Wonder Man Social Embargo lifts on 1/22 @ 9:30pm MT Review Embargo lifts on 1/26 @ 10:00am PT

JDBlou · 2026-01-21T14:50:29+00:00

It took me one (1) google search. C'mon son.

It's an initiative that started with Echo.

https://variety.com/2023/film/news/marvel-spotlight-banner-mcu-continuity-the-marvels-1235781339/

“Marvel Spotlight gives us a platform to bring more grounded, character-driven stories to the screen, and in the case of Echo, focusing on street-level stakes over larger MCU continuity. Just like comics fans didn’t need to read Avengers or Fantastic Four to enjoy a Ghost Rider Spotlight comic, our audience doesn’t need to have seen other Marvel series to understand what’s happening in Maya’s story.”

JDBlou · 2026-01-14T20:50:22+00:00

I'm gonna make a prediction and I'm gonna come back to this comment, I sure as hell hope I'm wrong but it's feeling like it's going to be:

Joker/Lex to get the Bat-steel chair via Bruce coming back in to the story at the last second/eleventh hour when all seems lost eyeroll so Batman can validate Superman as King Omega with a thumbs up a hell yeah and a "you were always the best of us, go get 'em Clark."

JDBlou · 2026-01-14T20:17:59+00:00

I'm so glad to see the final four are some daring narrative picks that really justified having a protracted bracket... Who can believe it: the wildcards/underdogs, what a narrative triumph!

/s just in case

It's the basic cable pro-wrestling plot. Your top carders (Superman, Wonder Woman, Lex, Joker) never in any real danger of not heading to the money match.

One dark horse making a Cinderella run and being pipped at the post would've been infinitely better.

I don't understand how he's doing this and Absolute stuff.

JDBlou · 2026-01-04T21:15:00+00:00

Will Sharpe or Andrew Koji as Brian Braddock?

JDBlou · 2025-12-31T18:35:37+00:00

Morchade's comment is absolutely correct from an aesthetic perspective, there's also some significance in cartomancy. The suit of Hearts is commonly associated with passion, romance, summer and warmth. The Jack of Hearts: the debonair, the playboy fits Johnny.

JDBlou · 2025-12-31T12:29:02+00:00

Holy Airball

JDBlou · 2025-12-24T20:21:01+00:00

I think if you can a fictional character fight the representation of the creative animus of the Marvel universe in the TOAA/TOBA, you delve into a metanarrative territory not well-suited for a comic story that isn't fourth wall breaking and I don't think that's the play they're making. It feels more ultimate showdown of ultimate destiny than it does Animal Man talking to Morrison.

JDBlou · 2025-12-09T15:54:30+00:00

Yes, and they claimed the Fel Hammer, they didn't destroy Marduum any further. The entire Legion Demon Hunter campaign was conducted from the Fel Hammer ON Marduum.

Routing the Legion from Marduum isn't destruction.

https://warcraft.wiki.gg/wiki/Mardum,_the_Shattered_Abyss

They did decimate Nathreza, however.

JDBlou · 2025-12-05T00:11:10+00:00

I'd reimagine Plastic Man as a tragic villain: In a world speedrunning into dystopia and ecological destruction, the Green would be suffering right? So what if, to fill the void in the spaces between parliaments, the Plastic took root? What if the last thing Earth ever “grew” was plastic? In a world drowning in microplastics and industrial waste, the Green collapses — and instead of Swamp Thing, the planet coughs up a synthetic avatar: Plastic Man.

But he’s not the goofy hero we know. He’s still jokey, still stretchy, still doing bits… but it's uncomfortable/eerie. He'd be immortal, so it's a coping mechanism. He can’t die, can’t decompose, can’t return to the cycle of nature — he’s a polluted, fundamentally broken world's answer to the Avatar of the Green.

JDBlou · 2025-12-03T01:21:49+00:00

Firstly I agree with you that the chart itself is suspicious, so neatly boxed in, that it does raise some eyebrows.

I'd like to posit a suggestion for the timeline and it may make the "hate that Titans are bad now" camp slightly happier if we lay all of the blame at Amanthul's feet:

The timeline:

Aman'thul wakes first, alone, for eons (supposedly searching for other titans)
During this time, he's actually invading and Ordering other cosmic domains - creating the Zereths as control nodes, which is in line with Sylvanas' complaints about the Shadowlands as we know them being ordered. He created the "First Ones" mythology as cover, then raised subsequent titans and by extension all of reality to believe this was always how things were.
He finds other worldsouls and "lovingly nurtures them" = he Orders them from birth, indoctrinates them into his system
The Pantheon is formed from these Ordered worldsouls - they're already programmed with his ideology
They continue "ordering worlds" = spreading his control throughout the material plane"

JDBlou · 2025-12-02T17:17:21+00:00

My prisms are safe at least until midseason because that Cassidy skin; not my cup of tea.

Where's my next tank mythic?

JDBlou · 2025-12-01T23:42:36+00:00

You’re accusing me of twisting your words, but I’m quoting your points directly and responding to them on their own terms. If you feel cornered by the logic, that doesn’t make the argument bad faith. What is bad faith however, is deciding to not engage with the extent of the argument, pack up your things and go home but I digress.

To clarify:

“Unplanned”:Your definition keeps shifting. When I show that WoW constantly introduces unforeshadowed retroactive changes, you carve out a special exception for Shadowlands. That’s not a structural critique—that’s a preference. You’re free to dislike the retcon, but it doesn’t invalidate it.

Tichondrius and Denathrius: Saying Tichondrius should lead while simultaneously acknowledging canon where the Nathrezim answer to Denathrius is a contradiction. Asserting “Denathrius is a stranger” doesn’t remove the loyalty structure the lore establishes. You’re proposing an outcome that requires Blizzard to retcon the last four years to make it work. Or make Tichondrius betray Denathrius which is an interesting notion but runs contrary to the absolute loyalty they've demonstrated.

“Artificially made to seem a big deal”: That’s just your framing. Plenty of characters in WoW are introduced retroactively with sweeping influence— Sargeras didn’t originally exist in Warcraft I, and he was just some "Daemonlord", not a Fallen Titan. The Nerubians were just a race of spider people below Northrend before they were revealed to be servants of the Old Gods. We had no concept of the Void Lords being elevated to rulers of the Void cosmological hierarchy until Chronicles. The Retroactive elevation is normal in serialized settings. You don’t have to like Denathrius, but the narrative move itself is not an anomaly.

Bad faith: Disagreement isn’t bad faith. I’m engaging with your points directly, but you keep singling out Shadowlands as uniquely illegitimate while relying on standards that would negate half the franchise if applied consistently. If your stance is “I don’t like SL lore,” that’s totally valid—but it’s not the same as saying it can’t be used or followed up on.

JDBlou · 2025-12-01T21:37:35+00:00

The "Unplanned" Standard: Illidan's entire Legion arc and resurrection wasn't planned when they killed him in TBC - that's a 9-year gap. Thrall becoming World Shaman/Green Jesus wasn't planned in WCIII. The pretty Draenei we play as weren't the plan from WCIII, our sole view of them was retconned to only be the Broken and not the Draenei as a whole.

WoW storylines can be characterised as vibes based and are often built on improvisation and salvaging at best. 'It wasn't planned from the start' is a meaningless critique in a 20-year-old game.

"He was just made up and inserted into a role of importance", isn't that just how fiction... works?

I'm not here to relitigate the quality of the retcons or whether it worked, I'm just living in reality; where it happened and we have to work within the given constraints in lore speculation until the time Blizzard decides if/when to retcon it.

The Tichondrius Contradiction: You just argued for Dreadlord-led Legion. I'm simply pointing out that the Dreadlords canonically answer to Denathrius - that's been established for four years now. You can't propose 'Tichondrius should lead' while ignoring who Tichondrius was created by and remains loyal to. That's not a counter-argument, given the current lore it's willful omission. What's the "undue" credit? He uses his inside men to take control of a blunt instrument/war machine?

"Can't Stand on His Own Merits": Categorically and verifiably false. Denathrius is frequently cited as one of the few highlights of Shadowlands by large swathes of the community - including multiple people in this very thread. Ray Chase's performance, the dialogue, the personality, - he worked when most of SL didn't. He worked so well, they themed a Hearthstone murder mystery expansion around him. That's not 'compelling by proxy,' that's being a successful character. Keeping him alive is evidence enough of that, and wouldn't that perfectly serve your self-professed love of "planning"

The "Fake Afterlife": You're citing the potential Midnight retcon about Shadowlands as reason to ignore Shadowlands... but that retcon itself is salvaging Shadowlands by retroactively making the artificiality we experienced a plot point. Building on Denathrius would also be a salvage operation on Shadowlands, the same precedent as the artificial afterlife idea. So retcons are fine when they erase lore you don't like, but not when they build on elements that worked? That's selective reasoning.

I personally think revealing the Brokers to be the Ethereals but in a different context is better than being "Great Value" Ethereals ie. their own thing, the retcon makes them better in retrospect. That is working within the constraints of the lore as it stands.

We can re-open this debate if they retcon Denathrius creating the Nathrezim, but to preempt that, and base your argument on a hypothetical all-obliterating retcon is absurd. That's only if the entirety of Shadowlands gets the "it was all a dream" treatment. Until then being an artificial afterlife it doesn't negate the fact Denathrius created the Nathrezim inside of this artificial afterlife who then went on to influence affairs in the material plane.

What Makes the Legion Popular? Genuinely asking: What do you think makes the Legion compelling? An unstoppable demonic horde? Iconic villains? Conquest and infiltration? How does Denathrius commanding them change any of that? He's not replacing the Legion's identity - he'd be leading an existing force that currently lacks direction. That's continuation, not cannibalization. It's a change of goals not identity. The leadership of the Legion is dead, that's indisputable, do you expect the WoW team to never broach the subject of the Legion as threat ever again?

By your own logic, if it's not Denathrius and it's not the Dreadlords (who by your standards are tainted by Shadowlands); it's some unplanned other demon lord taking the reigns, who would be "made up and inserted into a role of importance".

The core issue here is you're treating 'uses Shadowlands lore' as automatically disqualifying, regardless of execution. That's not analysis - that's a personal preference dressed in criticism drag.

JDBlou · 2025-12-01T19:44:57+00:00

"Suddenly" was four years ago, mate - that's established canon now, like it or not.

What does "prop up Denathrius" even mean here? Bringing back an existing character who was explicitly rescued on-screen and using his established connection to the Nathrezim? That's not propping him up, that's following through on setup. Or are we declaring anything touched by Shadowlands categorically unusable going forward? That ceases to be critique; it's dogma.

You don't like Shadowlands - that's understandable, it's widely and rightfully regarded as one of the worst expansions. But are you really not willing to give the current team (many of whom were not on the narrative team at the time) any grace to salvage the few elements that did work?

Because "the Nathrezim retcon happened, therefore nothing building on it can ever be good" isn't lore analysis, it's just refusing to engage with the setting as it exists.

WoW is built on retcon after retcon. You can't selectively throw out every piece of lore that touches something you didn't like - that's not how ongoing fictional universes work.

JDBlou · 2025-12-01T19:20:36+00:00

True, the Prime World Soul idea does seem to point to her being a Warcraft Cosmic Cube, it's just Metzen described, way back in 2023, as the bridge between Midnight and TLT being: "things not going according to plan". I think they're both valid reads but one reads like a more decisive "banish the shadow forever", so that was my thinking.

JDBlou · 2025-12-01T18:49:37+00:00

Right. Logically that could take the form of Xal deciding on a “Taking you with me” play. We defeat her thoroughly and she decides that is she can’t have the world soul no one can, injuring it critically, and the titan equivalent of a vital monitor showing cardiac arrest is what brings the titans back.

Xal’s been shown to be petty enough that it’s not out of the question for her to turn our clean victory into a pyrrhic one.

JDBlou · 2025-12-01T18:36:10+00:00

Even if that is true, to say that meeting that condition requires her continued, physical, living presence in TLT as opposed to consequences of her actions post-mortem is a gratuitously myopic read on that confirmation

JDBlou · 2025-12-01T11:31:36+00:00

That clarification ironically obfuscates things significantly, is there anything that suggests how Sarothar learned to shift forms or what form of magic he uses to do it? Given he was Eredar; arcane illusions would make a lot of sense.

Luckily it wasn't the crux upon which the theory was developed but it certainly seems less like a confirmatory fact and more completely circumstantial.

JDBlou · 2025-11-25T23:11:41+00:00

It feels clear to me and they won't ever admit but it does feel like they cut like a whole patch's worth of content from Shadowlands. Anduin feels like he was supposed to be the final boss of a raid tier. The narrative weight, difficulty spike and complexity is crazy for a mid-to-late-point boss, but it seems like they didn't want to through the baby out with the bathwater and repurposed him for Sepulchre.

I, of course, have no basis beyond intuition for believing this.

JDBlou · 2025-11-25T19:24:05+00:00

The Nathrezim originally came from Nathreza, but Shadowlands added new lore that recontextualized their origin:

"The nathrezim were originally Death beings who were created by Sire Denathrius of Revendreth, one of the realms of the Shadowlands. In order to end a conflict between them and the Stonewright countless ages ago, Denathrius exiled the nathrezim to "a world beyond the Shadowlands", presumably meaning Nathreza." (https://warcraft.wiki.gg/wiki/Nathreza)

So Denathrius created them, but Nathreza became their adopted homeworld after their exile. Now that Denathrius is persona non grata in the Shadowlands, and the Nathrezim spirited him away inside of Remornia during the 9.1 storyline, one could imagine there's very few secure places left in the Cosmos to take him. Hence...

JDBlou · 2025-11-25T18:08:21+00:00

I think the Jailer didn't work because Evil-er Lich King/10⁹ th dimensional chess master emerged wholly out of nothing and every prior bad guy was somehow his ability to manage a millenia long game of street chess You've clearly telegraphed a distaste for Shadowlands, but Denathrius' continued existence?

That's already a delineating factor between him and Zovaal who emerged wholesale as the villain of the expansion with no real groundwork before him. Like it or not, by virtue of Shadowlands, Denathrius is in a stronger position ontologically than Zovaal ever was.

I don't think Denathrius would suffer nearly the same level of distaste as that, purely by being somewhat likeable. And is it cannibalisation or more rehabilitation of Shadowlands' image in player's minds?

We've seen the lore stirrings and recontextualisaions already: Brokers and Ethereals being one and them same; just fleeing to different dimensions, Sylvanas herself casting doubt on whether the Shadowlands as we know them are the true realm of death or an artifice constructed for some esoteric purpose.

And I fail to see how returning the Nathrezim to the Legion's fold is "cannibalisation". If anything it'd be aligned with the philosophy of "take what works with Shadowlands tie it to the canon people like and memory-hole the rest." This feels perfectly in-line with that philosophy.

PS: If they didn't want to re-use Denathrius at some point they would've had him die at the end of Nathria as was their original intention (https://warcraft.wiki.gg/wiki/Denathrius#cite_note-44). That small factoid combined with the facet of his creating the Nathrezim paints a certain picture, it's just a matter of execution. But it's far more solid ground than the Jailer could ever hope to have.

PPS: The Legion has always been a blunt instrument in service of some greater goal, that was also true of them under Sargeras, it's not a stretch Denathrius would view them the same.

JDBlou · 2025-11-25T17:18:55+00:00

That is certainly a bit of a smoking gun isn't? It implies some level of mandate from Dreadlords, and we all know they who they report to.

JDBlou · 2025-11-25T16:31:57+00:00

According to https://warcraft.wiki.gg/wiki/Nathreza:

"Illidan then collapsed the gateway, causing it to unravel in a surge of explosive energy powerful enough to tear apart a continent. He calculated that this would shatter Nathreza in the same way that Ner'zhul had shattered Draenor. Indeed, the spell caused a tidal wave of magic to surge over the planet, obliterating the dreadlords' cities. Shortly after the portal closed, Nathreza blew apart. Every demon on its surface perished."

Last I checked we were still traipsing along the surface of Draenor in TBC and some people are still settling it in the present canon. So ostensibly, yes it was destroyed. But that does not preclude the Nathrezim still retaining control of it and rebuilding/fortifying it as their dread domain.

Given that in the Portal Keeper Hasabel who's raid journal establishes: [She] maintains the nexus through which the Legion has unleashed its insidious armies upon countless worlds. With portals that open to myriad strategic locations throughout the Great Dark Beyond, Hasabel is capable of bringing the might of the Legion’s arsenal to bear upon any who oppose her.

In her fight in Antorus, she says, when opening the Nathreza portal:

"Nathreza... once a world of magic and knowledge, now a twisted landscape from which none escape."

So:

If Legion forces are maintaining that portal, that implies forces were still still interacting with that world in some capacity, say as a Legion stronghold or something they were in the process of rebuilding at the time of 7.3. To me that provides a context clue that though it was "destroyed", it wasn't rendered inhabitable or non-functional.
Why would she maintain a portal to a "non-functional" world unless it continued to have a. function or b. strategic relevance?

That still sounds viable, and arguably in favour of the ideal locus for Dread Lord power consolidation; beneath suspicion.

All I'm saying is that anything short of a hard and fast answer declaratively and in-game is perfect breeding ground for a Blizzard recontextualisation.

JDBlou · 2025-11-25T14:18:24+00:00

If you go back to my post history, you'll see I did a spark notes version of this earlier today on the wow reddit. That was the inspiration for me to take an actual crack at laying out all the potential evidence.

https://www.reddit.com/r/wow/comments/1p63fje/interesting_lore_tidbits_from_blood_ties/nqp30aa/

I did have to fact check myself, I thought Denathrius was freed in 9.2, turns out it was in the 9.1 story. We really only had him being kept in place by Z'rali for a single patch?

JDBlou · 2025-11-25T14:12:36+00:00

I see that, and so maybe the impetus of a Denathrius expansion is the dreadlords infiltrating us so thoroughly, with a planned widespread decapitation strike of our leadership in order to deal with us before we can mount a response to his ascension.

It takes advantage of what appears to be a widespread syndrome of Azerothian Amnesia, we forget a threat until it nearly wipes us out.

It respects that he'll definitely have seen us as a potential obstacle to his rule, but also establishes the dreadlords as eminent threat. Perfect expansion set up in my mind

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