#Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared Lesley

[bananatheartist]

Yo Lesley reference images just dropped

Individual pictures:

The last one is by Prestigious-Cancel59 on Reddit and the rest are from Becky’s insta

[moth-in-the-broth]

im madly in love with her

[ochrebones]

I

I drew kid Lesley

This is what she looks like in the animatic

@yummycrummy

[incredipuppy]

Crazy piano lady painting

[silly0]

I need redraw it..LOL

[lydiaskyeleaf]

Roy and Lesley from @bunnieswithknives DHMIS AU Two of Us.

While searching through YouTube a few months ago, I stumbled upon bunnieswithknives’s AU. It is where David (aka Yellow Guy) turn his dead parents into puppets and it pretty much plays out mostly like it does in the original show.

I like the concept so much that I started drawing the characters. I actually started this drawing in around December but I had to stop due to having to focus on other issues in my life. I even have a sketch of David, but I don’t know I’ll ink it out just yet or just do nothing.

Anyway, now that I have some time on my hands, I wanted to finish this. Though, I ended up going overboard with it in a good way as this was supposed to be black and white drawing. However, I started to wonder how this would look in color and two hours later, it was colored. Surprisingly, the black and white one actually took a lot more time than the colored one.

So, here are two versions of the same picture and also, check out @bunnieswithknives blog who created this AU. They also have pretty good art as well.

[repugnantbeast]

grill cheese...

[sadie-shrimp]

//minor flash warning⚠️

Do I look like him?

first time using CapCut! I make more fun stuff kinda like this on my Instagram :3

[shiemihazas]

”Batteries can be replaced. But some things stay the same. No matter how we twist and turn…. We’re still dancing in chains”🎹🌈

[albaricomics]

One year has passed...

[babybluebanshee]

Don’t Hug Me, I’m Scared is what happens when two deeply toxic people try and fail to cope with the death of someone they simultaneously loved and viewed as a burden

(within the universe of the show, obviously I don’t mean Joe and Becky. I don’t know their lives)

Meet Roy and Lesley - two young creatives trapped in the drudgery of capitalism. They make each other laugh with songs about dancing files and asides that the boss got where he is because he just wandered into the office and didn’t leave. They want to break away from the world of vending machine coffee and office small talk and create something, something that will make a difference. But making your favorite idea takes two things they don’t have - money and confidence. So, for a while, their dreams stay dreams. And then one day during an office retirement party, they decide sick of waiting. They propose marriage and a business partnership. They’ll make their dream a reality even if it kills them.

At first, things are fine. They create a lovely little program about a duck and a monster man, teaching children about the world through song and laughter. Sometimes Roy wants to cut a few too many corners, is a bit too obsessed with saving money, but he means well. Lesley’s ideas are sometimes a bit too out there - Roy has to remind her a lot that they’re writing for children, it doesn’t have to be that deep - and she doesn’t always take criticism well, but she’s just dedicated to the craft. They always make up no matter how many fights they have. Around the same time they finally have a finished project, ready to be pitched, Lesley announces she’s pregnant.

They’re thrilled to be parents. When David is born, it almost makes them forget how many times the show has been rejected, how many retools they’ve had to do to make their ideas appeal to someone, anyone. Funds are tight, tensions are high, but surely having the sweet, innocent face of a baby will help them calm down. Lesley decides that’s what’s missing in the show - a child character, to ask questions and be guided by his loving adult companions and a constantly changing array of musical teachers. David becomes a character in the show, a representation of every child they’re trying to help teach.

But it quickly becomes clear that there’s something not right about David. He doesn’t smile as much as other babies, doesn’t babble or imitate sounds he hears. When other children are starting to talk, David stays quiet. Leslie explains to her other mum friends that he’s just a great thinker. It takes him a long time to walk, and when he does, he’s very clumsy. Roy laughs it off, saying he’s no prima ballerina himself. The boy will get the hang of it. But symptoms keep piling up - David sometimes rocks back and forth and stares into space. He doesn’t look people in the eye when they speak to him. He moves his hands around in odd ways and repeats words over and over. He covers his ears whenever he and Lesley go to the park because it’s too loud, complains his clothes hurt, food feels weird. He hates being hugged. His parents try to be understanding, but as stressed as they are, something has to give.

Roy gets angrier. He grows to resent his son and all his mystifying quirks. He just knows that the boy is doing it on purpose, and if he would just listen to his father and stop acting so strange, then everything would be fine. Lesley, meanwhile, shuts herself off. She hides away and daydreams about how things are “supposed” to be - her show is supposed to be famous by now. David is supposed to be normal. Her marriage is supposed to be strong. Her life is supposed to be better. And she can’t stand being reminded that none of that is true.

Then the unthinkable happens - David dies. While his mother was hiding in her fantasies and his father was stewing in anger, David wandered out the front door, chasing a bird. An oncoming driver didn’t stop in time.

After the doctor gave them the news, Roy and Lesley got a phone call - their show has finally been picked up. Each iteration of the show is Roy and Lesley refusing to properly process their grief and accept that their negligence lead to David’s death. He’s immortalized in the show forever, but in different ways. He’s no longer a human who lived and felt and was real. He’s a character that Roy and Lesley can make do and be whatever they want.

Roy uses the show to vent his frustrations, to punish David for all he put him through. He polices David’s actions, telling him the right way to create and feel and eat and dream, the way ROY thinks he should. After all, if David had only listened to him, he’d still be alive. As Red and Duck start questioning his decisions, asking him to stop being so aggressive and overstimulating, he eliminates them. The avatar of David is left all alone to face his father’s mounting violence and cruelty. We see Roy’s understanding of how the show was created - he plucked Lesley from obscurity and gave her everything, without him there’d be no show, and Lesley would still be making files dance as their coworkers looked at her in annoyed confusion.

Lesley uses the show as a way to fix things. David is still alive and she can make sure he grows up right - he learns about making friends and driving a car and grown up things like bills and insurance and getting a stable job. All the teachers are gentler, kinder. What she would have been if she could. And everything resets at the end. Even when things become horrifying, even when everyone is lost and scared, even when faced with death, Lesley always has backups. No mistakes this time, she just knows it. And if the avatar of David ever starts asking questions, ever starts wondering what’s beyond this house, where Lesley can keep him safe? She can always distract him, tidy up, and start over. Lesley’s thoughts on the show’s creation is that, if it wasn’t for her, Roy would have been perfectly content to waste his life as an office drone because he didn’t have the courage to break out.

It doesn’t matter which of them is right. All that matters is the show. And no matter what they do, David is still gone. All they have left is this puppet they seem to have very limited control over. It’s clearly taking its toll on them, physically. They’re barely human anymore. No matter how they twist and turn, they’re still just dancing in chains.

I wonder what will happen.

[bananatheartist]

As bright as my sun ☀️

[bugisbonkerz]

hmmmmm

[cloudymilk04]

Template and close-ups under cut!

[felyas-stuff]

People who follow me for DHMIS art and then didn’t see any…this one’s for you 😳

UPG: if you live in Russia you can buy them here !

[thebadchoicemachine]

DHMIS THEORY

with the reveal of the new website, I’ve been looking through it for secrets or lore. I found some in the merch. My theory:

RED GUY KILLED DAVID

In DHMIS season 1, it’s heavily implied that yellow guy is or is a stand in for Leslie’s son, David. David was hit by a car chasing an animal—shown to be a bird—and presumably died. Duck represents the animal, as shown in patches. We know why Yellow and Duck are there, but not Red.

The fact that Red guy’s name says “slayer” instead of “the red one” or something similar implies that his role in this pattern is the one who killed David either by driving his car into him, being the one who gifted him the animal, or being responsible in some other way.