#cartoon paralells

[random-dragon-exe]

I swear, these two are suffering dental problems on opposite sides of the spectrum.

What is up with business men having unique sets of teeth? It's like a trend now.

Also when you think about it, I find it funny how their villainous stories can be traced back to a singular event with a child.

[melancholypolywog]

meanwhile…

[cartoonico]

This 2003 Splinter face is sending me because

[hollyhousen]

Superman’s words about his identity in this scene are what I have imagined might be going through Danny Phantom’s mind at the end of “My Brother’s Keeper,” and that is HIGH praise. Peak of comfort and affirmation.

[fouramnesiacrommies]

Claire Donally - Delta State (2004)

She is so cute 🌷

[dragon-dress-128]

Hey, so I didn’t think I could find any more plot beats to compare the two series with, but then I watched The Farmer’s Llamas—

[olderthannetfic]

Random thought about Steven Universe, bc of how dirty it was done by not just Cartoon network but also fandom.

One of the things I hated about the fandom was how people were so set on the "race coding" that they couldn't even just take the characters as their own entities within their own realm and system. That doesn't mean you can't celebrate the characters, or draw paralells, but the fandom went way the fuck beyond that.

One incident I remember explicitly was when Pearls were first revealed as a servant "slave" class, and instead of viewing it as interesting or whatever world building... guess what people did.

They got angry and ranted about why the "white" gem would be a slave and how it was racist because Garnet the "black" gem was Black-coded, so obviously it was racist because reason... I guess. The fact that the color of a gem is superficial didn't matter.

The fact that Gems have no canonical race, or that, while they may have obvious features, that has no impact on their role in the lore was completely ignored. Or the fact that gems are made for specific work, and that "slave" was a bit of a reach.

Also the fact that, after years of saying that Garnet is black bc her VA is black. Suddenly it didn't matter that Pearl's VA is an Asian-American woman. Then again, Amethyst was also voiced by an Asian-American, but got coded Latina because... well, honestly it was basically just a bunch of stereotypes, especially negative ones: Loud. Glutton. "Obnoxious". Rude. Mean.

Another one was how people cried racism that one of the Diamond characters didn't turn out looking more "Indian" and just ended up as a "basic white" character. Once again, that character, Blue diamond, is a fucking humanoid gemstone, blue everything. Most of the gems didn't have any kind of explicitly cultural clothing. Esp when compared to the human characters, like the Indian main-side character, who apparently was also Hindu... whom people then promptly drew as Muslim in a hijab, which is a whole other can of offensive and really really bad decision worms. Guys if you have an Indian character in a show, especially a Hindu, drawing them as a Muslim is not a good move.

--

There are "What if white people were the real oppressed class?!" bad decision pieces of art, but this doesn't seem like one of them.

[cdroloisms]

if i had to be accurate i think exile was not at all obsessive or systematic abuse, i genuinely think it was revenge gone wrong wait hear me out. we have proof that the whole cdream is obsessed with ctommy theory wasnt realistic or canon and if we take into account how weirdly cdream sometimes acted in exile with the whole letting tommy have fun with the trident etc we can kinda make paralels to similar stuff irl which is why i always looked at exile as revenge based bullying gone horribly wrong. like cdream really did act like a highschool bully and you know why it comes across like that? because both ctommy and cdream are hella young. a lot of people wanna make it more traumatic more abusive more horrific or gory or whatever but the simplest explanation is often the first one, it was all bullying. and i find it very very weird how people on the other side did not consider bullying bad enough for it to be taken seriously so they had to invent intestine cakes and whatever the fuck else just to consider exile "bad enough" to be taken seriously when bullying is already more than bad enough.

isolating the victim? check. aking them do something against their will? check. lying to them? check. pretending to be their friend? check. making them believe their other friends abandoned them? check check check.

also the way it was done, like really? literally the trope of no one coming to the party and victim sits alone feeling sad? what is this, a cartoon show about the power of friendship??

exile was neither "not a big deal" nor "horror movie levels of abuse" it simply was a sad arc with themes that do hit too close to home for many. the psychological ramifications that came from it? whole nother issue that needs a seperate analysis because yes, bullying victims can and do develop paranoia and some of the other stuff ctommy exhibited but not all like the whole ctommy still being scared of cdream, following him obsessively even months after it was clear cdream wanted nothing to do with him anymore, etc did throw me off because thats not really regular bullying or even abuse victim behavior??? i digress

tldr exile was bad thats a fact but it wasnt SAW movie franchise levels of bad

sorry for the rant, wanted to get my lore thoughts out

tbf exile being 2 weeks of vengeful peer abuse, also known as bullying, is straight up just canon

the "obsession" take that we specifically had issue with had a lot of issues in the way that it very deliberately rewrote c!dream's entire character to explain ALL of his actions through an obsession with c!tommy. specifically, there was a lot of malice ascribed to him LONG before exile in order to say that c!dream basically wanted to do something like exile from the very beginning to c!tommy, but wasn't able to until exile happened because c!wilbur was protecting him or some other shit. that reading relied on the worst possible faith retelling of everything c!dream has ever done + a good amount of just straight up narrative rewriting to emphasize how young and innocent and vulnerable c!tommy is and how obsessive weird creepy stalker grown ass man who wanted c!tommy to himself c!dream apparently was from day one, a take that emphasizes exile as The End Goal of months of obsession instead of being in service to some other goal as is canon. that's the obsession take that was passed around quite frequently that we specifically took a lot of issue with.

on the other hand, c!tommy being c!dream's victim because c!dream disproportionately blames him and took all sorts of shit out on him and found a degree of vindictive pleasure in hurting him is literally just. canon? that's canon.

[chaifootsteps]

You know how i cope with the fact that Helluva Boss is "wasted potential: the show"? By gaslighting myself into tinking thats not an actual cartoon, but a fanfic of one better adult cartoon from another universe:

In some other paralel universe, there is an aclaimed adult Cartoon that aired in adult swim from the early 2000's, called "Helluva Job", wich follows the wacky adventures or 4 demons, all very different in personalities and have a hard time working together, triying to get out of their miserable life as the lowest class of demons in hell by working on killing humans in exchange of money from those who commision them those murders.

Every episode its about them trying to get their new target, a premise thats kinda repetitive but the show manages to make it fresh avaery episode with its creativity.

It had a wacky absurd humor that doesnt take itself seriously, sometimes based on very silly and cartoony things happening to the protagonists, it also had a very, VERY dark humor that would make kinda fucked out jokes about taboo themes (kinda like drawn together), wich made many people belive that the show "didnt age well" despite still being hilarous. It also had some sexual humor, but it was very limited and always with clever jokes that arent just the characters screaming the names of genitals.

Robo-Fizz, The Cherubs and Verosika are some of the recurring villains that where remembered for having neat designs very charismatic personalities. Even the people that never saw the show know them and loves them.

The show was also know for having a lot of criticism of capitalism and rich people hidden behind clever dark humor, that didnt distract from the sillines of its show.

Stolas is just a recurring joke of "that one creepy old man Blitzo sleep with because he is rich and has to do it to keep his job", he never gets more than 4 minutes on screen and its always him being an steriotypical rich asshole who abuses his power and makes gross comments to Blitzo (and he is very classist and racist). Stella is just the woman thats married to him and she tries to be a decent wife, but she is clearly annoyed with him and clearly she just waiting for him to ask divorce.

Stolas also dies in the finale of the show when a metor falls over him, Blitzo celebrates this in the most childish and exagerated (but also extremely funny) way possible.

The art style was like a combination between Clone High and Dexter's laboratory, with the use of exagerated shapes to form its cgaracters. And the animation was just decent, but its praised over the character designs, wich are simple yet efective and creative

The show got 2 seasons and those were enough, it was remembered as one of the darkerst yet funniest cartoons that ever aired on adult swim, and how people still rewatching it years later.

Meanwhile, Vivziepop is some popular artist in the fandom of that show thats know because, for some reason, she got obsessed with Stolas fucking Blitzo, and she insist that their relationship is the most beautiful thing ever, and hates Stella for some headcanons she created about her.

She wrote the know fanfic "Helluva Boss" wich is basically her mischaracterising every character into becoming this really boring, flavourless version of themselves and get reducted to one aspect of their personality. And her trying to gaslight us into thinking that Blitzo and Stola's relationship was some misunderstood tragic wholesome romance, because "Stolas actually loved him!". Almost everyone in the fandom makes fun of this fanfic.

Extremely valid, Anon. To get by in this bitch of a world, sometimes you've just got to gaslight yourself a little.

[strechanadi]

Matthew Bourne Swan Lake, the 2019 DVD edition

So I finally got to watch the 2019 Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake with Will Bozier and Liam Mower and I have thoughts.

First things first - Nicole Kabera is gorgeous queen and Katrina Lyndon is having a blast as the girlfriend.

I quite like good 95 % of Bourne’s changes he made from the original 1995 production - be it in choreography, costume or dramaturgy. I like the slight shift with the girlfriend not being in it from the beginning with the general secretary, which makes her story more tragic and painful, so bring it on! I like there’s no prince as a kid at the beginning with a swan plushie. But I’m not sure I like that the connection between the secretary and the stranger was erased. True, with the 1995 production the end of act III (the ball) looked a bit too cartoon villain-y, with the stranger evil laughter while shaking hands with the secratary, but now - he just goes to the queen and embraces her and it’s just... Bland. I don’t know, I quite like the idea of the secretary plotting with everything and everyone all the time.

Now to the main characters. Liam is pretty good (saying it in the most british way possible), there’s no denying that, his dancing and technique is on top, his acting skills undeniable and he’s a perfect cast choice for this role.

But now to Will. I was truly looking forward to finally seeing him, as he was the only Swans/Strangers I missed back in 2019 when I was in London to watch the production live. And I hate to say it, but I was quite disappointed. His characterisation was OK I guess, nothing special necessarily, but nothing too bland either. But what was putting me off all the time was his technique... It was clear he is not a classically trained dancer (as Adam Cooper was back in 1995 or Matthew Ball and Max Westwell in the 2019 run) and it was painful to watch, especially with the whole company evolving so much in this aspect! Back in 1995, they were not what you would call a ballet company (and New Adventures is not claiming they are a classical ballet company, so it’s cool) and there was basically just Adam Cooper (and possibly Scott Ambler) standing out. But now, looking at the company (both men and women), they are different kind of animals now. True, Bourne is still much more about musical/jazz/modern/ballroom/whatever type of dancing, but it is undeniable his dancers now are much better in the classical ballet technique department. And watching the male corps de ballet as swans doing really well with all their arabesques, pas de chevals, developpes and pointed feet in general, and then Will who you can see is trying, but his feet are just not trained enough for this sort of things... And it’s infurriating, because the man has A JUMP! His elevation is huge, he was seriously flying over the stage.

Is the Swan about pointed feet? Of fucking course it is not. The Swan is all about raw energy, animalistic power, charisma... (to the point where Matthew Ball sometimes looked like too well classically trained ballet dancer, not truly ready for the sheer abandon)  But the technique matters as well. It may not be the most imporant thing (and gods know it is not for me, not by far!), but while its lacking is putting you off, then it is clearly a problem.

Will found his was as the Stranger, he seemed much more in his element, reigning over the stage and all the characters. And he was positively glowing in last act as the beaten up, but still fighting Swan. I love all those moment where he was jumping head first between the other swans, ferociously protecting his prince, fighting for him almost on the verge of absolute hysteria. The ending was as heartbreaking as it should be.

But still...

MB’s SL is still one of my very favourites. It’s still fucking spectacular and I love all the paralels and connections and reflections of the original SL characters and story with Bourne’s new one and all the possibilities his retelling offers. But I just couldn’t shake the treacherous ideas about different casting for this latest dvd edition.

Because I would give anything to once again see Max Westwell as the Swan/Stranger (preferably with James Lovell as his prince - since these two together broke me beyond repair). And Katrina Lyndon as the Queen (because she was heartless, stone cold and freaking amazing in this role) and Carrie Willis as the Girlfriend.

[baggebythesea]

Instead we paralell play like two-year-olds, occasionally sneaking glances of each other like fourteen-year-olds until we've decided that vibe together enough to dare to make cold talk like fifties cartoon characters and eventually - maybe - dare to bring up our special interest.

Kids - I need you to know that adults absolutely don't have our shit together

[kevin--of-desert-bluffs]

WTNV quick rundown - 121 - A Story of Love and Horror, Part 1: "Barks"

Read the rest here!

The password is MUDWOMB. The username is MUDWOMB. The website is MUDWOMB. Where did the rest of the internet go? Welcome to Night Vale.

The main story is about Frances Donaldson and Nazr al-Mujaheed. The two of them both decide to try dating and end up going on a date with each other. They have a good first date although it starts awkward and decide to go on a second date together. From there they end up dating steadily for the next month.

Whilst watching TV late at night, Nazr sleeping beside her, Frances finds a channel displaying a Barks Ennui advert. The cartoon dog steps out of the screen and tells her that 'this' does not belong to her and that she needs to put it right.

Weather: "Riches and Wonders" by Eliza Rickman & Jherek Bischoff

Frances is fascinated by the concept of time and has been since she was very young.

Nazr spends most of his time thinking about football and is completely content with that, he started dating to try and add more happiness to his already content life.

Football in NV involves spells and counterspells.

The NV Football Boosters club (meeting at the Applebee's that everyone remembers as Chilli's but has apparently always been Applebee's) Hannah Gutierrez says that 60 minutes is too much and games should be 15 instead.

There is a show in NV called Stop Chef where contestants try to stop a chef from cooking.

Love Day is a holiday in NV. Michelle is giving away 'ironic' love songs and says love is dumb, Maureen agrees but then waxes poetic about it which embarasses them all and Cecil has to leave.

There is a Safety Parade that nobody is allowed to march in.

There is a meeting at Town Hall to discuss if everyone ended up back in their right universes after the 'holes to paralell universes' thing that happened.

Stay tuned next. Just stay tuned next. Good night, Night Vale. Good night.

Proverb: Welcome to 2018. The year we finally do it. The year we eat the sun.

[cartoonico]

I didn't know why Anga looked so familiar to me when I first saw her and then I realized...she's basically Cassandra's fursona 💀💀💀

[tt-squid]

OKAY SO. this is going to be partly a discussion of the cannon facts, and my own made up interpretation of the various forms of cannon, and how the squiddles acts as a narative foil/mirror for jade harley

also... its 12:25 am rn as of me starting to type this up? so idk how coherernt this is going to be...? BUT. in terms of 'cannon' squiddle lore, theres three main sources:

the comic propper (specifically the flash where jade dreams post the death of her dreamself, pre the creation of the dreambubbles)

the fan-created-but-lets-be-real-its-cannon squiddles album

jades pesterquest route

(squiddles lore begins under cut!)

homestuck propper

in the comic, the squiddles are a subconsious reimagining of the horrerterrors blah blah badly reviewed tv show that ran from 2000-2004 blah blah you get the point, youve all read homestuck. the horrorterrors are the fabeled blackdeath trance of the woegothics to the squiddles tangle-buddies and candycorn-shrimp

theres skipper plumbthroat and his crew, the squiddles, various other unknown creatures including narwals

hussie also states at somepoint (idk when or where exactly) that squiddles are a 'cute, approachable fachade' that the horror terrors present themselves as

music

in the squiddles album and the additional pieces that go with it expand on the squiddles by giving names to some of the squiddles (princess berryboo), and setting up some sort of synopsis? im not exactly sure what it was doing its just a great album if your into the squiddles lol

ADDITIONALLY TO THIS: mobius trip and hadron kaleido, which is a great album btw, and presented as songs that could have been played in the homestuck universe (paraphrasing here, i cant find the exact quote:) 'in order to prepare the kids for sburb'. the main song in the album that relates to the squiddles is 'lies with the sea'

this on its own isnt exactly related to the squiddles in anyway? but im stretching those straws together to make a basket and in that basket its a piece of paper saying that if the horrorterrors project themselves as cute little easily marketable characters, and mobius trip and hadron kaleido is setting up the kids (subconsiously) for sburb, then it works

ALSO IN THE SQUIDDLES ALBUM, and accessible from the unofficial archive, is squiddlevid.swf

its basically an intro for the squiddles show, but seeing as it dosent have any names, nor a specific squiddle, inkabelle, described in jades pesterquest route whos the main focus of this essay, its null and void

still a important piece in the squiddles cannon! but its just not relevant to this tangent im currently on

i lost where i was going with this.

okay try again. 'lies with the sea' in this long rambled theory relates to the next point (perfect seguae :]) in which we talk about two specific squiddles mentioned in jades pesterquest route

pesterquest

the most interesting thing about jades pesterquest route (for me anyway) is when shes talking about the 'silly cartoon show rose dosent like'

(this is from a transcript i found of the game cause i dont have the energy atm to grab a screensht from somehwere)

so jade 'lonliest girl in the world' harleys favourite squiddle is the one that gets lost in the dark scary place at the bottom of the ocean all alone with no friends or sense of where she is

HRMMMMMMM... making any connections yet?

well gee sounds like someones missing their friends a whole bunch, and is relating to a squiddle from her favourite cartoon show

through this its very easy to draw the paralell between jade and inkabelle, with podlight being whoever is placed as jades 'savior' (who this is depends on what part of jades story were choosing this to link to)

discussion: the podlight dilema

so.

jade is inkabelle, but who is podlight?

whilst its never speficically mentioned, its presumed at least (?) that podlight is a squiddle. HOWEVER. unlike previous exampleswe cant take this at face value. cause do you really think that squiddles wouldnt be leaping with joy to make friends with whatever they see? theres probably a squiddle out there whos dated a rock or something idk :\ (this really means nothing i just needed to say this for my own comfort lol)

theres a few characters in homestuck you could place next to podlight and say 'welp! that looks good enough, no im gonna go see if that whashings finished yet...' and go do that, forgetting about the previous topic entirely (definitely havent done this multiple times lol)

some of these include:

alt calliope

calliope (for the purposes of this, theyre different people)

dave/davesprite/davepeta

feferi

alt calliope:

during the later acts and sub acts and intermissions of homestuck as well as in postcannon such as *sigh* homestuck^2 and rhe epilogues, alt calliope tracks down jade multiple times , forcing her to furfill her duty as the witch of space (isolating herself from her friends in doing so, you know how it is with space players u_u)

seeing as the squiddles are manifestations of the horrorterrors, and skipper plumthroat is the main antagonist of the show, its not too much of a stretch to connect skipper plumthroat to lord english seeing as (from my memory at least) in his destruction of the dreambubbles, lord english was killing off the horroroterrors like theyre pieces of dust in the path of a laser beam

seeing as podlight 'tracks [inkabelle] down and saves her' in the original run of the squiddles cartoon, this would allude to alt callieope tracking down jade and 'saving her' by telling her about what it means to be a witch of space

WHICH IS BLEAK AS FUCK NO WONDER JADE CRIED WHEN SHE WATCHED THE SHOW AS A CHILD

like seriously give the girl a break shes had her whole life guided by the clouds of her dreams, only for that to be taken from her when her dreamself died, to the point where she dosent even remember what the colourful reminders on her fingers are for bar one, and then shes thrust into sburb where she spends the majority of the time alone or dead or asleep, before getting told by alt callie that 'OH YOUVE GOTTA BE ALONE CAUSE YOUR A SPACE PLAYER AND STUFF' like bro dude mate give her a break!!! (and then davesprite comes along and is like 'nah lol just vibe haha whats gender again? B33')

calliope:

after her death in the game over timeline (or whatever it is, idk this part makes NO SENSE AT ALL THEY SHOULDVE JUST STUCK TO ONE OR THE OTHER) callie plays the role of helping to illuminate jade on what was happening in the realm of the living outside of the yellow brick road and how she died!

dave/davesprite/davepeta:

theres SO MANY paralells between dave (all versions of him) and jade (all versions of her). from time/space to derse/prospit to the different forms of isolation, LIKE THEREES LOADS.

but thats not about them

this is about a fictional tv show in a webcomic that ended over half a decade ago.

SO PODLIGHT!!

theres the thing about knights and helping space players in their quest to bring about the creation of the genesis frog, which is described by kanaya. dave does thi for jade in homestuck, and even knowingly causes his death in the proces (for long winded reasons relating to his ascention to godtier blah blah boring stuff!)

the main part i want to talk about with the daves and the jades is two things!

one being jadesprite and davesprite on skaia before jade ascends to godtier. jadesprite is sad, alone and lost, and has to come to terms with the fact that all her friends on prospit are dead (taking note now: i just realised that cause prospit crashed into skaia theres the chance that jadesprite found the ruins of her old life ouchie)

but anyway!

davesprite finds her, does the comforting stuff, and presto! paralells between this and podlight finding inkabelle in the murky brineswallows and rescuing her :3

ADDITIONALLY - as you can guess by the image above, davesprite finds jade in the void and darkness (hint hint murky brineswallows hint hint) of space near the green sun after her talk with alt calliope and is the one to save her by waking her up so that she can... distract some doggos.......?

the dave(collectie) theory is the one i think has the strongest connection to podlight personally but, as this is a throwaway line from a dubiously cannon game i HIGHLY DOUBT that there will be any conclusion to this lol

feferi:

okay i know this sounds far fetched. BUT. after jade looses her dreamself, she has the weird dreams everyone gets when one half of you is dead as a corpse

in that dream

feferi is the one to enlighten her to her deathness after some weird rainbow almost trickster related..... stuff

in this!!! its important to note that there a lot of ties to the squiddle universe (the squiddle theme playing throughout, squiddles, but also candycorn shrimp, the narwals i can never remember the name of and other stuff, and the horrorterrors)

after hade and feferi (not pictured) party in the void of whatever is happening here jade 'wakes up' (taking this from the flash title)

the flash in question fades/glitches out to horror terrors presumably not having a good time out in the far reaches of the furthest ring connecting to the whole lord english/skipper plumbthroat thing

-

(theres also something you could say about jade and her rejection of the standard tropes for homestuck (how she fuses with her sprite, interacts directly with the narative esppeacially in early homestuck, and how she has her introduction segment) and how she, princess of prospit, also rejects the steyreotypical tropes for princesses of being rescued by a knight (in reference to how she breaks off from both knights in early homestuck, dave/davesprite and karkat)

but thats not exactly a fully formed thought yet -_- )

an additional thing i forgot to mention in the above section: jades theme from pesterquest contains the same motif as in the song 'carefree princess berryboo' (or vice verca? they share the same motif anyway)

in conclusion:

and finally! okay so its now 3:19 am, time to wrap this babey up:

its ;ate and im tired -_-

jade is inkabelle :B

the identity of podlight is up for debate :/ but dave is a very strong contender!

i know squiddles lore you couldnt even dream of (made it up in their head)

[fouramnesiacrommies]

Luna Palacios appreciation post

Delta State (2004)

[lightanddarklove]

I have an archetype I adore and it’s the content I’ve been consuming since 2003 baybee

Let me know if I forgot anything and also I can totally make more slides for this if you want some more.