And basically doing my annual "Was Bart's girlfriend Val as awful as I remember her?" rereview and the short answer is...

YES

Y E S

YEP!!

God I hate her

WHY ARE BART KON AND TIM CONSTANTLY PUT IN VERY QUESTIONABLE SEX SITUATIONS

CAUSE SHE SLEPT WITH HIM

AND IT'S. LIKE.

NO???

It's SO fuckin' gross!

And she had a crush on him when he was like 15-16 and she was already in her 20's

And I hate that the comic is on her side narratively

She treats him like garbage, she bragged to her friends about sleeping with him, told them he was the Flash (because they HAD to know it was the Flash she was sleeping with), tried to make him feel crazy when he called her on it, and told him it was his faulty she had to tell them because dating him was so stressful.

Oh and she stalked him at the beginning, using Star Lab recourses, despite Star Labs telling her to leave him the fuck alone. She also pushed him into getting his powers back and getting back into the Superhero thing. Then makes him feel like shit over it.

It's like red flags all the way down.

SeeMarieRun: I hate that DC did this to all three of them!

And yeah it really is!

Because she's preying on his vulnerability at being age accelerated again

Max is dead, Wally's gone, Tim's a mess, Kon is dead.

And Bart is in this weird space of trying to feel comfortable in his skin. Trying to be 20

He had a hard enough time being 15/16

YEP!

And the roommate is pressuring him to drink, she's trying to mold him into My Perfect Super Boyfriend

I know there are people that don't like that she just got dropped and never talked about again, but like, I don't trust DC to handle that any better then they did the first time around.

God his roommate was bad, too. Like, Bart, why are you friends with this man, you clearly don't like him. But at least Griffen was interesting. Kind of

It's better that way. Like I hated it - when I played Bart, I had him say that he had the memories from when he was older but since Legion brought him back based on the first time he was caught in the Speed Force, they didn't really FEEL like his memories. Like he specifically said there was a complete emotional disconnection.

Which I know overwrites the bit with that VR machine and him killing Inertia over and over again but DON'T MIND THAT EITHER

That's a good way to play it. I was going to play it out like those are some of the few memories that are actually fuzzy for him (because trama will do that) and he just doesn't like thinking about it or talking about it if he can avoid it. And oh yeah, I'm not even acknowledging the VR bit. That was SO wildly out of character.

Like we know how Bart handles trama and that ain't it.

And I'm sorry his telling Tim no when Tim was like please come join the Titans

RIGHT?! Also, very out of character.

For the Justice League?

I like that he and Tim were still talking during that time, and I like to think that when Bart was depowered he and Tim were talking with "Cissie Rules", where we don't talk about Superhero shit unless you're bragging because it stressfull that he can't help. But there's no reason Bart woudn't rejoin them if he was back in the game and Tim asked.

And like - 20 isn't too old for the Teen Titans. They haven't all been under 20 since like 1990.

That's why half the time it's just Titans.

There's no way he would turn them down for the JLA, they're HIS TEAM

The ONLY thing I'm glad about is FMA nailed Tim's reaction.

None of this also-ran shit dismissing him, saying he never took him seriously that we saw in fucking TT 50

Just absolutely gutted.

Gar and Raven were on the team and they're over 20 (even if Raven keeps getting deaged, which was a really creepy time to decide to hook her up with Gar, not a good look for him)

Dick hasn't been under 20 but still on the Titans for YEARS.

GOD! TT50 was just awful!

I hate Gar/Raven

I refuse to reread that. Everyone was out of character and that was the start of "Bart was a sexual predator's actually! Lol isn't that hilarious! XD"

SeeMarieRun: SAME! I was never into the fanon of it in the cartoon (though I didn't hate it there, just wasn't my thing) but putting in the comics was just awful.

I'm half tempted to have some kind of memshare down the line of Bart's break up with Val. Just to explore his own feeling on it. Because he just kind of avoids thinking about it, and hindsight as not left Val in a very good light in his mind.

I'm not even sure if Bart would have told Tim about her, since their relationship was perpetually on the rocks

Tim probably would’ve been very cautious on it. More because she knew who Bart was

That makes sense. I think things would have gone pretty different with her if he had actually talked about her with Tim.

Kon would be really pissed at her whether hed accepted his thing with knockout or not

Esp bart. Bart is extra baby

Bart probably has a year or two of chronological age on Kon and much longer lived experience even if it was VR. But little brother energy

if kon hasn't accepted this thing with knockout by the time this memshare comes up, I could see a scenario where he ends up accidentally repeating some of Stacia and Dicks points to Bart, and Kon just having an "...oh..." moment.

yeeep

two flavors of weirdo creeps god

They both are pretty resilient for moving past that.

true! i think bart just mostly doesn't think about it if he doesn't have to.

man, i also keep thinking about how if they have to interact with unicorns and he can't interact with one, he's gonna be bummed. and the topic could end up coming up then too, if someone asked into it.

Kon’s supposed to take Tim to a unicorn

ooo, is that for a certain plot or is it just so tim can see a unicorn and geek out?

You’d have to ask em. I think they’re going to be accessible to anyone that wants to find them, but the idea is Kon takes Tim when no one else is around so he doesn’t have to feel weird about being able to ride one.

aww! that's so cute!

Yeah I was just gonna do it as a side thing in one of their little camp areas

Some plots will have a rest stop somewhere in there bc they have to travel to get to the plot

But like you have to go find one so you can have characters go look by themselves or in pairs without everyone around

pegasus unicorns

that will take you flying

ooo! that sounds really cool! love that we get kinda mini side events for when they camp.

would pegasus unicorns still work by regular unicorn rules?

yes

(there'll be other magical stuff to play with tho)

he's gonna be super bummed he can't fly on a pegasus unicorn, but that's good to know there's gonna be other stuff for them to play around with. He would probably just quietly avoid showing interest in them and concentrate on the other stuff. avoid awkward questions and the snooty horses with wings

I'll probably have some flying griffins and other stuff

Maaaaaan.

awesome!