u/Sivilian888010

Original post on Sao's X here.

Original X/Twitter post here.

I assume this is to Mormons what those terrible Christian propaganda books are to Protestants.

Original Post by Sao

Art by sao

Put yourself in the shoes of someone in Village 3. Someone who was there when the apocalypse began for real. When Shinji went beast mode trying to save Rei from Zeruel, and triggered an impact, starting a cascade that would lead to an apocalypse that murdered billions of people.

You've survived giant alien robots walking around, the air being made unbreathable, the ground being made unfarmable, barely scraping by when it comes to food and water because of the technology humanity managed to reverse engineer.

You've lost friends, family, loved ones because of the apocalypse. Because of Nerv, because of Gendo, because of the actions of one teenage boy who was given apocalyptic power, and then failed when it mattered the most.

And then all of sudden. The one who caused the apocalypse shows up in your village.

Would you REALLy be nice to him?

Would you really care if the apocalypse was an accident or not?

Would you really care that he didn't intend to cause the apocalypse?

Would you really care that his father tricked him into piloting again?

Would you really care he was a teenager?

Or. More likely. Would you be outraged that the cause of your misery. The state of the world. Your dead loved ones, and want him dead. Or. If not dead, at least gone or locked up and far away from you so he couldn't potentially cause more harm?

(Warning for discussion of suicide and mental health)

Of all the things that bugged me about the last rebuild movie. This was the biggest.

It's completely and totally stupid that nobody is the least bit concerned when Shinji starts wandering around the village by himself. And it's totally idiotic, that his alleged friends seem to not be the least bit concerned that an ACTIVELY SUICIDAL teenage boy coping with guilt, PTSD, depression, and likely every mental health issue in the book after what he's been through is to let him wander off somewhere by himself.

It's even more gauche and stupid that Touji and Kensuke even say 'he just needs some time to himself to work things out'.

Do you know what happens in real life, when you leave a suicidal person by themselves to 'work things out' ? You walk in and they're hanging from the ceiling, or they jump off a balcony, or you find them in the tub with slit wrists.

The director must have some serious misconceptions about how mental health works if he thinks 'some time to himself to work things out' would ever do anything to help Shinji after all the horrible terrible shit he's both done to others and had done to him.

Shinji could have literally jumped off the edge of that concrete pier, and drowned himself and NOBODY would have known what happened until days afterwards when someone found the body being picked apart by the Penguins.

The characters should have behaved more like how people would when they have an actively damaged and suicidal person among them.

I understand given everything they couldn't afford to baby him. But there's a difference between 'babying' someone, and making sure the person who caused the impact, who may still be militarily important to Wille isn't dead in a ditch somewhere.

He destroyed the world. Realistically the only way he could ever be forgiven is if he fixed the world, and brought back the people who died. Kaworu said he could do that by piloting the eva again and pulling the spears. But he couldn't. So after that, there's nothing he could have done to make up for what he did.

He could spend the rest of his life helping out in Village 3, become a monk and spend the rest of his life praying for the souls of those he killed, and it just doesn't seem like it would ever be enough to make up for his mistake. Not when millions of people, including children died because of that mistake.

I'll just assume you already know about that scene in Ultimate Spider-Man that heavily implies Wolverine, in Spider-Mans body, tried to sleep with a teenage MJ.

My question is. What possibly could have motivated Bendis putting this in his comic?

My theory? Behind the scenes grievances.

Behind the scenes grievances at Marvel and DC comics have been the cause of many a boneheaded creative decision. From John Byrne having Superman and Big Barda make a sex tape to piss off Jack Kirby, to Joe Quesada's messy divorce infamously leading to One More Day.

I can't help but feel this may have been motivated by Bendis. Bendis and Millar both had VERY different ideas for the direction the ultimate universe should go. Because if you look at the state of Marvel at the time, there was a bit of a divide between them on what direction the Ultimate universe should go.

Millar wanted a more grounded, gritty and 'realistic' Marvel universe. The 'world outside your window' except what was outside your window was the real events of the 2000s, 9/11, the Iraq War, Bush bungling Hurricane katrina. That sort of thing. And to add that tone, the characters are more 'realistic' versions of who they are in the 616. With more flaws and issues than thr 616's more idealistic versions. Captain America is a man out of time, who still has some backwards opinions on race and gender politics. Thor is a god on earth, and accepts worship as one and changes the settings conception of religion. Hank Pym, who only hit his wife once in the 616 after having a bipolar episode, is written like a realistic a pill popping person with Bipolar disorder, who when he as an episode attempts to murder his wife.
He basically wanted to push the Ultimate Universe to do things you could never get away with in the 616.

Bendis on the other hand. Clearly wanted a more optimistic or at least less grim universe. He basically wanted a more refined version of the 616, with the decades of baggage, continuity, and thousands of characters trimmed down and refined. Basically the characters he loved distilled down to their essence. Which is obvious in Ultimate Spider-Man, which many people consider the best version of the character in the comics. Ultimate Spider-Man is still more or less the Peter Parker we know and love in the 616, just earlier in his career. The villains in the spider-Man side of the universe are still who they were in the comics. MJ is still MJ. Flash is still flash. Norman and the rest of the rogues are still mostly who they were in the 616.

He wanted a version of Marvel that was more accesible and streamlined. But still recognizeable.

This creative tension between the two of them would continue until Millar eventually left the Ultimate Univers, and Marvel to do his own thing with works like Kick-Ass and Kingsman. After which Millar

Also. It's clear Mark Millar has an affection for Logan/Wolverine. He's probably the only character in the Ultimate Universe he didn't have to exagerrate or make 'realistic' because he's already a gritty grounded character with a troubled past. Old Man Logan is still one of his best works. Ultimate Wolverine, is actually one of the better written characters in Ultimate X-Men.

So what could be a better way to troll a guy who you dislike the creative direction he's taking this new universe your building, than to mess with a character he actually cares about?

So this is pure speculation. But I can't help but believe Bendis felt Millar was going too far in places with the Ultimate Universe. Especially with the Ultimate X-Men, which could become very grim and serious at times. So he decided to 'get back' at him by making one of Millar's favorite characters do something 'grounded and realistic' that wouldn't be out of place in The Ultimates. To try to show how dumb the whole idea of making a character 'grounded and realistic' is. Considering other creators at Marvel at the time like Grant Morrison, didn't care for The Ultimates and the liberties it took with the characters, especially Captain America, who even to this day is decried as 'fascist and bigoted' for being writen like a realistic person from the 40s and not an idealistic paragon. It's likely Bendis shared the same opinion.

Basically it was him going. "It's not so fun when it's YOUR favorite character being portrayed as 'grounded gritty and realistic. Is it. Mark."

This just a theory though. Not sure if there's any actual meat to it, or if it's just me seeing connections where there are none. Maybe it was just a poorly thought out joke.

The Miss Japan pageant is happening, and someone shared this. Immediately made me think of Shino and Mari.

I bet Mari dealt with a lot of Godzilla jokes in High School.

Original art on X/Twitter by Sao here

"As a hobby, I can pretty much draw the basics of American soldiers in the Vietnam War without any reference materials."

From Ultimate Hulk Vs Wolverine.

I had this idea because in the original Men In Black comics the MIB fought more than just aliens, they also fought magical creatures and interdimensional beings.

I can see a few options.

1. They blow up the gate, wipe the memories of the entire populace, and pass off the loss of life as a human terrorist attack.

2. They get the situation under control, wipe the populaces memories, and then pass the gate off as something else (a radioactive containment sphere, a theme part attractione etc.) until they can figure out how to close it.

3. If the situation is so big they can't possibly clean it up. Infiltrate the JSDF (or whatever modern military actually sends troops beyond the gate) to try and scope the situation out, and influence their mission whenever they can.

In case you need another reason to hate Zorzal. Not that this would have worked. Tyuule was considered a disgrace and a pariah by her own people for surrendering to Zorzal, so they probably wouldn't have even acknowledged Zorzals bastard as their king or queen.

Original artwork on his X/Twitter is here and here