She is extremely proficient in the use of almost all weapons, as well as unarmed hand to hand combat. Second only to Clint as a ranged marksman. Highly skilled as an interrogator with everything ranging from reverse interrogation to extreme torture. She's a very talented actress, speaks a ridiculous number of languages, is an accomplished hacker, and excels in pretty much all the standard areas of espionage. She’s also very impressive physically. She picks up new fighting techniques insanely quickly, is on par with olympic level athletes, and does it all on the fly without planning or safety nets. I’m pretty sure she could have one hell of a lucrative career in Cirque du Soleil.
I tried to simplify my take on her in another application once. Basically, if you think of skills as points, Natasha has more points than the people around her, and she's spread them evenly across the board. Now, if a more normal person spent all their points in one area, they'd beat her at it. Not by a whole lot, though, and she’d still run circles around them in everything else.
I play MCU Natasha as being genetically enhanced. Not to the extent she is in the comics, but to me it’s pretty obvious that she’s not just run of the mill human. I sort of split the difference between normal human, and the extent to which she’s genetically altered in the comics. Slower aging, faster healing, quicker reflexes, stronger bones and muscles. The kind of thing that lets her get thrown across a room by an explosion and walk away from it in high heels. Nothing that I would consider superhuman, exactly, because that’s more in the arena of certain X-Men and Deadpool and Thor and people on that much higher level. It’s something, though - an extra level.
● strengths: A lot of her strengths are things I’ve gone over in her abilities section. Some of them might belong down here, some of the things I mention here might belong up there. It’s a blurry line with someone like Natasha, who turns every part of herself into some kind of weapon or defense.
So let’s talk mental and emotional strengths.
Natasha has absolutely amazing psychological resilience, which is probably not surprising to anyone who knows what she’s been through. Problem is, not many people have a clue, and only one truly understands. She is a survivor, a fighter, she will adapt and thrive because there is no other option for her. Adversity will break you or make you strong enough to overcome it, and Natasha faced enough during her Red Room training to make her damn near indestructible. Now, that’s not the same thing as being unaffected. Far from it, in fact. Natasha accepts the things that happen to her, and lets them move through her. The bad thing in her life don’t define her for one simple reason - if she allowed them to, she’d be crushed under the weight of them.
She also has an amazingly strong sense of self. This doesn’t have anything to do with self esteem or confidence. She just knows who he is. It might not sound that impressive until you factor in just how much of Natasha’s life she spends pretending to be someone else. The talent she has for holding onto who she really is underneath all those masks she wears is a big part of what keeps her sane in her line of work.
A sense of humor might seem like an odd thing to consider a strength, but again, it’s all about context. For Natasha, it’s not only a coping mechanism, but a survival mechanism. Most people reach a point of “I have to laugh or I’ll cry” at some point in their lives. Natasha’s pretty much set up camp there. The fact that she can find humour in the small things, that she can look at insurmountable odds and crack jokes, it’s something fairly special.
● weaknesses: Natasha has some serious trust issues, which is probably not a surprise to anyone. Or it wouldn’t be a surprise to anyone, if she trusted them enough to tell them about her life. So that’s a fun little cycle that kind of feeds itself. She has trouble letting people get close to her, and being honest with them once they are. It takes her a very long time to make friends, and even then, to some extent she’s always playing a part. Emotional growth is not exactly something she’s made much progress on in her adult life.
She also protects herself by hurting others, which maybe wouldn’t be so bad if not for the fact that she’s in some pretty deep denial on that front. This partly stems from the fact that she rarely lets anyone get to know the real her, but that’s going to be a common thread through pretty much everything she does. Something that’s been a means of survival for such a long time can’t just be set aside. She will crack the wrong joke at the wrong time to make someone mad at her. She will push all the right buttons at the worst times to make someone lash out. The best/worst part of it is that she’s good enough to make most people think that they’re the one making the choices that drive a wedge between them.
I’m not sure if I would call this a weakness, or a flaw, but one of the biggest things that can make Natasha difficult to deal with is a major case of survivor’s guilt which can manifest as aggression, anxiety, and ruthlessness. Not to mention it causes her to have a very skewed view of her own self worth. As a tool, she knows she’s damn near flawless. You won’t find a better spy or assassin, and she doesn’t doubt this. What causes her issue is the belief that it’s completely impossible to be both good at the job she does, and a good person. She believes that she is so deep in moral debt that she’ll never be able to climb out of it. She fully believes that, no matter how much good she does now, her ledger will never be in the black. If you asked Natasha, and she was actually willing to be honest with you, she’d tell you that she is the best agent and worst human being you’ll ever meet. She’ll do it with a smile on her face and amusement in her voice that will make you wonder if she’s being serious, but she’ll still come back with that position every time.
● skills (optional): I’ve gone over most of her skills in other sections of the app, so I figure I’ll just very quickly go over the ones that I think might be useful in placing her in a job.
She’s an amazing assassin, spy, and general ass kicker. She can shoot any weapon you give her, take out anything you put in front of her, and she doesn’t flinch. Her skills as a hacker and interrogator could be useful if there’s anything they’ll be facing with more intelligence than the monsters. She’s also tough as nails, and I’d go so far as to call her a survivalist. Bear Grylls who? If a team ever needed to head beyond the safe zone and needed to make it back in one piece, I think she’d be a very good addition to that team.
● housing (optional): Shared housing would be fantastic. She’d fuck off from a communal room, but she’d be willing to deal with a single roommate. Stick her near someone who will annoy her, please, because she won’t already be grumpy enough. XD
● network username: nat
● network sample: [The camera feed for this message doesn’t show a face. It doesn’t show any part of a person, actually, save for a flash of fingertips at the beginning as someone starts the transmission. What it does show is the floor, and on the floor is a belt buckle.]
So, how messed up is this place? Puts the number of teenage runaways who never turn up again into a whole new light. Might even explain Amelia Earhart. Probably can’t do much for the Lindbergh baby. Can an infant even know that they don’t belong?
Not the point.
If I understand this correctly, I’m not the only person who didn’t really want to come here? They don’t have the best batting average, do they? This seems like a hell of a price to pay for having a moment of clarity about your place in the world. Still, if I’m here, I’m hoping there will be at least one familiar face from home. Preferably one I don’t want to punch.
So… Avengers Assemble. [The words are delivered with all the levity of a eulogy, and you don’t need the camera to show her face to know that she’s not smiling.] Or at least check in. We aren’t exactly a study in the emotionally well adjusted. I can’t be the only one of us here.
no subject
● name: Ophelia
● age: legal
● contact: journal PM
● other characters: none
character information
● name: Natasha Romanoff
● canon: MCU
● canon point: post Civil War
● age: allegedly early 30s
● (canon) background: http://marvelcinematicuniverse.wikia.com/wiki/Black\_Widow
● abilities: Natasha can and will kick your ass.
She is extremely proficient in the use of almost all weapons, as well as unarmed hand to hand combat. Second only to Clint as a ranged marksman. Highly skilled as an interrogator with everything ranging from reverse interrogation to extreme torture. She's a very talented actress, speaks a ridiculous number of languages, is an accomplished hacker, and excels in pretty much all the standard areas of espionage. She’s also very impressive physically. She picks up new fighting techniques insanely quickly, is on par with olympic level athletes, and does it all on the fly without planning or safety nets. I’m pretty sure she could have one hell of a lucrative career in Cirque du Soleil.
I tried to simplify my take on her in another application once. Basically, if you think of skills as points, Natasha has more points than the people around her, and she's spread them evenly across the board. Now, if a more normal person spent all their points in one area, they'd beat her at it. Not by a whole lot, though, and she’d still run circles around them in everything else.
I play MCU Natasha as being genetically enhanced. Not to the extent she is in the comics, but to me it’s pretty obvious that she’s not just run of the mill human. I sort of split the difference between normal human, and the extent to which she’s genetically altered in the comics. Slower aging, faster healing, quicker reflexes, stronger bones and muscles. The kind of thing that lets her get thrown across a room by an explosion and walk away from it in high heels. Nothing that I would consider superhuman, exactly, because that’s more in the arena of certain X-Men and Deadpool and Thor and people on that much higher level. It’s something, though - an extra level.
● strengths: A lot of her strengths are things I’ve gone over in her abilities section. Some of them might belong down here, some of the things I mention here might belong up there. It’s a blurry line with someone like Natasha, who turns every part of herself into some kind of weapon or defense.
So let’s talk mental and emotional strengths.
Natasha has absolutely amazing psychological resilience, which is probably not surprising to anyone who knows what she’s been through. Problem is, not many people have a clue, and only one truly understands. She is a survivor, a fighter, she will adapt and thrive because there is no other option for her. Adversity will break you or make you strong enough to overcome it, and Natasha faced enough during her Red Room training to make her damn near indestructible. Now, that’s not the same thing as being unaffected. Far from it, in fact. Natasha accepts the things that happen to her, and lets them move through her. The bad thing in her life don’t define her for one simple reason - if she allowed them to, she’d be crushed under the weight of them.
She also has an amazingly strong sense of self. This doesn’t have anything to do with self esteem or confidence. She just knows who he is. It might not sound that impressive until you factor in just how much of Natasha’s life she spends pretending to be someone else. The talent she has for holding onto who she really is underneath all those masks she wears is a big part of what keeps her sane in her line of work.
A sense of humor might seem like an odd thing to consider a strength, but again, it’s all about context. For Natasha, it’s not only a coping mechanism, but a survival mechanism. Most people reach a point of “I have to laugh or I’ll cry” at some point in their lives. Natasha’s pretty much set up camp there. The fact that she can find humour in the small things, that she can look at insurmountable odds and crack jokes, it’s something fairly special.
● weaknesses: Natasha has some serious trust issues, which is probably not a surprise to anyone. Or it wouldn’t be a surprise to anyone, if she trusted them enough to tell them about her life. So that’s a fun little cycle that kind of feeds itself. She has trouble letting people get close to her, and being honest with them once they are. It takes her a very long time to make friends, and even then, to some extent she’s always playing a part. Emotional growth is not exactly something she’s made much progress on in her adult life.
She also protects herself by hurting others, which maybe wouldn’t be so bad if not for the fact that she’s in some pretty deep denial on that front. This partly stems from the fact that she rarely lets anyone get to know the real her, but that’s going to be a common thread through pretty much everything she does. Something that’s been a means of survival for such a long time can’t just be set aside. She will crack the wrong joke at the wrong time to make someone mad at her. She will push all the right buttons at the worst times to make someone lash out. The best/worst part of it is that she’s good enough to make most people think that they’re the one making the choices that drive a wedge between them.
I’m not sure if I would call this a weakness, or a flaw, but one of the biggest things that can make Natasha difficult to deal with is a major case of survivor’s guilt which can manifest as aggression, anxiety, and ruthlessness. Not to mention it causes her to have a very skewed view of her own self worth. As a tool, she knows she’s damn near flawless. You won’t find a better spy or assassin, and she doesn’t doubt this. What causes her issue is the belief that it’s completely impossible to be both good at the job she does, and a good person. She believes that she is so deep in moral debt that she’ll never be able to climb out of it. She fully believes that, no matter how much good she does now, her ledger will never be in the black. If you asked Natasha, and she was actually willing to be honest with you, she’d tell you that she is the best agent and worst human being you’ll ever meet. She’ll do it with a smile on her face and amusement in her voice that will make you wonder if she’s being serious, but she’ll still come back with that position every time.
● skills (optional): I’ve gone over most of her skills in other sections of the app, so I figure I’ll just very quickly go over the ones that I think might be useful in placing her in a job.
She’s an amazing assassin, spy, and general ass kicker. She can shoot any weapon you give her, take out anything you put in front of her, and she doesn’t flinch. Her skills as a hacker and interrogator could be useful if there’s anything they’ll be facing with more intelligence than the monsters. She’s also tough as nails, and I’d go so far as to call her a survivalist. Bear Grylls who? If a team ever needed to head beyond the safe zone and needed to make it back in one piece, I think she’d be a very good addition to that team.
● housing (optional): Shared housing would be fantastic. She’d fuck off from a communal room, but she’d be willing to deal with a single roommate. Stick her near someone who will annoy her, please, because she won’t already be grumpy enough. XD
● network username: nat
● network sample:
[The camera feed for this message doesn’t show a face. It doesn’t show any part of a person, actually, save for a flash of fingertips at the beginning as someone starts the transmission. What it does show is the floor, and on the floor is a belt buckle.]
So, how messed up is this place? Puts the number of teenage runaways who never turn up again into a whole new light. Might even explain Amelia Earhart. Probably can’t do much for the Lindbergh baby. Can an infant even know that they don’t belong?
Not the point.
If I understand this correctly, I’m not the only person who didn’t really want to come here? They don’t have the best batting average, do they? This seems like a hell of a price to pay for having a moment of clarity about your place in the world. Still, if I’m here, I’m hoping there will be at least one familiar face from home. Preferably one I don’t want to punch.
So… Avengers Assemble. [The words are delivered with all the levity of a eulogy, and you don’t need the camera to show her face to know that she’s not smiling.] Or at least check in. We aren’t exactly a study in the emotionally well adjusted. I can’t be the only one of us here.
● prose/action sample: [http://riverviewooc.dreamwidth.org/658.html?thread=501138#cmt501138]