#he doesn’t have a super unique design but im ok with that for what im using him for

[lily-avara]

Inspector…

Also my commissions are open!

[vonkarma2]

9 13 & 19?

9. What is one of your character's theme songs?

Very difficult to pick just one this is so much pressure. Does anyone have like only one song associated with them like a side character or something. Ok I couldn’t think of anything that wasn’t embarrassing so Im dodging the question. To make up for it here’s a playlist I made of ed ideas like if it was an anime these could be the ending song. Or an ending song if it was the same as like dorohedoro where they had a bunch of different ones 

13. Which OC do you make art/media with the most?

I think it’s actually Angel, like Rocio used to be the OC I drew by far the most but I actually think I draw Angel slightly more these days or at least like in terms of drawings that take more than 15 seconds. Probably bc there are more poses and outfits I can draw him in + expressions I can draw him with, whereas Rocio only does this 😐🧍and wears the same thing like every day of their life. But yeah he’s super fun to draw and I actually have written some things from his perspective as well which I also think is fun :) he has like a unique perspective like within the characters because of his personality and backstory. I feel like I haven’t shown like the negative sides or what he’s like enough so far though so I’m looking forward to doing that in the future 

19. Who is your most recent OC?

So I think like I’m not going to count people as an oc if they don’t meet the qualifiers of 

-Having a name -Having a solid defined storyline and/or personality -Having been drawn or written abt more than once By this metric I haven’t made any new ocs in a while 😔 I’ve done like character designs but none that have really stuck, probably because I like already have a lot of established ones that I’m focusing more on yk. Like there are a lot of storylines I already have, so I feel like a lot of dynamics + types of characters I find interesting are already covered, and I usually don’t really need to make new ones. Usually my motivation for trying to make new characters is like an aesthetic or tone I think would be interesting but that’s not really enough to base a whole character off of yk. I’d like to come up with more ocs bc I like designing characters but yeah I think I’d like to focus more on my older ones for now. Maybe I’ll try to come up with new like main ocs if/when I finish writing out their story. I feel like the side stories will be in minor character limbo forever bc I don’t really have a story with them and also bc I was picturing them as a comic or visual novel which I would never finish in a million years. Whereas I think I could eventually finish writing something yk.

But anyway time to actually answer the question <3. Actually now that I think abt it it’s probably Connor Armitage collab with @lycanthrology . Does he really count he like canonically exists (long story short he’s another character’s shitty absent father) but doesn’t ever appear or get directly mentioned or anything. Absolutely 0 relevance to the story at all. Also he might not count because Ive never drawn him + I don’t think anything had been written with him.

Before that it’d have to be Dominic Ortega from meat city which is also a collab with various people including @zipmode whose art you should check out <3 (the other people I’m not going to tag here because idk their usernames on this website). First and foremost he is a rabbit furry. But also he’s like an old man who used to be a lawyer but got incredibly tired of his life and so moved to meat city and became an evil wizard instead. Carnomancer specifically bc yk meat city. He likes creating monsters for fun and unleashing them among the populace also for fun, main goal is to escape boredom in life + find some kind of connection even (especially) if it’s negative. He used to have a sort of friend in thr form of James Bianco who was like. His Jesse Pinkman. But unfortunately he was accidentally killed horrifically, and Mr. Ortega’s (Im not on a first name basis with him it feels weird) attempt to resurrect him instead created a mindless zombie which eventually gained an entirely new intelligence. This person’s name is Rico theyre like their own character but the question didn’t ask to explain them as well so I’m not going to <3. But the two characters do interact I might give them like a goal they have to work together to accomplish that might be fun to write abt. But yeah he was created May 2022 so that’s when I have most recently made a new character.

[notnctu]

Johnny has a new tattoo and I’m over the moon with this news 😱 🤩 can I request a reaction with the members of 127 + ten finding out their s/o has a bunch of tattoos?

omg im on a social media cleanse (excluding tumblr) atm so im completely out of the loop for updates DID HE POST IT BC I WANT TO SEE IT SO BAD !?!WHAT IS IT DO U KNOW if anyone finds it on tumblr can they like... tag me LOOLOL

i hope i was able to do this request some justice as i dont have any tattoos myself but i really want some! & this prompt came conveniently after i just finished writing a tattoo scene for one of the ridin’ club :)

you can read it under the cut!

-author doie ❀

━ taeil:

“you are covered with intricate details in the most astonishing way.”

he radiates cool uncle vibes ngl so if he had a s/o with a bunch of tatts, he’d find them so so cool. like more of an admiration for your tiny details and he’s also the type to remember every special meaning/or if you don’t have one. he also won’t hesitate to always plant a kiss on his favorites. like he’d push your hair away that hid the one behind your ear, and graze his lips softly against the drawing.

━ taeyong:

“this one’s for you.”

cmon tae has a few of his own and so if he finds out that you also share the same love for tattoos, he’d be excited! such a sentimental, he’d definitely find a way to mark you on his own body. not anything too specific, but something special you both share that can be translated through an image. and bc you love him as much as he loves you, he’d be very honored if you were to get a tattoo designed by him!

━ johnny:

“it means everything important to me.”

as much as i would like johnny to pull up with a whole sleeve, i can kinda tell that he’s someone who likes tattoos that hold a lot of value to him? god the peak of his interest when he finds out you’re tatted up would sky rocket so hard. yknow why? bc he finds you utterly beautiful. every tattoo is special to you, and to see that importance represented on your body has him falling even harder for you.

━ yuta:

“be my first.”

yuta finds you bad ass af, like you’re already a bad ass to him but the tattoos are just the icing on the cake. seeing you with so many cool designs, he’d probably want to get one of his own and would ask you to choose his first one. not only because you clearly have an eye for such amazing pieces, but he wants his first to be memorable.

━ doyoung:

“i love all of them because they make up you.”

doyoung is tough to gauge, but overall he’d be in awe when he first notices your tatts. like he’d take your hand, lift up your sleeves without saying much and then whispering a small “wow”. and while he isn’t entirely expressive on the topic, its obvious, through his subtly praises and tiny kisses, that he loves the way every single piece of art come together to make a masterpiece that is you.

━ ten:

“match with me.”

this man got a whole tiddy tattoo ok he’s just as committed as you so if he sees that you’re covered in them, he won’t hesitate to talk up a storm about getting matching ones. especially, if you two have the same spot without one already there. ok ok lets not be too cheesy, he wont make it anything too grand to where you two both have a moon on your chest, but definitely something that pairs together. like a 1/2 fraction so together you two make a whole.

━ jaehyun:

“tell me about them.”

he waits to hear about your tattoo stories like theyre his favorite bedtime story. he’s intrigued, because every piece of art has a background story as to why it came to be. so if you have a bunch, he’d love to know all about each one. if anything, he’s more in love with your passion/excitement over your own tattoos, than he is about you having them.

━ jungwoo:

“this is my favorite one to trace.”

he love them. that’s all. hahah anyways, this soft baby loves loves that you’re tatted up not only bc you look super hot with them, but bc he loves tracing your lines! during cuddles, his fingers would dance across the ink lightly at an attempt to leave soothing touches, but also wishing to recreate your beautiful drawings with his fingertips. and he doesn’t miss a single fine detail that dot your skin.

━ mark:

“it’s like art on art.”

his reaction would be kind of childlike? Like very amazed and constant exclamations of praise! more of like a marveling the work of the artist and honestly finds your tattoos super cool and fun, but also appreciative of how unique they each are. he already thinks that you’re a piece of art alone, so he always says that it’s art within an art piece.

━ haechan:

“one of my favorite y/n things.”

he lwk the type to tell you to show them off? more like a strong advocate for your art to be on display, because he thinks they’re wonderful and obviously have become a part of you. and he’s never one to want any part of you to be hidden, he wants your creativity to be expressed. which also goes into how it’s one of the things he loves the most about you.

[twinvictim]

your opinions on each of the post team silent games and a rating out of 10. hand 'em over

YEAHHHHHH FINALLY CATERING TO ME!!!

Uh really long post oops. for reference, my rating for the first 4 sh's are as follows

Sh1: 9/10 Sh2: 7/10 Sh3: 9/10 Sh4: 9.5/10

Silent Hill 0/Origins

overall score: 7/10

Alot of the games issues can of course be attributed to it being a psp game, and while i won't excuse everything bc of that, j have to be honest and say I think it had so much potential as a (very) late ps2 game. Not to mention, the game ON THE PSP functions as it should. (The ps2 port does fucking not tho..oops) ans you'll see that this is...a rarity post team silent.

The story has alot of potential, Travis as a character is interesting and sympathetic and j think his dynamic with alessa js super fascinating to dig into, both of them being abused children and there was alot of intrigue regarding his powers, the game feels like a smaller more watered down she, and for that I can't fault it too much. The weapons system isn't my favorite but the combat itself is reminiscent of 1 and 2 and I really like a good chunk of the monster design, there was clearly thought and care put into it, nurses and strughtjackets/lying figures be dammed. The unlockables are pretty cool though and alot of the environments look pretty cool for a psp game, hell i LOVE the theater level its super unique, I would love to see it in (actually functional) better graphics. I also think the puzzles are pretty solid, not hair pulling like sh1 even if they're not quite as clever as say sh3.

My biggest criticisms come from the reuse of sh1 characters (just alessa and Travis would've been fine, maybe dahlia and some more org characters would've been better) the bad ending being straight up bad writing. Not to mention they did the sh3 thing of "kill too many monsters and get the bad ending" which is...stupid. The foreshadowing of the butcher being? He's just kinda there, I like the lead up but it would be more interesting if the butcher represented something from those years between Travis' father dying and him being an adult. And while there's more replayability imo than sh2, it doesn't have difficulty sliders and that makes it kinda hard to come back to quite as often. Not to mention unlike sh1, 3or sh4 there's not as much horror focus and random events.

Overall, solid game its fun to play, very silent Hill and if you're willing to look past a few continuity errors and accept its a little different and slightly derrivitive at the same time, I like to say I had alot of fun with it and still do. (Maybe I just like Travis alot...idk)

Silent Hill: Homecoming

Overall score: 6/10

Once again most of the issues here are gonna be corporate fuck ups, but I'm also not gonna beat around the bush, this game isn't like...good. its bad actually. "But you gave it a 6/10?" Yeah bc its not NEARLY as bad as some other games I've.. experienced.

The negatives here are, many and vast, so let's run them down. Firstly the games performance is janky on console (ps3 at least) and abysmal/unplayable on PC, what with framerate issues that are detrimental to game play on pc and make the third boss impossible. That said on console it is completable and not even too terrible...usually. Scarletts boss fight however is terribly unbalanced and broken on all skews so :/. The combat is...functional but not anyone's favorite, it's difficult to use any actually strong weapon and you can pretty much strong arm ur ways through shit with just the knife (except scarletts first form..don't try it, it won't work) for some people this will be borening (not my opinion but w/e). Most of The puzzles...leave alot to be desired. I hate sliding block puzzles. Also no run button? At all?? No easy mode? Ok... also what is this.. wheel design for the inventory...im accidentally using my serum..what is serum also? And why is the item pickup noise like...bass boosted.

The character models look awful most of the time, and comically unfinished other times, some human models are just grotesque, (judge halloway, Adam shepherd, mayor Bartlett. .you get it) and yes...there are sexy nurses. Bc of course there are. (Whole ass out???) They did straight up have some terrible endings for this game (ph ending for one, the way you get the ufo? Hell the ufo ending is kinda boring. I like the in water ending here too but. Yeah.) the story has some, problems. To say the least.

However, while the performance is bad its not the worst I've played (on the ps3 once again..unplayable on pc) and I hardly noticed the framerate when I was just running around, I personally found the combat kinda fun, between trying to dodge accurately and still attack and not use all my health items (bc those and ammo are actually rare! Unlike some games...) it is kind of a challenge and reminds me of a much worse sh4. And hey, the health items both heal an understandable amount of health that i can easily read with a bar (unlike 1-3) and they're not a complete joke (unlike sh4...) i find the exploration really fun and sure the characters look shit but the environments are Fucking great. The church is one of my fav sections, short as jt might be and yes it stole the confessional scene but its pretty well written and acted I think. The monster design is pretty fucking rad too honestly, I like the schism, siam, I like the DESIGN of the needlers even if they make me so mad to fight, and hey the nurses and ph don't show up that much to be too aggregious. The boss monsters are also fantastic design wise, very unsettling and the boss rooms are interesting as well.

The story has problems but it also has alot of potential, the concept of people sacrificing ther children for silent Hill and being overcome by their own pain and guilt is pretty fucking cool, and alex is a good character they did a good job of giving him personality, ppl bitch about him being a soldier but a) he's not and b) soldiers are people too, and a sh game that could tackle toxic masculinity, be critical of the military, and also tackle abusive religeious parents is pretty intriguing, not to mentions themes of brotherly love that's complicated bc of how they clearly favored Josh . Sure, it misses the mark, but I like taking the potential and thinking about it bc its compelling to me. And like I said, i like alex alot.

Overall, bad game yes, but not the worst as it has enough good for me to honestly really enjoy it, besides it is pretty funny when it is bad. Don't play the pc port tho

Silent Hill Shattered Memories

Overall Score: 8/10

Unpopular opinion im sure but honestly? I find this game ALMOST on par with the team silent games. Its really that good, yes its a wii game, so this is my score taking into account the motion controls BTW.

For the good, man where do i start. Its BEAUTIFUL for a wii game and esp for a post team silent game, the graphics are nice and Constsitent, the environments are pretty and it has a pretty nice cold color pallet to contrast the warmer tones the series tends to skew towards. The acting and intrgrige are all on point and the WRITING is fantastic, its one of those games you play the first time not knowing the twist and play the second time picking up more and more clues and things that strengthen that twist so much more. Like sh2 its a simple story told in such a clever and interesting way that you'll probably be too invested to put it down, I beat it in one sitting in 6 hours bc i was so engrossed in the narrative. And the Puzzles man! The puzzles are phenomenal and fun to accomplish and there's even a little bit of variety in a few places on repeat playthroughs. The level of detail in this game is insane really, the things that change with the different psychology answers are pretty cool too and tho it all plays out relatively the same its still fun to see the different things you can get to happen. The gimmicks like the phone as an object, taking pictures, sneaking and zooming in, they're not too intrusive as to take away from the exploration or other game play but not completely useless and have some pretty fun Easter eggs too. The game plays sort of like a worse outlast with good puzzles and for that I do have to commend it. Oh and the fucking MUSIC is INCREDIBLE idk something ab this soundtrack has alot of heart put into it clearly.

Now, it's not perfect. The thing is, it is a WORSE outlast type game, in the running and hiding sense but well, the hiding is completely useless, its a run away game, which is ok, but I understand that people aren't gonna be a big fan of that when silent Hill has always balanced combat ad puzzles and exploration. The running segments are..aggravating, mostly bc its hard to figure out where to go, not to mention using motion controls that don't like to work half the time to fight the monsters off of you. Also, the monsters are not scarey in the slightest and the raw shock scream is actually enragaging if you've died one to many times, there's also...not really any penalty for dying. And once you're out for these running segments,there's no danger, no monsters, nothing to hide from despite having a hiding mechanic. Its not really a horror game more of a psycological thriller and I understand that the fact that its not horror can be disappointing. The psychology things might be a bit overhyped And yeah fine, the wii foreplay scene...well yeah its weird but it IS also funny as fuck.

That said, there's still alot thats good and alot thas unfair criticism lobbed at this game. Harry didn't have much of a personality in sh1 bc he's a ps1 character and sm really fleshed him out well, not to mention giving cybil some nice characterization, and they did some interesting things with dahlia and kaufmann. And Lisa.. well I'm gonna be honest I never found Lisa all that interesting in sh1..so it doesn't bother me that she's the way she is in this game. I know people hate the "horny" aspect of it but to be completely fair, YOU choose to make the game that way, don't answer in a sexual manner or look at boobs or anything else and you won't have an overly sexual game, its...literally that easy. Its given as an option for the play id they want to go for what is arguably another joke ending. (You cannot tell me sleeze and sirens is meant to be a real serious ending to the game. Cmon) and you can complain about the innacuuracies if you want but its a spin off, a retelling of the original game. Its not canon, and it didn't change the original game. It just took the ideas presented there and made them more human and lest fantastical, there's some supernatural elements but it takes a backseat to the human moments. And its honestly really cool.

Overall, great game, i reccomend it if you don't mind some slight jank with the motion controls and honestly? Look up directions on where to go for the running segments and you'll have a pretty good time overall.

Silent Hill Downpour

Overall score (so far): 7.5/10 *to be noted i haven't finished actually playing it yet but I know the basic plot and some of the details so I doubt it'll change

And so for the final silent Hill Game, I have to say, i don't think it deserves NEARLY the hatred it gets, there's alot about it that i find really cool and even fun and I think its a solid entry, a little better than origins in some parts and its downsides are both unfortunate and once again, mostly Konami's fault . That said, I'm also not gonna kid and say its a good game, just that I like it alot and we should be nicer to the last silent Hill game were probably ever gonna get.

Downpour has a pretty good, original story overall, there's alot to it, alot of intricacies and intrigue to it that honestly make it a pretty sold silent Hill game. Its different enough from the others to stand out but not super far removed from its themes and messages. I like that it doesn't try and lean into the cult aspect and tries to do something else with it, it doesn't try to explain silent Hill, but just use it to torment the characters, as it should be. There's tragedy ad human feelings here and some of them aren't the most...sensitive but they are pretty reasonable reactions id say. Playing as someone who's odds are stacked against him from the beginning as he's a prisoner is a cool way to open the game, someone convicted and you must discover if he is a good person or not. Themes of revenge explored more than in sh3 which is pretty cool. The environments look pretty nice, and i like the look of the otherworld, once again being unique with its cooler color pallet, but without the ice so it really feels like its own thing. The EXPLORATION is awesome with an actual open world which I think works well, there's alot to do in town (unlike sh1 and 0 on limiting hardware and 2 which just pretends you can explore to town but you cant) there's alot for cool little stories and sidequests to do, my favorite so far being the cinema (which has a section of ACTUAL fixed cameras like old Resident evils which is smth SH has never done and its super fucking cool!) And all the sidequess help strengthen murphy as a cheacter and argue for his innocence or complexites. The weapons system is pretty cool, picking up items and attacking with whatever you might find, finding cool Easter eggs with exploration and having fun noticing things. And it does honestly have the strongest side characters outside of SM. The puzzles are pretty solid and fun to figure out with some cool mechanics and the seperate difficulties is a great thing to bring back (actually done well like sh3) I also kind of like the method of triggering the night world/rain/monsters, and silent Hill really feels likes its constantly punishing Murphy, as it should. The music might not be Akira but its still pretty damn good, and fuck yall I like the Korn song, and you CAN press start and skip it yknow. (Thx tomm hewlit)

The negtitives tho, well they are there. For one it has the worst performance of any sh game outside of pc homecoming and like...the hd collection, the framerate like to shit itself alot lmao, its not usually detrimental bc I've played re2r with similar framerates but, yeah its not great. Not to mention while the models look better than hc they don't animate well or often at all, and the game has trouble loading in the models as fast as they should. The sound mixing could use...some work too, poor murph sounds like he's eating the mic. While I find the games exploration really fun, murphy also has the issue of not running very fast so it can be a little annoying to get back to a place you want to be when you can't run that fast, not to mention the loading times. The monster design is def the worst in the series, maybe on par w SM. Which is disappointing bc there's some pretty good moments here and there, but not nearly enough to make it scary and there's so much you can do with monsters with this premise. Also, the running sections in the otherworld are better than SM ad even more engaging than the brief ones in 2 and 3, but still, I'd prefer to do puzzles or fight a boss or smth. I will also say, the endings are, iffy while the main 2 endings are really good and Anne's bad ending as well as the joke ending are great, murphys bad endings are weird and ooc for the muphy you come to know in the game (even more so than Origins) plus, idk that the writers knew all that much about prison andbprison culture, nobody in a real prison would be mad ab Murphy killing a pedo (there's some racist implications here and there too which is. Unfortunate and disappointing. I like Howard and Robbie but they are a bit tropey, esp Howard) that said Anne is a compelling albeit unlikable character and thas pretty cool to see pulled off.

Overall, while it has downsides, I don't think Downpour is worthy of all the scorn it gets, this can have problems and you can point them out without disregarding the good parts and while it is unfortunate it doesn't run better and have some extras and didn't handle some things great, I still think its worth a playthrough, esp if you go out of your way to do the sidequests.

Bonus round

Book of memories is not a game I intend to play bc I don't wanna get a vita and can't imagine I'm missing much. It doesn't look bad pwr say but I'm not interested tbh

Fuck PT. :)

[twewy-comix]

the big one-oh - let’s watch twewy

only two more after this!!!

LAST TIME: EVERYTHING SUCKS

“neku wake up! you fucked up big time” “beat”

they decide to go check out where they can get with their keypin. also a dude walks through neku and he hears his twitter feed

it’s indeed become homogenous - once known for being full of all sorts of individuals with their own viewpoints, it has been reduced to a wasteland of people shuffling about like zombies. not a single unique thought to be found. the same phrases, repeating endlessly, mindlessly...

...and that’s just what twitter was like BEFORE the replies meme amirite (canned laughter) (wild applause)

「えっ、ハネコマってハネコマ？」kawaii

and if there’s one person we can always trust, it’s joshua

anyway they continue their search for konishi

love this cat

thot detected

murder!

thot detected

after doing some murder and awkwardly-timed feelings jams, neku and beat find a wall that’s all fucky. i wonder who could possibly have done this

kawaii

they go through to udagawa, where the air is thick with space cat powder. the source seems to be the weird sigil sho drew, so neku tries taking pictures of the past to figure out wtf happened. he doesnt explain how it works to beat because “there’s no time,” which im sure won’t bite him in the ass later

(happy birthday tsudaken)

oh hey it’s our pals kariya and uzuki im sure they know what happened here

jk it’s a boss fight

the anime’s weirdly inconsistent about when it shows blood or not, huh

beat manages to knock uzuki’s red skull pin off, which im not sure was a thing in the game?

they realize they can reverse the brainwashing this way and remove kariya’s pin too, thus avoiding any senseless murder

honestly i didnt rly like how this scene was the last we see uzuki and kariya in the game*, so if the anime is changing that im fine with it. Let Them Live

(i mean theyre in neo twewy so we know they live) (but i thought they were double-dead for nine years, dammit)

*(but the last time i talked about that ppl got mad at me lmao)

haha... sure u are ;)

THE WHOLE BUILDING’S FUCKED UP (AND NOBODY NOTICED???)

oh ok. in the game beat just grabs the camera and uses up all the photos and they find something useful by pure luck lol

oh shit they found his catnip stash

hey havent we seen that design on an evil sky laser recently

yeah from an evil sky laser

oh. that too

anyway there’s a gold key pin in the envelope and a letter that says “try not to get killed by konishi”

wasnt he trying to help joshua get into the river? yet he had this keypin all along?? what gives??? you have to watch the secret reports OVA to find out

oh no

yeah and the weird art installation’s in the way too

male gaze

OH COME ON THEYRE DOING THIS ON PURPOSE 

nope, nothing to see here, move along

murder accusation #2...

...ignored

(he doesn’t say megs/megu-chan here. fascinating)

OH. UH. OKAY

some context: here’s the game’s version of this scene:

nine years ago i drew this comic based on that scene (which i re-uploaded earlier today):

but i hadnt read the secret reports yet back then, and on my second or third playthrough i thought “oh maybe he actually meant hanekoma here”

also earlier today i was musing on that and thinking “nah, probably not, but given how the anime framed his resurrection it’d be really funny if he was” because hanekoma was RIGHT BEHIND HIM

but here we are. he really was looking for hanekoma, who was right behind him. that answers that!!!

but i guess the question here is: is hanekoma the composer? or rather, does sho think hanekoma is the composer?

(i know the answer ofc. probably.)

anyway yeah it’s funny. and also way funnier after i said “nah probably not, he couldnt POSSIBLY be THAT much of a dumbass”

no, dude, you cant tap him on the screen or he’ll just teleport all over the goddamn place. you gotta aim your shots through him, like the guy you really wanna hit is standing behind this asshole

unfortunately not everyone can be a super awesome gamer like me so they get their asses kicked. and--wait what

day six....? in the game they were on the last day, right? what do they need an extra day for?? and by they i mean the writers

bunp

NEXT TIME: THE END EXCEPT NOT BECAUSE THERE’S TWO EPISODES LEFT BUT IT LOOKS LIKE THEYRE GONNA DO ALMOST EVERYTHING IN THE NEXT ONE AND IDK HOW THEYLL HAVE ENOUGH TO FILL THE LAST

[charcolor]

ok. because nobody was asking about it, here's my proseka group ranking

25-ji - i am mentally ill and also i kin one of them. their covers/songs are all so good. it's also unique in a lot of ways (only group where none of the characters meet at school, only group with only 1 first year, only group with a sekai manifested from someone that isn't the leader, only group that was an established music group before their main story, etc) and i like that. and because i'm edgy i like their aesthetics, story, and characterization. there's lots of interesting and realistic scenarios with them. kanade has trauma and blames herself for her father's illness, mafuyu has ultimately been driven to suicidal depression mostly due to her overly controlling parents, ena has a severe inferiority complex because she works super hard on her art and gets no recognition or praise outside of 25ji even from her own family (kinnie moments), and mizuki has resorted to skipping school to avoid transphobic harassment from other students. these are real problems lots of people relate to, someone could even relate to all of them at once, so it makes the stories so intriguing and the characters so memorable

wxs - my gf likes this one so i have bias. i love the clowns because they're all totally autistic. i love tsukasa and emu's noises. i also like how colorful they are and i think they all have very good backstories. i'd really like emu in particular to be expanded on she definitely seems like she'd be a "my family is rich and cares more about money than my own happiness" kinda character but i might be reading too deep into it.

vbs - definitely the gayest of units. they also get the giga-p songs AND echo so huge bonus points for that. i love their styles, an in particular is my favorite character design in the whole game. their story also rules, the only thing that kinda bothers me is i think kohane should have kept her glasses. the haircut i understand, it's cool, but i don't like the trope of "character stops wearing glasses to signify Change" bitch she needs to SEE!!!!!!!!! i know she has contacts but i don't get what was wrong with the glasses :( (also i know kohane is first in the lineup but i'm not the only one who thought an was the leader at first right. like she's the one they show at the beginning of the vbs story, kohane doesn't show up til like halfway through chapter 1 and i dont think they even display her name at first. actually that kinda bothers me too)

mmj - i like them, i don't have any strong opinions. i like some of their songs but i definitely feel like the songs they cover are very inconsistent, in some cases i think they should have gone to other units (like i think patchwork staccato fits in more with 25-ji, maybe near as well). i think the concept is super interesting, 1 aspiring idol + 3 girls who quit being idols, and the story behind those 3 girls and WHY they quit being idols. the characters just don't really stand out to me though...they're not like, boring or copied from other characters or anything, they just don't super interest me. BUT i do really appreciate how their story is handled, and their subsequent event stories are realistic idol stuff like finding an agency or managing live streaming sessions, i think it's a good take on that stuff

leo/need - i think the story is very well done, and the individual characterization too, but i gotta be honest. the more i think about leo/need the more upset i am. it has everything to do with their songs. i don't generally like deco*27's style, he's very talented but his style is just not for me (but i like hibana and ghost rule). pretty much every song leo/need has other than teo, roki and hibana (though even with hibana i play with the meiko cover) is sooo boring to me to the point where i actively dread having to play through them in multilives. not to mention that ichika gets WAY more emphasis than any other group leader. off the top of my head i can think of 5 songs (hibana, teo, roki, dramaturgy, and umitetie katiyetan or whatever it's called. whatever that one is) that are just ichika and miku duets, which is way more than any other group leader. in fact the only other miku/unit member duet i can think of is hated by life itself (with kanade). ichika even gets a solo cover (night sky patrol of tomorrow) which im pretty sure literally no other unit member has (not counting another vocal versions obviously). saki, honami and shiho get NO songs of their own, or even like individual duets with ichika or miku (and luka has NOTHING. vbs and mmj let her sing with them but not the unit that she was literally assigned to!!). in the mvs for teo and roki they just play their instruments together in the background without singing. i get they're the band unit but all the characters are meant to be singers in some form, there's no reason the other members shouldnt get to sing. (and it's not like ichika herself doesnt have an instrument!! like it's not like everyone else is too busy!!) LITERALLY DURING SHIHO'S BIRTHDAY LIVE SHE DIDN'T SING AT ALL IT WAS ICHIKA AND MIKU DOING TEO. i didnt see honami's birthday but i imagine they didn't let her sing either. it just really pisses me off how they just, neglect ichika's friends way more than they would for any other unit. but yeah i just think their songs are boring

[plunnies-n-shit]

ok ive realized something that annoys me about the Naruto Universe where the fuck is their cultural clothing like, i understand the usual argument "they're all japanese!!!!" first of all stfu Kishimoto has the same problem as most mangaka in that, aside from the two joke characters, he draws all of his characters as the same light-skinned-pretty-noble japanese and that's some right bullshit there's so much more variation in people also, two, culture, especially regarding food and clothing, is largely influenced by region and climate, and you cannot tell me that a (im generously gonna call it a) "continent" consisting of enough unique and drastically different biomes that they're called "elemental nations" doesn't have as many different cultures as it has hidden villages. give me Konohagakure jonin in furs of the animals native to the forests around the village-- draped over their shoulders, stitched into their vests, flung around their wastes, the natural patterns that are impossible to replicate allowing them to all but disappear into the shadows and undergrowth of their forests and masking their scent from trackers. People in the Land of Mists and especially in the Land of Rains wear clothing made from the hides of seals or native reptiles or cloth/leather that has been waxed, and it has to be almost reverently cared for so that it never loses its waterproof qualities. waterproof shoes, especially, are worth their weight in whatever metal is considered super valuable to Shinobi (imma go with "titanium") I think Kankurō was the only one i saw from Sunakagure that i think was dressed properly-- in the desert? with the sand and the wind and the sun? You don't leave your skin bare unless you wanna get burnt, then sanded to hell and back, and the black paint around his eyes would actually be beneficial to keep the constant, strong sunlight from damaging his eyes without having to obstruct his vision in any way. Gaara im gonna give you a pass for your sand shield, but Temari? put some clothes on girl!!!!! Long, flowing linen robes breathe easily while still protecting you from sun and sand!! headwraps prevent the scalp from being damaged by the sun!!!! sandals and footwraps keep your feet safe while also not getting absolutely filled with sand in two seconds flat!!!!!! Also???? The weaponry???? Are you telling me that "anything goes so long as you win" shinobi wouldnt take every element of surprise available to them including but not limited to taking their little murder children to the armory to pick an additional weapon or 3 to master? Youve introduced storage scrolls!!! You dont even need to worry about lugging them around!!! Even if we're just talking japanese weapons: naginata and bladed fans would be popular among the kunoichi. Kama and other chain weapons would be wildly popular among capture-interrogation teams. Staffs especially would be good for medicnin and "weak point" team members who need to be focused on defense And that's before you start pulling weapons from around the world bc of course shinobi smiths would jump all over the chance to design new and unique weapons What im saying is Kishimoto youre lazy and a coward and you were already on my Fite List for the bullshit apologetics you pulled to traumatize babyNaruto for the plot point, but youve moved up a couple spaces.

[wincore]

U WROTE A WHOLE ESSAY IN RESPONSE TO MY ASK I LOVEEEE THIS (& YOU💛)

when i want to take a mindless break i’ll usually rewatch anime (basically haikyuu and one punch man 🥴) and old nct content!! IM HAPPY TO HEAR UR STRESS HAS LIGHTENED 💕💕 ITS WHAT U DESERVE

ahhh i know for sure you’re going to be ok!! u are a genius/smartie/Einstein wants what u have. I WILL WISH U LUCK N MANIFEST UR SUCCESS 🤞🏻🤞🏻

MOONIE.... THESE WIPS... IM SO EXCITED WTF!!! realism in soulmates is such an interesting concept and i love that it’s with jaehyun!! (having flashbacks 2 jaehyun/reader tension in runway.... Yes Maam...im ready..)

SOULMATES IN THE OFFICE AND MAGIC FOR CEOS???? AND CRIME??? u are so insanely creative i’ve never read anything like that.. i am obsessed with ur brain wtf... also ceo jaewin?!?! im going to kiss u 100 times for that. & no pressure to include all those themes if it ends up being difficult to write but personally i love that idea!!! i feel like these are all rlly common tropes but putting them together would make something super exciting to read (& would be really unique!!). (((also: LEAD GUITARIST HYUCK.... IM LISTENING!!!??)))

I LOVE ROMCOMS!! i just watched 27 dresses the other day and was reminded of my love for them. as u know i am an avid fan of runway-side-character-taeyong.... i will bribe u for fashion designer taeyong’s return...

A NOMIN COLLEGE LOVE TRIANGLE??????? IM SO EXCITEDDDDD (ive said that probably 10x in this message my apologies) tbh love triangles scare me but i am Ready for the pain....

BFF2L IS MY FAVORITE TROPE QUEEN!!!! i can’t imagine what the opposite of How To Lose a Guy in 10 Days is but i LOVE that movie so i’m sure it’ll be amazing!!!

FAKE DATING W JAEMIN.... IM SO READY IM SO READYYYYYY

ok ngl i have never read anything sungchan related since idk him that well BUT IF YOURE THE ONE WRITING IT.... IM DEF READING IT!!! and i love sports au type things so im looking forward to it!!! i love a jock 😳😳😳

IM SORRY THIS IS LIKE ONE MILLION MESSAGES I JUST WANTED EVERY WIP/IDEA U SHARED TO GET A PROPER RESPONSE!!!

- tata 🥰

TATA YOU'RE MY FAV PERSON EVER AHHH ❣️❣️❣️ Reading this response is such a treat 🥰

ooh!!!! I really need to catch up with haikyuu there's SO much the last time I watched it S2 was ongoing 😭😭😭 and yes to one punch man!!! love that shiny bald of head of his, gives me instant serotonin 😘 I miss nct2018 from time to time and watch that content too :'0 AND THANK YOU SO MUCH IM??? your well wishes will get me into grad school I just know it 😤 this ask is my good luck charm 💘

IM SO HAPPY THAT YOU LIKE THEM IM LITERALLY ❤️💘💖🌞🎉🎊 PLSSS

The realism in the soulmate au is there bc it's more or less a regular fake dating au but the consequences are heavier I guess?? Like u are directly disobeying fate, you punks 😤 I LOVE MIXING DIFFERENT TROPES I ENJOY LIKE I LOVE THE USUAL ONES TOO BUT !!! EXPERIMENTING IS SO FUN 🤩 (also yes... i will be repeating the tension for jaehyun but this time yn is more flirty and nosy and annoying but also lovable i hope??? jaehyun is within an inch of his life after every conversation bc she absolutely ends him) ceo jaewin are my reason to continue writing and posting i have a rough layout for each of their fics already o( ❛ᴗ❛ )o

((about lead guitarist hyuck...... He is WAY too attractive for his own good but also annoying oops 😗))

HSJSJSJJS I have kept taeyong fics in the wip dungeon for too long but omg. I'm so happy you're excited about it!!! this fashion designer fic is dedicated to you tata 💝

IM GENUINELY AFRAID OF LOVE TRIANGLES AFTER TWILIGHT BUT I WILL GIVE IT MY BEST SHOT THANK YOU FOR BELIEVING IN ME 🤧

ALSO I GUESS THE OPPOSITE OF HOW TO TO LOSE A GUY IN 10 DAYS IS HOW TO GET A GUY (OR GIRL) IN 10 DAYS????? I am not sure where I'm going with this but I'm certain I'll figure it out along the way 😸 fake dating is a fun trope and jaemin is a fun person to write so boom. here we go. (also almost every plot I come up with somehow suits jaemin?? He goes with every romance plot so well 😭)

I'VE NEVER WRITTEN SUNGCHAN BEFORE SOOOO I'll have to figure out a character for him. I believe he'd be the type to cause problems on purpose and test the limits for it 🤔 it's all speculation though!!

DON'T WORRY ABOUT THE LONG ASK!!! I will respond with a long post too so 🥰🥰 I hope anyone who doesn't like this on their dash can just idk block my "answered" tag?? At the end of the day, it's my blog and you're like my fav anon ❤️❤️❤️

[chowtrolls]

A question for my favorite Liam!! Could you tell me a bit about the trolls you've designed yourself? What's your process like?

It kinda depends on the design, I suppose! I’ve designed 27 of my 52 active trolls! That’s not counting trolls I don’t have on my select, like Chello, Veroix, Skulux, Orcais, Kithon, Jahspr, etc etc. Of those 27, 6 are what i’d consider my Original Trolls, ones who’ve been around for years. In those six you can look and see a LOT of myself! I’m gunna put this under a readmore but I’m gunna talk, like, specifically about a few trolls: Bruuno + Chowow, then Jawska + current Bruuno! Doing those ones specifically so I can also talk about my tattoo design process and how that’s changed!

I think Chowow technically predates Bruuno! At the time I was making them, I was really young, like 13? 14? idk. I made them both on a whim- Chowow was specifically made to be paired w/ his matesprit (he was originally gunna be an olive!) and Bruuno was made as the troll version of a beloved oc named Bruno. I put a LOT of my anger issues and trauma into Chowow, as a method of coping with them. I also VERY distinctly remember the day I looked at Corpse and said “I think Chow’s trans.”-> Saying that also helped me realize I’M trans lol. When Designing Chow, I specifically wanted dog ear shaped horns that were unique, in a way. And because Chow was based off my dog Gia...i just kinda looked at her liddol triangle ears and decided his get 2 be that way. His design has stayed...relatively the same, he got a hair cut but he’s always worn tank tops + shorts. Bruuno specifically was always the guy Who Had Tattoos. Bruuno’s muse was relatively dead for a very long time, he really only like Revived in 2018/2019? His original design was based off the OG OC- curly hair, thin as a rail, scattered tattoos that had little meaning. As Bruuno got quads, he got tattoos AROUND those quads, their symbols. I wasn’t very good at making my own tattoos so he had some that i based off musician’s (such as the squares that i think the drummer from TOP has?). As I aged, Bruuno’s tattoos changed ALL THE TIME there is NO rhyme or rhythm to them. I only looked at him and really, distinctly organized it all, when I saw another fuchsia with nice organized tatts, I think his name was Nihkos?? shrugs u_u Loved that mans. You can so very cleanly track my progress in tattoo design by looking at all of Bruuno’s sprites! Which leads me toooooo.............

..........Jawska! Jawska is, at his root, a Bruuno clone. I thought to myself “Hm. I want a Bruuno Clone.” And Thus Jawska Was Born. Typically when I come up with a character, I let them like. Mellow for a bit. In my brain. Rattle them around like a marble in a cup. And sometimes, I have a very VERY specific niche I want them to fill. For Jawksa, I wanted an asexual character whose asexuality was important to him, who was attractive but distinctly unfuckable. Jawska has some very important Design Notes - Curly hair, Distinct Nose, Slit eyes, 3 gills+fin prongs, broad shoulders+chest. I also seriously sat down and thought about his tattoos. His tattoos mean JACK shit. His chest piece + arms? NOTHING. there’s negative meaning. He got it because it looked sick. There’s SOME meaning, in some places- the blackout on his arm covers an old tattoo and the rings on his fingers are to hide the singular ring he once had. While working on his tattoo, i looked at other tattoos and specifically thought about the body parts that SUCK to get tattoos on. Collar bones, elbows, sternum. And I specifically aimed to leave those a little blank, using the negative space to give purpose but also keep in line w/ what people would normally not tattoo. His outfit is specifically something that doesn’t SCREAM fuchsia but doesn’t HIDE it. Like he’s got his fins and his eyes but he doesn’t wear any fuchsia- wears more red! That reflects how he sees himself: as someone on the bottom of the food chain. He isn’t special or important. He’s not royalty, he doesn’t deserve to wear his symbol or his color. He wears rose gold instead of gold because again, he’s not royalty he doesn’t “deserve” the gold, but also because the warmer rose gold fit better with his pallet. He wears baggy pants and a loose fitting shirt to hide his frame. As someone who was in an abusive relationship and someone asexual, he doesn’t want to be seen or perceived, he absolutely doesn’t want people to look at him and be attracted to him. Cargo pants hide the shape of his hips + legs, baggy shirt hides that broad chest. The tears + tank leave JUST enough open for people to not NOTICE what he’s doing! So it seems deliberate. There’s a few small, unnoticeable pieces of his design that work like cogs in a little machine. You wouldn’t look at him and see his low self esteem, or that he’s hiding. Which is what he wants! 

And now back to Bruuno, my beloved idiot. I was going to do Jolene (i really only made jolene because an old friend mentioned there not being a lot of butch women, so i wanted to try my hand at it! another design thing I enjoy is finding niches or concepts I don’t see a lot of, and try to make my twist on them. jolene’s in the process of being a lil reworked design wise so i won’t talk abt her.) but I figured I could explain the bits and pieces of Bruuno now. Any design I make, at least now, tends to be very similar to Jawska- there’s small, unnoticeable bits and cogs, or themes that work together hand in hand. I could honestly sit here for hours explaining all of it. Bruuno is the only Monark who has both horns- even though he was designed first, I had all his “relatives” lose that C shaped horn. How they lost it is different and important to them but Bruuno having both horns is a way to show he’s Different from them. In ANY outfit he wears, its typically loose-fitting or a tank top, right? He has a dorsal fin that he doesn’t like having pressed down, but he also enjoys having his figure disformed. Wearing baggy, open shirts give him a more carefree appearance, which is why he does it often when in the limelight. His more casual outfits tend to be cargo shorts, tactical pants, sweats, and tank tops. He really wears long pants because they hide the robotic leg. Despite that, they are all loose fitting, comfortable, but still have an “edge” to them. He has JUST enough piercings in to have that lil edge but not be seen as a cocky highblood! Enough to impress but not be flashy. His robotic arm is VERY clearly a robotic arm, but it isn’t one that looks incredibly flashy. He’s a gigantic fuchsia rockstar with a million tattoos, of course he’s going to stand out, he has no need to be even flashier with a high tech super cool arm or a billion piercings. Another important aspect is his hair! There’s SO much story behind his hair i won’t even go into it. Bruuno has always had curly hair because around the time I made his design, I cut off my super long hair and suddenly I was left with a mess of curls. In my own experience, people likes touching my hair w/o asking, i’d get teased all the time, I’d get a fuck ton of unasked for comments ( “you’d look better with straight hair.” “boys would like you better with straight hair.” “curly hair looks messy.” gags. die. choke on a dick.) and I kinda used Bruuno to vent that out? I put my insecurity and frustration with my hair into Bruuno. I was too damn depressed to straighten my hair, so I decided Bruuno gets to go through that. He primarily wears his hair pulled back now because he’s also too depressed to straighten it. ok now im too tired to finish this. u_u 

[bladekindeyewear]

HS^2 bloggin’ upd8 2020-01-17

Alright, morningblogging yesterday’s 2020-01-17 upd8 to Homestuck^2 let’s go!  Spoiler-free again.  I kinda don’t want even the next chapter names image-spoiled above the cut anymore so I’m going to have to figure out WHAT to put above the cut in these liveblog posts for visual reinforcement... a unique silly icon?  Going back once I’m done with the upd8 and posting something non-spoilery but weird-looking out of context?

Eh, can’t be assed.  Just know that after this I’m going to pony up for the Patreon commentary and skim it for anything plot-useful to y’all (in a separate post).  Let’s get started.

Okay, what’s next:  Any bonuses?  Oh, none!  Phew.  Unless those are coming faster too and just staggered differently, which would mean I gotta overcome my irrational pre-Homestuck-reading anxiety even MORE often.  :T

No Homestuck you don’t GET to ask how my-- ah, right.  :P

(FYI, HS^2 has been good to my emotions so far, quite a balm for the epilogues, so once I START reading I’m usually fine; but after being hurt so badly how could I possibly convince my lizard brain to trust it until it’s right in front of me?  Seriously, just hearing that the upd8 has landed messes me up a bit until I come fix it by reading w/ y’all here.)

Okay, so whose feelings?  As much as I’ve been waiting for Jade, I hope this isn’t about Jade.

> ==>

Ah fuck, we’re finally with the Pursuit Crew.  Bracing myself.  That means we get to see probably sleeping Jade ( :C ), full-swing DaveKat (approving nod), the first canon onscreen look at masculine-mode Roxy (<3), a probably pretty pissed off Kanaya (possibly either the feelings target, the one Saying How Are Your Feelings, or both), and uh... did they drag Callie along?  Or leave her back there with her meta freakout?  Probably left her back there, but... hm.

Let me turn up the brightness on this screen to sear these next pages into my retinas.  (Also, it feels odd to still be using a four-person “==>” for these, although if Jade is still asleep the numbers might fit on both ends... :c )

> ==>

I don’t think Dad is in the spacefaring business, so this is probably one of Jake’s shittier spaceship designs.

> ==>

...well that’s a touch disturbing.  Is that a Jade-occupied bed or are those just pillows?

Oh what the fresh fanfic’y heck is this command.

> i enter.

Okay that’s great.  I got a kick out of that.

JADE [in calliope red]: the prince’s power grows.

--but that’s not.  That explains the narrative command text, it’s alt!callie talking through a still conked-out Jade.  Please let her wake up between speak-throughs, please tell me you’ve learned that trick??  I already know you’re gonna pull an “oh she was asleep pretty much all of those THREE YEARS OF TRAVEL” thing on me and that’s hard fucking enough to deal with.

KARKAT: JESUS CHRIST!

He’s actually using the full curse correctly, huh?

...These commands.  Guess part of the puzzle is how much alt!Callie is being typically morbid and how much she might actually be wising up enough to get a kick out of this.

> the knight of blood falls.

DAVE: dude can you chill for like even a single fucking second DAVE: also are you ok

Has CallieJade chilled for even a single second this entire trip??  Is he asking just if Karkat’s okay or Jade too???

--yeah I’m overblowing things out of nervousness.  Just wait and see a bit, boots.

Alt!Callie has at least learned to be more of a smartass:

> karkat is characteristically appreciative of the alarm call.

Shirt trade Karkat, nice.  And uh, Jade’s dress sure is a... dress.  Hm.

(Did alt!Callie alchemize adjustments to did she just luck out to have a red-symbol’d Bec belt and accent leggings?  I’d prefer the former, because as much as it would be acceptable within Homestuck proper, using the transition between the epilogues and this new-author’d work to just HAPPEN to give her a fitting outfit without an excuse via providence is kind of lazy.)

KARKAT: OH, PARDON THE FUCK OUT OF ME FOR OVERREACTING A LITTLE WHEN MY GOOD FRIEND "POSSESSED JADE" BUSTS INTO MY RESPITEBLOCK AT 5 AM! KARKAT: NEXT TIME I’LL JUST PULL THE COVERS BACK AND LET HER CLIMB IN! JADE: i am uninterested in that scenario. KARKAT: GREAT! POSSESSED JADE ISN’T EVEN HORNY! HOW FUCKED UP IS THAT?

...please let that mean he’s not used to her being possessed all the time and she wakes up sometimes.  PLEASE.

DAVE: but im pretty sure i locked that door JADE: i unlocked it with my mind. DAVE: fuck KARKAT: FANTASTIC. JADE: the prince’s powers are growing, but so are mine.

Dave, I’m pretty sure regular-ass no-Green-Sun Space powers can flip a few lock tumblers too.  (--though, I guess from context this was a Jakeship technolock.  Confirmation on the ship’s bad taste in design.  --I think I’m foggily remembering it said in the Epilogues that they took one of Jake’s ships just like Dirk did, too... man, being depressed so much by the Epilogues sure took a lot out of my ability to recall them decently.)

KARKAT: LIKE YOU DON’T FLOAT AROUND LIKE A CREEPY PIECE OF SHIT ALL DAY AS IT IS?

God DAMN IT she’s been asleep and possessed the whole fucking time.

> sleep is abandoned, coffee sought.

More obligatory DaveKat being cute, somehow only emphasized by the embarrassing glowing-with-power observer who doesn’t really get any of it.

Ah, here we go:

> the rogue is also awake.

Oh huh.  Cool!

Hero outfit, understated...  her his choice of heart-shades color-coded to stand out from Dave more to avoid further mistaken identity cases.  Works well!  (Holy shit I only JUST remembered at the end to go back and correctly gender Roxy as him, that was close. I blame the epilogues for a lack of visual reinforcement; I shouldn’t have as much trouble soon enough.  Seriously, I don’t remember ANYTHING without visual reinforcement, I think that’s why I remember so much of Homestuck proper so clearly.)

KARKAT: OH SHIT, THERE SHE IS! I DIDN’T EVEN HEAR HER FOLLOW US! ROXY: sometimes a girls just got to get her drift on i guess ROXY: it be like that

ilu roxy.

I missed Roxy so much, you guys.  I need more of him remarking on all this crazy shit if I’m gonna stay sane though all this.  (And I need more of him and AWAKE JADE kicking ass independently or together if I’m going to continue to believe there’s justice in the world.)

> ==>

We rarely saw Rose drinking anything but the rare coffee in canon, but I think Kanaya would have gotten her plenty into tea, yes.  Or at the very least, wanting the aesthetic of drinking tea with Kanaya would have gotten Rose into tea even if it never crossed Kanaya’s mind to try the stuff.

ROXY: well i mean who knows what she drinks now ROXY: dirk probs tossed the coffee machine out the space window right away ROXY: dude doesnt "believe" in "substances" > the prince is contemplated for a moment in silence.

FUCK, Dirk can see the narrative all the way out here???  No wonder alt!Callie’s forced to have possession turned on 24/7.  That’s fucking disappointing.  How the hell are we going to get any proper Jade time with THAT hanging over our heads?  She’d only be able to do anything when Dirk’s knocked out, and maybe not even THEN!

I was virtually promised more of actual non-asleep Jade getting shit done in HS^2.  Now there’s an even longer wait on it than I expected.  This sucks.

(EDIT: BOY did I misread that link line. Thinking “is contemplated” meant is sitting contemplating, when it meant "is being contemplated by everyone here". That was dumb of me.)

*clicks that next link*

Oh my goodness, Roxy joined the Bird Hair Crew.  It makes him look like a fucking asshole but I kind of love it.

KARKAT: IS THERE MILK?

I can’t believe Karkat is okay with drinking milk.  --yes, culturally Trolls are more comfortable with animal excretions than we are, but you would’ve thought years of railing against Equius would have purged any tolerance the idea of milk from his psyche.

I guess Dave introduced him to cereal, and it was all over from there.

DAVE: this is more like a castle DAVE: a castle of idk DAVE: twenty something ennui

Sounds like a relatable mood.  Especially considering Dirk probably decided to conquer reality out of almost nothing but twenty-something ennui.

Alright.  You aren’t going to turn Kanaya into an alcoholic or anything on us are you?

> the knight of time seeks a sylph...

--this is the shittiest shipboard starship aesthetic.

> ...and finds her, momentarily.

WOW that looks fucking depressed.  :(

> ==>

...okay you know what?  Never mind.  That outfit has wrapped straight back around into Trying Too Hard and is now hilarious.

DAVE: you ever feel like our whole lives are eventually gonna end up like this DAVE: just blasting through space on a sweeps long journey to ""somewhere"" chasing after or running from some vague enemy thats sometimes a god modded pet dog and sometimes your dad DAVE: without the faintest fucking idea of whats going to happen when we get there DAVE: thats a little specific but you know what i mean

Why do you think the epilogues upset us so much?  We thought we’d won free of that bullshit.

> ==>

Oh jesus christ that’s the most depressingly sad I’ve ever seen Kanaya drawn.  :C

--Karkat got you to watch Serendipity?  That’s amazing, Dave.

KANAYA: You Arent Reminding Me Of Her As I Rarely Think Of Anything Else KANAYA: I Close My Eyes And I See Her KANAYA: I Keep Them Open And I See Her

Fuck.

Y’know how little showing these two in love and actually HAPPY together we’ve seen in this entire comic and its subworks?  Despite them having spent at least a few happy years together we only saw in tiny screenclips?  And how Candy alluded super hard that they most likely couldn’t get that in this real timeline where shit’s going down?

Seriously, FUCK.  You could at least pretend to give us some hope, here.

Oh no, don’t ask for the nursery story, Dave.  Unless it turns out to be a funny one or a Rose twist on an old story or something.  Which it probably is, I should stop worrying.

> ==>

KANAYA: Oh Its A Wriggler Story About A Young Prince And The Beloved Flower He Loved And Lost DAVE: flower DAVE: like a plant KANAYA: Its A Fairytale Dave DAVE: right KANAYA: A Singular Wild Rose He Failed To Cherish When He Had Her KANAYA: And His Journey Of Discovering What She Meant To Him All Along KANAYA: Culminating In A New Quest To Find Her And Win Her Back

Dirk you PIECE OF SHIT did you rewrite the narrative of the fucking STORIES SHE TOLD CHILDREN?!??  Does the fact that alt!Callie is only in the present mean he can rewrite ANY past event we didn’t literally SEE???  FUCK you.  Seriously fuck all of this.

Please tell me she was kidding just then, or realizes there’s fucking something wrong with what she’s saying and getting angry or.

(EDIT: shoutyourporpoise replied: "Hey, idk If you picked up on this, but the 'nursery story' Rose told to the wigglers is just The Little Prince, which is maybe a BIT early for them to read, but I don't think that's a case of Dirk changing the narrative; its just Rose being Too Adult as usual." Oh, damn, I didn't even CATCH that it was that story. That makes all of this a lot more forgivable, even if pretty unforgivably leaning into the fiction that Dirk used to brainwash and kidnap her. Maybe that's exactly why it worked -- fiction, a story so blazed into the public consciousness? Hm. Thanks, shoutyourporpoise.)

KANAYA: But In A Way I Feel As If It Is the Greater Universe Trying To Tell Me Something

Mother fuck I’m even going to have to see our protagonists warped by Dirk when they’re ostensibly FULLY SHIELDED aren’t I.  There’s only so much of that I would be able to take, you know.

KANAYA: It May Simply Stem From My Longing To See Her Again And How Much Is Indicative Of Something More Sinister KANAYA: She Is A Goddess Of Light And The Only Of Her Kind We Know Is Alive After All KANAYA: Maybe Shes Wrested Dominion Of The Entire Concept In All Its Appearances Within This Frame Of Reference

Hm.  Well, it being a product of Rose’s ascension instead of Dirk’s is possibly a more charitable take, with Ultimate Rose projecting the delusion enforced on her backward, visible to past Rose’s Sight when she isn’t paying attention and thus paving the way for Dirk to paradoxically exploit that “ideal” as something Lighty and Important and “Perfect”.  I still don’t fucking like it though.

> ==>

DAVE: sorry i know you say you got your badass monster powers but kanaya you look tired as hell DAVE: not that im tryna psyche you or whatever but youre waxing poetic in the dark which i guess is maybe on brand but still

Yyyep.

DAVE: unless terezi is lurking in the vents somewhere and now that i bring that up its actually not out of the question so im kind of gonna be thinking about that one for a while

Pffff.

DAVE: youre the only person i know whos still basically the same as when i met you

--Which is kind of going to have to change, right?  She’s got some other cosmic purpose ready to change her a little more than she changed pre-human-troll-meetup, you’d think.

> ==>

Cute as hell.

> ==>

KANAYA: How Are Your Feelings

There’s the title drop.  I’d think Dave’s doing pretty well, considering?  Still fucked over by Dirk betraying and tricking Rose away who he’s been close with all his life, but.

> ==>

DAVE: except sometimes your best friend disappears and your other best friend goes into a ghost coma and your third best friend fucks off to space with your dad DAVE: the dude youve spent the last 7 years convincing yourself isnt an egomaniacal anime villain DAVE: and who isnt actually lying in wait to completely decimate your life and your emotions and shit

Ah... yeah.  A little worse than my casual list, huh?  Forgot that Jade vanishing into a possession-coma for THREE FUCKING YEARS is going to be hard on people inside the comic too, fuck.

DAVE: maybe it was naive to think that a bunch of twenty something trauma victims could run a society

I was honestly surprised they TRIED to run society at all.  Jasp even just highlighted a big reason why not in the bonuses.

DAVE: cool how earth c existed for centuries then we show up and manage to ruin society in seven fucking years

:(

Well, the trolls got THEIR lesson on why they didn’t deserve to rule over their new universe like gods; I guess some of y’all needed that lesson too?

DAVE: every serious conversation i have inevitably falls apart into riffing on a casual acquaintances ass

True.

Dammit, Dave didn’t feel like he could just be Some Guy even on Earth C.  :(

> ==>

...don’t think I’ve forgotten that nursery story, though.  I don’t want to think that it was something that ACTUALLY past happened, especially not without manipulation.  Like maybe past Rose was foreseeing the false purpose that Dirk wrote for her or the like, a cooperative misunderstanding between the two instead of Dirk or Rose literally reaching back in time.

> meanwhile...

KARKAT: WAIT, WHY THE FUCK AM I EVEN ASKING? HE’S OBVIOUSLY NOT FINE. KARKAT: ARE ANY OF US? ARE YOU? ROXY: not rly KARKAT: EXACTLY.

:(

--Oh right.  I remember that Callie and Roxy were going reasonably steady in Meat even though it was only alluded to, she didn’t freak out and stay awol or what have you.  That’s good to remember.  But it means Roxy deliberately left her behind to go on this dangerous quest, for years.  :C

KARKAT: KANAYA BARELY EVEN TALKS, CALLIOPE WON’T LEAVE THEIR CABIN, JADE JUST FLOATS AROUND LIKE A CREEPY BALLOON THAT’S MOSTLY MADE OF HAIR.

Oh, SHIT.  I should have read one line further.  They DID bring her.  Alt!Callie being here too must really FUCK with her.  ...maybe she can actually learn to accept that alternate way her life might’ve played out, though?

KARKAT: THE REALLY FUCKED UP THING IS I MIGHT BE THE MOST OKAY OUT OF ALL OF US, WHICH IS HOW YOU KNOW SHIT HAS REALLY GONE GLOBES UP.

Quite true.

ROXY: ur kinda an intense dude anybody ever tell u that KARKAT: NO.

Pff.

> ==>

KARKAT: AGAINST PRETTY MUCH ALL ODDS, AND DESPITE ME NOT DESERVING ANY OF IT, I ENDED UP GETTING PRETTY MUCH EVERYTHING I WANTED. KARKAT: OVER AND OVER AGAIN. KARKAT: SOMETIMES IT ALMOST FEELS LIKE WHATEVER SLATHERING MONSTROSITY OF A COSMIC HELLBEAST THAT PUT ALL THIS SHIT INTO MOTION...ACTUALLY LIKES ME?

Well, if you want to blame Lord English for instance... we never saw Caliborn and Karkat interact much, but the parallels between the two were drawn so severely that Caliborn was basically the idealized, multiverse-threatening Ultimate Kismesis that he’d always dreamed of.  And operated against him without him even ever quite realizing it.

If a level of “respect” went from Caliborn to Karkat, too, from his Lord-Englishy vision nigh-omnipresent, then this outcome isn’t very surprising at all.

> ==>

(I don’t quite feel I get why Roxy shifted to this exasperated-Dave expression, but I get logically that he’d been waiting for Karkat to make a breakfast choice... Homestuck proper rarely pulled a “last line said corresponds to next-panel’s expression” without either leaving the conversation blank or having the NEXT lines of the conversation reinforce it, to prevent this inelegant misunderstanding.  Andrew was really damned talented in getting his point across visually, in that regard.  Just like, that careful visual intent delivery.)

Alright, I guess that’s it for this short upd8!  Meeting the pursuit crew was both more and less difficult than I expected.  Hopefully I get desensitized a bit as the characters continue to feel semi-almost-sorta-fine.

I have NO idea how this group is gonna work as a proper crew when we get to whatever weird other-players’ session this shit is going down in, though.

[tomiyeee]

finished the story quests for bl3 (but barely any of the side missions yet) and i got...Opinions(tm)

(sorry if this doesn’t cut on mobile! also if you want to hide spoilers i’m tagging all my bl3 posts as “bl3 spoilers” so ny’all can blacklist it)

in no particular order:

i honestly wanted to give gearbox some slack and try my best to like this game bc i know people had probably unfairly high expectations for this game given all the build up, but they really just kept letting me down in everything but the graphics

said this before but overall, the characters are all Quite lackluster

^^ tyreen and troy included. adding the word "bitch" to every sentence does not automatically make it funnier

that being said, i super love their backstory + relationship with typhon/nekofeyo-whatever

the character designs are equally boring. moxxi was the only one who got a real improvement imo. lilith and maya are okay. rhys...i dont think i have to explain. lia...i dislike her hair; the black felt like it balanced out her design better and the white streak was interesting and cool but full white just looks bad tbh. zer0 feels less sleek and more bulky which doesnt fit him much. tina lost her pretty color palette and cute outfit. where are all the bright pretty color palettes in general???? there are other colors besides brown and black???? use them?????

ending of pre-sequel: “you will need all the vault hunters you can get” me: “ooh does that mean all the vh’s from previous games are back? i can’t wait to see everyone meet each other! :D” bl3: only nine of them come back, 3 of them die, the rest are involved in maybe one mission at most

boss fights. super. boring. and tedious. i mean this could be partly because i was playing on ps4 which made it extra not fun but if the only reason the fight is difficult is because they have a lot of health...it's not fun or challenging. i want fights like handsome jack with interesting mechanics. i want fights like angel with emotional impact. i want fights like the pre-sequel final boss that i forgot the name of with variation that isnt just "now they have an attack that shines bright lights in ur eyes, covers the whole arena, and can knock you down in one hit im looking at you traunt and killavolt". tyreens fight was the only one that i somewhat enjoyed because of this. all the others were just like "ughhhh again?"

im really enjoying melee amara playstyle. taking out badass enemies in four hits is my jam. this is just my fallout 4 playthrough all over again babey heck yea

typhon just wanted to be a good dad!!! he called tyreen starlight which is adorable!!! he did the best he could and tyreen hated him for it!!! i don’t blame either of them for that tbh, it makes sense from both their perspectives. tyreen definitely should have been more understanding, but she’s a dick so :/ (not saying this is a writing flaw, just a character flaw)

hammerlock needs higher standards in men but i really appreciate the undeniably in-your-face "fuck you" to all gamer dudes

i really. hate. how little the player character seems to matter in the story. in pre-sequel the vh's all had unique dialogue AND npcs would respond, sometimes even with character-specific lines. even when it was the same across vh's, it still felt like the npcs were interacting and speaking directly to them. the player character felt like a character of their own, rather than just a vessel for the player to do quests and kill enemies with or an errand runner for the important characters. i thought that was the direction they were going in with bl3 too but this just feels like bl2 only worse. there’s a separation again between you and the story and it feels like you’re just watching things happen. now ur not just a silent protagonist, but instead your a speaking protagonist who gets completely ignored. whats the point of including unique dialogue if it's not even acknowledged beyond an "uh-huh, moving on"?

sometimes the logic just feels kinda dumb. the twins killed/disabled maya and lilith in a heartbeat, they can literally disintegrate the most powerful beings in the universe, but the vault hunters? absolutely not. they must fight them for 40 minutes and then die.

after the fight with troy, no one even touched tyreen. there's no way they could have thought "yup she's definitely dead, no need to shoot her in the head or anything just to make sure. we didn't do anything to even hurt her, we just assumed." turns out she's 100% alive and gets up to start the apocalypse. who'da thunk! i know they wanted the end to seem more dramatic but it just seems stupid that they could have stopped tyreen like 5 missions earlier had they even the slightest bit of common sense.

lilith was one of the biggest threats to tyreen and troy's whole plan. of course they should leave her alive and simply steal her powers. let's kill the monk siren instead.

i know they didn't include this to give all players a fair experience instead of favoring sirens, but it kinda sucks playing a siren character and it's just completely ignored outside of ur action skill. tyreen and troy are sapping siren powers left and right, but they choose to leave you with yours. when you enter the eridian place with typhon tannis starts glowing because it has "something to do with sirens". what about the one standing right next to her? this applies to bl2 as well...jack i would willingly charge ur vault key for u pls why do u take lilith instead :'(

oh yeah speaking of tannis! i LOVE that she got angels powers. for some reason it just makes me really happy. maybe it's bc i think it's sweet that part of angel survived. maybe it's because it makes for cool fanart. maybe it's just cool. idk. also like that we got a solid explanation of what angel's powers were (influence over technology). i always thought her having control over it in bl2 might've been cuz it was hyperion tech and she had access to it same as she had access to the satellite from bl1. it wasn't super clear since it seemed like she could also materialize things like the ammo during her fight.

that also reminds me: all the dramatic reveals in this game felt kinda badly done.

the very first one with zer0/katagawa. like the whole time i was walking around looking for him i was trying to think why he might've turned/something must have happened to him or rhys. everyone was saying it was undeniably zer0. i finally meet him and take one look at his bright ass maliwan armor and its like. really. you couldnt have made it anymore obvious that thats not zer0. and then his helmet gets knocked off and surprise! it's not him. i totally didnt already figure that out with one glance 10 seconds ago. (maybe even earlier when you got glimpses of him around the building but i always missed it cuz i was looking at the fish tanks n shit)

also the tannis reveal. she was speaking to me in the same way that only known siren characters could. weird unexplained things were happening and seemed to be related to tannis. i wonder if she's a siren? surprise! she's a siren.

tyreen and troy knew about the great vault through some unknown means. typhon was talking about having a son and a daughter who he told stories about the great vault. typhon calls tyreen his daughter a while later and lilith acts surprised like honey ur a little slow, i figured that out several lines ago.

basically i'm not saying they were so obvious that i knew from the beginning of the game; i only figured them out a little before they were outright stated. but it was enough that it kinda ruined the effect and the characters acting surprised only when it was blatantly spelled out for them just made it annoying.

i feel like most of this is pretty negative, but i don’t mean that i hate the game and was miserable playing it. it was honestly okay...like i said i wanted to like it, but gearbox hates me specifically and killed/ruined all my faves just to spite me sooo...*waves hand back and forth in a sort of “ehhh” gesture*. i think my opinion on bl games from most to least fav would be: tftbl, bltps, bl2, bl3, and bl1. so it’s not the worst, but deeefinitely not one of my faves. i mean jack’s not in it (or if he is he doesn’t have a big role) so it’s already at a huge disadvantage. the ending was ok, it was all dramatic n stuff and it kinda makes sense i guess, but it was just about as okay as the rest of the game really. i don’t hate it but it’s not great either yknow?

[comicteaparty]

February 17th-February 23rd, 2020 CTP Archive

The archive for the Comic Tea Party week long chat that occurred from February 17th, 2020 to February 23rd, 2020.  The chat focused on Crossed Wires by Iris Jay.

Featured Comment:

Chat:

Comic Tea Party

BOOK CLUB START!

Hello and welcome everyone to Comic Tea Party’s Week Long Book Club~! This week we’ll be focusing on Crossed Wires by Iris Jay~! (http://crossedwires.irisjay.net/)

You are free to read and comment about the comic all week at your own pace until February 23rd, so stop on by whenever it suits your schedule! Discussions are freeform, but we do offer discussion prompts in the pins for those who’d like to have them. Additionally, remember that while constructive criticism is allowed, our focus is to have fun and appreciate the comic!

Whether you finish the comic or can only read a few pages, everyone is welcome to join and chat with us!

DISCUSSION PROMPTS – PART 1

1. What did you like about the beginning of the comic?

2. What has been your favorite moment in the comic (so far)?

3. Who is your favorite character?

4. Which characters do like seeing interact the most?

5. What is something you like about the art? If you have a favorite illustration, please share it!

6. What is a theme you like that the comic explores?

7. What do you like about the comic’s story or overall related content?

8. Overall, what do you think the comic’s strengths are?

Don’t feel inspired by the prompts? Feel free to discuss anything else that interested you!

Alex_makes_comics

Just started on this comic. It's highly addictive. The art is super expressive ( I am always really jealous of people who can use dot shading effectively), and the story is fast paced. It keeps you turning pages. I did not see the twist of the vr helmet coming at all and I love that. I love thinking I am reading one thing and then finding out I am reading something else. It suddenly made the character design choice of having a dragon samurai as the MC so much more understandable. This choice was fun to begin with, but it so much more perfect when you realise it's an avatar. I'm only on page 25 and I have to get back to work,so it's early days yet for a favourite character. So far, I'm just annoyed at all the characters for talking in class

snuffysam (Super Galaxy Knights)

I made it through the comic, and it was a really fun read! I like how the mechanics of the universe embellish the concept of hacking without... making it "unrealistic"? Like, I often see hacking portrayed in media as just typing gibberish code and saying "i'm in", which is generally pretty silly. What Crossed Wires does is turns hacking into essentially real-world heists, where you need disguises and acting and people watching your back. Sword fights aside, that's actually way closer to how hacking actually works (like, it's easier to get someone to tell you their password than to crack the password database). My absolute favorite example of this is the ending of Chapter 02 (which is also my favorite scene of the comic). Michael has been built up as this absolute dirtbag, and the number of creeps he somehow has following him has made him nigh-unbeatable. I'm not going to spoil exactly how the gang gets to him in the end, but watching him get beaten down was one of the most satisfying things I've ever seen in a comic.

RebelVampire

I agree that story wise, the way it handles hacking is really unique. Which tbf to TV, real hacking is generally actually very boring. And as @snuffysam (Super Galaxy Knights) says, there's actually easier ways like just getting someone to tell you their password that are way easier. In real life, even, the first thing companies who are hired to test another company's security do is just show up in person and try to trick their way past people. People are really the worst enemy of all security. But anyway, even though it's a bit weird, I definitely think turning hacking into this real life VR experience is unique while capturing the real life flaws that humans create for security ventures. I also like that the beginning really just starts right up with this premise without taking like 20 pages to exposition. Just gotta accept a fighting dragon, which works really well in this case.(edited)

My favorite moment in the comic so far is actually probably the one morning chat between Cass and VRRMN where they have a serious talk about their relationship and the future. I actually like that their relationship is built on the point that sorry isn't enough, and that while you can see VRRMN's sincerity, you can also justifiably see why Cass isn't going to forgive so easily. And it was just a very real and heart breaking scene since no matter the direction,, nobody was going to be happy. Which tbf, I also like this scene because Cass is my favorite character. I like that Cass is a smidgen more down to earth than some of the other characters so far, and I really like this dilemma where Cass wants to leave hacking, but keeps coming back. Plus Cass is cool and badass, so there's that too.

Ironically, though, I think I like seeing Cass and Alan interact the most. I like this kind of...brother sister relationship they have going on where Cass just wants to protect Alan who is way too eager to get over his head. So all their interactions are super cute

But lets chat about art for a second. I really like that the art style in this is like this interesting mix between modern and cyberpunk. When it comes to stories where you have VR or similar involved, there's a lot of directions to go. Some just use the same art style throughout, some drastically change it, etc. It all depends on what is being sold to the reader in terms of setting. What I like about the art, though, is that despite it really doesn't change much, I'm sold on both the modern real world and the cyberpunk sort of feel I get from the world of the hackers. I always feel like both aspects are unique and have a lot of character, which I don't find in a lot of other similar comics

Iris Jay

Iris Jay here, author of Crossed Wires! Thanks for the rad comments so far, it means a lot that y'all are reading my weird queer hacker comic. <3

And I'm glad you dig the worldbuilding!! XW originally started as a Hackers fan comic, and I wanted to capture the same general feeling of it-- a cyberpunk story that wasn't happening in some neon-lit future, but now, the present, albeit with slightly better graphics capabilities. (Of course, with VR technology rapidly catching up, it's probably going to be historical fiction by the time I'm done with the series, buuuuut what're ya gonna do...)

Cass gets a LOT of cool stuff coming up very soon in the comic. I'm super excited to show y'all where the story goes next!

snuffysam (Super Galaxy Knights)

Oh, one other thing I love - I really like how both of the main protagonists are trans. Like I really think it adds some interesting parallels and theming to the story - these are both characters who felt rejected by the world, they went into VR for escapism and for avatars that portrayed who they really were. And I'm interested to see how the theme of a person's VR avatar being very closely tied to their identity is explored further in this chapter (I'm guessing it will be, particularly with regards to Cass).

sagaholmgaard

Im only about 30 pages in but I dig the style difference between the digital world and the dots for shading, and the real world with the greyscale shading. It's really cool. And the use of big areas that are colored black!! Love that kinda stuff, want to get better at using that myself!

Comic Tea Party

DISCUSSION PROMPTS – PART 2

9. What exactly is the Amphisbaena Project and how does it work in a way that it physically affects a person? What is the goal of the people who revived it, and who revived the project in the first place?

10. Do you think Cass will ever forgive Vrrmn/Theresa for the events that happened between them in the past? Can their relationship be repaired, and how will their soured relationship affect their separate relationships with Alan?

11. Do you personally believe in the hackers’ mission in exposing wrongdoing despite it being illegal? In general, what do you think the story has to teach us about standing up for both ourselves and for society?

12. Overall, how do you think the events of the story will change Alan, his relationships with others, and his pursuits of hacking? How will the other characters change and grow as people over the course of their adventures?

Don’t feel inspired by the prompts? Feel free to discuss anything else that interested you!

RebelVampire

I feel like the Amphisbaena Project maybe started as like an anti-hacker measure. Since it's not like hackers are doing legal things, so it walks that ethical grey line of what is and isn't ok to do to law breakers. Like, if someone is invading your home, is it fine to shoot them. But now I think the people who revived it (which I have no guesses as to who yet), are using it to eliminate business rivals. Cause that sounds like something a corporation would do. As for how it works, I think it's just a simple matter of information overload to the brain, just on like...a brain-breaking level. Which this leads me into the moral quandry of, do I believe in the hackers mission. The short answer is no, because personally speaking I don't believe breaking the law is good in most cases, and often wrongdoing taints the results. However, I also emotionally understand why people would do this. The characters have made their personal mission sort of clear, and that makes me empathize with their plight. So all in all, I feel the story teaches us that standing up for yourself and society isn't easy. Whether it's an emotional or physical hardship, there are sacrifices and sometimes, you just gotta be ok with that.

Let me move onto character growth. I don't feel Cass will ever forgive Vrrmn, but I do think Cass will move past it to the level of being cordial. And I think Alan will be a big part of that, since both seem nice enough to not want to put Alan in the middle of their personal issues. So while the relationship will never be what it was, they'll probably be able to say How are you without Cass sneering. XD As for Alan, I kind of feel that the story will teach Alan more humility. We've already seen quite a bit of this, but I think his overwhelming confidence could still be more tempered as the story goes on. Not just because Alan will face strong people, but with more experience comes more wisdom. So at the end, Alan will be able to recognize that those boasted skills in the past weren't so great. As for other characters, I feel like I need to know them more before I can say.

Comic Tea Party

DISCUSSION PROMPTS – PART 3

13. What are you most looking forward to seeing in regards to the comic?

14. Any final words of encouragement for the comic?

Don’t feel inspired by the prompts? Feel free to discuss anything else that interested you!

RebelVampire

What I'm most looking forward to in the comic is probably just seeing more of Cass. I'm interested to see where Cass goes both emotional and physically as the hacking world begins to change somewhat do to the events of the story. Overall, this is a stylistically interesting comic that covers a lot of ground with lots of interesting visuals that complement the story well.

Comic Tea Party

BOOK CLUB END!

Thank you everyone so much for reading and chatting about Crossed Wires this week! Please also give a special thank you to Iris Jay for volunteering the comic and creating it! If you liked Crossed Wires, make sure to continue to support it via some of the links below!

Read and Comment: http://crossedwires.irisjay.net/

Iris’ Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/irisjay

Iris’ Shop: https://shop.itsnero.com/

Iris’ Twitter: https://twitter.com/irisjaycomics

[twin-heroes]

modern au where the lotus pier is a well known bakery !!

• madame yu is the head baker/manager. she rules with an iron fist and is slightly intimidating, but she is known for never skimping on quality. if you want something done perfect, madame yu will make sure it is going to be even more than perfect. the desserts at the lotus pier may be a little pricey, but they are definitely worth it. there motto isn’t “attempt the impossible” for nothing.

• jiang yanli and wei wuxian both work in the kitchen!

• jyl is a great baker and super talented with decorating. she’s very creative when it comes to designing the desserts. they end up so beautiful and elegant that you almost don’t want to eat it because it would be ruining the masterpiece. she would tell you otherwise and is actually very excited when people eat her desserts. she is truly madame yu’s pride and joy.

• wwx on the other hand is a little more abstract, especially when it comes to flavors. he’s very experimental which often has madame yu yelling at him, but his unique ideas made the lotus pier stand out. jiang cheng is usually his taste dummy.

• “chocolate and habanero peppers? who the fuck is gonna eat spicy choc— mMPH HEY BASTARD DONT SHOVE THINGS IN PEOPLE’S MOU— wait what the fuck why does this taste good?” “just believe in me bro.”

• “oh! a-xian, did you add hibiscus in the frosting? it tastes really good and the color is gorgeous!”

• jyl and wwx are always helping each other out and bouncing ideas too! “a-xian, what should i use to make structure this?” “how about rice krispie treats? btw shijie! what could go with the hibiscus frosting?” “oh, good idea! hm, i think a lemon cake might suit it well!” “that works! shijie always has the best ideas.”

• jiang cheng and jiang fengmian are both at the front. jfm is usually at the register while jc is the one preparing drinks and is occasionally at the register as well! (i imagine more people work there too).

• jc’s biggest pet peeve is picky customers. he has to really restrain himself from throwing a cup at them. jfm usually has to pat his shoulder to calm him down. “you’re almost there a-cheng, it’ll be ok.”

• in the afternoon, jin zixuan walks in with his gucci sunglasses on while a group of tiny elementary school kids follow behind him.

• “why is the peacock wearing sunglasses? it’s raining outside.” “shut up. that’s what rich people do. did you see his umbrella though? michael fuckin’ kors.”

• jin ling has decided that the best place to hang out after school with his friends is at his mom’s bakery. so jzx picks up jin ling, sizhui, jingyi, and zizhen from school, drops them off at the bakery, and then goes back to work.

• but before going back to work, he always orders a coffee and bitches about his day with jc.

• “a-yao is a little too good at convincing people and frankly im sacred.” “yeah? at least you don’t have wei wuxian as a co-worker.”

• the kids all love the bakery tbh. especially the lan boys since they rarely get to eat sweet things. jyl will always lovingly prepare something for the kids to snack on while they hang out and do homework. it tends to earn her some gentle nagging from madame yu.

• “a-li! at this rate you’re going to spoil the kids rotten.” she says, but she always ends up sneaking the kids a few cookies here and there.

• the kids are particularly attached to uncle wei, especially little lan yuan. he always sits down with them and listens to them talk about their day at school up until madame yu or jc yells at him to get back to work.

• after an hour or so, the kids, minus jin ling get picked up.

• zizhen’s dad constantly picks him up, but it varies with the lan kids.

• if it’s lan qiren, then they have to hide all evidence of snacking on sweets (poor jingyi seems to always get caught and sizhui ends up turning himself in bc he doesn’t want jingyi to be the only one getting in trouble).

• but if it’s lan xichen or lan wangji, then they are safe. every time lxc comes in, he always makes sure to tell wwx that lwj says hi (lwj never told his brother to do that btw) LOL.

• if it’s lwj that comes, well, wwx is constantly shamelessly flirting and everyone seems to know that the two are in love with each other, except wwx and lwj. even madame yu has to let out a groan in frustration. eVEN THE KIDS CAN SEE IT.

• “lan yuan, why doesn’t your dad just say he likes uncle wei.” “um...father...is a man of a few words...”

• wen ning probably got recruited by wwx to work there too at some point.

• maybe 3zuns also hang out there from time to time. nie mingjue is actually a big fan of dainty little sweets.

THIS IS WHAT I HAVE FOR NOW

[uniformbravo]

a bunch of winter 2020 anime first impressions from Me

Koisuru Asteroid / Asteroid In Love

ok ive already professed my love for this one so i wont get too much into it but basically it’s Extremely cute & im way invested in the two (HOPEFULLY romantic) leads bc their relationship is so sweet so far aaaaaaa

like do u SEE this shit im actually tearing up hgnfhrognfghdjfnjg

this show is Pretty and Cute and Space-Themed and Probably Gay what more do u Need. i love it 10/10

Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken!

so fucken good, this is the one i was most excited for based purely on the art style/animation and god did it deliver, everything is such a treat to look at i fuckin LOVE a setting w/ just as much personality as the characters

and My Goodness the Characters, 3 distinct girls w/ strong designs & personalities that aren’t like super moe/catered to cishet dudes heLLO

we Love a gremlin protag & her chaotic neutral best friend & the “fuck you dad i want to make anime” dreamer they meet........

also HELL YEAH it’s about making anime and they don’t even use that as a gimmicky set piece, the art is a huge part of the story and the detail with which it’s explored in the first ep gives me high hopes for the rest of the show aaaaa so excited to see where this one goes after that BANGER of a first episode

Jibaku Shounen Hanako-kun

switching gears to a less great one lol..... so the thing is this show’s visual aesthetic absolutely fucking slaps in a way that’s so rare to see in a sea of samey anime art styles, like the character designs are unique and everything is so damn colorful, the backgrounds alone blow me away w/ how fuckin Pretty they are??? LOOK at this shit

and just. this show has a lot of stylistic flourishes that make it like 100/100 Certified Good-To-Look-At Anime

which makes every other aspect of the show that much more disappointing lmaoooo like ok i can deal w/ a mediocre story if the visuals slap, which they Do, but also these characters look 10 & we’re doing the whole sexualizing minors thing which fucking BLOWS it’s so uncomfortable to watch........... i feel like it’s one of those things where they’re trying to justify it by being like “o well hanako’s like a thousand year old spirit or whatever so he’s not REALLY underage” but fuckin. fuck off he looks and sounds like a Young Boy yall know what ur doing ugh

it’s not a thing that happens Constantly throughout the episode, really just a few moments here and there, but it is in the op pretty prominently so i feel like it’s gonna be a Thing that keeps happening so idk if i’ll stick w/ this one in particular which is a Damn Shame bc it really is such a gorgeous looking show im mad

number24

ok ngl just from the character designs alone i rly didn’t think this one was gonna make as good a first impression as it did??? i guess the huge ensemble cast of pretty boys reminded me of last season’s actors: songs connection, which uh. was Not great,

so i went into it totally expecting it to be all shitty but it rly surprised me, i found it so intriguing? the characters are actually really endearing so far...... i love how it doesn’t try to shove the entire cast in our faces in the v first ep but instead starts out w/ a small handful and lets us spend a lil time w/ them while only giving assorted Hints and passing impressions of the others, that was nice

also love how very not “generic sports anime” it is right off the bat by dropping us right into the middle of these characters’ story instead of doing the whole “bright-eyed first year joins the team and fights his way to the top” sorta deal- which you’d think would be a confusing and awkwardly paced approach but in this case is handled surprisingly well, especially because it seems like it’s gonna have a lot more elements of a character drama than a straight up classic sports anime (which i am Super here for)

(there is a lot of rugby in the op though so we’ll see how things go, it’s only been 1 ep after all)

the air drop into the characters’ established lives makes introductions a lot more organic as well; since the characters are already familiar with each other we don’t have to sit around watching everyone introduce themselves to the protag, we get to infer their relationships and general opinions of each other through their various interactions & it’s a thousand times more engaging imo!!

i mean we do have this other first year joining as a manager and our protag did deliberately say he learned everyone’s names/info after deciding to become a manager so im sure we’ll be getting those character introductions anyway, but well. we’ll cross that bridge if/when we come to it

also i believe this takes place in college rather than high school?? i couldn’t pay attention to every detail but i definitely got that kind of vibe in which case Hell Yeah another welcome deviation from the norm babeeyyyy (i just checked and it Is college yeehaw)

basically what im saying is im tired of tropes & number24 just no clipped past the first 25 chapters of the sports anime formula and also it’s set in university AND it seems to be character-driven & im living thanks thank u

Pet

ok ill be honest i completely forgot that i watched this one lmaooo (which should give u a hint as to what i thought of it *thinking emoji*)

the art style’s whatever and the animation’s whatever, nothing special there. the show is like, dark?? more stupid than dark idk it feels a little bit “welcome to my twisted mind” but the twist is homophobia w/ a mild side of ableism, and also an entire episode of suspense wondering if im gonna have to watch this black side character die (he doesn’t, so there’s that at least)

honestly i cant even remember what drew me to this show enough to put it in my plan to watch, i guess the premise sounded interesting enough (something about controlling minds and erasing memories?), but mature psychological shows usually aren’t really my scene, especially when they’re executed.... Like That. i did kind of enjoy the twist at the end, mildly, though i feel like it was pretty obvious in hindsight and the only reason i didn’t see it coming is bc i can be astoundingly shortsighted when it comes to things like that (aka im DUMB)

since it took until the very end of the episode to Really introduce our dynamic duo tho, i feel like this ep was more of a prologue than anything and the Real show is gonna begin in ep 2, which is great n all but uh. idk if i care enough to give that a watch tbhhhh. i might just to see what the show has to offer but really truly honestly cant see myself sticking this one thru to the end lmao rip

--

hate to end on a bummer note like that but hey that’s all i got for this post ! i have more shit to watch so i’ll probably end up making like a part 2 w/ more impressions but this is getting long enough that it’s becoming kind of a pain to keep adding more so thats it for now boiyoeiyeoii

[koolkvat-blog]

       hello  loves  ,   what’s  up  !   i’m  super  excited  to  be  here  &  to  finally  play  my  precious girl  ,   jade aka kool kat   .   i’m  LOLA  ,   use  she / her prounouns  ,   i am NINETEEN  ,   &   i  am  currently  in  the  gmt + 1 timezone  which  means  yes  ,  my  ass should’ve  been  awake  for  intro  posting  but  i  don’t  know  what  time  management  is  and  ended  up  swamped  w/  work  ,  so  !   everything   you  need  to  know  about  about  miss  kat  is  under  the  cut  ,   &  i’m  rlly  thrilled  to  be  apart  of  such  a  wonderful  rp ��with  such  gorgeous  muses  .  corniness over  ––   if  you’re  looking  to  plot  sumn  out  ,   just  hit  that   ♥︎    &   i’ll  make  my  way  on  over  to  ur  dms  ,  or  feel  free  to  add  me  up   on  discord  which  i’ll  give  in im’s  if  anybody’s  interested  !   ♡♡♡         tw  :   family issues  ,  body image issues  &  drug mention  ( not  explicit ) . 

001 . SYNOPSIS  . FULL     NAME  .      jade        kikuchi . NICKNAMES  .      kool kat    . AGE  .      twenty - one . DATE     OF     BIRTH  .      twenty  -  seventh     of     september   ,     1993      /     libra . PLACE     OF     BIRTH  .      harajuku ,   tokyo ,     japan .         GENDER  .       cisgender     female . SEXUALITY  .     (  closeted  )  pansexual  . NATIONALITY  .      japanese  ,  now  american  too  after  successfully  gaining  citizenship  . ETHNICITY  .      asian  . OCCUPATION  .       fashion designer at katz designz      ,     former  fashion  design  and  journalist  student  back  in  her  original  timeline  . PLAYLIST  .      here  !  (  +  )     charismatic , enthusiastic , warm , energetic , adventurous , compassionate , animated . (  -  )     deceptive ,  independent ,  emotional , territorial , ambitious , impulsive , temperamental , insecure , sarcastic .  

002 . AESTHETIC  .      wheatgrass  smoothies , 90′s  anime  with  subtitles  , chanel  no. 5, speeding  on  a  desert  road  with  the  windows  down ,  painting  your  toenails  on  the  dashboard ,  neon  prints ,  cat  lazing  on  a  balcony  in  the  sun , black  lace ,  japanese  horror  films  ,  sour  cocktails  with  sugar  around  the  rim , half - smoked  cigarettes ,  stacks  of  fashion  magazines , long  hair  hastily  dyed  different  colours in  a  motel  bathroom ,  thrift  stores   .

003. INFORMATION  .

tl;dr : a flighty, inattentive adventurer: a follower of whims; personable and sociable but lacks the skills to maintain relationships because she’s entirely (and perhaps too) career focused, checks her horoscope daily and entirely relies on the stars when concerning relationships, epitome of a britney spears / gwen stefani stan back in the 2000′s, still owns a (bedazzled) flip phone, collector of vintage fashion (chanel, elle, juicy couture etc.) a subscriber to the Leonardo Da Vinci sleeping method; catch her at 2 am making soufflés or buying plane tickets to shiwei so she can really experience the culture: will tell you she loves you ten minutes after first introduction because she’s high: kind of unintentionally insensitive to those she doesn’t know and closed off but in like a cool, lovable way. 

•    heads up im running on like 5 hrs sleep so sry when this inevitably derails ! ok sweet let’s get into this . 

•    so as aforementioned this is jade kukichi, aka, kool kat. she was dubbed that by her friends due to her unique fashion style and sense of dress, and it’s stuck. lbr nobody other than her friends can use that term so if you do, she’s just going to stare at u for a quick sec before saying ‘it’s jade’. 

•    born in harajuku, tokyo to a cardiothoracic surgeon of a father and a politician of a mother, jade grew up traveling the world and becoming flighty af, never thinking she was going to make long - term friends and kinda being okay with that. 

•    her family has never stayed in one place for very long, though her aging parents eventually settled into a permanent residence in the us around the time she turned sixteen, not soon enough for jade to break the habit of wandering, but thankfully quick enough for her to meet the bratz girls who were just as adventurous and fun - loving as she. she's spent much of her teen life jumping from place to place wherever her interests are that moment, collecting people along the way, but to find friends was the only thing she was missing. jade has a brilliant mind, but she lacks patience and follow through. she needs guidance or she'll jump from idea to idea, job to job, whim to whim.

•    ngl, jade pretty much hated her home life. her parents were an overbearing presence in her life, her mother wanting jade to be a proper lady who also went into a profession like theirs (entirely serious and stifling when it came to creativity, doctor, politician, lawyer etc.) while jade herself wanted to check out the latest trends and go to the mall w her friends – so she turned all of her focus and energy into getting good grades in everything she wanted to do in the hopes that she could be the most successful fashion designer, then leaving town forever. 

•    like she spent 7 yrs in high school graduating w honours but she barely knew what was happening in 9/10 of her classes and sometimes she just slept through classes and then wing her exams which she miraculously did well at. it was just not a good idea to send jade to a public school at 11 after being in boarding school for the rest of her life and then never really enforce any rules :~\ she has trouble with that kind of thing.. as in making logical choices instead of saying "YEAH lets go watch american psycho and smoke weed!" skipping chemistry to do just that 

•    she loves fun and values doing what makes her happy over most things. it's hard to pin her down and she spends most of her life chasing after ideas that don't really follow any sort of conscious order, bc she’s really got that ‘i’ve got dreams and i’m gonna do everything in my power to achieve them’ personality. 

•    according to bratz canon she’s worked as literally everything ? she’s one of those insufferable people who r just. good everything ig and that’s just how it is on this bitch of an earth. jade’s been a photographer, a song - writer and bass player in a rock band (shout out to bratz rock angelz the best movie w the best soundtrack ever), a student studying fashion design, a fashion columnist, a quickly fired nanny, and many other things in between. 

•    so when she appears in toonsville she’s kind of out of it that she’s not doing something w her skills and sets up her own business which she loves ? being her own boss suits her fine (for now) because she’s got a Real Job and she's actually trying rly hard so she can fulfill her dreams !! like suck it mom nd dad haha !!!

•    jade has a lot of weird feelings TM about her body and her looks and struggles a lot with her self confidence :~( she had a shit time at school with boys saying she was too thin and she compensated by acting like she didn't like anyone at all for a while and now she thinks she isn't good enough for anyone when rly she is a cinnamon bun too good for this world too pure 

•    best friend ever she is so good at being a friend if u text her at 3am to go out or cry on her shoulder shes ready to go at 3:15 even if she was sleeping w lots of snacks and treats and love!!! she is sooo extroverted around those she’s comfortable w, she gains so much energy from being around people and she loves being nice and being around ppl she likes 

•    she becomes the mom of groups pretty easily (hence why she’s the leader of the bratz) bc she bottles up most of her own problems to help ppl with theirs!! which is toxic yea but she puts people first always so !! plz help her poor repressed soul!! rip kool kat.. 

•    still super into the stuff of her time so like.. she loves the x files and bad reality tv shows (i want to be a hilton) and reads gossip magazines on the reg because she enjoys that stuff! also very into girl groups.. ginger spice / posh spice is an eternal mood.  

•    anyway yes sweet adult-child of 21 (she is in denial about that tho like she doesn't want to be childish) who is v nice v kind v loyal v baked a lot of time, v passionate v silly. idk what i'm doin hope u like it < 3

004. WANTED CONNECTIONS . 

friends / best friends / ride or dies . jade genuinely loves people, loves talking to strangers and getting into intense conversations with people she’s only just met, learning other people’s way of life and bettering herself for getting. she is, however, incredibly blunt and has never once minced words to keep from hurting someone’s feelings or to ease them into a situation. she’d much rather have a one-time conversation with a stranger than make long lasting relationships. she has three very close friends –  to the point of co - dependence –  and honestly, she’d rather spend all of her time doing things she loves such as her hobbies, sticking her nose into the latest vogue, or searching for cute collars and treats for her cat mica w them instead of making new friends. she's also FUN and she'd be happy to go on crazy road trips or buy out a movie theater for a day or anything that she thinks will her buds happy. she's traveled all over, so she’s v well read and cultured. she loves people but she hates complication and won't deal with any sort of emotional labor. she wants to live in the moment and expects everyone in her life to do so as well. just be chill, y'all. 

frenemies / enemies /  rivals  . please be her enemy, she needs people to antagonize shdhshd. she grew up pretty much affluent so she’s pretty spoiled even if she doesn’t want to admit it, and that rebellious side of her hasn’t died down yet. despite the fact that she is wealthy and in good community standing, she has a hard time letting go of childish grudges. in general she’s got a lot of suppressed feelings and ready to fight everyone who hurts her friends – like an irritated cat – so, honestly, come at her ? she is sometimes a little fickle and flighty and a unintentionally stuck up when it comes to art / fashion and she has definitely said the wrong thing at the wrong time and pissed the wrong people off, she can’t stand anyone underestimating her or thinking she’s dumb bc she’s interested in fashion. like gtfo !

ex’s , fwb’s , possible love interests .  jade is fairly fluid romantically and is the type of person who hates labels but also just wants to be cherished and called cute pet names lowkey. she loves a lot and gives a lot to her relationships, but typically doesn't want to commit to anything important. she’s gone from one disastrous relationship to another, ending up with a boyfriend who constantly ridiculed her image that was essentially the catalyst for her cutting off romantic ties, quite a recent wound before she found herself on the island actually. worst thing is tht she’s convinced herself that she’s been the problem in these relationships –  that she turns good people bad or that she is too much for people to deal with, she’s not sure what the issue is and she doesn’t really want to know. so…. fuck everything amirite ? anyway, she’s a strong independent woman who don’t need no (wo)man. 

etc . pls give me people jade can give a makeover to, people she shares an apartment w on the island, people who think fashion is girly and vapid.. creatives who love what she’s doing, anything tbh << 3

[phtholo]

lair review for @corvidus-fr (who it won’t let me tag oof)

so for starters i LOVE Geode??? I adore characters who are like her, and her lil quote is amazing bc honestly id be the one asking for a lime green costume

Geode LOOKS like a fashion gal, and idk if it’s the scarf n glasses, but as soon as I saw her i got those vibes and i was SO HAPPY to see her bio.

I think it’s interesting that she turned to villains to design clothing for, and personally I think that’s a lil unique since characters like her usually design for good guys. Despite the bio being short, it absolutely captures the kind of character she is just by how it’s written, and I love how short it is. It’s not too much and not too less, and you get a good grip of the character!

Apparel wise, I Love how the scarf is layered. I didn’t even think gold would be underneath the white scarf, but it makes a pretty cool color, esp since it goes with her glimmer. Her accent and the Autumn Breeze is just as lovely, and just. the apparel is so good. It matches her character, and the colors n everything is just so good. I Love Geode.

ok so if the last review im doing has a derg w/ Gem Thief on one of their dergs im going to SCREAM i love that apparel So Much but ANYWAYS

I’m sad Hune doesn’t have a bio yet because he looks SO GOOD?? The cobwebs, the gem thief, the sword-- all of it looks good!! His coloring is super good too and just? If/Once you put in a bio for him Let Me Know I want to get to know this mans. I don’t normally like Savannah/Safari but like....................Beige of those genes is so good........... and he’s STAINED TOO,

this is a good man,

ok so any time a derg has this accent/is themed similarly i choose theme immediately because despite not knowing much i LOVE Egyptian stuff. It’s been a super hot minute since I’ve looked at anything related to it so forgive for the lack of better words

Anubis doesn’t have a bio either but I!!! Really love him. I love the accent, I love how these genes work together and how his colors work, just. he’s so good. I never would’ve thought Ripple/Facet/Thylacine would ever go together. Also the colors go so good w/ the accent w/ the Thylacine

With the outfit itself, the Summer Swelter is so good like. I love any type of fall-thing like that bc it usually looks so good with the dragon it’s paired with. I also Really Love Tail rings no matter what so that’s a bonus. Another thing I like is that the outfit is simple!! I really like dragons with more simple apparel :D

Y’ALL DON’T UNDERSTAND HOW MUCH I LOVE PIRATES MAN

There’s only a quote in her bio but i love her so much already, and her ACCENT IS SO GOOD ALONG W/ HER OUTFIT. Just. God I love the Seaspray stuff i need all of the seaspray stuff.

I also like how the satchels go with the outfit too, since it matches the strap of the cutlass. The red is super good too, brings out the red in her poison. just...............im not saying much bc like-- words cant describe how HAPPY i get looking at her-- I LOVE mirrors & pirates man.

Focusing on the quote-- I love how its written. The accent comes out clear in the quote and I just Really Love the phrase “feathery ponce.”

i only know like two things about Shark but i LOVE her

on top of the fact that I really love lady guards, i Love Water Related Dergs & Fish. For a sec I thought that the accent was somehow apart of her genes because they? so So Good together and just. I love this lady and I hope she knows I support her and her fish. If you put in more of a bio for her Let Me Know bc I would die for her tbh

Overall I really love what’s all in your lair! I love how the dergs are dressed, I love their colors, and for those with bios im just. In Love with their personalities-- I’m saying love a lot but like holy shit man. Your lair is really good and I’m glad I got to glance around at it!!