to define a character’s alignment and/or leanings towards another side. Aladdin notably uses color to hint at danger, greed, or corruption. Military units use color as an identifier.

Color is a hint to character. Humble, soft-spoken characters will often prefer muted colors; browns, dark reds, navy, royal blue, gray, forest green. Vivid, vibrant characters love the jewel tones. And if you have a sweet little girl, princess or otherwise, she’s almost certain to like pastels.

However, color isn’t just useful in reminding the reader what sort of character he or she is dealing with at the moment. It’s also handy in setting a scene, adding to a mood. (Watch “The War Was In Color” if you don’t believe me. Then again, listen to it anyway. Even if you’re not a fan of the movie-from-which-the-fanvid-was-made. I could’ve found another one that would have also worked, but this is more fun.)

If you have not watched The Lord of the Rings, then you won’t be able to relate, but Peter Jackson masterfully uses color saturation and lighting to set the scenes, highlighting a progression through the story in a way that characterization might be able to convey, but never in the exact same way as Tolkien’s words do. However, Jackson is able to reasonably emulate Tolkien’s literary style through an art style, visual cues, and lighting.

In the Shire, the light is warm; the most common colors are green and bright yellow, and the lighting feels natural, like bright summer sunlight. As the travelers leave the Shire, the lighting moves towards grays and blues; still natural, but more like the light of a cloudy day. Rivendell is fittingly full of fall colors, as a refuge of the Elves that may be compared to their eternal autumn; the lighting is, again, natural, warm, but softer, full of memory; “sunbeams” and avenues shot with frequent lights are commonly seen in Rivendell. Upon leaving Rivendell, we are again exposed to a similar winter light. Moria’s strategically placed beams of white light against the overall dimness create a greater impression than mere blackness could, and Lothlorien is filled with a soft silver radiance, colder and purer than any other light in the whole set of movies, symbolizing the eternal refuge of the Elves in which the world is forever young.

However, it is not until The Two Towers that the lighting really takes on a role all its own. The blue, pale lights of Frodo’s journey, washing out the hobbits’ faces and making them seem paler, almost sickly, contrasting Frodo’s hair still more strongly with his skin and eyes, the drab, gooey look of the Dead Marshes, and the sickly, greasy light of the Morgul Vale reflect the growing darkness and danger of Frodo’s quest, and the poisonous lure of the Ring. Of course, it leads to the pass at Cirith Ungol and Shelob’s lair, which was nearly impossible to convey through film as written; with the dirty gray-and-white look in the movie, Jackson did a fair job. The journey culminates in the red-and-yellow-saturated Sammath Naur on Orodruin, the lighting underscoring the crux of the quest. The remaining scenes of The Return of the King have a soft, distant, dream-like quality, which is best summed up by Frodo’s quote: “We set out to save the Shire, and it has been saved; but not for me.”

The two Captain America movies and The Avengers use a similar progression of color, though more subtly than Jackson’s use in The Lord of the Rings. In The First Avenger, many of the scenes are cast in warm sepia tones, like a haven from the horrors of war; the entire film has a charming vintage-yet-unexpected look. The Avengers expertly uses shadow and light to convey a mood, while many of the scenes from The Winter Soldier (which I still have not yet seen) appear to be cast in a bluish, cloudy winter light, similar to some scenes from The Two Towers.

However, these colors are not all mutually exclusive. The First Avenger uses the chilly, cloudy natural light to hint at forebodings of ill-fortune, while certain deleted scenes from The Avengers make use of a similar sepia cast, and the forest confrontation scene uses a nighttime moonlight that is reminiscent of the blue cast from The First Avenger. While I can not say much about The Winter Soldier, I think it is safe to assume that it follows the same trend, using sepia to highlight memory or safety, pale blue light for foreboding or the realization of a horrible fate, and a chiaroscuro theme for the uncomfortable truths that will come to light (no pun intended.)

So should it be with your stories.

Not that you can pick a color scheme to symbolize every last thing in your story, but you can at least use a color scheme to evoke an emotional response in the reader, and reusing those color schemes is just a bonus to help keep the reader interested. (Readers like repeated imagery and symbolism, because it makes them feel good because they’ve been paying enough attention to notice it when it first appeared.)

Think of yourself as a filmmaker. Pick a color palette and stick with it. Use color effectively.

Thanks for reading, and God Bless!

Flash Fiction: “Helpless” and A Few Tools (Avengers edition)

Tags

captain america: the first avenger, captain america: the winter soldier, characters, completed stories, fanfiction, iron man, short stories, story dynamics, the avengers

First things first: the Flash Fiction of the day (and then everyone who’s only here for Story Hour can just skip to the comments, if they want. ;-P) Warning: Dark. References to suicide. Continue at your own risk.

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Steve reached into his mouth.

Gripping the capsule in his fingernails, he pulled it from the empty space where one of his wisdom teeth had been pulled months before. (He remembered that. He wasn’t supposed to. A patch on the back of his neck had immobilized him, and an IV line fed tranquilizers and painkillers into his bloodstream, but his metabolism had broken them up, burned them out of his blood. It had hurt. It was too strange, to be in pain like that and yet physically incapable of screaming.)

He stared at it, and it seemed to be winking evilly back at him, its glossy coat like a milky, unseeing-yet-aware eye.

He wanted to yell, to scream, to crush it into powder, into fluffy gray ash, but he couldn’t. It was filled with the most virulent substance SHIELD had been able to concoct, and he could not risk it getting into the city’s water supply. Even diluted more than a million times, it would still cause people—living real actual thinking breathing people—to sicken, waste away, fade, die.

All he could think was How did it come to this?

All he could do was to slip it back into its space and resolve not to use it.

He was still screaming inside.

---

Yup, it’s dark. There are cookies in the comments for anyone who can point out the huge, glaring, obvious main reference in this piece.

Now, on to lighter stuff; a few tools for writing the Avengers in everyday life.

1. Neither Thor, nor Steve Rogers, despite both being blond and muscular, are idiots, not by a long shot. Thor is a warrior, and unabashedly so. He’s probably good at cranking out a couple of battle plans when they need them (after he gets over his arrogant streak in Thor, that is.) Thor has a vocabulary that no other Avenger can rival, and has some operating knowledge of battle tactics, as well as being even more experienced than Cap. Steve is more intuitive than Tony Stark, which may be why people discount him, because sometimes it can be hard to follow, but if you’ll bear with me… Steve is a reader. (Remember that scene in The First Avenger, with all those books?) Steve uses his head. It’s not like he had a choice, since his body was rather lacking for the first 24 years of his life. So maybe he was getting beat up every other day, but he was also probably pretty good at outwitting the bullies. Steve Rogers was probably the SSR’s most valuable tactician, for goodness’ sake! Not only could he come up with an effective battle plan beforehand, he could also modify and adapt it while a bunch of Nazis and HYDRA agents were trying to kill him. Not even sloppy, to tell the truth. And then, in the Avengers, we get to see him strategize on his feet again, and we learn something more about him–Steve is an excellent judge of character and is extremely good at placing his teammates for the optimum effectiveness. Steve is empathetic and compassionate. That’s his edge.

2. Tony Stark is a bit more vulnerable than you’d think. His brash, arrogant front is more bluff than reality. He uses it as a shield to try and keep him from getting close to anyone else, because his experience with Obadiah Stane tells him that caring is a vulnerability. Actually, he and Steve clash not because they are absolute polar opposites, but because they’re different sides of the same coin. They have some personality traits in common, but they have different backgrounds, and their pasts tend to come between them. I think I love these boys so much because anything goes, really. It would be possible to write them as friends, or to have Tony be a supervillain without really wanting to be (can someone please write this with Pepperony instead of that other painfully non-canon ship… the Ship-That-Shall-Not-Be-Named), or whatever. The tensions between them are because they are somewhat similar but with personalities that still clash.

3. All the Avengers (with the possible exception of Thor and Clint) would probably have a preference for organic food, whenever possible. Thor isn’t choosy (though he still would probably like organic, since it’s the only kind of food on Asgard), while Clint is perfectly okay with junk food. However, the others’ reasons for choosing organic are different. Bruce does it because it’s healthy and he wants to support organic farmers, Tony for similar reasons (also partly publicity and elite whatever,) Natasha just because it is a choice she does have and I think with her history she’d like to have the chance to choose for herself, and Steve… well, his senses are enhanced, and nothing tastes familiar to him, with all the artificial flavoring going on these days. If he doesn’t have a choice I suppose he could live with processed or whatever but really, even for normal people, after eating organic for a while, processed foods are disgusting. (The limited-edition sugar-not-corn-syrup Coke would be a godsend for him.)

4. Concerning Steve Rogers: he never actually completed basic training. Thus, his knowledge is all entirely practical, learned on the fly while in the middle of leading the Howling Commandos. (This is why we respect Cap: He was thrown into a battle situation practically unprepared and still owned it.) His military bearing was mostly learned from the Commandos. (Ironically, this makes him a little more like Colonel Phillips, who also strikes me as a bit of an unorthodox commanding officer.) Also due to the fact that he was learning on the job, he knows some unexpected things as well as borderline-legal ones. For instance, due to Hydra’s obsession with Norse mythology, I imagine Steve as being able to read runes, in German, and pronounce anything from that mythology (or anything Asgardian) better than Jane Foster can. Also, apparently he knows how to hotwire a car, and I would expect that he knows how to disable certain types of bombs and IEDs. Not entirely hopeless with technology. After all, with Tony’s help, only a couple of weeks after waking up in the twenty-first century, he is able to help fix this sci-fi helicarrier engine. That’s impressive by any standards.

5. Tony Stark sees more about his teammates than he lets on, and while he struggles with compassion and being a team player, I expect he acts on it.

6. Clint Barton has a sense of humor and enjoys startling people. (No one else, except for Natasha, really intentionally startles people. Mostly it happens because Steve or Bruce is sitting in the background and they’re so quiet people forget they’re there.)

7. Bruce is compassionate, but he hates worrying over others’ problems because he feels helpless to fix them. (Did I mention that I love Bruce Banner? He’s such a sweet guy!) One of Bruce’s flaws is that he tends to be focused to a fault on anything he’s working on… there is room for story development here.

8. Natasha Romanoff is perhaps the most screwed-up of the Avengers. When she’s not on a mission, she doesn’t know exactly how to respond to personal barriers or how to put together any of her own. (This will probably cause her to make Steve uncomfortable; he doesn’t like other people in his personal space, and he doesn’t particularly like to be touched, either; in The First Avenger the only person who he really allowed to touch him was Bucky, who was perhaps the only friend he had had for many years, and he wasn’t used to other people in his space.) She does know to give Bruce space, though.

9. Most of the Avengers have snarky sides, though Tony will probably pretend to be surprised every time Steve snipes right back at him. (They should absolutely have an insult war.)

I think that covers just about everything… Thanks for reading, and God Bless!

TCWT: What’s normal?

Tags

authors, baroness emma orczy, bbc sherlock, brian jacques, captain america: the first avenger, catholic culture, catholicism, christian fiction, christianity, creative writing, dee henderson, disney, dynamic characters, editing, editor, fantasy, frozen, generations, invented religions, jorge luis borges, living life with passion, loyalties, macguffins, magic realism, marvel, novels, o'malley series, paranormal, redwall, religious themes, roman catholic, sherlock holmes, sir arthur conan doyle, spiritual, star wars, story dynamics, story tools, supernatural, t.h. white, the avengers, the scarlet pimpernel, the sword in the stone, uncommon heroes series, urban fantasy, world building, writing

I thought that I would not be doing TCWT again. I’m almost too old to do it. But I decided to come back at least one last time. So, here you go.

The prompt was “What do you think is commonly done well in literature? Done poorly?” I think it depends on the author and genre as much as anything else. Some things are well-done in one genre and horrific in another, or okay in one and marvelous in another.

Religious themes. A character’s religion, how they practice it, if they really live their faith, if they even practice what they preach at all, is a marvelous tool in character development whether you are religious or not. I have never been able to understand why some people neglect it. A character’s beliefs, including their religious persuasion, tells us quite a bit about that character. (This is why, if someone leaves the religion space on their character sheet blank, I often have headcanons about their beliefs.) Some books where this is done well: Dee Henderson’s “Uncommon Heroes” and “O’Malley” series (among the only romance I actually read). Living what you preach is a sign of sincerity, honesty, and sometimes even of courage. Often, it takes courage to say more than “non-denominational” on your forms, and the thing is, these characters don’t overtly try to convert others. It is the way they live that makes others think, “Wow. I wish I had what they have.” A book where this is done poorly: Many books (sadly) in the Christian fiction genre. (Oftentimes, Christian fiction is like romance; you have to be extremely choosy to find the good stuff.)

Religious themes in general: If a character actually lives what they preach, then religious themes in the plot itself are generally a given. Normally, you won’t run into actual angels or demons “on-set”, but the forces of evil vs. the good guys will probably happen. I very much prefer the sort of stories with a fallible main character, who falls and fails and then gets up again and apologizes for it (or, sometimes, doesn’t apologize and then sees the error of his ways.) Everything else just feels like another Christian fiction forgettable Mary Sue.

I also like to see slightly-different versions of real-world religions in stories (such as the world where Christianity developed slightly different, though all the teachings are still the same, the practices are different; some practices never evolved, while some that don’t exist in the real world did.)

Magic Realism. Now and again, I love a good story with spiritual/supernatural themes in the magical realism style, where it’s all strongly realist and then seamlessly in comes a bit of the supernatural. I love it when the plot twist throws me off, but when I look back into the rest of the book, I can see how it was subtly setting it up the whole time. Sadly, many “paranormal” stories tend to be “paranormal” throughout, without any magic realism. For me, it’s not urban fantasy if they don’t have the urban before they have the fantasy. Otherwise, it’s just fantasy.

A few notes on urban fantasy: I have read a couple of very good dystopian/urban fantasy novels where the story was very well-written. One of the biggest shockers, in my opinion, is when something that’s out of our normal experience happens and the characters treat it like a normal occurrence, because in their world, it is normal.

Items with character and/or significance. Now and again, there will be a MacGuffin that really ties everything together; it doesn’t even matter what the MacGuffin is, it is the significance that goes along with it. For instance, in the Star Wars prequel trilogy, it was Padme’s charm that Anakin gave her when they were both very young. (I swear, Attack of the Clones would have been so much better if at some point, Padme had slipped the japor snippet out of the collar of her dress and said quietly, “I still have the amulet you gave me.” I would be shipping Anidala so much harder than I do now, trust me.) In my novel Loyalties, it is the multi-generational hand-me-down amulet, the symbol of a master’s care for his apprentice, which is worn hidden in the French braid across the back of an apprentice’s head (or, alternatively, depending on the circumstances, hung on its ribbon around their neck,) that ties the generations together, as it is passed down from Rynnar to Winter (who tries, upon his leaving active service as a Ranger, to return it, but Rynnar refuses to accept it), and later from Winter to his apprentice Elían, and is constantly there to remind Winter of Rynnar, even in Rynnar’s absence, during the first book. (I’m certainly praying to the Muse that I end up doing it right.)

Martin the Warrior’s sword, in the Redwall series, is a recurring object that serves to both tie the series together, and to remind everyone of Redwall’s first Champion. Another example would be Sir Percy Blakeney’s “pimpernel” signet ring in the Scarlet Pimpernel books (which, though not recurring, was key to the first book–was that a spoiler? I hope not…)

Items that get left behind. In my opinion, many authors these days tend to forget about this. Things get broken and left behind. Things are not overly important, and things should not be overly important to the characters. For instance, someone can and will lose their arrows or throwing knives (which, believe it or not, is a loss that was, in the past, a very hard one, since both were very valuable, especially arrows, which were hard and time-consuming to make by hand and thereby expensive. There will be times when someone rips their shirt or goes swimming and loses it. For some reason, authors these days seem too often to ignore these instances.

On the other hand, a character losing something with sentimental value can be a very emotional moment. It can be the last straw that breaks the camel’s back. Or it can illustrate that at this point, the character doesn’t even care any more, or is just grateful that they got out of there alive. Martin the Warrior loses his father’s sword, which Tsarmina snaps in half, pushing him into vowing vengeance on the wildcat, as it was the only thing he had left to remember Luke by. Someone’s horse dies, and it’s a very emotional moment. Beaumont the hound in The Sword in the Stone (book, not the movie.)

Or, someone escapes a burning building to find that they left their old notebook behind. When the other character offers sympathy, the first just says, “It’s all right. It was only a notebook. I’m just glad we both got out alive.” Or even, “I don’t need it any more,” illustrating a dynamic moment in a character’s journey. Moments like these are a tool that is sometimes sadly neglected. People tend to forget that in a prior era, people would attach value to things using a different methodology than we do today. They would keep things because they were valuable or hard to replace, not because of sentiment, quite so much. In realistic historical fantasy, this is sometimes a stumbling block, though not always. (Kristoff losing his sleigh in Frozen could have been done so much better. At least they weren’t afraid to have people lose their gear in the movie.)

Use of small cues. This is a big one. Some people nowadays seem to want everything to be blatantly obvious and to avoid the search for small meanings and symbolism. This is the reason why some people hate character movies and characters like Obi-Wan Kenobi; they don’t see anything past the not-really-action of the movies or the character’s quiet, unassuming exterior. Forsaking dynamic characters for the sake of flash, some people end up creating Mary Sues.

However, I believe there are authors out there who do this really well (Brian Sanderson, Liam? I think I got that impression,) using small character cues, such as a slight movement, a nervous habit (such as fiddling with one’s sleeves) that recurs throughout the book, and tiny facial expressions that are left open for the readers to interpret to subtly build well-rounded, fleshed-out, dynamic characters. After a while, the reader becomes familiar with a repeated movement (“oh, Halt’s up to something; there’s the eyebrow!” “He’s reaching for his cuffs, even though he’s wearing a short-sleeved shirt. Poor kid.”) and learns to associate it with certain moods or actions. After a while, if you’ve seen The First Avenger, you get to recognize Steve Rogers’ nervous half-smile and distinguish it from his awkward smile, his stage smile, and the genuine article in Avengers. (Did anyone else notice how eerily similar Coulson’s non-offensive “I’m not a threat or even important to the plot at all; take no notice of me” half-smile is to Steve’s awkward smile? Since we know Steve better than we know Coulson, this tiny little fact, whether intentional brilliance on the part of Joss Whedon and whatsisname who plays Coulson or happy serendipity, tells us loads about Coulson as a character.)

Excessive stage drama queens. Basically, some characters just draw attention to themselves when they shouldn’t, detracting from the plot and being blatantly obvious (“don’t be obvious!”–>Moriarty’s best advice ever!), so much so that it’s sickening. This is just annoying. If it fits into the plot and the character, all well and good; it works! (This is why we actually can like Tony Stark.) But if not, then… then what’s the point? Seriously. All you have is an over-made-up actor who can’t even recite his lines properly. BORING. *shoots the wall* Sickening.

For me, most of what annoys me is blatantly obvious or lacking when it should be there. Of course, my pet peeves will be different from other people’s, but I think that all authors should try to improve their work based around these issues.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this listing of things I think are well-done but could be improved in fiction, thanks for reading and God bless you, as always, and don’t forget to drop by the other blogs on the chain through the rest of January! 😉

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5^th – http://whileishouldbedoingprecal.weebly.com/

6^th – http://jasperlindell.blogspot.com/

7^th – https://erinkenobi2893.wordpress.com/ (you are here) and http://nasrielsfanfics.wordpress.com/ (this would be Rosalie; I still need to read her post so now I’m done with mine I’m heading over to do that.)

8^th – http://miriamjoywrites.com/

9^th – https://ramblingsofaravis.wordpress.com/

10^th – http://semilegacy.blogspot.com/

11^th – http://kirabudge.weebly.com/

12^th – http://thelittleenginethatcouldnt.wordpress.com/

13^th – http://maralaurey.wordpress.com/

14^th – http://dynamicramblings.wordpress.com/

15^th – http://theedfiles.blogspot.com/

16^th – https://horsfeathersblog.wordpress.com/  

17^th – http://www.juliathewritergirl.com/

18^th – http://butterfliesoftheimagination.wordpress.com/

19^th – https://gallopingfree.wordpress.com/

20^th – http://www.alwaysopinionatedgirl.wordpress.com/

21^st – https://deborahrocheleau.wordpress.com/

22^nd – http://irisbloomsblog.wordpress.com/

23^rd – https://clockworkdesires.wordpress.com/

24^th – https://introspectioncreative.wordpress.com/

25^th – http://wanderinginablur.blogspot.com/

26^th – https://anotefromthenerd.wordpress.com/

27^th – http://randommorbidinsanity.blogspot.com

28^th – http://unikkelyfe.wordpress.com/

29^th – http://teenscanwritetoo.wordpress.com/ (We’ll announce the topic for next month’s chain.)

(Hey, look! Rosalie and I share a day! Awesome. ^_^)

Dawn

Tags

captain america: the winter soldier, colorblind, completed stories, connor rawleigh, marvel, nat brachevis, novels, original work, short stories, spiderman

A short story, involving characters from Colorblind.

Enjoy!

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Dawn

                Nat was almost startled to see the young reporter-cum-unwilling assassin sitting on the sofa in the living room, staring absentmindedly at the painting of a calm forest glen, as if he hadn’t moved in hours. Sometimes, Connor was so quiet that Nat would forget he had company, only to be abruptly reminded of it as he ran into a rather surprised Connor, a few minutes later. Connor would sit perfectly still for hours at times, and other times look vaguely reproving as Nat bit back a curse on being startled yet again.

The thing was, the younger man wasn’t doing it intentionally. It just happened.

“Hey,” Nat said. Connor looked up, startled out of his thoughts. He smile, an odd, endearing, childlike half-smile.

“Hey.”

“Do you never make a sound?” Nat teased gently. Connor looked surprised for a moment, then a mischievous look crossed his face. Nat knew that look. It was too adorable for how purely wicked it could be.

“Not all of us are as big as you,” Connor told the powerfully built police officer. Nat snorted.

“Not all of us are mice,” he said, grabbing the younger man in a playful headlock. Connor just laughed and remained still. They both knew that if Connor wanted to get out, he could get out, as Nat’s latest still-healing bruises could attest.

“Tired?” Nat asked. Connor shrugged.

“I haven’t actually been tired in a long time,” he said. “It’s almost as if I have too much energy. I was just thinking.”

“Dangerous pastime.”

“Well, if no one did any thinking, we’d all be going nowhere.”

“If you did less thinking, my friend, less of those places we’re going would crash and burn,” Nat teased. Connor ducked under his arm and shoved him off the sofa. Nat sat on the floor for a moment, inwardly smiling at the progress they had made. After a few months in the safehouse, Connor no longer started at sudden sounds, though he still occasionally would lash out violently, if provoked. Also, Connor was becoming less awkward when it came to human interaction.

“It’s been a long year, hasn’t it,” Nat said thoughtfully. Connor snorted.

“It wasn’t even a full year,” he pointed out. Nat shrugged.

“True enough.” They were silent for a while, comfortable in each other’s company.

“Connor, there’s something I should probably tell you…”

Connor, there’s something I should probably tell you…

                “Connor! Connor, wake up!”

“What?” he grumbled. He felt so strange… He blinked. It was dark, except for a small pool of light puddling around their lantern, with a dim aura from an abandoned street light over head. “Wha—How did I get here?”

Nat blinked at him. “You’ve been here for the past five hours, with me. You came here with me.” Connor blinked. Oh. Right.

“I was asleep?”

“Yup. I have no idea how you manage to sleep during a stakeout, but that’s what happened.” Connor rubbed his face.

“How long?”

“About half an hour. Did I ever tell you you’re too precious when you’re sleeping?”

“Please, just shut up.” Connor groaned. “Dreaming from your point of view. Weird.”

“Well, at least we know one thing from that.”

“And what’s that?” Connor sighed, exhaustedly.

“You’re grumpy when you first wake up.” Connor made a face at him. “There’s still hope that you’re not irreparably broken.”

“And I sleep in the middle of a shootout about to happen.” Connor ran a hand through his hair. “It’s cold out here.”

“It’s three a.m. They turn the heating off when decent people aren’t going to be around.” Connor actually laughed.

“Guess we’re not decent people, then… is there any coffee left?”

“You don’t like coffee.”

“True, but the label on the thermos says it keeps things warm for eight hours.” Nat finished pouring out a cup and handed it to Connor, who choked it down, making a face at the taste. He looked at his watch.

“I just remembered. We missed the new year.”

“Apparently that was three hours ago… was I awake for that?”

“Yes, you silly kid, you were. And you didn’t remark on it.”

“Forgive me for being focused on the mark.” Suddenly, Connor straightened up, his eyes lighting, like a wolfhound catching a scent. “It’s time. They’re coming.” Nat stood, behind him. The smaller, slimmer, younger man was entirely focused on their target, a pale, unpretentious shadow in the darkness.

Seconds later, he dashed across the intervening space at a breakneck pace, using one of the men as a springboard to tackle a second. Nat was using his boxing lessons on the third, while Connor had already disabled a fourth. The kid’s methods were unorthodox, but effective, Nat had to admit. “There are more coming in,” Connor said, barely out of breath. Like a shadow, he was there one moment and gone the next, leaving Nat with the kids.

“Hey, it’s okay,” he said, softly, consoling the little ones whom they had just saved from a fate similar to Connor’s. “It’s going to be okay.”

 

When Connor came back, he was alone, barely disheveled, not dirty, but he was carrying a Taser, which probably wasn’t his. “We’re done here,” he said, quietly rather than tersely. Nat nodded.

“Okay, we’re good to go.” He picked up one child. The other instinctively turned to Connor, who lifted her, staggering slightly under her weight—the little one was almost as tall as he was, and certainly stouter.

“Oh, that reminds me. Connor, there’s something I should probably tell you…”

END

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Yup, just two guys being my lovely boys. Gotta love brotherhood, by spirit if not in blood. 😛

If you were wondering about what it was that Nat (aka Police Sergeant Nathaniel Brachevis) was going to tell Connor, it’s involved with the end of the novel, but if you want a spoiler SPOILER ALERT the two of them are going to be recruited for a search/rescue/destroy program, going after the guys who trained Connor as an assassin and caused him to have amnesia in the first place. END SPOILERS Basically, protecting other people with the same ‘condition’ Connor has (he can see some wavelengths of ultraviolet light.) So yes, it’s sort of a superhero/spy/psychological/thriller novel. But if you asked Connor, I’m pretty sure he’d say he’s not a hero, he’s just a person who likes to know other people are going to be safe. He’s kind of complex like that.

This is why I think Connor is one of my personal favorites: He’s a sweet guy, very gentle, with an earnest and charming personality, adorably awkward, too. However, he has this other side; he’s a very deadly assassin without being aware of it. Someone else is trying to pull the strings, but he won’t let that happen, and he suffers from amnesia as a result. (Yup, he is actually the one at fault for having a basically blank memory.) I wouldn’t say he’s broken, unlike SPOILERS FOR THE WINTER SOLDIER Bucky, post-Hydra; Bucky was pulled out and they didn’t leave any of Bucky in the Winter Soldier, at least, as far as that was possible. On the other hand, they left Connor with his human, civilian persona, as a sort of a cover for him. That’s not to say that he isn’t messed up. It’s just more subtle, and possibly even harder to root out than it will be with Bucky.

Actually, believe it or not, the plot of Colorblind was not actually influenced by The Winter Soldier. I started work on Colorblind before Winter Soldier actually came out, before I even really got into the Marvel fandom at all. So maybe Connor’s character was a fraction influenced by Peter Parker, but really, I had no idea about Winter Soldier when I started writing this. I haven’t seen the Bourne movies either so I don’t really have any idea where the parallels lie, if there are any at all.

The idea for Colorblind came when I was thinking about how sometimes being special makes you vulnerable, and I wanted to explore that. Connor’s “superpower” really isn’t all that useful in a fight (though it might be in detective work,) and he was used, as a pawn, as a result of being “special.” Part of the idea was after seeing a particularly noxious shade of orange, and from there it became what if certain colors could drive people insane and turn them into murdering psychopaths? And from there, you can probably see where the plot went. 😉

Bottom line: Connor is an awesome fighter, but with a softer, gentler side, who is willing to fight so that other people don’t have to suffer through what he did. He’s also naive and kind of innocent, and I just find that endearing. Please tell me what you think of my character in the comments–also, if there’s a sort of character development that I seem to be falling short on, I would appreciate the help with that 🙂 I’d love to discuss it.

Also, I found a couple of people who I think look a little like I imagine Connor–they just look innocent 😉 and that’s a big part of Connor’s character. I’d love to know who you, my readers, think looks more like you imagine Connor.

Asa Butterfield

I’m not really sure who this is–does anyone know?–but I frankly think he looks more like I’d imagine Connor to look.

 

Marvel’s Red Shirts?

Tags

captain america: the first avenger, completely random posts, iron man, marvel, rambling musings, randomness, stuff i notice

I just noticed something. But rather than tell you, I think I’ll show you:

Okay? You know who those guys are, right? Well, if you were paying attention in Iron Man (and even if you weren’t while watching Captain America: The First Avenger), you’d know that the first one is Dr. Yinsen, incidentally the guy who saves Tony Stark’s life in the first couple minutes of the movie and helps him ultimately escape (oh, did I forget to say “spoiler alert?” Whoopsie…), and the second one is Dr. Abraham Erskine, the man who created the supersoldier serum and who was instrumental in making Steve Rogers into a superhero.

What the flaming kerfuffle, Marvel?

I’m noticing a pattern here. Scientist person. Key to the early character development/hero’s journey of the central character. Gunned down early in the film.

The guy with the glasses always dies. (Except for Brucie, but he’s a central character. He doesn’t count.)

I hope this isn’t a pattern. I was enjoying the feeling that Marvel movies were unpredictable.

Ladies and gentlemen: legitimate Red Shirt of the Marvelverse. The guy with the glasses.

(And now that I’ve, hopefully, made you laugh, here’s something I found while out browsing the web that hit me right in the feels.)

These guys are going to be in SO MUCH TROUBLE when SHIELD finds out that Steve was actually aware of them the entire time. It was in the flashback–he remembers it! *cries* Poor guy… *sobs wildly*

*cries* No. Just… no.

He froze to death and he remembers it.

People, that’s just too much… *goes to cry in a shrubbery*