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adhdtsukasa · 6 months ago

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tsukasa tenma has ADHD!! except it's an actual analysis because 1. look at my url 2. i'm mentally unwell (and i started to love tsukasa mostly because i immediately recognized my ADHD traits in him). which is a thing i should probably leave for ADHD awareness month, HOWEVER!! it was my birthday yesterday and i wanted to spoil myself (i just kinda overlooked how much time writing it from scratch would take me, so i'm a bit late with it). and i reaaally don't wanna wait until november when i finally wrote it down because i'm so HYPED because i was preparing for it like what? two years? somewhere around it. and that's a LONG time.

please keep in mind that i'm no psychologist, psychiatrist nor a neurologist and while i do use some sources (cannot really confirm if they are true, though... because i forgot to write credits down... so i'm really sorry for that), most of this analysis was just based off on my personal experiences with the disorder (and i don't really have the full professional knowledge of what i struggle with i'm just a Boy). i mean, i am analyzing a character from a hatsune miku game. i think i'm already putting way too many effort than i should.

also the examples of tsukasa's behavior here are not all of the things, because i wrote down only the things i remember off from the top of my head. sorry, guys. my hyperactive ass is not sitting thru all the stories again just to get my crumbs, unfortunately.

anyways, with this a little bit unprofessional and messy introduction, let's get it started!

1. THE MAIN PART OF THIS WHOLE THING, AKA HOW THE ADHD SYMPTOMS CORRESPOND TO TSUKASA'S BEHAVIOR

i wanted to write it down in my own words, but i think the screen above has summed it up perfectly; there are some established symptoms of ADHD, but to be an ADHDer you don't have to experience them all. and this is going to explain why i'm gonna show a lot of these symptoms later, yet gonna connect only some of them with tsukasa. it's only these i have evidence for, and yet i think they're good enough to point at tsukasa and already say woah! an ADHDer!!

in short, there are three types of ADHD: hyperactive, inattentive (ADD) and combined. the combined one is the most common iirc, so that's also what i'm going to focus on today. especially since for a rep of the other types, i could say that shizuku's a rather great representation of ADD — but that's not the point of my ted talk today, so i'm not going to go into the detail about it. i'm sure some momojan or shizuku oshi would do better than me in this field, so i'm leaving it to the experts.

these are the symptoms that i managed to gather — the first two screens being about the symptoms viewed in children, the last one being about the symptoms viewed in adults. "in which one of them tsukasa belongs to?" that's a good question, because i actually don't know. calling a high schooler a child doesn't sit quite right with me, yet a freshly turned 17/18-years-old is not exactly an adult, either (although most of the symptoms i'm analyzing come from these that are viewed in adults). and while i do think tsukasa has more of the symptoms viewed in adults, we're gonna analyse them all! because i'm putting my all into this.

FORGETFULNESS

i believe there's not much left to say, as this is the most obvious one and everyone already knows that. even though it's not touched that much anymore for some reason, tsukasa's forgetfulness is his very apparent trait. it varies in severity a lot of times: from him basically forgetting both his childhood and true feelings in the main story to him, for example, forgetting his own phone and lunch (in the same day!!) in hinamatsuri. even saki in the same event, while they were arguing, called him a "big, dumb forgetter" and assumed that he forgot what happened the day he brought her the hinamatsuri dolls to hospital. while forgetting basically half of your life is not exactly normal and can be a sign of something bigger, like dissociative amnesia, his forgetting of just the ordinary things and it happening a lot definitely still fits this trait.

EXCESSIVE TALKING/PHYSICAL MOVEMENT

while this is something that you'd rather connect to emu (and for a good reason), it's not like tsukasa is completely devoid of it either; he talks a lot. he moves a lot. it's not on emu's level of hyperactivity, but it's also not "a lot" that's taken as a social norm, based on how the people around him react. he's putting the 1 in oddball 1 2, after all.

in holy night or some side stories connected to it (it might be meiko's side story? but i'm not exactly sure) it was also said that tsukasa moves in his sleep a lot to this point that his parents have to leave his christmas presents under his door instead of next to his bed.

oh, and he also talks to himself a lot. even in class, which was confirmed in chapter 6 of dazzling (or maybe even earlier, it's just the one moment that i remember). (but i'll get to this moment later on)

he says his long monologues, he strikes his poses at every occasion — and while i don't think that's the first thing you think of when you have "excessive talking/movement" in mind, for me it sure does count as it.

LITTLE OR NO SENSE OF DANGER

this point can seem rather weird, because "isn't tsukasa always riddiculed at rui's weird inventions"? well, yeah, he is, that is not a thing to deny. but he also agrees to try out most of them, if not all, if it's for the sake of the show. he's aware of what can happen, but he also doesn't back away if it means that he'll be one step closer to achieving his dream of stardom.

does it count as "little sense of danger"? well, i'm actually not sure, for me it doesn't, but maybe for someone it does. i'd say that's a rather weak point, but i wanted to include the explanation for the counterpoint of it — that's why i even mentioned it in the first place. i don't have a lot to say about this tbh.

update: oh, actually no, wait, i just remembered. remember how tsukasa in phoenix decided to not eat anything for three days just to be able to resonate with rio, while also having to do straining exercise on top of that? you certainly cannot say that's a safe thing to do, but he still went along with that in order to get the role. it makes me come to a conclusion that tsukasa actually has a sense of danger, but sometimes chooses to willingly ignore it if only it makes him get closer to fulfilling his dream. i think it's coming close enough to the little/no sense of danger to be actually considered an ADHD trait.

DIFFICULTY KEEPING QUIET

while i'm not sure if what i'm going to talk about is a difficulty keeping quiet in a traditional sense of way, it definitely counts as it, somehow: tsukasa is loud. like, really loud. and that's another obvious fact both for us and for characters in-universe, especially when thinking of tsukasa shiho's first thought is that he's kinda noisy, which can be seen in the "a friend's brother" 1koma. (and probably a lot of other cases. free shiho.)

tsukasa doesn't seem to realize that he's way louder than he should be and that him being loud is his first impression in most of the cases, though, or at least i don't remember any moment where it happens (and it's a possibility. then that's on me, i guess.). and yeah, i know what's the reason for it, obviously — he's supposed to be a comic relief character. because wansho's stories are mostly supposed to make you smile, as this is what wansho's aspiration is. however, as much as being intended to make the viewer laugh it wouldn't be, it still is a part of tsukasa's character, and a rather important one on top of that. his constant loudness is something that's definitely not considered normal by the society and could very well fit into this symptom.

and since i promised to elaborate on the mentioned before scene from dazzling chapter 6: when tsukasa talks to himself in class, it always ends up to be loud. and it already happened a few times.

(tl by tsukasa's #3 fan on youtube because i don't have proseka on my phone wah)

if it's not a difficulty keeping quiet, then i don't know what is. bro can scream up to 120dB as measured by robonene for god's sake.

IRRITABILITY/QUICK TEMPER

again, this is something that was more apparent with early game tsukasa, maybe he just got medicated. idk man. but even if it happened three, almost four years ago, it still happened, i don't make the rules. back in the early game, tsukasa was really easily losing his temper and getting annoyed, mad even — i mean, that was the whole point of the main story argument: tsukasa's first response to nene accidentally messing up their show, which was not even her fault, was to shout at her. and while this was obviously very important thing to him and being upset at this is a rather understandable reaction, taking this as far as screaming at a poor girl for not being to face the audience because of her anxiety is not something a person who can control their anger would do.

it could be also easily seen by his reaction to emu and rui's antics back in the early game, which were often stained with irritation.

another example is his hinamatsuri argument with saki, where, despite loving her so much, he still got slightly mad at her for not liking the new dolls he bought her. he started to regret his harsh words and actions soon enough, obviously, but it doesn't change the fact that it was rather easy for him to get him across.

INABILITY TO DEAL WITH STRESS

if i'm not mistaken, tsukasa has once said something along the lines of "is it anxiety? there's no way a star like me would feel anxiety" — but i cannot recall for the love of my life in which story it appeared, so i don't want to take it as a face value when i don't have a solid proof for it.

other than this vague mention of "something that's in the story but i don't remember where", i'll admit, i don't really have anything backing me up for this tbf. i mean, i guess maybe tsukasa doing his best to appear strong as a child to not worry his parents could work? because the stress of saki being in the hospital definitely was also present here, although i just see this more as a coping mechanism for his situation than a reaction to stress, so that's not a solid evidence either.

so, yeah. take this one with a grain of salt, actually.

from the symptoms that weren't listed here, i remember reading something about people with ADHD enjoying to show off more, which is certainly what tsukasa does often — and while it actually applies to me too, it wasn't on an english site so i didn't screenshot it and i cannot really find it anywhere in english... so even though i treat it just like my whole argument for the inability to deal with stress, i thought it's just worth mentioning.

however, there is obviously one more thing...

HYPERFIXATION/SPECIAL INTEREST

obviously, i'm talking about acting here: for tsukasa, acting aligns with all these criterias. it is his deep passion; it is something highly engaging for him; it is sometimes all-consuming for him; he tunes out the world around him when he thinks about how can he possibly improve his acting (see: the dazzling moment i showed earlier. yeah, i like to use it as a backing point a lot, as you can see.); and it is something that is his life-long interest.

is it his special interest or his hyperfixation, though? well, it's hard to tell...? because while according to screen two, spinterest revolves around a topic and hyperfixation revolves around an activity, so it would qualify what tsukasa feels towards acting as a hyperfixation, it's still kinda hard for me to call it so because of its length. yes, screen three clearly says that hyperfixation can last years, but they mostly revolve around shorter periods of time, after all (my longest hyperfixation was just a year long, for example). i think it's up to you to determine whether you'd call tsukasa's love for acting a hyperfixation or a special interest, but it's something from these two most certainly.

i'm also a big fan of the headcanon that tsukasa's other spinterest is kaito ww it's in no way a canon evidence (unfortunately!), but kaito's 1* side story, where tsukasa and emu are watching kaito's show and tsukasa is explaining to her why kaito's wearing a scarf somewhat implies that tsukasa knew a thing or two about kaito before the main story. and i'm all for it. colopale let tsukasa be a kaito fanboy pleaseee.

2. I REALLY LIKE ANALYZING SONGS, IF YOU CAN'T TELL

those who have already read a few of my things probably know what i love to do the most — analyzing songs!! so i wouldn't be myself if i just left tsukasa's commisions without analyzing them under the angle of neurodivergence, especially since the sole reason i became obsessed with the thought of ADHD tsukasa was that one sekahaji line (there's too much noise, so much noise and it keeps getting worse you will always be famous).

of course, remember that only the world hasn't even started yet should be taken as a canon value! producers are often given space to do whatever they want in the lyrics of the songs they are commissioned for, so they're not canonical in any way. i think it's still fun to look at their lyrics and ramble about them for a bit, though. i've already got too carried away anyways.

won't be posting photos of the lyrics since i'd hit the images limit, but you can check them yourself — all the translations i'm taking, as always, from the vocaloid lyrics wiki. (since filament fever has two tls on there, i want to clarify that i've only looked at and considered in my analysis the official english one, because it's, well, official.)

THE WORLD HASN'T EVEN STARTED YET

besides the mentioned earlier there's too much noise, so much noise and it keeps getting worse, which i think of as a representation of overstimulation (since i used to see people asking "oh but why tsukasa has something about there being too much noise in a song made out of his feelings when he's such a loud person himself". because he likes the noise he makes, not the overwhelming, overstimulating noise from the outside!!), sekahaji also has a rather good amount of quotes that could be read as something connected to neurodivergence (based on the fact that it's not supposed to be a song about this topic): the main theme of these are procrastination, which can be seen in let's cross the end of all of this, partying forever and the world hasn't even started yet line itself. the thought of the world not even starting implies that there's still a lot of time left to do something, while "partying forever" can refer to deciding to give up on doing the things you should do and going to drown in something that indulges only you and yourself for the rest of eternity. while procrastination is not counted as an official ADHD symptom, it's a trait that people with the disorder very often have (for reasons obvious).

other lines, which i couldn't entirely fit into a box of a certain symptom, are there's too much conflict, so much conflict and it keeps growing (a parallel line to the noise one, so it means something! right) and let's break the plans for a harmonious future. in my personal interpretation, they both can be viewed as your typical neurodivergent struggle in a neurotypical society — "too much conflict" refering to an internal struggle of not being completely normal, while the "harmonious future" that's going to get broken are just the social norms that are going to be broken because of an off-putting, neurodivergent behavior. something that some neurotypical people dooon't really like.

TONDEMO-WONDERZ

since i've just talked about breaking the social norms, "why?!" and "do it like this!!" aren't like you, huh? line from tondemo-wonderz is going to go first, because it revolves around the same topic. it's the same case: it's about (subconscious, not intentional) fighting what's accepted by the society by just being yourself — because you're neurodivergent, you're different.

from the other lines in tondemo-wonderz, i have only one and it's take an eraser to your memories?!, which is pretty much self explanatory. as always, a mention of forgetting something in tsukasa's commision. who would've thought.

88 SHOOTING STARS

another self explanatory line that i have written down as first: it's okay if you only remember a little part of it sometimes. another mention of tsukasa forgor™, and while it corresponds with what happened in dazzling, it's still a line mentioning forgetfulness — so it's worth mentioning.

aren't we just inevitably going around in circles? and it's okay if you take a rest for a little bit sometimes can be interpreted as another mention of procrastination and while it's not that apparent as it was with sekahaji, because going in circles can refer to something else and taking a rest sometimes is not a bad thing at all, i still wanted to mention them here. for the record.

you ought to slip and fall in panic in the final moment is connected to a symptom that i showed, yet didn't elaborate on it (because i didn't have anything to work with) — making careless mistakes. the same case, yet with another symptom goes with is this not enough yet again? is this not how it's supposed to be? couldn't we go even further than this?, which can be seen as a reflection of unability to listen to instructions. a bit of reaching with this one (like this whole part damn), but as i said earlier: for the record, i'm leaving it here. to show that i had some intense thoughts.

tbf, when i think about it now, maybe the mentioned earlier "why?!" and "do it like this!!" aren't like you [...] could very well fit this symptom too.

MR SHOWTIME

mr showtime you will always be famous, because this is a song that gave me a looot of things to work with. i was so flabbergasted when i read these lyrics for the first time. tsukasa tenma why are you like this. /aff

there are a lot of lines hinting being easily distracted, and these are basically the very first ones, too: you know what? i just can't make up my mind, it's so messed up that i can't put my thoughts together and a merry-go-round (my thought process) goes round and round are all about it. like you cannot deny it this time, if it's not about being unable to stay focused then i really don't know what is [insert the tsukasa don't look away stamp here because i love it and it's my biggest motivation to actually focus whenever i do something]. the more i mess around and waste time, the more i become hungry / and i can't handle it can be seen as about procrastination again, and even not "can be seen", it's literally being frustrated at yourself for wasting time, that's the sole outcome of a procrastination!! being bothered by feeling anxious, meanwhile, is resonating with the inability to deal with stress once again.

also jumping the gun. driving in a zigzag manner can actually connected with the little to no sense of danger. because, as far as i'm aware, driving in a zigzag manner is certainly not a safe activity. don't do it at home.

from the symptoms that i haven't yet mentioned to this point, am i taking a long way? am i making a fruitless effort? can be reflecting difficulty organizing tasks — since the poor planning of your activities can make you take a long way and can make you do a fruitless effort. then, where's the fun in taking shortcuts all the time? can be read along the lines of something coming close to extreme impatience and while a person that's extremely impatient would actually enjoy taking the shortcuts to get closer to their goal or destination, said impatience can be also connected with the desire for something interesting to happen. a task can make you impatient not because it's long, but because it's simply boring — avoiding shortcuts can make it less boring, even if it extends its duration. with this explanation, it makes the unexpectedness (unexpected program) is the best part of the show (my life) perfectly fit into this category, even though i wouldn't call this line a sign of impatience on its own.

i have some issues with i'm pathetic. i can't satisfy myself, because... at first i thought of connecting it with either mood swings or inability to deal with stress, however i'm not sure if that's really it. i'm pretty sure it connects to neurodivergence in some way, but i just can't put my finger on it, so... i'm just leaving it here for the record, once again.

oh, and there's also i got lost in the world (stage) and / the end credits rolled (the curtain fell), which also is pretty much summing up the experience of being neurodivergent in the neurotypical society. in the middle of trying to stay true to yourself and having to mask just to be accepted, it's easy to get lost — and once you do so, there's no going back. the curtain falls.

to end this part of the analysis, i'd show the lyrics from filament fever and sekai wo terasu tetrad here. i won't do this, however, and the reason for it is fairly simple — they don't give me much material to work with and i'm not really surprised, because mr showtime has succesfully sucked all of the neurodivergent coded lyrics into itself. there just won't be another song like mr showtime, i fear.

i can just say that in filament fever there is running away from the flow of time — which got me thinking of either procrastination and unability to stick to time-consuming tasks, with the former being more plausible as a potential interpretation... but that would be it.

3. NAKAYAMA IS A METAPHOR FOR NEURODIVERGENT MASKING AND IT'S THE STUPIDEST THING I'VE EVER SAID BUT YOU HAVE TO HEAR ME OUT ON THIS

listen, i know how it sounds.

i'm not actually a fan of trying to fit every thing a character does into a box of a metaphor, symbol or allegory, i really am not. i think some things should just stay as simple as they are, but this thought has been bothering me ever since i've first seen spoilers of what's happening in a story where you're the star for the very first time. i'm in no way saying it has any canonical meaning, but i just thought it would be fun to include. because maaaybe someone sees my vision.

for those who haven't seen tsukasa4 yet or want to have a recap of what has happened in it: the whole event story revolves around tsukasa trying to grasp his role (as always). wxs got recommended to shunmei-za by shousuke and went there to practice their acting skills, immediately getting thrown onto the preparation for their next performance. tsukasa, however, is not a lead this time — he got the role of a supporting character and has got basically three lines to say on stage total. since tsukasa's used to playing lead roles, he obviously has issues with grasping the role — it's hard to use method acting in regards of a character that says three sentences total and nothing more. with help of bakuno reki, one of the actors in shunmei-za, and the rest of wxs, he manages to create a portrayal of nakayama that would make him "come to life" and "be a protagonist of his own story", something that would make it easier for him to get into role, however...

he gets a little bit too carried away with his acting during the actual performance.

and this is not something that would ruin the whole play, obviously, he's just a supporting character, the less invested audience would probably forgot about his impact on the story after five minutes of his last appearance — but he still made a slip-up. he still resonated with his role, but didn't achieve the utmost perfection. he still did well acting, after all, he managed to receive praise from the director in the end... but it's still a very apparent mistake that was made.

(tl, once again, by the awesome tsukasa's #3 fan)

and that's where the nakayama masking metaphor theory (it's not even a theory but it sounds cooler this way) comes in.

nakayama is supposed to be just a man. from what we know about him, he's in his late twenties and works as an editor — and even though tsukasa makes up a whole backstory for him later on, he's still supposed to be ordinary. nothing special. he's coming nowhere near the other roles that tsukasa has played, he's not on the same level as miles, torpe and rio. and while you could possibly consider torpe and rio as rather ordinary, they still had something interesting to happen to them, the main reason why they were lead roles for their respective plays. in the tsukasa4 play, nakayama has nothing like that. he's literally just a guy, he's normal. and "normal" is a keyword here.

tsukasa did everything he could to fit into nakayama's role. he followed the script, he took the advice from a more talented and professional actor that is bakuno, he didn't do any mistakes during his preparations — and yet he still managed to mess up in the end. why?, besides of the fact that he just let himself become one with nakayama during the performance and it resulted in a supporting character outshining the lead?

if we take as a fact that tsukasa is, in fact, neurodivergent, it would make sense that he's having troubles with playing a normal person — because he's not exactly normal either. and this would very well work out as a metaphor of masking; even when you try your best, even when you mask yourself perfectly, you can still make slip-ups. you can still accidentally drop the act in middle of something that absolutely required it, or, similiar to what tsukasa did, can accidentally overdo it and end up perceived as even more weird than you'd be without masking. something something i got lost in the world and the end credits rolled. rings a bell?

and i'm not saying that tsukasa has a problem with masking, because he doesn't. he tries his best to pass as a normal member of society, but he also makes no effort in actively masking his weirdness (or else he wouldn't be a part of oddball one two). however, if you want to neurodivergent code your character, it would make sense to include a possibility of it in some way, right? especially since wxs stories' already had the theme of dealing with being perceived as weird (eg. rui's whole backstory, obviously). even if it's not affecting tsukasa directly, i think it would be cool to include something that indicates this issue's existence in his story and, in a way, his struggles.

however, as i said earlier, this is a very stupid thought and that's why i left it for the very end. i don't actually think that how tsukasa played nakayama was supposed to be a metaphor for masking, it's just a pure coincidence that it could be interpreted like that when you think about it too much.

aaand with this, we've finally come to an end!! (finally. i'm so exhausted.) i don't have anything more to say about this topic. maybe i'll retweet it with some more evidence in the future if we ever get more ADHDkasa content. for now, it would be all!

is tsukasa actually intentionally written as an ADHDer? Who Knows! there's a possibility that he is, but even if he's not, he's still one in my heart. regardless of the status of his possible neurodivergence, analyzing his behavior in this light was still very fun! and maybe i even converted someone into the ADHDkasa hell.

feel free to add something if you want to, and feel free to correct me if i got some things wrong! i still hope that even though of how messy this whole thing is written, i did tsukasa justice and didn't accidentally say too much nonsense lmao

...i hate ending analyses.

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biblically-accurate-dca · 6 months ago

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super disorganized sketch page because i do what i want

#my art #not sure if i wanna tag these... hrm #i wonder if alt text shows up in search results.... shudders #well anyway. i wanna ramble about these!!#for willy mafton: i've been working on designing more of the human cast. mainly all the big name important ones #it's been a slow process + a little challenging but i like getting the chance to practice drawing faces! :]#in regards to His design specifically.. it's very much based off of his movie apperance #but with a reference to that Classic sprite thrown in #bc i thought making him a little cartoony and inhuman would fit him :] but idk im not an expert on his character or anything #about the rabbit lady: i forgot how i had that idea initially but it ended up looking so fucking cool tbh #im always a fan of making her design less of a feminine eye candy type of design and more of a Spooky Murderer type >:3c #it also gave me the idea to try making some similar designs for the glams...#but if i do that im not gonna be giving them that vintage rubber mask look... since they're meant to be super flashy and high tech looking #so i was thinking they could have faces with more of a silicone texture.. and that have a style based more off of their in game art work :]#so they'd be like giant dolls with weird moving faces rather than having a vintage animatronic look #also that van in the bottom middle is 100% a homage to a specific user i wont be mentioning but iykyk HFJZJFJF #ANYWAY the 🌞🌜 stuff: dont be weird about it please HFJZJG #im aware that these tags are very easy to ignore but like. genuinely pls dont be weird about them #dont romanticize it. its not meant to be ''y/ndere'' or anything like that #its actually a bit personal to me so like... interpret it as you like but be aware its not meant to be a happy or positive thing #anyway i think thats all i have to say... i've been trying to branch out a tiny bit regarding the things i draw #it's always nice to challenge yourself even if its tough... especially if its tough!!#i mainly draw just for my own sake but i hope ppl see something they like here #these tags got so fucking long oops... i'll stop now JFKZJFKSJGKSJG

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skrunksthatwunk · 8 months ago

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other half

redraw screenshots taken from this post i made a while back ignore that i forgot to actually link it for like an entire day

#THE SILLIES #i have an exam in 9 hours and i haven't studied for it. kuwabara was more important (<- i'll be ok + i'll study soon)#yyh #yu yu hakusho #kazuma kuwabara #kuwabara kazuma #yusuke urameshi #urameshi yusuke #kuwameshi #yyh puu #idk what people tag him as... :/#also i hope it's not too obvious that i'm the least comfortable drawing yusuke outta the main four. idk what it is. the eyes? hm #like hiei i can't draw consistently but i usually like it anyway so whatever. but yusuke i just feel like i'm so close to getting it right #but i never quite get there. essence uncaptured vibes tarnished. but that's probably just me #also no kuwa would not steal a catalytic converter. it goes against his honor code as established in episode uhhh idk 7? the one w/ eikichi #skrunkart #haven't done one of these flat tone sketch pages in a while... i like them though they're pretty #though i kiiiinda gave up on the overall composition by the end </3. eh whatever at least it's out there now #also my favorites of this are the one of kuwa holding puu with like. club penguin eyes? and puu diving at kuwa's egg. i just think they're #ute. plus the one of kuwa sleeping holding puu w the thousand yard stare. idk just silly to me #anyway hopefully it's clear that i love kuwabara. the end

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that-was-anticlimactic · 5 months ago

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i will never understand how or why the httyd movies did the books such an injustice.

the movies aren't even an adaptation - they stole the name of the series, the name of some of the characters and places, and the general idea that there are dragons. honestly, i would be fine with the movies and maybe even like them if they didn't capitalize off of cressida cowell's incredible books that never get any credit.

the books are an amazing story about the cycle of violence and how vengeance and revenge is dangerous. hiccup says that the past is a ghost story, one we need to learn from to better ourselves. the books are about how everyone deserves freedom, how every creature, every being on the earth deserves to be free. we see that in the slavemark, with the dragons.

and like... hiccup is so different. they did him a severe injustice. he's scrawny and intelligent and learned to talk to dragons simply by observing them! he chooses kindness first above all else; instead of yelling at toothless to train him, he is kind. and in the end, that kindness is why toothless chose to save him. bc even toothless himself says that dragons are inherently selfish creatures who care only for their survival. hiccup is brave - his beliefs differ drastically from both the vikings and the world.

hiccup is a child who chose to do the right thing even at the expense of himself. he agreed to free the slaves on nobert's ship, and in return, they gave him the slavemark which is easy to give but cannot be removed. he was like twelve. and having the slavemark means he cannot be with his tribe or his family, it means he isn't considered a human being anymore. and he keeps it a secret for awhile until it's revealed and when it is everyone turns their backs on hiccup. his family, his tribe, his mentor, people he TRUSTED. everyone except fishlegs, and, once she got over the shock, camicazi. he was thirteen. and even when he lost his memories and was really injured, he persisted. he was told to go to tomorrow and to save the dragons and he did bc in his heart he knew it was right even though he didn't know who he was or how he got there.

and fishlegs,,, oh my god FISHLEGS!!! the did him SO DIRTY!!! fishlegs is hiccup's best friend, one of the main motivators for hiccup. he steals norbert's potato for the sake of fishlegs, he gives fishlegs his dragon and goes to retrieve another, he takes the blame for fishlegs. and fishlegs does the same for him. he takes the slavemark with pride. he refuses to turn. he gives hiccup his lobster claw necklace which is his most prized possession. he is brave for hiccup, he believes hiccup is alive. he fights for hiccup harder than anyone else ever has. he does not turn. his is loyal, has allergies, has asthma, has a squint and a limp, has glasses bc he's blind without them... and he's still a hero despite being a runt, despite everyone even the adults telling him he's hopeless, telling hiccup to leave him behind.

and they cut camicazi! i'm sorry, but astr*d is nothing compared to camicazi. camicazi is a tiny, feral child who can easily best hiccup, fishlegs, and pretty much anyone in a sword fight. she can bring a grown man to tears with her rudery and smack talk. she is recklessly brave and craves adventure and follows hiccup blindly bc she trusts him that much. she isn't in love with hiccup - in fact she doesn't care about romance and love. she gives up everything to help hiccup bc she has a strong sense of justice. she is the motivator, the cheerleader, she finds a positive in everything. she never gives up. literally never gives up. and that's one of the most inspiring things about her: she always has hope.

and toothless! god!!! toothless is *thought to be* a common or garden dragon. he is horrifically tiny, he is literally toothless, and is the biggest brat in the world. he will cause problems on purpose. he has a stutter, he's the most selfless selfish dragon around. he and hiccup can talk to each other. he masks his fear with singing and being annoying. his growth is remarkable. he starts off refusing to obey hiccup, doing the opposite of what he says, making life harder for literally everyone around him, and he's still somewhat like that. but he's also braver, more caring, more willing to make sacrifices for the sake of others. he's clever, which he needs to be to make up for his size and aggression. he protects hiccup with everything he has, therefore, he protects what hiccup cares about just as hard. he was the only dragon that didn't abandon the vikings in the first book bc he cared about hiccup.

and snotlout,,, god,,, i will never forgive the movies for butchering snotlout. hiccup's cousin, the bully character, the one who is horrifically jealous that hiccup's dad was born before his. the one who desperately wants to prove himself, to be worthy, to make people proud. and you hate him, you despise him. he betrays everyone many times bc of the nothing promised to him by alvin and his mom. he loses himself, turns his back on himself, all bc he wants to prove himself. all bc he wants to be better than hiccup. and hiccup still forgives him and gives him chances, sometimes out of pity, but also bc snotlout is his cousin. he can't just turn his back on him no matter how miserable snotlout made his life. and in the end, snotlout sacrifices himself for hiccup. he gives up his life for hiccup in one last attempt to set things right. his death and the events preceding it are one of my absolute favorite moments in the book. gives me chills. makes me cry.

that's the thing with the books - they're so realistic. there is no inherently happy ending where everything works out. the first book begins with "there were dragons when i was a boy", implying that they're gone now. the books show there are consequences to our actions. they enslaved the dragons, they fought against them during the dragon rebellion all bc alvin and his mom said to, and now they're gone bc a simple apology doesn't fix hundreds of years of enslavement. and the only way for the world to move forward was for the dragons to leave and heal on their own. and now they have to learn to live without them. and yeah i've heard the third movie ends like that but. it doesn't have the build up. it doesn't have "there were dragons when i was a boy". it doesn't have eleven books of development to back it up, to make it feel meaningful.

i know that the movies are really special to a lot of people. i know that, on their own, they're genuinely good movies. i can acknowledge that the soundtrack is amazing and the animation is beautiful. i just can't see past the way they butchered the world that i love, the world that i grew up with. i can't see past the way people yelled at me for saying i liked the books better, the way that people gave me weird looks when i showed them a picture of the original toothless, when i tell them that nightfuries aren't even a type of dragon. cressida cowell created hundreds of different dragons, and the movies couldn't even pick from that. i can't forgive the way that barely anyone knows there are books bc the movie barely gives credit to them. i cannot forgive the way they capitalized off the books and then shoved them aside. i know cressida thinks they're good movies and i know a lot of httyd book fans also like them. but i just... i cannot get over how much they changed and how they missed so much and ignored the books. also they got rid of camicazi so hiccup could have a love interest and that is unforgivable to me.

if you disagree, that is a-okay. we're all entitled to our own opinions. i just ask that you, perhaps, try the books out. give them a chance. bc they're amazing works of art and also just like. don't yell at people who don't like the movies? whether it's bc they prefer the books or just aren't into that kind of movie. and just remember that dreamworks didn't come up with the story; cressida cowell did.

#corey talks:)#this has been in my drafts forever but i saw something that made me have feelings and so i finished it and here take this iuygfcvghuij #i justgod the books are SO GOOD and barely anyone knows theyexist #and i think that's what makes me the kost upset #or some [people chose to ignore they exist or don't give them a chance bc... i don't even know why. ppl are just so quick to dismiss them #the books are so important to me (literally got a httyd book tattoo) and i get most book fans also like the movies #but it sucks bc i can't go through the httyd tag without being bombarded with movie stuff #i'll even look up 'httyd books' and half of it is still about the movies.#i'll look up snotface snotlout and only finds movie stuff even tho ig they changed his last name in the movies???#i'll look up camicazi and find it filled with astr*d. WHAT.#i'll look u toothless and only see the freaking nightfury. not the original.#like god movie enjoyers at least tag correctly. i get you want ppl to see your posts but the more i see movie stuff in the book tag the mor #i hate the movies lol like the movies are so much more popular than the books let us have our tags okay #sorry if any of this sounds bitter also i hope it doesn't sound like i want to argue or fight #this is just my opinion and i have feelings and i just want ppl to know there are books #also i am not shaming anyone who likes the movies like i already said you do you boo just don't come at me for doing me #bc yes that has happened to me multiple times :) which is one reason why i get so upset :)#i just personally cannot separate the two. i know some ppl can and i'm glad! but i can't and that's okay too #httyd #httyd books

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serpentface · 6 months ago

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Do you conlang? I was wondering if you had naming languages (or possibly even more developed ones) for pulling the words you use. I tried to search your blog but didn't find anything, wouldn't be surprised if the feature is just busted tho. Your worldbuilding is wonderful and I particularly enjoy the anthropological and linguistic elements.

Ok the thing is I had kind of decided I was not going to do any conlanging because I don't feel like I'm equipped to do a good job of it, like was fully like "I'm just going to do JUST enough that it doesn't fail an immediate sniff test and is more thoughtful than just keysmashing and putting in vowels". And then have kinda been conlanging anyway (though not to a very deep and serious extent. I maybe have like....an above average comprehension of how language construction works via willingness to research, but that's not saying much, also I can never remember the meanings of most linguistic terms like 'frictives' or etc off the top of my head. I'm just kinda raw dogging it with a vague conceptualization of what these things mean)

I do at least have a naming language for Wardi (and more basic rules for other established languages) but the rudimentary forms of it were devised with methods much shakier and less linguistically viable than even the most basic naming language schemes, and I only went back over it LONG after I had already made a bunch of words so there's some inconsistencies with consonant presence and usage. (This can at least be justified because it IS a language that would have a lot of loanwords and would be heavily influenced by other language groups- Burri being by far the most significant, Highland-Finnic and Yuroma-Lowlands also being large contributors)

The 'method' I used was:

-Skip basic construction elements and fully move into devising necessary name words, with at least a Vibe of what consonants are going to be common and how pronunciation works -Identify some roots out of the established words and their meanings. Establish an ongoing glossary of known roots/words. -Construct new words based in root words, or as obvious extensions/variants of established words. -Get really involved in how the literal meanings of some words might not translate properly to english, mostly use this to produce a glossary of in-universe slang. -Realize that I probably should have at least some very basic internal consistency at this point. -Google search tutorials on writing a naming language. -Reverse engineer a naming language out of established words, and ascribe all remaining inconsistencies to being loanwords or just the mysteries of life or whatever.

I do at least have some strongly established pronunciation rules and a sense of broad regional dialect/accents.

-'ai' words are almost always pronounced with a long 'aye' sound.

-There is no 'Z' or 'X' sound, a Wardi speaker pronouncing 'zebra' would go for 'tsee-brah', and would attempt 'xylophone' as 'ssye-lohp-hon'

-'V' sounds are nearly absent and occur only in loanwords, and tend to be pronounced with a 'W' sound. 'Virsum' is a Highland word (pronounced 'veer-soom') denoting ancestry, a Wardi speaker would go 'weer-sum'.

-'Ch' spellings almost always imply a soft 'chuh' sound when appearing after an E, I, or O (pelatoche= pel-ah-toh-chey), but a hard 'kh' sound after an A or U (odomache= oh-doh-mah-khe). When at the start of a word, it's usually a soft 'ch' unless followed by an 'i' sound (chin (dog) is pronounced with a hard K 'khiin', cholem (salt) is pronounced with a soft Ch 'cho-lehm')

-Western Wardin has strong Burri cultural and linguistic influence, and a distinct accent- one of the most pronounced differences is use of the ñ sound in 'nn' words. The western city of Ephennos is pronounced 'ey-fey-nyos' by most residents, the southeastern city of Erubinnos is pronounced 'eh-roo-been-nos' by most residents. Palo's surname 'Apolynnon' is pronounced 'A-puh-lee-nyon' in the Burri and western Wardi dialects (which is the 'proper' pronunciation, given that it's a Kos name), but will generally be spoken as 'Ah-poh-leen-non' in the south and east.

-R's are rolled in Highland-Finnic words. Rolling R's is common in far northern rural Wardi dialects but no others. Most urban Wardi speakers consider rolling R's sort of a hick thing, and often think it sounds stupid or at least uneducated. (Brakul's name should be pronounced with a brief rolled 'r', short 'ah' and long 'uul', but is generally being pronounced by his south-southeastern compatriots with a long unrolled 'Brah' sound).

Anyway not really a sturdy construction that will hold up to the scrutiny of someone well equipped for linguistics but not pure bullshit either.