#and I LOVE the little tweaks in everybody's designs

[jamiebluewind]

Oh no... new bainrot dropped

The character designers cooked 😖💜✨

[strangererotica]

EXPLICIT CONTENT | MINORS DNI

Springtrap x Reader | Summary: Your uncle has asked you to keep watch over his new investment, Fazbear Frights, and the vintage artifacts his attraction contains. When you begrudgingly accept his offer, things take a turn for the weirder. An encounter in your dreams with a yellow rabbit changes you…for better, or worse?

Heads up: This fic is not for everybody, and that’s okay! It’s a fucked-up fever dream and if the summary intrigues you, come along for the ride. If not, that’s okay too. Things get heavy here. There’s monsterfucking, dream sex, vaginal penetration, some choking, fear, lust, disgust, basically a whole grab bag of fuckery, so if that’s your thing, read on, dear deviant 🫵♥️ PS the end is kind of fire, I love a good twist!!!

To be honest, you thought the idea of opening a theme park ‘attraction,’ based on the mysterious disappearances of children was fucked up. But your uncle was convinced there was a market for such a sick endeavor, that an audience existed whose search for thrills and chills would have them willing to shed money for a chance at experiencing horrific local nostalgia.

Because really, who wouldn’t want to relive the tragedy of multiple kids going missing? You were being sarcastic, of course. But part of that sarcasm stemmed from genuine bewilderment. What was your uncle thinking when he formed the concept of Fazbear Frights? He’d always been into horror as a genre, but as far as you’d understood, his interest was confined to books and film, not true crime. And if the subject matter of the Freddy’s story had involved the tragic disappearance of local adults, maybe Fazbear Frights wouldn’t have bothered you as much as it did. But kids had gone missing, lives had been upended, and your uncle was about to make a profit off of their heartache.

The worst part of all? You’d accepted his offer to work there. The cost of life after college was kicking your ass; you could barely afford your rent as it was, working two part-time jobs. Money was more than tight; you needed extra cash wherever you could find it. And besides, the Fazbear Frights gig would only last a couple of weeks, just until the attraction opened. Your uncle’s job offer had been to monitor the security of the place overnight, with generous pay promised. You couldn’t understand why he’d be willing to pay someone to guard a bunch of creepy old relics from an abandoned pizza parlor, or why additional security was necessary when the theme park itself already had an overnight guard? Your uncle maintained that additional security was needed, and that he only trusted family with the responsibility of protecting such an important investment as his precious, twisted attraction…

Entering Fazbear Frights, your first impression is that it’s really fucking ugly. Granted, it’s supposed to look old fashioned, and maybe the building’s creepiness is simply proof of good set design. However, a sense of unease lingers in your stomach, and you’re almost positive it’s caused by something beyond the decor. The attraction is fully furnished, but won’t open for a couple more weeks while the finishing touches on lighting and sound are tweaked. Those changes are made during the day, when at least a little sunlight can be seen filtering in through the windows, reminding you there’s life outside. For your part, working the night shift, the dark building makes you feel secluded and more than a little creeped out.

You have a flashlight, and mostly functional electricity running through the building. But there’s still much to be desired in the way of making the attraction feel…not haunted. And it occurs to you that that’s the word which describes how you’re feeling: haunted. The hairs on your skin are standing at attention, a cold sweat clinging to the back of your neck, but why? Obviously the setting is creepy, but it’s meant to be. You’re usually comfortable around spooky decor. It’s not as if you’re a scared kid wandering the halls of a haunted house alone…but that’s how you this place makes you feel…

It’s getting late. An outdated digital clock (probably a relic from the late eighties itself) on the desk in front of you reads 3 AM. You shiver as yet another cold breeze whispers past your shoulders. You look around, studying the vintage posters on the wall, wondering how much money your uncle threw away in order to call these scraps his own. The figures staring back at you look menacing, despite their wide smiles. They’re called animatronics, you remember. That’s how your uncle had referred to them. You also recall his mentioning one animatronic in particular, a Freddy’s original he’d managed to get his hands on and would be bringing to Fazbear Frights. You haven’t seen it yet, and to be totally honest, you’re not sure you want to. If the animatronic your uncle purchased looks anything like the ones in the posters you’re staring at, you’d prefer to never encounter such a creature…

Re-entering the theme park feels like walking through the gates of Hell. You’d rather be anywhere else than here. Another night of spending six hours alone in the gloomy replica of a literal crime scene has your stomach twisting. And you didn’t sleep well, either. Your dreams had been too vivid to allow you rest. You’d dreamed of a monster, or something that could certainly be called one…a massive, towering figure with patchy, mustard-yellow fur clinging to its skeletal frame. It resembled a rabbit, or had, at some point long ago. While still maintaining the general shape of a rabbit, its appearance had decayed, warping its cuddly features into something ugly. Its eyes were cold gray orbs that rested deep in its oversized, vacant skull, tendons and ligaments intertwined with wires that wrapped its skeleton, which you later realized, was comprised of metal rather than bone.

Your senses had been particularly keen in the dream. The rabbit’s scent was stale, yet comfortingly nostalgic. It reminded you of an old quilt your grandmother had once given you from the bottom of her dresser drawer, which smelled of love and other ancient, homemade things. She’d wrapped you up inside it, with kisses and promises that the chilly winter night wouldn’t be as cold now, that the quilt had been waiting there in the dresser for years, waiting for someone who needed it…

The rabbit’s fur was coarse, your skin a soft contrast when you wrapped your arms around its waist. It felt like the outdoor carpet that had lined your parents’ back porch, which your feet and rain had pelted countless Summer nights. The rabbit’s fur was cool to the touch, moist with something bittersweet, a musky blend of old books with yellowed pages, their corners turned down and words lined in pencil…

And against your lips, that was also his taste, his tongue the flavor of nostalgia, his large, unbearably strong hands crushing your body against his like he intended to make love to and ruin you all at once. Whether or not he consisted of machine or animal, he was more human than anything else, fully formed with the parts needed to bring you to a state of rapture. He held you suspended, your legs around his waist, fucking up into you with more vigor than his decayed appearance would suggest him capable of. You clutched his back, and then his ears, locking your fingers around them and bracing for impact as each of his mechanical, brutal thrusts punched inside you with a machine’s precision…

You’d woke up in a state of climax, your body drenched with sweat. The sheet beneath you had been ripped from the mattress, balled into tight fists. Your chest heaved, your bare breasts glistening with perspiration. Your cunt was pulsing, fluttering with the aftershocks of a powerful orgasm. Arousal dripped down your quivering thighs, onto the mattress which was soaking wet beneath you.

A shower and breakfast had done little to calm the questions racing through your mind. What the hell was that? Your dreams were rarely as vivid, as visceral, as the one about the rabbit. And as for the sex…it had been the best sex you’d had in a dream, ever. And it had been with what must surely have been a monster…

You hope your six hours at Fazbear Frights will go quickly tonight, partially because you’re still a little unsteady and aroused from your dream this morning. Additionally, you’re looking forward to sleep, because maybe the rabbit will be waiting for you when you close your eyes, again?

Unexpectedly, your uncle meets you at the staff entrance of Fazbear Frights. He seems excited about something, and you’re grateful for a distraction from your thoughts of the rabbit. “Hey kid,” your uncle greets you with a friendly wave. “How’d it go last night?”

“Alright,” you reply. “It’s a little creepy in there, but that’s the point, isn’t it?”

You don’t miss the subtle gleam in your uncle’s eyes, revealing how pleased he is that his attraction is having its desired effect. “That’s right,” he says cheerfully. “Gotta give the people what they want. And what they want-.” He turns his key in the lock and pulls the door open for the two of you. “-Is the authentic Freddy Fazbear experience. Which is why I’m here tonight.” He lets you step past him into the building, and locks the door behind you both. “-To show you the part of my collection that’ll really have people talking. We just brought him in today-you’ve got to see him…”

You grimace visibly. “It’s the fucking animatronic, isn’t it?” you groan, and your uncle rolls his eyes.

“Yes it is, sourpuss,” he teases. “And trust me when I tell you, it’s gonna make this place really feel like Freddy’s, like you’re stepping inside a time capsule or something.”

Your uncle led you down a hallway to one of the doors marked STAFF ONLY . “He’s showing his years of course,” your uncle continued, searching his ring for a different key. “I mean, this animatronic sat abandoned for thirty years; of course he’s gonna look a little rough around the edges.”

Your uncle finds the appropriate key and jiggles it inside the lock. “But just knowing that we, Fazbear Frights, have our hands on the one and only Spring Bonnie-.” He sighs proudly. “-It reminds me how much all of this was worth it, y’know? Now that he’s here, back in his element. Where he belongs.”

Your eyebrow lifts in curiosity; you resist the urge to laugh in your uncle’s face. “You do realize you sound just a little bit crazy, right?” you question him. “Talking about this thing like it’s a real person or something. Don’t tell me-.” You lean in, whispering. “-You talk to it sometimes, don’t you?”

Your uncle pauses before whispering back, “yeah, but, the only time I really feel crazy is when he responds…”

You giggle at that, watching while your uncle pulls the door open wide. “Here he is, (Y/N),” your uncle declares, beaming in the doorway. “The yellow rabbit himself. Spring Bonnie in the flesh-err, I mean, fur…”

For a moment, you assume you must be dreaming. Because you find yourself looking at the exact same rabbit from your dream this morning. He looks different, sat on the floor, leaning against the far wall; but it’s unmistakably him. Your uncle watches your expression, slightly confused. “Is he really that scary?” he asks, his voice hopeful.

You take a step forward, curiosity overriding your apprehension. The rabbit is large, just as large as he was in your dream. Even seated on the floor, you can tell his height is substantial. Tentatively, you reach for the rabbit’s face, stroking his musty-scented fur tenderly.

“D-be careful!” your uncle frets behind you, adding, “that thing was very expensive-be gentle with him-,” but his concerns aren’t necessary. You know this rabbit…intimately well. And once you’re alone with him again, you’ll make sure to take excellent care not to damage him in your…exertion…

“What did you say his name was?” you ask, gazing into the rabbit’s steely eyes. Your uncle clears his throat, obviously perplexed by the care you seem to feel for a decaying animatronic you had no interest in seeing only moments ago. “Uh, Bonnie,” he replies. “Spring Bonnie.”

“Bonnie,” you repeat, allowing the word to sink over your tongue. “That means beautiful, doesn’t it?”

Your uncle nods, still confused, and glances at his watch. “Well, it’s just about midnight,” he says. “Time for me to head out. Come walk me to the door, will ya?” He pretends to shiver. “This place gives even me the creeps at night, to be totally honest.”

You choose to leave the rabbit (for now). “I’ll be back,” you whisper against his ear, quietly enough that your uncle doesn’t hear. He’s waiting for you in the doorway, a warm smile on his face, your fascination with the yellow rabbit a fleeting curiosity to him, and nothing more. Once you’re sure your uncle is gone, you exhale a sigh of relief. Locking the door behind you feels like sealing the world away completely; and in contrast to yesterday, that kind of isolation is now exactly what you want. Your heart thuds against your chest like a horse’s hooves, skipping beats as you turn for the hall.

You’ve bunched your skirt around your waist, your shoes clicking loudly in the empty hall. Heavy rain pelts the tin roof as you round the corner that leads to him. In the doorway, a tall, familiar figure stands. His gray eyes flash cold as steel, locking you in place at the opposite end of the hallway.

Thunder growls outside. The building’s electricity spits in and out, crackling around you like fireflies caught in a jar. Your heart’s in your throat, lips spreading into a wide smile. The hall goes dark, lit only by the steely gaze of the yellow rabbit...

…until suddenly, even his eyes disappear, and you’re left engulfed by an all-consuming darkness.

Lightning flashes, illuminating the hand reaching for you. Robotic, aluminum fingers draped with rotting yellow fur close around your throat, silencing the scream beneath them. The rabbit lifts you by the throat till you’re completely suspended, feet dangling limp and useless beneath you. His sour breath reeks of rotten meat and dried blood, the kind of smell that instinctively alerts you to danger. Your eyes roll back, surrender sinking over you as you accept your fate.

But as quickly as he seized you, the rabbit yields. You feel the cold, filthy tile meet your cheek as you land against it. Through gauzy vision, you make out the metallic feet of the rabbit standing before you, his endoskeleton clearly visible. He takes hold of your hair, and tugs you upright, holding you in place as your trembling legs cannot sustain you. His eyes bore deeply into yours, chortled breath leaving his mechanical chest in a slow, grotesque pant. When he speaks, your whole body shivers.

“You…” the rabbit murmurs, his wide jaw cracking, fleshy tendons stretching. The curdled timbre of his voice betrays the smile on his lips; the rabbit is glad to see you.

“How…long…” he snarls. “…has it been…?” He drags a thick, soiled finger across your cheek, the gesture unexpectedly tender. “…Since anyone desired me…?”

Your chest is heaving, conflicting emotions of every kind overwhelming you. A sick cocktail of fear and arousal throbs in your belly, keeping time with your pounding heart.

“P-please,” you stutter, tears bleeding down your cheeks. “Don’t h-hurt me…”

The rabbit tilts his head to the side, thinking. His hooded eyes wash over you, this tiny little creature in his hands, pleading mercy from him.

“Mmm,” the rabbit hums, his skeletal chest vibrating like a lion’s purr. “You think I’m a monster, don’t you?”

You gasp as his touch glides from your face to your chest, his big paw closing over your breasts. He groans at the feeling of your heartbeat thundering against his palm. “I’d forgotten,” he says. “How a woman’s pulse feels…the proof of her life, beating in the palm of my hand…”

With his other paw, the rabbit clutches the back of your head and draws you closer. The stench of rot, of horror and decay, cannot repulse you anymore…not when his tongue has breached the barrier of your lips, the thick, sinewy muscle undulating against your tongue in a wet bed of perversion. His bulky fingers lodge between your thighs. Immediately, you begin to grind against the textured fur, wetting his mechanical digits with your arousal.

Seized by a sudden courage, you lift your hips in a way that has you poised atop one of the rabbit’s fingertips, his damp appendage resting against your entrance. He obliges your silent request, allowing you to sink over his thick finger, taking him as far as you can.

The thunder inside you eclipses the storm outside. You moan filthy, disgusting praises as he pleasures you, all sense of fear long-abandoned in exchange for the fulfillment of your most hedonistic desires. His fat, coarse digit strokes you like it was made for you to ride, reaching places inside you no part of any man ever has. You’re going dumb on top of him, so dumb you don’t even notice when the rabbit gently eases you onto the ground.

He’s under you now, his back pressed against the wall, his paw of a hand still clutching your cunt, letting you use his fingers to get yourself off. A dark, satisfied chuckle rumbles up from his bony chest. “Just look at you,” he murmurs, his steely eyes heavy with lust. “Bouncing on my lap like a slutty little rabbit, aren’t you?”

His lewd words and husky tone send you over the edge. Your body convulses on top of him, the muscles at your core clenching around the rabbit’s touch, sucking his fat appendage rhythmically as you ride out your high…

“Fucking Christ!” A man’s voice bleats through the hallway like a frightened animal. You whip your head to see him, blinded instantly by the beam of his flashlight. He’s wearing a shirt that identifies him as the theme park’s security, and as your eyes follow up to his face, you’re met with the wide-eyed gaze of unfiltered horror staring back at you. His flashlight shakes wildly in his hand, catching the rabbit’s skeletal leg in its beam. Confusion sets over you…followed by shame. Because the rabbit is now as he was when you arrived there tonight…sat against a wall, unmoving and limp, no more than a broken machine overcome by decay. But unlike earlier, you’re now sat straddling the broken machine, your cum dripping down its tattered fur…your hands locked around one of the animatronic’s arms, lodging his hand between your thighs…one of his fingers buried deep inside your cunt…

The guard clears his throat; you force yourself to meet his eyes. “Th-there was a c-.” He clears his throat again, blinking to focus. “-County-wide power outage, miss…I knew you were um, keepin’ watch over the place for your uncle, and uh-.” He swallows, forcing his eyes from dropping to the place where your body and the animatronic are joined. “-I th-thought you might be spooked in here, alone-.” He glances at the rabbit, then back to you. “-in the dark…”

Frustrated tears burn at the corners of your eyes, your cheeks hot with humiliation. Carefully, you ease the rabbit’s finger out of your cunt, wincing as the metal scratches your skin. Somehow, it didn’t hurt before. You smooth your skirt down, concealing your nakedness but none of your shame.

Standing in the beam of the guard’s flashlight, you summon every bit of the (minimal) pride you have left to tell him, “thank you. That was very kind of you, to come check on me.”

He licks his lips nervously, eyes darting between you and the animatronic propped against the wall. His flashlight illuminates the perverse scene, revealing your cum still glistening on the rabbit’s fur. The fear in the guard’s expression has softened to a pitying disgust.

“I think it’s time for you to go home, miss,” he says. You wipe a tear from your cheek, glancing back at the animatronic one last time, before leaving Fazbear Frights (and your rabbit) behind, forever…

[kennys-parka-jacket]

1, 4, 9, 12 for fandom love game :3

list 3 positive things about your current fandom(s)

-It has been around for decades, which means there is a rich and interesting history surrounding the community.

-The way some fans take background characters with very little screentime and build them up into something unique and compelling which can stand on their own.

-Honestly just the fact that there is an active fandom with AUs and OCs and stuff for a media that everyone and their grandma knows about is really cool. You might be shocked by how common it is for well known media to just not have an active community; so that makes this fandom really special.

4. say something nice about a ship you don't ship (it can be another ship in your fandom, a mutual's OTP, etc)

Shout out to Kyle and Eric shippers for utilizing Eric's fat, letting Kyle go apeshit, and writing hot smut. Also red and green is a nice combination.

9. a ship that isn't your OTP but that you enjoy

For the sake of answering this, I'm gonna say that Kenny x Everybody is my OTP. So, non-Kenny ships I enjoy:

-Rebecca and Estella

-Kyle and Nichole

-Stan and Tolkien

-Carol and Stuart

-Mayor and Victoria

-Laura and Mrs. Tweak

-Kevin and Shelly

12. compliment someone else in your fandom

-She hasn't been active in a while, but @princessmarionette is always a delight to see on my dash or in my activity. Also she made what I consider to be THE BEST kenny comic EVER, like PLEASE go check it out.

-@butters-flower-mom has lots of lovely headcanons about Butters and is generally nice to talk to. The way she depicts Butters is so in-character that sometimes I wonder if she's secretly a writer working for SP Studios.

-@trans-dwightschrute has been nice to me and her AUs are fun to hear about.

-@mystqueerion has an endearing amd infectious love for kenny and marj.

-@muttsterion has been a professional kenny lover for over ten years and counting. This place would not feel the same without her. Also she puts awesome fan art and nature vids on my dash.

-@buttfrovski a kewl dude. I have officially run out of ways to say "he is nice to me and fun to talk to" lol. Also his art is really cool; the shapes are canon accurate and there's lots of little touches added to make his digital art look like it's made out of paper. He's also really good at making the SP kiddos look good in different poses, something that can be surprisingly difficult.

-@green-alien-turdz is one of those artists whose work I can always recognize from art style alone. Detailed backgrounds, uniquely unconventional designs for the characters, and lifelike atmospheres, really elevate his fan content to the next level.

-@cheylouwho is an archivist queen who has been in the community for a very long time. She is the organizer behind the re-animate project, the official forum archival, and much more.

[pucksrph]

𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚊𝚍𝚟𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚞𝚛𝚎 𝚣𝚘𝚗𝚎: 𝚋𝚊𝚕𝚊𝚗𝚌𝚎 𝚟𝚘𝚕 𝟷 — "𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚋𝚎 𝚐𝚎𝚛𝚋𝚕𝚒𝚗𝚜" 𝚜𝚝𝚊𝚛𝚝𝚎𝚛𝚜

from the first volume of the taz balance graphic novel! Some nsfw sprinkled about, i tweaked some of the lines from the original dialogue for better starter lines. change pronouns around if desired! if a multi, please specify muse !!

I have proficiencies in vehicles

Trust me, if the law hastles us, i’m the guy you want at the front of the wagon!

Bor-r-r-r-ing! No thank you, not for me.

I’m studying my cantrips!

Just say masterbating, we get it. “Don’t come in, mom! I’m studying my cantrips!”

It’s kinda tough to see… but I think shit has gone south.

I get the whole “wink wink you’re gonna be rich” vibe, but it came across as kinda murder-y.

Right! I’m… precepting…

Dude! You scared the bejeezus out of me!

Suck it up, because this is the way the game works.

It’s dangerous as hell out here, you better cowboy up.

Their warcry isn’t very creative…

I’m with you, my man! I’m always anti-tarrying! 

I guess we should go after him?

Nah, I’m good out here.

Well that sounds… nifty…?

So! How was the ominous clanking cavern?

I don’t want to talk about it.

That’s okay, I really didn’t give a shit.

Heckie darn, a cave in. Can’t get past that!

I would actually heartily recommend you turn around, this is not a great place for tourism.

Oh, excellent! I was just starting to establish a rapport!

To be fair, he wasn’t as cool as you were! 

Loooooook, my dude… I think we have gotten off on the wrong foot…

Everything’s chill my dude, prommy! 

See, now THAT’S impressive!

You weren’t kidding, you ARE dangerous! 

Smell you later! 

Oh, I’m gonna have to give you ten embarrassment points of damage… aaaaaaand ten psychic damage.

Wonderful! Now I got a pee stain!

Don’t you worry! I’m perfectly fine!

Is that… sniff sniff… roasting meat?

I need to take a knee after hawling your sorry ass…

You just HAD to go and shoot poor old [name], didn’t you? What’d he ever do to you?

Are you always so judgemental?

I’ll let you leave here alive if you do one teensy-tiny thing for me.

Hey, uh, I think this might be a trap.

Oh yeah, my dude, we’re killing everybody… Okay, maybe not kill everybody.

Gods, I love it when we plan shit out.

Okay, as you seriously going to try and befriend everything that tries to kill you?

YOU THREW MY WOLF IN THE FIRE! THAT WAS MY FAVORITE WOLF!

I cast CHILL THE FUCK OUT!

Why, it’s my dear friend, whatever-your-name-is!

Do you need any money? Can i just sort of give you everything i have?

Hey! Heeeyyyy, look at me. Look at this face. It’s [name], this is [name] talking. Would I lie to you?

All I want you to do is help me… and give me a little gold. Or maybe a moderate amount of gold. Or a lot. It’s really whatever you feel comfortable with.

You’ve cleaved the final gerblin! … Cleft? Cleavered? Clefted…? He’s fucking dead, alright? I’ll buy a thesaurus before the next battle. 

Boy! I wish I hadn’t needed to murder them! 

Save them? Before teatime? Never! 

[ name ], since we’re friends here — best friends, I would say! Lovers, maybe? Time will tell — what happened here?

Man, [ name ], when you charm someone, you charm the HELL out of them! 

Oh great, he’s a douche. [ name ] is a douche.

We’ve been wandering around here for two hours! 

We should have a map, a good ol’ adventuring map. It’s pretty standard operating procedure.

Whoever designed these caves has no sense of feng shui! 

Maybe she thinks your tractor is sexy, but you’re no longer welcome here!

[novastaar]

I messed around with Frog's design a bit (she does still have her hat, I just decided to draw them without it for once)

I got a suggestion to add stickers to her design, and I know this isn't what the person meant, but I just couldn't resist.

Looks like the Vegimals got into Peso's things! Oops! Frog loves the vegimals' silly antics, so they just let it happen

And now it's time for random info nobody asked for (Frog edition)!

After Tweak rebooted her, Frog had almost no memory of her past

They're slowly regaining her memory due to random experiences on the octopod

If you look closely, you can see little spiral patterns on to bottom of Frog's hands and feet. Those are little sticky suction pads that let her stick to smooth surfaces

Frog can turn her head 180° like an owl, and it always freaks everybody out

Frog can only feel very basic emotions, and simply doesn't understand more complex ones

Her frog hat was a gift from Peso's mom (my headcannon for her is that she used to knit scarfs and hats for Peso and his siblings when they were younger)

If they spend too much time in the water, her hand tends to lock closed when she grabs something, and she has to detach her whole arm and get Tweak to re-attatch it later

Tweak has done this MANY times

Kwazii likes to call her Tadpole or Taddy as a nickname

[imthepunchlord]

Do you think X and Y need to get a remake already?

Well, technically BW should be next but I'm also dreading it thanks to BDSP, and as Gen 5 was the peak of Pokemon's pixel art and thinking that it'll go 3D and it's up in the air how good it'll look... yeah I'm not that excited to see it.

But a remake of XY, I wouldn't quite want what they'd probably do, cause most likely it'll be a match for match remake but I want changes to XY.

The biggest thing I want for XY is for the story to be reworked up cause I wasn't satisfied with XY's story. Most enjoyment I got out of XY was enjoying traveling through Kalos, and it's frustrating cause I think if they had more time they could've had something better. Well, story for all of pokemon.

But like, I wanted to see Malva in Team Flare then get surprised to learn that this tough admin is ONE OF THE ELITE FOUR MEMBERS which like, bruh, you realize she's been holding back this whole time. Essentially toying with you and could've knocked out any time she wanted.

I wanted Team Flare to be funny. Like, how can they be designed to be so flamboyant and fashion oriented but nothing comedic was done with them. Thankfully Skull came next.

I wish Lysandre's reasoning was better or they did something to work off of it, cause he talks about how ugly the world is so it needs to be destroyed and remade to what he thinks is better and I'm just like

Kalos is beautiful and everybody is nice. Where is this coming from Lysandre? Maybe a good chunk of the League should've been made to be assholes in some shape or form. That could offer why Lysandre thinks Kalos sucks.

I also wish I got to see Lysandre getting the legendary, and that there was better build up of them cause it feels they're included last minute. And I wish poor Zygarde got included and more present and did something. Like, I enjoyed Rayquaza coming in to tell Groudon and Kyogre to calm the f down. I enjoyed Giratina arising and kidnapping Cyrus mid speech. Given the lore, Zygarde should've appeared.

I wish the "friends" were done better if they were a must to be included, they all seemed kinda pointless and a little annoying. I'm also annoyed that the rival gets pokemon but they don't show up on their team, like, what was the point of that if they're not used? They get one of the fossil mons, not on the team though. They and Shuana get a Kanto starter, not on their team though, so what's the point? Also RIP those 2 other boys, no starters for you!

...actually yeah, they didn't even get the Kalos starters. I guess Sycamore just has favorites, sorry guys.

I also question why the Kanto starters are even there, outside nostalgia. Like, if there were to be starters to be gifts to you, for sure Snivy and Piplup would've made sense given they're based on French royalty. That's why Serperior was one those gates.

I'd also want to see the Swords of Justice to appear in Kalos in some way given they're based on the famous French musketeers. Maybe they should've been the big legendaries here since Yveltal, Xerneas, and Zygarde don't really feel that tied to Kalos. Maybe them being hostile to humans could confirm Lysandre's views, and oh man, just imagine if you were dealing with Team Flare AND the Swords of Justice and you befriend Keldeo and through that friendship, Keldeo unlocked that power or evolved or whatever, and it shows the big three that oh, maybe there is something for human-pokemon relations and for things to be improved but Lysandre stays stubborn and things escalate, and the Swords of Justice work with you to stop Lysandre and save everyone.

I'd also hope to see Galar and Paldea a little incorporated into Kalos, either in pokemon, culture influence, and lore. Especially Paldea as it seems that was the region that Kalos went to war with a long time ago.

I also would love more mega evolution, but for it to be tweaked. Keep it for pokemon that need a boost of power and not popular mons who are already solid, with only exception being starters; which I am surprised that the Kalos starters didn't get megas. Uh, let mega evolving be more common and not restricted to late game and post game. Also really work off you get the ability through the bond, so you need your pokemon at a certain friendship point to mega evolve and can't just do it right away. And just call them mega stones. I always found the "insert pokemon name-ite" to be kinda silly.

But I also get why it's not being continued. It is a little bit of a shame cause that was my favorite of all the new gimmicks.

I'd also love to see regional variants for Kalos. Like, the dragon Torchic line I drew out, Kalos was the region I had in mind, with the Gallic Rooster as unofficial symbol of France (which might be why Torchic appears in XY), and I believe the cockatrice I tied it to is of French mythology. And in general, for every remake, I think it'd be a lot of fun if they updated the dex to include regional variants that could plausible exist there or make sense to.

Anyway, I'm not sure XY needs a remake now, but I do think it needs an overhaul, which I've heard that we were supposed to either get Z or XY2, but they got cut because there was no time to make it. Which, I do wish we did get Z because that third version is always the superior one, able to have more time and add more stuff in and make tweaks so it goes better, and XY I think needed those tweaks. It's a beautiful region and I like the dex a lot, but I didn't enjoy it for the story or characters. Most of them didn't even stick with me, nor could I remember their names.

Unfortuantely though, remake wise, Pokemon just likes to copy and paste typically, and if BDSP is going to be the new norm for pokemon remakes, it's a remake I don't want for XY, or BW.

[scarlet--wiccan]

Oh, and I really appreciate Pichelli's take on the new costume. This is no shade whatsoever to Dauterman, I love all of his work, but one of the first things I thought when I saw his new design for Wanda was a lot of artists are going to have a hard time drawing it. The hair is obviously going to be a technical challenge for some people, but I think there's a lot of awkwardness in the neckline and the shape of the shoulder cutouts, as well as the the way the bodice transitions from skintight materal to drapery at her waist. Even the proportion of the headpiece is a little unusual. It looks great when Russel draws it, but it might not fit well into everybody's style, especially those skinny little skirt panels. They do not lend themselves to dynamic movement.

Anyways, Pichelli tweaked it juuuuuuust enough and it looks great, and moves really well, in all the interiors. And I think issue #5 is going to look amazing, too. Dauterman's interiors never disappoint, and I'm super excited to see him back on a fantasy comic.

[anxiousconstantly]

QUEER EYE SEASON 6 BAYBEE

THERE ARE MOTHA FUCKIN SPOILERS AHEAD SO BE WARNED BITCH

Antoni -

Sir has not used ONE avocado so far. We call that. Growth. He has cried four (4) times tho

Mans is in love with Terri and I’m here for this relationship

“Change can be terrifying because you don’t know what’s on the other side but something as simple as one recipe you realize it’s not that big of a deal at all”

“HEY LETS GO WEIGH THINGS ON THE NEW SCALE”

“THERE WILL BE N O FLAVORLESS FOOD THIS WEEK 😤🥰”

“Small little tweaks will over time will make a big difference over times”

“I’m in a tree 🥰!!!! Oh my gosh 😥”

“EVERYTHING IS CUTE 😤😤 EVERY SINGLE THING IS CUTE 😤😤😤😤”

ANT BABY S T O P PUTING RANDOM SHIT IN YOUR MOUTH

“It’s really hard not to fall in love with someone who is so passionate about what they do”

Tan -

The clothes for angel?????? Y e s ??????

“I don’t know any woman, outside of the size two runway models, that doesn’t have that little bit of fat on their tum”

“I want to remind Todd what there is to life with his wardrobe… I want to remind him that he can move forward through his clothes”

The way he finds clothes for the hero’s that are so similar to what he knows they already are comfortable with but elevated is jus AH. And how he makes them feel happy and good in their bodies. I just love tan so much

MY STONE FACED BABY CRIED

Mmmmm layers be adding shape but taking it away. We call that magic

“I just want you to see the version of you that I see”

“I wanna get you to where you’re not hiding yourself away”

SARA’S CLOTHES??? Y E S

Karamo-

I love the way Karamo thinks s o much and I also love how he gets the w a y he thinks across with his words.

“Broken crayons can still color”

“Does that say BYOB???? Bring ya own BOBBY”

“You don’t deserve to be sleeping through your celebration”

“You need to accept and forgive your past so you can be joyful and present right now”

*while twerking* “IM ON A SUGAR HIGH IM ON A SUGAR SUGAR HIGH”

“Your dream gave you the highest and greatest moment of your life but you forget that because it’s so easy to focus on the negative”

No one:

Karamo: SQUEEEEEEEE

Bobby-

THE PINK SUIT???????????? SO GOOD

HE NEEDS MORE MOTHER FUCKING S C R E E N T I M E. IVE BEEN SAYING IT

“If you don’t take care of you, you can’t take care of everybody else”

MANS BUILT A B A R N FROM THE G R O U N D UP IN A W E E K AND ITS S O GOOD GODDAMN

His designs like always are so beautiful, but the way he is so open to keeping a room the way it is if that room is special to the hero. I love him

Johnathan-

YES TEACH THAT REPUBLICAN ABOUT PRONOUNS

Their outfits are s o stunning this season, baby looks s o good

“His scalp d o e s look like a block of parmesan cheese”

“You can do all sorts of things that make you happy and s t i l l be of service”

*very seriously* “it’s nothing that a French tuck cannot fix”

SARA’S HAIR??????????????? YES BITCH

Random thoughts

The prom episode

Just

*yes*

The country version of the theme song makes me ears bleed but I’m still here for it

Can I nominate myself for queer eye so I can get hugs

ANTONI TRYNA GET TAN TO GRAB A CRAWFISH H E L P

“It’s too easy to exist and too hard to live”

I LOVE NEON SO MUCH I WISH TO GIVE HER LIDDOL KISSES

OH M Y G O D NEON IN THE PLOOKY’S SHIRT

“The first step to being a teacher is being a learner”

THE THERAPY ANIMALS IM C R Y I N G

“Thank you for showing me how to cook tiny little pretty trees”

Every time a hero has a “I need help” moment i S O B

Reggie, about the elephant: “ima take him”

Bobby: “we found him together”

[meizi-inc]

"I don't mind an unreasonable amount of trouble."

― Dashiell Hammett, paraphrased

You are the Punk, an Empowered™ low-life who used to be a big crime-fightin’ deal.

These days, you waste your nights away, brawling and bed-hopping in a brazen bid to forget all that. Hasn't worked so far but you are nothing if not determined.

Your old partner’s shiny new partner’s been snatched, he wants you to find her, and you’d be a bigger bastard than usual if you pretended you don’t owe him one.

Seems you’ve got some choices to make...

What’s it gonna be?

Tweak your Punk! : customize name, pronouns, fight-style, height, take-out preference, etc.*** 

Call in a favor of your own! 

Abuse your powers! 

Scare the regs at your favorite drinking hole!

Pet an alley cat!

Piss off the high-powered (and highly telepathic) head of a mysterious organization! 

Piss off a high-powered crime boss with a (literal) god complex! 

Hell, piss everybody off!

Blow all your ill-gotten cash on {{{CLOUD}}} and screw scrap dance the night away! 

Fall a little bit in love...

Bite off more than you can chew! 

Be the scumbag they expect!

Be the hero they don’t!

The choices are yours. Just don’t blame me if the whole thing goes to hell and blows up in your face on the way there. There’s plenty of blame to go around.

***That said, the Punk is, by design, not a blank-slate character. Certain aspects and traits are immutable.

Tooth+Nail is an upcoming maximalist+retro-futuristic IF inspired by one too many sleepless nights up reading comic books and watching Devil in a Blue Dress on repeat.

18+ for blood, sex and death; smoking, drugs and alcohol consumption; physical and psychological violence; trauma and PTSD; allusions to abduction and assault.

Oh, and strong language. Lots of that one.

Check out Issue #00 [here]

[shinneth]

hello~!! didja see the journeys ep with paul yet? what did you think of it? 👀

Oh, I sure did! Less than 24 hours after it came out, no less. Which is saying something, since I've not watched any of the Pokémon anime since XY (more had to do with getting rid of cable + general burnout; not to knock on XYZ, but Best Wishes hurt me).

Thoughts on it? Well, a little on the mixed side. Least I can do is go over it in more detail. Without watching Journeys at all outside this episode, I've got the overall gist well enough. So, guess it's time to pick this apart.

Cramming 2-3 plots in one episode was a misstep imo

I heard the last time Ash's reserve group at Oak's lab was featured in Journeys, it did a less-than-stellar job showing them off. Apparently, a good chunk of them weren't even seen in that episode, let alone had a role in it. This episode rectified that and made sure every single one of Ash's currently-owned Pokémon was at the very least visible, as even the ones who only got background/still-shot moments at least got to display an element of their personality. That much I greatly appreciate. Guess it's inevitable that pulling this off well will only become increasingly difficult as the series presses on with Ash as a protagonist, so at the very least I can respect this episode for going out of its way to make the vast majority of these Pokémon relevant in one way or another.

Especially since the Fire-type brigade had a special purpose in helping Ash's Gengar learn Will-o-Wisp. And as someone who values the strategic aspect of Pokémon battling, I'm super happy it was this move that Gengar learned and not something like Fire Punch. I enjoyed seeing this being shown in such detail! It really did feel like stepping back to the older seasons that actually put effort into showing off the importance of training.

However, as I watched the episode, I noticed how much time was being invested in these two plot points and remembered this is supposed to be the episode where Paul returns after a 12-year absence...

And from what I understand, Paul ain't gettin' any more appearances after this. This is it! This is all we get after a decade-plus of nothing!

So, in all honesty, I think at the very least the plot of Ash reuniting with all his Pokémon, Goh properly getting acquainted with them all, and the training for the Masters 8 should have been its own episode. Because I do believe it's very important to honor history and give everybody their due diligence when the anime gives them time to actually show up and matter.

Now, with Gengar learning Will-o-Wisp? That meshes in well with Paul showing up. I'd keep that. But the abundance of nostalgic fluff (that I love, but I gotta tell it like it is) really made this episode feel more than a little truncated in the areas that should have mattered most.

It was a competently written comeback for Paul...

On a superficial note, I am a little bummed that Paul didn't get any tweaks in his design (such as colored irises, which Ash was granted from Best Wishes onward; before then, his eyes were just as dotted and black as Paul's). I certainly didn't expect him to get a new outfit or anything since they didn't give Dawn that much (... from what I recall they DID give that to Serena, buuuut Serena's from the era of customizable PCs so I guess that makes a little more sense? Didn't play Gen IV's remakes, so idk if they offered that in those), but it would've been cool.

Then again, I HAVE heard about the interview in which the logic for never ever letting Ash age for the sake of keeping some "feeling like the first day of summer every day" sentiment... much as I roll my eyes at that, I've pretty much given up on the progression of time EVER being feasible in this series. Up through DP, I could at least pretend Ash was aging a year per major region (minor quests like Orange League and the Battle Frontier didn't warrant full-year lengths to me). At this point, given the design and how many generations we're in now, there's really no other choice than to accept this is basically Anime Simpsons time-wise.

Paul having his own Gyarados, Garchomp, and Metagross was completely believable, of course. He's been doing this Pokémon training thing just as long as Ash has, and there was zero indication that he would have stopped after Ash beat him. Unlike Gary, Paul didn't decide on a career change. He was set on challenging Brandon again (more on that later...). So, yeah. It would be perfectly logical for Paul to have about as many reserves as Ash. Reggie's got a big-ass backyard for that, after all. And all three of these Pokemon are ones I'd totally see have Paul having on his own journey.

Would've liked a longer battle, ngl

I'm not sour that Paul lost to Ash again here. Ash losing to Paul at this stage probably would have damaged his cred significantly (considering what all he's accomplished from XYZ and Sun/Moon) - this is right before the Masters 8 stuff starting up, after all.

But I think I would have at least preferred a tie.

Then again, with a certain other plot element I'll get to in a bit, I suppose that might have weakened that message a tad. Really, though, I would've liked a longer battle. I'm just used to Ash/Paul battles being lengthy affairs, full of twists and turns and crazy-ass strategies being utilized. Like, in all fairness, all 3 of Ash's Pokémon gained significant abilities from this battle alone (Lucario got Bullet Punch, Dragonite got a crazy-ass combo move, and Gengar got Will-o-Wisp). I am bummed we didn't get a resurgence of Counter Shield - THAT would've been cool to see make a comeback! And it's one of Ash's few legitimately clever tactics. Though I guess that technique was more of a Dawn-related thing, ultimately. Still, didn't stop Paul from copying it in the Sinnoh League :P I wanna say Dragonite's made-up technique may have been some kind of loose reference/spiritual successor, but in practice it looks like they serve completely different purposes.

Thanks to so much time being eaten up with Ash's Pokémon reunion, there sadly wasn't much left for there to be an epic fight. What little we got was good enough, and it was very nicely animated.

The real appeal in Paul and Ash's rivalry, though, was in how Paul actually made Ash question himself and his methods/motivations. Paul on the outside came off as someone who should have no business being as good as he is because he isn't all about the "love and friendship" aspect of Pokémon. Naturally we're past that development for both of them, but this extended into their battling as well. Their first full battle was loaded with multiple switch-outs on both ends, Ash being forced to wonder what Paul had planned when something didn't immediately make sense to him, and it was just a glorious display of battling psychology.

I guess switch-outs being forbidden from the off in this battle played a role in how this could have been just a little bit more in-depth. And it'd be foolhardy to just expect this battle to be right up there with both of the full battles that happened in DP. The characters are both in very different places now compared to then.

Still, I couldn't help but roll my eyes a little when Paul actually wondered "Oh shit, is Burn really affecting my Metagross' strength?! The thing that the Burn status effect has always been?!"

ofcoursehefuckingknowshehasafuckingmagmortarwithflamebodyandREALLYfuckedpikachu'sshitwiththeburnstatussowhytheeverlivingfuckisheevenwonderingaboutthistohimselfgoddammit

... a GYM LEADER you say

So. I'm of two minds about this.

It's REALLY COOL the series itself is acknowledging that Paul is far too talented to just be an aimlessly-wandering nobody trainer and gave him something that'll elevate his status and reflect just how his presence positively affected the series.

Bonus points if (and this is SUPER-DELUSIONAL OPTIMISM btw) Paul actually became a Gym Leader for the next series AND was adopted into the game canon by actually being a Gym Leader in the Scarlet/Violet games.

On the other hand...

COME ON, HE IS AT LEAST A FRONTIER BRAIN CANDIDATE

YEAH FUCKING REMEMBER THAT? LAST THING WE KNOW PAUL DID POST-LEAGUE WAS GO OFF TO CHALLENGE BRANDON AGAIN.

WHEN ASH BEAT BRANDON, HE WAS OFFERED A POSITION TO BE A FRONTIER BRAIN.

SO EITHER

PAUL BEAT BRANDON BUT TURNED DOWN THE OFFER BECAUSE WHY BE A FRONTIER BRAIN WHEN YOU COULD BE A GYM LEADER AND IT'S NOT LIKE THE ANIME ESTABLISHED FRONTIER BRAINS > GYM LEADERS OR ANYTHING OH WAIT YES IT HAS

"It’s a group of facilities, somewhat like a Gym, but more intense where you challenge and battle against an amazing group of powerful trainers called Frontier Brains." -Brock

OR

PAUL JUST NEVER DEFEATED BRANDON I GUESS

(also lowkey I really really really would've loved for Paul to meet Cynthia again...)

His behavior in the battle this episode DID have him more in, say, a "gym leader's" mindset, I would say. I'd go as far to argue that Paul wasn't really putting his all into any of those matches with Ash. He really seemed interested in drawing out new powers from his opponent. The few times where he shows something of a reaction during the battles, it's when one of the three new powers/techniques started showing that aura-like flare.

I'm certainly not saying Paul wouldn't make for a good Gym Leader. Given the subtle showings of his growth in the episode, such as Infernape actually following Paul's suggestion; something he wouldn't have done in DP regardless of Paul's prior ownership of him... also, him telling Electivire to play and all that, yeah. That's indicative that he's not as excessively rigid as he was before. Paul has the maturity and discipline to be an excellent Gym Leader; certainly 8th Gym Leader material for sure.

My thing is... this is very much beneath him. If the episode had more time, maybe we would have gotten Paul saying that in his pursuit of gaining power, he realized that wasn't ever going to stop someone out there being more powerful than him no matter what he did.

We could have gotten something like, Paul admitting that his fascination with seeing power really felt the most rewarding when his influence drew power out from his opponents.

Looking at the facts, almost every time Paul and Ash battled in DP, Ash would either get one of his Pokémon evolved or they'd learn a significant new move or ability (or technique). Paul is really good at making Ash dig deep and bring out the best in all of his Pokémon.

It stands to reason that Paul's passion might lie in bringing out the true potential of other trainers; it gives him a better battle to have that improves his own team while simultaneously benefiting his opponent.

With a specific sort of focus like this, added with the fact that Paul has zero type preferences of any sort (all we know is that he really likes powerful 'mons who are as good at tanking hits as they are at dishing them out), that really screams "Frontier Brain" more so than "Gym Leader".

In all fairness, it's never outright said whether or not Paul accepted the offer to become Gym Leader. Which can let me headcanon that while he went to Professor Oak to educate himself, it wasn't necessarily to become Gym Leader. Paul's realizing that he can't rely entirely on self-taught methods to ascend in this way of life. Whatever he becomes in the future, Paul's clearly taking the steps necessary to reach the level he seeks to be.

So while I wasn't really thrilled about Paul being used as the "measuring stick" for Ash's chances against anyone in the Masters 8, at least there's an implication that Paul isn't exactly spinning his wheels, either. Much as I'd love to have him be part of the Masters 8 (no guesses on who I'd have him replacing in that), clearly the powers-that-be did not have that intention from the onset.

Hell, one can argue that Paul becoming Gym Leader is just his stepping stone to reach greater heights. After all, it's not uncommon for Gym Leaders to later challenge, on on rare occasions, defeat and replace members of the Elite Four.

So there's an ounce of hope here. Of course, I don't expect we'll ever actually see Paul in the anime again. Maybe 24 years from now. I'll be lucky to be alive by then!

Paul plz

gawd you're still so tsundere af

BITCH YOU HAVE BEEN IN NO LESS THAN FOUR POKEWORLD EQUIVALENTS OF THE SUPER BOWL

SHUT YO' ASS UP

I'd post more pics/gifs but I ran my limit now

So uh... yeah! Those are my thoughts on the episode. In a vacuum, it's great, had lots of nostalgic potential and at the very least they didn't completely ruin Paul like they EASILY could have. Kudos on the writers for making him show his maturity through his subtle cues rather than making him overtly friendly like the rest of Ash's recurring posse.

I really do enjoy more strategic elements being employed in the battle and the episode overall. I feel like Gengar's Will-O-Wisp especially will be a game-changer for Ash's chances in the Masters 8.

However, I would've really appreciated having more time, maybe not compact this episode with three major events, y'know? I'm sure there's a filler somewhere in Journeys that could've been trimmed out to facilitate this.

Also not thrilled about the prospect of Paul becoming a Gym Leader as it's very much beneath him (unless this is some clever-ass tie in to the games and god is that ever wishful thinking or his stepping stone to reach the top), but I do like that I can infer that Paul's at least found a reason to battle for his own sake now.

Yeah. Remember when Brandon asked Paul why he battles? We never got an answer to that, ever.

So this might be the closest we get: not a Gym Leader aspiration, but a necessary step in Paul's mission to bring power out in others to improve his own style.

Could use some work, but considering I'm almost certain this is all of Paul we're gonna get from here on out, I'm just gonna treasure and headcanon the hell out of it.

[emsartwork]

i forgot to add: how do design ????!?!??????

So I’m not expert but this is how I think of character design! (also sry if you were asking about clothing/outfit design thats a little different)

under the cut because this is long im so sorry

So in my opinion there are three really important aspects for character design!

AESTHETIC: obviously everybody’s aesthetic is different, but this is more about what vibe the character has, what makes them THEM design wise. 

INTENTION: who is the character supposed to be? this can range from their personality, their back story, their occupation, or their role in the story, but the design need to fit that intention.

COHESION: does the design go well together? or do certain aspects clash too much? obviously you can have disjointed parts of a character design, and if those serve a purpose then thats fine, but if its so disjointed its distracting from the character as a whole you might need to tweak things. 

AESTHETIC: the contrasting part of the design (white flowers in dark hair, dark trim on dress, and dark shoes) provide interest to the eye. The mixing of round and sharp shapes also keeps the design from feeling “boring” even though its relatively simple. 

INTENTION: so what role would this little doodle character have? according to her design elements, shes cute and friendly with her round shapes (bouncy balls, babies, etc), but could have a sharp/fast/active or even dangerous edge to her with the triangles (arrows, knives etc). of course the design doesn’t limit her possible roles. She could be a bubbly younger sister who teases the older protagonist, or maybe she’s the villain hiding in plain sight. the shape this character design doesn’t really have is squares(think bricks and rocks), which communicates that she might not be really strong, steady, or reliable. 

COHESION: repeating the curves across her whole design builds cohesion, it communicates that “yes, these are all part of the same character”, it also allows the eye to “rest” on a familiar shape or line. 

NOW LETS LOOK AT SOME DESIGNS

(Boku no Hero Academia) so both of these characters are super heroes, but have vastly different design elements. so lets analyze them.

OCHAKO(the pink one) is all rounds, with a few pointed shapes in hair mostly, but a little on her costume as well. Her personality is cute, bubbly, and friendly which perfectly suits her soft and bouncy design. Howevre she also has a very slight edge to her, which is seen her determination and drive to improve herself over the course of the anime. 

KIRISHIMA(the red one) at first glance, seems to be super pointy!! shapes that are usually seen on villains or really dangerous characters, but while he IS sharp(literally sometimes) and sometimes aggressive, he is also made of squares, which perfectly suits his loyal “i gotchu bro” attitude towards most of the other characters in the anime.  

ISSUE AREAS: so the only problems i have with Ochako and Kirishima’s designs is that their costumes each have one area that clashes a little too much for my taste. With Ochako, the belt over the color blocking stripes down her crotch are......questionable taste wise. I think the design would be better if the pink chest ended above the belt in a shallow v. not only would this mirror the triangle aspects of her hair, it would fit the belt outline, and continue the trend her costume has of being “grounded” or “heavy”. Kirishima has those.... gears??? around his shoulders??? and while the gear teeth are technically squares, the gear shape itself is a circle, which is a shape that isn’t present anywhere else in his design. I think changing the gears to something similar to his boots or his mask/headgear would create a more cohesive design(also the gears just look hard to move in)

These two characters are presented as individuals so their costumes don’t have to match at all even though they are still seen as “connected” because of the art style for the face, hair, and body. 

In a group giving the outfits cohesive motifs is an easy way to present a strong team image! In Yuki Yuna is a Hero, the girls all have colored lines(usually princess seam placement), armor or fabric hip accents, covered arms, and similar flower shapes in their hair. The Aesthetic of each girl is strong in a monochrome signature color, but not over whelming as the black+white connects them even in color so they aren’t out of place. 

Speaking of color! if your characters are all similar looking (like same body for all of them) you can communicate their personality and aesthetic just with color! (only gonna talk about a few of the ponies) Pinkie Pie (the really pink one) is energetic and playful, so her color scheme is a variation of the primary colors(happy, child like), and have one of the more saturated colors(high energy, intense) of these characters in a large quantity. Apple Jack (the orange one) is a down to earth farm girl, and her color palette is accordingly, mostly earth tones, its also warm analogous colors, which makes her appear un-complicated and warm personality wise. the pop of red is a nice touch to add interest, but notice that its uses sparingly in her cutie mark and tail accessory. Rarity on the other hand is elegant and fussy, her high contrast scheme of white and dark blue/purples gives her more visual interest and is something that makes her appear more “complex” in addition to the gradient thats included in her hair. the colors are also all cool colors, bringing to mind cool glass or water which both have connotations of grace and beauty.

however all the characters here are unified by their colors being on the pastel side, which is also important for a cohesive cast.

another, short, note on color; making the color/line/shading of your figure different from the background can help them stand out, this is used ESPECIALLY in children’s media, but can be applied to any illustration or animation as needed.

Color can also help your characters “read” quickly on screen, the powerpuff girls are a prime example, of having a distinct color blocking and silhouette. even the color blobs at the top and my crappy hand silhouettes STILL read as the characters despite being broken down into abstract elements. I also really enjoy the thick outline in the powerpuff girls, it really makes the characters pop to the foreground even though they have pretty simple designs and are often in a colorful setting.

Also, for a lot of animation, silhouette is INCREDIBLY important for your characters, some designers sketch silhouettes and then design the particulars its so important to nail the shape. These examples from Coraline are some of my favorites (though Laika wins in my heart every time no matter what lmao) because the simple shapes are SO CLEAR and indicative of the character, you literally don’t need to have watched the movie to know these are each different characters with different personalities and roles. 

silhouette can also help tell the story. In Kubo and the two strings (another Laika film) the above three characters are sisters. One has chosen to leave her home in the heavens to live on earth, and the other two stay in their roles as “heavenly” warriors. This is even shown through their designs, the two sisters are weighted on top and their cloaks don’t even touch the ground, while the first woman has trailing, heavy sleeves, hair, and robes all grounding her and emphasizing her connection with the earth.

another example of shape/silhouette reflecting the story, In The Croods, the family of cavemen are for the most part very top heavy, with large torsos and arms, usually in a more hunched over position, while the newcomer, Guy, is bottom heavy with thin arms and stands more upright. In the plot, the family represents the old ways, the strength and rules that have helped them survive, they look like very stereotypical “cavemen”, while Guy resembles the modern man, and appropriately is associated with new ideas and forward thinking.

MORE SHAPES, in DC super hero girls each girl has a distinct personality emulated by her shape language. Zatana is dramatic curves and edges, Super girl is hard, straight edges against curves, giving her a solid muscular shape. Wonder Woman, though also strong, is taller and leaner, lending to a confident leader type. Green Lantern is slim, her lines all flow into each other giving her a go with the flow look. Bumble Bee is, of course, tiny, but her boots and gauntlets add weight and strength to her otherwise small frame. Batgirl is lanky and has a lot of pointed style lines, reminding the viewer of a skinny cat (ironic what with cat woman i know) or weasel which mirrors her preferred “sneaky” crime fighting style.  (also yes this was just an excuse for me to gush abt how much i love the dcshg designs shut up)

so in my opinion, Cartoon Saloon’s The Secret of Kells is PERFECT in aesthetic, intention, and cohesion. Kells focuses very strongly on creating silhouette WITHIN the larger figure shape via color and line, most of the characters pictured here have no neck, the one who does, Brendan, is the main character and the use of negative space that cuts into his shape is used to draw attention to him. Kells is also very strongly inspired by Medieval Illuminated manuscripts (namely, the book of kells lmao). The characters still manage to stand out against outrageously detailed backgrounds via their simple shapes and strong color blocking. 

Aisling, a secondary but very important character, is not human, and has a totally different shape language from the rest of the characters. She is thin and pointy, while most of the others are round or square. Aisling also has the most negative space making up her silhouette, compare the triangles made by her arms and legs in the above picture to the figures in the first image where everybody’s body is self contained with no negative space. She is also very different color wise, very pale and cool colored, as opposed to the warm saturated colors of the human characters. (yes this was another excuse to gush abt one of my fave pieces of media deal with it)

hopefully that wasn’t too rambley and actually helps? if yall have more specific design questions lemma know lol

[qqueenofhades]

If/when they make a Joe/Nicky prequel movie, what are some of the Dos and Don’ts for them, with regards to historical accuracy. Like, what do you think they should include, and what do you think they should avoid?

Oof. This is a GREAT question, and also designed to give me a chance to ramble on in a deeply, deeply self-indulgent fashion. That is now what will proceed to happen. Consider yourself warned. So if they were miraculously to be like “well that qqueenofhades person on tumblr seems like she knows what she’s talking about, let’s hire her to consult on this production!”, here are some of the things I would tell them.

First off, a question I have in fact asked my students when teaching the crusades in class is whether you could actually show the sack of Jerusalem on screen. Like... if you’re making a film about the First Crusade, what kind of choices are you going to make? What narrative viewpoint are you going to uphold throughout the story? Are you actually going to show a slaughter of Muslim and Jewish inhabitants that some chroniclers described as causing enough blood to reach up to the knees of horses? (Whether it actually did this is beside the point; the point is that the sack went far beyond the accepted conventions of warfare and struck everybody involved in it as particularly horrific.) Because when you’re making a film about the crusades, you are also making it by nature for a modern audience that has particular understandings of Christian/Muslim conflict, religious warfare and/or tolerance, the War on Terror, the modern clash over ISIS, Trump’s Muslim ban, and so forth. The list goes on and on. So you’re never making a straight, unbiased historical adaptation, even if you’re going off the text of primary sources. You’re still constructing it and presenting it in a deliberate and curated fashion, and you can bet that whichever way you come down, your audience will pick up on that.

Let’s take the most recent example of a high-profile crusades film: Kingdom of Heaven from 2005. I’ve written a book chapter on how the narrative choices of KoH, aside from its extensive fictionalization of its subject matter to start with, make it crystal clear that it is a film made by a well-meaning Western liberal filmmaker (Ridley Scott) four years after 9/11 and two years after the invasion of Iraq, when the sympathy from 9/11 was wearing off and everyone saw America/Great Britain and the Bush/Blair coalition overreaching itself in yet another arrogant imperial adventure into the Middle East. Depending on how old you are, you may or may not remember the fact that Bush explicitly called the War on Terror a “crusade” at the start, and then was quickly forced to walk it back once it alarmed his European allies (yes, back then, as bad as America was, it still did have those) with its intellectual baggage. They KNEW exactly what images and tropes they were invoking. It is also partly why medieval crusade studies EXPLODED in popularity after 9/11. Everyone recognized that these two things had something to do with each other, or they made the connection somehow. So anyone watching KoH in 2005 wasn’t really watching a crusades film (it is set in the late 1180s and dramatizes the surrender of Jerusalem to Saladin) so much as a fictional film about the crusades made for an audience explicitly IN 2005. I have TONS to say on this subject (indeed, if you want a copy of my book chapter, DM me and I’ll be happy to send it.)

Ridley Scott basically sets it up as the Christian and Muslim secular leaders themselves aren’t evil, it’s all the religious fanatics (who are all made Templars, including Guy de Lusignan, going back to the “evil Templar” trope started by Sir Walter Scott and which we are all so very familiar with from Dan Brown and company). Orlando Bloom’s character shares a name (Balian de Ibelin) but very little else with the eponymous real-life crusader baron. One thing Scott did do very well was casting an actual and well-respected Syrian actor (Ghassan Massoud) to play Saladin and depicting him in essential fidelity to the historical figure’s reputed traits of justice, fairness, and mercy (there’s some article by a journalist who watched the film in Beirut with a Muslim audience and they LOVED the KoH Saladin). I do give him props for this, rather than making the Evil Muslim into the stock antagonist. However, Orlando Bloom’s Balian is redeemed from the religious extremist violence of the Templars (shorthand for all genuinely religious crusaders) by essentially being an atheistic/agnostic secular humanist who wants everyone to get along. As I said, this is a film about the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq made three years after 9/11 more than anything else, and you can really see that.

That said, enough about KoH, back to this presumable Joe/Nicky backstory. You would obviously run into the fact that it’s SUPER difficult to make a film about the crusades without offending SOMEBODY. The urge to paint in broad strokes and make it all about the evil Westerners invading is one route, but it would weaken the moral complexity of the story and would probably make it come off as pandering to guilty white liberal consciences. Are we gonna touch on the many decades of proto-crusading ventures in Iberia, Sicily, North Africa, and other places, and how the eleventh century, especially under Pope Gregory VII, made it even thinkable for a Christian to be a holy warrior in the first place? (It was NOT normal beforehand.) How are we going to avoid the “lololol all religion sucks and makes people do crazy things” axe to grind favoured by So Very Smart (tm) internet atheists? Yes, we have to demonstrate the ultimate horror of the crusade and the flawed premises it was based on, but we can’t do that by just showing the dirty, religiously zealot medieval people doing that because they don’t know any better and are being cynically manipulated in God’s Name. In other words (and the original TOG film did this very well) we can’t position ourselves to laugh at or mock the crusader characters or feel confident in looking down on them for being Dumb Zealots. They have to be relatable enough that we realize we could BE (and in fact already ARE) them, and THEN you slide into the horror and what compels them to do those kinds of things, and THAT’S when it hits. Because take a look at the news. This is happening around us right now.

Obviously, as I was doing in my First Crusade chapter in DVLA, a lot of this also has to spend time centering the Muslim point of view, the way they reacted to the crusade, the ways in which Yusuf as an Isma’ili Shia Muslim (Kaysani is the name of a branch of Isma’ili Shi’ites, he has a definite historical context and family lineage, and hence is almost surely, as I wrote him, a Fatimid from Egypt) is likewise not just A Stock Muslim. In this case, obviously: Get actual Muslims on the set to advise about the details. Don’t make stupid and/or obvious mistakes. Don’t necessarily make the Muslims less faithful or less virtuous than the Christians (even if this is supposed to praise them as being “less fanatic” than those bad religious Catholics). Don’t tokenize or trivialize their reaction to something as horrific as the sack of Jerusalem, and don’t just use dead brown bodies as graphic visual porn for cheap emotional points. Likewise, it goes without saying, and I don’t think they would anyway, but OH MY GOD DON’T MAKE THIS INTO GAME OF THRONES GRIMDARK!!!! OH MY GOD!!! THERE IS BEAUTY AND THERE IS LIGHT AND THERE IS POETRY AND THAT’S WHY IT HURTS SO MUCH WHEN IT’S DESTROYED! AND THE CHOICES THAT PEOPLE MAKE TO DESTROY THOSE THINGS HAVE TO BE TERRIFYINGLY PLAUSIBLE AND FAMILIAR, BECAUSE OH MY GOD!!

Next, re: Nicolo. Evidently he is a priest or a former priest or something of the sort in the graphic novel, which becomes a bit of a problem if we want him to actually FIGHT in the crusades for important and/or shallow and/or OTP purposes. (I don’t know if they address this somehow or Greg Rucka is not a medieval historian or whatever, but never mind.) It was a Major Thing that priests could not carry weapons, at least and especially bladed weapons. (In the Bayeux Tapestry, we have Odo, the bishop of Bayeux, fighting at the battle of Hastings with a truncheon because he’s a clergyman and can’t have a sword). They were super not supposed to shed blood, and a broadsword (such as the type that Nicky has and carries and is clearly very familiar with) is a knight’s weapon, not a clergyman’s. The thing about priests was that they were not supposed to get their hands dirty with physical warfare; they could (and often did) accompany crusade armies, bishops were secular overlords and important landholders, monks and hermits and other religious preachers were obviously part of a religious expedition, and yes, occasionally some priests would break the rules and fight in battle. But this was an exception FAR more than the rule. So if we’re going by accuracy, we have Nicky as a priest who doesn’t actively fight and doesn’t have a sword, we have him as a rule-breaking priest with a sword (which would have to be addressed, and the Templars, who were basically armed monks, weren’t founded until 1119 so he can’t be one of those yet if this is still 1099) or we just skip the priest part and have him as a crusader with a sword like any other soldier. If he was in fact a priest, he also wouldn’t be up to the same standard of sending into battle. Boys, especially younger sons of the nobility, often entered the church at relatively early ages (12 or 13), where it was treated as a career, and hence they stopped training in arms. So if Nicky is actually out there fighting and/or getting killed by Yusuf several times for Important Purposes, he’s... almost surely not a priest.

Iirc, they’ve already changed a few things from the graphic novel (I haven’t read it, but this is what I’ve heard) so they can also tweak things to make a new backstory or a hybrid-new backstory in film-verse. So once we’ve done all the above, we still have to decide how to handle the actual sack of Jerusalem and massacre of its inhabitants, the balance between violence comparable to the original TOG film and stopping short of being exploitative (which I think they would do well), and the aftermath of that and the founding of the new Latin Christian kingdom. It would have to, as again the original film does very well, avoid prioritizing the usual players and viewpoints in these events, and dig into presenting the experiences of the marginalized and way in which ordinary people are brought to the point of doing these things. It doesn’t (and frankly shouldn’t) preach at us that U.S. Invasions Of The Middle East Are Bad (especially since obviously none of the characters/people/places/events here are American at all). And as I said already but bears repeating: my god, don’t even THINK about making it GOT and marketing it as Gritty Dramatic Medieval History, You Know It’s Real Because They’re Dirty, Violent, and Bigoted!

Also, a couple tags I saw pop up were things like “Period-Typical Racism” and “Period-Typical Homophobia” and mmm okay obviously yes there are these elements, but what exactly is “period typical?” Does it mean “using these terms just because you figure everyone was less tolerant back then?” We know that I, with my endless pages of meta on medieval queer history, would definitely side-eye any attempts to paint these things as Worse Than Us, and the setting alone would convey a sense of the conflict without having to add on gratuitous microaggressions. I basically think the film needs to be made exactly like the original: centering the gay/queer perspectives of marginalized people and people of color, resisting the urge for crass jokes at the expense of the identity of its characters, and approaching it with an awareness of the deep complexity and personal meaning of these things to people in terms of the historical moment we’re in, while not making a film that ONLY prizes our response and our current crises. Because if we’re thinking about these historical genealogies, the least we can do (although we so often aren’t) is to be honest.

Thanks! I LOVED this question.

[the-crustacean-sensation]

what are the little lines that appear on some of the characters eyes sometimes? is this just crustacean anatomy i don't know about or is it a style choice

[time for a long post in which I may have actually misunderstood the question but I had fun answering it anyway lmao] Good question!! I will readily admit that I used to have a better answer for this but since I made these characters in 2018 and it's the end of 2021, I actually forgot what my younger self was going for when making these design choices. Corsicana's eye lines are more straightforward though, I drew a little color headshot of them next to a real mantis shrimp so you can see what I was going for:

At least I'm assuming you mean the little black lines in Corsicana's eyes and Maggy has the white version that goes all the way across hers? Because any other lines would be eye bags (visible in the pic up there), eyelid shines that I mostly forget to draw in the first place, fur/scale/exoskeleton markings OR possibly the single eyebrow I give characters when they have to make an expression that requires a brow when I usually don't add them for some reason!!

So with the real mantis shrimp, you can see those little bands in the middle and for my interpretation I just went with two since I use Big Chunky Lines and can't fit the original amount in there? I decided not to go with the two black dots as the pupils for an anthro shrimp because with compound eyes, the little "pupils" will move around as the eyestalks rotate or the angle of light changes. They're called pseudopupils and I opted to leave them off my shrimp OCs because it'd make them less humanoid to have freaky fake pupils that change position in the light? I thiiiink the bands are what allows the mantis shrimp to see polarized light so as far as I know, they're the only animal with these funky eye lines.

UM. AND THEN FOR EVERYBODY ELSE I ACTUALLY HAVE NO IDEA, if I were to try my hand at the concept of an anthro crustacean for the first time today (instead of back in 2018), the triad would look a LOT different. I was focusing more on stylization and function instead of accuracy but yeah there's things I wish I changed, I think bad reference photos is what caused the eye-bands for other characters. The tint of crustacean eyes in some photos causes a little stripe to appear occasionally and I think that's what I was noticing? It's actually the #1 thing I forget to add when drawing comics of the cast, the eye-stripes are missing in some panels and I had to fix that before printing issue 1. I guess in retrospect it wouldn't have hurt to tweak the character designs but I'm too attached to the cast at this point to make any changes, even if some parts no longer make sense. MAN I'VE BEEN RAMBLING FOREVER BUT I HOPE THIS HELPS AND I ACTUALLY UNDERSTOOD WHAT YOU WERE REFERRING TO, I love getting questions like this because it can usually be answered by either useless arthropod fun facts live in my brain rent-free or it's a """creative liberty""" which can be fun to talk about as well. Thank you!!

[powdermelonkeg]

I don't think anyone else has asked so I will: when designing your Missing Links, what was your favorite aspect for each of their designs?

Piper: His hair. My process with him is literally "start with a pistachio and then draw Elsa"

Taps: He has Ed Elric's face. I love that.

Soldier: Tweaking Wild's designs? He's basically Wild in a new outfit. The crystals are fun though.

Fox: His little feather!

Cadenza: EVERYTHING. Cadenza is my favorite visually.

Kasuto: Her eyes turned out SO well, and her hair looks floofy. Maximum floofage.

Prima: Her armor. You guys should take a closer look at that. 😉

Shard: His hair. His hair taught me SO much, and now I can use it as a template for everybody else.

[nightwings-bussy]

random question but im super curious, whats your opinion on teen titans go and their portrayal of dick? they make him out to be an over bearing whiny loser with nothing special to his name besides being batmans sidekick, even to his own teammates, and other jokes that constantly nerf him/his capabilities. i get its for the comedy, but imo they rlly massacred my boy on that show ;_;

i've never seen teen titans go, so i'm not gonna sit around and hate on it. but aw man nonnie i'm sorry that was your experience with it :/ i will say, i've never felt a huge compulsion to watch teen titans go, bc my sense is that that's true for every character in it. i liked the 2000s teen titans show fine but i prefer the ntt versions of the characters by far.

i think in a general sense something's been getting lost in a lot of the attempts to animate the titans. i don't tend to like many animated versions of them; if i had to rank my favorites, i'd rank young justice above the 2000's teen titans run and that above dick as depicted in the dcau. i'm not really thrilled with any of those.

largely i attribute this loss in quality to people feeling the need to "update" character designs, backstories, personalities etc. to match more closely both with current comic runs (for marketing reasons) and with the sensibilities of the modern day. for some characters, an amount of tweaking probably makes sense - there's some vaguely racist/xenophobic undertones to kori's original backstory for example that should probably get workshopped a little. not a ton - i actually think ntt does a pretty great job for its time - but enough to make a show about teenagers appealing to its core demographic.

but in dick's case, what i've observed - and this may be true in the comics as well - is that in his animated iterations since the 00's, there tends to be a lot of cross-polination between his personality and tim's. tim's the robin that most teenage television viewers and comic book readers in the 2000's would likely be the most familiar with - he'd been robin since 1990, and would be until 2009. as a result, i see a lot of mixing and matching of his personality and dick's in the myriad animated series. mind you, they have a lot in common: they're both highly capable perfectionists who often play the light and upbeat snark to bruce's dour shadow. but for example, i read the dick in young justice as essentially having tim's personality, general appearance, skillset, weapons, and interests and dick's backstory, and that's just...not my favorite thing. in yj it's egregious enough that when tim actually showed up in yj he felt totally redundant.

(obviously dick's not the only person who gets personality-swapped in the animation process; the "tim" of the dcau is pretty plainly jason in everything but name.)

and this isn't even getting into the fact that even in the 2000's teen titans show, we don't have donna. kori's...essentially a different character in a way i'm not a huge fan of. i would say of everybody who gets a personality makeover, i'm the most enthusiastic about the way they altered beast boy and raven, fairly neutral about the changes to dick and vic, and most negative about the changes to kori and the elimination of donna from the team comp. i've already talked way too long, but i personally feel that taking the team from an even 3 girls/3 guys split into an uneven 2 girls/3 guys split where the two girls are polar opposites, don't really get along until a significant amount of time passes, and who are both ultimately endgame love interests for two of the boys on the team is... not a good change. i know this is some people's favorite versions of these characters and that's fine! but i really don't like it very much, and unfortunately (at least imo) it really affected pretty much every iteration of those characters from then on due to the show's popularity.

so...yeah. i'm not a huge fan of any animated version of the titans, or of dick in any of the animated features i've seen so far. if i had to pick one animated dick grayson i really like, it would be the one from the lego batman movie. when in doubt i'll choose goofy over self-serious any day.

[beevean]

SEGA and the eternal issue of “Sonic’s girlfriend”

[Translator’s note: here is the original article written by @latin-dr-robotnik​​, originally written on the 18th of May 2020]

Today we’re going to talk about one of the aspects SEGA is more secretive about: Sonic’s relationships.

[Translator’s note: this article was written to celebrate Seaside Hill Paradise’s 200th entry. If you’re fluent in Spanish, I highly recommend you to check it out! And if you aren’t, go follow Latin’s Tumblr blog if you haven’t already and you’re into Sonamy, analyses, gushing about music and shitposts.]

This article concludes my Sonamy trilogy, and I recommend you to read the previous two articles: “SEGA and the eternal issue of the Sonamy dynamic” and “’I love you’ – forbidden words in Sonic”. This means this is a shipping article – if you’re not interested into another essay about the love life of a blue hedgehog, I can redirect you to other articles such as “Sonic and speed: are we misunderstanding them?” and “What went wrong with Classic Sonic’s music in Sonic Forces?”.

Everybody else, welcome to today’s article!

It should be noted that this article focuses more on the semi-official and strictly official aspects, since there is really not much to say about the fandom. Nowadays the fandom has a relatively peaceful coexistence, creating art, fanfics and more, for all kind of ships; sometimes there’s an occasional fight between ships or a ship that clearly is not appropriate… but besides that, everything seems relatively calm, at least in my experience and compared to other fandoms.

Too cool for relationships...

Few things are as mentioned and yet silenced by the official SEGA media as the fateful words “girlfriend” and “Sonic” put together. In official terms, Sonic has always been this young, cool hedgehog, with a pure love for nature and never too worried about life, but with a moral code that makes him fight against injustices. During his first years, Sonic was almost impatient and a little emotionally distant, although as it was the ‘90s and things were not so clear for the young SEGA star, different interpretations would take the character through different paths - some more radical than others. As the years went by, and going through many redesigns, certain aspects of his personality would be perfected, exaggerated, or even flanderized. His position on relationships, on the other hand, would remain relatively constant over the decades, with a few particular exceptions.

The this is that Sonic, in the words of his own creator Naoto Ohshima, has always been considered “a young man with a child's heart”, which has helped to substantiate and understand why the character would remain relatively distant from his feelings, and much closer to his own interests associated with the life of adventure.

... or is he?

Despite everything I just said, they tried in many occasions, if not succeeded, to give Sonic a girlfriend, with various results.

As carefree as Sonic is, and as much as SEGA tried to clarify this point over and over again, the people behind his character have always tried to introduce one or more relationships into his life. Even Naoto Ohshima himself has made his own suggestion as to who might be a hypothetical partner for his character. The different interpretations I’ve mentioned have tweaked Sonic’s character to make it more apt to certain types of dynamics, and the cultural gap between the East and the West (which I analyzed a few years ago with the first article of this “trilogy”) also has a considerable impact on the type of relationships that would be established for Sonic from very early in his history until today.

Author’s note: the concept of “Sonic + human woman” of 1990 wasn’t completely forgotten, no no, it was brought back 16 years later, in… well… the worst way possible.

Let’s see an example. Going back to his very origins, in his pre-Sonic 1 sketches Sonic was often depicted with a stereotypical damsel in distress, Madonna, his own “Princess Peach” that ended up being scrapped for many reasons, including the similarities with Super Mario. As the years have gone by, this concept has not disappeared, but rather the writers and directors of the series have taken it down different paths over time. While Madonna was too cliché, other candidates for the role of “Sonic’s girlfriend” would quickly appear to try different dynamics, directly or indirectly endorsed by SEGA.

Sally Acorn

For many years, Princess Sally was for Western fans the first person who came to mind when they thought of “Sonic’s girlfriend”. Since 1993, and for 2 more decades, her relationship with Sonic has gone in many directions, but fundamentally the most amazing thing about this whole situation was that she was Sonic’s official girlfriend (at least in the Archie Comics canon). It was also one of the many headaches for SEGA in the last decade.

Originally a fellow fighter against the macabre Robotnik from the 1993 animated series Sonic The Hedgehog, Sonic and Sally’s relationship was always marked by their opposite personalities; while Sally tends to plan ahead and is much more focused on the seriousness of the task, Sonic was the type to destroy robots first and think later. “Opposites attract,” they say, and by the (premature, I might add) end of that series both were already more than friends. They had already kissed a couple of times.

At the most critical moment in their relationship, Sonic, after a year of being missing in space and presumed dead by everyone, returns to Mobius only to end up back in potential danger, decides to ignore the wishes and warnings of Sally, who’s clearly emotionally traumatized and stressed by both the general situation and the responsibilities she had to carry out for her kingdom in the absence of her parents. The result of this explosive cocktail was one of the most infamous scenes in all of Archie Sonic, "the Slap", where Sally finally reacts violently to Sonic's selfish statements. The hedgehog's response? Well, a long exposure to the screams about her experience - also traumatic - up to that point. In the end, both end up screaming and crying in front of virtually everyone.

What followed in the next decades was an expansion of that original SatAM canon in the Archie Comics, in which its various writers introduced varying degrees of drama and increasing conflict to demonstrate the strong bond between them, destabilizing or even stabilizing it again, multiple times. They would be together for some time, then they would be apart, eventually rekindling the flame of love passionately, until a final sacrifice on their part and the eventual resetting of the entire Archie Sonic canon.

In their last years, after the Super Genesis Wave, Sonic and Sally’s relationship went back to being platonic. a good friendship with the advantages and disadvantages of their personalities - Sally’s leadership and Sonic’s extreme confidence - while the focus was put on the flourishing relationship between Sally and her best friend (and old computer!) Nicole.

Regardless of the way their relationship ended, it's undeniable that Sally has left a huge mark. Being a product of the West, her existence was never really accepted by the Sonic’s Japanese creators, but because the bulk of the fandom is here in the West, Sally's presence has been strongly associated with Sonic, the Freedom Fighters, the comics... and also the ship wars between her and the character we’re going to talk about next. Her very existence was a living contradiction to the Japanese central canon, an official girlfriend who broke all the ideas that existed for Sonic in terms of his conception of relationships and lead him through unique paths. Whether for better or worse, Sally broke the mold.

Eimi. Rosy. Amy Rose.

On the opposite side of the spectrum there’s Amy, a character that was originally conceived as the Minnie to Sonic’s Mickey, but with her own dynamic.

Despite Amy’s existence being strongly tied to Sonic’s, once again Sonic Team tried to avoid the classic cliché (in this case to copy Mickey and Minnie), opting then to establish Amy as the one interested in a relationship, while Sonic runs away from this idea. For this dynamic to keep working, Sonic’s feelings have to be kept hidden, with excuses like his “shyness”, which leads to ambiguity, or because, as said before, of his “child’s heart”.

The most interesting thing is that Amy kept her canonical status of “self-proclaimed girlfriend” since 1993, which makes her “official” and “not official” at the same time, but there are some traces left from the Sonic manga of 1992 (which in turn influenced Amy’s original design), where a prototype version of Amy (or, as it was spelled there, Emi/Eimi) played the role of Sonic’s girlfriend (or Nicki’s, to be more precise). With this detail in mind, Amy can be considered, at least in the East, the very first “Sonic’s girlfriend”, even before Sally – but her situation is much more complex.

Sonic Mega Drive (top) and Sonic Boom (bottom), representing some differences in different Sonic continuities.

In any case, the manga would be the first and only time Amy was officially considered “Sonic’s girlfriend”, because in the following decades and in several continuities the core of their dynamic shifted to Amy chasing Sonic. Both would get closer or further away depending on each case (in Fleetway, for example, Amy ends up marrying another character, while in Archie Sonic there would be only a few instances of potential interest, quickly overshadowed by convenience or other things directly or indirectly related to Sally), but generally no continuity would establish an official relationship. In some cases, such as Japan, it wouldn’t even be necessary to clarify the state of the relationship, since their cultures accept more easily the dynamic that Sonic Team proposed as an “official relationship”. Just looking at the artwork highlighted on Sonic Channel (run by SEGA of Japan) shows how much more accepted the relationship is, even though Sonic Team’s official artwork still avoids any kind of public confirmation. (Author’s note: I’ve written more about Amy according to the East and the West in the first article of this trilogy)

Unlike Sally, there is no “opposites attract” situation between Amy and Sonic, and, at first, there is no prior friendship from which a potential relationship could flourish. We witnessed their dynamics from the first moment they met, and it would not be until years later that there would be a minimal basis for interaction from which various official continuities would bring both characters closer together.

Technically Amy already knew that her destiny was tied to Sonic and the events of Sonic CD on Little Planet, thanks to her tarot cards (an element that has disappeared since then), but for Sonic it was just another day of adventure, and although we’ve seen how Amy's feelings have progressed, mostly in Adventure 1 and 2, Sonic has never reflected on his personal feelings; it’s an aspect of the hedgehog that to this day remains a mystery to the audiences.

Also unlike Sally, Amy has appeared in multiple continuities of all kinds and because of that her relationship with Sonic has been affected in various ways. The main videogames canon has remained ambiguous and unchanged for 25 years: Amy would stay close to Sonic and offer some good moments to reflect on her feelings about him (some of which I mentioned in my post about Sonic Unleashed and Amy’s emotional support), while Sonic would remain distant, uncomfortable, shy, and, more recently, potentially affected by her apparent loss.

Sonic X is the first official attempt (by Sonic Team no less) to offer an expanded view of our characters. There’s a lot of discussion about how Sonic is slowly opening up to Amy’s advances, and these developments follow a line that we discussed in previous articles of this trilogy, and how, during the 2000s, the Japanese writers of the series kept slowly deepening the interactions between the two, reaching very important symbolic moments like Sonic X Ep. 9, 52 and 76, among several others. I am purposely leaving out specific details to direct your attention to this fantastic thread by Yvanix Rose that highlights some key details about how this continuity worked the Sonic-Amy dynamic. [Translator’s note: the thread is in Spanish]

Sonic X, episode 76.

Another essential continuity for the development of this dynamic was Sonic Boom, since, despite having been a separate continuity with its own interpretation of the characters, its existence managed to influence the main canon in some way in the years that followed its original release in 2014.

Sonic Boom made two important changes in the dynamic: Amy did no longer externalize her feelings with the same frequency or intensity (speeding up a process that already started in the main canon in 2008), and Sonic was noticeably more nervous and insecure of his feelings for her, even being jealous in several occasions. These changes got the dynamic closer to the “friends who have secret feelings to each other but they’re too shy to admit it” trope, and in the second season it could even be said that there are signals of the “secretly dating” trope. Nothing was officially confirmed yet, but the changes to the dynamic offered a fresh perspective to work from: winks and inferences about a relationship that was not talked about but seemed to happen behind the scenes.

Sonic Boom S1E16.

Sonic Boom’s approach also opened the door to working a little more on the characters’ new personalities. Taking a little inspiration from the original foundations of Sally and Sonic’s relationship, Boom now presented situations where Sonic and Amy’s perspectives actively clashed with each other, leading to discussions and moments that showed a little more of the mundane details of the friendship they had, rather than appealing to more classic behaviors of the main canon, like Sonic leaving the scene in a hurry. Considering the way things turned out the last time we saw this kind of dynamic on screen, it was pretty safe to assume that their new opposites were now attracted; the implied secret dating and so on only helped to give it more sustenance - which the fandom would eventually take to the extreme.

And lastly there’s IDW Sonic, the comic series that replaced Archie Sonic after its cancellation in 2017, and the most recent arc that offers an interesting perspective. Starting its continuity from the end of the events of Sonic Forces (which at the same time took on certain characteristics from the post-Boom era, particularly as far as Amy is concerned), IDW Sonic didn’t waste any time in presenting the way in which it would carry out its dynamic between Sonic and Amy.

Amy makes her feelings for Sonic very clear, and he is surprised but unable to match them. However, Sonic doesn’t want to outright reject her, and suggests that she come with him; she refuses, claiming that she has duties to the Resistance, setting the tone for the rest of the series. (IDW Sonic #2)

“Sonic’s girlfriend” today

As I mentioned earlier, after the reboot Sally was no longer considered Sonic’s girlfriend, and her disappearance after the cancellation of Archie Sonic in general is a sign that we may not see her ever again, even as a friend. As of today, in 2020, only Amy has been left in her “unofficial, but…” state, with various minor events taking place both in the main canon and in IDW Sonic:

In 2018 the official SEGA shop wrote a description for a piece of Amy Rose merchandise that said “celebrate 25 years of Sonic’s girlfriend”; the mistake wasn’t immediately corrected, despite the fandom pointing it out immediately.

The video game canon has remained dormant, with Team Sonic Racing in 2019 featuring more of a regular friendship between Sonic and Amy, sharing rivalries and quiet moments alike.

On the other hand, since IDW Sonic and Sonic Boom laid their foundations, we've begun to see a certain shift in the way the two characters are presented. While we’ve talked about IDW Sonic already, Sonic’s social medias have done multiple “Twitter Takeovers” where Sonic characters answer questions from fans, and Sonic has always answered more like his version of Boom to the inevitable question about Amy and his “feelings”.

Recent official animations like Sonic Mania Adventures and Team Sonic Racing Overdrive have shown Amy flirting with Sonic in a more casual way.

The current dynamic seems to be pointing towards “Sonic’s hidden feelings”, and I think we are at a perfect point to change the approach. SEGA in general seems more open to the idea of bringing these characters closer, probably as a marketing strategy, but without yet separating themselves from the central ideas that defined the dynamic for the last two and a half decades.

Conclusion

The idea of “Sonic’s girlfriend” has been one of the most experimental and controversial in the almost three decades that this series has been around for. SEGA has opened the door to all kinds of ambiguities, developments and interpretations, all with their pros and cons, instead of settling on a definitive position. As iconic as these characters, conceived as Sonic’s “romantic interests”, have become, they have also had their share of criticism and controversy, especially in the fandom.

The presence of Amy as the only “official but self-proclaimed girlfriend” today says a lot about the control SEGA (specifically SEGA of Japan) regained over the characters, after decades of interpretations that offered different alternatives with various degrees of success. At her best, Sally represented an ideal relationship with Sonic, much more complete and profound than the back-and-forth game between Amy and Sonic. But at her worst, this same relationship represented everything wrong that could happen by associating Sonic with the emotional spiderweb of a romantic relationship. SEGA hardening its control over the characters seems to have put an end of this type of situation where Sonic ends up being involved in a romantic telenovela, but at the same time it has revitalized the flirting game and the implicit associations that give fuel to the fandom fire.

From my humble interpretation, I think we’ve reached a point where Sonic and Amy have shared enough stories and moments to solidify the core aspects of their personalities and their friendship, allowing them to take the next step, which is to play around with the idea of “something else”. 25 years ago it was hard to see how these two characters could work together beyond “it’s SEGA’s word”; today there’s enough of a story to find a rhythm and chemistry for them, and the series of situations they've put themselves in (e.g. IDW Sonic’s plot arcs) are increasingly helping this case. The topic of “Sonic's girlfriend” may be a controversial one for SEGA and the fandom in general, but the doors have slowly been opened for this debate to develop and be investigated with interesting results, and I think that, in this new decade of 2020, there’s a unique potential to explore this kind of discussion, without sacrificing in any way the central principles of Sonic as a character. Thank you for joining me in these 200 entries, and hopefully we’ll see each other for many more.