#LOL this is a fun screencap. had a lot of fun drawing this for once

[marsbotz]

ONE LAST SWING FOR THE ROAD!!

original screeeeenshot :]

[brinkle-brackle]

Thank yall so much @mjf-af @cheriboms and @alex-a-fans for tagging me!!! This is gonna be a fun one :D

This year:

1. How many times would you guess you watched the first Back to the Future movie?

I think around twice!! Once in a hotel room and once at a friend's house for labor day, plus the last 7-ish minutes when we found it on TV in another hotel room over Thanksgiving break :D

2. Did you get any sweet bttf merch? If so, what!

YESSS I DID!!!!! My dad gave me a Hot Wheels DeLorean from the third movie for Christmas, and my bf gave me a Doc and Einstein funko pop that I'd been losing my mind over 😭 those off the top of my head, I'm sure I bought myself some other things that just aren't coming to mind lol

3. How many cans of Pepsi Free did you chug this year?

I don't think any,, I'm more of a regular pepsi enjoyer myself

4. What was your favorite bttf fanfic you read this year?

In all honesty I didn't read much fanfic this year, but it was always a pleasure to read @bg-sparrow's mcflyjuly and doctober drabbles!

5. A favorite bttf fanart you saw this year? (please give us a link, not a screencap/repost!)

Ohh jeez I cannot choose just one so here are...

^^ this one from @cineshemp, the colors and lighting of this piece are so pretty (and it's true to life too!! I live a few hours away from the actual mall where they filmed and the sunset there looks so similar to this), and both Marty's pose and expression are so on point it's crazy. Like the cheeky little half-grin?? That's him. That's his spitting image. That's so him that's my Marty McFly <33

^^ this one from @fiddlstyx, I love this one because 1) just fiddl's art style in general is so cute, and 2) because this is so true to the scene! Fiddl nailed Marty's spooked expression, and the hand vibrates my brain so good. Both the shape of the hand (I struggle so hard with drawing hands lmao) and also especially the transparent effect, which is hella impressive to me on its own but on top of that it's traditional art,,, I would've struggled so hard to achieve that effect on paper so this totally blew me away!!

^^ and finally this one from @cheriboms!! I absolutely loved the perspective and expression on this one, I adore how cartoony it is :D cheri is somehow always able to draw doc looking incredibly doc-like while simultaneously making him look entirely her own (same goes for Marty too) and it never ceases to amaze me. This fandom is filled with such incredibly talented people and I'm so lucky to be friends with them <33

^^ OH OH AND!! THIS MARTY THAT MY BESTIE @goldendoodlerlockerlove DREW ME FOR MY BIRTHDAY TODAY :))) THE SEROTONIN I GOT WHEN I OPENED MY PHONE TO SEE THIS SILLY GUY

6. Did you create any bttf art or fanfic? If you did, what one(s) are you proudest of?

I did!! I didn't draw or write a whole lot of bttf stuff this year, I only did a few small things but I'll link em anyway cause I'm still proud of em :)

^^ the one mcflyjuly prompt I had the time and energy to do!! I based this fic off of a few episodes of the 90s cartoon iteration of The Moomins. The episodes I based this off of are about a child who turns invisible because of her bad family life (Marty's circumstances in this fic aren't as severe, but he's still Going Theroux It™️). I wrote this a little angsty throughout but with some hurt/comfort at the end,, and I really love how it turned out :)

^^ and then this is I think the one piece of bttf fanart that I drew the whole year 😂 just a lil Marty I drew on a to-go cup during my work shift. I'm very proud of him tho I feel like he's very Marty-y :D

7. How many times were you late for school this year?

Uhh not very often!! I think I showed up a little late to maybe 3ish classes? Which isn't too bad haha

8. Did you watch any other movies/TV shows with BTTF actors in them?

Yep! I watched Clue (1985) for the first time which had Christopher Lloyd, then had one one of my friends watch Star Trek III: The Search For Spock with me which I actually forgot had Christopher Lloyd as the main villain 😂 my college friends and I also watched Over the Garden Wall twice in the fall (Elijah Wood voicing Wirt and Christopher Lloyd voicing the Woodsman), and then my family and I watched Elf on Christmas day which had Mary Steenburgen :)

9. Was there a memorable moment you heard a Huey Lewis song this year?

I don't think anything really groundbreaking, just a few times when I was in a store and one came on and I started jamming haha

10. How many times did you fall down this year?

Probably a lot but the only moment I can immediately recall was eating it hard on the residence hall stairway right after saying goodbye to my parents for the semester LMAO 😭

11. Did you get to see BTTF: The Musical? What was your experience like!

Sadly no, although I really want to 🥲 I still gotta look up the clip from the Thanksgiving day parade that I missed!

12. How many times did your mom retell the story of how she and your father met?

Mmm probably around 3-5? But it was never really the same retelling,, it was more like she just told me new details or stories about when they were dating. It's always really sweet :)

13. If you could describe your year in a BTTF quote, which one would it be?

"Ah, wait a minute, wait a minute Doc--" (this year moved WAY too fast lmao)

14. ⚡️LIGHTNING ROUND⚡️ Did you get to: go on any trains, skate on a skateboard, ride a horse, drive a DeLorean, run in the rain, go to a dance, hang up a clock, play the guitar, pull an all-nighter, read science fiction, or drive thru Burger King this year?

15. Your future is whatever you make it! So what are you going to make of this coming year?

I'm gonna try to make more of an effort in my classes, and I'm hoping to expand more upon a play I started writing for class last semester! It was initially just for the assignment but now I've gotten attached to the characters and I have a little lore down so who knows >:D

Gonna be honest I have no clue who to tag lmao. I feel like a lot of the people I know have probably been tagged already so! If anyone else sees this and wants to do it feel free to :D and thank you so much @mjf-af for making this game, I had a blast doing it!!

BTTF Year-End Tag Game!

This year:

How many times would you guess you watched the first back to the future movie?

Did you get any sweet bttf merch? If so, what!

How many cans of Pepsi Free did you chug this year?

What was a favorite bttf fanfic you read this year?

A favorite bttf fanart you saw this year? (please give us a link, not a screencap/repost!)

Did you create any bttf fanart or fanfic? If you did, what one(s) are you proudest of?

How many times were you late for school this year?

Did you watch any other movies/tv shows with BTTF actors in them?

Was there a memorable moment you heard a Huey Lewis song this year?

How many times did you fall down this year?

Did you get to see BTTF: The Musical? What was your experience like!

How many times did your mom retell the story of how she and your father met?

If you could describe your year in a BTTF quote, which one would it be?

⚡️LIGHTNING ROUND⚡️ Did you get to: go on any trains, skate on a skateboard, ride a horse, drive a Delorean, run in the rain, go to a dance, hang up a clock, play the guitar, pull an all-nighter, read science fiction, or drive thru Burger King this year?

Your future is whatever you make it! So what are you going to make of this coming year?

I tag: @agentmcfly24601 @moonlightandstarshimmer @brinkle-brackle @bg-sparrow @bttf-dork @mrfutureboy @pepsifox88 @tsukinikawatteus @itsthemorph @synthsays and anyone who would like to answer these questions! as always, no pressure!

[chibinoyume]

Creator meme

Thank you @indelibleevidence for the tag!

RULES: it’s time to love yourselves! choose your 5 favorite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc.) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought into the world in 2020. tag as many writers/artists/etc. as you want (fan or original) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome works <3

--

This made me realize once again how much Fandom helped me through the pandemic for a few months - browsing through my own tags there’s so much stuff I’d completely forgotten about!

1) “Jane Doe” - a 3 part comic series (especially the first one)

Post 5x10, where Jane has lost her memories because of the ZIP, and slowly bonds again with Kurt and the team. Originally it was meant to be a 4 to 5 part comic series, but I needed to get it done before the finale aired, and I ran out of time. Since I have the lines written down somewhere, I may write it as a fic at some point, albeit a very minimalist one (and it would count as canon divergent post 5x10), because it was meant to be a comic script.

Still, the first part of this comic took SO LONG and while I can still pick at things I could have done better, I’m proud of it anyway, especially because my specialty are chibi-like drawings. Cute is my cup of tea, serious is haaaard. 

2) “Ever After” - a bittersweet Jeller oneshot.

Technically there is a second chapter to this, but reads more as an epilogue, so this could be read as a standalone (and I don’t know if I’ll ever get to finishing that 2nd chapter! I’ll try, though).

I mostly wrote it for myself as a fix-it fic (sort of) after the series finale. While I stubbornly will stay in happy-ending camp, sometimes when I saw images of the sad-ending, that feeling of dread filled my gut. I had some ideas in my head to narratively justify what happened, including the odd dinner scene, so I rushed to write it out while the Muse kicked and screamed at me to do so.

So in the fic, it starts as Jane collapses to the ground, but not everything is rosy and magically fixed. Both Jane and Kurt have to deal with the aftermath of what happened, and be there for each other as they learn their new normal and start healing from it, in the way supportive partners do ♥

3) Nightmares - a hurt/comfort Jeller fanart.

Post 4x12, this is how I’d imagine things may go, at least sometimes. Jane almost died (again), and even though she is now fine, has her memories and is no longer poisoned, losing her is still Kurt’s biggest fear, and he has nightmares about it in the following days or weeks. Not all the time, but when they show, it hits hard. She’d always try to reassure him as best she can, whispering words of comfort as he mumbles incoherently and apologizes for what could have been.

While some details about it still bug me (why am I like this) I still like this drawing a lot. One of the many scenes of Jeller in bed that are in my headcanon, if only finding good references for Jane’s tattoos (other than her arms) wasn’t such a hassle, I swear I’d have done so many more.

4) Honest screencaps: one & two (I couldn’t choose) 

I just had to lol when I was rewatching season 1 earlier in the year and screencapping things for drawing reference and because of reasons, some facial expressions where just too good not to caption. The ridiculous lines worked even better as a screencap-comic rather than an actual comic, imo.

It’s so much fun.

5) Too tired for subtlety - a silly Jeller comic.

Early season 5, Kurt is still very much a workaholic, even in the bunker. But this time, Jane is not having it. Mwahaha. 

It took a while to find photos of the relevant tattoos, and even then I had to BS a good bunch of them because the images were too blurry to tell xD. I swear if they released an artbook I’d buy it in a second. They could use the same pictures they had in SIOC where Jane was standing up with all her tats, they blur out the necessary bits and have a map of ALL the tattoos, dammit! 

How am I supposed to draw Summer Jeller when drawing Jane in a bathing suit is gonna take 5 hours just to find references D:?

Bonus) :D this ridiculous video (feat Rich’s rescue)

Basically, expectations vs reality.

This tiny video took way more than I’d like to admit lol and it still looks so choppy. But it’s part of the charm, right? lol Even so, the idea wouldn’t leave me alone and I had to do it. And I feel honored and proud that Ennis saw it on instagram xD

***

Hmmm, trying to tag people Amy hasn’t tagged yet! @marv-el-spot @birdsaesthetic @mchellesvanity @whatshouldjustbeours @singinprincess 

Anyone else, feel free to do it! So much fun.

[mrfutureboy]

I would like to know when you started drawing and where your passion for fanart started 😊

Oh FUCK dude i did not see this i’m so fucking sorry this is so late 😭 damn you, tumblr, for not fucking notifying me!! Anyway buckle up this is gonna be much longer than you asked for <3

Honestly ive kinda been drawing all my life! I hope that doesnt sound dumb cuz obviously almost everyone drew pictures when they were kids, but i know that it’s been a consistent hobby for me since i was little. By the time i was in 3rd grade I was hoarding notebooks to draw in. Cuz that’s something fun about me: i had a real huge habit of drawing in things that werent sketchbooks. Through middle school and beyond I did buy/receive sketchbooks, but I started out with various kinds of notebooks. One I had from like 2nd grade was like a hardcover, stationary-type notebook that I drew cats in lol, and I have 2 velvet lisa frank notebooks from 3rd grade. In high school and college I had a really bad habit of drawing in the margins on my notes and on handouts the teacher/professor would give. Those classes where the prof just prints out all the notes beforehand and gives them to you to follow along? Oh man, I spent so many classes barely listening while I drew on them! I also used to draw on my physics homework and tests and sometimes I even got extra credit for them (thank you jeff :D). I actually have a folder of various drawings I’ve kept from that 8yr time period and a lot of them are on classwork 😂

Obviously, I’ve been doing a lot of digital art lately, which I’m sure is what u were more curious about rather than the shit about drawing on my homework. I got a surface pro as a graduation gift in 2016 bc prior to that i had a wacom tablet and a janky ass laptop, so the gift was kinda a 2-in-1: i can do schoolwork AND art easily! i like digital art a lot and honestly im still learning new things abt it every time i draw. I use Leonardo currently (i’ll skip that story) but I started out doing digital art on sketchfu WITHOUT the wacom tablet in maaaaybe 2012??? 2011??? does anyone on this site remember sketchfu? Honestly couldnt even tell u how i found that site hahah the internet was just full of wonders back in the day. RIP sketchfu. Once i got the tablet tho some time later i used sketchfu still (i think) but also gimp and krita i believe.

Oh i suppose I should mention that i took art all four years of highschool and also minored in it in college! So it’s something i did academically as well as for fun. I keep thinking about going to art school for realsies but idk. I’m already $$$ in debt from my first degree i dont feel like adding to that 😅😓

Ok now for the second part of your question: I’ve also pretty much always done fan art! Ive never really been one for OC’s, EXCEPT for the self-insert superhero double life “comics” i wrote about a poodle named Sassy when i was in third grade. And then the knock off “comics” i wrote at a later time which honestly it was weird that i did a knock off of my own thing rather than just adding them to the original or making it a spin off with at least one of the og characters. Cuz it wasnt a spin off!! But anyway there wasnt really much to any of these characters; i just needed vessels to get my weird ideas out.

So anyway yeah most of what ive ever drawn has been fan art or self portraits, because its just easier for me to take characters that already exist and bend them to my will (artistically). Well excluding art assignments in school i guess because i would usually have to draw something specific and therefore not something self indulgent. But yeah ive drawn for lots of fandoms like the earliest i remember is warrior cats. Then theres things like pokemon and warriors and random other books i read thru middle school (i used to read a LOT but now im practically illiterate); spn, sherlock, and marvel through high school; and then marvel and bttf thru the end of hs and beyond. Idk i also have always loved looking at other peoples fan art and so im like “shit i wanna do that too!”. Tho i will say marvel was my biggest fandom and the one i had the longest interest in, so that was probably where the passion REALLY came from cuz I was drawing marvel stuff for such a long time (tho not posting shdjsk u have to trust me), but ive been doing fan art forever :)

(Of course, a lot of the fan art i was making prior to recently was drawn in lined notebooks or on homework sheets or what have you, and I wasn’t posting really any of it, but i was still making it and a good chunk of it still exists. Oh i should also mention most of it was with pencils or ballpoint pens like i wasnt doing anything too fancy. There was some digital art in the highschool-college time frame but it also really wasnt…much. Honestly i barely posted any of it here but I know some of it’s on deviantart)

I cant pinpoint the exact time I started getting more “serious” about my art in general, but i know the first pandemic lockdown gave me more free time and i was less stressed about schoolwork so i just kinda had a good outlet. (Tho i will say that prior, I had been in a life drawing club for a short while, and i had also been working on a personal sketchbook project that had me pretty ~inspired~ to do art. Also i watched twin peaks around this time and it inspired a lot of Feelings and i was making funky collages and other art pieced that were sometimes related to that. Some of those are on deviantart)

Honestly I think the Big thing with my digital art was coincidentally getting back into BTTF the summer of the 35th anniversary bc the fandom here was THRIVING and i was like “oh shit wait i want to contribute!” But as i kept drawing i kept wanting to improve and that leads us to right now where im constantly trying new things (whether subtle or obvious) and challenging myself to do full body drawings with different poses, and doing screencap redraws and what have you for various reasons (backgrounds, proportions, pose, etc)

So yeah :) Basically I’ve been doing fan art forever (I didnt even get into all the mediums ive tried but that’s another conversation bc this is already so long and convoluted) and it’s kinda coincidental that ive suddenly really gotten back into it and have improved dramatically in such a short time. Thank you so much @rovermcfly for the ask and again im really sorry you had to wait so long for a response! Stupid tumblr

[innenofutari]

On Goro Akechi’s morals and forgiveness (character analysis, but also just a very rambly post)

Akechi is… a very interesting character, I have no doubt about this. Also my favorite of course, if you hadn’t figured that out yet by this giant text you’re about to read (sorry). I have a lot I want to talk about in regards to him since he is so intriguing and we actually don’t have that much info about how his thought process works so it leaves a lot of room for speculation.

In any case, in this meta in specific I’m going to be talking about Akechi’s...morality(?), forgiveness and his relationship with regret. I’m not sure if that’s the best word to define this but I’ll roll with it for now. I’ll try to be fair and talk about things as I personally see them, it’s totally fine if you don’t share my views! Now, onto the actual meta.

Starting off, as people are obviously aware, Akechi is a morally gray character, a darker shade of, but he’s a sympathetic and tragic character nonetheless. That much is undeniable, he was written to be sympathetic, even if I’d argue Atlus did a pretty poor job of it in Vanilla (he was still my favorite ever since then though lol) but he’s reached his true potential in Royal, which makes me immensely happy to see. I get so unbelievably happy whenever I see people saying Royal changed their perception of him and started to like him more! But even then, there are a lot of people who just can’t forgive him for what he did, and that’s only natural. I personally think that, if you don’t try to sympathize with Akechi and truly, truly try to understand his mind and history, you’re doing him a huge disservice. But, forgiveness is something that everyone is free to think and decide if he deserves it or not. In Akechi’s case, I feel like forgiveness is something much more personal to the player, and this shows between the Phantom Thieves too.

There is a visual novel I hold very close to my heart called Umineko no Naku Koro Ni (which I’ll be quoting relentlessly throughout this entire post) that illustrates what I think better than I could put into words, so I’ll be quoting that scene with a few tweaks for better context:

“You said you understood the culprit’s motive.”

“...Yes.”

“Is that motive… a satisfying explanation for why they’d [commit murder]?!”

“Who knows. That’s for you to decide. Even if I say it’s satisfying, that doesn’t mean it will satisfy you. …You have to decide that for yourself.”

I really like this. It reminds me a lot of Akechi’s situation. I firmly believe that this has no “objective”, “most correct” answer to, just your personal feelings, which are the most important. I, as a player, do forgive Akechi, I want him to have a happy ending, another chance at life, manage to live happily with Akira and have some fun for once. That’s what “forgiveness” means to me in this situation, but while some people may empathize with Akechi, they still can’t forgive him. They think he should stay forever in jail or die since he cannot be redeemed in any way in their eyes. Where do I wanna go with this endless blabbering you ask, and I respond, I just want to try and see Akechi’s actions through two different lenses.

Well, I personally don’t like downplaying the crimes he committed and dumbing it down to “he was being manipulated” because, even if this is not false, it is not entirely correct either. Akechi is so fun to speculate about because he’s a character who is always clashing against himself in various ways as if he was in a constant state of internal turmoil, and this is not very different.

Akechi himself made the choice to go to Shido. It is extremely unlikely that he didn’t know he was going to be using his new powers for murder. He may have been very young, but despite the fact that he was a child forced to mature prematurely, he knew exactly which type of person Shido was. When he walked into that deal he was aware of the consequences and had fully made peace with the fact that he’d be taking another person’s life. Now, I’m not saying that Shido never manipulated him because he did, but not with that particular choice. 

This alone tells plenty about Akechi’s morals. I believe that Akechi indeed has some level of empathy for other people, but I sincerely doubt he feels especially bad about the Okumura-like people he had to kill. He might feel bad for the family of the victims or just feel nauseated with himself, however, he doesn’t regret a thing. As if he had grown numb to it. ...Until a certain point, that is, but I’ll talk about that later.

I would also like to elaborate further on Akechi’s continuous conflict with himself, and this particular piece of Maruki’s confidant immediately reminded me of this:

He’s talking about Akira here, but isn’t it interesting to note that Akechi’s internalized and externalized realities are, in contrast to Akira’s, the farthest they could possibly be from each other? His sense of justice, childlike desire to be loved and seen as a hero, in contrast to the cold-blooded murderer he had become? It’s like there are two people fighting it out inside of Akechi’s brain (lol) which must cause him a lot of distress. I don’t believe that Robin Hood is a ruse or that his Detective Prince façade is entirely fake. The way I see it, they are his ideal, which he strayed so far away from he lost grasp of who he himself is.

In my opinion, Akechi has never cared about fame the slightest bit, he used all of that as an opportunity to act out the person he wished he was, just and virtuous, while still being the feral murderer and bloodstained person he is today. These are two integral parts of him that he has never known how to reconcile. It’s interesting to note that in the third semester he was the one who since the beginning advocated firmly to return to the harsh reality but he had spent the entire game living in the comforting “detective prince” dream he made for himself until the engine room scene happened. 

With the third semester context, the engine room becomes so interesting because that scene is akin to Sumire finding out she’s not Kasumi. It’s a cold bucket of water thrown straight to Akechi’s face and telling him to wake up from this lie he made to comfort himself and face reality: he is no hero. Despite the fact that he is, too, a victim, he is simultaneously a murderer who perpetuated with the cycle of his father’s aggressions and he cannot escape that fact. Worse, he was being manipulated all along and his revenge plan and arguably his only reason to live AND justification for his actions was completely crushed.

Once again, this Umineko scene illustrates what I think Akechi’s situation up until that point was like:

Akechi rationalized every awful, inexcusable thing he did as, “It’s for my revenge’s sake” and ran with it. He was incredibly blinded by his hate and ignored the weight of the consequences of his actions up until that point where everything came crashing down right in front of his eyes. There is no excuse and no justification for that.

However, Akechi was also abused himself. There is no excuse for what he did, but is getting back at the person who took everything from him so reprehensible a thought? Is wanting justice against someone who essentially ruined your life not understandable? Many people like to say “cool motive still murder” or things of the like, but I’m asking you again to put yourself in his shoes.

Yet AGAIN with a Umineko screencap:

I played this the other day and one of the first things I thought of was Akechi. A lot of people draw parallels between Akechi and Adachi, but that’s just so damn wrong and make me lose my hair so much and become completely bald because that couldn’t be farther from the truth and I’m gently asking you to reconsider. In the pic above, Adachi would fit the “homicidal maniac” mentioned to a T, and while Akechi is by absolutely no means free of guilt and much less a stellar person, his crimes were moved completely by his heart. 

For the people who use his choice to become Shido’s hitman to say Akechi does not deserve any kind of forgiveness and that he’s a murderous maniac, I ask you to at least think of what state of mind he was at that moment. Think very hard about it, imagine how completely bleak life must have looked like then, to the point that he risked everything on murder.

This is nothing more than my speculation, but I believe Akechi’s thought process at that moment was something along the lines of, “I have nothing to lose since my (current) life is completely meaningless". It was as if he had reached such a numb state he chose to forgo all his morals and humanity in pursuit of at least one thing that would give his life meaning, that being his hate for Shido, which I also think was the only emotion he ever truly understood well ever since his mom passed.

Since Akechi is all about conflicting emotions though, I would also like to remind you how vulnerable Akechi really is to any kind of affection. His “childlikeness” that Robin Hood represents was, by all accounts, still there. Akechi has a desperate need to be loved while simultaneously putting up walls and wearing masks, making it extremely difficult to have any kind of meaningful relationship. This is something that Shido thoroughly takes advantage of, too.

That’s also why one of his lines to Akira hit so much harder for me, following this reasoning. “If only we had met a few years earlier,” expresses many emotions at once. If Akechi had known something other than misery and hatred during that period of his life he would not have latched so thoroughly to that revenge plan. Akechi simply had nothing to lose, since he had nothing at all.

I mentioned earlier that Akechi doesn’t regret a thing, which I still think it’s true. Before he had met Akira, he truly did not regret a thing, but meeting Akira caused him a lot of strife because not only Akira is a person whose whole existence flaunts everything Akechi could have had if he hadn’t fallen into fate’s trap, but Akechi also experiences happiness through his connection with Akira. Hanging out and talking to him truly makes him happy, and it’s something more genuine than he’s ever known. Yet, it’s too late, because his choices were already set in stone and he had already pulled the trigger with no way to take any of the bullets back.

That’s why Akechi is so confusing, so controversial and sometimes uncomfortable to think about. There is no clear line between good or bad, he just is something in the middle. Akechi is both a person who ruined a lot of people’s lives with no regard whatsoever to the consequences but also a victim rebelling and retaliating against the person who took everything from him and made his life a living hell. That’s why it’s so hard for not only some players to form opinions about him but also downright uncomfortable for the Phantom Thieves to think about. There is no objectively best answer for what he deserves. It just doesn’t exist. Should he spend the rest of his life in jail, or dead, because his crimes were inexcusable? Or should he be given another chance at life to learn to be happy? It’s entirely subjective, and that’s why he’s so great to think or discuss about. 

Aaand that’s it, I’m grateful you read so far, hope I didn’t piss anyone off, also not gonna pretend this wasn’t very self indulgent because of the amount of times I quoted Umineko in it. Anyways, thank you!

SIDE NOTE: I didn’t write this recently, it had been sitting on my drafts for some months now and I found it again today and decided to just release it into the wild because why not? I think this was meant to be much longer than it is and to elaborate more eloquently on a lot of points I brought up (like the PT with Akechi) but alas, I lost the train of thought and so it Perished.

[kirby-the-gorb]

reply roundup!

highlights for the past couple weeks:

@shegosato wrote another image description [here], for mining kirby, and @pranque wrote an image description for kirby at his computer [here]! thank you both! <3 all you folks who’ve so kindly contributed your time to add image descriptions since I’m not currently able to are honestly super important and appreciated.

there are also new stickers! etsy link is [here].

on the [last roundup]:

@spageddie28 said: THE GORB NOTICED ME 😳😳🥺🥺���💖 #all praise the gorb

@askluckyandfriends said: I got noticed too :D

yes!!! that’s why I do these roundups, I love seeing all the fun tags and replies everyone leaves for me, and this way I get to acknowledge them!

@your-local-neighbourhood-kat​ said: The hug would make both of us feel better 🥺🥺🥺

even though he’s got little arms I bet kirby is the best at hugging. (I hope whatever’s on your mind eases soon.)

@shegosato​ said: i love ur kirbys they deserve an id <3 hope ur year's been good so far op!

aww, thank you! I know writing good image descriptions takes genuine effort (which is why I don’t do it myself like I should, I’m sorry TnT ) and deserves sincere recognition at the very least! (I’d love to just properly compensate someone to caption all of them as they go up someday, but it will take a while to afford. I will be sure to put out a call for interested parties once I get there!)

on [keyboard]:

@zer0cracy​ said: Freddy Mer-kirby

ohhh what a good pun! he’s even got the sparkles to match lol

also to the person who tagged it metal gear, I see you. I appreciate you.

on [train]:

@papioligoat​ said: Look at this gorb go. Lad vibin.

he’s where he Belongs.

@rinnyhere​ said: I want to ride an endless train and just sleep. tired of thoughts.

ohh that sounds so peaceful. just ride the train forever. highest quality naps.

on [miner]:

@macro-microcosm​ said: I also lost my part-time work haha. please donate to this artist! they’re so delightful and make such lovely work. they’re at this every. single. day.

aw that sucks! I hope things are at least relatively stable for now. (and thank you so much for your kind tags! I haven’t missed a day since I started in june 2018 :> )

@jupiterlandings​ said: he’s mining to get his webkinz crown of wonder

unfortunately I don’t know anything about webkinz so I can’t fully appreciate the joke but he’s clearly working very hard towards his goals and I support him!

@shegosato​ said: op thats a cute easter egg. also hope uve doing well! mayhaps a post abt commissions or donations will help?

I was very happy with myself when I came up with it lol, and I think that is a good idea! I already put out new stickers this month, but maybe I will finally figure out sticker commissions or just advertise kofi commissions at the same rate as the patreon tier.

on the [sticker poll]:

@liongerudothesilly​ said: I do not have Twitter, but I vote Fancy Dresses please! If you'll take a commented vote!

I just want to make sure you know your vote was seen and counted! (and I secretly wanted fancy dresses to win too lol, but even counting your vote and mine it still fell a little short. maybe I will just do it next time without asking! :v )

on [sweep]:

@aggron-rocks​ said: what a responsible orb

one does not become a gorb on virtue of cuteness alone. good orbs also help with chores when they can!

on [valentines stickers]:

@insertusername77​ said: These are so good. At the rate things are going, Kirby's gonna be my Valentine this year

I imagine kirby would love to be your valentine. :> (he may not be very reliable at giving you chocolate, but I think he’s pretty okay at making bouquets from supermarket flowers!)

@here-comes-de-custard​ said: im going to cry these are so cute

@osohey said: joy and love and happyness and joy

@leolithe​ said: !!!!!!!!!!!!!! great arts!

I don’t always have anything to say in reply so they don’t always end up in the roundups but I see all the tags people leave and I always love tags like these, I love it when my art can make people happy <3

@legendarykerfuffle said: all i need for valentines is kirb

honestly same lol, my partner knows this and often manages to find cute little kirby plushes to give me :v

on [sumikko]:

@virovac said: Decided to look up Summikko Gurashi [screencap of character description for “penguin?” that says “am I even a penguin? penguin has no confidence. in the past, there might have been a plate on penguin’s head...”]

penguin is just like that! (they were a kappa rather than a regular penguin, which is why they are green and like cucumbers a lot. that’s what the plate thing means.)

@askluckyandfriends said: Aww I hope your mom has a great birthday!

she told me she had a nice day! (and also bragged about my art to her friends at the office lol)

on [stamps]:

@virovac said: Kirby says support your post office!

yes!!! we love the post office!

@tinybandee said: delicately places him in the mailbox, happy trails kiddo

if I wasn’t already tired for today I would love to draw him peering out of the mailbox back at you. that would be very cute. instead we will imagine it together.

from the ask box:

anonymous said: It's fine! Don't push yourself, you can't help it not feeling too great *showers you with support*

(this was sent when I posted about delaying stickers for a day) thank you so much! this genuinely did make me feel better about taking longer than I expected to get them ready <3

[rockmiyabideusexmachina]

2019 Megaman Valentine’s Day (Talent) Contest Results!

Part two of results day, even though I always label the Talent category as Cat. 1, these results are in reverse. Oh well.  Again, raffle prize winners will be contained in both posts, so keep an eye out after my commentary on your art. Not all raffle prize winner are contained in this post. I’ll be contacting all winners soon enough, so sit tight!

To see the Humor category results, please head to THIS POST.

Will any of our Iron Chef contestants be able to create an artsy meal with these ingredients?:

To find out, along with your Talent category winners and full gallery of entries, click here after the break:

Category 1 (Talent) - The Way To A Mega Man’s Heart Is Through His Stomach

This category had the larger amount of participants, and was honestly a lot harder to judge. I really was going back and forth on where to place people, because I love so much about all of them! Your delicious culinary character combos were all delectable in their own right, whether they were actually edible pieces of art or not. I did leave this category up to interpretation a bit more, despite the initial description wording it as a food-themed pinup. As long as it contained some sort of food with a character, it technically fit the theme. 

Thank you once again to all who participated. You all make holding these events fun year after year!

I know imgbox gallery gave people some issues before, so as always, let me know if images or links appear broken. Crossing my fingers this works smoothly this year! XD

After each entrant’s name, there will be a link in the character description to the entry, too, just in case the external inserted images don’t load for you.

[Full Talent Gallery]

1.) @prar-draws​ - Zero and Ciel

While most entries focused on sugary sweets, such as pastries or candies, prar thought outside of the box just enough to stand out against the rest. Taking Zero and Ciel’s already long hair and turning it into ramen and soba noodles, the pair are relaxing together in an overflowing hot tub bowl of their pasta-y strands, broth, veggies and then some, while they enjoy their own bowls of noodles. Despite being heavily layered in clothing, *warning* this is one steamy, saucy pic! XD

*For coming in 1st (in back-to-back years, no doubt), prar has won $100 via Paypal, or a prize of their choice up to that value.*

2.) @digitallyfanged​ - Tron Bonne and Megaman Volnutt

Ever the tease, Tabby’s Tron is wooing Volnutt with a sugary-sweet sensory overload at the hands of both her, and her Servbots. Or maybe at the head, too, based on that 2-tier strawberry cake that doubles as a hat on happy Servbot. While including so many treats were definitely eye candy in this piece, so too is Tron in that dress, causing Volnutt to deeply blush. 

The soft glow of the lighter transparency background, along with the usual shine of your lighting on the pair in the foreground, help them stand out. Even if my mouth is watering more at all the Servbot’s treats. Hahaha.

*For coming in 2nd, Tabby has won $50 via Paypal, or a prize of their choice up to that value.*

3.) @irischroma​ - Nana

Nana is ready to split her banana split sundae with you. I see what you did there. Your mission is to follow her every command as she feeds you, in her bonus rpg/sim screencap. I really liked the use of multiple halftones to accent the shading on both her and the background of the full image. The background itself is really cool, to incorporate the ice cream mounds, syrup and sprinkles, which also actually align nicely with the sprinkles on her apron. Truly adorbs.

*For coming in 3rd, Iris has won $25 via Paypal, or a prize of their choice up to that value*

And the remaining wonderful entries, in alphabetical order by alias:

@bracedshark​ - Marino

The first entry to embrace food-themed clothing, Marino is the living embodiment of the chocolate peppermint sundae she is holding. I love mint chocolate chip ice cream, so Marino’s green hair and clothing accents fit that ice cream color perfectly. Also while tying in your traditional peppermints as accessories on her, as well as the sort of melty pinkish mascara dripping down the side of her cheeks. 

*Bracedshark is the winner of Raffle Prize #1 - The cel of Duo*

@drewblossom​ - Ice Man and Roll

Another great use of food-styled clothing, Drew made a precious cinnamon roll dress for Roll, and an ice cream cone vest with a more whipped topping trim for Ice Man. Ice’s hair also adds to that whipped cream feel, yet despite dancing around, does a good job keeping that cherry from falling off the top of his head. XD This is a super cute scene, and has even better apparel style. 

*Drew is also the winner of Raffle Prize #4 - The Tamashii Nations Zero figure and Zero emblem wristband*

@hyperbole1729​ - Tundra Man, Top Man, Snow Robbit and Eye Ice

The first of two yummy cookie entries, which I’ll assume were baked around the same time, feature both real world treats, and 2D ones. I give Hyperbole big props for making the Snow Robbit and Eye Ice enemies into cookie shape form. They look super delicious, and I’m a guy who loves cookies with tons of frosting. XD Taking the pic on a wintry snowflake plate makes them stand out even more, so I totally loved your creativity with that. 

That baking didn’t only take place in Hyperbole’s kitchen, as Tundra and Top also spent the day making the same treats. I think their cookie cutter shapes have given me a clue to how you made yours. LOL Very cute!

*Hyperbole is the winner of Raffle Prize #3 - The Zero plush and framed X 3D sprite art*

@larytello​ - Zero and Ciel

Strawberry cake seemed to be the most popular choice of romantic treats, and here lary has Zero feeding Ciel her slice. Your digital airbrush shading has really improved, and it shows in this piece! It really gives a nice depth and definition to their arms and legs, not to mention the folds in Ciel’s dress, or the shine off of their helmets. Even with the heavily pink background, with all the hearts, they both still stand out nicely against it, despite their color schemes. Super cute!

@papillonthepirate​ - Roll.EXE

Our other real world food entry is a sugar frosted Roll.EXE cookie, complete with rosy cheek sprinkles and lemon-flavored ribbon candy antennae attached to her. Again, like Hyperbole’s submission, Papillon had the perfect heart decal plate design to help accentuate her creation, along with the doily it’s sitting on. I’m sure she was delicious! I appreciate the extra creativity taking the theme of the contest literally and making an actual tasty Mega Man character treat!

@peach35​ - X and Zero

A very cute scene of X and Zero sharing desert and a drink with swirly-shape sippy straws at a quaint little bistro off the shores of Dopple Town. And I’d imagine the pair of strawberries left snuggling on the table also sort of symbolize the hunter couple cuddling up after their cake and conversation, too. Pardon the pun, but I like the slice of life feel to the scene, that sort of gives it this Norman Rockwell-styled feel. The detail on your strawberries and lemon slices really turned out quite great; they look pretty real!

SockMonkii - Ashe

Ashe is so busy devouring that chocolate/strawberry filled cake slice, I don’t know if she fully realizes how much she has missed on her face. XD In fact, I think she’s likely eyeing the rest of the whole cake as the booty she’s after, rather than of any admirer. LOL The ribbon and bow background, along with all the hearts, help emphasize the cake as a romantic gift. Again, I see a lot of growth and improvement in your art style after a year’s time, and I think this pic turned out great!

@star-crossed-swords​ - Blues and Tempo

While definitely a sweet and romantic drawing, this entry felt like it fit in more with last year’s humor category theme, Beauty and the Beastman.EXE, that I almost wondered if you got mixed up with an older contest post. ^^; So I decided to go with the assumption that Quake Woman/Tempo had something delicious leftover on her hand that Blues was kissing off of her, to fit it within the content requirements. :D Their formalwear looks very nice on both of them. I like the sparkles on her dress coordinating with the starry sky outside the window. 

SubZeroIceSkater - Tundra Man

I totally read that tagline in Tundra Man’s voice. And the more bittersweet, the more pure chocolate, so it sounds good to me! Containing most of his stage enemies in cacao form, this box of chocolates is like a your chances at an extra life in item roulette. You never know what you’re gonna get. That’s sort of reverse Forrest Gump logic...right? I love how the box is designed just like his helmet’s rupee with icicles protruding, along with all the beautiful sparkling snowflakes and hearts in the background. I want a box, badly!

[maiji]

Makai Unification Tournament matchups (with special focus on Hokushin and Kirin)

As we all know, Togashi didn't depict like 90% of the fights in the Makai Unification Tournament. But he actually went to the trouble of MAPPING OUT THE ENTIRE TOURNAMENT BRACKET and making up names for every fighter. This means that if you pick some key people and follow them, you can see some really intriguing matchups (and also get names for your fics if you want hahaha). Which was possibly the intent - get readers all riled up and then not show anything lmao.

For fun, let’s walk through the tournament from the perspective of two powerful characters the series doesn’t really focus on - Hokushin and Kirin! OK I admit I just want to because I’m writing them a lot lmao

The handy tournament bracket chart thing

I was flipping through vol 19 and was reminded that many many years ago my sister had made these pencil notations on the two page spread of the tournament bracket. Basically she marked off where all the important people were, which is really helpful when you’re just staring at a sea of names. I've updated and transferred the notations to screencaps of the pages from MangaRock so you can see them too and be able to read them in English. A few names are rendered somewhat differently from what I’m used to, the most obvious being Rinku as Link and Kirin as Kylin. I’ve also noted a few bonus people below. Many thanks to my sis for doing most of the original legwork when we were kids lol

Blocks A and B

=^w^= Nekobaba appears in the anime as Nekotama, the size changing cat with the extra long claws.

LOL Zakuro is that loser who ran his mouth off in front of Yusuke and Hokushin about how how he was gonna take everyone down and plunge the Demon World into darkness, but then lost his first match. In the anime he also shows up with the gang on patrol in Mukuro’s territory.

Blocks C and D

(heart) Sasuga is the monkey-like demon girl Rinku falls in love with.

Also, I just have to say - DAMN, TOUYA, YOU LUCKY. He’s surrounded by (apparent) nobodies!! hahahahha. Except in the anime they changed it so he fought Kujo and gets his ass kicked. Oh well.

Hokushin and Kirin’s rounds

Here are the two surviving original generals of Mukuro and Raizen, two pretty big shots in the Demon World prior to this whole mess. Let’s see how they fared. (Ignore the stuff the announcer is saying in the images above about their block numbers, it’s irrelevant to the matchups below. These block numbers were for the mass eliminations during the prelims so that they could weed out tons of fighters at once. Both Kirin and Hokushin had to wipe out all opponents in their block in order to make it to the actual tournament bracket.)

Hokushin’s rounds

Round 1: Hokushin's first match is somebody named Himuro. Obviously my noodle husband kicks the ass of this random nobody with elegance and grace and moves on to Round 2.

Round 2: Here he meets Shishiwakamaru. Unsurprisingly, I'm of the opinion that Shishi is no match for him. But don't take my biased word for it - the animation team agreed. This matchup is actually depicted in the anime with Hokushin as the victor. (I'm not all that satisfied with how they did it, but again, they were busy plugging a lot of other gaps left by Togashi so I understand lol.) Yusuke's amazing nanny moves on to Round 3.

Round 3: Where he meets Raizen’s old beau Kokou and gets utterly massacred. I like to think he delays the inevitable with some ingenuity that forces her to put in a bit of effort to utterly massacre him. We know for a fact Kokou is the victor of this round because in the manga, Yusuke tells Kuwabara that Yomi was beaten by Kokou in Round 4, which you can see is the very next fight. In the anime, this conversation doesn't happen, so it was super funny to me when I watched the English dub for the first time and saw Kurama telling Yusuke (paraphrased) "Yomi lost to someone he had no business losing to" WELL EXCUSE ME ENGLISH DUB KURAMA, KOKOU COULD KICK YOUR ASS TOO. Anyways, this would've been a cool fight to watch, I think anyways.

Kirin’s rounds

Round 1: Some other rando named Nobusama 110% guaranteed bites the dust against Mukuro's badass general.

Round 2: This round’s interesting because, just like Hokushin, Togashi gives him a potential round 2 pairing with one of Yusuke’s friends - Jin. As much as I love Jin, I'd bet on Kirin just thoroughly mowing him down. In the anime, this never happens because Jin fights Souketsu (whom I always remember as “Raizen’s friend with the ugly hat” because of what Shu says to him lmao), but in the manga Souketsu was actually in Block A. If they just wanted Jin to get wiped out by one of Raizen's pals, Denhou already appears in Block D - though perhaps the animation team agreed that Jin probably would not have gotten past Kirin and didn't want to come up with attacks for the latter lol. Similarly, maybe they just did not wanna draw Denhou being cool, poor Denhou. Souketsu has to appear during the timing of the Yomi VS Yusuke fight anyways, so if we’re just thinking about resource allocation for designing and getting voice actors and whatever it makes more sense. ANYWAYS. Our sexy demon sorcerer moves on to Round 3.

Round 3: Wuh woh, there's Denhou. Kirin was probably annihilated here. That said, from a generous writing perspective, if I had to pick any single person in the series who is not Yomi or Mukuro as having a reasonable rat's chance in hell against one of Raizen's old friends, I'd probably pick Kirin. It's still super unlikely and definitely a surprise upset (for us readers who are fully aware of how powerful Raizen's pals are supposed to be anyways), but not completely unrealistic. But actually it doesn't really matter, because even if Kirin somehow made it to Round 4,

Round 4: He would then fight Enki. Where he would be confirmed screwed. The end.

That was fun, kinda like a fantasy football pool or something!

[riisinaakka-draws]

Under the cut there are some thoughts on the process and ideas behind the drawing JOURNEY INTO THE DARK if you are interested :)

I thought it would be too big of a burden to mention all of this within the art post. This is also for my own archiving purposes (so I won’t forget what was involved! :D) and it’s always nice to see how things start and develop...

Long post ahead! (contains spoilers for the show)

COMMENTARY:

I continued this work bit by bit over a period of several months (I started this just when s4 started airing) and only finished it recently. A few hours then and then (whenever I felt like it or had time for this), but I can’t really say how much time it took all together. Occasionally there were weeks/months that I just forgot about it and was more focused on other things...

Most of the thoughts here are fleeting ideas during the process (how a thing X lead to thing Y) and some personal fun and not something I actually spend too much time on dwelling or planning (or researching lol). I have probably forgotten some already and some happened by accident and some I am just incabable of putting into understandable words.

None of these are any actual instructions (or limits) of “this is how it’s to be seen”. Art doesn’t have to be or even shouldn’t be explained in some cases, but I just wanted to document the process and open up the symbolism since there were a lot of (random) things involved.

It’s also fun to look back on things and how they evolved and what their connection to other things were.

You are free to have your own interpretations of course and I hope this additional post doesn’t ruin any of those :)

The initial idea and motifs:

Flint decends the steps from light to darkness and Miranda is standing behind him as an accomplice/orderer. Stepping stones get bloodier by every step and gold coins are glimmering on the path (Urca de Lima’s gold). Sword is drawn out for war and slaughter. Black water as in the opening credits + general darkness to represent the abyss. Reflection shows James when he was happy (him returning to Hamiltons) and how much he has changed compared to that (McGraw vs Flint). Sort of stage / antique/ greek tragedy(?) setting with marble columns, red curtains (like a myth, a monology or a story or something).

A white feather shining in the dark to show there’s always hope and another way out. I already explained this in another post, but here it is again:

Short answer: Silver (although some of you may not like it) Long answer: the feather is for “hope and an alternative for war” (the dove of peace..haha). Also remember the trap Flint laid in season 1? The feather and the logbook in his drawer -> leads to Silver’s capture later.

The feather is also a reference to the swan of Tuonela (in Finnish mythology the river of Tuonela separates the world of the living and the dead (compare Styx in Greek mythology I guess). Flint decents to the world of death (also represented here by the pale and dead-looking organic shapes of the opening sequence’s sculpture… thing).

Anyway, the feather is mainly about Silver: both how they end up meeting in the beginning (the trap, and then some new hope along the way and eventually some light in Flint’s miserable life) and what (who) also ends up being “the end of Captain Flint” (a tiny nod to the swan guarding the border between the living and the dead).

Visually I wanted something to shine in the darkness to remind there’s always hope and another way out. At one point it had an additional thin string leading to Thomas’ hand. You know, a connection to the memory (and to the reason of Flint’s revenge and war path and so on) but the idea didn’t work so well and felt too distracting so I left it (the string) out. And then the finale happened (!!!) and the reflection became also the future.. :D

a way out of the darkness… :)

There was also a post going around a long time ago about the empty space (the absence of Thomas) next to James and Miranda in some scenes, so I incorporated that in here, too. Unfortunately I cannot remember who did the post, so I cannot link it right now :| It was something about how some of the New World scenes were framed in a way that it looked like there was something missing (aka the third person of the trio).

Here’s the early drafts again so you don’t have to scroll back:

I didn’t like the first composition that much and continued it into another direction with similar elements and the main ideas.

The stepping stones changed to wooden planks: angrier zigzag lines (rage) and also the idea of “walk the plank” (except that you don’t know when and where the nightmare ends...)

I ditched the gold coin idea. The overal setting became more spacious and gloomier to emphasize the vastness of abyss and the smallness of people. The stage / arch became the staircase seen in Flint’s dreams.

The whole thing is sailing on a similar sculptural thing seen in the opening sequence which for some reason made me think about the floating theatre in the Moomins (when the Moomin valley is flooded in one dangerous midsummer. LMAO):

(*coughs* lots of water, a stage and some drama after a disaster...so..)

(At one point I was also thinking about Howl’s moving castle and how that too is a monstrous looking vessel travelling between worlds (well, opening doors) but how the moving castle itself is also composed of various other things... and how in the drawing Flint would be stepping out of the ride for a moment to do some dark deeds in one of these ‘worlds’ etc.)

Black Sails opening sequence - is there a term for that cool monstrosity?

Some other inspiration and references:

Akseli Gallen-Kallela’s “Lemminkäisen äiti” (Lemminkäinen’s Mother, 1897).

(notice the swan, the black water, blood-covered stones, ‘the mother’ and the red-bearded ‘son’ waiting/asking for a spark for new life after the mother has combed his broken parts out of the river and assembled them back into the shape of a man)

I must admit that I didn’t bother to think any deeper parallels with Lemminkäinen and Flint (or the Mother and Miranda) beside this (more about it later though) and mainly had my thoughts just on this painting and its visuals because it is so well known (and liked) in Finland.

Moving on.

Screencaps from season 2 (source here):

I chose the latter stairs for the reflection (although modified) only because they were in London and there is an arch above them (to mirror the window in the drawing)

Some steps futher when the needed elements are more clear:

At some point I tried things with a lot more light and coldness (below, left pic) to channel some of the the dream sequence in s3 but in the end I chose the darker atmosphere, faces in shadows and I also wanted to preserve the red colour somehow (right pic):

The reflection sketch (at some point), although most of it cannot be seen in the finished work and thus didn’t need too much details. Young lieutenant James McGraw returning to London from his voyage:

Also, (and I am so sorry about this, but it was “fitting” and I decided to keep it..) in the reflection (when flipped and put in its position) the plank (their unfortunate blood-covered war-path and future) accidentally hides Miranda’s face and decapitates her so to speak and she won’t be there anymore ;_;

Thomas, on the other hand, is in the reflection to meet James -  both in the past and again in the future - but not in ‘the present’ where Miranda is.

Miranda in Flint’s visions (s3 ep3):

When I first met you, you were so Unformed.

And then I spoke and bade you cast aside your shame, and Captain Flint was born into the world. The part of you that always existed yet never were you willing to allow into the light of day.

I was mistress to you when you needed love. I was wife to you when you needed understanding. But first and before all I was mother. I have known you like no other. So I love you like no other. I will guide you through it, but at its end is where you must leave me. At its end is where you will find the peace that eludes you, and at its end lies the answer you refuse to see.

And then in s3ep5: You can't see it yet, can you? You are not alone.

The end part of it is seen in the fandom as a reference to Silver (and his partnership) and how Flint’s mind is telling himself to see it too. And I agree on that. I don’t think James had any hopes for Thomas being alive (especially in s3). As I mentioned earlier I originally did the reflection to show him (Thomas) only as a memory. Then the finale happened and the reflection got its double meaning :)

And here again Miranda as the mother (there has been better discussions about this topic and speech in the fandom so I won’t go more into that now). In the inspiration painting that I showed earlier the mother had assembled his son back together (for rebirth / reanimation) <--- Miranda being part of the creation (birth) of ‘Captain Flint’.

Aaaaand here’s the feather again and Silver’s words (and sort of motto):

“Take it from me, there's always a way.” (season 1)

“Nothing is inevitable here. I'm showing you a way in which we can survive this.″ (season 3)

Some further fixed details and adjustments. In the end the wall almost disappeared and to me it made this feel a bit like “floating alone without a shelter on your back or a place to return once you leave its premise”... I fixed the perspective of the planks (took me surprisingly long to notice what was wrong) and got the bloody red back on the planks (and not leaking too much on the water).

I wanted the water to be quiet, pitch black and endless and the reflection to seem like a dream. I probably should’ve done everything a bit more detailed or sharper, but in the end it didn’t feel so necessary (and it would have been way too much work, haha).

The final drawing:

The planning and initial idea was done after seeing s3 and just when s4 was beginning so there weren’t any thoughts linked to s4 while making this (other than the surprise connection with Thomas). Most of this I did paint after s4 though, but only to finish what I had already started.  

One more thing. I also made “the doors of the warship” -drawing after planning the JOURNEY INTO THE DARK (although I posted the doors pic first, since it was finished earlier).

It has a similar lighting and the theme of James and Miranda facing together ‘the civilization’ although this time they are stepping towards the light again (in hopes of closure and the promise of new life... which doesn’t go well as we already know ;_;).

James and Miranda about to leave the warship and meet Lord Peter Ashe in Charles Town:

So, here we sort of have a beginning and an end for their journey in the dark (together)  - believing that there are just the two of them left from the original trio.

Aaaaaand, that’s about it. Sorry about some repetition and messiness.

As I said in the beginning of this post, you are free to have your own interpretations (and I hope this post didn’t ruin any of them). These were just the things and thoughts that went into this work (or were stumbled upon along the way...), but you don’t have to take them to your heart.

Thank you so much for checking out this post and I hope it was worthy of your time! ( ˘ ³˘)♥  

[nebulous-wanderings]

Tsukista TV Ep 6 Summary Notes

This last episode of Tsukista TV focused on Tomotsune Yuuki, who plays Shun, and Doi Kazumi, who plays Kai. (I can’t help but notice that Blue Moon beer logo on the side of the bar in the above screencap lol). These Tsukista TV episodes were a lot of fun to watch, and it gave us more insight into the actors’ lives and personalities. Also, the Tsukiusa Taisou will be stuck in my head forever... I still haven’t written anything for the first episode yet, but that should be posted next week. I’ll put links to all 6 of my episode posts on my Scans/Translations/Misc. page once I’m finished. Thanks for reading!

For the intro bit, they were all doing these weirdly serious faces/poses

(All of them being weird)

Because this was Procella’s seniors’ episode, Shuuto wanted to do the intro part that Tomotsune usually does. Tani shouted (directly into Shuuto’s right ear) “GANBARE!!!”

After that, Shuuto gave Tani the “Explain Procellarum” challenge again, but this time he was only allowed 4 seconds. (The first time it was 10 seconds and the second time was 6 seconds) Obviously, Tani did not have time to say much (lol)

Discussing a surprising aspect of Tomotsune:

Yuusaku says he’s like a professional sports player and Tomotsune silently motions for Yuusaku to continue speaking. Yuusaku says there’s various stuff like his powerful movements and his flexibility

Tomotsune said he wasn’t able to “open his legs” at first (I’m assuming this means doing a split or just being able to stretch his legs far in general) but because he stretches regularly he’s able to do it now.

Everyone calls him strong (lol)

Tomotsune’s Image:

Tani: “I’m glad he’s the leader.” Even during practices, Tomotsune would always be a leader. Tani also calls him a big-brother type.

Tsubasa was about to say something but then Tomotsune cut him off and was like, “Ok that’s enough.” Shuuto’s yelling “Let him talk~”

(Tsubasa being taken aback)

Once they let him speak, Tsubasa says Tomotsune has a lot of charisma. “Yoshiki-san [Tani] said he’s a leader, but I think it’s more than just that.” “I think he definitely has a charismatic aura.” “I get the feeling he was born to bring people together.” *Tomotsune high-fives Tsubasa after he says this*

Discussing an unknown aspect of Doi:

They call him Doi-chan (lol)

Tani: “Doi-chan is… an alien.” (Tani just said 宇宙 = uchuu, but 宇宙人 = uchuujin = alien refers to a person whose actions and thoughts are weird to you; you can’t understand why they do what they do)

Yuusaku: “He goes at a 45° angle” (meaning he does things differently than most) “As they say in baseball, he’s like a kunckleball.” (A knuckleball is a type of baseball pitch that has an erratic and unpredictable motion.) Tomotsune agrees.

Shuuto: “He’s a natural airhead.” Tani: “He really is an airhead, like an eel.” (idk what he means by that)

Shuuto: “That time it looked like the shoes he wore grew wings, (I think Doi bought some sneakers with external wing flaps on them or something) he said ‘Why is it difficult to move my legs?’ Isn't it because of those bulky shoes??!”

Tsubasa says he’s Doi is the type that’s liked by people both younger and older than him. “When I’m troubled, Doi is the person that says the kindest things.” Doi responds by saying he was once a young novice and he knows the feeling of wanting to be a better person, so that’s why he wants to see Tsubasa continue to keep working hard.

Yuusaku: “During the stageplay, I’d say ‘Doi~ Doi~ Doi~ Kazumi~’ and that projected a different image of Doi” “He has a strong [acting] talent.” “He was okay with me doing that gag, but the real Doi Kazumi and the Doi Kazumi we think he is are two completely different people. So maybe if we take these two separate Doi’s and put them together, it’ll make an even more amazing Doi.” wwww

(“Doi~ Doi~ Doi~ Kazumiiiiii” *shakes finger* This gag is in Yumemigusa)

Tani: “As was with Yuusaku’s private life, I know almost nothing about Doi’s private life. I don’t know where he goes after work or what he likes to eat. Doi-chan is the most mysterious.”

Doi: “I’ll eat anything.” Shuuto: “That’s like the opposite of Little Red Riding Hood! wwww” (I’m pretty sure he meant Goldilocks from Goldilocks and the Three Bears since she was picky and only ate the porridge that was ‘just right.’)

Tani tells a story about when he, Shuuto, and Doi were eating dinner together at the airport in Taiwan (this was from the time they went to Taiwan for the Tsukista fan event). Everyone else had gotten Chinese food (because they were in Taiwan, obviously), but Doi was sitting in a different spot so Tani went over to him and was like “Oh what are you eating?” and he was just eating spaghetti and meat sauce. Everyone’s reactions are “For real? Eating pasta in TAIWAN???” wwww Shuuto, sarcastically: “What a genius”

Doi tries to defend himself saying since they were in Taiwan, didn’t they want to try and act all cool and stuff? Shuuto and Tani just laugh lol

(Doi said “To be continued” in English lol)

Shuuto introduces the next segment by saying it’s learning about Tomotsune and Doi’s “origins.” Tomotsune said “What do you mean ‘origins?!’”

Tomotsune and Doi do a cute segway into the next segment. (“pyon” is the onomatopoeia for a rabbit jumping)

(“It’s starting, pyon~”)

Tomotsune’s “Everyday Life” video

Doi comments about how long Tomotsune’s hair is in the video.

(He starts combing his bangs over his eyes)

Cut to him getting his haircut at the salon. He says the next day he has a filming which is why he needs to get his hair cut. He wants the length to go back to how it’s supposed to be.

(Tomotsune getting a haircut)

Cut to him after the haircut - Tomotsune in the video: “It’s finished~”

(Showing off the end result)

Before he filmed that last part of the video, Tomotsune said he ate dinner.

Doi’s “Everyday Life” video:

Tomotsune goes to play the video and says “double-click” in English (idk i just found it funny lol)

The video starts with just a large July tsukiusa visible and Doi speaking in a weird voice as if he’s talking as the tsukiusa. Then as the tsukiusa he says “Today we have Fuduki Kai’s stage actor, Doi Kazumi. Doi Kazumi-san, if you please~” And then he moves the camera further out so you see him sitting next to the tsukiusa.

Doi: “Hello~ *looks over to the plushie* Thanks, tsukiusa.” The rest of the video is him with a generic message kind of thing about being a part of Procella, them working hard on stage, and that he hopes the audience continues to support them. 

(Doi and his tsukiusa)

At one point though, his Kansai dialect slipped out a bit but he corrected himself in the video. Tomotsune made fun of it anyways lol

Tomotsune was laughing throughout the entire video. Afterwards, he said sarcastically, “That’s some normal ‘everyday life’ stuff in the video, huh”

Doi said it took him about 10 takes to get that final video (lol)

Doi: “It was all for a lonely person, wasn’t it (referring to himself). *turns around in his seat to look at the large July tsukiusa behind him on the set* Right Blue-usa? Me talking to you…”

Tomostune: “Disgusting…” Doi: “Hey!!” Tomostune: “It’s frightening [to watch him talk to the tsukiusas]” www

Reflecting on the life of actors:

Doi tries to remember some date, as in calendar date, but then he thinks Tomotsune is thinking he’s talking about a date that you go on with another person so he’s like “not that kind of date” www

Tomotsune: “There was a time when I thought I wanted to quit. But the thing that stopped me from doing so was the support from fans. It really was the voices of fans. They’re important. And the closest fans are your parents.” “When I first entered the acting world, they were really against it.”

Doi says he gets scared/nervous every time he performs on stage.

I couldn’t tell if Tomotsune was making up an example or telling a personal anecdote, but he was talking about how everyone gets nervous. Like when something unexpected happens on stage, e.g. someone forgets their line, but then in a split second you think of what to do in that moment to fix the situation.

Doi recalling becoming peers with other actors:

Doi says when he was starting out, his butai senpais taught him everything.

Tomotsune talks about how when there’s difficult songs and dances they need to learn, he appreciates the kind of person that gets angry over them not doing well enough. To him, they get angry out of love and care. Doi says he’s glad Tomotsune said that.

(“It’s been fun!”)

Tsukiusa T-shirt Designs:

While drawing his design, Tomotsune realized he ran out of space to fit the word he was writing so he’s like “sorry, everyone T_T”

(Revealing their designs)

Tomotsune thought the wheels on the train on Doi’s design were takoyaki. Tomotsune: “Takoyaki?” Doi: “Nononononono”

Doi’s design is a tsukiusa riding on the SL Ginga (a steam-powered train that’s used for special events and excursions). It says “7” and “Fuduki Kai” in the steam cloud. (I couldn’t read what’s written on the bottom-left corner because of his handwriting and it’s so small)

Tomotsune’s design says “Tsukista.” “11” “Shun,S” (He romanized the katakana so that’s why the ‘s’ in ‘tsukista’ is missing. Btw idk if the “Shun,S” part is supposed to be short for Shun Shimotsuki or if that comma should be an apostrophe so it says “Shun’s” instead)

Tomotsune: “It’s very ‘Maou-sama’” Doi: “It looks cool”

[chromsai]

Top 5 Arc V Moments.

OKay so this is very over due as hell I’m sorry like sincerely apologizing here. I don’t really have an excuse since I’ve known my definite favorite moments for a while, I just felt I had to… emotionally prepare myself to write all this out. And well

(it’s fucking June now…) as you can see it takes me a just a bit to become emotionally prepared for anything Arc V, especially so when it comes to deciding on JUST 5 Arc V moments but alright. Here they are:

5. Episodes 69 & 99 (tie): Melt My Heart

Yeah, I know I’m starting this list off with a tie just to emphasize how hard this is for me. Well anyway…

I’m choosing both of these episodes as a tie because my favorite thing about them both is, you guessed it!, fruitshipping.

Fruitshipping is, of course, my favorite pairing from Arc V (honestly, it’s my favorite in all of YGO in general by like… a really, REALLY long shot) and I’ve already talked about why episode 69 is my favorite fruitshipping moment from the entire show (tl;dr: it’s what made me go from casually shipping it to full blown “I WILL DROWN WITH THIS SHIP WITHOUT REGRET”) but the reason why I’m placing it tied to episode 99 in this list is of course because

this. Amazingly touching reunion. And although, yes it was short lived, nothing takes away how satisfying everything about this scene is, imo at least. Maybe you ship this, maybe you don’t. Either way, I’m not sure you can’t deny how heartwarming it is that Yuya isn’t holding back his feelings here. Okay, perhaps he is maybe slightly (goddamnit Yuya cONFESS ALREADY DAMNIT U DENSE BOY). Even the entire present cast finds it hella endearing:

Shingo’s satisfied look of approval pretty much confirms he ships it.Gongenzaka is beyond happy to see his best friends reunited, as they should be.Sora probably going thru the biggest sugar high of his entire goddamn life from how sweet this reunion is.

Look. At. Reira’s. Smile. Damn shoulda just shown baby Reira/Zarc a pic of fruitshipping… but then maybe Arc V would have ended 5 episodes sooner…Tsukikage, the cool stoic ninja, has been shipping this from the shadows but this scene was too perfect he dgaf about hiding it anymore.

Jack & Crow transcending shows just to show their approval of this ship.

Fruitshipping is all according to Reiji’s keikaku, and Shun seems glad he was awake to see this.

Not to mention my favorite part of this moment:

I get this is YGO and who knows if we’ll ever get an on-screen kiss but… the amount of time they stared directly into each other’s eyes without even blinking once, like… I know I wasn’t the only one who thought they were actually gonna kiss there for a moment… it’s symbolic of something, ya feel?

sweartogodithoughttheyreallywereandasiwatchediwasscreaming

This moment was too pure, too good, too heartwarming………

Anyways,,,

4. Episodes 31+32: A True ‘Entame’ Duel

Again, this is a moment I’ve talked about as being one of my favorite Yuya moments recently.

 There’s a lot I can add about why I love this duel (for example:

giving Shingo some character development as well as demonstrating that he actually really is a skilled duelist and a true entertainer in his own way, not just a follower or an imitator

Yuya using this duel to challenge himself and push himself to reaching for his father’s level of Entame Dueling which is his dream

the cliffhangers they left us off with at the end of ep 31, the one that happened at the beginning of 32 with Yuya diving into the collapsing castle (which, Idk about anyone else, but that legit got me anxious AF too cuz how unpredictable the duels in this show are sometimes) and of course the other one towards the end of the duel as he made his ‘destiny draw’ while calling for the audience to cheer him on, etc.

but what really makes this duel the textbook example of what makes Entame Duels so fun to watch is the flawless call and response (aka back & forths) between Shingo and Yuya and their absolute dedication to keeping the flow of their entertainment as intense and unpredictable (even for themselves) as possible.

Also, as far as YGO goes, there is always going to be moments where the protagonist has to rely on a ‘destiny draw’, but the way it was implemented in this show (pretty much always like this moment) was a really creative way that fits into the world and story-telling of the show extremely comfortably but also adding to the anticipation since both we AND the actual in-universe audience are expecting something BIG.

Another rewatch bonus here: the stark contrast between Yuya’s Entame Dueling vs Zarc’s vengeful, overpowering dueling- this duel is the prime example of everything that Zarc strived to achieve as an entertainer but was unfortunately ultimately swayed away from despite his true intentions.

Last note for this moment: this duel was will always hold a special place in my heart for happening at a time when I really needed it. It was a nice reminder to not be afraid to Take A Step Forward With Courage.

(Side note: this episode was also immediately followed by, without a doubt, the best written duel in Arc V: Shun vs. Sora, so that just added to this moment in retrospect due to the contrast between dueling for smiles & entertainment vs dueling for war & vengeance, which was brilliant considering these 2 duels perfectly showcase the 2 sides of of the single coin that is Arc V and its overall themes, so you could say that, yeah, MCS arc was fucking good.)

3. Episode 1 + 2: A Solid Intro that AWED

Alright, so I’m very aware that not everyone shares my opinion on this, but again this is a list based on my experience and perspective of Arc V so lol anyway,

Episode. 1.

I’ve told this story plenty of times before, I think, but I’ve left some details out. After watching + finishing Zxl (as it was airing, mind you) I was left feeling kinda… mostly… “meh” about YGO as a whole. The last few episodes of it, though, we got this a few times:

And I was kinda… also “meh” about it. *cries writing that*pastsaiyoufool Tbqh with you, my only reaction to him at first was “he’s riding a hippo while playing card games… does he even know what it means to be a YGO protag? Where is YGO going…” but it was also “eh, it’s YGO. Nothing’s changed probably.” Then, a certain someone was confirmed as “main rival” for Arc V and I was motivated to watch. “It’ll probably be just okay but I’m watching for Hosoyan,” I told myself, fucking clueless as fucking hell. “Plus this is the first time I get to watch a YGO RIGHT as it airs RIGHT from the start.”

So episode 1 finally came around and this happened

within the first… not even 2 mins in. And part of me was “ok” and the other part of me was nothatwasntcutethatwasnOTCUTEATALL*denial* (I am a known tsundere when it comes to the things I end up loving the most [see: Chrom, Shun, Zarc, etc.]). Then the next thing that caught my attention was:

. By now, I was internally being even more aggressively tsundere because Fuck that was cute… but he’s ridiculous! Dressing up like a clown?! NNNNO. though on the outside I just kept watching with a straight face like okay okay it’s the first episode, he’s allowed. I’m very dense too just like him.

My first impression of the duel was actually that it was rather okay & somewhat interesting for the most part and that the action cards seemed fun but oh boy a new gimmick but I continued watching, cuz again, I wanted to give it a chance.

My expectations, going into the show, were “this is just gonna be another silly, happy-go-lucky kinda theme, eh I already got thru Zxl so why not?” + no real expectations at all.

And then, 

this happened:

My first reaction: oH MY GOD LOOK AT THOSE EYESSS!!! (little did I know this was the beginning of my being zarctrash… yuuup… since episode. fcking. 1.)

I don’t know exactly why, at the time, and I don’t know about the rest of you but this was basically me right after:

Then the next episode continues the duel, Yuya wins, and again, I’m like

And to top that off, they give us this too:

First of all, that ending screencap of Yuya looking at the screen confidently right after he Pendulum summons for the first time and leaves everyone (including me) in shock… I’m sorry but, to me, THAT’S how you end a first episode. The animation. The soundtrack. The pacing and writing. Yuya’s sudden and mysterious (at the time) complete change of demeanor, along with the mystery of the Pendulum itself, is what left me in absolute awe, especially so seeing that even Yuya himself was not expecting it. It was all perfect. Then going on to the next episode and learning that Yuya suddenly had no idea what had just happened or where he even was… that got me hooked instantly.

But the ending to that first episode… haha… I started watching this show for Reiji Akaba and suddenly forgot he existed right after this moment happened. When he finally made his dramatic, opening double-doors + scarf flowing in the wind (in his office somehow?) debut, I was like “Oh sHIT there he is! Right… I was gonna watch this show for him… right…” Barely an episode in and I had completely forgotten why I was even watching anymore. I didn’t care. I just wanted to watch more. (And thankfully Reiji Akaba ended up also exceeding my expectations of his character like by a lot.)

I’ve seen this episode way too many times to count. I enjoy it thoroughly each and every time. But I honestly just really wish I could relive seeing it for the very first time. It was… such an incredible experience. To me, this is the best first episode of any YGO. I went in expecting nothing or even less than that and instead, fortunately, got everything I didn’t even know I ever wanted.

2. Episode 135: The Perfect Episode

I. Am an angst. Hoe.

Part of the reason why I enjoyed this show so much was because it gave me so much well-written angst that hit all the tropes I enjoy so much and then some.

This episode was and then some.

First of all, let me just address the fact that the duel between Yuri and Yuya was hyped and anticipated for 2 fucking years ever since Yuri was first revealed. Don’t lie, our first thought when we saw Yuri was “So WHEN are they gonna duel??!?” 

For 2. Entire. Years. This duel was hyped up, and I’ll even dare to say it was more anticipated than even the Yuri vs Yugo duel, honestly. Even up to the last minute. I can’t tell you the amount of polls and discussions I saw debating who would win the duel because not only was the duel hyped, after seeing the first half, (in keeping with the surprise nature of the show) the result was still pretty damn unpredictable (a lot of those polls I mentioned were split almost evenly half the time).

Then it finally happened.

And it delivered. My god did it deliver.

But alright, I know I titled this “The Perfect Episode” but yeah there was some flaws in the duel writing (Yuya, my boy, you forgot your monsters have Pendulum effects?, Yuri I get you were losing your shit too and just wanted to hitotsu ni but you also forgot to use your dragons’ effects or just didn’t bother, etc.) buuuut I’m going to call this off as somewhat realistic in the fact that when you’re feeling you’re going insane and panicking you just might not be able to think entirely straight and might miss a few card effects or so.

But besides that.

The animation for this episode, directed by Ebina, and the sound direction as well was spot fucking on. And the script throughout was…

Oh my god. The script throughout this episode…

Let’s just say, during the span of less than 24 minutes I

cried

and cried

and died cried.

A lot.

just getting those screenshots hurt… beyond words…

Major shout out to Kensho Ono for this scene in particular because. wow. 

(Side note 1: just in general, I thank the gods every day for casting Ono Ken as Yuya because I cannot think of anyone better to voice him ever. He left his own personal mark on Yuya’s character [Yuya’s “Ladies & Gentlemen!” was his own added touch and was not originally in the script, gods bless 🙌] + on the YGO series as a whole.

Side note 2: This is more of a personal one with regards to this scene in particular…I say often that I relate to Yuya a lot and let me just say that watching this scene was incredibly hard to watch through tears especially the first time around because, as someone who went through a terrible depressive episode that lasted months in 2014-2015, it just… reminded me… of that exact feeling… and I felt so. goddamn. horrible for Yuya… he never deserved that. Ever. This episode broke me so bad for a good while…)

Of course, I think the thing we all anticipated the most was… Zarc. We knew for certain that he would revive by the end of the duel. “How?” was the main question. Most speculation lead to the theory that Yuri would forcefully merge with Yuya despite losing, but that didn’t happen. Instead,

Zarc did it himself. Of course.

I think by the very end of the duel it was obvious but… that still didn’t stop me from spouting “no no they aren’t doing this tHEY AREN’T REALLY DOING THIS THEY CAN’T FUCKING DO THISSSS NOOOO!!!!” as he walked towards Yuri. And I knew exactly what was about to happen. And it still broke me anyway. And when Yuya’s Pendulum hit the ground

so did I.

*sniff* Fun times.

[Here is where I was gonna put some honorable mentions but the list was pretty damn long so I’m omitting it because honestly I’ll just end up listing like every single episode (besides episode 19 ofc well now y’all know my least favorite Arc V episode… wow… shocker, right?)]

1. Episode 37: Point of No Return

Welp. This is it. My favorite. Favorite. Arc V episode and moment.

The one episode I’ve seen like……. idefk how many times. I pretty much know the script by heart now. Yeah. In Japanese.

What is it about this episode? Maybe it’s the-

No! Stop we’re not there yet!

I think it’s the fact that this episode

is, imo, when shit TRULY. HITS. THE FAN. 

As I titled this entry, this is literally. The Point. of No. Return.

Nothing is the same anymore after this episode. The plot is completely, entirely on autopilot from this point on.

“Destiny Starts to Move.”

This fucks with me, man. How much so? Here look:

Yeah I know this was just 5 months ago, but my god. You never know what fate has in store for you. Look at this other thing that I just found again also:

haha “lol”. 

I can go on forever about the massive foreshadowing this episode is, or about how tragic it is, or both. OR. I can just… appreciate what they’ve done here.

I love Arc V because, as I said before, this show hits at like literally ALL of my favorite tropes, combines them with YGO and Arc V’s relatable AF characters, and then deconstructs those tropes immensely.

So for example, this episode alone:

A PLOT MAJOR duel NOT involving the main character/protagonist, yet still affects his life forever anyway.

“Kills” (ymmv) off a plot-important character within less than the first half of the show.

Said character STAYS that way (almost unheard of in YGO).

Said character’s dying words aka his last fucking will remains unresolved for pretty much the entire show until the very last episode. (FORESHADOWING WHAO)

You can’t. Escape. Fate. (The end result would be the same regardless of what happened this episode.) You can’t even change fate, in this situation. Not even slightly.

No. You won’t even fix your fate either. Hell, this is a trope that Yugioh usually actively avoids.

Yes, I know this episode is cruel in so many ways, and even more so in hindsight, but as I said before, I love angst. And I love deconstruction of tropes. And I love foreshadowing.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t just love this episode in hindsight. There are so many things going on

“Destiny Starts to Move” - yeah, after all of Ray’s bracelet’s struggles of keeping them away from each other, Zarc finally made his first definitive move sending Yugo here and now three of his four pieces are gathered in one spot, two of them misguidedly pissed at each other for extra hitotsu ni- dueling motivation, with not a single bracelet in sight. There’s no turning back now. Just another win-win Sunday night for Zarc.

And, oh yeah, this was Yugo’s debut. Just to emphasize the fact that their coexistence is unnatural.

Lmao no matter how you see it, their story is so damn sad fite me

Out of hindsight, though, I’ll admit that, besides Yuya, I still wasn’t entirely attached to the characters (or at least not to the extent I am today, even regarding Yuya), but this episode was, as I titled this, the point of no return for me as well. If I ever thought about quitting the show and just coming back to binge it later (which… never actually crossed my mind, I don’t think lol), this was the episode where I thought “shit… I’m definitely here forever now.” I mention the whole quitting and then binging thing cuz that’s what I pretty much eventually did with all YGOs before it, even DM, but not with this show.

Of course this episode is also where we get a hint of what’s been going on with the introduction of Yuri and Leo Akaba asking him to bring Yuzu to him, but doesn’t give enough away that it’s obvious at all. Pretty much all the mysteries gathered in this episode here quite nicely but the shock ending- Yuto dying- gave us all something even greater to ponder about… we knew when it happened that this was only the beginning…

“When the paper’s crumpled up, it can’t be perfect again…”

Honestly, I can continue talking about a bunch of other things regarding this episode for forever, but… talk about… otanoshimi wa kore kara da… so many things that came after this in the story were built upon this moment, it’s definitely one of the most important moments in this show. 

And it’s my favorite moment in Arc V.

[13flowersandfoxes]

1-169 because I saw your tag and I'm a reasonable man

1: How tall or short do you wish you were?Idk I like being tall until there are no tall guys who want to date me 
2: What’s your dream pet? (Real or not)Does that include realistically? Cause I'd love to have a fox or a snow leopard but foxes are expensive and there's no domestic snow leopards I've heard of. 
3: Do you have a favorite clothing style?I just wear what strikes me. I'm kinda all over the place style wise but I'm very true to myself. 
4: What was your favorite video game growing up?Soul Calibur II
5: What three things/people do you think of most each day:My best friend, my cat, food?
6: If you had a warning label, what would yours say?Crazy bitch approach with caution
7: What is your opinion on [insert person/thing here]?
8: What is your Greek personality type? [Sanguine, Phlegmatic, Choleric, or Melancholic]I don't remember these well enough to say
9: Are you ticklish?... 
10: Are you allergic to anything?Morphine 
11: What’s your sexuality?Bi
12: Do you prefer tea, coffee, or cocoa?Not coffee
13: Are you a cat or dog person?Both
14: Would you rather be a vampire, elf, or merperson?Elf. Especially a Tolkien elf. 
15: Do you have a favorite Youtuber?Not really
16: How tall are you?5'11
17: If you had to change your name, what would you change it to?Billie
18: How much do you weigh? [Only ask this if you know the user doesn’t mind!]250
19: Do you believe in ghosts/spirits?In a way yes
20: Do you like space or the ocean more?Ocean. But both scare me in a way 
21: Are you religious?Yes
22: Pet peeves?People chewing loud or leaving cabinets open
23: Would you rather be nocturnal or diurnal [opposite of nocturnal]?Nocturnal 
24: Favorite constellation?Orion
25: Favorite star?Betelgeuse 
26: Do you like ball-jointed dolls?No
27: Any phobias or fears?Being alone
28: Do you think global warming is real?Believe pollution is an issue. But not sure I trust politicians and scientists with an agenda when other scientists are saying they are wrong. And they're trying to say they're stupid or crazy or should be killed for disagreeing. I just have a hard time trusting that people who do that are actually right. 
29: Do you believe in reincarnation?No
30: Favorite movie??
31: Do you get scared easily?No
32: How many pets have you own in your lifetime?3
33: Blog rate? [You’ll rate the blog of the one who’s asking.]7
34: What is a color that calms you?Green 
35: Where would you like to travel and/or live?Germany 
36: Where were you born?California 
37: What is your eye color?Green
38: Introvert or extrovert?Introvert
39: Do you believe in horoscopes and zodiacs?No but I think they're harmless fun. I don't get why some people freak out like they're so bad to talk about hypothetically. I just think it's fun. 
40: Hugs or kisses?Both. Both is good
41: Who is someone you would like to see/visit right now?My cat and my best friend(s). And that's gonna be happening soon as I'm on the plane right now. 
42: Who is someone you love deeply?My cat :P
43: Any piercings you want?Not really. Maybe my lobes. 
44: Do you like tattoos and piercings?Not excessively. But I love beautiful pieces of art and can really appreciate the art that goes into both. 
45: Do you smoke or have you eiver done so?No
46: Talk about your crush, if you have one!Ugh he's a writer loves cats one of my best friends, a little eccentric, and he's genuinely understanding. We've both gone through some hard shit and we trust each other in that
47: What is a sound you really hate?Coughing. People talking obnoxiously loud in public places that are generally quiet. I can't think of anything more specific okay I'm on a plane right now. 
48: A sound you really love?My cat. Also my aunts cat cause he can't meow right he sounds like a dying squeaky toy and I can't stop laughing
49: Can you do a backflip?No
50: Can you do the splits?Almost
51: Favorite actor and/or actress?Dunno. Like Winona Ryder and Angelina Jolie to name a couple random ones. 
52: Favorite movie?Too manyyyy
53: How are you feeling right now?Tired and a little dizzy. I have a headache right now :(
54: What color would you like your hair to be right now?I'm happy with it being red. I'd like it to look slightly more orange though
55: When did you feel happiest?I'm not sure. Happy things seem tainted now. 
56: Something that calms you down?Animals 
57: Have any mental disorders? [Only ask this if you know the user doesn’t mind!]Bpd, possibly along with bipolar type 2 as suspected by my psychiatrist. 
58: What does your URL mean?I feel like I was something that had potential to be beautiful and good but it's just broken and painful now. 
59: What three words describe you the most?Crazy. Weird. Catlike. 
60: Do you believe in evolution?Yes. 
61: What makes you unfollow a blog?Being constantly douchey, or just annoying the shit out of me. I'm pretty nice though generally, I follow all sorts of people and I tend to like having variety in who I follow so I don't feel like I'm hearing the same shit over and over. It's a bit dull
62: What makes you follow a blog?Interesting content. Seems nice. Especially if they follow me first 
63: Favorite kind of person:Idk someone nice and funny that I can talk to easily. 
64: Favorite animal(s):I've said this so many times lol
65: Name three of your favorite blogs.Kellyann Saint Louis???
66: Favorite emoticon:💜💜💜💜 or 😊😊
67: Favorite meme:I miss the bad audition songs one. But I do have a special place in my heart for screencaps+tumblr posts/onion articles 
68: What is your MBTI personality type?Infj
69: What is your star sign?Sagittarius 
70: Can your dog roll over on command, if you have a dog?Nope. She can sit and that's about it. She's not very bright. 
71: What outfit out of all your clothes do you like to wear the most?Jeans and floral/sheer top
72: Post a selfie or two?Make separate post
73: Do you have platform shoes?Yeah
74: What is one random but interesting fact about yourself?I have webbed toes
75: Can you do a front flip?No
76: Do you like birds?To look at, but I probably wouldn't ever have one as a pet
77: Do you like to swim?Yes
78: Is swimming or ice skating more fun to you?Swimming cause I'm very new to ice skating I've done it twice and once was on crappy skates that really hurt my feet. The other time I was doing circles okay following the wall
79: Something you wish didn’t exist:The dark shit I've seen on here
80: Some thing you wish did exist:A special hell for people who do that shit
81: Piercings you have?My daiths
82: Something you really enjoy doing:Cooking sometimes
83: Favorite person to talk to:My best friend 
84: What was your first impression of Tumblr?Well I remember in middle school when it was brand new everyone was getting one and I tried it and I was just like How the Fuck do I do anything then the next time I had heard Things and knew somewhat what to expect 
85: How many followers do you have?280 ish
86: Can you run a mile within ten minutes? Lol no
87: Do your socks always match?I'm wearing one sock with cats and one black sock. Does that answer that well enough for you? Lol
88: Can you touch your toes and keep your legs straight completely?I think so I don't remember 
89: What are your birthstones?Topaz
90: If you were an animal, which one would you be?My friend used to say I'm part cat. Maybe fox cause they're basically half cat half dog. 
91: If a flower could aesthetically represent you, what kind would it be?Orchid
92: A store you hate?Torrid cause I spend way too much shopping there I can't walk in without buying something 
93: How many cups of coffee can you drink in one day?0
94: Would you rather be able to fly or read minds?Fly
95: Do you like to wear camo?No
96: Winter or summer?Winter
97: How long can you hold your breath for??
98: Least favorite person?This nightmarish girl who was homeschooled and was like a fundie Christian Mormon afraid of doctors and lesbians and gum and Twinkies (im literally not exaggerating) and was just loud and obnoxious and annoying in high school. 
99: Someone you look up to:Not sure. 
100: A store you love?Torrid
101: Favorite type of shoesOxfords
102: Where do you live?Utah
103: Are you a vegetarian or vegan? If so, why?No
104: What is your favorite mineral or gem?Amethyst. Also there's this green stone I have somewhere in my house I got from a roadside shop in Zion it's so pretty it's like quartz looking. I can't remember what it was. But it's pretty 
105: Do you drink milk?Not really
106: Do you like bugs?Not particularly 
107: Do you like spiders?^^^^
108: Something you get paranoid about?People hating me/being bothered by me
109: Can you draw:No
110: Nosiest question you have ever been asked?Got an anon once I deleted asking my favorite things to do when I'm having sex. That was probably it that wasn't called for. 
111: A question you hate being asked?"Are you working or in school right now?"
112: Ever been bitten by a spider?Maybe. Woken up with lots of bug bites in my day, most all of them mosquitoes but some not
113: Do you like the sound of waves at the beach?Yeah
114: Do you prefer cloudy or sunny days?Cloudy
115: Someone you’d like to kiss or cuddle right now:Idk
116: Favorite cloud type:? I just like clouds
117: What color do you wish the sky was?Idk I'm fine with it being blue but I like purple sunsets
118: Do you have freckles?No :(
119: Favorite thing about a person:Eyes or the sort of things they find funny
120: Fruits or vegetables?Fruits
121: Something you want to do right now:See my damn cat
122: Is the ocean or sky prettier?Yes
123: Sweet or sour foods?Spicy
124: Bright or dim lights?Depends 
125: Do you believe in a certain magical creature?No
126: Something you hate about Tumblr:People
127: Something you love about Tumblr:People
128: What do you think about the least?? If I thought about it then it wouldn't be thought of least
129: What would you want written on your tombstone?Not sure. I'm tempted to go with something morbid like memento mori just to be a little shit forever
130: Who would you like to punch in the face right now?Idk
131: What is something you love but also hate about yourself?My boobs
132: Do you smile with your teeth showing for pictures?I try not to. But I end up looking angry
133: Computer or TV?Both
134: Do you like roller coasters?Yeah
135: Do you get motion sickness or seasickness?Yes
136: Are your ears lobed or attached?Lobed
137: Do you believe in karma?No
138: On a scale of 1-10, how attractive would you say you are?5
139: What nicknames do you have/have had?I have one friend who used to call me Hanukkah, then brosef calls me hanners 
140: Did you have any pretend or imaginary friends?No
141: Have you ever seen a therapist/shrink?Lol yes
142: Would you say you are a good or bad influence to others?Idk I try to be a good influence but some people's parents have said I'm bad .... so idk
143: Do you prefer giving or receiving gifts/help?Both!
144: What makes you angryIdk just bullshit lol
145: How many languages do you speak fluently?1
146: Do you prefer boys, girls, and/or non-binaries?Boys
147: Are you androgynous?Nope
148: Favorite physical thing about yourself:Eyes or lips
149: Favorite thing about your personality:Idk I'm friendly
150: Name three people you would like to talk to right now in person.My best friend, my girl best friend, and ?? My sister maybe
151: If you could go back into time and live in one era, which would you choose?I can't choooooose
152: Do you like BuzzFeed?For dumb little shit like dog stuff or "boys try this" yeah I think it's fun but if you think it's actually journalism you're sorely mistaken
153: How did you meet your spouse/girlfriend/boyfriend/partner? [If you have one.]
154: Do you like to kiss others’ foreheads or hands for platonic reasons?No. cheeks yes. 
155: Do you like to play with others’ hair?Yes
156: What embarrasses you?Lots of things. 
157: Something that makes you nervous/anxious:Talking to people. 
158: Biggest lie you have ever told:Idk
159: How many people are you following?700 ish
160: How many posts do you have on your blog(s)?Idk
161: How many drafts do you have on your blog(s)??
162: How many likes do you have on your blog(s)?Idk
163: Last time you cried and why:Idk
164: Do you have long or short hair?It's medium but I wants it to be long again I miss it being long even if it's a lot of work
165: Longest your hair has ever been:past my chest
166: Why do you like, dislike, or have neutral feelings about religon?I say if something helps people and doesn't harm others in their lives let them. 
167: Do you really care how the universe and world was created?Not that much TBH
168: Do you like to wear makeup?Yes
169: Can you stand on your hands or head for more than thirty seconds?Never tried but probably not