#a long

[thebestbobaflavour]

Here in the winter, we shed off our leaves Though seasons will change, my heart, love, it heeds For the warmth in your glance, in your lips, in your warm embrace

When we break a branch, we'll shake off the splinters 'Cause wounds, love, they fade, and add to our shape

And rain will come to put out the fires, love And you'll remain my only desire, love 'Cause I am yours, and you are mine

[retellingthehobbit]

I went to read your comic on Ao3 and I noticed you'd started back in 2020. Aside from your clear and beautiful art progression, what can you tell me about the timeline of your comic?

Thank you! And yes, started this webcomic in January of 2020. “I sure hope nothing bad happens in 2020 that will hamper my ability to focus on a large personal project!” — me in January 2020 with all the naivety of youth. Top ten images taken minutes before disaster. This comic is like a deeply personal diary of my mental state, complete with the long empty hiatuses that are sort of like that part of Twilight where months of depression are represented by blank pages.

One of my favorite things about webcomics is how you can often see an artist’s style grow organically over time. I think it’s something that’s getting lost in the age of “Webtoon Originals,” where people are starting to expect webcomics to be produced by an actual production studio with a team of artists behind them and to maintain a consistent highly curated art style throughout. These professionally funded comics are fun, but they do lose the messy personal organic growth that used to separate webcomics from traditional print comics? But i could go on a whole tirade about webtoon haha 😂 !

The Hobbit is partially a story about someone learning how to express themselves. Bilbo starts the story as this stuffy little guy who is repressing a lot his own personality; he ends the story as a skilled artist writing elaborate prosy poetry about his adventures. I deliberately chose to start drawing the comic before I went to college, knowing my art style would change a lot of over that period!

Anyway here's the timeline as I remember it: Pre-development: I was working on sketches of the comic itself as early as 2016. Chapter 1 (A Bedtime Story/Tooks and Bagginses): (Posted on Tumblr in January 2020, on Ao3 later): Published shortly before I went to college. I was drawing in Paint Tool Sai, and hand-writing all the words instead of using a font. I set out to adapt at least the Unexpected Party chapter, but thought I'd probably adapt the entire novel within a year or two. ("It's a webcomic Michael. How long could it take? twelve months?") Chapter 2: (A Very Respectable Hobbit): Posted like a week after Chapter 1. This was when I still thought I could post a ten page chapter every week, haahahahahahahahahaha Fs in the chat.

HIATUS #1: DANCE BREAK: TIME FOR A GLOBAL PANDEMIC. The exact timeline of 2020 is a blur for obvious reasons, but I do remember the updates became very sporadic over this period. Chapter 3-5 (Very Old Friends and An Unexpected Party chapters): there’s a global pandemic. During Spring Break my college abruptly kicks us all off campus and sends us home. I keep looking at the “post dates” on these chapters like what??? Really? I posted that at thAt time? But there was a global pandemic happening and I was so busy and overwhelmed with college???? When did I have the time? I have no memory of drawing these. My memories of all 2020 are so blurry. I think these chapters just manifested spontaneously.

The weekly/biweekly update schedule has been tossed to the wind, never to return. Alas. Chapter 6 (An Enormously Important Dwarf, aka Thorin’s intro): I was back “at college” during our “hybrid” year, so in practice I was extremely isolated. this was posted during a year after the first chapter, in 2021. I would never have found the motivation to continue if I wasn't so excited to draw Thorin! I also joined a "comic club" at my college which was comprised mainly of awkward video calls with like three people. On a weirder note, this chapter was posted a few weeks after the January 6th attempted coup. I was drawing in a a weird headspace.

DANCE BREAK #2: IT’S TIME FOR A YEAR LONG HIATUS:

I've started to often dislike the word “burnout” when it’s applied to art. It implies that the problem is that you were drawing too much or that you can’t find inspiration, when often the problem is much bigger than your art-- it's wider economic anxieties and social circumstances outside your control. It is very hard to think clearly and create things when you are worried about your future, about work, about housing, about a global pandemic, about constant demands on your time, and about being extremely isolated. In hindsight, I wasn’t “burned out”— I was in a situation where I could not think clearly or produce anything. Chapter 7 (The Lonely Mountain): posted a full year after chapter 6. For a while I considered having this be the “last chapter” of the comic!

Changing art styles was a thing I was really motivated to do, and was my last “bucket list” item for the comic.

HIATUS #3: I get really busy with junior year of college! I grow more and more disillusioned with Tolkien as I learn more about The Hobbit Law crushing labor unions and worker's rights in New Zealand, and how Amazon takes advantage of that. The Tolkien Estate also releases a statement saying they disapprove of any unauthorized use of Tolkien's works for profit or not, which isn't really legally enforceable but is also just an act of pure contempt XD. Chapter 8 (A Tangled Web): I get sent to the emergency room in an ambulance for Reasons and begin drawing this in the weeks after, as I realize I don't care about the Tolkien Estate or Amazon or Warner Brothers or whatever hollow marketable products they produce under the tolkien brand. I think this is the weakest chapter of the comic, both in writing and art, and in hindisght think the comic works better without it pacing-wise. However!!!! I was drawing it in a weird mental state, so. XD

Also, at this point I am drawing entirely in Photoshop. Chapter 9 (Ash and Smoke): Back at college for senior year— time for dragon! The comic starts updating with something that resembles a "regular schedule!" this year had more and more people on campus in person, and I started to slowly make college friends :). Also, at this point I am the President of the comic club, and we are now meeting in person and rebuilding our comic empire. Chapter 10 (The Heart of the Mountain): Some funky bits of writing I'd like to revise at some point, but I enjoy the art in this chapter. Chapter 11 (Polite Nothings): If I were to do this all again I'd shorten this chapter and combine it with chapter 12. One important note is that originally, I tried to keep all chapters under ten pages. This made it easier to post them to Instagram and Tumblr, because tumblr still had a “ten image limit” at the time. However at some point I realized that was more trouble than it was worth, and really made the pacing difficult/slow as I struggled to split the story into ten page chunks.

A lot of webcomics often fall into what I call a “wheel-spinning” phase, where the author is so focused on finishing smaller updates that they lose the pacing of the larger narrative—- and so the story stalls out. I feel like I dealt with a lot of “wheel-spinning” while I was at college, both in my life and in my comic XD. Chapter 12 (The Quest): My internship company gives me an offer to work full-time, which I accept. in the last semester of my last year of college, I take the most helpful elective class I have ever taken: a class on using 3D models in blender to aid with blocking out illustrations. This is the first chapter where you see one of those backgrounds! From this point on my background art will improve dramatically. I also have lots of internet friends and college friends!

As I grow more confident in my art I also make the decision to change the character designs, something I’d wanted to do for a while. Chapter 13 (The Necromancer): I graduate college! It's time for some Lotte Reiniger art. I stay in my student housing until my lease ends. The art starts to grow more elaborate as I have more time to spend on it. Chapter 14 (Terms and Conditions): my summer is free, so I spend it drawing gay little hobbits. I move up North to live with my grandmother until my work start date. This is the very last “normal-sized” chapter of the comic, where I hold myself to keeping it under 10 pages. I also think this is where my new more elaborate character designs actually start to look a lot better XD.

I was finishing up apartment-hunting at this time, so both Bilbo and I were goin over contract terms. Chapter 15 (Unattached): summer free time!! More gay little hobbits. I move into my New apartment and sleep on an air mattress for a while. I have a lot of time to draw and the art gets far more complex; this chapter was also twice as long as my usual chapters. I am still proud of this chapter, honestly, even though it's gotten less attention than Chapter 16/17-- it's one I'd been excited to draw for a while. A lot of this chapter was drawn on my beautiful powerful beloved air mattress. Air mattress, my beloved. Chapter 16 (the Song of the Lonely Mountain): I start my new job! I get a BED. Lots of exciting things are happening. I was really excited to draw and post this chapter, because it’s one id been dreaming about drawing from the beginning-- it was surreal to see it "posted" because part of me never thought I'd get this far. I even started a tiktok and posted the chapter there, certain that people would enjoy it. However, tiktok basically ignored it, alas! This is why tumblr is the only social media site. Chapter 17: I continue my new job. My roommate surprises me with the news that they will move out at the end of our lease, making me realize that months have somehow passed. I make a post asking for anyone looking for roommates in Milwaukee to contact me via dms (that offer is still open, if you’re looking to move here in early June.) I privately am very confused about why anyone would ever want to leave a comfortable settled home to go off on an adventure and then realize that I am behaving exactly like pre-quest Bilbo Baggins.

Chapter 18: the chapter I am working on now!!! Another chapter I have been excited to draw forever!! It’ll feature studio-Ghibli-inspired backgrounds, exciting landscape art, and so much fun! I’ve also started a Patreon where, if you want to see “one page a week” instead of “twenty pages every Mystery number of Months” you can subscribe there. (The first page of Chapter 18 has already been posted!)

But yeah! The TL:DR:

I think the moral of all this (to me) is that it’s hard to make art if you’re just not in a position to do it, and you have to allow yourself time to grow and change as a person XD. Sometimes you need to spend a few years thinking and getting better before you're ready to go on an Adventure. I started this comic when I was very Young and Naive to the Ways of the World. The quality (and dips in quality) reflect my wildly fluctuating mental/emotional states while trying to draw each chapter in the midst of a global pandemic. My art has improved a lot lately, and I think a large part of it is really just being in a situation where I *can* improve— having a decent job, not being in the middle of a global pandemic with no vaccine in sight, not needing to live in constant fever-pitch anxiety, having friends, etc etc. I am completely different person now than I was while drawing chapter 1.

Not to be dramatic, but I think you can see there’s a lot more joy in the recent chapters than there is in some of the older ones. It's weird to look at your art and realize you've gotten happier. XD

[naked-covered-in-bees]

i've been watching misha and jensen panel videos for like 3 hours and now i just feel like i did way too much cocaine.

[lamunefrappe]

角のハンサム　Horned Handsome

LZ: The order for the "horned handsome"...Eh? Whose?

DT: For you?

XH: I work here

[rhythmicreverie]

In the stars' grand cosmic ballet, A lost sibling, once anew, Brought chaos in this family play. Dark forces clashed, and light prevailed, As love and strength redefined the tale.

[boinky-doinky]

I am never gonna finish this 😭😭😭 the dude with all the piercings is Hyde and the nerd with the glasses is Aaron. If you’d like to know more please feel free to ask 😏😏😏 I love to yap

[youhavethewrong]

by @beetlemoses

[marvelsmostwanted]

There are people – some in my own Party – who think that if you just give Donald Trump everything he wants, he’ll make an exception and spare you some of the harm. I’ll ignore the moral abdication of that position for just a second to say — almost none of those people have the experience with this President that I do. I once swallowed my pride to offer him what he values most — public praise on the Sunday news shows — in return for ventilators and N95 masks during the worst of the pandemic. We made a deal. And it turns out his promises were as broken as the BIPAP machines he sent us instead of ventilators. Going along to get along does not work – just ask the Trump-fearing red state Governors who are dealing with the same cuts that we are. I won’t be fooled twice.

I’ve been reflecting, these past four weeks, on two important parts of my life: my work helping to build the Illinois Holocaust Museum and the two times I’ve had the privilege of reciting the oath of office for Illinois Governor.

As some of you know, Skokie, Illinois once had one of the largest populations of Holocaust survivors anywhere in the world. In 1978, Nazis decided they wanted to march there.

The leaders of that march knew that the images of Swastika clad young men goose stepping down a peaceful suburban street would terrorize the local Jewish population – so many of whom had never recovered from their time in German concentration camps.

The prospect of that march sparked a legal fight that went all the way to the Supreme Court. It was a Jewish lawyer from the ACLU who argued the case for the Nazis – contending that even the most hateful of speech was protected under the first amendment.

As an American and a Jew, I find it difficult to resolve my feelings around that Supreme Court case – but I am grateful that the prospect of Nazis marching in their streets spurred the survivors and other Skokie residents to act. They joined together to form the Holocaust Memorial Foundation and built the first Illinois Holocaust Museum in a storefront in 1981 – a small but important forerunner to the one I helped build thirty years later.

I do not invoke the specter of Nazis lightly. But I know the history intimately — and have spent more time than probably anyone in this room with people who survived the Holocaust. Here’s what I’ve learned – the root that tears apart your house’s foundation begins as a seed – a seed of distrust and hate and blame.

The seed that grew into a dictatorship in Europe a lifetime ago didn’t arrive overnight. It started with everyday Germans mad about inflation and looking for someone to blame.

I’m watching with a foreboding dread what is happening in our country right now. A president who watches a plane go down in the Potomac – and suggests — without facts or findings — that a diversity hire is responsible for the crash. Or the Missouri Attorney General who just sued Starbucks – arguing that consumers pay higher prices for their coffee because the baristas are too “female” and “nonwhite.” The authoritarian playbook is laid bare here: They point to a group of people who don’t look like you and tell you to blame them for your problems.

I just have one question: What comes next? After we’ve discriminated against, deported or disparaged all the immigrants and the gay and lesbian and transgender people, the developmentally disabled, the women and the minorities – once we’ve ostracized our neighbors and betrayed our friends – After that, when the problems we started with are still there staring us in the face – what comes next.

All the atrocities of human history lurk in the answer to that question. And if we don’t want to repeat history – then for God’s sake in this moment we better be strong enough to learn from it.

I swore the following oath on Abraham Lincoln’s Bible: “I do solemnly swear that I will support the constitution of the United States, and the constitution of the state of Illinois, and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of Governor .... according to the best of my ability.

My oath is to the Constitution of our state and of our country. We don’t have kings in America – and I don’t intend to bend the knee to one. I am not speaking up in service to my ambitions — but in deference to my obligations.

If you think I’m overreacting and sounding the alarm too soon, consider this:

It took the Nazis one month, three weeks, two days, eight hours and 40 minutes to dismantle a constitutional republic. All I’m saying is when the five-alarm fire starts to burn, every good person better be ready to man a post with a bucket of water if you want to stop it from raging out of control.

Those Illinois Nazis did end up holding their march in 1978 – just not in Skokie. After all the blowback from the case, they decided to march in Chicago instead. Only twenty of them showed up. But 2000 people came to counter protest. The Chicago Tribune reported that day that the “rally sputtered to an unspectacular end after ten minutes.” It was Illinoisans who smothered those embers before they could burn into a flame.

Tyranny requires your fear and your silence and your compliance. Democracy requires your courage. So gather your justice and humanity, Illinois, and do not let the “tragic spirit of despair” overcome us when our country needs us the most.

Sources:

• NBC Chicago & J.B. Pritzker, Democratic governor of Illinois, State of the State address 2025: Watch speech here | Full text

• Betches News on Instagram (screencaps)

[ducktollers]

🐊🐊🐊🐊🐊

[kensatou]

you're doing amazing sweetie KPOP DEMON HUNTERS (2025)

bonus:

[santapau]

New Secret Knots comic: "Cryptid".

[crabussy]

need everyone to know that the artist who created this iconic artwork:

is STILL creating wolf art TO THIS DAY. TEN YEARS LATER. proof that the world is beautiful. her username is wolfroad! you can find her art right here, and here are a few of her more recent pieces that I absolutely adore:

[lrndvs]

compliments from girls go hard

[piedpip3rrr]

What is this? A crossover episode???

[thankstothe]

folk hero really