So Like. Ward-era Parahumans Definitely Had Some Kind Of Khepri-romanticization Kink Subculture Right.

My correct Amy opinions

Amy is characterised primarily by the belief that she is destined for evil. She believes this because of her 'evil pedigree', a belief caused by Carol's emotional neglect, her temptations, primarily her desire for her sister, her ability to fulfill her temptations, through her power, and her lack of enjoyment of doing good through healing.

She doesn't really desire to do good; her stated reason for continuing healing is that "people wouldn’t understand if she stopped" and she never wanted to be a hero. Healing is a crushing obligation. But she doesn't want to be evil or to hurt people, and so she tries delay and deny her own evilness. Her rules exist for the sole reason to help her resist temptation.

She doesn't seek help because she believes that it wouldn't help, because of her inherent evil.

She loves her sister, and doesn't want to disappoint her.

Amy's obviously a controversial figure, and there's a lot of room for interpretation, especially once you add Ward into the picture, but I think that the above should be an uncontroversial foundation for discussing Amy, and that you're probably wrong if you disagree

The Power Cut contains more than your daily recommended dose of insightful character commentary

THE POWER CUT

A fanzine about THE POWER FANTASY

Issue #1: "The Balancing Act" coming February 14, 2025!

The Power Cut is a collection of meta essays, illustrations, and jokes. The Power Cut contains mature content and spoilers for The Power Fantasy #1-5. The Power Cut will be available free online. The Power Cut is so excited to meet you!

Contributors:

@artbyblastweave

@idonttakethislightly

@jkjones21

@khepris-worst-soldier

@meserach

@rei-ismyname

@tazmuth

@the-joju-experience

Cover art by @tazmuth

Jack Slash works as well as he does basically entirely on the basis of how visibly the author Does Not Like Him. There's a version of Jack Slash written by some other guy who actually unironically thinks his character archetype is hot shit, and that version sucks and the version of the story that he's in also probably sucks. This version also sucks but you can feel everyone else in the story rolling their eyes in unison at the fact that they've gotta put up with his bullshit, everyone going, "alright, can we please stop with the Dark Knight pastiche and go back to playing realpolitik with well-realized individuals who aren't homicidal cartoon characters that we're forced to take seriously purely by virtue of their inexplicable six-digit grimdark looneytunes bodycount"

if worm happens after wildbow develops ward/weaverdice power sensibilities she never meets the undersiders. lung doesn't hear her stepping onto the gravel roof because his trigger only has like light thinker notes tbh. and he's already a brute/changer, blaster with mover notes, that's already a lot, we should trim down, we should trim this down. Really drive at the cocaine elements of his trigger

Finally got my copy of The Power Fantasy #6

heavy power fantasy is so cool i wish i could crush my enemies into meat orbs

it is rlly funny that wildbow thinks so little about legend that he forgot he never gave him a name in worm so ward accidentally canonizes that his son’s name is also his name

I did a painting party for my birthday and here’s what I made

There really is basically no reason for Imp Vista friendship to happen in a world where Regent doesn't blow up but I really wish there was. Maybe in comedic less serious AU they can still be Best Friends because there really is something so engaging about a world where the Undersiders and Wards hate each other but are also forcing friendship through gritted teeth off the clock for the sake of Team Little Sisters

Imp invites Vista to one of Taylors block parties in hopes that exposure to raw villainous joy will turn Vista supervillain. Vista brings the Wards with her in hopes that exposure to good natured heroes with a system of ethics will make Aisha want to join the Wards. Everyone is out of costume and random adults try and solve the tension between what they perceive as two groups of teenagers having a spat over nothing. Lisa and Chris Win are forced to shake hands and apologize lest they set a bad example for the kids watching. They play Cornhole and Regent makes the Wards mess up every single throw. Emotionally charged game of Uno turned philosophical debate between Brian, Taylor and Dennis.

In conclusion I have a vision for a beautiful world of WardSiders frienemyship and it all boils down to this image

Cauldron’s funny in this regard, first because all of its members can fit in a minivan and because literally 90% of their capacity relies on Contessa; when she has to fake her death and can’t intervene Cauldron stops existing within a handful of hours.

And their plan is also based on the bus factor; they let the apocalypse happen early because every 2-3 months a bus crashes and every bus maybe contains the person who can kill Scion. And they are vindicated in this; Foil, Tattletale and Weaver all could have died in any of the 8+ Endbringer fights they went to, and very likely would have eventually died in one of the dozens they would have gone through if Cauldron stopped Jack from setting off Scion

This discussion of superhero logistics reminds me of an element of Worm's background worldbuilding that I've always found really interesting, which is that the heroes are running out of teleporters. They had a cloak-style mass teleporter, Strider, who was apparently indispensable for troop deployment at Endbringer fights, but he didn't get the hell out of dodge in time so by the Behemoth fight they mention having to seriously kludge other not-as-good powers to get everyone on-site on time. No one dies forever in comics so the question of "what are the risks of one guy's powers becoming indispensable to our organization" isn't as salient, but here goes Worm, gesturing at the idea that you might just get super fucking unlucky because you became organizationally dependent on a couple golden gooses who you inexplicably keep bringing to live fire situations. If they weren't hard to replace, they wouldn't exactly be superheroes, would they?