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SO LAST NIGHT I WAS REWATCHING NEWSIES for the first time in ages and a few things occurred to me. One, that basically you have to read Jack's behavior towards David as romantic attachment. Otherwise there is absolutely no way to justify his spontaneous interest and subsequent obsession—seriously, what, is he planning on killing David and replacing him in his family? Why are you always around, Jack. AND THEN I STARTED A RUNNING COMMENTARY IN MY HEAD which I put here in order to keep my brain safe from it.

00:45 Spot Conlon has somehow already heard all the newsies in New York talking about Jack Kelly's strike ... which was started like, what, a couple hours ago? Maybe one hour? Spot's network is fucking amazing.
David is a pretty incredible manipulator. Like, not in a bad way. But he basically modulates his accent to endear himself to people, and he's about as charming as Jack and is adored by just as many people.
By the way who made Spot god of the newsies.

00:52 Man Jack I hope David is a trustworthy fellow ... or like, strong enough to pull you back up again, otherwise you're going to die a horrible hanging death.

00:56 Now everybody's singing David's song. This is really David's strike almost completely. He'd be the freaking main character of the movie if Jack's crippling insecurity didn't demand so much screen time.
By the way, Jack stands between David and thugs armed with chains. I am pretty sure I'm not that good of a friend to anybody, and he's know David for what, a few days? Weeks, tops?
"Hey David!" He basically captures Dave in that hug. David is surprised but he looks like he hasn't processed anything that's happened in this entire scene.

1:00 Uh, guys, Skittery is actually completely right. Getting your picture in the paper got you guys nothing. In fact, it mostly just ruined Jack's already shitty life!
This is the last real dance routine of the whole movie, man, and we're only halfway through!

1:07 Sarah confuses me. For one, she is the only character in the entire film that doesn't have an east coast accent. Also, Jack is into her--it just like, completely pales in the face of his obsessive fixation on David. And he's way more willing to be directly shitty and manipulative to her face in a sad and pathetic sort of way ALL OF THESE THINGS MAKES SEEING THEM AS A COUPLE EXTREMELY UNCOMFORTABLE.

1:11 Like, for instance, how Jack is apparently incapable of introducing David to anybody without grabbing him around the neck, possessive much? Also this whole speech at the rally was pretty clever on the kids' part. All the other newsies are probably vaguely familiar with the Jack-David-Spot leadership of the strike, but one fake argument later not only have we LEARNED THEM WELL, but they all acknowledge each other as awesomesauce and basically present themselves as a unified front. "I say, that what you say, is what I say."
Also this is the part of the movie where Jack's obsessive fixation on David becomes reciprocal. I mean David liked him before, but it's sort of like, "Yeah, Jack's my friend and he's pretty interesting and like him, but man, he's sort of unpredictable and he lies to my face occasionally."
BUT NOW, HE LEAPS TO DEFEND JACK ARMED WITH ONLY A ... velvet swing.
Jack, by the way, totally bolts and lets him do this.
It is possible that David leaps into protective older brother mode because Jack is basically acting like a panicked kid.
ADRENALINE-FUELED BALCONY CLIMBING.
Man Blink takes a baton in the face trying to save Jack. What are you trying to take out his only good eye?
Jack totally lets him do this, too.
How many fucking cops do you need to restrain one skinny seventeen-year-old?
SERIOUSLY DAVID'S ATTEMPTS TO CLING TO HIM rather pathetically ARE THWARTED BY THE FACT THAT THERE ARE LIKE A DOZEN COPS CARRYING HIM AWAY THIS IS UNNECESSARY.
And how the hell did David avoid being arrested? He assaulted a cop in the fact like three minutes ago? I can only speculate that standing next to Denton shielded him from the law, somehow.

1:18 THE TRAIL.
Okay two points about this scene.
First of all, Jack is clearly, obviously being railroaded, they are not even bothering to hide it. Which is totally believable, and yeah, Jack is clearly powerless to stop it, but THERE IS A SYMPATHETIC MEMBER OF THE FUCKING MEDIA IN THE SAME GODDAMN ROOM? Come on Denton! You could have at least tried.
And David is bizarrely disappointed in learning the truth about Jack's real name and family. I say bizarrely because Jack was clearly lying about his name and David not only knew that, and knew he had a good reason for it, he had a good idea of what Jack's real name actually was because he's heard Jack called by it before. I WILL GIVE HIM THE BENEFIT OF HAVING HAD A HARD FEW DAYS.
WHERE IS JACK'S LAWYER.

1:22 Could Denton possibly have been any more of a dick about abandoning them.
David has clearly never been betrayed before.
GET USED TO IT DAVE, IT IS GOING TO BECOME A FAMILIAR FEELING, HAHA.

1:28 Okay like, just a few weeks or months ago David was an idealistic schoolboy and now he's stowing away in carriages, destroying property, and helping a fugitive escape from the cops. This change apparently freaks Jack out, and was particularly poor timed since he just got a YOUR FRIEND DAVID IS GOING TO ROT IN JAIL speech, but like, YOU KNOW WHAT maybe Jack is not wrong to be so startled. SERIOUSLY DAVE WHAT ARE YOU DOING.
Jack is also a lightning fast thinker on his feet, because he is clearly only running away to keep David out of prison. HE LIKE, INSTANTLY REALIZES THAT THAT IS THE ONLY WAY TO GET DAVID TO RUN AWAY FROM THE POLICE.
Which means he totally like, ~comprehends~ David's tremendous attachment to him, AT LEAST HE DOES WHEN HE HAS TO MAKE A SPLIT-SECOND DECISION BASED ON IT, and it also means he probably thinks David is fucking stupid. EVERYBODY ELSE HE KNOWS HAS A WELL HONED RUN-FROM-THE-COPS INSTINCT.
Everybody in the fandom loves the scene where Jack shoves David up against the wall and chews him out. But, uh, I really don't think it looks like he's about to make out with him, man. He looks like he's chewing out an obnoxious younger brother.

1:30 ... DAVID, DID YOU JUST LIKE
ANNOUNCE
THE FACT THAT YOU TRIED TO BREAK JACK OUT OF PRISON LAST NIGHT
... TO EVERYBODY
...
And then you wonder why Jack has to go to such great lengths for your sake HE IS CLEARLY FIGHTING AN UPHILL BATTLE HERE, TRYING TO KEEP YOU OUT OF PRISON.
By the way why did everybody assume Jack was a traitor he's spent hours or maybe even days out of sight in prison being held by vindictive evil dudes who hate him. You all know this. There are seriously tons of explanations for his sudden change of heart, THE MOST LOGICAL OF WHICH IS WHAT, IN FACT, ACTUALLY OCCURRED.
No wonder this child has such low self-esteem, everybody actually does hate him.
David is so wounded by the name thing.
HAHAHA GOOD JOB JACK YOU GOT DAVID TO ACTUALLY SAY THAT HE DOESN'T WANT YOU AROUND ANYMORE, AND EVEN TRY TO ATTACK YOU! DO YOU FEEL BETTER NOW? I bet you cry yourself to sleep tonight.

1:35 The badguys' cunning plan sort of baffles me here.
Step 1: Threaten Jack's best friend as a means to get him to join your side.
Step 2: The next day, taunt Jack by telling him you are going to go beat the shit out of his best friend, and he can't do anything about it because of how cunningly you manipulated him in step one! YOU TOTALLY HAVE HIM BY THE BALLS NOW.

1:40 THERE ARE SO MANY WITNESSES TO THIS ASSAULT.
Sarah was much more effective in this fight than David.
So I don't know why she made the sudden turn towards suckville. "You're hurting him, stop!" I think they know they are hurting him. It is why they are PUNCHING HIM IN THE STOMACH REPEATEDLY.

Honestly at this point I stop paying attention to the movie, usually; nothing terribly interesting happens except that JACK NEVER APOLOGIZES EVER OR EVEN EXPLAINS HIMSELF. David grudgingly forgives him but man, Jack, if you'd just tell him why you did it, he'd be saying sorry to you.

SO IN SHORT, this movie wants to have a hot-headed impulsive insecure sort of manipulating jerk as its hero, except Jack never does one thing impulsively and has no temper. Even his fistfights are, in fact, completely calculated. His most violent, rage induced moment is when he (very carefully) shoves David against a wall so he can lecture him about not thinking about the consequences of his actions. The movie also wants a pacifistic, naive, idealistic foil for Jack, except David is actually a smooth talking smartass of a teenager living on the brink of poverty—he and his nine-year-old brother are pulling in the entire family's income, he can't be that naive. Idealistic, sure, but in a practical way! Oh, and he at one point totally loses it and tries to assault Jack, SO MUCH FOR YOUR PACIFISM, DAVID.

I would've liked to see that assault play out man, actually. I'm pretty sure Jack would just stand there and let David hit him—he is not even very good at hurting his friends' feelings, the worst of his cutting insults basically translates to, "Well, sure, your words might have been brilliant, but you lacked the self-confidence to express them without my help!" .. Sick burn, dude. So anyway, David would hit him a couple times, realize that Jack was just standing there and then he'd be all oh god, what have I done.

And it'd be hilarious.

I need to write fanfiction.

Anyway, I also want to post this awesome thing straight from the mouth of Bioware, when someone on their forums demanded to know why they didn't spend more time catering to straight men (seriously):

"You can write it off as "political correctness" if you wish, but the truth is that privilege always lies with the majority. They're so used to being catered to that they see the lack of catering as an imbalance. They don't see anything wrong with having things set up to suit them, what's everyone's fuss all about? That's the way it should be, any everyone else should be used to not getting what they want."

Well, one of their employees, technically, but dude, major awesome.

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I heard the guy who said that is one of the head writers or head of the company or something I am too lazy to check

I HOPE THAT IS THE CASE it'd make me feel better about them generally, because I mean, in the games I've played they actually do cater pretty heavily to the straight white male--like in Mass Effect 2 the only romance options outside of regular heterosexual pairings is HOT LESBIAN ACTION, one of which is pretty much explicitly said to not be a ~real relationship~. :/

I DO LIKE THEM THOUGH make I will play this game someday.

Found it!

http://vincentvalentine.dreamwidth.org/126101.html?thread=379797#cmt379797

Also, that wasn't just any Bioware rep laying the smackdown. David Gaider is the lead writer for the series. This would be like, say, Hideo Kojima smacking down a homophobic fanboy for being privileged on the Konami forums. In short, it's even more awesome than you think it is.

YEEESSSS

DAVID GAIDER IS AWESOME. He also goes around the forums telling people off for using homophobic/misogynist/racist/etc language. He laid a pretty beautiful smackdown on a couple of guys throwing around slut/whore, I wish I could find it.

Dragon Age 2 is awesome! You should give it a shot sometime, if you have the chance. It's not perfect, but it's actually one of the more inclusive/not white straight cis dude central games I've played. I was really impressed, even though the fandom seems to be more or less full of total douchebags who think everyone else is getting ~catering~. There's also awful things like a PC mod to make a WoC a white aryan lady! I don't know, the fandom's awful but the game itself is pretty great. I just finished it yesterday.

I don't think David Gaider was too involved with ME, which is kind of a bummer because while I really liked Mass Effect 2 (I am struggling with ME1 because I want to murder Kaidan, but THE KNOWLEDGE THAT I CAN KEEPS ME GOING) there was some pretty obvious pandering to straight cis dudes.

HAHA FUCKING KAIDAN, YOU HATE HIM TOO?! SERIOUSLY, I WAS SO HAPPY WHEN I KILLED HIM OFF

I will definitely check it out! AFTER I GET BACK TO THE STATES and uh replay Mass Effect 2 a couple times, haha.