Hello, bar!

How is it Friday again already?? (Not that I'm complaining.)

Anyway, one of the things that interested me most in AoU was the central motif of legacy and endings. One way that played in was the repeated use of statues and architecture, but there were a lot of good lines about it too. Ultron talks about how "people create children to supplant them, to help them end." Tony, of course, talks about his Wanda-induced vision of the dead Avengers as his legacy, and how much that scares him, how much he wants to avoid that becoming reality.

We see Clint and Natasha grappling with this idea too. It's probably most obvious in Natasha's conversations with Bruce--initially, in her moment of weakness, she sees leaving the fight as the best possible course of action, because she sees herself as nothing more than what Red Room made her, and therefore as incapable of contributing anything good. But later she comes back to her senses, when Bruce advocates running away again. He tells her "you've done plenty," but she knows now that her job isn't finished. In fact, it's a long way from being finished, because she makes the decision to move forward by taking on the training of the new Avengers. I think I'm probably more positive about her AoU arc as a whole than most, but I particularly loved this decision--to see Natasha go from feeling that she's nothing more than Red Room's pawn to deciding that she can choose her own legacy and she wants it to be one of being a hero and mentoring future heroes. I think that's huge and wonderful for her.

Finally, we also see Clint coming to terms with what it means to do enough and go home, although this plays out in less direct terms than some of the other arcs. He takes ownership of his role in the team from the beginning, and the fact that it may require sacrifice on his part. He promises Laura that he'll come home, and for a moment it looks as though he might be considering retirement when he talks about not doing any more projects on the house. But by the end of the movie, I think it's pretty clear that he's realized the team and the world still need him.

So, bar, my question to you this week is what do YOU think about our favorite assassins and their endings/legacies? I know I talked a lot about AoU in this post, but I'd love to hear different versions you imagine, AoU-compliant or otherwise! This post is for discussion, comment fic, recs, or anything else to do with the theme. I can't wait to hear your thoughts!

Things to remember:
1) Always label NSFW (Not Safe For Work) stuff in the title and post under a cut.
2) Fic and artwork needs to have a rating and warnings (or you can say that you’ve chosen not to use warnings).
3) For people with annoying internet connections, say in the title if a comment is graphic/images/gif-heavy and post picspams under a cut.
4) Have a damn good time! (Because if that’s not happening then this post has clearly failed.)