#batim: illusion of living

[ripleycano]

This is what Joey sounded like in TIOL

[glossytoothpick]

So I moved recently and thought that for the fun of it I’d take a picture of every Bendy thing I own

I have more Bendy stuff, they’re all just from independent sellers and not the official Bendy team. I’ve been a Bendy fan since 2017 and got my first piece of merch on Christmas (it was the Bendy umbrella shirt fun fact). Most of these I collected when I was younger but some of it is more recent. My biggest flex is having the original release of the Bendy plushies (this they have squeakers in them.)

[somewhereinthemilkyway]

👿📖

[spiritintouch]

I started to hate "the illusion of living" even more while drawing this art.

[inky-lacuna-numinous]

Today is a GREAT day to be a batim fan!

Happy Halloween

[archer-kacey]

[hascious]

Chapter 7 of Cycle 360 has been dropped on a whim

i only read over it a few times so lmk if you see typos or something idk

this was probably one of my favorite chapters to write tbh... as much fun as rise was i love the dynamic between these 3 bozos so much. the main part of this chapter comes from part 4 of The Illusion of Living by Adrienne Kress, so be warned, there's spoilers for that. if you for some reason havent read the books, i'd highly suggest it, they're amazing. TIOL specifically was one of my favorite (if you couldnt tell)

and heres some bonus art i've made since the last post, unrelated from cycle 360:

also!! i havent directly said this here but if there's any questions at all about cycle 360, and i mean any, send them my way!! im more than happy to answer, especially given how long its taking me to write these chapters. worst case scenario, the answer is a spoiler and i'll just give a vague hint. or even if youve just got something to say, feel free :)

[culssi]

The men, the myths, the legends. Said by my best friend

I’m actually super proud as this is the first time I’ve done this perspective, or even attempted perspective.

So more joey and Henry. Yeah I’m feeding a joey drew simp. (She knows who she is.) @llserenell

More underneath! + sketches and stuff

Me and my best friend wanted new matching profile pictures so I decided to draw one. I had a clear image of a summer beach themed one because why not.

I’m having so much motivation to draw at the moment! And my art style has gotten better.

Sketch + lineart.

All together it was quite easy although I struggled a bit more with Joey but yeah.

I’m not showing the reference because the reference was actually just me. I took two pictures of myself for the two and put them into one.

My friend split it for us. Theres them on their own. Don’t mind Henry with his whole chest out.

All together it took 3 hours and 4 minutes which is pretty good because usually it’s 5 😀

Hope you like it! Have a good day/night!

[mickeys-malarkey]

Y'know… sometimes, I think I should just share my Thoughts exclusively in drawings instead of tryna write 'em out & ending up posting analyses as long as the Empire State Building is tall… 🤔

A Love Letter to TMATM + the Rest of Bendy by Domino Effect Part 4/8:

“A Fitting Prison”

“Fatherhood”

1 • 2 • 3 • [You are here] • 5 • 6 • 7 • 8

[spotlightstudios]

The back is done!

Joey messed up a lot of people's lives w/ his company, but Sammy is my favorite of them, so he gets Art Privileges♡

(For anyone who missed the first one, I decided to draw scenes from the End Credits of batim in the front/back of my copy of The Illusion of Living! Sammy is in the back cover.)

Doing this was so much fun! Serotonin to level ten!

[moon-art123]

“A letter from Henry. You might not think I’d keep such a thing, but I do. I have no ill will towards the man as you know.”

The Illusion of Living is a book packed full of lies but this right here has got to be the biggest one.

“I have no ill will towards the man”

Dog, you literally spent thousands of dollars on a machine to create a whole parallel world so that you could create your own version of Henry and put him through endless cycles of pain and misery. On top of that, you stole all of his hard work, claimed it as your own and profited from it, taking all of the recognition and money that was rightfully his.

“I have no ill will towards the man”

I literally had to put the book down after reading that lol

[randombendyfan]

[reanimationstation]

SINCLAIR MY BELINCLAIR.... i cant believe it took me so long to draw the guy ever!!

[bendy-n-stuff]

Some information I think people should be aware of, I’m pretty sure Nathan Arch is Joey’s Sugar Daddy.

DON’T LEAVE YET I HAVE PROOF!!!

In The Illusion of Living, we learn Joey and Nathan are friends via time served in the military. Nathan comes from old money. They go out for drinks what seems pretty regularly. Paying for a friend every once in a while is fine, but every time? Expense one

In the first game, we know Bendy Land was a thing and needed lots of steel. Like, 12,000 dollars of it. And who do we know is a steel tycoon? Nathan Arch. That’s expense two

In Boris and the Dark Survival, we get an audio log of Joey calling Nathan while said man is on vacation with his wife. For money. Y’know. Like a sugar baby would

SPOILERS FOR NEW BOOK! In Fade to Black, Nathan has paid for Joey to get a whole tv show. A whole tv show! In the 50s! There’s only like 4 channels on tv!!! Nathan ALSO hosts the opening party! Yeah, sure. Friends.

Finally, in Bendy and The Dark Revival, Nathan buys the entire studio. “It’s for his son!” I hear you cry. Sure. Sure it was my friends.

All I’m saying, is that Nathan paid for Joey in sooooo many “convenient” ways. That’s a Sugar Daddy and I don’t think Nathan even knows it. Joey does, but Nathan sure doesn’t. Might also explain why Wilson hates them both

[salpho]

Joey only hated Henry because he loved him. Even in spite of Joey's negativity, he fails to hate Henry and still manages to compliment and praise him and his aspects. The only reason Joey was so hurt by Henry leaving was because he loved him.

This text is subtle but I can easily see the praise within the negatives Joey lists

"Henry Stein was one of the biggest factors behind the studio's idea and the teams behind the product *remembers he's a hater* BUT he also didn't make a huge long impact. He helped create the entire studio and controlled what our product's identity was though."

[multi-level-shipper]

Just to avoid reblog chaining/ bendysplaining on lucky-dreamfisher's post, I'm gonna throw this Tweet up here and talk about it.

Here's the thing, Meatly has labeled the all the books as "fun extras." All the books, meaning the Employee Handbook, Illusion of Living, Crack-Up-Comics, DCTL, TLO, and Fade to Black.

And yes, they are bonus content. You do not need to read them to understand the base games. It's just odd to me that they're being treated as if they have no connection or impact on the "canon" of the games. It just feels a little disingenuous.

Illusion of Living is Joey's autobiography. Yes, it is completely fair to expect people NOT to read it, because how well it holds your attention largely hinges on how much you like Joey, and Joey talking about Joey. But you CAN'T ignore the fact that this is a giant life story dump from one of the most integral characters to the plot.

And then we have Buddy from DCTL being HEAVILY implied to be our Boris. It was never confirmed from what I remember, but the timing of the transformation lined up with BATDS. So we could argue that even DCTL still has SOME lore relevancy as far as the games go.

Even the Employee Handbook has notes and other details from the lives of the JDS employees (on top of being an actual game guide lol.)

I guess the main thing that confuses me is this; if you are going to have books that tie into Bendy's canon, why call them "fun extras"? Why separate them?

I'm all for the authors having their creative freedom, (I've said before how much I love Adrienne Kress's work and how much she breathes a soul into these characters,) but specifically pointing out how the authors "make things their own" in the context of this Tweet seems to mean it separates the books from canon entirely.

Maybe I'm reading the tone of the Tweet as too dismissive. I am biased. I do not like Meatly. It's frustrating to see him as the creator of this franchise twirl his hair and go "well...actually the books are kind of the authors' thing idk..." when, hilariously, the books are just echoing the game's characters and lore nearly down to a tee.

TL;DR The Bendy books are plot relevant, why are we (TheMeatly) just now deciding to separate them from canon?