#I think they dig a good job getting just cartoony enough so I wanted to emphasize that

[samglyph]

I’m not immune to slasher comedy coming of age musicals. Apparently

[myapathyhaspeaked]

Platonic Sides Week Day 4: Inside Jokes

Back in the day, yearly Halloween decorations were less holiday fun and more a force of nature. The Core Sides would wake up on October first to find the Mindscape common room covered in gore and grime. Blood seeped from the floorboards, and impressions of haunting faces were pressed into the wall. Posters for horror movies were plastered all over, and cobwebs crowded each corner. It was the result of Virgil and Remus sneaking in late at night. Inspired by Virgil listing off the scariest things he could think of, the Duke would bring it all to metaphysical reality.

But then Virgil was accepted, and instead of ambushing them, he was invited to collaborate with Roman. The decor wasn’t nearly as scary, now consisting of cheery jack-o-lantern lights and plastic skeletons, but now that they had more than a late night raid to set up (and Remus wasn’t involved) it was a lot more cohesive, and the others could tell that real thought was put into how it was all arranged. Unlike before, when it looked like the Exorcist throwing up everywhere scene equivalent of a Spirit Halloween. It was also a lot more relaxing for Virgil, who didn’t have to face the consequences of telling Remus of all people (why did he used to think that was a good idea?) what he saw as shit-your-pants worthy the morning after. And despite what one might expect from someone who loved making himself a nuisance and inviting himself where he wasn’t welcome, Remus didn’t crash the decorating or switch out the cartoony ghost banners for goopy intestines. He just went back to his tower in the Imagination, and did his worst.

Because of recent “developments”, they were now making an effort to not force any Side out (though some were more excited about this prospect than others). Since Halloween was soon approaching, Virgil had hesitantly decided to dig up an old tradition, and invited the Duke to join Roman and him in decorating. After all, with two Creativities bouncing ideas off each other and two safer Sides to keep His Disgrace in check, it had to turn out great, right?

Yeah that silly idea was thrown out the window as soon as the twins’ opposing tastes lead to them butting heads.

“Why the hell would I use plastic knives? This isn’t a school cafeteria, I’m using high-quality, stainless steel, blood covered knives!”

“You’d use plastic knives because we don’t want someone to poke their eye out!” Roman argued. In his defense, he wasn’t suggesting they use the dinky plastic knives found in fast food restaurants that can’t actually cut anything, but plastic molded to look like the kind of bloody knives you’d see in cartoons, with bright red blood painted onto a right triangle on a stick. 

“Maybe you would, but I have some goddamn artistic integrity. The glorious season of Halloween deserves nothing less than real knives.”

Having had enough, and really needing a hand with hanging up the witch on a broomstick, Virgil decided to get involved (which was never a good idea, but being smart was Logan’s job).

“Yeah, because we totally want a repeat of Crochet Night,” he interrupted with a snicker as he struggled to get a loop of string onto one of the hooks they’d stuck onto the ceiling. It didn’t help that he really didn’t feel safe standing on a chair for this, so he was shaking a bit.

“Crochet Night?” Roman asked, interest evident in his voice, because one would assume that crocheting was a very mundane activity, the kind of thing you’d expect grannies to do while talking about the latest bingo game. But the combination of yarn, needles, Remus, free time, and perhaps a lack of supervision had some interesting possabilities, and he was intrigued.

“It’s a long story,” Virgil answered, and he wasn’t lying. It would be a task of its own to even describe the end result.

“Yeah dude, get your own fucking noodle incident!” Remus jeered, stabbing some rusty nails in the wall to hang decorations from. The nice thing about the Mindscape was that they didn’t have to bother finding a stud.

“Excuse me, Rudey Gloom and I have so many ‘noodle incidents!’ Just last week was spaghetti Sunday!” the Prince protested, and Virgil just shook his head and went back to trying to hang the witch (because that’s how it actually happened). He’d explain it later.

It was a while later, and they were debating if adding fake eyeballs to the blood red Hawaiian punch was too much. In Remus’ opinion, there was no such thing as too many eyeballs, but the others didn’t fully trust him not to put in real ones. Maybe one of two though, ones that they verified were just ping pong balls or something before they were put in, that might be fun.

One might think the first week of October is too early to start putting out party snacks. But since food in the Mindscape didn’t expire unless they (just Remus really) wanted it to, a table of them served just fine as decoration.

“We could make them outta jelly, then it would be like eating an actual one.”

Roman cringed at his brother’s suggestion, before hiding his face behind a sip from a red solo cup. Yes, like in the movies.

“I’m pretty sure you’re the only person who’d want that,” Virgil said, setting down a tray of those sprinkle covered sugar cookies that have pictures of pumpkins and ghosts on them.

“You say that,” the Prince replied, looking more excited than the situation called for.

“You say that,” Virgil mirrored, laughter barely contained by the grin on his face.

“What the fuck are you two saying?”

“Oh, it’s uh…” he trailed off, because really to understand he’d need to explain about five weeks’ worth of context, the history of ferrets, and the plot of an obscure kids’ show episode.

“You had to be there, Angus Boredom!” Roman boasted, gesturing his solo cup at his brother. Remus groaned, wanting more than ever to know what that was all about now that he was being denied the knowledge.

Several minutes later, Virgil gawked when he walked in with paper mâché supplies to see the twins working together to stick spooky gel stickers to the ceiling. Them working together for once wasn’t what he was reacting to, though that was also unusual. No, the real weirdness was that Roman was sitting on his brother’s shoulders.

“Hey Emo,” Remus waved, causing Roman to brace himself against the ceiling so he wouldn’t fall off. “You got the sauce?”

“For the last time, glue is not a condiment. And what are you two doing?”

“Uh, isn’t it obvious?” Roman asked as he removed the backing from a squishy spider sticker. “We’re putting up stickers. They glow in the dark, it’ll be fabulous!”

“I can see that, I’m not blind,” he rolled his eyes. “Couldn’t you use a ladder or something?”

“Nah, do you know how many people die from ladders? This is much safer,” he answered, and normally Virgil would argue that there was no way that was true. But really? They were quite good at it. Roman could stretch and reach and maneuver however he needed to, and Remus had no problem adjusting so they didn’t come crashing down. And, as long as he was given a bit of warning, Remus could stroll over to where they needed to be next and Roman wouldn’t so much as sway, balancing himself with his twin’s gait. It was obvious they had done this before. Multiple times.

“When did you even learn how to do that?” he queried, because before Remus revealed himself to Thomas, a majority of the interactions he used to see between the Creativities consisted of medieval duels.

“Oh, well we were on this quest in the Imagination,” Roman began, and that was already a plot twist. Last he checked, each brother was banned from the other’s side unless given explicit permission to enter. Of course, that didn’t mean the rule was actually followed (it wasn’t). But before he could continue, steam started escaping from his ears.

“Unfortunately, a wizard banned us from ever saying what happened that day, so it’s a pain in the ass to explain. I’d try writing it down, but I don’t want my morningstar to be dyed pink.” Usually Remus was immune to curses, since he didn’t mind if horrible or weird things happened to him. But the bastard of a wizard had personalized the curse to do things that actually bugged him, like covering his sketchbooks in cute cat stickers. He was tempted to donate it to Patton, but the paternal Side probably wouldn’t have been too appreciative of the drawings within.

Virgil looked up from where he was spreading out a tarp in preparation for the messy craft. “So I’ll never know?” The twins just shrugged in unison.

“Eh, I guess that’s fair. Three Sides, three things we refuse to explain, all checks out.”

---

@platonicsidesweek

[mynameisnotsoda]

Lore dumping my fnaf au

I just remembered that I inserted myself and my best friend into the au for funsies (you'll notice I do that a lot. This is how cringe I am)

In my first draft I went on a rant abt how much I hated Wilbur's face but after going back to fix it I just needed to add his glasses LMAO. Initially I forgot about the face paint until I stared at my ref LMAO it's supposed to look faded and I think I did a pretty damn good job

Other than that the rest is fine. Erm. I didn't think I'd yap so much about that the actual lore is below the cut lawl

This is Maya!!!! (she/they) she's the mechanic in the pizzaplex, is addicted to caffeine, and is my bestest friend !!!!!! In the au we live together and also work at the same place that's so funny ‼️‼️

They usually work the night shift but if there needs to be emergency repairs during the day they're always on call for that. Nights usually consist of checkups and clean up of the animatronics and androids (will get into that later).

Clearly, I have a favorite, so he's also my favorite in the au itself LMAO cSoda works in the daycare but often leaves to bother the animatronics ☝️☝️‼️‼️

the daycare has an art station so that's where they work, they also help clean up and watch over the kids with the daycare androids !!! Who are *drumroll* Mumbo and Grian !!!!

(I forgot the makeup in this doodle,, and apparently the white stripe on the red part of the dress uggghh) the daycare androids are supposed to be more human looking to not scare the little kids, but cartoony (and tall) enough to differentiate from the human coworker. I like to imagine their faces are rly simple bc they're LED screens with projected expressions to make emotions n stuff. Plus I wanted to keep their faces similar to their skins with an in universe reason for it pfsjshgdhdh

Tumblr keeps bugging out every time I wanna post and it's DRIVING ME INSANE !!!! half this post got deleted and I'm SO MAD ABOUT IT but anyway here's the refs I made like 2 years ago. Their designs haven't changed since I made them so I probably won't remake them unless I start hating my old art enough LMAO

The canon heights I never wrote down so here they are: Ranboo 8'0, Wilbur 7'2, Maya 5'4, I'm 5'7, Grian 7'0, Mumbo 8'0, James 7'0, Tommy 6'6, Jimmy 5'5 and Schlatt wasnt in the AU at the time but he's 6'4

I didnt really make this au for anything except silly scenarios and because making the designs were fun pFF ALSO I FORGOT TO MENTION Sneeg is dj music man !!!! I never got around to drawing him before since I just figured out recently I wanted him to be dj music man so yeah !!

I know this isn't that much of a lore dump but I think I got all my thoughts out for now lawl everything will be under the animatronicfication au tag :v

I have GOT to draw Wilbur the way I used to. The biblically accurate animatronic eyes do NOT look good in my art style 😭😭 also I just noticed I basically painted the same thing into my sketchbook wtf I completely forgot about this doodle until I found it after digging for au art 🤯🤯

[revchainsaw]

Coneheads (1993)

Another Entry from 1993. I'm leaning towards the thought that 1993 was a booming year for moviegoers. Unlike my previous review (Demolition Man), Coneheads is a movie that I am not visiting for the first time. I have fugue like toddler memories of the unforgettable silhouettes of these characters but I also have much more vivid memories of seeing reruns of this film on Comedy Central throughout my school years. Of Course, I can not hear Soft Cell's Tainted Love without thinking about this film.

The Message

Coneheads is a Sci-Fi Comedy exploring the American immigrant experience of a family of illegal aliens, but these aliens are of the extraterrestrial variety. All joking aside, that is how the plot presents it's central conflict as the INS is hot on their trail. The Coneheads are a nuclear family of aliens from the planet Remulak. Dan Aykroyd plays the father Beldar, he is employed most comically as a Taxi Driver and also by his home planet as the Time Keeper, whose job it is to inform the invading force of the most opportune time to conquer the earth. Beldar's mate and lifelong companion is Prymaat, played by Jane Curtin. Together they have a daughter, born of Earth, named Connie.

The first act of the film tells of the Coneheads arrival and stranding on Earth and how they are treated as foreigners and second class citizens by the people of Earth. However, they are never assumed to be aliens, just kinda freaky looking. Much of the humor comes from no matter how strange and unappealing they act the Coneheads kindness, hard work, and diligent behavior earns them the admiration and love of their neighbors and coworkers everywhere they go. Eventually Prymaat becomes pregnant and they give birth to Connie.

After a time jump, Connie has entered her teenage years and the generation gap and the culture gap between the Coneheads and their rebellious daughter begins to manifest. The Coneheads are loving parents and Connie a loving daughter and it's just so heartwarming to see such a functional relationship played out as they navigate these difficulties.

Unfortunately, the INS director who had once been on the Coneheads case early in their years finds that the unresolved investigation into these aliens has left a dark mark on his record and could be used to foil his political aspirations. Due to this realization his ambition towards these goals turns his apathy about the case to a dogged pursuit that would put Wile E. Coyote to shame.

Eventually the Coneheads are brought back in touch with the Remulak people and Beldar is forced to choose between his devotion to his culture and his people, and the life he has built for his beloved family as a citizen of Earth. Through some trickery and a decision to spare the Earth, Beldar becomes the anonymous savior of the Earth and the Coneheads are granted U.S. Citizenship.

With our Invader Zim's and Solar Opposites on our plates, does the Coneheads hold up as a satisfactory offering to the Cult of Cult?

Let's get to the Benediction.

Best Gag: 10 fingers, 10 toes, 10 inch cone

The Coneheads is sort of a one trick pony when it comes to humor. No one particular gag sticks out more than any other as most of the comedy tends to be, a Conehead does a weird thing and then people react either shocked or strangely unfazed. However, one seen has both reactions and a ton of that weirdness in rapid fire succession and that would be the birth of Connie Conehead.

Best Effect: Narfle the Garthok

At the climax of the film Beldar is set in colosseum battle against a creature known as the Garthok. The effect is a simple stop motion beast, and it certainly looks corny by todays standards. Even next to an old Ray Harryhausen film the creature looks cartoony. I think that's more than forgivable considering Coneheads is basically a cartoon. I want to take a moment to give props to the makeup department, at no point do i feel like the Coneheads do not look like aliens, they completely sell the very mild alien features that set the Remulaks apart from Earthlings, but these effects are just that, mild. I'm a monster loving boy and I gotta get my monster love out. I love the Garthok, and I may have to admit I've watched Coneheads a few times just to see the Garthok.

Worst Aspect: Just a Dash of Implied Racism

Racism is just an aspect of our culture. There's no pretending that isn't the case, and for that reason for generations racial stereotypes and observations have made it into our films. That is not to say that observations about race being made are automatically racist, however, I think there are some jokes about how the Coneheads are treated in the film, or the things they do that only work if you are familiar enough with racist caricature that the gag makes sense. Unfortunately, these few moments do not go so far as to subvert the gag. For instance, in a film where a black character is implied to be in danger because the police show up, would be an example of a racial issue that is implied because the audience recognizes the implications of how race is a part of American culture, but an implication that the hallways of a building where aliens live in smells funny or that aliens behaving like freaks is accepted implies that the audience thinks that foreigners smell strange or behave in freaky ways, and does not do enough to subvert these stereotypes. Do I think this was intentional or malicious? NO. But it is important to talk about. The filmmakers swim in the same cultural water as I, and the implied biases that you must understand to get some of the jokes are the same biases that are implanted in me. It's just important to note.

Best Aspect: It's All Love Baby

There is a lot of love on display in Coneheads. Beldar and Prymaat are supportive to one another and to their daughter. There is conflict and misunderstandings in the plot, but it shows that a loving family is not measured by a lack of conflict but by how they deal with their issues. Connie is a loving daughter. The friends and neighbors of the Coneheads are also incredibly kind and supportive of the young alien family. Ronnie, played by the ever endearing Chris Farley is so enamored with Connie that he openly accepts all of the weirdness and well intentioned abuse he suffers as a human trying to find an in to a Remulak family with open arms. It's a shame that so much humor in todays film comes from characters being awful to one another. It's refreshing to turn back the clock and enjoy a comedy that runs on such a warm hearted engine.

Most WTF Guy: Dan Aykroyd is a fucking Weirdo

Between Ghostbusters, Nothing But Trouble, and Coneheads I'm coming to realize just how freaking weird Dan Aykroyd is and I love it. This guys mind must be like an Adult Swim bump marathon.

Ambiguous Aspect: An American Tale

The humor of Coneheads is a fish out of water tale, and as such relies heavily on the cultural context of the American Dream and it's relevance for immigrants. In a way Coneheads can be seen as in dialogue with movies like An American Tale, Scarface, and many others. I was born in America, as a military brat, and I have lived in other countries but always on American military bases and where my status as an American was more of a benefit than a hindrance in my day to day interactions with citizens of whatever country I was living in. I have no personal context for these struggles or how the humor of Coneheads is in anyway relevant.

From where I'm sitting I really enjoy how the themes of the film explore the exploitation of immigrants. How Beldar has a genius level IQ and an absurd work ethic yet he is payed in peanuts and happily overproduces for his bosses. I appreciate the exploration of the cultural gap between immigrant parents and their bicultural children. I'd like to think, because I quite enjoy Coneheads, that this movie is sensitive and is presenting these issues in a sympathetic light instead of just using prejudices of "wacky foreigners" as fodder for cheap jokes, but I'm not really sure I'm the position to determine that.

At the very least it's something to chew on. If any of you in the congregation have read any articles pertaining to the subject of how the immigrant experience was portrayed in Coneheads please shoot me a link. I'm sure it would be illuminating to read. Perhaps I am over thinking things and maybe the film makers did not wish to have the movie picked apart, however, immigration is currently and has always been a sensitive and complex category of interrelated issues in our country and if Dan Aykroyd and the other writers did not want to dig into the subject maybe they should have steered clear of the topic in the script.

Summary

Coneheads will not likely be the funniest film you'll ever see. It's certainly a product of it's time and I'm not sure that even then it was for everyone. This is a heartfelt family story but it is also what happens when an SNL skit by a very strange and very high Dan Aykroyd is successful enough to receive a Hollywood budget and a feature length claim to your time. It's by no means amazing, but it is easy viewing. Good luck getting Soft Cell out of your head this week.

Overall Grade: C

[everydisneymovie]

Review #44: Zorro The Avenger

Post #48

8/9/2020

Next up is 1959′s Zorro the Avenger

This is the first time we are going to have to flub the rules a little. Zorro the Avenger was not an actual Disney movie, it was a bundle of six episodes from the Zorro 1957 TV show re-released in theaters out of order, since The Sign of Zorro was released internationally first and also comes chronological first in the episodes it bundled with. However this was technically released in America first so we are going with that. Another issue is that the movie appears to no longer exist since there is THREE OTHER movies ALSO titled Zorro the Avenger released in 1962, 1969 and 1972 that tend to muddle search results. Unable to get my hands on a copy, I decided to just watch the six episodes of the TV show that were edited together, but even looking through Disney’s database there is no confirmation on WHICH six episodes were put together for the the movie... until I did a little more digging. The movie is about Zorro fighting a villain named ��The Eagle” and the actor credited for playing the Eagle appears in exactly 6 episodes... BUT THOSE EPISODES ARE NOT IN SEQUENTIAL ORDER SINCE HE DOES NOT APPEAR IN EVER SINGLE EPISODE DURING THE ‘EAGLE STORYLINE ARC’ So I was only able to pinpoint 5 of the 6 episodes as the ones used in the official movie, so I just watched every episode that mentions “the Eagle” in the plot description, some that do not actually feature him but Zorro fighting his henchmen instead.

So to recap... I did not actually watch the theatrically released Zorro The Avenger movie... but I DID watch all the episodes and then some that I assume make up the movie as a whole... So there is a very high chance that I watch the entirety of Zorro The Avenger and you cannot legally disprove that.

I just want you all to know what I went through, so my struggles are not in vain. I will be judging the episodes I watched as an entire movie since that was Disney’s intent when repackaging it.

Enjoyment : [3]

This movie suffers from a lot of minor issues that keep it from being fun. Because this the end of a television season I feel like I don’t know this iteration of Zorro well enough for him to be a likable character. The action is fun if a little cartoony, but I never really felt any tension when I was supposed to. The episodic nature means tension builds and resolves very quickly since these were not filmed with the intention of being watched back to back. Its not awful but it is very boring. 

Quality : [3]

For a TV show the camera work is very subpar, and there are no interesting shots. The sets are actually quite nice, but we don’t get any good framing of them so they never take on a life of their own. The writing is also a little flimsy, since brand new characters will appear without much build up and exit the story without fanfare. I cannot bring myself to blame anything on the original show runners since they did a perfectly fine job on their show as a whole, it just really isn’t formatted for what Disney tried to shoehorn it into.

Hold up : [4]

Surprisingly Disney has been... passable with its depictions of Mexicans. What I mean is that there are no overly racist caricatures, but the Mexico we see on screen is still a very fictional and cartoony interpretation. For the most part it seems the cast is mostly Texan and Mexican actors, so there isn’t any noticeable cases of whitewashing. However there isn’t really anything else positive I can say beyond all the stuff they DIDN’T do. This whole movie is kinda like that.

Risk : [4]

I like the basic concept of Zorro, he is a prototype for a lot of modern super hero stories. There is a reason he is canonically the inspiration for Bruce Wayne’s alter ego. There is a lot of swashbuckling action and stealthy attempts to hide his true identify that you would expect from a super hero story. I also like that Zorro is a story about fighting tyranny from a mostly non-white perspective. However I feel like Zorro wasn’t really channeled into a place where Disney could capitalize on his best qualities. The whole thing feels slapdash and not like a true movie. (because it isn’t.)

Extra Credit : [1]

The theme song slaps. It sets a mood that the show never fully archives and I could listen to it a hundred times and it would never get old. I also like the character of Sergeant Garcia. He is a bumbling henchman who repeatedly fails to catch Zorro and we see the mental toll Zorros constant victories take on him. We rarely ever see villains henchmen get sympathetic character arcs and he grew on me.

Final thoughts:

For all the effort I put into watching this ‘movie’ I had very little to say. It is a very average movie without anything particularly good or bad about it. The character of Zorro and his heroic exploits are just interesting enough to carry a few episodes of a TV but not a full movie. Formatting the story this way is lazy and robs it of its potential. I don’t think there is anything too harsh I can say about the experience of watching this ‘movie’ but I doubt I will revisit it other than to listen to that bop of a theme song. Unless you are a big Zorro fan and want to consume all version of the masked hero, just listen to the theme song and give this a skip.

Total Score: 15/50

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[the-blueish-trashcan]

He’s in Charge; Chapter Thirteen

Pairing: Henry/Bertrum

Warnings: Body horror, major violence (choking, lacerations, drowning), major transphobia

A/N: Basically.... Joey is a terrible human being, if he can even be called that anymore.

Chapter word count: 3,052

{First part} {Previous part} {Next part}

Chapter Thirteen; The Ink Demon Revealed

Bendy’s smile wasn't right. He could see the separation of the teeth and realized they were points. Bendy's horns stood tall, angled sharply like real horns might have been. He had no eyes to speak of, just ink dripping thickly down his face. His figure was as far from cartoonish as it could have gotten, looking more like that of a distorted human, at least from what little Henry could see.

"Snooping around, are we, Henry?" That voice made the animator's blood run cold, his heart pound in his chest. "What's the matter? Cat got your tongue?" Joey's voice taunted from the mouth of the beast. "You know, I should've gotten rid of you first. That useless accountant was bound to kick the bucket sooner or later, but you? You're just a persistent little thorn in my side, aren't you, bitch? You've been talking, I know you have, and that… oh, that's what got all your little friends taken out. Well. You won't be gossiping around for much longer, you hear me?" As he spoke, he continued to lean closer to Henry's face, his grip also tightening on his throat.

Henry did his best to pull away, but had nowhere to go. He didn't notice his feet slowly leaving the ground.

"As much as I'd like to rip you limb from limb right here, right now and spread your blood like paint, I need you for one more little thing!" Joey's words became a shout as he hoisted Henry high on the air. The monster pitched forward, seemingly with the aim to slam Henry into the ground and land heavily on top of him. The animator let out a strangled cry, letting go of his flashlight to brace himself with his arm. Instinctively, he squeezed his eyes shut.

The impact was only a fraction of what it should've been. Air suddenly rushed back into his lungs, Joey had let go of him. His eyes flew back open, only for him to be temporarily blinded by light. He was no longer underground, he was in a room he didn't recognize. 

Joey towered above him arms spread wide. The way pale light leaked in from the roof above surrounded him in a halo, and in any other instance, Henry would have found that humorous. He barely looked humanoid, let alone heavenly. "Look around! There are things happening here that are far bigger than you, bigger than any of you writhing maggots! Look at me! I've made myself into something fantastic!" The madman bellowed.

"You killed people." Henry couldn't stop the words. 

Joey bent to his level, ink melting away from part of his face to reveal a still very human eye. Thick ink slopped into Henry's lap as a result. "I did what had to be done and I should have started with you!"

"You killed people! Susie, Wally, a-and Jack-" Henry's voice had become frantic, pushing away from what used to be a man with his feet.

Joey made a grab for the front of Henry's shirt, dragging him closer again. "You think I was going to do this blindly?! I made sure it worked and shut down your gaggle at the same time! And miss Susie Campbell, well, she's the angel she always wanted to be!" 

"You're-"

"-mad?! Insane?! I knew that's what you'd say, you don't understand! You need to be a little mad to do something great!" 

"You used my design!" Henry found himself crying. 

"So what?! I needed a base, you should be thanking me for making your dreams come to life!" Lifting Henry once again, Joey swung him around and let go, sending him flying into a wall. 

Henry's back hit first, then his head. He slid down the wall and blinked, dazed, but stayed where he landed. As Joey ambled toward him, he noticed that the demon- that's the only thing he could be- had a serious limp in one leg. The foot seemed to stick to the floor with each step, twisted in at the knee. Henry didn't get a lot of time to ponder the condition. 

"Really, I should be thanking you, too! Thanking you, for leading me to these useless people, so I could give them purpose! For giving me these cartoons to mold my new self after!" Joey bellowed.

"They weren't useless!" Henry protested before he could stop himself. "They had jobs, they made-"

"Shut. Up!" The words could hardly be made out of the roar. Joey launched forward faster than expected, claws latching around Henry's throat and digging in. "You just don't fucking know when to shut up, do you?! You're a typical woman! I don't need any more blather from you, do you understand me?!"

Henry had no choice but to stop talking then, eyes wide.

"I said, do you understand me?!" Ink flew from behind the pointed teeth, landing on the animator's face. He nodded quickly, and the demon let go, standing to full height. "Let's keep it that way, why don't we? Now, let's say it's eight PM. I'm being investigated for murder, but oh, I'm wheelchair-bound! You'd have to do some pretty deep digging to connect the dots to me!" As he spoke, Joey began to pace back and forth. "That means your job is suddenly harder and oh, would you look at the time… you'd like to just go home already, so you do! You leave the work for the morning, say… seven." He was no longer watching Henry, instead watching his feet while one cartoony finger tapped his chin.

Trying his best not to look like he was doing so, Henry took in his surroundings; Dirt floor, wooden room, light coming in from outside, barely. The buzzing overhead lights cast an orange glow over everything. There was a huge pulley system in the vaulted ceiling, holding huge chains that lead into a deep, deep pit. He couldn't see what the chains held up, and didn't want to. He and Joey were under an overhang, set mostly in shadow from the way the light fell. Off to one side of the pit was a set of stairs. He really didn't know what room that was, he couldn't remember seeing anywhere like it.

"That buys me at a minimum of nine hours of free time, so by the time they move into questioning me, it'll probably be around noon, if not later, so… over half a day's time you'll be stuck with me." Joey continued, slowly turning back to the animator. Somehow his grin seemed even wider and it made Henry shutter. "I sure hope you don't get hungry easy, you'd be braindead to think I'd feed you anything. Then again… you've probably got enough there to keep you going for at least a week, I mean, geez." With a pointed finger, he indicated Henry's body.

Realizing what Joey meant by the comment, Henry pulled in on himself, trying to look even smaller. 

"Oh, come now…" Joey faked a sickeningly sweet voice. "Not getting shy on me, are you?" He slunk closer, bending until he was walking on his hands and feet. With his new build, it looked almost natural. "Please, I'm sure you're perfectly acceptable to some people." He put emphasis on the last two words, clawed hand reaching for Henry's face.

On instinct, Henry flinched away, pushing back with his feet but having nowhere to go. 

Joey's claws dug into his cheeks on both sides, squeezing his face. "Oh, I nearly forgot about the rich prick you've been shagging! He must like your personality an awful lot! Either that, or your rates are too good to pass up!" Dragging his face closer to Henry's, he tilted his head to the side. "Tell me, where's your loverboy now, hm? Maybe on his way to buy you out of this little pickle. Or maybe… he simply brushed you aside. You're just an artist, your degree isn't worth the paper it's printed on."

Henry hadn't even realized he was trembling until that moment. The eye Joey had left visible was twinkling, though it looked oh so wrong in that face. 

Joey let out a deep, resonating laugh right in his face, the smell of ink and decay coming through on his breath. "You know, I was worried that I'd bore myself to death just waiting for someone to come discover me, but this! It's a perfect way to pass the time, the look in your eyes when you're terrified is delightful!" 

"He's expecting me." Henry squeaked.

"What was that?" Joey growled back. 

"B… Bertrum. I-I'm supposed to be with him tonight." Henry mumbled, regretting it as Joey's claws started to drag down his face. He could see red rising on his cheeks from the edge of his vision, blood quickly dripping down.

"Well that certainly puts a damper on things, doesn't it?" Joey scoffed, licking Henry's blood off of his claws with a huge black tongue.

Involuntary, Henry whined.

"It's a shame I need you alive, really. I can't be as messy as I'd like. But just for that little inconvenience-" His voice rising in volume again, Joey sunk the same claws into the fabric of Henry's shirt, piercing it and through the bandages beneath it and then his skin. When Henry let out a strangled cry from the pain, the demon started to drag his hand, shredding everything he'd put his claws through down to the middle of Henry's stomach. 

Joey's motions were quick, but Henry's hands were just as fast. They flew up to Joey's face, pushing on it and trying to shove the demon away. 

All it earned him was a deep growl and deeper punctures. "Still fighting, are we?! Persistent fuck." When Joey began to curl his fingers, Henry instead reached to grab his hand, biting his own lip so hard it nearly bled.

"L-let go, let go, let go!" Henry yelled, trying again to push away. 

“Let go of what, hm?” As Joey spoke, his claws pushed on the underside of Henry’s skin, bringing tears to the animator’s eyes.

“Let go of me, let go!” Henry practically shrieks, pushing back harder.

“As you wish!” Joey stands with a flourish, ripping his claws away roughly enough to tear through the skin. Blood splattered across Henry’s leg and the wooden floor. 

At first, the only reaction Henry could have was a wide-eyed, open-mouthed expression, pain taking over his system. His hands trembling, his eyes drifted from the demon to his chest and stomach. What concerned him more than the shredded fabric was the amount of blood seeping into the fabric of his shirt. When Joey began to laugh, deep and slow, he looked back up, a hand slowly pressing into the new wounds.

“I have to say, maybe if you’d used that expression in your drawing, you would’ve been more successful! That was perfect!” Beginning to pace back and forth again, eyes fixed on Henry, Joey continued to laugh. “A true shame I need you alive, I want to see that face again!”

“Why…? Why keep me alive if...” Henry trailed, still shocked.

Joey froze, gesturing wide. “Have you got any sense at all?! You’re my bargaining chip! I know when I’ve been caught, but I have a way out! You! You’re my way out! Unfortunately, you’ll most likely be wanted in one piece. Now what could I do to you before anyone comes to save your ass…” Joey began to pace once more, a cartoon finger tapping his chin. His attention wasn’t on Henry anymore. 

Seizing the opportunity, Henry jumped to his feet, sprinting to the stairs he’d spotted before. Of course he was sure Joey would chase after him, but even a few moments’ head start could make a difference. He was nearly at the top of the stairs when Joey’s distorted, deep laugh came from where a balcony separated the room from what had to be the rest of the building, the demon coming into view just beyond the railing. Henry froze mid step. “H-how?! What?!” Henry sputtered. “You didn’t- I-”

With no warning at all, Joey launched himself towards the animator faster than should have been possible, hand outstretched. His claws latched on Henry’s throat, swinging him into the wall just next to them. “You know, I should’ve let you run! I would’ve loved to chase you down myself!”

Practically ignoring the words, Henry did his best to shake his head. “Please, please just let me go! I-I can’t do anything else, y-you’re strong enough, you don’t- you don’t need me! Please, I want to go home!”

Joey only laughed. “Do you have any idea how pathetic you sound right now?! It makes me sick!”

“Then just let me leave! You’ll never hear from me again, never, I swear, I won’t talk to-”

“You’re not going to be talking to anyone after this! You talk way too much, and I have just the thing for you!” Still gripping Henry’s throat, Joey started to walk back towards the balcony, above where they had originally been. 

Henry started to kick his legs, aiming to kick the demon himself, while trying to pry the hand away from his neck. The way he was being carried, he couldn’t breathe. 

“I can’t believe I didn’t think of this earlier! It’s perfect!” Joey bellowed, reaching for a lever Henry could barely see. “You’ll finally see the heart of this place, what’s truly making everything I’ve done possible!” He had to shout above the mechanical works powering up, the chains being pulled, wheels turning. From the very corner of his eye, Henry could see a hulking machine being pulled from the pit; It was huge, box-like, save for the massive round nozzle on the front. Under the nozzle was something like a catch tray, and pipes spanned down from the bottom of the machine into the pit. 

Before it even stopped moving, Joey swung him over the wooden railing and let go. With hardly any time to react, Henry let out a whine and put down his arm just before he landed hard in the dirt. Pain instantly shot straight up to his shoulder and spread through his hand. His hip also began to radiate pain, the combination making him land on his side.

“And don’t you fucking move!” Joey shouted from above as steam escaped the machine, nearly drowning out his words. 

Joey didn’t have to give the command twice. His head swimming, Henry couldn’t react beyond a heavy pained groan and laying still.

The machine above him abruptly screeched, drawing a panicked look from the animator, who quickly sat up. Shortly after, it started to chug, spewing ink from the nozzle as it shook on its chains. The liquid started to pour from the bottom of the catch tray through a drain, emptying into the abyss below. Clutching the arm he landed on to his chest- his right arm- he backed away, watching in awe.

Then two different hands were on his shoulders, digging into what was left of his shirt and into his skin. Henry let out a yelp as Joey dragged him backward, stepping in front of him at the same time. Henry was grabbed under his arms before he could stop it, his ribs being violently pressed inward as Joey did so. 

“This’ll teach you to run your mouth!” The demon bellowed, crossing the space left between them and the roaring machine. Henry didn’t have any time to question what was being said when his head was shoved under the stream of ink. His back landed hard on the metal, causing him to gasp, and swallow far too much ink. He gagged instantly, closing his eyes hard. He brought up the one arm he could move to try and block the flow, but it hardly did anything at all. Then Joey pulled him back out, making Henry cough, spitting ink wherever he could. He couldn’t see, but his hair and clothes were plastered down. As much as the injuries Joey had caused hurt before, they hurt far more with ink flooding into them. 

He was still trying to pull air into his lungs when he was shoved back under unexpectedly. At that point, Henry gave in; he stayed limp, and tried not to swallow any more, but it was coming in his nose as much as it had been his mouth. He tried not to gag again. He could hear Joey speaking, or maybe laughing, but couldn’t make out what the words were.

The was pulled out a second time and cast to the floor. For a long moment, he couldn’t make his body respond to anything. Then it reacted on its own, a burn starting in his throat. His stomach twisted, expelling ink before Henry could even sit up. At the same time, he began to cough again, violently. A shaking hand came up to at least wipe his eyes, which stung horribly. His head was ringing, both from the impact and from the horribly strong smell of ink that absolutely surrounded him. 

And Joey was still talking.

Henry couldn’t hear him over the rush of blood in his ears. Not for a very, very long time- or what felt like it. The demon’s voice faded in slowly. 

“-fucking sad sight to see, you know that? Sad. Weak, is what you are. Fucking weak.” He spat. 

Just as Henry was starting to push himself up, Joey harshly pressed a foot into the side of his head. The action not only pressed his face to the ground, but into the puddle of  inky vomit that had gathered there, which made Henry cringe.

“Disgusting. Why not do something about it, huh? Maybe fight back?” The only way he could tell Joey had leaned closer was that his voice got louder. “Or have you finally given up? If you’d just done that in the first place, none of this would’ve happened! Then maybe your friends would still be alive! Interesting little thought, that one… That this is all your fault. Isn’t it interesting, Henry? Come on, tell me what you think!” He laughed, pressing his foot into Henry’s head more firmly.

Between the pain, the cold ink, and the way his body radiated pain, Henry just couldn’t keep his eyes open or his mind focused anymore.

[calliecat93]

Callie Reviews: TMNT 2012 Season One (Part Three)

(Part One) (Part Two)

Here is where we look at the season as a whole. For this, I will be looking at four things: Animation, Voice Acting, Characters (Heroes, Villains), and Story. I’ll be going more into depths about some stuff I skimmed over here as well. So lets dig in!

Animation

This is the Turtles first CGI show... okay yeah the 2007 movie was CGI, but that was a movie. When I first heard this, I was reluctant as I felt like 2D was becoming more and more of a lost out. But the CGI was really good! Mind you it looks a tad bit dated now as every season they pushed more and more to improve it. But still, it’s very well done. I can’t recall any point where I thought it looked bad or cringy...aside form when they wanted you to cringe anyways. What helps is that the show does add in some 2D elements, There’s the comic-style flashbacks of course, but even past that. They use these anime-like quirks like the sweatdrop, blushing, wide blank eyes when reacting in shock, vein burst when a character is angry, all these tiny little things that give it a more cartoony feel. I can’t recall any other Nickelodeon CGI shows that were doing this prior, so it helped it stand out among the other shows.

Another plus side? The character designs. Aside from a few background characters they re-colored, none of the important characters look the same. Like I know that some don’t like April’s design, but at least they gave her and Karai their own distinct character designs. Then there are the Turtles. Something I don’t like about the upcoming show is how much.. accessorizing they add in to make the Turtles look distinctive. 2k12 kept it very simple. Different heights, eye color, shade of green, and of course body build. For example Donnie, the genius who is mroe invested with machines than training, is both the tallest and most slender. Raph, the strongest, is the most buff and Mikey, the youngest, has larger eyes and freckles to show his child-like nature.And even with Raph,a ll four boys have kind of high school athlete-like builds. Nothing over the top like say... the Michael Bay films. Basically, I can believe that these guys can do the ninja-like agility more than I can with the overly buff, giant versions that have been used.

When ti comes to the mutants, the animators get creative. There are so many unique mutant sin the show. Snakeweed, Spyder Bytez, Dogpound, Fishface, Splinter, Leatherhead, all the mutants have their own unique design that work for them. They also know when to get creepy, like with the mish-mash... thing... from The Alien Agenda. That was disturbing as heck, and it’s not even the creepiest one they come up with! Oh just wait for next season, haha... but yeah, mutant designs are great!

Now the settings are kinda... meh. I mean The Lair is cool, but it’s mostly just either the the Lair, the New York landscape, Shredder’s lair, or an empty warehouse most of the time. It’s nothing really... creative I guess is the right word. We also don’t explore new York much, mainly settling on skyscrapers as the setting. It’s understandable why since New York is the setting, but still it juts gets kind of boring after awhile. But for what it’s worth, they do try to do creative stuff when they can like in Baxter’s Gambit with the black and white screens.

And of course, there is the fight choreography. As I said before, it’s fantastic. All the fights in the series are fluid, well-paced, and fun to watch. If I had to give some examples off the top of my head, there’s New Friend, Old Enemy when the Turtles rise form the water. The mix of black and red is absolutely perfect. There’s the first fight against Shredder in The Gauntlet which despite the boys getting constantly knocked down by Shredder, they give it everything they have. It looks freakin’ badass. Then there is any Splinter fight scene. There’s not many, only about three in this season (It Came From the Depths, I, Monster, The Showdown two-parter) but they are excellent. I said that the Splinter vs Shredder fight was the best and nothing after ever topped it, right?

So yeah, if I was going to rate the animation on a 1-5 scale...

Rating: 4.5

Voice Acting

The series was voice directed by veteran Andrea Romano, so you know that the performances are gonna be solid. As far as casting goes, they got in a LOT of big names both in the voice acting industry and out. There’s of course Greg Cipes (Mikey), Mae Whitman (April), Nolan North (The Kraang), Kevin Michael Richardson (Shredder), Phil Lamar (Stockman), Clancy Brown (Dogpound) and of course Rob Paulsen (Donnie). Rob’s casting was actually a pretty big deal as along with being a veteran with nearly 30 years of experience, he was also the voice of Raph in the original 80′s show. So getting him back even as a different Turtle? Yeah... that’s pretty big!

Then you have more well-known on-screen actors, like Sean Astin (Raph) and Kelly Hu (Karai). Now they both actually have very solid VA-ing careers and still do voice work to this day, but if you’re say... a Lord of the Rings fan and known Sean only for that, this may entice you. The newcomers to voice acting are Jason Biggs (Leo), Christian Lanz (Fishface) and Hoon Lee (Splinter). There’s also guest actors like Jeffrey Combs (The Rat King) and Roseanne Barr (Kraang Prime), so a solid mix of professional voice actors and a few newcomers. The result?

The voice acting is fantastic. Like even as the show goes on and you see more and more mixed reception, the acting is NEVER one of the things you see go down. If anything, it is one aspect that continues to improve episode by episode. All four Turtle actors do an amazing job conveying their characters, able to go from comedic to dramatic in a split second. I’d say that out of everyone, Hoon Lee impressed me the most since he’s the only one aside from Biggs (and... e’ll talk more about him next season) I hadn’t heard of. And he gave a very solid performance. Everyone did. Even for just minor characters like Pulverizer (Roger Craig Smith... yes Pulverizer is Sonic the Hedgehog) or some of the villains like Snake (Danny Jacob who voices King Julian outside the Madacgascar films) or Spyder Byte (Lewis Black), they convey their characters perfectly. Like Black’s character is a rude slob you want to punch, and he does such a great job in making you feel that way!

So yeah, you got a strong cast, a veteran voice director, and a crazy group of characters for them to voice. All of them nail it. And just wait, this is only the S1 cast. Wait until you see who they bring in for future seasons!

Rating: 5

Characters

As I said in Part One, this is the best part of the show. I know a lot of people who fell off TMNT as it went on, but still kept interest because of the characters. To me, this is always the most important part of storytelling. Yes having a good story itself is important, but a good story will be nothing without likeable characters to move it. A cliched story may be annoying, but if the characters are likeable and strongly written, people are usually more forgiving because they care about the cast. This show is no different. To this day, the thing that kept me attracted to the show was the Turtles, April, and Splinter and what they’d get into next. All of them have strong personalities that get you to care about them, or at least see where they’re coming from. I could gush about each of them one by one... so on we go!

Lets start with Mikey because he is the least developed this season... and most of the show sadly. I’d even say that his focus episodes dropped massively in quality after this season as he was forced mroe and mroe into the comedy relief/designated victim/little brother role. It’s a shame too because this season did an excellent job in balancing out both the comedy relief and the more innocent side of the character. Mikey is the most naive of the brothers and the least serious among them. It’s not to say that he can’t take situations seriously, it’s just that he’s more easy-going and fun-seeking than the other three. His biggest problem is his inability to focus and goof around, which has caused several instances of accidentally setting off alarms. 

While not the best of the four, Mikey is a talented ninja and the best at going off just raw talent. He doesn’t think through fighting moves, he can just go with the flow and be perfectly fine. His strongest skill hpwever is his empathy and desire to make friends. While this has backfired on him before, like in New Friend, Old Enemy, where Bradford used and then kidnapped him for a trap, Mikey is incredibly non-judgemental and open-minded. It’s why he could befriend Leatherhead so easily in It Came From the Depths. He saw that the Kraang were attacking him and decided to simply talk to him like he would anyone else, even pointing out that maybe LH only acts like a monster because that’s how he was treated for so long. Mikey may not be book smart, but he’s very emotionally smart. As I said, Mikey’s character sadly devolves into annoying comedy relief as it goes, but for this season he had a strong start. No meaningful development aside form slow progression on paying attention (Parasitica being the final payoff... also if you’re afraid of wasps then avoid that one), but his character is strong enough to carry him through.

Raph is the brawler of the group and the quickest to anger. Hie’s the strongest fighter and incredibly confident... unless he has to deal with bugs. His biggest flaws are his both his anger and his jealous towards Leo. The first half of the season has Raph frequently back-talks and argue with Leo all because he got made the leader over him. For example, in Never Say Xever he is unhappy with Leo using mercy because bad guys don’t deserve it. Leo does eventually use the more Raph-like approach when kidnapping Bradford... and it fails miserably. What saves them? Leo’s act of mercy causing the Purple Dragon to repay the favor sand saving their shells. While he does slowly get a better grip on his temper once Splinter tells him of how dangerous it can be (Turtle Temper), it takes until New Girl in Town for him to overcome his jealousy once and for all. It’s very well done too by having Leo finally get fed up and give Raph what he wanted. Ultimately Raph can’t handle the pressure once things get rough and comes to understand both what Leo deals with essentially every day and how his own actions made it worst.

After that, Raph becomes the perfect example of a follower. While he’s still question Leo, he has good reasons for it, like everything involving Karai for instance. But he actively looks out for him more and stops mocking him outside just brotherly messing around. And even during that point, while Raph could be an insensitive jerk, he does love his family and will make amends when he goes too far. When he mocked Mikey wanting friends in New Friend, Old Enemy, at the end he comforted him after the fallout with Bradford and assured him that he’s a good person. When he mocked Donnie’s crush in Operation: Break-Out and led to Donnie going on a mission solo, Raph was worried about him, realized that he way too harsh, and tried to make amends by giving Donnie all the credit once back home. While Raph doesn’t conquer his temper completely, over the season he does get a better grip on it, can admit when he goes to far, became overall nicer, and by the end is a much better person. It was good stuff!

Donnie is probably the most... divisive of the four. Not because he’s badly written per say. He’s intelligent, but also high-strung and prone to stress. He’s not a bad ninja, but because of his focus on machinery, he’s the least skilled. The two episodes that focus on this are Metalhead and Monkey Brains. Metalhead has an admittedly meh plot where he gets sick of his bo staff and therefore creates the robot Metalhead to act as his weapon. The ‘meh’ plot is IDT it addresses the message of ‘the weapon doesn't make you a good fighter, you do’ very well, ut still Monkey Brains does a much better job, demonstrating Donnie’s tendency to over-think everything and how that is detrimental in a fight. By the climax, he’s able to get himself to rely on his instincts against a mind-reading villain (we’ll get to him later) and kick his ass.

Then there’s The Pulverizer episodes, which are the most interesting but sadly don’t go anywhere after this season. It has Donnie accept Pulverizer as an apprentice of sort, mainly so the kid can have some form of self-defense if he’s going to put himself into danger. It’s ultimately ineffective, but mainly because of Pulverizer wanting to rush and not listening properly. The most important part though is Splinter telling Donnie that by doing this, anything that happens involving him after will be his responsibility. Which we see in The Pulverizer Returns where Pulverizer decides ot let the Foot mutate him to gain awesome mutant powers. Donnie tries to save him, but sadly he fails and Pulverier.. it’s not pretty. While Donnie does still save him after, he’s left with the guilt of ultimately failing his student. I’ll go into mroe about how horribly the writers wasted this next season, but here? It was interesting to give Donnie this plot since you’d expect t to go to say... Leo. I think it really worked for what it was worth and let us see a side of Donnie outside just being the smart one.

So with that said, why is he divisive? Well... it’s because another major part of his character is his crush on April. He doe snot... manage it well, to say the least. He is rather, well... stupid and kinda creepy with it. But I do want to point this out. Yes, it is annoying but I think there’s a good reason for it: he’s an awkward teenager. Yeah him asking her to feel his goosebumps (Metalhead), accidentally calling her ‘his April (The Gauntlet), accidentally saying awkward things when she acknowledges him (pick any episode) are incredibly facepalm worthy at best. And yeah, they should have done better setup than have him just find her pretty when seeing her once. However he does genuinely care about her and int he premiere, he was driven more because he saw an innocent girl scared and was unable to help than his newfound crush. The feelings are genuine and Donnie being awkward about is because... well, Donnie is awkward in general and he does slowly improve. Honestly I’ll have mroe to discuss about this next season cause haha... boy is THAT a clusterfuck. But ultimately while Donnie can be annoying, overall it’s pretty bearable and he has plenty of positive traits to balance it out.

Finally, we get Leo. He’s the group leader, but unlike the past series where he pretty much grew up with that role, here he gets the role halfway through the first episode. He starts as a goody-two-shoes with a mischievous side who had a very basic view of leadership. He see sit as a position of authority, greatness, and unstoppable. That’s not to say that he doesn’t take the role seriously, he does. He devises plans, does his best to keep his brothers focused, and frequently asks Splinter for advice on how to best do things. But he also frequently uses cheesy one-liners and does his best to be as over the top with his heroics as possible, thinking it’s cool when it isn’t. It gives Leo a more naive feel to him, someone who is serious but also is still a teenaged kid who has a lot of learning to do.

The pressures of leadership are Leo’s primary focus as a character. While he has some doubts, the biggest blow to his confident comes in The Gauntlet after there massive defeat against Shredder. The following episode has him unsure of if he can properly lead the team and feeling guilty when things go wrong. But the ultimate meltdown comes in New Girl in Town where Raph finally pushes him too hard and he quits. He’s realized at this point that leadership is not like it is on TV. it’s unforgiving, stressful, and you’re gonna be the one facing the consequences when things go wrong. His difficulty dealing with this is what attracts him to Karai. She’s fun, does whatever she wants, and doesn’t care about the rules. She offers him a form of freedom that he hasn’t had before. It’s why he tries to get her to change sides, he doesn’t want her to be an enemy. Unfortunately things end badly between them this season, but you can see where Leo is coming form no matter how naive he was about it.

Leo evolved a lot over the season. He went from a naive teenager who quoted old TV episodes to a serious, determined leader who was willing to do whatever it took to get his team through. He never quit being optimistic and he does still have his stress with leadership later down the road. But the season is about him easing not the role an understanding the weight of that role. It’s very easy to feel bad for Leo because he tries incredibly hard, but he doesn’t receive a lot of gratitude or payoff, and he just has to accept that. By the finale, he’s willing to make the ultimate sacrifice to ensure both success and his family's safety... something that becomes a bit of an issue in later seasons (looking at you Space Arc). I’d say that because we got to see Leo actually having to come to terms with the role, it makes this imo the best version of the character. We actually have to see him accept the role and how he hate show it limits his free time, something IDT the past versions really did. And all while having this dorky, idealistic side that keeps him likable and all the mroe relateable. Overall, I’d say that the leader in blue was handeled very well here!

April is my favorite character in the show, but her writing this season has some issues. Now as a character herself, she’s perfectly fine. She’s an independent sixteen year old and incredibly proactive. Whenever she finds info on the Kraang or about her dad, she looks into it. When everyone is ready to quit in Panic in the Sewers, she’s the only one who actively tries to do something and get everyone else to not give up. When Splinter offers to train her, she accepts it and we see bits and pieces of her progressing. But it’s done realistically as demonstrated in Karai’s Vendetta where it’s very clear that April is nowhere near her level. But it also demonstrates her determination and how she never gives up, getting back up after every blow and at east trying to put up a fight. While she’s forced to sit most things out and does on occasion get kidnapped, she still tries to be an asset and does very well as an intel gatherer. She’s also incredibly stubborn and can get in over her head without thinking things through, like in Metalhead and the finale episodes. But ultimately her proactiveness and need to take action are her strongest traits and what makes her a useful ally.

The issues with April are in the writing of the plot. I already mentioned how the early episodes could have done mroe in having her ease into the group. There’s also after Karai’s Vendetta where despite living with the guys, we don’t see her until the penultimate episode. We see her express hating it in that episode, but we don’t get to explore the fallout of her losing her normal life. In fact we...d on’t see April’s life outside Turtle stuff until next season, and even then not by much. Now of course the show is about the Turtles and you gotta keep the focus on them, but still we get a bunch of ‘show, don’t tell’ problems with April. We’re told things like she’s living with her aunt, but we never see them interact. Hell, IDT April’s aunt is ever mentioned outside the pilot. We also find out that April is the Kraang’s target... and we never see how she feels about it. If she’s scared, if she’s worried. We can assume that she has some stress about it, as indicated when she vents in Karai’s Vendetta, but little to no showcase of how she feels about it. Mind you we don’t with the Turtles either, but still. Still, overall April is a solid character imo.

That brings us to Master Splinter, the best written character by far. Splinter is the perfect balance of a mentor and a father. He’s firm, strict, and not afraid to dish out punishment when it’s necessary. But he’s also gentle, patient, knows how to give his sons proper guidance, and when to let them figure things out for themselves. He’s also snarky as Hell, so it’s good that he has a sense of humor. He’s also a flawed person. He lost his wife and daughter because of hat is essentially a sibling rivalry that went WAAAY too far and his own inability to control himself worsened things. He lost his family and then his humanity, ending his life as Hamato Yoshi. Since then, he’s hidden int he sewers and tried to focus his energy on raising and protecting his sons. It makes letting them go topside difficult, as it is for any parent whose children are growing up. He can make mistakes, like letting his fear control him and press his sons far too hard in Panic in the Sewers, but he can admit those mistakes.

Splintr’s largest plot in the season, outside mentoring the boys and April, is accepting his mutant status and overcoming his fears. Many epsiodes such as the premiere, Turtle Temper, Monkey Brains, Panic in the Sewers and the finale show how much pain the rat master carries and while he’s move don to a new life, it still haunts him. The episode that best displays this however is a filler episode called I, Monster. In it we get this version of the Rat King, the mind reading villain from Monkey Brains, who uses his power to swarm New York. When he senses Splinter, he proceeds to try and brainwash him too. The episode does an amazing job at showcasing all of Splinter’s fears. The boys outgrowing him, his past tragedies, ending up alone, and the Rat King slowly uses all of it to break him down. Splinter fights back, but the thought of the boys moving on without him is ultimately what defeats him until the boys remind him of who he is. He is Hamato Yoshi, Master Splinter, but most of all their father. They need him and always will. Which lets Splinter overcome the mind control and essentially Airbend Rat King through a wall. It was awesome~

Despite that episode being filler, it’s one of the season's best. It is a strong character exploration piece about a father who has gone through Hell and is faced with the fear of his kids not needing him. It is very relatable and makes Splinter all the mroe sympathetic. And we see Splinter truly embody who he is now when faced with the Shredder again and upon learning that his daughter had survived. He went into full rat mode and gave Shredder the beating that we all wanted. And the season ends on a perfect lead in for the next one. Splinter now knows that Karai is his daughter while she was raised to hate him. It’s any parent’s worst nightmare. He now has to deal with that revelation as well as how he’s going to break it to his students. Splinter has some solid growth int he season, something that a lot of mentor figures in cartoons don’t get, and it’s done perfectly. He has his flaws, but is still a strong father figure to his sons. Add that to Hoon Lee’s absolute perfect performance and you have what is in my opinion the best incarnation of Master Splinter in any TMNT series.

While the main cast is strong, the supporting cast and villains are... not so much. There isn’t really a supporting cast honestly. The best we have is Leatherhead, who is awesome. He’s a damaged character. One treated like a monster and tortured for who knows how long. It left him damaged and prone to trauma-induced outbursts. But he is a good person who knows that what happened to him was wrong and can be quite sweet when given the chance. He didn’t have to save humanity, especially since most would scream and run if they saw him, but he didn’t want anyone else to endure what he did. It’s best exemplified with his sacrifice in TCRI, going back to Dimension X and knowing fully well what’ll await him there. But he does so to save his friends and give them the chance to save the Earth. LH is freakin’ badass and I love him!

The villains though are... kinda boring. Most of the mutants, while the designs are cool, are incredibly one-note. Not all of them, like the Rat King is so dramatic and twisted and his VA does such a great job with the delivery that you both love him and want to strangle him. But others like Snakeweed or Spyder Bytez are just... well, evil for the heck of it. The Kraang are the worst though since at least the mutants are only in like one or two episodes. The Kraang are annoying as HELL. They can be dangerous but the redundant speech pattern and all fo them having essentially the same personality (aka none) is so... boring. Min you in Season 4 we kind of get an explanation to why, but it doesn't change how grating they can get. That being said in large groups they can be dangerous and with things like the Technodrome, they’re not to be taken lightly. Still, GAH I HATE THEM!!!

The Foot are somewhat better. Stockman is pathetic and remains pathetic throughout the entire series. Bradford is a pompous asshole. Xever is a little more interesting in that he kidn of was forced to work for Shredder or go to jail... but sadly after that reveal, he reverts to typical henchman status sadly. Shredder is the Big Bad and a no-nonsense leader. He has no empathy and is more than willing to inflict physical violence on his troops if they fail him. He even threatens to harm Karai, his daughter (kinda...) if she questions him. He is a very single minded perosn, his only goal beign to kill Splinter and his students by any means necessary. Hell. he only starts caring about the Kraang when he realizes that they can advance his goal, but has zero issues letting humanity fall to them. Oh, and there’s his glee when Karai tries to kill Splinter. WOrst? THis isn’t even the worst that he does int he show. Oh just wait for next season. JUST WAIT. Otherwise though, while a powerful fighter, he just mopes in his throne for most of the season, but Richardson’s badass voice acting was nice to hear.

The most interesting villain by far is Karai, and Thank God for it. While Leo is a good-good, Karai is a bad girl. She’s laid-back, does what she wants her way, and doesn’t play by the rules. She’s introduced as a competent fighter, but unlike the other Foot she’s more interesting in talking to the Turtles than killing them. I think she did become genuinely fond of Leo, but ultimately she’s going to be loyal to what she thinks is her family. She also started off realizing that there were bugger problems, like the Kraang, that required more attention over the vendetta until the Turtles betrayed her. Then she pretty much went ‘screw it’ and decided to go with the vendetta, which only got worst when she met Splinter for the first time. Still, ti was nice to have someone actually question Shredder and try to be sensible. She’s definite the most well-written of the villains, and the revelation about her being Splinter’s daughter means that there is MUCH more to come for her. Like I said, just wait for Season 2!

Okay, this section was a LOOOT longer than I thought. So I’ll just finish by saying that the villains aren't all that interesting, but the main characters are very well written. They have strong personalities, plenty of room for growth, and their interactions always gel really well. Very well done!

Rating: 4.5

Story

The main plot threads are the Turtles against the Foot, and the Turtles feud against the Kraang. All with some subplots, like Pulverizer and the mutant of the week stuff, and filler episodes thrown in. I say that the plots are handled very well. For example well go with... say two or three Kraang-centric episodes. Then we may or may not get a filler episode before shifting over to the Foot Clan for awhile. It never felt like we got smothered with one faction over the other, which is good. The plots also slowly intertwined and it felt like they came together at just the right time during the last six or so episodes. Hence hwy the finale worked so well, giving some kind of payoff on both ends.

Many of the episodes were very basic and outright bizarre. Like Cockroach Terminator having a mutant cockroach tr to murder Raph... it’s kinda gross, but entertaining! Every episode normally has at least something small that’ll carry over as the story goes along. For example, Donnie built Metalhead in... well, Metalhead and brought him back in the finale, plus it helped him learn mroe about Kraang tech. In Baxter’s Gambit, April finally gets her own weapon and she attempts to use it in Karai’s Vendetta. The episodes all play a part, even if just minor, in the larger narrative and I feel some of the later seasons kind of slacked on that. This season had a perfect balance.

That’s not to say that it was perfect. Like at the end of TCRI, we find out that April is the Kraang’s true target which makes us wonder why... and the next episode is about Raph’s fear of bugs! So TCRI was episode 17, we don’t even mention this fact again until Karai’s Vendetta, which is episode 21. Five episodes later, and even then we get one tiny hint (April doesn't get damaged by mutagen-laced water) and... that’s it. The.show has a bit of an issue with not exploring fallout, which is weird because Panic in the Sewers did and id it excellently. Maybe it’s because they have to make episodes to sell toys, IDK. It doesn't do too much damage, but it makes it feel like they both wasted character opportunities and like there’s something missing. But at the very least the episodes remain entertaining, so there’s that.

Rating: 4

Final Thoughts

You know what I like about this series and why I ran it above the other ones? Well it does something that I feel that the previous incarnations lacked: The Teenage Mutant Nina Turtles felt like teenagers. They felt like a bunch of kids truly entering the world for the first time. They screw up, they have problems to overcome, and they don’t always learn it immideatly. Like their cockiness is a frequent pain in the shell for example. But the reason that I like pretty much all of the episodes aside form Episode 11 is because it feels like we’re watching a group of kids truly starting to grow up and learn about how rough life can be. How they have to change, how they have to fix their mistakes, and just become better people. As a nineteen year old who was just staring to figure my life out, when I started the show, that drew me in. I related to these characters so much. I felt like I was growing with them and coming to understand who I was due to it.

It felt really nostalgic to go back over this season. Imo, it still holds up big time. It’s funny, action-heavy, well animated, and the characters are just as enjoyable as I remember. Would I call this the best season? Hmm... maybe. I still have three more to look over. But it was a really fun ride and it got TMNT 2012 off on the right track. Can they stay on it during Season 2? Come back next week, and we shall see!

[joethecasualnerd]

Laughing Salesman New: Episode One Review

The idea of shorts is very interesting. They take less time to produce, have a very simple plot to get through, and are built on the characters, rather than a story.

It should be something that I enjoy, and for the most part I do. Like what I said about slice of life shows, they are a breather after watching some heavy shows and don’t spend a lot of your time if you aren’t digging it.

Then we get shows that have a pair of shorts for one episode, much like the cartoons of the nineties and early 2000’s, which is great because you don’t have to wait another week to watch one short, getting two a week.

However, there is a bigger risk in finding a short that you don’t like, or getting both shorts to be ones that you don’t like. You can’t just skip one wait next week to watch another one, you must slog through a half that you don’t like, hoping that the next one would be better.

Sometimes, they are and sometimes they aren’t.

Does the same fate befall Laughing Salesman New, a franchise that had (up until this new series) never been released outside of Japan?

SPOILERS AHEAD

The first half of the episode involves an office worker, Nakajima. Just your plain as day office worker, who is very much an introvert.

One day as he goes to lunch, his friend in the office invites him to go to a bar. Nakajima makes the point that there wouldn’t be any bars open in the middle of the day, to which the friend just tells him to not worry about it.

Instead of getting out at the ground floor, they go the basement of the building and walk through the dark hallway to a glowing door labelled Club Daydream.

They go through the door and to Nakajima’s surprise, there is in fact a bar that is open and filled with beautiful women.

They start drinking water, with a couple of the hostesses goading them into drinking, Nakajima being entranced by one woman named Haruka, when the titular Laughing Salesman, Moguro enters the scene.

The friend, Sakamaki, explains to Nakajima that Moguro approached Sakamaki, who was looking for a place to drink in the middle of the day, and Moguro did indeed point Sakamaki to Club Daydream.

The two realize that their lunch break is long over, and they rush to go back to work, with Nakajima saying that he’ll be back later in the night.

After obsessing over Haruka for the day, Nakajima goes back to the club, only to find out that it doesn’t look anything like it did earlier. He runs out after meeting a less than attractive woman and then runs into Moguro.

Moguro explains that the club only becomes special in the middle of the day, and at night just becomes a regular club.

The next day, Nakajima, still obsessing over Haruka, asks Sakamaki if he wants to go back to the club at lunch. Sakamaki says that he doesn’t want to get in trouble again, but Nakajima says that he will pay for them both and that seals the deal.

Back at Club Daydream, the two begin drinking hard liquor and Sakamaki says that it is all Nakajima’s treat and the they start to go wild, drinking more and more.

When the bill comes, it is a staggering 480,000 yen, which is $4,314.18 as of writing this. Nakajima only has 10,000 yen, or $89.88, and says that he will come back tomorrow with the money he owes.

As they stumble back to work, which they are several hours late and presumably lose their jobs, Moguro is talking to Haruka, who is laughing at the fact that Nakajima thought that he could experience a wonderful dream for only 10,000 yen.

The half ends with Moguro saying that you need to be careful what you dream about, because reality can come back to bite you.

The second half begins with a new character, a woman named Takashima, an office woman who is having quite a rough day. She messed something up at work, her coworkers don’t like her, and overall just seems very depressed.

She does have a vice to cope with all of this, shopping.

Takashima loves shopping, but she tends to overspend and is almost always in debt.

She goes to buy a purse, but knows that she doesn’t have a lot of money and is debating whether or not to buy it, when Moguro comes up and correctly predicts that she has a problem.

He gives Takashima a business card and leaves. The next day, after Takashima did in fact buy the purse, she overhears her coworkers making fun of her, as they do.

She is walking home, lamenting on the fact that she can’t go shopping anymore, when she pulls out Moguro’s card.

Suddenly, Moguro appears out of nowhere and asks to talk to Takashima. Over drinks, Takashima explains her situation. Moguro then gives her a black credit card and says that the next time she wants to go shopping to use that card.

After another day of being made fun of by her coworkers, she goes shopping and uses the credit card and to her surprise, it works.

She goes on a major shopping spree and is very satisfies with her purchases. The next morning, she gets a knock on the door and two women in work uniforms greet her and barge right in, taking everything that she had bought the night before.

Moguro comes in and says that the stipulation to using the credit card is that he will repossess everything that she bought the night previous. She can sate her shopping habit and still have money to live, just so long as they take everything the next morning.

A few days of this go bye and while Takashima is satisfied with knowing that she can spend all she want, she’ still upset in that she isn’t able to keep the things that she buys.

At work the next day, she overhears one of her coworkers mentioning how they spent a day at the spa and another coworker complimenting on how beautiful and youthful she looks.

Takashima thinks that going to a spa would be okay, since they really can’t take that away (right?).

After spending a day at the spa, getting a full makeover essentially, goes on a date with a gorgeous guy and overall has a wonderful night.

When Takashima is walking home, out of an alley Moguro comes out and says that he needs to take what she bought.

The morning comes and back at Takashima’s house, she wakes up, hobbles to the mirror and see that her youth and beauty were taken away, leaving her to look like an old ugly woman.

Moguro posits how Takashima should have listened to what he said, they will take everything that she bought with the card.

REVIEW

Sorry that this review took so long, but in all honesty, there really isn’t anything to say about this show.

There aren’t any characters to get attached to, no significant development for the characters that are there, and some of those characters being unlikable.

I get that’s the point of the shorts, to show that too much of a good thing is bad and follow instructions or else face the consequences, essentially fables of how people are always in need of something, but always squander when they get it.

Other than that, the shorts weren’t very interesting. The only character to get attached to is Moguro, who is in the episode for a short time that the only thing you can get out of him is that he is some supernatural salesman with a smile that takes glee in watching people not follow the rules he has set up when he helps them.

I would be much more interested in the show if there was more of him, not necessarily give him a backstory (to keep him a mysterious figure), but more of how he chooses his clients rather than randomly appearing when someone has a problem.

On the plus side, the show does have some interesting animation, being overexaggerated and cartoony, which could be a negative, but it’s unique and will set itself apart from other shows.

I’m in a bit of a bind on what to score this show, but I can’t deny that I was bored throughout. Maybe someone else would find enjoyment in it, but this is not for me.

Pros

Interesting animation

Moguro is a good character

Cons

No other relatable characters

Not enough Moguro

Give a Chance or Hold Off?

HOLD OFF

Thanks for reading, and I do apologize again for having this review taking so long! Besides me not really having much to say about this show, I have a big project in the works that I hope is released soon.

It’s not anime related per se, but I do have interests other than anime and I hope you guys enjoy that when it comes out.

Thanks for reading, see you next time!

Peace.

[dorothydelgadillo]

6 Examples of Perfect Inbound Websites & What We Love About Them

When creating a new website or determining if your website is up to the new standard of inbound marketing, you might find yourself looking at competitors or industry leaders for inspiration.

Often the path of looking at competitors puts you in a place of “well their website sucks so mine is pretty great,” but then you look at industry leaders like HubSpot and say, “Ugh, my website could never be that good.”

But the truth is the best inbound websites come down to a few basic principles.

5 Things Great Inbound Websites Do

It is clear that not everyone is going to agree on what makes a website great or what even makes them “Inboundy,” but in our research and experience it has become very clear that there are a few principles that make a website “perfect” and these principles are going to be the foundation in which we judge every website.

1. It must be helpful and educational.

Can people find what they're looking for? Think about it this way, if you were a buyer, what questions would you ask that would lead you to buy something from your company?

Most of these could be summed up in what we call The Big 5 topics: cost, problems, comparisons, “best of” lists, and reviews. If your website is not addressing these five topics, then it is safe to say that your website is not helpful.

2. It must be easy to use.

In today's world where all buyers generally give websites just a seven-second time span before leaving, ease of use could not be more important. A great way to determine this is to assess whether your navigation leads to the right pages and can people self identify on the homepage. If yes, GREAT work, if not, keep reading -- we’ll go through some websites that are great at this!

3. It must be visually appealing.

Now this is a very subjective opinion some websites can look really outdated and others could look like they were made in the future, but if the goal of the website is to resonate with the identified potential buyer, its ultimately their opinion that matters.

However, one thing that all websites must be diligent about is creating a design that relates to buyer.

If you are selling tech, show cool tech things, but if you are a financial advisor, show people that you want to work with and make them draw the conclusion that “oh that person is just like me.”

If you can do that, you are being visually appealing to your audience and that is the ultimate goal. In our examples today, we will show off some websites that are setting the 2019 standard!

4. It must be utilizing video.

With video becoming the number one consumption of media on websites, it is so important that every website utilize it. If you don’t, your buyers are likely going to leave asking more questions than were answered and you may even lose a potential sale.

The data bears that out -- 76% of companies who use video said it helped them increase sales, and use of video during the sales process has increased from 25% to 37%.

5. It must solve for your business needs

A lot of the time companies will fall in the trap of “this is my website and I am going to have it how I want it. Though, there is nothing wrong with having a unique website but we must remember the most important thing about all websites is that its for our prospects and clients, not for ourselves.

We have a really hard time getting over our pride and remembering that our websites aren’t for US, they are for OUR CUSTOMERS. Some of the best solutions to solve for this specific problem can be found in an article written about the Key Characteristics of the Perfect Inbound Website.

Now, that you know what a great inbound website has, who has done it right? Here are 6 examples of perfect inbound websites and what we love about them.

1. River Pools and Spas

River Pools and Spas (an IMPACT client that was founded by Marcus Sheridan) is the definition of educational, on their homepage they call out how much content they have to help someone make the right pool buying decision.

From their more than 700 articles and a pricing guide gives the user exactly what they are looking for and FAST! I would almost say that there is too much information, but they do such a great job of keeping the website organized that the user can find exactly what they want.

This is thanks to greatly to the learning hub.Why is this the best part? Because it calls out the most common questions that people are looking to answerIt allows the prospect to go into autopilot and start finding answers rather than getting frustrated by having to search for them.  

Looking at the design of the website -- I want to get into a pool right now! A visually appealing website should relate to the persona and want them to take action. After being on this website for two minutes, I am ready to get into my swim trunks and make a big splash!

Lastly, not only does River Pools utilize video, it also has a whole page dedicated to it.

Rather you want to get into the nerdy details of what makes a pool work or just find out which one is best for you this website has done its job by educating the user through a video to an extent I have never seen!

The video above is a great example of how to educate your prospect on a subject that is very broad and situational but in such a way that is helpful and build trust.

2. Visible Body

Being in the higher education space, you would expect this website to be hard to use, maybe like a government website, but that is not the case here.

Visible Body knocks it out of the park when it comes to being educational by providing every resource you would need to learn about the product right on the home page.

Outside of that, they have a full resource center that links you to blogs, eBooks, videos, and so much more, but the way the approach their industry is refreshing. When most think about science or anatomy they might think white lab coats and stuffy professors, but they take that stereotype and replace it with animated skeletons and 3D images.

What makes this site so easy to use is the navigation menu. By having the navigation help self-select who the prospect might be it gets the right information to the visitors in the fastest way possible. Visible Body has done a great job of truly knowing and understanding their end users and providing the easiest way to find exactly what they need.

This website makes me feel like I am at the science museum looking at the Body World display. To be very honest some of the images and videos have a very futuristic feeling about and this is great for their targeted personas.

The video section on their website is called “Award-Winning” and I cannot disagree. When you find yourself on their YouTube channel, they do a very good job of making it relatable to anyone who might be watching by making it very easy to understand by not speaking in science lingo and using layman terms.

Their videos are not overtly selling their product, but they reference it enough to show viewers why they’d want to become a client. Nicely done!

3. Salesforce.com

Some of you might be thinking, “Well, DUH Salesforce is going to be on this list--they are one of the biggest tech companies,” but not so fast.

A lot of big companies struggle to be educational and just focus on revenue, but Salesforce is not one of those companies.

They have stayed true to being helpful and educational despite how large they have become.

From transparent pricing, inspiring testimonials, and a knowledge center that has more information than the Philadelphia Library, Salesforce is truly an educational resource for not only buying a CRM but for running a successful business.

I think for the first time ever I have seen a website that makes it almost too easy to find what you are looking for.

Salesforce’s navigation does an amazing job of calling out pages aligned with your role, need, industry, or your height, just kidding.

But in all seriousness, this navigation should be a standard for all websites.

A good rule of thumb is to make sure people can navigate to what they need in no more than three clicks from the homepage. Anything more than that causes frustration at best and could degrade trust at worst.

The last thing I think of when it comes to Salesforce is being an eco-friendly company, but they have me craving to go on a 14-mile hike in Colorado with their outdoorsy theme.

Not only is it really playful but it is relating to my generation by being cartoony and not boardroom executives talking about numbers! Salesforce counters their reputation of being hard to use and bulky with their youthful imagery and fun characters. This might just be enough to cause someone to forget what they’ve heard and dig a little deeper.

On the homepage, Salesforce has a video section about “trailblazers,” people they describe as drivers, innovators, leaders, and lifelong learners.

These videos make you want to buy the product today and take over the world.

This human connection empowers you to see being a SalesForce user as so much more than that; these videos draw out real emotion because it is clear that the Trailblazers are on a mission to change the world through their company. This is not a self promotion or testimony video, this is just simple SalesForce highlighting humans that are making change.

This is my favorite video: 

  4. OptiMonk

One of the first things that you will find on the OptiMonk homepage is a video giving you a 60-second overview of exactly who they are and what they do. This gives great context for what you are going to see on the rest of the site, along with their education center, where there are guides and blogs addressing some of their most common topics.

Some websites will try to over-complicate things, but OptiMonk does a good job of keeping it very simple by having everything you need on the home page. This makes it so much easier to find exactly what you’re looking for and if you can’t find something right away, they have a very helpful chat option that will lead you in the right direction.

One of my favorite things they utilize on their homepage is a slider of features that can educate the prospect right on the homepage.

OptiMonk’s drawings show they are a young, playful company that loves to provide great tech and help customers hit their goals.

One word that I think of when it comes to this site is that it is “clean.” The white and orange theme with pops of color is very well done.

5. Vidyard

The learn section of Vidyard’s website is nicely organized by role of the end user, which makes it easy to find the right content very fast.

One thing that really sticks out is the video inspiration hub. This is a great way of showing that normal people just like me, use their products, and see great results! Outside of that their content library is filled with blogs, videos, E-Books, guides in short there is enough to earn a master's degree!

The homepage is very simple, requiring the user to self identify who they are or what products they are looking for. Then this becomes a customized experience by talking directly to the buyer rather and general terms.

One thing I was worried about is that the speed would be slow on mobile, making it frustrating due to all the videos, but the way they have that set up it is actually very fast!

A lot like OpitMonk, this website is very simple, with a mostly white design with pops of color. . I find that my eyes do not get distracted by all the colors, pop-ups, or anything. They have done a great job of keeping the user very focused.

Considering Vidyard is a video company, I would be calling the CEO if they were not using video on their website. I would say they use video to such an extent that there really isn't need for text. You could just watch their demo video, and then make a buying decision, it's really that simple.

6. Sheffield Metals

Kind of like River Pools and Spas, Sheffield Metals (an IMPACT client) is a company that could be misconstrued as “boring,” but they have turned that on its head!

They address every question you could ever ask about a metal roof and even go on the defense with comparison blogs.

You can tell that they have thought of every question a prospect might have and have addressed it.

When it comes to doing buying research, you can likely find exactly what you are looking for right in the navigation.

They even call out the different warranties.

I never thought that a roof could look so good! By showing off images of houses and building with a nice metal roof, it gives them a sense of, “Oh, I know that place!” or “That looks like my house!” The visuals draw a real human element that is hard to replace.

When thinking of metal roof videos, you would expect to see guys on top of a building putting on a roof, but they reject that and provide videos that are fun and insightful. The best one is Buying a Metal Roof? Top 9 Things to Consider. This addresses some of the biggest questions, educates the buyer, and builds trust!

  What’s Next?

Now that we have looked at some fantastic inbound websites, what is next?

I would recommend you and your team to go through your website and break it out in the four categories, then rate yourself from a 1-10 for each one.

After you have done that, put a plan together of how to increase each category by one point.

If the task seems like too much, no worries! We have a fantastic website team here at IMPACT who would be more than happy to help! 

from Web Developers World https://www.impactbnd.com/blog/examples-of-perfect-inbound-websites

[dragonnan]

I rediscovered this while digging through some old writing.  I was sent a Q & A by a guy named Steven Savage who was planning a book regarding fanartists.  No clue if it ever got published but at any rate, it was something entertaining that made me think about the impact of fanart on my current career.  Since writing this back in 2014, I’ve gone on to create a lot more impactful fanart - specifically for Psych - to the point of hearing direct encouragement from creators and actors in the series. Never stop doing it - fanart is awesome and totally worth it!

What kind of fanart did or do you do?  Has it changed?

I started out with anime fanart - I love the clean lines and colors and it was fairly easy to copy the style.  I created a lot of Inuyasha, Trigun, Cowboy Bebop, and Fullmetal Alchemist as well as a variety of other random genres. I've also done some live TV characters as well from series such as Psych and Beauty and the Beast.  

How did you "get into" doing fanart?

I've always been a fan of the "what if" question.  In other words, what if this character had wings or what if he or she were secretly a gunslinger.  I like that I can answer those questions with my art to satisfy that curiosity.  

What is your history of doing fanart (and art in general)?  How have you evolved as an artist?

I found that imitating the art of established anime helped to develop my skills as an artist.  While I was trained in fine art, drawing anime style expanded my abilities in another direction and has had an impact on how I draw in general.  I can more quickly sketch out human figures and poses with less need to reference model photographs for accuracy.  Granted, non-reference drawings lend themselves to being more cartoony but I find I like that look all the same.  I also tend to colorize my work in the manner of cell painting, which relates to my appreciation for sharp, clean lines and shapes.

How has fanart helped you in your career?

After drawing fanart for a year or two, I met the President of a reselling company (he was showing his products at a store I used to work for).  He saw my work and asked if I'd like to design the covers for some of the paper tablets his company sold.  This included two manga style covers. Since then I've illustrated 3 books and got a job as an illustrator for a company that produces gift shop items.  Through them, I've created screenprint, embroidery, and a plethora of sculptural items.

How would you recommend people using their fanart/fanart interest to improve their job/career prospects?

First, don't depend on random comments from fans of the series you're creating your art for.  Fans will be excited over fanart because they love the character, but not necessarily because the art itself is amazing.  You'll want to get a true critical response.  Also, don't be hurt by responses that aren't glowing praise.  The best thing for your art is to hear about the faults.  This will give you an opportunity to improve upon your style and, in addition, impress clients who may want to hire you at some point.  Finally, don't place all your hopes on just fanart.  Explore lots of styles.  Take a look at the classics.  Try to see if you can replicate the art style of Leonardo or Klimpt.  The more you learn about art, the better your chances will be.

What jobs do you think are good for those that do fanart, and why?  Do these jobs differ from other, similar jobs?

Well, that depends on the knowledge and experience they have.  Someone who has only drawn fanart may find it difficult to get a high-paying art job.  This is a tricky question to answer because there are so many kinds of art related jobs, yet they each require a certain set of skills that go beyond just fanart. But, for one example, book illustration is a great place to start. There are a lot of self publishing writers in need of artists.  Those are the people I did all of my book illustrating for.  A good place to start would be to talk to a book publisher and let them see your work.  If they like you, they may keep your name handy as oftentimes writers will ask if they can suggest a freelance artist to illustrate their book.

Do you feel there are career interests, opportunities, and issues that people may find if they do fanart versus those that do not?

I think fanart, just like fanfiction writing, has a bad reputation of being poor quality or traced art. If that's the only thing on your resume, I don't think it does you any favors.  This is why, regardless of how good an artist you may be, you want to develop your talents beyond just fanart.  Give yourself the best possible chance because breaking into the art world and making a career is hard enough for even professional artists.

Fanart involves working with characters created by others.  Do you find this provides any advantages - or disadvantages - in your career opportunities?

A little of both, to a degree.  On one hand, it can show your skill at replicating an existing design.  At my current job [AN: I’ve since left this employment and now work full time as a freelancer], there've been a few times where a company has provided us with a .jpeg of their logo and want to see it on a sweater.  Due to the way the art needs to be set up, that means redrawing their logo in Illustrator.  So, in that respect, I think a good handle on fanart can show your ability in that manner.  On the other hand, the term “fanart” can raise red flags simply because employers may question your overall skill.  So you can draw Naruto, but can you output a screenprint design?  Of course, this all goes back to the kind of job you want in the first place.