#Tad Mulholland

[bone-stealing-horse]

recently I was rewatching Kipo and The Age of Wonderbeasts and I remembered a friend of mine likes water bears.

Allow me to introduce: Mulholland!

[cottonspridet]

No hay contexto, solo dibujos que hice a las cinco de la mañana, ¿Les gusta el ship?

[bed-wed-behead-your-fave]

Tad mulholland from Kipo and the Age of the Wonderbeasts

[seanhowe]

“Sleight of Hand”  Illustration by Haruo Miyauchi accompanying “The CIA’s Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test” by Tad Szulc, Psychology Today, November 1977

"When its field agents reported problems in handling LSD for secret tests, the CIA hired a New York magician, John Mulholland, for advice on how to improve their skills. He was to prepare a manual of tricks for slipping drugs into the drinks of unsuspecting test subjects."

[kakusu-shipping]

🏳️‍🌈 for shirokuma :D or if you want to, any other character in the bear polycule!

YEEEEEEAH QUEER BEARS!!!!

Sense this is the only ask I've gotten so far for this I'll just do the whole polycule because I love them all and haven't talked about them in forever

Shirokuma - He/She, Bigender, Biromantic Lesbian

Monokuma - He/It/They, Trans Man, Demiromantic Gay

Mr. Grizz - He/Him, Trans Man, Bisexual

Funtime Freddy (Funfetti) - He/They/Neos, Trans Masc, Pansexual

Toy Freddy (Teddy) - He/Him, Panromantic Asexual

Jackpot - He/It/Neos, Genderqueer, Omniromantic Asexual Queer

Tad Mulholland - Any Pronouns, They/Them (plural), Polygender, Queeromantic Asexual

Riri - They/Them, Non-Binary, Genderfluid, Bisexual

[pointlessjey]

Headcannon/fic ideaWhat if a mute the same species as Tad Mulholland shows up in las vistas post s3 but he is more like a mega in the way he acts. During this time this red Mulholland he captures good billions, Amy, Molly and cotton. In order to save them Kipo has to go into the dreams of each one and convince them of the dream world. Unfortunately the dream world is set before emelias cure meaning their loved ones are there with. One of these confrontations include being caught by Newton wolves

Aww no that's so bittersweet. Imagine Yumyan in Mollys dream. Imagine them not wanting to wake up and face reality because it hurts too much :(

[cattywh0mpus]

Hey yo happy gluttony day

I hope y’all are enjoying it with YOUR various loved ones! 💕

Now if you’ll excuse me I stayed up all night drawing this and it is 9am now and I will now very ironically sleep through the whole holiday. Fareweeeeelllllll

[fannishcodex]

Tad Mulholland: I have your daughter.

Jamack: I don’t have a daughter.

Tad Mulholland: She made me reevaluate my life choices and now I feel really bad, can you come pick her up?

Jamack: Oh my gods you have Kipo.

Tad Mulholland: I’m gonna become a painter.

[cartoon-connoisseur]

What do you mean this isn’t how it happened?

[adobe-outdesign]

I love Kipo because at one point one of the main characters just asks one of the main villains if he realizes he’s being a bitch-ass motherfucker and he’s like “wait really?? shit my bad dude” and then fucks off for the rest of the season

[theirisianprincess]

[keentall]

we love two living helpful animated water human things

[kakusu-shipping]

Grass and ghost for the pokemon asks (my two favorite types)!! For uh,,, your bears?

You🤝Me - Grass and Ghost types my beloved

💐Grass Type💐- Have you ever given each other flowers? If not, what kind would you want to give them? What type would they give you?

Out of all of them, Shirokuma and Tad Mulholland are the most likely to give flowers, and would be the most flattered by receiving them. They both love a classic romance.

It probably wouldn't be any fancy bouquet with flowers with meaning or anything like that, just random hand picked wild flowers they thought looked pretty.

👻Ghost Type👻- Who’s the easiest to scare? How do you think you would fare in a haunted house?

We're... probably a pretty hard bunch to scare, just because of the situation we're in. Shirokuma is the most likely to fake fear, just for a change to jump into my arms and be comforted, but he doesn't actually feel fear.. I'm not sure any of them do.

If we could go to a haunted house we'd all probably be fine. A few things might get Mulholland and I sense we can still be surprised, but nothing would actually scare us.

We'd probably get kicked out though, sense Funfetti and Jackpot wouldn't be able to stop themselves from getting in on the fun and causing issues for the attraction...

[sailormoonsub]

Ain’t that the guy who plays the new spider-man??

[kataow-titlecards]

07 | Mulholland

The friends stumble upon tardigrade dream-maker Tad Mulholland, who allows the gang to realize their bliss. But let's get real: It comes at a price.

[fannishcodex]

Unpopular Opinion Maybe: Kipo had an Identity Crisis in S1

More and more I honestly get bothered when people are all like “ooh Kipo wasn’t affected by being a mega mute lab experiment due to her parents experimenting on her it’s so refreshing compared to other cartoons LOL” because it’s completely glossing over season 1 where Kipo absolutely freaked out over her body suddenly physically changing and suddenly looking like a mute for no apparent reason. Tad Mulholland gave her a dream that was largely about this, Wolf almost left her over this. Kipo was absolutely affected by this, it absolutely caused an identity/existential crisis for her, it absolutely freaked her out.

Kipo absolutely freaked out when her body started growing fur and exhibiting other extreme physical changes and showed indications she was somehow suddenly changing into a mute for no apparent reason. (This in no way indicates she ever harbored serious anti-mute feelings. This is literally about her body suddenly physically changing for no apparent reason.) So much of Tad Mulholland’s dream reflects her anxiety and yes, angst, about these sudden physical changes. Kipo’s allowed to get upset when her body suddenly starts physically changing and she has no idea why; and it’s happening on top of an already stressful situation where she’s separated from her father and the rest of her people in a world that’s still brand new to her and filled with as many dangers as wonders, etc. Kipo again has angst, or is reasonably upset over the whole thing when Wolf realizes she seems to be part mute and seemingly lied about it, and apparently rejects her for it; Kipo pours out her sadness and frustration and emotional turmoil to Jamack, who comforts her, and of course Jamack couldn’t comfort her if Kipo wasn’t upset or had angst and an identity crisis.

Kipo’s not automatically a cheerful sunflower all the time. She’s largely positive because she makes a concentrated effort to be (for example, Kipo does seem tired and ready to leave Jamack, but she decides to go back for him). Kipo’s an actual character with feelings and should be allowed to experience all emotions, even angst, because she should be allowed to get upset.

The only “refreshing,” actually different thing about this is the order--Kipo freaked out and had an identity crisis and angst when she got signs of an extreme change in her body before she learned the truth behind why this was happening.

I’d argue Kipo’s reaction is more about being so relieved to finally get some kind of answer for why her body’s been physically changing that she doesn’t try to challenge it too much, and that she’s also in denial about the gravity of the situation when she gets the revelation about what her parents did to her, and she also ends up pressured by time crunch/emergencies and just pushes her actual feelings over this aside because there’s no time. Kipo learns what her parents did to her, and then has a like a week to save her dad and her people before Scarlemagne’s coronation. Kipo really doesn’t have time to fully process the revelation; she has to focus more on using her mega mute jaguar powers for the practical use of saving her father and people, not actually take the time to really consider how she really feels about them and what her parents did to her.

And even when she’s just focused on practically using her mega mute jaguar powers, Kipo is in fact stressing and angsting over it. She may say she’s fine and express enthusiasm for her mega mute jaguar abilities and act impressed with what her parents did, but her mega mute jaguar abilities do adversely affect her whether she directly admits it or not. In the Deatherstalker episode, Kipo does show signs of the emotional pressure her mega mute status has put on her; with these mega mute powers, she has the power to help her dad and her people, so she keenly feels she has to, she feels responsible for this and probably feels that there’s no one else she can really turn to fully take this burden (of course she loves her dad and people and wants to protect them, and of course this is an all ages show with a number of kid protagonists, but still, she just turned 13, and lived a pretty normal, safe Burrow life until her home was attacked), and she stresses over suddenly being asked to successfully do a thing she’s never done before; Kipo gets super freaked out when her mega mute powers accidentally hurt Benson; and of course the Chevre Sisters have warned Kipo that she can lose her mind if she fully transforms, and much of the season is devoted to making sure that doesn’t happen. And later Kipo gets a concrete example of that threat when she learns her mother has been entirely absent in her life because she’s lost her mind to a mega mute transformation for 13 years and was also under Emilia’s control. (And while this probably needs its own post, to sum up: a lot of this is also again Song and Lio’s fault because of their experimenting, Song exposed herself to mutation, Emilia’s the worst but it doesn’t seem like she would weaponize Song if Song didn’t turn herself into a mega mute monkey susceptible to puppet pheromones torturously taken from Hugo.)

While it’s nice feeling like you’re seeing something new and refreshing, I feel like sometimes people fall into overly reactionary trends and don’t look at things on an individual basis or think of characters as their own individuals. Maybe people want to think it’s refreshing that Kipo’s not affected or not having angst over being a mute lab experiment due to her parents (but again, she has been affected by this) because they’re comparing this to other cartoons, but what about Kipo as a character herself and the show as its own story?

I also actually think the idea of Kipo getting upset over this makes more sense than many other cartoons and has much more impact, because her situation is actually really severe when you think about what the story’s done so far in terms of events.

I’ll probably do another separate “unpopular opinion” post on this, but to sum up: Lio and Song unnecessarily experimented on baby Kipo without her consent and pushed their own ambitions of “making the surface safe for humans” on her, also without her consent. It was canonically a dangerous experiment because they failed to realize Kipo could’ve lost her mind and been stuck as a mega mute, something that did happen to Song for 13 years; Song was accidentally mutated, and again the side effects were gravely underestimated because Song had a dramatic transformation where she not only lost her mind but destroyed the DNA Burrow, and Kipo could’ve been killed in that accidental rampage (and Hugo/Scarlemagne was literally scarred from it, he suffered literal physical damage from it--which also implies worse than injuries and physical scars could’ve happened).

I’ve read some people essentially say “well, not every cartoon has to get this emotional, it could just be cheerful,” and that just makes me think 1) then a cartoon should be written so that the more 24/7 cheerful tone fits, and 2) there are several cartoons you can already watch that don’t get so emotional. Just deal with the cartoons that do choose to be emotional, because cartoons can have a wide variety. 

And I don’t think KATAOW is the place to pull “oh haha she’s not affected by all this even though it’s super messed up because let’s be just different from others and not think about our own story and cast we’ve just gotta go against an apparent so-called trend without laying down the groundwork to actually support that reactionary rejection of an apparent so-called trend.”

And I do really hope and still think that on some level the show is actually gonna pull through and address this and do something really neat. Because while Kipo acts like she’s fine with what her parents did to her, again there was her severe freak-out in season 1 when faced with actual consequences of what they did and with no one to give her any explanation for what the hell was happening, and there are her struggles with her experimental mega mute jaguar side in season 2; and just as importantly, Wolf and Benson seem alarmed by what Lio and Song did. I think that’s critical. Even if Wolf and Benson aren’t explicit about it, it’s pretty clear that they look uncomfortable with what they learn from the Project Kipo notebook, even if they’re more focused on going along with Kipo’s cheer. I just feel like that will be followed up in season 3.

And it’s a 3-season show. Writers have said that they have told a complete story with the show over 3 seasons. I can imagine that in season 3 they’ll follow up on this in some way and better challenge what Lio and Song did and let Kipo finally freak out over what her parents did, as much as she freaked out by herself in season 1.

Because that also gets to me. As things stand now, Lio and Song have avoided the worst of the direct emotional fallout of what they did to Kipo. They did not get to see their daughter have a gradual meltdown over the sudden changes in her body, her confusion and emotional turmoil and fear that her friend-sister Wolf rejected her over the whole thing. Kipo’s only ever acted like “it’s fine” to them about it. And I find that really unfair, especially to Kipo. She should get to be upset, she should get to be upset with her parents and make them better realize the consequences of what they actually did to her. Lio and Song should also just deal with even more consequences. 

P.S. I also don’t really buy the half mute/half human as mixed race metaphor because it’s too deeply rooted in scientific experimentation on babies without any possible consent (and Kipo is already actually mixed race with a Black father and a Korean mother), and I have more thoughts on what it’s more about and its potential as a more unique story that’s specifically tied to the world of KATAOW, but I think that’s another post too.