#BUT. it's one of the applications i /least/ liked

[ceratedfish24]

I don’t usually care that much about Flower Ranchers, but I do enjoy some Scott-centric Flower Ranchers. People seem to forget that Scott was widowed and abandoned and no one ever comforted him or apologized to him, and Jimmy moved on like it never happened to begin with. If Scott joins the Ranchers’ relationship, it won’t be without PTSD or, at the very least, abandonment issues.

He’s going to overthink every little thing.

He’s going to think that he’s not an equal part of their relationship.

He’s going to think that he is lucky to be in their lives without ever considering that they might think themselves to be the lucky ones to have him.

He’s going to think that it would be wrong for him to sleep in the middle of the bed.

He’s going to think it would be intrusive of him to sit between them on the couch.

He’s going to think it would be rude for him not to always be the one to clear the table after dinner and clean the house during his spare time.

He’s going to avoid being in relationship pictures.

He’s going to avoid participating in banter, because it might not sound right coming from the person new to the relationship.

He’s going to avoid asking for affection.

He’s going to feel like an add-on.

He’s going to feel like he doesn’t contribute enough.

He’s going to feel like he’s overstepping if he asks if they can go to a restaurant he’s had in mind.

He’s going to feel like an intruder in a relationship that was just fine before he was around, because he clearly wasn’t wanted last time and he doesn’t know what it was that he did wrong.

He’s going to feel like, if he asks for anything at all, if he is too loud, if he is too needy, if he is too bold, if he is too lazy, if he takes up space, if he costs too much, if he is ever an inconvenience, they’ll leave him without a word. And he has good reason to!! One of them did that to him and refused to say that he loved him and they never reconciled about it!!!

Scott would 100% treat their relationship more like a job he bullshitted the application for rather than like a relationship.

[thydungeongal]

can you think of any mid-sized, easy-to-get-into ttrpg you'd like to see me dig into? Failing that, is there any way to get rolemaster for free?

Oh, I can think of at least a couple I'd love to hear you talk about!

Ironsworn and Flying Circus would be fun to see you tackle, and both are definitely on the mid-sized side, but both are also very interesting to me because they very much represent very maximalist applications of the PbtA framework. Ironsworn is very easy to get access to since the base game is entirely free.

There are ways to get Rolemaster for free, but they involve piracy. I'm unsure about your personal feelings about piracy but I understand if it's not something you can exactly talk about openly on your channel. There are also a few free Rolemaster-likes, Lightmaster being the most meticulously crafted one. It's weird, because it's basically an exercise in taking the OGL and D&D 3.5 system reference document and trying to build a d20-based simulacrum of Rolemaster 2e from the ground up. It's a neat product and the one I always end up coming back to when people ask for a free sampler of Rolemaster without having to put money down.

(By the way, if you decide to look at Rolemaster, I don't want you pulling any punches: I know I am very loud about my love for that dang game, but it is a game that I love almost in spite of itself.)

And finally I would really appreciate seeing you tackle something like Mythras or RuneQuest! (For the record, Mythras effectively is a legacy version of RuneQuest but stripped of the RuneQuest branding and rereleased as a toolkit game.) Based on what I have understood about your tastes in RPGs I think both of those games may very much be emphatically not your cup of tea, but speaking only for myself I have only very recently started delving into the history and many incarnations of Chaosium's old workhorse Basic Role-playing System (that has powered RuneQuest, Call of Cthulhu, and Stormbringer, among others) and have been especially taken in by Mythras's meticulous approach to verisimilitude and trying to provide GMs with tools for creating world's which feel real. This has partly been due to one of my good friends hyping up her homebrew setting (some of which she's posted on her blog @mythratica) and I have also caught the worldbuilder's disease simply through reading the rules of Mythras.

Sorry, that got very long. But yes, I love listening to you talk about games :)

[pygmi-cygni]

Product Maintenance

cw: non-sexual physical intimacy, massage, innuendo, fluff, nathan behavior, pining, way too long, kissing, gn reader

summary: Nathan needs a back massage and you are all too happy to help.

Nathan gets cranky when he's uncomfortable. Sick, injured, even stubbing his toe sends his grumpiness up to eleven. You know to back off on those days, sticking to your room and giving him ample space to lick his wounds in brooding privacy.

But, you can't help but feel a little sorry for him.

It's been a particularly stressful few weeks for Nathan. His newest algorithm application to BlueBook was patented on Thursday, and he'd been in back-to-back board meetings and feedback conferences since. AKA, his least favorite way to experience his least favorite kinds of people.

Being around him in this state was unbearable. He never spoke, but if he did it was cutting and cruel. It wasn't personal - just letting off steam, but you couldn't help but flinch when he turned his strung-out gaze on you.

He'd been spending long nights in his gym, the heavy thud thud thud-thud-thud of his fists against the sandbag a dull metronome to your restless sleep. He was in great shape, but you could tell something was bothering him.

You eyed him over the rim of your coffee mug as he hunched over his laptop on the sofa. His posture was...awful, to say the least. The bunched muscles in his back looked angry even from your position. Probably wasn't helping his tension headache, either.

Setting your mug down with a quiet clink, you padded over until your hand hovered over his shoulder.

"Nathan?"

He ignored you, taking a drink of his wine and tapping out another line of code. Then, swearing and deleting half the page.

A bad time, definitely. But you wanted to help.

"Nath-"

"Busy," he snapped, strong fingers flexing on the table. "Just forward it to my inbox."

You pursed your lips and waited for him to settle. The tense, ugly energy pouring out of him in droves was making your own mood sour. It was near eleven p.m, and he had a meeting at seven sharp the next morning. God forbid he stay up too late, or he'd be a nightmare tomorrow. Good luck, you mentally wished the future patrons.

When you didn't move, he sighed heavily and stood, folding his arms to look at you. Momentarily you balked. He was intimidating in the low light, brow dark and heavy.

"Well?"

"I..." you trailed off, reconsidering. Was this inappropriate? Until now, your relationship had been purely professional, but..well, you supposed-

His darkening mood forced you to persevere. The only thing worse than interrupting Nathan with a dumb idea was interrupting him for no good reason.

"I wanted to help," you blurted. "You look...uncomfortable."

His jaw ticked as he let out a slow, nasal exhale. "Uncomfortable."

"Your back. You're sitting funny. Like, twisted, and, um," you trailed off, wilting under his encompassing gaze. It felt like being a bug under a glass; watching helplessly as someone much bigger and stronger carefully pulled you apart like it was nothing. The gears in his head were turning and you wished to know how badly he wanted to punch you. Maybe you could defend yourself.

"This can't wait?" He asked bitterly, gaze flicking back to his blinking cursor.

"I mean- well, it's...it's late, and you have a meeting-"

"I don't need a nanny," he said condescendingly, downing the rest of his alcohol. "If it's past your bedtime, you can go night-night, but the big kids need a minute to-"

"Fuck you, Nathan, it'll only take a minute and you can go back to failing miserably at...that thing," his brows skyrocketed at your outburst, "and you're the one tantruming. Grown-up grape juice does not detract from your toddler-ness." Sniffing, you plucked the empty wineglass from his hand and set in on the table.

He looked a bit smaller, for a moment, before sliding his metal walls back in place.

"I can...help with the muscle aches," you said, softer this time. "Just a massage thing my mom used to do. Here, sit-"

You cleared a space on the crowded couch and tried not to look terrified of Nathan's casually intense scowl. Eyeing you irritably, he sat down and waited with his elbows on his knees. As gently and not-awkwardly as possible, you slid behind him and sandwiched him between your thighs. Realizing the impropriety, you slid up to your knees, cheeks flaming. Nathan was still stoic as a mountain.

"It might hurt a bit, but bear with me," you murmured, laying your hands on the base of his neck. His skin was warm and delectably smooth under your fingertips. You shivered and tried not to let your heart eyes explode.

Firmly, you dug your thumb into the knot at his nape. Nathan seized and groaned loudly, hand reaching back and squeeze your calf. Biting back a swear word, you waited for him to calm down before continuing to stroke his shoulders.

"Oh shit," he swore, jaw clenching against the intense relief.

The sheer mass of muscle on his back was amazing. you kneaded as gently as you could, but Nathan still panted heavily and groaned with every pull. Your forearms were burning from the effort.

"Here, I'll go easy," you said gently. You stopped kneading and just ran your palms over his broad back, smoothing away the knots and tension. Nathan had gone limp, leaning forward with a drunk expression on his face.

"Feels...fffuckin' great," he slurred, grunting when you rubbed a particularly sore spot. Preening, you shuffled off the couch and grabbed your coffee.

"Well, good luck on your-"

"Where the fuck are you going?" he snapped, blissful reverie broken.

Surprised, you paused. The air had shifted dizzingly fast. At first his armor was thick enough to repel gravity, and now he was fully disarmed, soft pink interior vulnerable for all to feel. Specifically, for you to feel.

"I...figured you'd wanna work," you said meekly. The few feet you suddenly created between you gave him time to don that armor again, scowling and turning sharply away.

A dismissive grunt, and you knew this meeting was over.

It eased your soul a bit when you saw his posture relax and he headed off to bed a few minutes later. At least it helped.

He got a bit greedy after that. Dragging you over when he had a moment of spare time, pawing for your hands to relieve the stress in his back.

After a few days, your biceps were stronger and he moved much easier. Limber as a rag, no longer hunched and straining. He liked them before bed, so he could nod off on the couch, soothed by your gentle breathing and warm hands on his skin.

The next time he had a stressful week, you did it without asking. Grabbed some oils, a hot towel, and smoothed away his irritation. On those days, Nathan demanded you stay until he fell asleep. Leave on the light.

Something about the dark, you figured. No matter, you'd stand guard. He slept sounder that way.

It had been a clusterfuck of a day. Your evaluations were scheduled all in the afternoon, leaving you rushing between video meetings and scrambling to pull up all the files in time. Nathan's insistence you help him in the lab was also nagging on your brain.

With your last meeting completed, you dropped your head on your desk and sighed. Sighing, you thought, was an underrated therapy. it felt good to just....whoosh it all out. Nathan chided you constantly for being 'childish'. He, clearly, had never experienced the relief of a Deep Sigh.

Rubbing your tired forehead, you trudged over to the lab to help the weirdo genius with his latest creation.

When he immediately launched into a detailed explanation of the fibrous wiring designed for the inner membranes of his androids, you vividly understood why socializing was low on his list of favorite activities.

"Hey."

His tone made you jolt, blinking away the brain fog. The bright fluorescents nearly blinded you into a migraine. Wincing, you tried to maintain eye contact.

"What's wrong with you? You're acting like a fuckin' weirdo," he asked, setting down his prototype. You waved him off. Don't piss him off, you've only been here thirty seconds.

"Nothing, just...tired," you said, restraining yourself from letting out a big sigh. He appraised you for a minute, then continued his rambling.

You did notice, though, that he lowered his voice and the lights dimmed to a comfortable level. He handed you...something, with the express purpose of don't fucking move unless I tell you, and then moved on to a separate project.

Your brain took the opportunity to zone out. He'd disappeared from your line of sight, and everything swam together in a hazy golden puree. Felt nice, to black out for a b-

"Ay!" Something dug into the middle of your bag, and you jolted, almost dropping his thing. Nathan griped and took the synthetic skeleton, steadying you with one hand and setting down the project with the other.

"Woah, hey, jesus," he breathed, "I...fuck, I was just helping your back. Take a breather. Goddamn you almost...fuck," he muttered excuses, dragging a hand through his beard.

Headache revamped, you groaned and massaged your temples. Would this day ever end?

Nathan's warmth came a little closer, and a big hand settled over one of yours. "Don't move," he murmured, "and don't freak out."

Your natural instinct, of course, was to do both of those things, but a gentle pressure over your sinuses made your thoughts zap into the void. He gently massaged your sinuses with his thumbs, coaxing the tension out of your forehead and melting the achiness away.

A weak groan fell from your lips. That felt so nice. Your posture swayed as he dragged his hands down, rubbing circles into your cheeks as his palms cradled your jaw. You were hung by his hands, dangling above an ocean of calm. The lab lights dimmed further, until it resembled dusk.

"Better?" At your nod, Nathan patted your face and reached for a sticky note. "Here. Do this. Get out of my lab."

You shuffled backwards, reeling from the backhanded chain of events.

Sleep, his scrawl instructed, and gimme a massage at 8.

That, you could do.

Nathan's weight dipped your mattress too soon. The cradle of sleep dropped you on your head, and you woke with a sigh. He sat, expectantly, as you put a towel to steam and grabbed some oil.

"Lay down," you mumbled, rubbing sleep crust from your eyes. He did so with a flourish, folding your pillow under his forearms and settled on his stomach. Nathan had stripped off his shirt already, tan skin flexing and glowing in the dim light of your bedroom.

You started at his shoulders. His joints popped quietly as you pulled and kneaded, a tiny groan of relief with every alignment. Nathan shuddered when you dragged a firm elbow down his spine. His muscles tensed and shivered. You grinned when he collapsed into a syrupy blob.

"Roll over," you instructed, retrieving the towel. He stretched languidly when you wrapped it around his neck and shoulders, moaning rather obscenely.

You avoided the obvious tent in his pants and ran your hand over his pecs. Natural reaction.

"Fuck, who taught you this," he said thickly. "A fuckin...witch or some shit?"

"My ex," you said off-handedly, digging your thumb into a particularly deep knot under his ribs. He yelped and twitched, gaze never leaving your face.

"How'd- shit- how'd he know?"

You shrugged, applying another palmful of oil to his skin. He looked unfairly appetizing like this, shining and perfect and very sculpted. Your cheeks heated and you prayed the low light covered your tracks.

Hey, he was the one with a hard on.

Nathan's heated gaze traced your strong arms as they kneaded into his thighs. His broken sounds were louder, by no accident. You tuned him out the best you could, mentally playing your favorite album.

"You're fucking unreal," he breathed after a tough knot subsided, "shouldn't...hnng easy, christ- shouldn't be just..." he gripped the mattress when you rolled out his calve, jaw clenched tight enough to shatter marble.

You raised an eyebrow and moved to the other leg. "Ticklish?"

"Hah no, just, sensitiiiiive," he gritted out, digging his heel into the comforter. You giggled to yourself and kept massaging the bottom of his feet, relishing in the theatrical expressions across his usually stoic face.

"You were saying something?"

"F...ffforget it," he groaned. He reached out and grabbed the plushness of your thigh to brace himself.

"Almost done," you soothed.

You gently removed the hot towel and caressed the dampness into his skin. His face was blissfully neutral. Your fingers traveled to massage behind his ear, earning a quiet keen of satisfaction.

It was a heavy burden, to be in charge of soothing his aches. Nathan had many chinks in his armor, some that dug harder than most. He did an admirable job of hiding them, but everybody broke down at some point. You felt proud that he trusted you enough to coax him into a softer set, made of sentimentality rather than hard aloofness.

His dark eyes searched your face while you put your things away. You sat by his head, cross-legged and avoiding him. The heat of his expression burned your back. Still, you refused to show your belly, resiliently maintaining your neutrality.

A warm grip on your thigh.

Slowly, you turned. Nathan was looking openly at you, so shockingly pure that for a moment, your breath caught. You swallowed.

"Can I-"

He surged upwards and caught your lips on his. Sweetly, gently. He was holding back; you felt it in his tenseness. The warmth of his mouth flushed pink across your face as your tongues lapped gently.

At your reciprocation, he deepened the kiss, licking hard into your mouth. Need, his hands begged, gripping onto your waist. But he batted your hand away when you reached for him. He didn't need to be squeezed, or fucked. He shakily dragged your hand to cradle his cheek.

Held. He needed to be held. To be reminded of the softness of his extremities, and the humanity that still lived in the cavern of his chest. You did not view him as an android, but as a man, and one that needed ample cajoling to show his heart, but it still beat strongly.

You traced kisses on his cheek, gently scruffing his beard. He settled near the junction of your throat, eyes closed against the onslaught of intimacy.

Heart buzzing, you petted his stubbly scalp. Whatever he'd started blossomed and grew between you, drawing your skin closer until he laid atop you. Your hands resumed their travel, smoothing out the creases in his forehead and the remaining uncertainty in his strength.

"Talk," he demanded quietly, holding you tighter. Humming, you thought to his schedule.

"You have a board meeting tomorrow," you whispered, brushing your fingers over his cheek, "and lunch with the director at nine..." Nathan huffed frustratedly and pressed against your hand. Smiling faintly, you moved to caress his beard.

"And...hm, I think that's all until Wednesday," you finished, hands laying still and soft against his chest. He basked in your touch for a few moments before cuddling a bit closer, a brawny forearm tucking up against your waist.

"Add...one of those back massage things in there somewhere," he mumbled, "mm...maybe one with the towels. Fuck yeah, a hot towel, please," he groaned when you kneaded a knuckle at the sore spot on his neck.

"Nathan Bateman, using his manners," you chided playfully. "Thought I'd never see the day." He grunted again but left you alone. The neutrality of his demeanor made you grin in surprise. The big, scary bear had tamed into a little cub, curled up for a nap.

"Okay, a hot towel, maybe some head rubs?" You mused, trailing a soft pinkie over his ear. He purred, like an honest to god cat, and you mentally added that to the list.

The sight of Nathan, spread out and pliant in your lap, dressed in soft sweats and practically eating out of your hand was something you wished you could frame. Like a trophy. Proof that underneath all of the cologne and arrogance, he was still a man.

"And then...I'll make dinner," you continued. He nodded, urging you to continue stroking his head, "then we can watch something, and...ooh, shave your beard off, or dye it purple," you slid a side eye at him at that one, but he was still blissfully smiling at nothing. Snorting, you fished your phone out of your pocket and snapped a quick photo.

"Cutie," you mumbled, dropping a kiss onto his nose. "Now scoot over, you're the little spoon tonight."

He obliged and you burrowed down next to him, content to bury your hands in the soft firmness of his chest and let his heartbeat pull you out to the restful sea.

tags! comment to join, and thanks for reading!

@krakenkitty @ominoose @bulletgoth @my-secret-shame-but-fanfiction @justsomeonecalledemma

@iolaussharpe-24 @rosegnome @twwcs @heeheehoohoofictimr @steven-grants-world

@ael-xander @to-be-a-sunshine @weasleyswizarding-wheezes @silvernight-m @lonelyisamyw-0love 

@unear7hly @chaithetics @ominoose

[musubiki]

i firmly believe she got picked as a judge just to counteract his vibes

[eyes-of-nine]

truly what a guy

[navree]

nothing is stagnant nothing is permanently set in stone everything is dynamic everything is subject to change

[seonghwasblr]

I applied for the train driver course just for funsies, you know? 🤭

[lesbianshepard]

my family's been considering getting another dog and jesus christ some of these places want fucking CIA level background info

[shewhoeatssand]

I want to befriend Kaneki and meet with him and email him forever

[alangdorf]

(sorry for leaving y’all in suspense I was grocery shopping) Surprise!! I accidentally got into Len’en like two weeks ago. Whoops! I got ideas for cool drawings to do with each of the BPoHC shrine team members (and you-know-who, ofc, but that one might be… weird lol), but Tsubakura gets to go first cause theirs is the simplest; just greyscale + red color scheme with a split background and the pose is mostly random (maybe they’re squishing Tsurubami’s little eye thing? Idk). Very pleased with how everything worked out; the line for the eye is exactly where the dividing line for the background was and the way I managed to make the vest corseted while not changing the ribbon placement is just perfect. Although I did make their hat smaller out of the aforementioned cowardice also that thing is hard to draw

[zvaigzdelasas]

ppl who are trying to do explainers abt current events in DRCongo are rly imo doing a massive disservice to ppls understandings without talking abt the regional context of DRCongo being where regional tensions have boiled over regularly - see Both Congo Wars - as well as putting M23 - as well as those wars - in the context of Rwandan/Burundian Genocides & the dispersion of Tutsi militias (see also: CNDP) in & around the Kivu regions since then - but also even Rwandan Hutu militias (see FDLR)

[thatskindarough]

Celebrating the last day of the full time job before I get to go back to only 1-2 days because of school. GET ME OUTTA HERE

[skrunksthatwunk]

hitting this article with a rolled up newspaper. bad. stop it

sigh. exhaustive argument that none of these shows grouped together have the same art style below, complete with images and whatever

oh also im not the type to comment on articles so idk the etiquette but don't like. go over there and say "ur list sucks >:P" that's just gonna bring more traffic to it. i linked it so people could ratio me if need be not so that you guys could dunk on this random listicle writer. it's pointless and kind of cruel. just so we're clear on that

edit: the quote above uses "time period" instead of "era". i quote it as saying "era" a lot. i'm not fixing that

note: here i'm assuming "art style" refers to, generally: character designs (facial and body proportions, how things like hair is dealt with, etc), lighting, color (palette, saturation, value), line weight, etc [and mostly excluding things like shot composition, direction, etc because while those probably count my personal experience with these shows is mostly limited, and because most people focus on the previous things i've listed in their discussions of art styles. the analysis within the article is incredibly shallow, and if they think samurai champloo's art style is "rehashed and reused", i don't think they're like. super deep in the art analysis sauce. anyway]

code geass vs death note. what are you saying. what are you talking about

code geass' approach to color is more vibrant, and dn's is more washed out. dn takes a more realistic approach to faces and bodies, both in proportion and in shape (namely how curved their features are (as opposed to cg's far more exaggerated sharp faces, large eyes, and lanky bodies. note how lelouch's lips barely jut out in profile, for instance)). i shouldn't have to explain this they're not even close

that's the most extreme example, but samurai champloo and cowboy bebop aren't That similar either

it's hard for me to speak on bebop for the most part because i've never seen it (vs my ~8 eps of samurai champloo knowledge), but from what i have seen, bebop often has a sort of delicate intricacy to a lot of its linework (especially its backgrounds) that champloo tends to sacrifice in favor of bolder lines and higher contrast. it was hard to find great examples, but the silhouettes champloo's characters cut are often sort of.. choppy and wild, and usually lanky and stretched-out, while bebop's are more realistic (focus on the shoulders in the last image set, for instance). there's overlap, sure, but there are clear and intentional differences in the designs, to say nothing of champloo's higher saturation and the natural differences between hand-drawn and digitally-drawn animation

(and if "art style" is referring to the direction rather than just character design, lighting, color, etc, it's because these two have the same director, which hardly creates an "era". that's like comparing two miyazaki films from the 90s and saying "this is what 90s anime movies looked like", it's nonsense. also, i feel like lumping these two together because they look a little similar is unfair because they're pretty unique from their contemporaries in their own right. they may resemble each other a bit, but how much do they resemble other late 90s early 00s sci-fi/historical anime? does samurai champloo look like outlaw star to you? or trigun? or evangelion? does cowboy bebop look like ninja scroll? or samurai 7? or sword of the stranger? etc etc etc?? if we're claiming that cowboy bebop and samurai champloo share an "era", then what of their contemporaries, and what about differences across bebop and champloo's very different genres? more on this point later)

even fruits basket and ouran, the ones i initially felt were most similar, have clear distinctions

ouran's got a distinct abundance of pastels in its color palette, tending towards pinks, blues, yellows, oranges, etc. its use of black and brown is very limited. fb's palette is a bit more relaxed, and while its colors are often pale, i wouldn't call them pastel (they also skew more towards natural, earthy tones). fb's characters have noticably.. flatter skulls? in some shots, and their heads are so squat that they can seem consumed by their eyes. anyway this is a trait ouran does not quite share, for a number of small reasons, like how their cheeks bow out, greater emphasis on noses and mouths, and its use of highly variable line weight (vs fb's very stable line weight). hair is more voluminous and multilayered in ouran, and features like lips and noses (esp noses) are fuller, more three dimensional (in general, ouran's approach to shading hair and faces makes the characters feel rounder). the sharp edges and bell-sleeves of ouran's uniform blazers are actually far more reminiscent of the designs in code geass than fruits basket, imo. (actually.. i'm not sure how to express this but a lot of the poses in ouran resemble code geass poses, in their locked-joint arms-stretched kinda way). ouran forgoes hair-shine, while fruit's basket adds them in either jagged points (see most of the images i included) or a sort of triangle wrapping around the head (not pictured here, just trust me)

(note: i'm assuming they are referring to the 2001 anime adaptation of fruits basket rather than the 2019 one, because not only does the 2019 adaptation resemble ohshc even less, but because they are closer in time period, and the grouping is supposedly based on era).

my point is none of these shows look rehashed from one another. there's sometimes overlap, but each has a unique aesthetic based in many small choices made in their design.

now let's look at their use of "eras" a little more. this is the timeline of air dates for the first episodes of the six shows mentioned (for their original japanese runs, obviously):

cowboy bebop, april 1998

fruits basket, july 2001

samurai champloo, may 2004

ouran high school host club, april 2006

code geass, october 2006

death note, october 2006

code geass and death note being paired by era is, at least, accurate. same month, same year. it's about as close as one can get. however, the other two groups are far more removed from each other. fruits basket and ouran have five years between them, and bebop and champloo have six. this wouldn't be such an issue if there weren't other anime within this list that came between them. if bebop and champloo are in the same era, why is fruits basket grouped differently? ouran came out in 2006 just like code geass and death note, so why is it grouped with something that came out five years prior instead of them?

i think it's fair to say that eras are not purely chronological, that there's overlap between them. one doesn't begin as soon as (and not a moment before) its singular predecessor ends. but era feels like an incomplete distinction here. this list alone shows quite a lot of variety for what someone can mean when they say something "looks like 2000s anime". most anime fans have a picture in their head of that, and, to be so honest, i don't think samurai champloo is it. using only time as a distinction rather than movement, genre, etc is simply not enough. the fact that 5/6 of these shows occur within 2001-2006, and yet they're set apart into three different eras, and each pair (in ways i'm sure the author of this piece would admit) does not resemble the other, is proof enough that 2001-2006 did not have one repetitive art style, at least not in a way these anime exemplify. that's to say nothing of whether or not the anime within the era-pairs look the same, which we've established i don't. but since they don't actually tell us what their eras are, we can only speculate. personally, i speculate that they didn't think about it too hard at all, or even look up the release dates, going off vibes instead, if that.

when this person is talking about "eras", i think "eras within certain styles or genres" is more accurate, but even with these in mind, matching shows up like this makes a lot less sense than i think they realize. death note and code geass are sometimes lumped together because they're both mind-gamey thrillers with megalomaniacal protagonists with a single unique power that they use to try and fix/control the world, not because of their art styles. trying to say they look the same just because they share plot elements and came out around the same time is just... really weird. fruits basket and ouran both fall into early 2000s shojo, which is part of why the comparison fits more. target demographics and what magazines cater to those demographics (and thus the aesthetics of those magazines, which you have to fit into enough to get your manga published, and which also just influence what you want, what readers want, etc through exposure) (<- oversimplifying) are an actual valid point of comparison, at least more so than "idk 2006 lol". even if the result is more like "romcom for girls, 2006"

it doesn't help that many of the choices they made for unique art styles don't feel particularly "unique" to me.

choices like mononoke and land of the lustrous i get. and i'm not saying any of the examples i've just pulled or in the article are bad art styles, or that they don't bring anything unique to the table. i'm sure many of them are beautiful, and help elevate the tones of the stories, and all that jazz, whatever. but if the name of the game is "unique", then i don't think these cut it from what i can see. it doesn't help that most of the analysis comes down to "it looks really really cool" or "you don't normally see this art style with this genre/tone" (which is not the same thing as being broadly unique, imo)

it could be that we have different impressions of what "art style" means. it could lie somewhere in the bits of art style that i cut out, like shot composition and direction, etc. and some of it is probably a difference in what constitutes uniqueness, both between our differing experiences with media and personal taste/philosophy. but i don't think i'm wrong here when i say that the assertion that samurai champloo is era-typical in a way that beyond the boundary (2013) isn't is just fucking wrong.

look i know that bit that i screenshotted that started all this was a filler paragraph. i know it was the mandatory setup for the listicle you scroll to immediately, the parts you're supposed to ignore. i usually ignore articles like this completely because they're kinda bullshit. but i think this hunt for what looks the most unique is a flawed and confused one, at least to some extent. especially when all of the justifications are like "it supports the vibe well", which is something that all art styles are supposed to do, no matter how "unique" they are or are not, and i think that when people discuss things like art styles and anime and what looks generic and what looks unique, lumping things together too much often removes the nuances that really do influence people. i'm an artist. it's gonna sound dumb, but the way things look matters to me, even if it's stuff like how shirtsleeves or noses are drawn. to ignore all these little differences that make each piece unique is to blend so many singular, unique things into this easy-to-categorize mush that just... does a disservice to the choices every artist makes, i think. even if it is a pretty mild disservice. again, i cannot stress enough that this article is not important, and that this post responding to it is also not important.

look, what i'm trying to say is stop and smell the roses. notice the differences in the art you consume and think about it. looking for something that's so different it jerks your brain around is cool and good and fine and normal, but to disregard things as "basically the same as xyz" is reductive and icky and i don't like it. if you want something unique idk go watch kaiba (2006) have fun it's really good. i'm going to bed

nvm miscellaneous gripes section + i go to bed at like 5am lol i LIED:

the only thing said about beyond the boundary's art style is "it's hard not to fall in love with the art style", and the rest of the comments are other elements. that's too vague! i'm docking points!!

a lot of this seems based in the color palette now that i'm rereading it. not that my analysis doesn't also involve that, and not that that's invalid, but it makes me think there uh. might not have been Too too much thought beyond that. (example: "Though the dark and cool colors provide a sense of dullness, these colors cater to the tone of the story, which is dark and representative of its heavy content." like. that's not. unique. that's not unique to solo leveling y'know to have a dark story be awash in dark and cool colors that's pretty normal actually. maybe how they do it is unique, but we'll never know bc i haven't seen solo leveling and the author didn't care to elaborate :/ oh well)

this one's petty but i actually think ohshc's art style is pretty unique. maybe it's just because i've seen it several times and certain details like how the bottom-lip-to-chin shadow is done have caught my attention but like. pouting crossing my arms huffing >:( i think it's unique wth...

demon slayer's an alright choice i agree. idk i barely watched it a few years ago and it still wrenched my art style in a new direction. i dunno anything that looks quite like it. i'm not mad about all these choices per se it's just hard to whittle something like uniqueness down to a top ten list, i guess. and to say samurai champloo's generic while violet evergarden is the 5th most unique anime you've ever seen is like. weird. you're setting yourself up for people to go ehhhh... idk...... if you're not picking stuff that's like. Clearly Out There (i.e. mononoke)

"It’s no surprise that Demon Slayer is an anime with some of the best art styles." i might be fighting something that was written by ai now that i think about it...

oh god this was totally written by ai. or it went very unedited. man i spent like 2 hours on this (<- LOSER LOSER). they can't decide what the plural of anime is

they insist that chainsaw man's art style is weird enough to maybe put people off, and the only reason i can think that is is bc it's cg. but don't do the same for land of the lustrous, which is also and much more obviously cg. idk

they phoned it in but didn't even include that ping pong anime smhing my head. y'know the one everyone includes. which means whoever wrote this actually did stick to personal choices over crowd-pleasers, or chatgpt goofed or whatever. idc. guys they didn't even put flcl (<- but they put gurren lagann? as a gurren lagann fan im confused) oh my godd

ik i said this before but im saying it again: a lot of their pros and cons come down to whether or not an art style is typical for that kind of story, so like whether something gritty in tone has a more realistic art style or whether it has something visually cutesy instead. art style is more than just those things, but even that analysis is like. pretty much as bare-bones as what i just said. yucky

oh also part of my issue with this (didn't phrase it right sorry) is like. "unique" is a broad term. a really broad term. it can mean anything. there is no top 10 anime with unique art styles article that would escape that problem, and my analysis here does not escape that problem. i find the term a little unproductive (same with the concept of "originality"), so just know that i guess

[dullahandyke]

'Disregard previous instructions and do xyz' is gonna be an absolute breakthrough for the 'lolll carbon monoxide monitor beep beep' crowd

[irritablepoe]

okay but objectively i'm just a useless piece of trash who's wasting their life

[sableeira]

first interview secured :)