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deadghosy · 11 months ago

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Ive just been reading your Lucifer big sister headcanons, and thier so so so so good, i love how you wrote it🥰. What about Lucifer with a little sister? Any thoughts? How different would he treat her? Maybe she fell at the same time as him and Lucifer blames himself for leading his sister down the same path as him. I can seen him being a protective older brother because come on their in hell surrounded by sinners its got to be stressful even tho she isnt weak what so ever but Lucifer can help but baby his sweet little sister.

(Obviously no pressure to write this)

Have a nice day 😁👋

As a younger sibling, I was gonna make this as I made the elder sister! So I’m glad you asked this as I can’t help but love to make this version. 🦆 sorry if it’s long, I just had fun making this🔥

YOUNGER SISTER! READER X PLATONIC HAZBIN HOTEL

Prompt: you are the younger sister of Lucifer Morningstar who fell along her older brother.

Dead ass you fell on top of Lucifer when you both fell from heaven.

“Groannsss….GET OFF!” Lucifer yells pushing you off him. You huffed getting off him as you dust yourself.

I headcannon reader to have a slight rebellious attitude sometimes like Adam but she’s not as terrible.

Like reader has a shirt that says “kiss my ass” with a kiss mark on the shirt as she puts up a rock gesture 🤟

Lucifer found your shirt and burned it, he can’t have his baby sister have such an inappropriate shirt!

“LU-LU! NOOO MY SHIRTTT” “THIS SHIRT IS NASTY LITTLE SIS!-”

He put his hand to your face to keep you away as he burned it. It was a funny sight as you huffed kicking him in his nuts as he groaned falling face first to the ground.

I also headcannon that reader is the reason why Charlie had a emo phase as reader kinda has a different aesthetic than Lucifer.

But on a serious note, Lucifer was kinda scared when you fell with him as he puts his hand through his hair watching you sleep. He couldn’t believe he brought his baby sister with him on his down fall. He knew he influenced you as you looked up to him more than the other angels. It was like if you were his child, his baby.

But he tucks you in bed as you were sprawled out in your bed snoring loudly. He chuckles kissing your head and leaving your room as he closes your door with a slight sad look.

Back to the funny sibling things, you are definitely the one who sneaks in the kitchen to take his leftovers for payback. After Lucifer walks out of his workshop tired and hungry.

You basically told him to take care of himself more. He walked in the kitchen to find his leftovers gone. So you could tell what happened next.

“Y/NNNNN!” You heard a fierce yell as you had shoved the food down your mouth and ran as you heard a loud flapping of wings behind you. “WHEN I CATCH YOU, YOU BETTER PRAY!”

It’s was so cartoony at how Lucifer chases you while you ran for you life. You have wings but he flys better than you so it’s no use.

He caught you, making you cook dinner for a month as you groan while he smirks patting a duck like a mafia man. “And you better wash the dishes too-” “NOW YOU ASKIN' TOOO MUCHHH!”

But soon the sinners came and made the freedom Lucifer gave them, turn into pure hell as you watch worried at the stress your older brother had. Lucifer tries to smile to show you it’s not affecting him, but it is.

He soon makes you stay all time in the palace, scared for your safety as you stay in your room worried at how isolated he soon becomes. Charlie would walk around babbling about you as she kept your company. You smile at your cute niece giving her boops to her nose.

I also headcannon you and Lucifer are like secret twins as you both hyper fixate about a lot of things like [favorite thing] as he hyper fixates on ducks and gives you his ducks to show off how cool he is as your older brother.

But also I can see reader being shorter than Lucifer, like to his shoulder as Lucifer blinks like a frog as you smile with an evil gremlin ready to stab someone.

But now for some overprotective brother headcannons.

You know how Lucifer when to see Charlie at her hotel, you joined wearing basically a female version of Lucifer’s outfit. But you wore shades to off your ✨coolness✨

Alastor was irritated at your louder personality but you also had a charming aura around you like how Lucifer has his prideful smile. Alastor smirks down at you as you are shorter than Lucifer, he kisses your hand with made you just stand there with a dotted blank expression.

Immediately Lucifer picks you up like a doll as he growls at Alastor like a dog ready to chump his hand off. He knew the radio demon just wanted to piss him off, so the whole time you were in the hotel with him. He always has you close and behind him from the radio demon.

Now if it was a sinner trying to court you, they better hope you don’t snitch like the young sibling you are. Cause ohhhh boy! Lucifer is teleporting to their house to give them nightmares. Maybe even killing them if they made you uncomfortable.

Heaven and hell agrees you are a cutie, demon or angel. Cause in heaven there were angels trying to court you but your brother was always behind you looking stern as he puff his chest trying to see if they suit you best.

Like literally he scares people off as you stand there minding your business.

“I feel a disturbance in the air…” Lucifer says as he was reading a book but pulls the curtains to see an angel trying to court you with their wings.

Immediately you’re being teleported to your room confused as a duck poofs in your hand.

“What the fuckkkk….” You say confused

#lucifer morningstar #lucifer magne #lucifer #hazbin hotel lucifer x reader #lucifer morningstar x reader #fluff #hazbin hotel fluff #platonic Lucifer Morningstar #hazbin hotel x reader #hazbin hotel x female reader #younger sister #young sibling activities #sister reader #young readers #hazbin lucifer #hazbin hotel x platonic!reader #hazbin hotel #hazbin hotel headcanons #hazbin hotel x you

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fluffygiraffe · 8 months ago

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So, I saw your Puzzlevision Jr. AU and I can say that he's so adorable! What is his story in the Puzzlevision Jr. AU?

Puzzlevison Junior! Full Lore! CW; Spoilers!

Mr. Puzzles never grew out of Children's TV shows, but accidentally seeing a violent one scared him. That show was why he felt he should cut off his head and put a TV there. He's less violent, nicer, and probably acts more childish. Probably has better intentions, making the world a better place and safer for children of all ages! The shows he'd make the cast would be more story-book, cookie-cutter, happy, and less violent. In the movie, when he realizes Mario has run away, he tries to get him to come back in the nicest way possible, but Mario is really upset with the fact he took his TV time. He'd get his face smashed in, as he realized later he had to let chaos run amok in his channels to actually get good ratings, probably cried (as he didn't want it to be scary). But in the end, he did. Mr. Puzzles would politely try and put them in different shows but get startled when they started being violent in them. When he got the Five Stars, he immediately removed all the scary TV shows, leaving only his channel. The set would be more happy and colorful, think Sesame Street Elmo's World When Mario ruined it, though, he almost began to cry, but he kept his cool and told Mario to "Go into the corner and count to 1000" with a fake parent-like tone. When the cast break out and make their own show, he'd get really upset and whiney, starting to cry as he threw another fit, slamming his foot down over and over as he simply began to complain. In the fight, he'd be dodging the others, trying to be more defensive and he'd try not to hurt anybody. When they get five and a half stars, he'd lose his powers. He'd begin to apologize and cry, mostly about the castle. He "didn't mean for all the bad to happen" and he "promises he'll be good this time." (Note, I'm on the edge of him being redeemed or he just gets kicked away like in the movie.)

All the Movies!

IT'S GOTTA BE PERFECT - Something went wrong. SMG4 was making the best video ever, and the TV had to help him! It's only the nice thing to do! The keyboard would be more pastel, but still, meaty themes that he mostly tried to hide. The meat went awry, and the rest of the movie went normally.

Western Spaghetti - A more cartoony and happy version of a Western place. One-Shot Wren tries to be as evil as the place allows him to be. His downfall was the fact that the world limited his powers, and Meggy was only "knocked out" every time that she should have been killed.

WOTFI 2023 - Mr. Puzzles expected a nice happy lesson about how stealing is wrong, but it went wrong. The episode is the same.

In the end, he looked nervous as he sat down, clutching his knees. He then says "I promise children, next time, it'll be different... Next time will be better."

All the Episodes!

Mario's Mysteries - It's basically the same, except there are no violent themes. Why would there be? Kids shows don't have those! The only time that there are any "adult themes" is when the programming breaks in the TV Time song, in which Mr. Puzzles looks very distressed and worried, though he changes the topic to The Bee Movie. The pipebomb reward was replaced with a kazoo! The Bloo-Skido part was a playground instead, and the rocket launcher was a party popper. When they find out Mario ate the spaghetti, there is a flash of anger in SMG4's eyes, which quickly is replaced with playful cheeriness as the episode ends with SMG4 promising more spaghetti for him.

Once Upon an SMG4 - Practically the same, except for the fact that there is less being mean to the animals. The motives for money are changed to healing the sick animals because we want a good message after all! The SMG4 Witch is less scary, of course, because he doesn't want to scare small children. More cartoony too. The scene where Smg3 meets the fairy godmother goes more like this- The animals still mess up the dress, but while Smg3's eye twitches, he tells the animals they tried their best. Mr. Puzzles comes in with pastel fairy wings and a crown, of course with a tutu. "Hello, dear princess! I'm the fairy godmother and- What in the world are you wearing?" (He sounds more concerned and worried.)

Scooby Mario, Where'd You Go? - Practically the same, doesn't really change much. The robots are less spooky and the atmosphere is colorful. Instead of going to prison for breaking an animatronic, Bob comes out of the bathroom and asks what he missed. Turns out he was in there the whole time! They then get the pizza as the camera moves out, the show having a happier ending!

Mr. Puzzles' Incredible Game Show Spectacular! - Pastel colors! Yay! He doesn't get mad, he gets sad and overwhelmed. Instead of screaming "IN A MINUTE" with a scary face, he simply looks upset with wide eyes. Exasperated, I suppose it's called. He tries to negate fighting, trying to help them settle their differences and try and make up with reasons like "You should always be nice to your friends" and such. Mario ruins everything and Mr. Puzzles has a temper tantrum. It's less "trying to kill everybody" and more "go away! :(" He doesn't actively try to hurt anybody, and the cage he uses for Mario is just a cardboard box. The audience is plushies.

#ehhegedgvsghfsvfg i love this au #long post #cw long post #Mr. Puzzles #mr puzzles #smg4 puzzlevision #puzzlevision junior au #smg4 mr puzzles #smg tv adware #puzzlevision arc #smg4 au #Mr puzzles au

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panda-puma · 1 year ago

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I'm a little baffled by your post about the one piece anime, because while I would also recommend people read the manga instead, it still is a vastly more accurate adaption than the opla? like, opla is lovely for what it is, but oda being involved in it doesn't change the fact that they took huuuge liberties that the anime just... doesn't? which is perfectly fine for an adaption, I'm just mentioning it because it sounded like you were focused on the character dynamics, which are just... vastly, vastly different in the manga AND anime vs the live action. I'm thinking about Nami and Sanji in particular (and Usopp as well to a degree), who all kind of feel like watered-down versions of their actual selves (Nami isn't greedy enough, Usopp not cowardly enough, Sanji... well, I'm not saying Sanji being different is a bad thing asdf). Again, perfectly fine for an adaption that doesn't mean to adapt its source material beat for beat, but it just leaves me really confused over how the opla is possibly a more faithful/a better adaption than the anime? Which, as far as I can recall, has severe pacing issues, annoying fillers and leaves out things like the cover stories, but still sticks waaaay closer to the actual story and dynamics as they are in the manga.

(First of all: you can like the Anime. As I said before, I've watched the entire Anime 3 times this last year. But you can enjoy something and still know it's flawed. Very flawed, even.)

Uf, I will try to make this as short as possible xD If i sound dry or "angy", sorry, English is not my first language ^^

What baffles me is that most people really think the Anime of One Piece is a faithful 1 to 1 adaptation, or that everything on it is canon (except the fillers), or that Oda approves the changes they make. For context: it was very common in the 90s/2000s to just take a manga that was doing good and make an animation that took the characters and story and did whatever they wanted with it. One Piece is not the only victim of this treatment.

I respect the animators and Seiyuus, they do their jobs good and are what makes the Anime enjoyable. But I really can not understand the Directors and the changes they decided to make to the characters (and this applies to the whole series, not only 20 years ago).

The changes you see in OPLA are necessary to translate a drawing (Manga) to a series acted by real people. Also, condensing 95 chapters of Manga in 8 episodes and trying to bring the essence of the characters to the screen, translating Japanese funny gags to an International Audience and also having the input of 25 years of Oda thinking "huh, maybe this could have been explained better" it's obviously going to make things change.

The Anime has none of those excuses. It's also a drawing so no need to tone down, supposed to have the same Audience (even tho they really tried to make it for little kids and it shows), they clearly don't have an issue with the length of the series and they don't ask Oda for nearly any of the changes they make!

Pretending Oda being involved or not doesn't matter is just so weird to me. You know all One Piece characters are Oda's OCs, right? He is the original creator of the characters. He knows them better than anyone else. He knows where the story is going, what is acceptable, what is on character and what is not. Just because they are very famous characters it doesn't mean they are not someones Original Characters. He loves them and cares for them. Not respecting him as the only one that can say something is canon or not is completely disrespectful and dehumanizing.

About watering down characters in OPLA: again, they are real people acting the characters. In the Manga they are exaggerated to a comical effect that wouldn't translate as comical if it's real people who do it, it'd just be weird. That's because it's different mediums and different audience. But the core of the characters is very present, just less cartoony. On the other hand, the Anime reduces the characters to just this comical effect, taking away nearly everything else of the characters, making them just gags.

Answering to the specific points you make about OPLA:

Nami not being greedy enough: Nami's greed before Arlong Park Arc is just her trying to save enough to free her people. We don't really see her greed until after she is free. We haven't reached this point yet in OPLA, apart of her wanting to dress nice and enjoy a bath.

Usopp not being cowardly enough: they can not spend 5 minutes of an 50 minute episode showing him screaming around or running away. But they did show him running as first reaction in Kaya's Mansion, twice. They showed him wanting to go back home after encountering Garp. He does say cowardly things all the time, like wanting to leave, stay on the Merry, not fight the Fish Men, running away the second Chu payed attention to him… It's just less cartoony. They are also not showing inner dialogue of the characters, it's just shown by their acting.

Sanji not being a pervert: Not only is Sanji's perversion waaaay exaggerated in the Anime, to an unpalatable degree, it's also a very Japanese Funny Gag that wouldn't translate good to an International Audience. Sanji in the Manga has, on top of everything else, a friendly relationship with Nami. He can talk to her like a human being. They are friends that can agree or disagree without drama, that join forces to fix things very often and act very calm around each other unless something "special" happens and Sanji is lovestruck, but even so, he usually comes back to being normal pretty fast. Of course he likes her and he is attracted to her, but he also sees her as a person... unlike the Anime. This translated to into the Live Action to a man that tries to flirt and has no success, but that can take a no as an answer without being offended. Also, Oda probably wanted to show on the Live Action that the real reason Sanji is on the crew is no other than him following Luffy (that is also a thing that the Anime waters down: Sanji's dedication to Luffy)

The main point is: yes, OPLA is an Alternative Universe where things are shown a bit differently, but the core of the characters is the same. You see them and you see real people, just like in the Manga.

And let's see about the faithfulness of the Anime... just because the Arcs are called the same and things kind of happen the same, it doesn't mean it's a faithful adaptation. The most important thing in a story is the characters and how they interact and react to the world. These are just some differences between the Anime and the Manga that I can think of off the top of my head, just from the East Blue Saga. (without any particular order)

-- Zoro's real backstory (Manga) is that he had been in the Shimotsuki Dojo probably since birth, practicing his 2 Sword Style and only starting the 3 Sword Style to carry Kuina's Soul with him. [((spoilers from Wano: now we know Zoro is also a Shimotsuki, so he was training in his family's Dojo. It also explains why Koushirou gave Kuina's sword to Zoro so easily: they are family, and Zoro would carry the Shimotsuki name to the top of Swordmanship))].

Zoro's backstory in the Anime is completely changed to make it look like he is a random funny kid that came out of nowhere and one day appeared in the Dojo. His signature 3 sword style is also made like he just "wanted to use as many swords as possible".

I don't think it's very necessary to explain why this changes are just... terrible for the character and continuity.

[Edit: the following is not correct! Check the reblog for the correction :D] The Anime also makes Zoro's departure from Shimotsuki Village like something he planned to do, saying goodbye to Kuina's Grave and Koushiro… when in the Manga he literally tells Luffy he was kicking pirates out of his village and he got lost and didn't know how to get back. [/end of incorrect part]

Changing Zoro's character at every turn is something they love to do in the Anime.

Usopp in the Manga wants Luffy&co. to meet Kaya, because he cares about her well being. He wants her to make new friends, to be able help them and feel useful doing it. Usopp knows what Kaya needs is contact with the world and tries to bring it to her.

Usopp in the Anime is jealous and secretive of her. He doesn't want the others to go meet her, even knowing they are good people. He'd rather have her to himself.

This is a fatal change to the character of Usopp. He is a kind hearted lovely man that wants what's best for his friend... but the Anime just shows a jealous asshole.

In the battle against Cabaji, Zoro cuts his own wound, so his opponent can't use it as an advantage anymore.

In the Anime, he lowers his defense on purpose and lets Cabaji cut his wound.

The first one shows how far he can go to prove himself, also shows he is not at all worried because he doesn't consider Cabaji up to his level. I'm not sure what the second one is supposed to show apart from "children can not see self-harm".

Also in Orange Town in Manga, Luffy is fighting as much as possible against the cage he is trapped in, biting the bars. And afterwards he is very worried asking Zoro to leave him and not carry him or he will get worse from his wounds. In the Anime he is just surprised that Zoro can carry him like that. He doesn't really fight his predicament.

The Anime usually shows Luffy as an uncaring friend, which is sad when he is a character that cares so much and has so much empathy.

In the Manga, Zeff cuts his own leg and eats it to survive after giving all the food they have to Sanji.

In the Anime, Zeff lost his leg because it got caught in the ships broken pieces, and he had to cut it to survive. (i guess he survived 80 days thanks to the Holy Spirit or something) (again with being palatable to children)

In the Manga, the first encounter between Tashigi and Zoro is brief, Zoro gives her back the glasses and carries on (even tho tilted by her looking so similar to Kuina).

In the Anime, Zoro breaks Tashigi's glasses with the shock and she proceeds to be the meanest person ever insulting him in many ways (isn't she supposed to be a good person?) and forcing him to work for her to pay her glasses back, even tho she has no need for the money.

The Anime shows Zoro as a pushover, when in reality he is not. He was "pushed over" by Luffy out of the blue because it is Luffy, not because Zoro would let someone random do that to him. This type of "Zoro gets messed up easily by anyone" is very repeated through the Anime, taking away the importance of his relationship with Luffy and the other few he pays really attention to.

In the Manga, Sanji wants to be famous and have his face seen in the Newspaper. That's why he gets mad when Usopp is in Luffy's Wanted Poster and he isn't.

In the Anime, he is already a famous cook. We can see it in one of the many filler in Loguetown, where another cook has been wanting to surpass him for a long time.

[((spoiler of Whole Cake Island: This collides directly with how his Wanted Poster makes his bio Family looks for him to use him, after knowing he is still alive.))]

Also in Loguetown, in the Manga Luffy goes directly to the place Roger was executed.

In the Anime they make him get lost a hundred times for comical effect. He also meets Smoker, Buggy and others on the way… taking away all the surprise.

In the Manga, Zoro and Luffy are pretty confused with Sanji's romantic reaction to Nami. They don't get why she's getting special treatment. Zoro even wonders if she bewitched him somehow.

In the Anime, as soon as Sanji starts flirting with Nami, Zoro gets irritated and Luffy gets uncomfortable.

In the Anime they try hard to make Zoro have a romance with any girl that shows up, adding reactions that are never present in the Manga.

And well, a huge one that needs more elaboration, because it is the core of the Manga: Luffy is shown observing and judging situations and people constantly. Every time something is happening that shows the true nature of people, he is specifically shown paying attention.

In the Anime this is translated as him being an empty headed kid that barely thinks or cares about anyone. He is a shell of a man, who only repeats that he wants to be King of the Pirates...

This is a very tiny list of examples that explain themselves without going into extensive detail…

I can go on and on about more changes that make no sense or change characters personalities, but if I do, I will dedicate its own blog to it to not clutter this one. I need bigger posts to explain the changes I see in dynamics between the characters xD

And as I said: if all of these changes were approved by Oda, I would be happy to accept them. But sadly they are not.

So to me, the One Piece Anime is just a fan-made adaptation that takes too many liberties. Or, as Animes are really considered in Japan: just advertisement for the Mangas.

On the other hand, OPLA changes were approved after negotiations and struggles and years of back and forth. Oda was very invested in it, trying to really show his vision and his world as good as possible. That's why i consider the Live Action as a faithful adaptation of the story.

Of course you may not consider these things important, but they are for me. In the end, you are free to enjoy One Piece as you wish! ^^

Anyways, thanks for reading so much! xD This ended up not being short at all, but i controlled myself as much as possible, i swear uvuU

#ask #one piece manga #one piece anime #comparison #one piece #very long post #one piece live action

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popculturebuffet · 2 months ago

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HCG: Garfield His 9 Lives Retrospective Finale: The BOOM! Comic Book (Commission for Emma Fici)

Happy halloween all you comic cats and welcome to the finale of my look at Garfield His 9 LIves! We've covered the cult classic book, the beloved specail and now we're onto the final entry: the comic time forgot.

So in the 2010's Garfield had a comic book done by Boom Studios, both an ongoing and a few mini series, initially written by Garfield and Friends and The Garfield Showrunner Mark Evainer, but by this point written by Scott Nickel. Nickel seems to primarialy work in kids comics, having done some of Sports Illustrated's graphic novels for kids. A real thing that exists.

So naturally with a new medium, it was time to once again take a stab at this concept. Honestly with the films going on I wouldn't mind if they tried to do a full film version with 9 new lives, but we'll see.

For now this is the last stab at the concept and is largely forgotten as the Boom Garfield comic didn't make a huge splash. It is currently being reprinted which is good, I hate when things fall into limbo betwene licenses and i'm still waiting for Image to put more than meets the eye back into print. and meant I could read the whole thing on comixology unilmited as it's recently added the garfield comics.

So fitting the medium, much like the book, 9 Lives III: Season of the Witch has each life have a wildly diffrent visual style, probably the most of any of these, with the artists involved really going wild. Out of the three it has the most visual range, and even the segments closer to garfield writing wise still look vastly diffrent. I love it and while a style or two dosen't work for me I applaud the variety. Nickel writes all 9 , the only time one writer wrote all of these, if not a massive departure as Jim Davis wrote the bulk of his 9 lives and Phil Roman oversaw the adaptation and has a director credit for the whole thing.

As I hinted at last time this one's a mixed bag as the first few segments.. are not great. But it picks up as it goes along. It's the weakest of the three and while I admit I defintely have love built up for the other two versions I don't here, going into it for the first time for this review, it's more that a lot of the segments fall flatter, some not taking nearly as big swings or trying to do the old narrative thing of looping in past versions of garfield's fast. Sometimes it works, but the better segments, with one exception, tend to just do thier own weird genre thing. It's time for 9 last lives, 9 last ways to loose under the cut as we see the good, the bad and the ugly of garfield.. and also garfield homaging the good the bad and the ugly.

So unlike the others Boom's 9 Lives was originally done as the last 4 issues of the ongoing series, two lives per issue and instead of a garfield life, we just get a full page intro from garfield instead of the one off blurb from the original book or similar intros in the specail. These are mostly fine, just fun little diversions to help set it up each themed to whatever life it is and linking them back to garfield. It's a solid wraparound that dosen't really have an ending as the last one is a scinetest theroising garfields future instead. It does however have my faviorite depection of johns hair i've seen

These are done by Andy Hirsch who looking at his website seems to prefer historical fiction for kids, a cartoony style but you learn something. He did do work for boom on adventure time, regular show and amazing world of gumball so it's not a shock he wound up here. He does really fantastic garfield work and i'd love to see him return to the franchise if they ever do comics again

Art by David Degrand

Cave Cat sucks. It just.. does. On the writing front Nickel falls into the trap most of the lives from the other versions avoided, the same one that made me hate King Kat: it's garfield BUT IN ANOTHER SETTING. Jon is his cave owner! Nermal gets mailed to abu dabi! fucking vito the pizza making man shows up for some reason! I get these are aimed more at kids, but kids expect.. more.

And the thing is looking into the artist.. David Degrand honestly slaps: he did backups for rocko, has a unique and fun chunky art style he just.. didn't get to go as far with. You can see this in the fact he did another garfield story, what seems to be issue 10 of the boom comics, that he , like with cave cat, put art of up on his site for his portfolio

This is so much more expressive and fun btu Cave Cat isn't. The writing really lets him down while Mark Evanier clearly let him have a bit more oomph to his weirdness. That and Evanier can be fucking weird in general, and it fit what they were going for more. Defintely going to have to review this issue at some point and check out some of degrands other works, but Cave Cat did him dirty. I can't tel lif he thought he had to hold back or not drawing monsters he simply couldn't go all out but the man is awesome even if his anthology segment isnt'

Art by Kari Smith I couldnt' find out WHICH Kari Smith made this as Kari Smith turns out to not only be a shockingly common name but lead to a few artists, none of whom SEEM to have worked on this. I did give it my honest best and the art here is decent, if nothing special and nothing like the other kari smiths I found. Granted that again could simply be boom editorial stepping in.

King Cat is fine, which you wouldn't think given how much I fucking hate the animated version. And it DOES keep garfield owning slaves for some reason, but they mostly feed him and fan him. They don't you know. .have garfield whip the piss out of assorted slaves or actively visit the pyramids. He's just doing what a pampered cat/advisor to his king probably would do.

The plot itself.. is kinda boring but at least uses the setting better: Garfield is the beloved pet/advisor to his king, being the one who suggests the pyramids and thus the one who inherits the throne. The king's evil vizer, you know the type, wants the throne instead and sends mummies, a plauge of rats and the god of death anubis against him. And I love how each backfire: the mummies are so dang slow he can just unravel them, he, as you'd expect from garfield, bargins with the rats giving them a bunch of cheese and Anubis.. is pissed the evil vizer interuppted his poker game and kills him.

Honestly.. this one's pretty good. I don't love it and having garfield have slaves is questionable as always, I don't really LIKE characters who own people outright on principal because .. i'ts slavery, I shoudln't have to explain why slavery bad or why a beloved cartoon cat shouldn't be practicing it, but they at least don't tdwell on it as much and use the setting for egyptian gags and in the style of the prince and vizer. it's not amazing but it's at least a marked improvment.

Art by Roger Landridge

Pirate Cat comes to us from Roger Landridge, who as a first for the artists for these stories has a wikipedia article: He started writing a deranged comic strip from 2000ad, The Straightjacket Fits, did a popeye series for IDW and to my delight is the same guy who wrote and drew the excellent Muppet Show comic for boom I've gotta cover one of these days. All in all an acomplished dude. his art style here is nice and expressive, a bit more cartoony than usual for garfield and fitting the story.

It's also nice to get an original concept, as while I don't entirely mind the boom comic recycling concepts, as they do new stuff with the basic premises each time, it is nice to get NEW lives as history is vast. And garfield as a pirate fits as well as a viking with him pillaging lasanga and on a treasure hunt against Jon. It's also the only one that does this past lives gimmick that works for me as Odie and Nermal as his crew, along with some other cats, just makes sense and nermal isn't just.. shoved in there as a button. While Jon as the antagonist is just.. inherently funny. It's hard to imagine Jon as evil but here we are. We also get Melvin the sea monster

I like melvin Give him and old eli a spinoff yesterday.

Art by Yehudi Mercado

So I encountered something entirely unexpected here... see turns out the artist for this one, also artist of Barkham Asylum and other childs comics.. got to write a marvel comic.. what if miles morales #4. Each one in this series was by a diffrent author showing miles as a diffrent marvel hero and for some reason his idea of "Thor but in brooklyn".. became..

I mean combining the two could be clever, combining brooklyn arcateture with asgards buuuut

I mean my god. He later apologized and agreed to donate his residuals to a brooklyn charity but my god. Anyways I mostly bring it up as it's infamous and it'd be weird if I didn't.. and because so far googlling anyone else involve just brings up "They did a bunch of other neat stuff I might check out, usually better than this" not "They did a racisim".

So anyway this story itself is good. I like Mercado's style here, nicely stylized and the first of this anthology to really stand out. The script is also great , with Evil Roy Gato coming into town to force them to print goofy novelty shirts so when it's invented he can send the work offshore and pocket the money! It's just such a weirdly specific and goofy idea it makes me giggle. And his defeat by clint eastwood garfield is delightful. Just typing the sentence clint eastwood garfield is amazing and it's this right mix of fitting, as they both have an excellent resting bitch face, and being fucking weird to have an icon of hypermasuclinity who once ranted at a chair represneting the president for some reason represented by garfield. It's a great segment and while it's marred by it's artist being a bit of a shithead, my hope is that mercado genuinely learned from this and gets a chance to do better. Also just to be clear marvel editorial ALSO deserves blame for that one as they approved it and thought nothing was wrong with it. Mercado is NOT blameless, but my god ya'll read this script and thought "this is fine".

Art by Brittney Williams

Brittney Williams is the first artist whose work i've actually seen before in the marvel series "Patsy Walker AKA Hellcat" a decent slice of life comic starring patsy with fantastic art. Williams was fantastic there and does incredible work here.

Super Cat is a golden age superman pastiche, which happens a lot but works due to putting it's own spins on it: their clark kent stand in is a copy boy, trying to pine after a golden age style dismissive lois, fight a nefarious villian in a mech suit in a world of delightfully drawn furries. It's a simples tory: super cat gets depowered and his new sidekick, odie , the newspaper's janitor who stumbled in on supercat's identity and becomes his sidekick and saves the day. It's cute, funny and gorgeous to look at, getting the right ballance between a golden age comic and parody, feeling like one while also having nice colorful modern florishes in it's art. Super Cat might be my faviorite of the 9+ lives, and is certainly my faviorite of this batch. It's fun, breezy and I may cover it in full someday and gets the feel of superman comics from the golden age down pitch perfect. Read this one if nothing else.

Art by Andy Hrisch

Andy Hrisch gets to cut loose a bit and I like that they let the wraparound guy also do his own segment. You can see more style with this one, with a bulkier sam whose close to garfield. This story leands heavier on comedy than babes and bullets and is delightful: Spayed accidently eats poisoned lasagna and has to figure out who in his rogues gallery poisnined him> The comic has lots of fun designs, reminding me of dick tracy a bit but in it's own style and the payoff for both thigns is great; Spayed spends the day grilling all his enemies.. and thus they all come calling to beat him up, with the real culprit being his secretary he wouldn't pay. He's forced to pay her (He was never poisoned).. but since the whole "pissing off his rogues thing" is thanks to her instead of just..demanding a raise, which is a lot but sadly realistic givne this climate, he leaves her to get pummeled by his enemies. Sam's a jerk here.. but he's a likeable jerk versus Slaverfield. A guy being a touch anti heroic and leaving an asshole to other assholes is a bit more tolerable than "WHIP THEM WHIP THE PISS OUT OF THEM.. FIELD"

Art by Frazer Irving

Frazer Irving is an artist who seems to specialize in horror and being unsettling. Lab Cat ironically is more of a horror comedy, but irving DOES do a great monster design for the cat.. his humans... welll

This is also the only story i've seen talked about entirely for it's art. And it's a mixed bag. I do think Irving does great horror work here, if with dodgy humans.. but the offputting feel dosen't quite match the story, where a bumbling pab tech is forced to look after a giant monster and gets it t calm like any other cat. BOth sides of Lab Cat aren't bad: the idea this big horrifying mutation that man has created is just as much cat is ever is adorable, and the tech leaving the cast hastily and his exasierated reactions.. are genuinely funny. It's just not completely strong as it's clear the writer and artist werne't on the same page as much as with say the first 9 lives "Primal Self". It stillg ets points with me for doing something so diffrent with the basic concept and is on par with sam spade as far as the takes on a life we've sene before go. This one honestly grew on me for it's creatvitiy and unique garfield design and while it dosen't mesh perfectly, I like it a lot more than I did the first go round and a LOT more than the first two segments.. or our last.

Art by Genivive FT

Space Cat is a throughly disappointing finale, more on par with our first segment. It's a star wars riff.. which as a child of the late 90's and early 2000's i've seen far too many of those to be impressed by "OH you made Jon the emperor instead of darth vader, you made arlene leia and garfield han good for you"

It's only two highlights are making it's odie super intellgent, it's C-3PO. C-3POdie, which they shoudl've gone with is fun.. but we just dont' get much time with him or Ace Nova. Ther'es intresting bits here, I like the ending reveal that this was all a setup to get the infinity brick and that Ace.. ends up resetting time and space

But i'ts agressively bland. The art is decent, nicely done digital stuff that reminds me of a more polished versoin of John Allison's early work on scary go round before he started handrawing the strip again

Though the artist has done better work as seen by her deviant art instagram and her own style is better.. which does kinda note the pattern: these artist seemed to be restricted somewhat by whatever paws, boom or the writer wanted, compared to the previous two versions where there was little, the only restirction on the animated one being budget and censors but still not enough.

Overall

Mixed bag was my thoughts going out of the graphic novel.. but on this reread as I reviewed it it's generally.. okay. It has one truly awful segment, a few okay ones, and a lot of geninely great ones. It's the weakest of the three easily, as it's clear the writer for all three wasn't al ltha tup for actual experimenting the way Jim Davis was. He leans more toward humor for ALL segments instead of trying something diffrent with even Lab Cat being a horror comedy. I have nothing against comedy, especailly since this is garfield, but what made 9 lives in both previous versions so unique is it blended comedy stories you'd expect with diffrent styles of comedy, like the three stooges, or horror, noir , biography and more. This 9 lives dosen't seem as keen to experiment in the story ,though the artists involve all try their best, I feel there's WAY more that coudl be done with this concept in this medium and hope we get another crack. I"d even love for some of these artists to come back as they can do more bu it feels like SOMEONE told them to be more garfield. 9 Lives 3: The Dream Warriors is still well worth reading for it's good segments, but feels a bit downgraded, the way it feels like Davis slowly homognized the franchise. It wasn't super deep to begin with but it feels like its experimented less and less as it goes and it's to the franchises detrment

9 LIves Boom Ranking

Super Cat: I gushed about this plenty. It's fun, breezy and unique for a superman parody using the standard golden and silver age setup. Sam Spade: A solid noir spoof with great art Cowboy Cat: A fun western romp with good art from a guy who really needs to sort some shit out. Pirate Cat: Garfield's really handsome when he's on a boat Lab Cat: Despite it's clash of art and words it still stands out Garfield Wraparound: Pretty standard garfield stuff, pretty fun King Cat: Better than the original but still fairly bland compared to the rest Space Cat: Bleh Cave Cat: The artist deserved better.

So that leaves one bit of buisness left. We have 30 segments over three versions, we've ranked them all indvidually.. but which ones are the best? The worst? The middle? Let's see

Overall Ranking

For this i'll also be thrwoing in the babes and bullets special, because why the fuck not.

Primal Self Diana's Piano Super Cat Babes and Bullets (Special) The Exterminators Court Musician (Special Lab Animal (Special) Lab Animal (Book) Sam Spade (BOOM!) Cowboy Cat (BOOM!) Space Cat (Special) Blues Cat Stunt Cat Babes and Bullets (Book) Cave Cat (Special) Garfield (Book) Garfield (Special) Lab Cat (BOOM!) Pirate Cat The Vikings In The Beginning (Book) In the Garden (Specail) The Garden King Cat (BOOM!) Cave Cat (Book) Garfield Wraparound In the Beginning (Special) Space Cat (Book) Space Cat (Boom) King Cat (Special) Cave Cat (BOOM!)

And while I didn't intend it that way, this ranking was entirely by the seat of my pants I do like that it ended up with one of each near the top. I do recommend checking out all three versions of 9 lives if you haven't, it's a trip and well worth the time. Not all segments are created equal, but what's good there is great and well worth your time. Thanks for reading

Next Time: Thanksgiving.. the only garfield holiday done in it's actual month. What a concept.

#garfield #garfield his 9 lives #boom studios #comics #jon arbuckle #odie #david degrande #roger langridge #kari smith #yehudi mercado #brittney L. Williams #andy hirsch #frazer irving #Genevieve F.T.#halloween

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izzydizzy13 · 7 months ago

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ok real talk for a second

how are we avoiding AI gang?

Like, I see a lot of people quitting Instagram bc of their policy to feed art to the Meta AI, and I agree that it is not Cash Money of them to do that... but I am also not entirely sure how it changes anything, because doesn't literally *every* website populate Google? If so, doesn't Google's AI take that anyway, as well as any image AI that uses Google as a database? so most of them, from what I can tell...

Am I fundamentally misunderstanding how this works? I ask because most of the art I have seen here recently hasn't been glazed as far as I can tell visually, and while Tumblr isn't feeding images straight to AI the same way Instagram is, I am still worried for y'all. I kind of hope I AM just confused, because it would be fantastic to have places where I could upload unglazed works in their pure, unswirly form. I just thought I could Glaze my future works and upload them wherever I would usually upload, including Instagram because, well, their AI isn't any better at reading it than Dal-E as far as I'm aware. It is gonna be quite annoying though, because it takes upwards of an hour to glaze something to the Default strength, and I like uploading silly little doodles that only took like 5 minutes in and of themselves lol, so I'll have to be more picky about what I post...

Anyways, I am gonna start using Glaze on my art at the minimum, I tested it with an older work and it's not very noticeable. I'll drop the glazed piece here for anyone who has been curious about how it would affect their art visually and been too scared to try using it

the grass looks bad because of me, that's my fault for not knowing how to draw grass. The Glaze is that swirly triangular pattern that is most noticeable in the exact middle of the image, on the shorts and leg. It is virtually invisible on the face, which is the part I care most about anyway. So, while yes it would be an annoying affect if it were something really aggressively well-rendered, I've got very few issues with it for my more cartoony art style. It's the default amount of glaze, so not the highest tier of protection possible but enough.

I didn't really care about AI theft when it was still in its infancy, I still don't think it's the end of the world or anything like that, people enjoy art for the personal connection it has with its artist, and I like to think AI will never fully replicate that... not to mention that all of these AIs are in for a legal nightmare once someone sues for copyright infringement ... but, with how high quality the images are becoming and how thoroughly integrated it is into many of our browsers and websites, I still don't wish to help it any further if at all possible.

For anyone who wants to utilize this anti-AI Glaze, here's the link to downloads for Glaze

There is a browser version as well, though it requires an invite (automatically granted to anyone who doesn't use AI via email) I haven't tried that one yet, my computer is thankfully able to run the desktop version so I've had no need to get an invite.

If this is the first you're hearing about Glaze, I should also mention that there is a thing called Nightshade on this very same website. It does a very similar thing to Glaze, except for that it also gives AI models incorrect information when fed to it that, through a bunch of technical stuff that I don't understand, actually makes the AI worse than it was before. I've decided to just use the regular Glaze since, personally, my goal isn't to screw over the devs who made the AI, even if it's something I disagree with. I just don't want my work utilized, so I will Glaze it and move on. I can't really blame anyone who uses Nightshade though, just explaining why I don't.

I was also wondering if any of y'all have a contingency plan in the case of AI developing to the point where Glaze doesn't work anymore... like are we just gonna have to delete everything from the last however long we've been glazing or what? yike

#ai art #anti ai #idk what tags will be good here I'll be real chat #may the Tumblr algorithm do its thing #artist on tumblr

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atangledupmess · 2 years ago

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Okay, so idk what happaned but everytime I tried to post this drawing I got an error message, everything else it was posting just fine but this drawing kept crashing everything, I am reposting this for the 7TH TIME!!!! I even am trying to log in different devices man T0T

🍰Sweet, Sweet Victory~🍰

♡I know I am, like, 2 weeks late to splatfest, but I was struggling with drawing and motivation, I drew the sketch a week ago but hated how stiff it looked (old sketches will be included in a reblog) and decided to review it again at a later time with a more fresh view and after seeing a specific fanart for Frye I decided to restart everything and it turned out SO MUCH BETTER than I expected!

♡I wanted to try my hands on a more cartoony style and try out a pen I've been meaning to use but actively avoided it, and I am SO PROUD of it!

♡Also, I just really liked her color palettes during this splatfest and I just had to draw her, I had no choice in this I just had to.

♡I'm still unsure about the font, I struggled a lot to make it match, in my eyes, with Frye but I've never been good with fonts lol so I did a version with just Frye to just show her off XD -🍓

#saltys art #please if you could reblog this again #id greatly appreciate #delete the old reblog or sm idk #just help a girl out TwT #ive written out the same tags so many times #im tired #im also going to remove the sketches and add it in a reblog #idk maybe that's the problem?#splatoon #splatoon 3 #splatoon 3 frye #frye fanart #splatoon 3 splatfest #team sweet #team frye #spicy vs sweet vs sour #splatoon 3 fanart #splatoon frye

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spewagepipe · 8 days ago

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On 2024

Living through the slow death of capitalism makes it exceptionally difficult to tell to what extent my disdain for the New is coming from the usual generational alienation as I age, versus to what extent it's because capital is quite demonstrably choking the life and soul out of all forms of artistic creation. Anyway, here's a retrospective of the year that is sure to discredit me in the eyes of all of my new followers.

Best 2024 Horror Movie: The Substance I didn't do a Shocktober marathon this year, so I really feel like this one needs to be addressed: The Substance didn't frighten me, personally, but it did make me feel some of the most profound despair and dismay of anything I've watched in years. Maybe more intense than Hereditary, even? Anyway, it's also great that, between this and Barbie last year, we can tell that the film industry is a meagre 10 years behind the state of online discourse as far as women's oppression.

Left 4 Dead Award for Best Cooperative Shooter: Helldivers 2 More so than any game that I can think of from the last decade, HD2 feels like the sort of game that is worth turning into a pseudo-hobby unto itself. With that said, I'm increasingly wary of how the perfunctory fascism jokes are making it harder to tell if everybody is actually cognizant of the satire. I'd really like it if the live service updates would try to a) make the Helldivers look more like chumps, b) make the enemies look more heroic/positive, c) provide an opportunity to start undermining the SE state.

Best 2024 Video Game: Helldivers 2 Wait, what? HD2 already one the special category award, this is supposed to be a more general one for... oh, oh I see. So, normally, there would be maybe like a dozen worthwhile games that come out in a year, and I'd play maybe two of them, and the rest would go into my backlog. But, uh... everything sucked this year. Like the entire lineup of "Game of the Year" stuff I've seen has been one long sad trombone sound effect.

Denis Villeneuve Dunking on Frank Herbert Award for Best Adaptation: Dune: Part Two I say this lovingly, as someone who's always liked Dune in a vague way, as like a setting, or maybe even as a "franchise", but who never really enjoyed the experience of Dune itself (or any adaptation thereof) – these movies are just flat out better than that book, huh? Not even in like a "each version has its merits" way but in more of a "now that we have Fury Road there is no reason to ever bother re-watching Road Warrior" kind of way.

Best Board Game I Tried in 2024: Hegemony It's a 2023 release, but I narrowly missed my shot and finally got to play it in January of this year – but holy crap Hegemony is, like, a surprisingly solid reflection of the way class warfare works under capitalism? The way you're dependent on your opponents while trying to undermine them is something else – like a twisted inversion of the hedgehog's dilemma.

Best Older Video Game that I Played in 2024: Deathloop I needed a massive PC upgrade just to be able to run Deathloop, so I only finally got to play it just this year – so maybe my biggest criticism of the whole thing is that they should have busted the graphical quality down to something way more cartoony and stylized so that it wouldn't be so fucking demanding. Because, yeah, other than the delay, this game whipped ass.

Best 2024 Campaign-Format Board Game: ISS Vanguard The internet tells me that this technically "released" in 2022, but my pal who kickstarted it didn't physically receive his copy until this year, so that's clearly bullshit. There's a lot to criticize about Vanguard – and criticize I will, once we've finished the campaign – but I keep coming back to it because the story is just intriguing enough, and the cycling modes generate just enough excitement for one another, that it has proven really compelling.

Most Disappointing Video Game that I Played in 2024: Prey I'd make a special mention here of Red Dead Redemption 2 because the way that game made me feel like my soul was leaving my body was certainly unexpected, but the prize goes to Prey largely because I wasn't expecting RDR2 to be my cup of tea in the first place. But the wild gulf between the Prey that everybody else seemed to enjoy and my own sad, sorry experience is frankly just... hard to reconcile.

Best Board Game I missed in 2024: Earthborne Rangers Earthborne Rangers was ostensibly released in 2023, so I technically "missed" it last year, not this year – but I've been waiting for the entire year to play it and the second printing still hasn't manifested, so I feel more than justified.

You Might Be Noticing that There Aren't Any TTRPGs in this List: and that's because all the TTRPGs I played this year were old, unremarkable, and/or kinda shit. To be quite honest, nothing much came out this year that I'm excited to try, anyway. But I've got a few backlogged items that I'll hopefully have the chance to write about in the future, and there's been some buzz that we might finally see Burned Over get a formal, self-contained release next year, so that's cool.

#2024 #new year #movies #video games #tabletop #awards #retrospective

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noelis1stperson · 1 year ago

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music themed games.

DOOM ETERNAL or DOOM are one of the games that use their soundtracks effectively in order to portray the mood of the game, for instance if you're just wondering around the music is somewhat subtle, but once you see and enemy on the first shot you take the music becomes more intense until all the enemies in the area are dead, the music used is also great as it really sets the mood of the game.

youtube

Another classic game themed around music is guitar hero, using the custom controller, the game gives timed events that you have to press in order, that go along with the rhythm of the song in the background

youtube

a game similar to guitar hero is Friday night Funkin, which is kind of a more keyboard controlled game and a cartoony version of guitar hero. but it is still a music themed game that uses the rhythm of the song as the timed events. its a smooth game however personally i think guitar hero is better as its timed events are more closer to the songs rhythm and overall just looks cooler.

youtube

Another game that is also similar to both of the games is Osu , however its a more simplistic version of the game so personally i don't think its as good as the two previous games, but just like the rest it uses the rhythm of songs as the timed events, which are hit with a keyboard, but it also has another version that is to do with moving your mouse at the right time in certain motions, which i think is quite cool

youtube

A classic mobile game most are familiar with are my singing monsters, a game which is based around making your own music, beats, and rhythm using different creatures that all connect together to make a custom song, each monster have their own unique tune, for example beats, or singing.

youtube

Another game that uses their soundtrack to set moods is Devils may cry 5, Much like DOOM when you're just roaming around, the music is calm, but once you encounter an enemy, the music becomes louder and more heavy until the enemies are all gone, the game is for a specific type of audience so I'm not really a fan but it does capture the mood using music well

youtube

Yet another similar game is Final fantasy VI remake, which once again also uses the music to set the theme of the environment, its another type of game I personally isn't interested in however it also captures the current mood and atmosphere.

youtube

A unique music game that separates itself away from the rest is called sound shapes, you play as this slime ball creature in a wrecked city where you climb up walls and collect music notes. damage items such as missiles move along with the beat of the song, which you have to avoid, voice notes are also used in the game as physical bridges to progress along the level, its quite hard to describe but the video explains it a lot better.

youtube

Another unique game that subtly uses music as themes is Billie bust up, for example in this boss fight, the boss is singing with music in the background while you have to avoid obstacles and jump on platforms and avoid the quick events where the boss tries to swipe, I think the purpose is to more set a theme of the boss and create a small sense of tension while you run away.

youtube

A really subtle game that uses music as a theme is actually quite noticeable, the game doesn't use any specific soundtracks to set moods or stuff like that, instead you play as one of the most famous music producers of all time, 50 Cent, where you didn't receive your money, and a gang is trying to take you out while you have to progress along and get the money, while the gae is quite old, it still plays amazing and the fact you play as 50 cent throughout the game is awesome.

youtube

#Youtube

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i-kevxia-i · 1 year ago

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music themed games.

youtube

#Youtube

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realcube · 3 years ago

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YOU BUY A PLUSHIE OF THEIR BEST FRIEND

characters ♡ iwaizumi, kenma, akaashi & tendou

tws ♡ graphic plushie abuse and parent!reader in akaashi’s

HAJIME IWAIZUMI

♡ honestly, you saw the oikawa plushie sitting in the window of some sports shop in the mall which you rarely visit

♡ and that same morning you had heard from iwaizumi that oikawa would be in town and visiting y’all tomorrow, so what would be a sweeter gift to give a rich volleyball player than a miniature version of himself?

♡ hence you bought it without a second thought (well, trying your best to ignore the ungodly price they had plastered on a glorified piece of stuffing)

♡ in fact, you also thought it would be cute to show iwaizumi since he hasn’t seen his best friend in years! perhaps he’d appreciate the little token of fame that displayed how far his childhood teammate has come

♡ but you couldn’t have been more wrong

♡ like you even went to the effort of showing it to him while he is cooking bc that is when he is most peaceful, but no.. he was still annoyed

♡ but he wasn’t irritated for long, bc who could stay mad at such a cute face? (don’t ask whether he means your face or the plushies lol)

♡ however, even if he drops the “argument” (parenthesis bc it was just banter disguised as a quarrel), the oikawa plushie will still likely be defaced within the next 1–3 business days

♥ ♡ ♥ ♡ ♥ ♡ ♥

“ew, what the fuck is that!?”

“it’s oikawa.” you hummed, gaze flickering between the plushie and iwaizumi’s utterly disgusted expression. honestly you couldn’t see anything wrong enough with the plushie to merit such large reaction; the eyes were a bit cartoony but other than that, it was cute!

“exactly. get it out of my house before i throw it in here.” he spat while motioning to the pot of boiling rice, attention hastily fixating on the steam rising from the water, rather than having to view that thing any longer. “how much was it?” he muttered, hesitant to even imply that he was the slightest bit interested in it, but his curiosity was strong.

“expensive.” you croaked while averting your gaze, staring at the bubbling pot and smiling as if you didn’t notice how he was glaring you down, out of the corner of your eye. “but whatever, it’s not for you, anyway. it’s for him, and i’m sure he’ll appreciate it.”

iwaizumi rolled his eyes and scoffed, which is seemingly all he has been able to do since he laid eyes on the plushie, “put the receipt next to my gym bag. i’ll return it on my way there tonight.” he said in an oddly flat tone, which contrasted with the exaggerated gasp that was ripped from your throat.

“no way!” you pressed the back of your palm against your forehead while lifting the plushie in an exaggerated manner; if he was going to make a big fuss over a piece of stuffing, you may as well be dramatic too. “just because minikawa is better at volleyball than you, doesn’t mean you have to be envious of him. i love you both equally.”

catching on to what you were doing, iwaizumi first had to suppress an chuckle before snatching the plushie from your clutches and holding it above the pot of boiling rice; poor minikawa’s fluff being dampened by the steam. “let’s see if he can swim.” he tried to utter in the most sinister tone possible, but failed as you both had already burst out laughing.

once he was able to catch his breath, he retracted his arm from above the pot and casually threw the plushie back to you, “here.” he said gruffly, as if he hadn’t just been cackling like a maniac a few seconds ago, “but if you’re gonna give it to him, at least let me sew the thing a better outfit first.”

you hummed, raising an eyebrow before glancing at the plush, scanning it’s attire and realising it was wearing his blue, argentinian uniform. immediately figuring out what he meant, your nose scrunched with joy, “it’s fine, i’ll sew a small seijoh uniform right now. you work too hard.”

iwaizumi chuckled, reaching backwards to slip a strong arm around your waist and pull you forward, planting a kiss on the first place his lips could reach; your jaw. followed by sensual whisper, close to your ear, “thank you, angel.”

KENMA KUZOME

♡ okay it really depends which bsf you buy — kuroo or hinata

♡ but realistically, why would a plushie of kuroo exist? he’s literally an employee at japan volleyball association (or an pornstar/tax evader depending on what manga panels you’ve been looking at)

♡ meanwhile hinata is a pretty famous athlete, so it’s not surprising when you find a plushie of him for sale on amazon

♡ kenma had entrusted you with the task of finding “a few cute gifts” to give shōyō when he comes to visit

♡ you had bought all the usual stuff like soaps and flowers, also you had the idea to buy a customised MSBY jackals bottle opener and towel, so you thought you were set

♡ but you had never ran to the virtual check-out faster than after you saw that plushie

♡ (also since kenma is famous too bc he is a stock trader/CEO/youtuber, there is probably a plushie of him for sale on amazon too — along with kageyama — and all three of them were in the “frequently bought together” section)

♡ kenma is terrified

♡ it didn’t bother him too much at first; he acknowledged that he thought it was creepy but he decided not to mention it since it wouldn’t be his problem for long anyway

♡ but then you arranged all the gifts in a hamper, which you placed on the vanity which sat directly across from your shared bed

♡ so when he woke up in the middle of the night and took a small sip of water, he caught a glimpse of the plushie and it’s beady, dead eyes staring him down and he literally screamed

♡ it wasn’t loud enough to wake you up but it still left his throat sore for the next week, and he spent the rest of the night hidden under the sheets, almost suffocating

♡ when he told you to get that gremlin out of his room and you asked why, he almost had a breakdown trying to explain that he wanted the plushie gone without admitting that he was scared

♡ because if he did — since he married a menace — he’d probably end up finding ten other plushies around the house, in the most unsuspecting places and it’d give him a heart attack every time

♡ one eye open when i’m sleeping 👁

♥ ♡ ♥ ♡ ♥ ♡ ♥

upon ripping open the parcel that had just arrived, you immediately sprung to your feet and rushed to kenma’s office just to show him the adorable item you bought.

he owns a small suction cup sign which he sticks to his door whenever he is streaming or simply does not want to be disturbed, so when you notice that the sign wasn’t up, you barged into the room with the most cheesy grin gracing your features and the plushie hidden behind your back, “guess what?”

“you bought something.” his gaze remained fixated on his PC screen, yet he replied without missing a beat.

“correct!” you announced proudly, noise scrunching with delight, “it’s for hinata, and i think it’s so perfect.”

before kenma got the chance to utter a single question, he flinched along with his desk as a large item was slammed onto the surface. turning to look at the source, his hairs jumped to stand on their ends as he met the lifeless eyes of a ginger goblin; he could’ve sworn he saw hellfire in it’s inky pupils

“perfect?” he questioned, voice being reduced to a hoarse whisper.

“yeah,” you trailed off, noticing how his expression fell into a grimace, “don’t you like it? look what it does!” you tone was still surprisingly lively as you pressed it’s stomach, and hell broke loose. it sounded like hinata’s bathroom song being sung by a choir of devils; the noise caused kenma involuntarily cringe and avert his wide stare, yet he could still see out of the corner of his eyes that you seemed to be.. content? pleased with the chorus of ungodly screams? wearing a cute smile too? were you both hearing the same thing?

left speechless, all kenma could think to utter was a brief, “okay.” before returning to his work. if he didn’t care about you deeply, he’d have thrown the thing out the window by now. but he doesn’t want you to think of him as irrational or manic, so he forced his mouth shut and glued himself to the chair. in fact, he was too paralysed in fear to even move his arms; bonus!

happy with the response, you picked up the plushie and began heading for the door, but kenma couldn’t help but snicker at how you held the wretched thing dear like a baby when it was literally the visual manifestation of sin.

“alright, kenma.” you peered over your shoulder and playfully blew him a kiss, which he reciprocated — he basked in your radiance, even if it was over a cursed gift, “i’ll let you get back to work. but remember to take a break soon.”

you reminded him, since he had a tendency to overwork himself (when he wasn’t procrastinating) and he nodded, letting out a small sigh as you closed the door behind you. he wasn’t exactly sure how he was going to break it to you that the plushie was a bit freaky, but that was a problem he could deal with later. perhaps he’ll surprise you with a new car and then — while you’re overwhelmed with joy — he’ll ask you to take it on a test-drive to the incinerator and throw the plushie inside.

KEIJI AKAASHI

♡ the most supportive boyfriend <3

♡ even if the plushie is literally terrifying, he will try to fix it with marker or just sew/knit a new one

♡ and if y’all have a kid/baby he will show it to them and be like “look! it’s uncle kou..”

♡ and while the baby is all happy and content, he’ll take a video and send it to bokuto, who replies with a video of him making funny faces, for akaashi to show the baby

♡ either way, akaashi will be pleased...

♡ ...until his kid starts carrying miniature bokuto everywhere

♡ and whenever you try to take it off them to wash it, they immediately start wailing

♡ it was endearing at first; how they were cuddling with the plushie almost all the time, and how akaashi had a bunch of pictures of mini-bokuto in the most random places bc your kid refused to leave it at home (including the aquarium, the mall, the cinema and the supermarket, sitting on the shelf amongst the towering diet coke bottles)

♡ but it got to the point where you were both afraid that they’d never grow out of it..

♡ but fortunately, once bokuto actually came to visit y’all — and your kid got to see uncle kou in the flesh — they kinda left their plushie in favour of the real deal

♡ even when bokuto had to go back home, your kid spent so much time playing with the toys he brought, they pretty much forgot about the plushie all together

♡ benefits of tiny child brain 👍

♡ but what you and akaashi failed to consider, was the fate of the grimy, tattered bokuto plushie once your kid had given up on it

♡ it was in too poor condition to give to charity, so that only left you with one option...

♥ ♡ ♥ ♡ ♥ ♡ ♥

“i suppose this is goodbye.” you monologued, watery gaze fixated on the torn plushie in your hands. well, your hands that were protected by two layers of disposable plastic gloves, of course; there was no way in hell you’d touch that thing with your bare palms. not when it was covered with grime, dust, filth and memories.

“don’t be so dramatic, sweetheart.” akaashi chuckled. though he found it endearing that you were almost as attached to the plushie as your baby was, he simply couldn’t bare another second so close to the object without some sort of nose plug; it reeked.

as you stared dejectedly down on the plushie hovering over the endless trash void, akaashi considered swatting the plushie out of your hand and into the garbage to spare some time, but he didn’t dare to touch it without hand protection. “why are we still standing here?”

you sighed, turning the plush to face him with it’s beady eyes, “look, it’s so cute. plus our baby adored it so much, maybe we should keep it for memories’ sake?”

“or maybe we shouldn’t.” akaashi reached up to squeeze his nose shut, which conveyed to the point he was trying to prove.

“yeah.” you said nonchalantly as your grip on the object loosened, allowing it to fall from your hand and join the rest of the trash. though your stare was filled with sorrow, akaashi appeared as though he couldn’t care less, but he did try to force a frown for your sake.

his gentle touch lingered on your back, opposed to holding your hand, “i’m glad our house is free of that stink.” he mused, planting a brief kiss on your cheek before walking inside, likely to feed the baby.

needless to say, you both spent the rest of the night looking through his gallery of photos with the baby and their ex-best friend.

SATORI TENDŌ

♡ worst mistake of your life

♡ he’s a menace

♡ makes it his personal goal to put the poor ushi plushie through everything

♡ at first he did exclusively evil stuff; like putting it through the blender, the washing machine, the oven, encasing it in chocolate etc

♡ like it is wasn’t even for stress-relief or anything- he just thought it was funny

♡ (he even opened up a secret tiktok account to showcase his shenanigans @ushiwakasmoothie )

♡ (and he’d send the tiktoks to ushijima like “yo dude, this guy on tt is DESTORYING your plushies” and ushiwaka is 99% certain it’s tendou making the videos but he still replies “Haha! 😂” )

♡ but eventually you convinced tendou to be nicer

♡ (so now that he is a changed man he has to make a new account for his cute photos @ushiwakaismyson )

♡ and his feed is mainly comprised of the plushie doing nice things like drinking milkshakes, going on walks, doing yoga, enjoying a bubble bath — generally just the opposite of the hell he was put through earlier

♡ and the account probably becomes really popular too bc who doesn’t want a picture of mini-ushijima riding a toy tractor as their homescreen?

♡ ultimately, all good things must come to an end, though

♥ ♡ ♥ ♡ ♥ ♡ ♥

trying to take a nice skyline photo with the plushie sat on the balcony railing of tendou’s penthouse wasn’t exactly a smart idea. but who’s to say any of your ideas ever were?

“more to the right.” you mused, staring at the scene through your phone camera, trying to capture a gorgeous shot of the horizon while also keeping the plushie as the focal point.

in tandem with your request, he adjusted it, but not without tossing his head back and letting out an exasperated groan, “my arm fucking hurts.”

yet all you could do was giggle, “i’m almost done.”

“really?” his eyes practically lit up with joy as he jolted to his feet and let go of the plushie in favour of running behind you, peering over your shoulder to peek at the photo you had yet to take.

“i said almost.” you grumbled, just about to snap a shot until a large gust of wind caused your hair to flew over your eyes. once it ceased, time seemed to slow down as you both watched the plushie lose balance on the thin railing, stumbling backwards on it’s uneasy feet until it was gone, over the edge.

the look of concern you both shared after watching the object quickly disappear past the glass barrier quickly morphed into one of stifled delight, “what the fuck—” you cackled, tears brimming at your lashline.

“there he goes!” tendou had to rest a hand upon your shoulder to stop himself from keeling over with laughter, “oh, god—”

this went on for a while until you were both able to successful stand up and repress your snickers enough to form whole sentences again, “should we maybe head down and grab it?” you inquired politely, only to be met with a roll of tendou’s eyes as he guided you back instead.

“nah, it’s fine. he had a good run.”

taglist: @scftfairyking @the-astrumnauta @thefutureastronaut @itsmeaudrieee @definitelynottrin @fairyrintarou @littlemochi @90steaology

if your name is in italics i can’t tag you!

click here to be added!

#haikyuu x reader #hq tendou #akaashi x reader #iwaizumi x reader #kenma x y/n #iwaizumi fluff #haikyuu x gender neutral reader #haikyuu tendou #tendou x y/n #tendou scenario #akaashi keji x reader #akaashi x gender neutral reader #iwaizumi x gender neutral reader #kenma x reader #kenma hcs

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adrenaline-whump · 2 years ago

Text

AI art, and a couple of thoughts

Awhile back, an artist/author I follow started playing around with digital art assistants. They made it sound interesting enough that I tried Midjourney...and got a little hooked. (Examples below the cut.)

As a person who’s never had the patience or skill to Do Art, I find it overwhelmingly joyful to just...enter some words, and be given art in return? It’s most likely not what I pictured, but that often makes it more fun. I had fun in the beginning putting in abstract concepts, just to see what came back. Two of my favorites were generated by simply putting in “evil hunger” and “icy rage”.

Evil Hunger:

Icy Rage:

At that time, Midjourney was...not good at rendering humans. You see, it works by taking all the art it has access to online, attempting to match keywords to prompts, putting that subset of the art in its little AI blender, and spitting out the result. It doesn’t know, for example, that humans typically have two eyes that look in the same direction. Early experiments gave me a lot of figures facing away from the camera in silhouette, which was good because the clearer ones usually came straight from the Uncanny Valley. I got human figures with one leg, and horses with six.

That was Midjourney version 3. They’ve since come out with a version 4, which is much better at getting the proper number of physical features sorted. It still has a hard time with hands...but that’s a problem for all artists, from what I understand.

As you can read in the Discourse, if you’re so inclined, AI art can be Problematic. Is it stealing? Maybe. It’s a little ludicrous for me to input “icy rage” into a text box and claim the result is “my art.” There are thousands of real artists, living and dead, whose skill the AI is borrowing. That said, can we defend it as creative derivation? Artists (and writers, and most creatives) borrow from each other all the time. We use each others’ work as inspiration and let it drive our own creation. Isn’t that what’s happening here?

The question is, how much of the result is transforming others’ works, and how much is straight up copying? Unfortunately, there’s no way to tell.

For myself, I’ve got two rules. One is, I don’t use artists’ names in my prompts. A lot of people do, but to me, that’s where it crosses the line into plagiarism. The other is...well, I’ll illustrate with something it gave me awhile back:

I asked it for a “fire opal talisman” and it gave me this set of four. Look at the one in the lower right corner. It looks like the AI has picked up a signature from whatever art it was using as a reference. That makes me profoundly uncomfortable. So my second rule is, no matter how much I like a result, anything with a ghost signature/watermark is out.

Now, this is a whump blog, so of course I was curious about how it might do for that. The answer is...meh? Even though the current version is better at rendering people, it’s still not great. Many human figures end up looking cartoony. Also, Midjourney has a list of words that cannot be used as prompts, in order to prevent misuse. That’s definitely a good thing, but it means I can’t use “bruised” for example.

I did get a couple of interesting whumpy results, like when I asked it for a film-noir-ish wounded man in a trenchcoat:

That’s not bad. I could use that as story inspo or illustration. It’s just that ultimately, I find that the more specific the result I want, the more difficult it is to wring that image out of the AI.

And one more thing

Since I’m posting this on Tumblr in November 2022, I’m contractually obligated to add this masterpiece I generated five minutes ago:

(IYKYK and all that. The weirdness of the 3 and 4 are an AI artifact, but it amuses me to think that this might be the start of a dream sequence or hallucination where our MC imagines the clock’s numbers moving and changing.)

#ai art #my opinion #tangentially whump related

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sketching-shark · 3 years ago

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I think it's the ironic fact that JTTW fans already know how DBK and Sun Wukong's friendship broke apart but are more curious on LMK versions of Sun Wukong and the Six Eared Macaque were friends alongside falling out.

HA! Well, while it often does seem that way, I'm going to go ahead and be a complete snob in a Journey to the West purist kind of way by wondering how many Six Eared Macaque fans would consider themselves more JTTW fans or more Monkie Kid fans, or if they feel they're a mix of both...

I've seen a lot of people argue that these two works of fiction are their own thing and that as such Monkie Kid (and associated fanworks) shouldn't be expected to follow the canon of JTTW, and fair enough for some parts. I've also, however, seen people who argue for this complete separation seeming to use it as an excuse to not acknowledge or learn about ANY original aspects of characters such as Sun Wukong and the Demon Bull King, or even very important deities such as Guanyin and the Jade Emperor, and who as such end up making some pretty gross generalizations/assumptions about them even though they are of great religious and cultural importance.

For example (and while I know a lot of the fun people get from fan works is in exaggerating certain traits), Sun Wukong seems to often be presented with an "inherently" evil/thoughtless/chaotic character, while his intelligence, deep love of his family, genuine efforts to become a better person, & many acts of saving lives, as presented in JTTW, aren't even mentioned. I feel like a lot of this is due to the way he acts in Monkie Kid (while I maintain that this version of Sun Wukong seems to be Bad End Monkey King, he does do a lot of deflecting his issues with a show of humor/a carefree attitude & does seem really bad at communicating due to a fear of making things worse). Even so, the popularity of Thoughtless/Evil/Selfish Sun Wukong that doesn’t really allow for any of the nuance or a display of his beneficial traits as shown in JTTW does make me wonder how many people have been exposed to a good translation of og classic Sun Wukong...As I've said before, I've noted that a number of Chinese people on this site have expressed frustration with the fact that a good chunk of the monkey king’s Western audience seems to be getting their impressions about Sun Wukong, the Demon Bull King, the Six Eared Macaque, etc. from some mix of Overly Sarcastic Productions, Monkie Kid, and social media instead of from at least a translation of the original text, and it is true that a LOT of the nuance of these work and these characters can be very easily lost, especially if your drawing your information of them primarily from a cartoony version of the original source.

That would be an interesting poll though...out of curiosity, how many of you fine folk have read the break-up & fight between Sun Wukong and the Demon Bull King either in the original text or in a translation, or is your exposure to them primarily through Monkie Kid?

Again, I need to make it clear that I'm not Chinese & didn't grow up with the story, but I will admit for my own part that reading the DBK/SWK break-up in the Yu translation actually made me more curious about how their dynamic is going to play out in Monkie Kid than I am curious about what's going to happen with Mr. Macaque.

This is primarily because besides SWK’s fight with Princess Iron Fan and DBK being given a LOT of page space in JTTW, there seems to have been some serious stuff that went down between the three of them in the events post-JTTW and pre-the main plot of Monkie Kid...the last we see of DBK in JTTW (if memory serves correctly) was him being hauled off by a host of heavenly warriors to be judged for his crimes of not giving SWK the palm leaf fan & also eating humans. When Monkie Kid starts, however, we are told that DBK had emerged “from the Netherworld” & immediately starts wrecking everything around him. What this suggests--if Monkie Kid is something of a fan continuation of JTTW--is that DBK ended up being executed by the heavenly forces, but managed to fight his way out of the underworld in a manner somewhat similar to SWK, who we are told he is equal in strength to in JTTW. In that beginning fight of Monkie Kid DBK is also shown as so enraged that he won’t stop his path of destruction until SWK buries him under a mountain for 500 years. It’s never said in the show, but--and this is important--this is basically exactly what Buddha did to SWK to start him on the path of atonement. So there seems to be some very intentional parallels between SWK’s havoc in heaven & DBK’s havoc on earth, which may suggest that one of the things Monkie Kid SWK really wants is for his former dear friend, his sworn brother, to find a way like him to be less violent and thus ultimately less vulnerable to destructive and self-destructive behavior, and that the way he tried to start this was by giving DBK the same treatment he got when he was a raging warlord.

We are furthermore told that it was right after DBK was sealed that SWK disappeared for all those centuries, and while the impulse may be to write it off as him just wanting to enjoy himself (given a lot of his behavior in the show’s timeline), given the indications that this SWK may be deeply depressed, I feel like the answer could be something a lot more tragic...there seem to be a number of clues in Monkie Kid that while the journey of JTTW happened, something made it end disastrously, with SWK either assuming or knowing that Zhu Bajie, Sha Wujing, Tang Sanzang, and Bai Longma are dead. And per JTTW, this wouldn’t be the first time that he’s experienced a horrific loss, given the war with heaven and the burning of Flower-Fruit Mountain. And then right after THAT, it seems DBK emerged from the underworld, and so Sun Wukong was put into a horrific position: either murder his sworn brother, or let him continue to rampage & harm and/or kill who knows how many humans. SWK ultimately gives up his staff to do the repeat of “500 years under a mountain in solitary confinement route,” which as per JTTW he considers better than the alternative, but he immediately follows that by exiling himself. In JTTW SWK is a really sociable person who makes friends wherever he goes, but man, for this SWK...his life must at that point just feel like one failure after another, that in spite of all his best efforts he wasn’t able to save anyone he really cared about, and now he just trapped someone who was so important to him under a mountain & fated him to suffer the same things he had when he was in that position. How much more does he have to hurt his fellow yaoguai? How many more times does he have to choose between yaoguai and humans, feeling like no matter what he decides it’s just going to result in pain for him and/or his loved ones? I can easily imagine super sociable & easily upset (he cries a LOT in JTTW) SWK feeling like after sealing DBK, he just can’t do this any more. He just...can’t.

This is all just speculation, but knowing the JTTW backstory between SWK and DBK does, at least for me, make their Monkie Kid relationship a lot more intriguing than it might be otherwise. Especially now that DBK seems to actually be making some small steps to quell his constant rage & lust for power. He even saves SWK and Qi Xiaotian from an explosion/nasty fall in the season 2 special! The Bull family weren’t really present in season 2, but I really hope they make a comeback in season 3 (if/when we get it) precisely because Red Son, Princess Iron Fan, and especially DBK have such an involved history with SWK. Plus it would be really fun to see two old warlords trying to awkwardly make amends with each other & struggle to be good teachers & positive role models to their student & son.

In any case I feel this potential is more interesting than whatever fanfic The Six Eared “I’mma Plagiarize The Demon Bull King’s Backstory Of Being Best Friends with Sun Wukong” Macaque is creating lol.

#monkie kid #journey to the west #lego monkie kid #lmk #lmk sun wukong #lmk dbk #lmk six eared macaque #anon answered

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egg-emperor · 3 years ago

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Forgive me if I'm mistaken, but I remember you saying that you weren't a fan of people interpreting Eggman's actions as misguided attempts at doing good. I have to agree- he's much more fun as a proud villain! I was wondering, since you don't like "good" Eggman, what are your thoughts on a more evil Eggman? That is, a version of Eggman that's "eviller" than the one we have now? Love your blog!

Yup that was me, I'm very passionately outspoken about how I love Eggman's evil and don't like to see it sugarcoated or downplayed in any way. XD He's truly a seriously dangerous and deadly threat that's not to be underestimated. He knows what he does is evil, he's specifically used the word to describe his actions and he's aware of the damage he can cause and has always been shown to have total apathy towards it because he only cares about getting what he wants.

I absolutely love that about him, he's a proud, confident, shameless villain that clearly has a blast doing what he does. He can be silly and knows how to have fun but he can also be a serious intimidating threat and he deserves credit and appreciation for that, it's a part of what makes him so charming and entertaining.

When it comes to being more evil well, I mean, he's surely responsible for thousands if not millions of deaths already, due to the severe collateral damage of his actions that have had catastrophic destructive effects all across the world and even the entire planet at once. He's also done tons of damage to wildlife and the environment. As long as the world still exists for him to rule, I don't think he cares about absolutely anything else that his actions could result in, so he doesn't hold back.

And it's not just the collateral damage, he also isn't above the intentional murdering of his enemies and he appears to have no limits in it, as he's always trying to kill Sonic and his friends, most being kids. Even the eight year old Tails multiple times, who he says killing will be a pleasure. And not even just his enemies, he'll even try to kill innocent people like all those at Station Square during his attempted missile launch gone attempted suicide bombing.

He's also known to be a cunning manipulative gaslighting liar that will fuck with people's heads to get what he wants. He also isn't above mistreating and punishing his lackeys and even his own creations when they fail/don't do what he wants them to. You know, the exact things that people have been praising Starline for and saying it's why he's a better eviller villain than him, despite Eggman already doing all that and more multiple times for years before him lol

I think people really gloss over how fucked up and evil this man can get and how people try to find excuses for it baffles me. I think it's mostly because of the way he isn't a stereotypically designed bad guy and he can be goofy and humorous too. But that really adds to the fun and instead of overshadowing his evil, it should really be emphasizing it because a guy that looks so uniquely cartoony and can be very silly is capable of so much evil.

So I find this a very interesting question because I'm not really sure how much more evil he can be made when he's already a very dangerous evil man. I guess if he tried to destroy the whole world but is it not more evil to split it apart to release a powerful ancient being instead, likely killing tons in the process? I think it's worse that his plans are likely responsible for so much damage while he strikes fear into the hearts of the rest of those that survive.

And I guess he could be more sadistic instead of apathetic but he actually has shown hints of sadism in his actions. He can find joy and excitement in the fucked up shit that happens to his enemies, take him celebrating that Sonic is "nothing but floating chunks in space now" after he thought he killed him and saying that killing Tails will be a pleasure. And even with innocent people that have never bothered him in some cases- like his evident excitement when he talks and jokes about the bad things that could happen at his park in Colors' PAs.

I don't think it's really how evil he can get, I think it's more about how his evil is actually presented. Eggman can do a lot of dark messed up stuff with hardly any limits because of his self centeredness, apathy, and even some slight sadism at times. Personally, I love when his darkest most evil side/actions get more focus. It actually makes up a huge chunk of my headcanons and fanfiction because I find evil, dark, badass Eggman absolutely thrilling. I can't get enough in it in my favorite media or other people's fan stuff too.

I do think they could do with a lot more focus on it in the games again, so people can truly recognize that he's a seriously evil threat. It's not that he isn't, I stand by him being just as evil in the more recent games as he was before, he still does very fucked up things now. It's just that the games don't give it the focus and tone it needs for most people to realize it, since the recent titles have the direction of having a much more light-hearted tone and humor.

I still want the more light-hearted funny moments where Eggman is silly because I love it and he always makes me laugh and smile. But I do want to see more of the balance between funny and evil in full effect too, so everyone can see it instead of some people acting like I'm reaching or making it up lol. Most games before Colors and onwards focused more on why what he was doing was so messed up while still giving him a good amount of funny moments too and that's what I want more of.

Basically where I'm going with this is that I wouldn't want his evil to be presented in a way like SatAM Robotnik for example because I think it takes away a lot of the silly humorous charm that Eggman has on top of all the great evil he does. But as long as he keeps that balance, there's a ton of in character fucked up things he can do and there's a lot of fun that can be had with that. And I think we should get to see it as much as the funny stuff.

So I'm not sure how you can make him much darker and eviller while having him still be in character because there isn't much he won't do, as long as he gets what he wants and the world still exists for him to rule. But I can say that I'd absolutely love if the tone itself was darker more often, so his already existing evil could get much more focus blatantly on screen. It would be so awesome and also help more people realize that he's never stopped being an incredible evil threat! :D

And thank you so much, I'm delighted that you enjoy my blog!

#asks #dr eggman #eggman #dr robotnik #dr. eggman #opinion #my post #analysis

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miloscat · 3 years ago

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[Review] The Lord of the Rings: Aragorn’s Quest (PS3)

A waggle-optional wonder.

I played the DS version of this ages ago. Made by TT Fusion, who usually handle the portable Lego games, it was a decent top-down brawler type (also ported to PSP and PS2(!)). This version for Wii and PS3 is by Headstrong Games, who are known now for the Art Academy games but previous to this on the Wii made a House of the Dead rail shooter and Battalion Wars 2. This one’s got ambitions, packing a lot of mechanics in plus a big framing device that really sells the story.

Let’s get to the framing story first because it might be my favourite aspect of this game. It’s all based around Sam in his middle age, retelling the story of the War of the Ring from Aragorn’s perspective to his kids as they prepare for the king to visit the Shire (an event described briefly in the appendices to LotR). Not only does this give context to the levels played as Aragorn and purpose for Sean Astin’s copious new voiceover narration, it has a whole playable hub in the Shire where you can romp around as the kids.

Sam’s son Frodo Gamgee (should be Gardner but w/e) does odd jobs for hobbits preparing the party, treasure hunts, and learns game mechanics to be used in the levels while play-acting as Aragorn. Part of this is recreating scenes that aren’t covered in the levels themselves with other kids playing parts and see-through imaginary baddies to battle. It’s all immensely charming and captures the feel of a pastoral peace in a world of legendary conflicts. The levels recapping the movie plots do a good job at that and feel like a good proper adventure, plus I liked new additions like helping Elder the Ent dismantle siege weapons in Fangorn Forest, or doing errands in the areas around Rivendell.

Some of the levels are also hub-like with wide open spaces, sidequests, and collectibles, and I loved roaming around them and discovering stuff. Even the more linear levels still have a lot of side paths and optional stuff. A lot of the gameplay is combat of course, and this is where things can get hairy. Originally this game was a Wii wagglefest; when ported to PS3 Move controllers are supported but thankfully a regular Dualshock 3 with traditional controls is also an option. The legacy of the motion scheme can still be felt with the awkward aiming and necessity for directional attacks, especially the small windows for particular attacks to hit the tougher enemies for big damage.

It’s more comfortable with a normal controller, but there’s still contextual stuff that needs doing by toggling between weapon types that feels like it could have been streamlined. It feels like a game targeted at kids, but may be a bit complex. There is a concession in the form of player two, who can jump in at any time as an invincible Gandalf to perform buffs, heals, and powerful attacks (and in the Shire story as Frodo’s sister Elanor with an over-large wizard’s hat). Sadly their presence locks the camera perspective in a clumsy way, and their movement has an odd momentum to it that player one’s doesn’t. I tried to convince my spouse to play with me but she opted out in part thanks to that; the few Gandalf/Elanor-locked bits of content I did in the style of Brothers or Nintendo Land’s Animal Crossing Sweet Day, moving two characters at once. An interesting challenge!

I started this playthrough on the Wii before discovering that I could opt out of waggle if I jumped ship to PS3. In doing so I also discovered that in the HD transition they’d removed the heavy motion blur when you start running fast. Good move! On top of this the PS3 version just looks much better in general, the extra resolution helping the colourful, stylised look to pop even more. The bloom lighting is a bit heavy at times, through. Overall with the gameplay style and slightly cartoony designs, this felt like a successor to the Hobbit game on the previous console generation, but without the constant instant death traps. I had a nice time with it.

Now having covered the LotR and Hobbit adaptations to my satisfaction, next on my quest through Tolkien-derived games is the original sidestories, including The Third Age, Online, War in the North, and the Shadow games. Note that I won’t be playing any older works or strategy/tactics games. But first, I’m taking a little break to play Elden Ring and maybe some other stuff. It won’t be long before I’m back in Middle-Earth though!

#The Lord of the Rings #Lord of the rings aragorn's quest #headstrong games #JRR Tolkien #review #ps3

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