gwenfrankenstien (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
gwenfrankenstien) wrote2009-08-20 02:14 pm
gwenfrankenstien) wrote2009-08-20 02:14 pm
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Still More Steam DCU: The Lady Elias Faculty
AKA Steampunk Birds of Prey. I miss that comic so fucking much, you don't even. It was the first comic I ever bought new.
l-r: Mrs. Barda Free; Mrs. Katherine Spencer; Miss Helena Bertinelli, the Lady Huntingshire; Headmistress Miss Barbara Gordon (seated); Miss Sandra Wusan, the Lady Shiva; Miss Dinah Lance; Miss Zinda Blake, the Lady Blackhawk; Miss Karen Starr.
The Lady Elias Finishing School for Young Ladies caters to the upper middle class. The halls positively exude the kind of dowdy respectability the captains of industry want ingrained into their daughters, in hope of acquiring for them a marriage to a titled gentleman.
Miss Barbara Gordon is an American, a native of New Gotham. She is confined to a wheelchair due to an injury sustained aiding the crew of the Robin in a battle against some of the most fearsome pirates to sail the sky. No middle-class gentleman would leave his daughters in the care of such a woman, though, so the official story is that she caught ill as a small child and was left crippled by the disease.
In her youth Miss Gordon had a brief romance with Richard Grayson, then Viscount Bludhaven. Her intention was never to marry Richard, though. While in America, she lived in a Boston Marriage with fellow New Gothamite Miss Dinah Lance, with whom she traveled Europe and eventually settled in England.
Miss Gordon leads a double life as the mysterious Analytical Engineer known only as the Oracle, invaluable source of information in the crusade against air piracy. She has been known to steer students who she thinks will be useful towards careers on combat airships.
After Lady Elias' retirement, Miss Gordon accepted the position of Headmistress at the school. She also instructs the young ladies in Analytical Engineering and in English Literature.
Back home in America, Miss Dinah Lance was embroiled in a torrid, on-again, off-again engagement with Californian Mr. Oliver Queen. She broke off the engagement for good when she caught him with another woman, moving in with her close friend Miss Gordon and swearing off men.
The two women toured Europe together, during which time Miss Lance had countless flings and flirtations with gentlemen from all regions of the globe, each time insisting that this would be the last.
She followed Miss Gordon on to England, where they continue to share a living space. Before her retirement, Lady Elias offered Miss Lance a job at the school, where she teaches Natural Science and Handicrafts. Her classes are peppered with anecdotes about life in America and the Continent, which many of the girls find fascinatingly romantic.
Miss Helena Bertinelli, the Rt. Hon. Lady Huntingshire, is one of two English gentlewomen employed by the Lady Elias school. Her family, despite the air of respectability lent by a Barony, were on the whole truly despicable. Miss Bertinelli inherited the Barony after one of her father's dealings went sour and the entire family save Miss Bertinelli was slaughtered.
Following this unbearable tragedy, Miss Bertinelli, a practicing Catholic, turned to the Church for guidance. She knew that her father's sins would have doomed his immortal soul, and therefore sought to turn her own life around before she met a similar end.
Miss Bertinelli found it difficult to find either job or husband on account of her family's reputation, so when Miss Gordon offered her a position as not only an instructor but as Deputy Headmistress, she accepted the offer gladly.
Miss Bertinelli teaches Latin and Etiquette.
At this point, I say "fuck it" to the whole "backstory" business, because I've added too many characters and it's getting out of hand.
Zinda is a ridiculous eccentric. Like, not quite Howard Hughes-level, but she is a famed Aviatrix. If she weren't a noblewoman nobody would trust her to teach their children, but since she's rich it's cool. She doesn't give a flying fuck about the ridiculous Victorian social mores! I kind of love her to pieces.
She teaches Aviation. Obviously.
Karen has been at Elias the longest. She probably went to school there, which is why she resents being passed over for the Headmistress job. Having lived in Paris for several years, she teaches French. (...Which brings the JLAEIOU into this universe. Although technically Ted was there from the start?)
Drawing Power Girl in a corset = hilarious. HER BREASTS WILL EAT YOU. Uh.
So I was trying to figure out how Kate Spenser even works in this universe. I guess her husband left her? And now, she has to work to support Ramsey? Wait, her ex-husband is a writer, isn't he. So that works.
She teaches History. And possibly Law, though I don't think Elias Girls study Law.
Shiva's whole "Mysterious Asian Woman" business is a lot less creepy to me when it's in a Victorian environment, when that actually is what white people thought Asians were like?
She teaches Mathematics. And the girls pester her for stories of her fascinating exotic homeland, to which she responds by knocking sense into them because she is Shiva.
Barda is actually -gasp- MARRIED, and yet still has a job, because her husband is a former slave and therefore is not cool with the whole "forcing people to do shit they don't want, incl. having a billion babies" business that is Victorian marriage. So she is allowed to continue having a career!
She teaches Phys Ed, obviously. (Translating ridiculous Kirby designs into neo-Victorian = fun times, let me tell you.)
l-r: Mrs. Barda Free; Mrs. Katherine Spencer; Miss Helena Bertinelli, the Lady Huntingshire; Headmistress Miss Barbara Gordon (seated); Miss Sandra Wusan, the Lady Shiva; Miss Dinah Lance; Miss Zinda Blake, the Lady Blackhawk; Miss Karen Starr.
The Lady Elias Finishing School for Young Ladies caters to the upper middle class. The halls positively exude the kind of dowdy respectability the captains of industry want ingrained into their daughters, in hope of acquiring for them a marriage to a titled gentleman.
Miss Barbara Gordon is an American, a native of New Gotham. She is confined to a wheelchair due to an injury sustained aiding the crew of the Robin in a battle against some of the most fearsome pirates to sail the sky. No middle-class gentleman would leave his daughters in the care of such a woman, though, so the official story is that she caught ill as a small child and was left crippled by the disease.
In her youth Miss Gordon had a brief romance with Richard Grayson, then Viscount Bludhaven. Her intention was never to marry Richard, though. While in America, she lived in a Boston Marriage with fellow New Gothamite Miss Dinah Lance, with whom she traveled Europe and eventually settled in England.
Miss Gordon leads a double life as the mysterious Analytical Engineer known only as the Oracle, invaluable source of information in the crusade against air piracy. She has been known to steer students who she thinks will be useful towards careers on combat airships.
After Lady Elias' retirement, Miss Gordon accepted the position of Headmistress at the school. She also instructs the young ladies in Analytical Engineering and in English Literature.
Back home in America, Miss Dinah Lance was embroiled in a torrid, on-again, off-again engagement with Californian Mr. Oliver Queen. She broke off the engagement for good when she caught him with another woman, moving in with her close friend Miss Gordon and swearing off men.
The two women toured Europe together, during which time Miss Lance had countless flings and flirtations with gentlemen from all regions of the globe, each time insisting that this would be the last.
She followed Miss Gordon on to England, where they continue to share a living space. Before her retirement, Lady Elias offered Miss Lance a job at the school, where she teaches Natural Science and Handicrafts. Her classes are peppered with anecdotes about life in America and the Continent, which many of the girls find fascinatingly romantic.
Miss Helena Bertinelli, the Rt. Hon. Lady Huntingshire, is one of two English gentlewomen employed by the Lady Elias school. Her family, despite the air of respectability lent by a Barony, were on the whole truly despicable. Miss Bertinelli inherited the Barony after one of her father's dealings went sour and the entire family save Miss Bertinelli was slaughtered.
Following this unbearable tragedy, Miss Bertinelli, a practicing Catholic, turned to the Church for guidance. She knew that her father's sins would have doomed his immortal soul, and therefore sought to turn her own life around before she met a similar end.
Miss Bertinelli found it difficult to find either job or husband on account of her family's reputation, so when Miss Gordon offered her a position as not only an instructor but as Deputy Headmistress, she accepted the offer gladly.
Miss Bertinelli teaches Latin and Etiquette.
At this point, I say "fuck it" to the whole "backstory" business, because I've added too many characters and it's getting out of hand.
Zinda is a ridiculous eccentric. Like, not quite Howard Hughes-level, but she is a famed Aviatrix. If she weren't a noblewoman nobody would trust her to teach their children, but since she's rich it's cool. She doesn't give a flying fuck about the ridiculous Victorian social mores! I kind of love her to pieces.
She teaches Aviation. Obviously.
Karen has been at Elias the longest. She probably went to school there, which is why she resents being passed over for the Headmistress job. Having lived in Paris for several years, she teaches French. (...Which brings the JLAEIOU into this universe. Although technically Ted was there from the start?)
Drawing Power Girl in a corset = hilarious. HER BREASTS WILL EAT YOU. Uh.
So I was trying to figure out how Kate Spenser even works in this universe. I guess her husband left her? And now, she has to work to support Ramsey? Wait, her ex-husband is a writer, isn't he. So that works.
She teaches History. And possibly Law, though I don't think Elias Girls study Law.
Shiva's whole "Mysterious Asian Woman" business is a lot less creepy to me when it's in a Victorian environment, when that actually is what white people thought Asians were like?
She teaches Mathematics. And the girls pester her for stories of her fascinating exotic homeland, to which she responds by knocking sense into them because she is Shiva.
Barda is actually -gasp- MARRIED, and yet still has a job, because her husband is a former slave and therefore is not cool with the whole "forcing people to do shit they don't want, incl. having a billion babies" business that is Victorian marriage. So she is allowed to continue having a career!
She teaches Phys Ed, obviously. (Translating ridiculous Kirby designs into neo-Victorian = fun times, let me tell you.)