#i don't know how evident it is but her design + colors are supposed to allude to her future sea monster form

[kaahmbem]

THANK YOU FOR THE CIRSCYLLA LOVE EVERYONE HERE'S MORE SCYLLA SKETCHES I DID IN A LECTURE... my favorite nymph ever

[abyssal-author-and-artist]

oh shit i just realized i forgot to post the trans dipper essay

oh well, better late than never!

Introducing - Why Mason "Dipper" Pines is Trans and Why that Matters - an essay I spent more time on than I did my actual college project today

Mason "Dipper" Pines from Gravity Falls is trans. Trans masculine, to be specific. Do I believe this was intentional? No. Do I believe that there's a seriously convincing case to be made? Fuck yes.

So first off, he's just like me frfr, which is pretty compelling in and of itself. But that's not enough for a whole essay, so we move onto our second point - character designs. Dipper is designed like, well, like every modern-era trans man I've ever drawn who isn't goth. The shorts, the one shirt in the one color, the absolute insecurity. He even does the hunch of the back! Also, I think I heard somewhere that the vest is to make his shoulders look broader, which I'm not entirely sure is canon but I am accepting this whole-heartedly. It's such a trans move of him. He's too young (and it's summer so it's too hot) to wear a dysphoria hoodie so he picked a vest. (I say too young because dysphoria hoodies usually cover your chest and Dipper and Mabel probably haven't hit puberty.)

The second part comes directly from science. According to this article, and many others, sex in identical twins is complicated, but most identical twins will be born the same sex. There are cases where this isn't true (which might be the case for Mabel and Dipper) or they might be fraternal, which is also pretty likely. However, looking at them when they were younger (and listening to their very similar voices), it's likely they were identical and both girls. That's not to say I dislike trans Mabel - every trans woman I draw dresses like her, so I do love her being trans as well and them hitting the age of like. 10. and swapping genders is incredibly funny and adorable to me.

So, we can't reliably use the aforementioned evidence, then, can we? After all, identical twins can be different sexes, although rare, and we don't have any proof they are identical beyond their visual (and when they were younger, audible) similarities. Well, first off, I'd say that's pretty compelling evidence already. In a cartoon, especially one as detailed and beautiful-looking as Gravity Falls (the art is good and I will die on this hill), visual language makes up for a lot. And Alex Hirsh has gone on record saying that he very much wanted Jason Ritter and Kristen Schaal for Dipper and Mabel respectively, to the point where he would have canceled the show if Kristen hadn't signed on, so I wholeheartedly believe every character (with the exception of Grenda and any other characters who had last minute va's picked) had their voice actors picked very specifically. I can't find whether Jason Ritter voiced younger Dipper, though, so that's a dead end.

Now, that's all well and good, but it's a lot of visual language, isn't it? Why don't we move into something more based in the writing itself?

So the first and most prominent example of Dipper being transgender is the episode Dipper vs Manliness. You know it, you probably have emotions on it, it's the episode where Dipper is trying his hardest to be a man's man. The episode was supposed to be about toxic masculinity and how to be a real man is to stick to your morals. It's a good lesson and in my opinion, holds up even in 2024. Pretty good. Does a great job of what it wants to do. Now, Dipper vs. Manliness has been dissected to hell and back already as a transgender allegory, so I'll keep this brief: the episode centers around Dipper being mocked for not being manly. While Mabel and Stan still see him as a man, albeit an effeminate one, it gets to Dipper. He proceeds to do anything to prove himself a real man. If viewed as a trans allegory, Mabel is teasing her brother and not realizing how deeply it actually hurts him (whether accidentally because she fails to realize how insecure he is over it or because she hasn't been there before, depending on how you want to headcanon it). As for Stan, I like to pretend he's supportive but regularly forgets Dipper was ever a girl, so he makes a serious slip up because of that (and/or he's regurgitating stuff said to him. That hits harder if you also headcanon trans Stan, which I am warming up to). Dipper proceeds to try and prove himself a man, crying when he takes even one more blow to his self esteem/sense of identity as a man, and eventually gets comfort from his family when they realize just how BADLY they messed him up. He is affirmed as a man and the episode ends. Everything that can be said, has been said - including that you don't have to act toxically masculine - or even masculine at all - to be a real man. Remember this part, it will be important later.

So, other trans moments for Dipper come a little sparser. Dipper vs. Manliness is the example for a good reason. But still, there's other moments. The short Voice Over from one of the short story compliation episodes is another one that's commonly referenced as a metaphor for voice dysphoria. Yes, Dipper's voice is cracking in ways common for a cis pre-teen boy his age, but the pitch and tone of his voice can also be seen as his more feminine voice peeking through. Taking the potion can be seen as taking testosterone or other hormones. Granted, this falls apart when you consider that Dipper is later discouraged from taking the potion, because that could be read as Dipper being discouraged from transitioning, but on the other side of the spectrum, it could be read as Dipper being affirmed as a real man despite his voice. From that perspective, his family prevents him from taking (possibly dangerous) homebrewed hrt. Also, the euphoria he gets when it does change his voice is just. Absolutely adorable.

Now, my favorite resource for Dipper acting trans is in the episode Headhunters. He's asking Manly Dan questions and Manly Dan calls Dipper a girl. And MAN the discomfort on Dipper's face. He immediately attempts to correct Manly Dan, but is shut down and the episode moves on. I think that for such a short moment, it does a good job of making Dipper seem trans, though. He is called a girl and feels extreme discomfort around it. He does not like being called a girl. He is not a girl. But he's not shocked or surprised or even really offended - he's resigned. He's used to being called a girl. Sure, he hates it, but he doesn't cry or scream or anything. Sounds to me like a trans man who's absurdly used to being misgendered but still hates it. That pain never goes away, but sometimes all you can do is flinch in discomfort, try to correct and move on, like the episode does.

For a (mostly humorous) video of more of Dipper acting trans, check out this video.

So I think we've made a pretty compelling point for Dipper Pines being trans masc here. Looks pretty good, yup, this is a great essay, let's wrap it up. Oh? What's that? The name of this essay?

Why Mason "Dipper" Pines is transgender and why that matters.

Well, let's dive into section two of this essay - why does Dipper being trans matter?

Someone could easily say it doesn't matter. Just fun fandom headcanons, that's it, wrap it up now. Nothing more to say. Dipper is trans and that's just a fun reading of his character.

But I don't think that's the case. I think that Dipper being trans means so much - to trans fans of the show, to fans who have never seen or spoken to trans people before, and to queer fans of Gravity Falls and similar shows. (I personally am a Steven Universe fan who really valued the representation there, so Gravity Falls and all it's queer coding means a lot to me.)

First and foremost, I'm not going to keep you in the dark as to why you're remembering my earlier point. As a recap, it was this: Dipper vs. Manliness, and by proxy, Gravity Falls as a whole, says that you don't have to be traditionally masculine to be a real man. For a show that spends a lot of time mocking a kid commonly headcanoned to be a trans man, that says a lot, and a lot of stuff I think more people need to hear.

You do not need to act like your gender to be your gender.

You do not need to present like your gender to be your gender.

You do not need to fit some rigid box that society enforces to be who you are.

If you are a man, you are a man, trans or cis, regardless of how you act. (And the same goes for women and nonbinary people! You don't have to fit a mold.)

You don't owe anyone anything.

You don't owe people masculinity. (Or femininity or androgyny for that matter.)

I think that's part of the reason Dipper vs. Manliness ages so well. Dipper reads as trans, especially to queer fans, and his story in that episode tells us that we don't have to be someone we're not for people to take us seriously as who we are. At the end of the day, the really masculine thing is staying true to you - a sentiment echoed and reversed in The Last Mabelcorn, where the most feminine thing you can do is to stay true to yourself. I can't find it right now, but I could swear that there's a That GF Fan video explaining my point a little better. The point is, there's nothing that makes you more of whatever your gender is than staying true to yourself.

Additionally, if Dipper really is trans and someone sees themself in him, that can help them explore their gender or explain it to other people. Young kids who have never interacted with trans people before can see Dipper and grow up to connect the dots - or grow up to have him crack their eggs.

I know I'm new to the fandom and I was already out before watching the show, but he really helped me explore my gender. I like dressing like him - he's very relatable, even though I'm old enough to be in college now. I see him as a very anxious, slightly paranoid trans kid, and I see a lot of myself in him. He has a lot of issues, and a lot of issues that aren't trans specific but definitely hit harder when you are trans. He makes me feel seen on a level that I never thought a cartoon character could do.

Honestly, here would be a good place to put a rant about representation in kids media - queer kids under the age of 12 exist and struggle. I liked a girl (before realizing I was trans) in fifth grade, so about 9 years old. There are kids who experiment with their gender when they're younger than that. We're here and we exist, and every single time a character in children's media is made and is prevalent, another kid is able to really see themself.

That's really the point of this section. Dipper is trans. That matters. People - mostly queer kids but people of all ages - see themselves in him. He's here and we see him as queer because it's validating. It feels so good to hear Stan affirm him at the end of Dipper vs. Manliness, because it proves that at the end of the day, you don't need to present as super masc or femme or androgynous to be who you are.

Gravity Falls, through coding Dipper as trans, sent a message:

You are seen. You are loved. You are valid.

Thank you for reading this all. Trans Dipper means a lot to me, and I love writing him and seeing him in general. I want more of him because Dipper being trans means the world to me.

I love you all. Have a wonderful day. Remember to stay true to yourself.

[roodles03]

Since it was confirmed Velvette is a doll-based demon in official merch, I am now seriously considering my once crack theory that Velvette wears wigs so she has easily interchangeable and customizable hair. Hear me out.

Granted my only evidence to support this is how radically different her hair's overall mass is over her many different outfits. What I mean by hair mass is how much hair she should have at once. See how Vel's hair mass GRATELY fluctuates from having a fuckton to much less in such sort periods of time? Gaining and losing this much hair is just not possible in such a short amount of time. This is only possible if she cut her hair, but it appears to grow right back out in later styles. (Especially since two outfits with radically different hair masses are in the same episode! This being ep 2!).

As a professional cartoonist, when designing different hairstyles for the same character, you have to keep the hair's overall mass in mind (unless the character got a haircut or it or their hair grew out). You don't want it to look like a character has gained or lost hair just by having it in a different style. It is very clear to me Velevette's hair mass is NOT consistent in the slightest. For example, comparing her 1st outfit in ep 2 to her best known outfit in ep 3, the two where her hair is the longest and are in ponytails, the ep 3 design's pigtails has the same mass as the single ponytail in ep 2. This logically means Velvette has DOUBLE the hair in what can assumed to be a very short amount of time. With her 2nd outfit in ep 2, you CANNOT convince me all of that hair in her ponytail was able to condense into that TINY bun. Her poofy hair in ep 8 also appears to be way less then ep 3 or even ep 2's first design. Her hair's mass is just NOT consistent between ANY of her designs and fits.

So it makes sense that this could possibly be intentional character design, right? Because this is a pretty simple thing to not fuck up at a professional level.

I'm willing to accept counterarguments to this. Such as maybe she has hair magic just like she has been shown to have clothing magic.

Or this is just a design fault and they didn't consider Vel's hair mass. Which honsetly I wouldn't put it past them considering how consistently Viv's Character color palletes fail the value test. If you don't know what that is, it's basically turning the character black and white and seeing if you can tell apart the grayscale shades where different colors are supposed to be. The shades of gray correlate to different saturation levels in color. This is really important for creating characters that pop. A good example of a Viv character that fails at this is Rosie.

But the idea of Velvette being BALD and being able to swap out custom, styled wigs is infinitely funnier to me because then ALL THREE VEES WOULD BE BALD.

[accirax]

Fourth Anniversary Art Analysis

(Credits to DRDTdev for the art, obviously. Please support the original post.)

Yeah guys, this is definitely Charles, trust me. (/j)

In all seriousness, the reveal of what Teruko's brother (more or less) looks like got me thinking about a couple of things. I'd like to ramble about them in a space less directly linked to the public fourth anniversary art!

The first is that we've (basically) confirmed that Teruko's brother is older than her, something that I don't think we actually technically knew until now! I always got those kind of vibes, but it's nice to know for sure.

The second is something that most people have picked up on-- his white hair color. Between DRDT and altDRDT, the only people who we've seen with white hair up to this point are XF and Dandelion (I think those are the names people agreed upon???). Both of those seem... unlikely to be Teruko's brother, although, for what it's worth, they do both use he/him pronouns. That's not to say that Teruko's brother couldn't have dyed his hair after he and Teruko last parted, and still be someone else we know, like Teacher. However, I could also easily believe that DRDTdev may have wanted to draw this art as a soft disconfirmation of the "Teacher is Teruko's brother" theory before people got in too deep. It's too bad, though, I did like that one.

One of the reasons why I liked it was because of the synergy with Teruko's favorite color being red due to "association." However, even if Teruko's brother still is Teacher, it seems like he has no red in his design as of the last time Teruko saw him. I suppose red could still be his eye color, but I'm going to take this mean that Teruko's positive association with red is due to somebody else-- likely either Xander or Mai, or possibly still Teacher, but without him being her brother.

Lastly, and most importantly, I find it highly interesting that, at this point in time, Teruko's brother is shown with several scrapes and bandages, while Teruko has absolutely none. It got me thinking about the nature of Teruko's luck.

I wonder if Teruko's bad luck operates in a way where it will hurt whoever is around her until she's the only one left, at which point it has no one to attack but herself. (The only comparison I can think of is to the Death card in the card game Fluxx, so shout out if you know what I'm talking about.)

As long as Teruko is the "protagonist," her luck will go after the "side characters". But, if Teruko isolates herself, then the luck will go after the hero.

Now, there is a bit of contradictory evidence going on here, because Teruko has had unfortunate things happen to her since entering the killing game and being around other people. Most notably, the time that she slipped and fell while holding the cake, and when Xander tried to kill her. That's why I'm wondering if there's also an element of how much Teruko cares about these people involved. Like, if Teruko cares less about someone, they don't pop up as a "side character" punching bag as much. Or, if Teruko caring about someone is the inciting incident to turning an entire group of people into "side characters"-- that way, if she had no friends at any of the schools she attended, she could have avoided dooming them all.

Teruko cared a lot about Xander, so his betrayal was the tipping point. After she took one last blow, the scales tipped and more bad things started happening to the other students than to Teruko. Teruko falling down transformed into the much worse luck of Min dying. And, from then on, the "side characters" started taking the brunt of the bad luck (J's secret being revealed, Eden being bullied and threatened, Ace nearly dying, etc), while Teruko remained mostly fine.

If there is an element of how much Teruko cares about people involved, it would give her a lot of incentive to be a loner and actively make people dislike her.

Anyways, just a thought. This one is pretty off the cuff, so I wouldn't be surprised if I'm missing something or overstepping here.

Happy fourth anniversary DRDT, happy ???th birthday Mai, and a happy day to all of you!

[empressgeekt]

Trolls- headcanon, Creek and Branch are Cousins and Rosiepuff was both their grandmother...

okay. This randomly came to me, and I have to write this down. On mobile sorry for issues.

So, I was scrolling through Tumblr and saw fanart of acdepressed creek, and I though, "hey he kind of looks like Floyd's old concept design". Don't look up that design it's horrifying, but originally Floyd was supposed to look like Grandma Rosiepuff. Then things started to spiral. F9r two characters who seemingly have nothing to do with each other, Rosiepuff and Creek look awfully similar to one another. Same skin tone, and they both have minty green in their hair. In fact one could argue that Creek resembles her more then her own canon grandchildren. BROZONE all have cool colors and John, Clay, spruce, and branch all have blur eyes like her, while Floyd has a smaller similar nose shape. But that's the extent of it.

What if Rosiepuff had two surviving children, instead of the one who had brozone? And Creek was born of that second child.

I don't know what other people think but alot of the jab Creek makes towards Branch feel very personal. Sure pre trolls one Branch was not liked by the community, but Creek despises Branch personally. He tells Poppy that Branch doesn't want to be happy. Confronts Branch head on while the others passively complain. He even calls out the vest and that is a deep cut to Branch as we all know...but how would Creek know? Unless they share more of history then we think.

There are number of ways that's this could've played out, be it Creek's parent having a falling out with Rosiepuff before he's born, or maybe they didn't want anything to do with the band, but the two sides of the family clearly don't talk. Evident by Rosiepuff raising Branch alone, and never once is an aunt/uncle mentioned. However it wouldn't be too hard to believe that Creek knows about Rosiepuff, her death, and blames Branch for it. Heck he could've been taught that by his parent, The possible child of Rosiepuff's. And now in turn hates Branch.

This could even be supported by the amount of similar traits Creek has with Brozone. For starters, both Creek and at least two of the brothers (branch and clay) are planners. Branch and clay are prepping for the worst, but Creek is always planning how to control situations he finds himself in. Their uses are different, and as are the strategies, but the principle still stands. Creek also has a high emotional intelligence, like Floyd. He'd have to in order to manipulate people the way he does. A level head under pressure could also be a shared trait, Creek only really panics when he's in immediate danger, being eaten or when he and chef were one fire, otherwise he's very collected. He's the one telling everyone in the bird cage to remain calm after all.

But if they are related the why didn't JD or any of the others ask about him when Brozone reunited? Well, simply they didn't know about him. Creek is either the same age or younger then Branch, and if the two sides of the family weren't on speaking terms in the first place then its a slim chance they would be told about a baby cousin. And I have a hard time seeing Creeks family taking Branch in afte the accident and he went grey. So if branch knows about their relation, he's probably so detached that he doesn't consider them family. Not to mention the whole betrayl thing...

So thought? Was my brain on to something? Or is this just rambling.

[starrclown]

☆Sarcastic Chorus's video on Hazbin and the character design is flawed☆

"It's not that Helluva Boss has writing issues or it isn't as strong as it could be. What's happened is that these independently made shows are somehow now supposed to live up to every issue in the industry. There's legitimate critiques to make, I'm not saying you can't talk shit, but the level of personal vitriol is crazy to me. Like any issue that is a problem in the animation industry, the Hazbin verse is the one that gets the most shit for it. Like people complain about the designs, that these be skinny bitches with wasp waists when like, okay, that's the thing, it's got a style. Yes we do need more body types in mainstream animation but rather than hyping up the shows that do do this, the conversation has turned into a attack on Hazbin, and suddenly everyone is a character design master. They complain that everyone is too similar, that the colors are too messy, that there's too much red in doing this while people make fanart by the thousands. People could hype up the shows that do have multiple body types. Shera gang, rise up. But NO it's used as a reason why Hazbin sucks even though they are not uniquely guilty of this."

- Sarcastic Chorus, "I'm worried about Hazbin Hotel"

Sarcastic Chorus's video on Hazbin is flawed. I could make SO many more post about this guy but let's go with this one. It's obvious Sarcastic Chorus is not a artist. While I'm not a professional artist, I have drawn for years and would consider myself a decent artist. Let's break this down because that quote took 10 minutes to write.

"Like people complain about the designs, that these be skinny bitches with wasp waists when like, okay, that's the thing, it's got a style. Yes we do need more body types in mainstream animation but rather than hyping up the shows that do do this, the conversation has turned into a attack on Hazbin, and suddenly everyone is a character design master."

This is my evidence that Sarcastic Chorus is not a artist. Just because Vivziepop has a style does not mean that she doesn't have to show body diversity. Hell, since she has such a distinct style she SHOULD be trying to have more body diversity! It would actually make sense for some of her characters backstories! Showing body diversity could help portray what the beauty standard for the characters time was. It could even be a insecurity for certain characters if they don't meet that standard! The reason people don't hype up shows that have body diversity and shit on the shows that DON'T have body diversity is because body diversity is important.

(Also people DO hype up the show with body diversity. Why do you think people were so happy when Sun Wukong form LMK has stomach rolls. Why do you think people were so happy when Willow Park started to work out?)

Fun fact, I'm plus sized. Do you know how nice it is when characters are plus sized? Do you know how nice it would be to have skinny characters? (Like really skinny characters). Body diversity is important for any show because representation is important. (Representation of any kind is important. Race, religion, sexuality, gender. It's all important.)

"They complain that everyone is too similar, that the colors are too messy, that there's too much red in doing this while people make fanart by the thousands."

Again, I do not believe Sarcastic Chorus is a artist. If you wanna learn more about colors, design, body types and just general art tips then I suggest two channels, Lavendertowne and Lovesart23. Lovesart23 has actually redesigned multiple Hazbin Hotel characters and she gives information and tips for character design in those videos. Lavendertowne is the same thing exept she has been posting for YEARS. She also goes into more detailed descriptions and has videos about specific topics in art. 2 great channels, highly recommend. I'm pretty sure they both have Tumblr, I know for a fact Lovesart23 has Tumblr, support both of them on all socials. Let's break down his points.

Everyone's design is too similar

The colors are too messy

There's too much red

All of these have been criticisms for Vivziepop's art for years. All of them are valid. Let's be quick about this.

Everyone's design is too similar: This is true to some extent. The biggest peice of evidence is the kids and parents. In Helluva Boss and with Charlie and Lucifer. The kids look exactly identical to their parents. Moxxie and Crimson are the biggest example. (One of my favorite examples is if you pause on the news scene in Hazbin Hotel where Katie is right against Charlie, they have the same colors.

The colors are too messy: Honestly I don't really care about this one. The only example about this is the repeating if colors like red, black, white, and pink. Beelzabub is the biggest example I can think of where the colors are messy.

There is too much red: Yes. Yes. Yes. Look at the Hazbin Hotel pilot. Look at the early episodes of Helluva Boss. There's way to much red. There's also way to much red in the new designs. Everyone besides Angel in the main cast have red when they don't need too. Vaggie had grey tones, Nifty had brighter colors, and Husk was darker and had more orange tones. Now they changed that. There is WAY to much red in Hazbin and Helluva boss.

Now my favorite line:

"But NO it's used as a reason why Hazbin sucks even though they are not uniquely guilty of this."

Hazbin is ABSOLUTELY guilty of this. That's why you brought it up. That's why EVERYONE brings it up. Wanna know the characters that actually have diverse body types? Here I'll list them.

Mimsy - Hazbin Hotel (Shes plus sized but she's only on screen for like 2 seconds.)

Ausmoedus - Helluva Boss (Ozzie has a big chest but he has a thin waist and small legs.)

Vortex - Helluva Boss (He's muscular. Actually this is pretty cool.)

Some of the random people in Verosika's entourage - Helluva Boss.

Adam - Hazbin Hotel (He's chubby. Cool. Villain character is chubby.)

Mammon - Helluva Boss (Another Villian character is chubby. Sick Vivzie sick.)

(I know I'm joking about it but I do find it kinda weird that the two villian characters are fat. If you want more opinions on that subject then look it up on here. I don't really wanna talk about it. Also, I'm not saying villains can't be chubby. It's just that the two villian characters are the ones that are explicitly fat and don't just have a big chest.)

I genuinely can't think of more. That's the problem. Everyone is pencil thin. I do hope if there is more characters on Hazbin or Helluva that they are plus size of small and we get good representation.

Okay that's my first rant blog on here! WOOOO! I might make another video on Sarcastic Chorus because I disagree with most of his opinions. But that's enough for right now. Next post will either be a rant or more Anne Boonchuy because she's great and she gets overshadowed too much for a main character. (Another rant I will make because I am PASSIONATE about this.)

Goodbye Matey's! (Matey's get it? Like pirates! Ha!)

- ⭐️StarChild⭐️

[technovillain]

Obsessed with your alt Gisu design, you have so much talent! 💙💙💙💙 I was wondering how you came up with each of the interns alt designs. Also hope you make a comic using that Alt design for Gisu one day!

tysm!!!! i'm glad u like them ehehehe ^_^ i can give u some design notes. it will be a long post sooooo I will put it under the cut. always love an excuse to ramble abt design choices.

Gisu: I do like her dinosaur shirt swag, but i feel like her layering doesn't have a lot of clarity in terms of like. what is going on with the shirts (vest?) and since the dino thing is never relevant to her character, I decided to lean into the electrokinesis theme with the lightning bolt jumper & under-cape pattern. Which is just a headcanon but I always forget it is!! I just like the idea of her being into electrokinesis bc it would make a lot of sense for someone who is paired up with Otto. Changed her bag to be a strap for her board so she doesn't have to carry it around all the time. Asymmetrical bun for some of that PN1 asymmetry flavor. Mismatched shoes bc she seems like the type to think that's cool (also maybe bc i do this and i'm projecting) Missing toof from skating incident + torn jeans. Electrokinesis scars on her hands, bc I like to think that psi-powers can leave physical damage if not used properly.

Morris: tried to balance out his proportions a little bit because sometime i feel like his head is so big you can't even see his body in screencaps. tried to make his head less round and his eyes too, I kind of like the thing that PN1 did where the heads sort of just fade into necks with less of a cutoff so I did that too. Nasty teenager moustache just felt right + some freckles. I changed his nose scar to face the other way bc I thought it was supposed to be nostrils at first. No notes on his levball-lawnchair wheelchair bc it is everything to me.

Lizzie: wanted to up the 80s goth influence on her. Imagine her hair as the super-teased puffy fried Siouxsie hair of the 80s goths. Nerfed her amount of patterns just for the sake of there is no way I am ever going to draw all of her details ever bc I don't have that kind of patience. again the graphic liner to lean into the 80s goth style. Also took away her chin/neck priveleges bc I did that to norma first and wanted them to still look similar. denim vest for more 80s influence.

Adam: (his is the only one i haven't stuck to drawing like this yet bc i like his canon round head) but I made him more square in general bc I feel like he's the most grounded and straight-edged intern. gave him more pattern on his dress (tunic?) and hat bc everybody has more pattern than him. the linked lapel pins and hat dangles are meant to evoke his use of the yo-yo weapon. Unified his color palette more with more green and purple. Strings tied around his fingers, again for more yo-yo imagery but also bc he seems like a workaholic who would be overscheduled and have a lot to remember.

Norma: this girl knits!!! she was the first character i tried to "PN1-ify" and she just felt like she needed a big old backpack. for her overprepared freshman who thinks she knows everything energy. also symbolizes her putting a ton of weight and expectations on her shoulders when she really doesn't have to (which is kind of a core tenet of the little bit of canon personality she has) orange glasses bc my tinted glasses addiction is quite evident. the yellow pompom on her hat matches Lizzie's, giving them a sibling connection, also saying that she knitted her sister's hat :]

Sam: the first thing that I thought when I first saw Sam's canon design was that she looked straight out of 2013 with her ugg boots and that particular shirt pattern, which maybe isn't exclusive to the early 2010s but once i thought that it was burnt into my mind. So I tried to make her look more 80s with the short skirt and buckled boots and off the shoulder sweater. the too-long sleeves give her kitty energy (and i put cat hair on them). Gave her whale earrings bc she seems to really like whales in canon. gave her a cleft palate scar because i drew her with that once, plus I kind of see it when she makes the :3 face. revoked her neck priveleges altogether because if compton and dogen don't have them why should she!!!

[meimi-haneoka]

Cardcaptor Sakura Clear Card Chapter 71: Comments + JP-ENG translation differences

(pic courtesy of Dyoring on Twitter because the JP one criminally covers the costumes) Looks like I'm still alive after that bomb that was chapter 70, huh? 😂 Welcome back to our monthly appointment with angst with the commentary on Cardcaptor Sakura Clear Card, everyone! Last chapter might have bent me, but I'm not broken yet! Mwahaha! And yet, I can't say this chapter completely healed me, far from it! Sure, it's full of fluff and happy feelings...but man, how we feel his absence here. It's so apparent and glaring that it hinders the complete enjoyment of the chapter, which I'm sure is totally the feeling CLAMP wanted to elicit from us. If you care even a little about the new characters, you can't help but feel a sense of "this is not how it's supposed to be", while reading this. Fortunately, the cliffhanger at the end gives us good hope for the kids to start get into action to solve this mess at the earliest, hopefully with the help of someone we were waiting for? In the meantime, let's explore this chapter and all that it talked about...I don't have particular translation mistakes from the ENG version to report this time around (thank god).

Gif of the month, and then we go!

The Color Page

Well, this was a surprise? I didn't expect a color page like this, opening the very last volume of Clear Card Arc, but it's also true that there can be a quite powerful meaning behind those four outfits. They're literally representing the first discrepancies that originated after Kaito's rewriting of everyone's memories. Sakura's eyes are closed, she appears to be very pensive, no, actually as if she's contemplating something. About to make a decision. As she stands literally in the middle of all those outfits, this can be interpreted as way to convey how she's in the middle of these two lives they have lived and are living right now, and she's probably the one who can really do something about this whole mess. The conjunction ring. "Which outfit am I going to choose to wear?" isn't the frivolous question it might seem, but in this case it actually means "which life will I decide to keep?" Tough question, for an even tougher answer. But remember what Touya onii-chan said. "When it's up to me to decide what's real and what's not, then I decide to go with what I don't want to lose".

Besides the hidden meaning analysis, this is also a nice way to have set in canon the colors of *all* the main outfits for the play. (●ˇ∀ˇ●) (nice to know Akiho's Alice outfit actually got a gradient blue on her shirt!)

A New Life

The chapter starts with a very, very familiar scene, which might not have been drawn exactly the same as the original one, but it's definitely designed to remind you of it: the very first scene of volume 1, with Kero (and this time, Suppy) waking Sakura up to go to school!! I see what you did there, CLAMP 😏 In their latest Twitter Spaces where they talked about Clear Card, they did mention how the last volume would serve as a way for things to come full circle, and what's better than making a reference to the very first pages of chapter 1? We have the same Sakura introducing herself to the readers (breaking the 4th wall), same Kero shouting that it's time to go, same Sakura getting ready (this time she's evidently in a hurry though). We're clearly being introduced to her new life (that only we know is new) after Kaito rewrote their memories thanks to Momo's book. And well well well, what do we have here?? It's the very first panel of the chapter, no, of the volume, and we're already spotting something off, here??

Oooh, the Kinomoto home....grew an additional portion of itself?? Or did they build it in the few months that passed from the school play? I wonder what for...? heheh...(already knows)

But that's not the only surprise! We just need to turn the page and we are immediately taken aback by Sakura getting ready...with a new school uniform, which represents her second winter uniform (the one reserved for the colder months, just like it happened in Tomoeda Elementary) while she tells us she soon will be attending the 2nd year of Tomoeda Middle school!!! I was completely shocked when I saw her total-black new uniform!! I have to say that the idea of unifying the top and the skirt in a one-piece dress is definitely good, I really like it, but I thought that having even the black tights might be a little bit too much. Later we'll discover she's got black boots too. I'd need to see this in full color to judge! I predict the tie and decorations will be red! 👀 I want to point it out now, since Sakura says it immediately, but the French translation made it sound like she's already starting the second year of middle school, and honestly the ENG translation with the choice of words kinda infers the same: but from what we'll see in a few pages, we're in full winter (it's about to snow too) and Japan usually gets spring vacations between March 25th and April 5th (right between the end of a school year and the beginning of the next) so it cannot be really that imminent. I predict this could be February/early March at best. The JP text says もうすぐ which means "soon" but that can also only mean they're just in the last month of the school term.

So we basically had another mini time skip of about 5/6 months, considering the play very likely took place in September (kids were already wearing their long sleeved uniforms but some guests to the school event still wore short sleeves). If you ask me, it doesn't look like Sakura grew much in these 6 months. 😂

And when she quickly goes downstairs, that's where we find the other surprise (which was actually expected): AKIHO IS COOKING IN THE KITCHEN, apron over her uniform and all!! Yeah, remember? Thanks to the rewriting of their memories, now they're living their life as sisters! In fact, we see them interacting in a friendly and comfortable way, which is totally reminiscing of how they were interacting even before this big change happened. And yet, personally, I have a hard time getting used to the new arrangement. 😅 Sakura introduces Akiho to us as her twin sister, confirming they live together with Touya and Fujitaka too.

Sakura tells us people often comment about how they resemble each other very much, and as if on cue, Mokona sensei provides us with yet another very cute double feature of Sakura and Akiho smiling happily and lovingly at eachother. As much as I want Akiho to go back to her real family, I have to admit this panel totally melted me. ❤️ My lovely Akiho looks so happy....and that's why it also hurts a lot. Well, here come the first explanations of how this hell of a change can work at all, in this situation!! Apparently, Akiho has always suffered of fragile health ever since she was young (....) so she always lived with great-grandfather Masaki to get treatment and rest. With some friends we have been joking that, if this is the result of what Kaito wrote in the story he wanted for Akiho, he must have watched lots of soap operas, because the justifications totally seems at the writing level of one! 😂 Sakura says Akiho came back home to live with them only recently. And while Akiho excitedly yells that she's cooked the no-fry croquettes that Sakura taught her the recipe of, we also find out from narrator Sakura that this is probably the reason why Akiho still addresses her in a very polite way, with suffix -san and all. And sigh, my heart here broke a little because the no-fry croquettes....was the recipe Sakura taught Akiho specifically for Kaito, and that she successfully prepared for their date, eliciting a delighted comment from him. ☹️☹️Now she's still cooking them for her loved ones...but it's different. ☹️ Aaaaaa but here comes Fujitaka, ready to have breakfast and go to work, greeting both his daughters.........gosh, this sounds so weird. Will I get used to this madness before this chapter ends?? As it normally would be expected from him in this situation, Fujitaka addresses Akiho with a -san suffix too, so narrator Sakura says that probably that's also where all Akiho's politeness comes from. Fujitaka says that Touya conveniently left very early for his job, and Sakura adds that he'll go straight to his university classes afterwards. Uh uh uh, I wonder why CLAMP didn't want to show us Touya's reaction yet. Did he notice anything...? Fujitaka-papa gets ready to taste Akiho's croquettes....and with a delighted face he says they're delicious!! ......I mean, this totally works. Look at these two dorks faces, they light up in the same way. 🙈😅😅

Narrator Sakura keeps telling us about Akiho and how she transferred to her school before summer (and behind her, in the flashback, we can see the name Kinomoto Akiho written on the board), that she participated to the play for the school event and all...and that she wants to make so, so many happy experiences now that she's with her sister, to make up for the time they spent apart.

The girls leave the house and we get a chance to see the coats of the second winter uniform too: they're very pretty and compliment the whole outfits very well (they got big scarves and gloves too!). Some snowflakes start to fall down and Akiho just needs to sneeze once to unleash the scariest kaijuu in Sakura: ....that of the fussing big sister! 😅😅 she gives her her own scarf on top of Akiho's one and feels with her own forehead if she's getting a fever, demanding to know immediately if she starts feeling unwell! 😅😅Akiho worries that Sakura would get cold in this way, but she doesn't want to hear any of it!! Awwww, how can I not melt in front of this? 🥹My gosh Sakura really is super protective of Akiho here...and we immediately get another character to remark that: our dear Tomoyo!! She comments on Sakura's behavior in JP with this funny way which could be translated more or less with "powerful big sister manners", and I cannot really disagree! 😂 Akiho states that she's feeling better now, that she doesn't experience pain like before...but Tomoyo just knows that Sakura will worry no matter what, and the girl in question confirms so herself: because Akiho is someone important to her. Akiho cannot really do much else than blushing with happiness and thank her...😊 Tomoyo gives the final touch to this scene with one of her kind but sharp comments: "Maybe sister complex runs in the family!", making reference to a very early joke in CCS where Yukito teased Touya telling him he had a sister complex for how he's always so protective of his younger sister: well, guess what, now said sister gets to have the same complex towards her twin too 😂😂

We proceed with the chapter and we have Sakura meeting Syaoran in front of the school, showing us how nice and elegant the male second winter uniform (well, we mostly see the coat) is! Syaoran comments how cold it got overnight and as the caring and loving boyfriend he is, he inquires his girlfriend about her health. Luckily she's super healthy, and apparently, as she says herself, the Cards are too! Yessss, folks, it seems the Sakura Cards are back with Sakura, now!! Sakura didn't have a particular reason, but apparently the previous night she summoned Mirror to have a chat! Syaoran asks what she wanted to discuss about with him, and Sakura announces that she was thinking about telling everything to Akiho. Everything that happened while they were apart...about Tomoyo and her costumes, about Kero, Yukito and Yue, Kaho, Eriol, Nakuru and Suppi....and most importantly, about the Cards.

Now, before we proceed, I would like to talk about two different aspects that really stood out for me from this couple of pages. First: the relationship Sakura's got with her Cards. As I was saying, it seems the Sakura Cards are back with Sakura, and judging by the panel where Sakura says she wants to tell Akiho about them, the Clear Cards don't seem to be part of this scenario. The panel shows both Clow and Sakura Cards (because of course Sakura would need to tell her the whole story), but no Clear Card is present at all. We can only infer that probably everyone forgot about the Clear Cards too (although I still think they exist somewhere, it's just that they're hidden/sealed for now), and that Sakura might not have her problem with the uncontrollable powers anymore. Did Kaito fix that problem for her too, in some way?? Did he really go that far to ensure everyone's happiness...? And another thing I noticed, is that Sakura seems more...comfortable with the Cards and her own powers. Summoning a Card just to have a nice chat is the complete opposite of what she was doing at the beginning of chapter 1. She had put away her key, saying "I don't use it much anyway...and maybe it's better like that". The next thing you know, the day after she started producing incidents and Clear Cards. You see, I'm not sure how accurate this is, but ever since this started I've always thought that the problem with Sakura's rampant powers was caused by something of psychological nature. Since the production of the Cards seemed to be so connected to her emotions, in the beginning her power was so chaotic that the Cards were pretty much originating randomly (Gale does seem really random and not based on any thought or memory Sakura had), to become more and more connected with her thoughts and desires along the way. The more she got in touch with herself and her desires, the more the Cards were produced as a result of those, and eventually Sakura found out on her own that the Cards were originating from her own wishes. But that did not end there, because the Clear Cards started to change again when Sakura started to finally listen to Syaoran's advice to look into herself and listen to the stirrings of her heart, and started trusting her intuition and powers more: from merely following her wishes, the Cards started to take the appearances of her loved ones, which would become important later on in Clockland to help her remind who she was. Basically, anticipating her needs. Even if we didn't see an immediate reaction from her, finding her loved ones on her way contributed to wake up her conscience, with the final coup de grace from Akiho and Syaoran. So where I'm getting at is....could it be that Sakura's connection and trust in her magical powers, in this gift she's been blessed with, has become so strong that it ended up stabilizing it? While she was detached and almost refusing it before, dismissing her intuitions as "it's just my imagination", now she's learned to accept it as a part of herself and trust it more? If this is the case, I think that would be a very lovely character development for her. We'll see if I got it right.

The second thing is that I cannot help but noticing again how Kaito really avoided changing any important part (save for adding a sister) of Sakura's life: everything is still as it was before, the events in her memories still happened as they happened, it's just that everything that concerns Akiho has been staged differently, in order to fit her in.

Syaoran, as the honest and straightforward boy he is, comments that probably what Sakura wants to tell Akiho will be a shock for her twin, Sakura doesn't deny that but confidently replies that knowing her, she'll accept the situation just fine. Syaoran wonders if that will really be the case since she doesn't have magic (he poses the uncomfortable but necessary questions), he's evidently worried she might feel somehow less for not being blessed with that gift....and here Sakura replies something that I publicly thanked CLAMP for on my twitter account, because it was time for a character to spell it out:

JP: (Yes), because Akiho-chan is...a very kind and strong person.

Kind, because she would accept whatever concerns her dear sister with the purest heart, devoid of any jealousy. And strong, because she'd be able to withstand the inevitable feeling of comparison that would ensue. Yes, because Akiho IS strong. She's resilient. She wouldn't have survived her trauma and abuse if she wasn't strong. She wouldn't have that single crumb of information about her parents that connects her with them, if she didn't keep stubbornly insisting with her clan to tell her something about them. She wouldn't have stubbornly insisted when she saw her most important person shutting a door in her face because he couldn't share his burden with her. I beg you to not reduce her character to just a girl we should pity on, because she's nothing like that. Let's drop the narrative she's "passive" right now. Otherwise when we'll see what is probably about to happen, she'll seem "out of character" for you. When she's always been like this, all along. Syaoran comments that Sakura really trusts Akiho, and wonders if it's because they're twins... Again, Sakura shows how wonderful she is, but most importantly, how her emphathic nature helps her amplifying her foretelling powers without even realizing it. Because she makes a very relevant comment: JP: "Even if she weren't my twin, I'd still believe in her. Because feelings and emotions aren't measured with time"

Again, let me clap my hands till they hurt. Because I can't count how many times, along the years, I've seen Sakura's bond with Akiho being dismissed or questioned just because they've been knowing eachother for short time. "Why does she fusses about Akiho so much? She's barely arrived shortly ago!" This is Sakura crossing the T's and dotting the I's for everyone. The value of her bond with Akiho isn't measured with the length of time they've spent together. If she feels she loves her very much despite knowing her since short time, that love is true and genuine nonetheless. As for someone who's able to experience very strong bonds with people in short time, what Sakura says here feels extremely validating on a personal level, too.

This reminds Sakura that she wants to talk to Akiho about someone else too....with a blush, she says she wants to tell her about Syaoran, how they met, how he's always coming to her rescue, and also...that he's her most important person ❤️ (the trademark definition!)

And here Ohkawa is finally paying her dues by writing this cute lovey dovey moment between SyaoSaku in the chapter, where the two lovebirds hold hands (scandalous!! 😂) and share a romantic forehead touch that shows an intimacy that is unrivaled by what we've seen of them till now, while Sakura says (with a hint of sadness?? Am I imagining things, or are her intuitive powers at work again?) that she would like to hear from Akiho about her most important person too. Yeah. I would like to hear about that too....

And as if to say "WELLLL, ABOUT THAT-" Sakura suddenly falls into a dream-state, and guess who she finds in front of her, in a scene that is a complete reference to a panel from chapter 6?

YEA, you guessed it, it's MCF!! 😂 our Mysterious Cloaked Figure just can't avoid bothering Sakura even in her new, rewritten, happy life, but lo and behold, when Sakura asks them who they are, they remove their hood without any drama!! And who could it be under that hood? Dear CCS fans, this chapter was shorter than usual with just 25 pages, but oh my gosh, if it didn't end up with a surprising cliffhanger that actually makes you go "WHY DIDN'T I THINK OF THAT BEFORE?" 😂

Young Lilie to the rescue!

A young Lilie stands in front of Sakura, introducing herself:

"I'm Lilie. I've crossed [time] and [dreams] to meet you"

Oh my gosh how cute she is, smiling brightly as usual! 😍 Since here she's clearly Sakura's age, we can see how young Lilie used to have her hair slightly longer than her daughter Akiho at the same age. ❤️ What is happening here? For those confused, or who aren't familiar with CLAMP's other manga, I'll copy-paste here what I've already written on my Twitter thread. What Lilie did here is customary in CLAMP's manga. People with lots of power are capable of crossing dreams, even in a different point in time. That's why Lilie says "I've crossed TIME and dreams to meet you". Lilie is already a Yumemi, so it isn't suprising at all that she can work her magic on dreams. She probably attempted this when she was still alive, of course, and about 13 (Sakura's age). Think of it as a "videocall from the past". Lilie is, at current state, of course still very much dead. She isn't revived or anything. This is a "communication" Sakura received from Lilie from the past, because of course she already knew how things could go and she made sure to reach out and help however she could. Remember Clow at the Final Judgement? He also left a "message" for Sakura from when he was still alive, through a dream. Time travel with your physical body might be another story altogether, but visiting people through their dreams is very "customary" in CLAMP's manga 😂

Now, we only need to see what Lilie will tell to our dear heroine. If she will spill the entire story, or if she'll give the necessary basic info but will wait for the girls, or rather, for her daughter to remember about Kaito on her own. Maybe with a little push. Of course I had already imagined (and even warmly called for) an intervention from Lilie, in some kind of way, but I guessed she would go talking to Kaito, as a ghost or something. That's where CLAMP surprised me again, making her go to talk to Sakura instead, and also revealing that MCF was her, or rather, one of the MCFs we have seen throughout the story. Because I'm still convinced that, basing on the scene, MCF wasn't the same person everytime. We have seen how sometimes it was Syaoran (and we'll probably find out why). Sometimes we have seen them outside Sakura's room, on a lamp post (and I imagine that one could've been really Akiho, maybe in a moment in her dreams when the artifact took control of her). We have a MCF often accompanied by a Dragon, we'll need to see who exactly that one is, too. Well, all in all, a few hours later I can say I digested this chapter a bit better, but man at first it was really hard. All this fluff, all this blushing, these warm feelings...people doting on Akiho, seeing her so happy....and I couldn't stop thinking about him....our Kaito who gave everything he could give of him to make this become true....where are you now...? ☹️ If I pause long enough to think about it, the stinging feeling comes back. I'm sure they'll come rescueing you soon. And you'll be so shocked, because the last thing you're expecting is that anyone would come searching for you. Claiming you back. Oh there's so much you're gonna learn, very soon, Kaito. And I can't wait to see it!!

Okay, let's now recap the next release dates for what concerns chapter 72:

April 1st, on CLAMP���s Youtube channel (digital, JP and other languages) April 3rd, on Nakayoshi (paper and digital, JP)

The situation is still the same with the digital releases, so for now we'll have to make do with reading the chapters on Youtube, first!

I remind you that there's also volume 14 getting released on March 31st! And on April 1st there's also SAKURA FES 2023!! Yay!! See you for next chapter and as usual my inbox is open for your asks!

[your-local-squip-fanatic]

Factoids on Lester Leander Belenus Papadopoulos BECAUSE THEYRE NEAT AND I DONT HAVE MY RESOURCES TO WORK ON CH 3 (feral goblin noises) also wtf is with me posting so much GOD

-To recap, he's from Rhodes, later moved to Athens, then New York. He's got the Greek accent too, but he eventually was able to switch back and forth from an American accent. Just don't ask him to say "she sells seashells by the seashore." He literally can't say it and it's painful to hear him try. Oh gods, dude stop you're embarrassing yourself...

-When I was still working on the AU early on (CHRIST, I think it'll be nearly 4 or 5 years now dayumn!) I had everything down for my characters, but the only one needing finished was Lester. I simply couldn't think of how his personality should be. So I decided to use myself as a base and go from there! Trust me, the similarities will be evident once I get to his introduction in Shatterverse! And maybe this explains why his music taste is very similar to mine haha

-Speaking of his character, during the early stages I made his father a rich movie producer just to allow me room to work until I could figure out what I really wanted to do. Now, just a normal... well, mostly normal family and Lester doesn't need to worry about looking normal. (Advice: making your first draft god awful is a good way to go, trust me.)

-Lester, due to the above, was also supposed to know Piper personally and even crush on her like the hopeless romantic he is. Obviously not the case anymore, but he went from acquaintance to friend of Percy, and possibly even having met Annabeth once!

-Lester's design originally was just a copy of the cover designs, but I wanted to make him more authentic about his Greek roots, and so I gave him darker skin. And to clear confusion, I draw Canon/ToA Lester/Apollo with a green tee and paler skin. DLAU Lester!Apollo has a smidgen more roundness in his biceps (that cute lil chub) and visible acne. DLAU Lester always has his red hoodie, but his thinness and sickly pale skin should identify him quickly!

-He can do 115° heat. Cannot do anything below 60°.

-Bonus round! He will eat pretty anything but he adores seafood, favorite color is red (not the case once the series is done MWAHAHAHA) and he cares so much. Like he will play nurse if you're sick, he will comfort you after a bad day, and he will FIGHT anyone picking on you. Granted he will most likely lose, but hes defending your honor buddy. This mf is 16 and he is such a SWEETHEART. Too good, too pure for this world

Guys as soon as I get access to my books I will start work on Ch 3. It's killing me more than you guys not having it.

[dragynkeep]

A concept artist for the new jl X rwby movie made a tweet showing that Yang's new fire powers have the exact colors of the lesbian flag but as a lesbian this is making me insane. I might be too nitpicky and reading too much into this. BUT....

To me, considering canon, Yang isn't a lesbian. But if she is, why can't RT just fucking SAY IT? If she is a lesbian, they SHOULD confirm it already like they did to Coco and Ilia instead of playing games. Same thing if she is bi/pan.

I'm not calling out a random concept artist especifically, I am talking about CRWBY in general. It sometimes feels like they don't want to confirm certain characters sexualities because they want to please everyone and if they confirm something that is not a popular headcanon or doesn't make sense for the fandom, they know people will get upset. But to me this is just harmful.

If Yang is supposed to be a lesbian who suffered from comphet, I think they did a terrible job at portraying this. If Yang was always actually bi/pan, they should confirm it instead of erasing her sexuality, and letting the fandom erase it as well. I think her sexuality could be open for interpretation but I am not even sure about that.

it's just weird that at this point we've had multiple sapphic characters confirmed but they seem to be dancing around the issue with yang & it's like, why? she's canonically mspec, the least they could do is put the lesbian hopes to bed because there's no way in hell these cock brained losers are going to make the main girl they designed as the "bombshell", with all three main creators having admitted to some form of sexual thoughts about, into a lesbian.

& considering how rare bi4bi couples are in media, bees being so would actually go against the grain for once instead of what their fans claim they actually do time & time again.

either way, no one should be listening to a concept artist for a noncanon movie, especially when there was complete silence when an animator put forward the pan yang headcanon (which was retweeted & approved of by miles btw) yet never seems to count as "evidence."

at this point i wish they would just confirm her one way or another. it's not going to stop people's ships either way (& it shouldn't after years of a big fat question mark surrounding her sexuality) but it would at least stop this jerking around concerning yang. but then again it took them 10+ years to confirm blake's sexuality once & for all beyond her loser va's say, so 🤷‍♀️

[pollywiltse]

Evidently my half-joke about André wanting the motto "Love and Glory" but being forced to go with "No Rival" instead so he went "screw you" and gave it back to himself when he made that booklet for Peggy Chew was someone's actual theory. Also I will be referring to the "No Rival" design as a pair of belligerent chickens from now on. (Also I hope she's exaggerating about it being displayed close enough to a window that the ink has almost completely faded because holy fucking shit Cliveden you should know better. You're a museum.)

No one has any idea what exactly is going on with that drawing because first of all if you see a colored reproduction/the original, it's clear that it's a knight of the Blended Rose, plus since it was for Peggy Chew and he was her knight, why would he have drawn someone other than himself (plus Captain Watson was the head of the knights of the Burning Mountain and should have had two squires), but the motto on that shield isn't the one that he's supposed have had, it's the one that Captain Watson had. So everyone's confused and it's not like we can ask him. (Or can we? Break out the ouija board!)

I'm curious about how they worked who got what motto and what girl and so on because I'm not sure whether you can claim that André escorting Peggy Chew says anything about his relative feelings for her compared to his other girlfriends, because on the one hand it was a performance plus it was political rather than just André throwing a big party because he liked parties (I think the politics - and the bit where this wasn't just André's show - may be something the Ronald bio actually goes into; we'll see if he gets his conspiracy theories all over it though), so he could have been paired with her for reasons that had nothing to do with his feelings, especially since I don't think any other knight is assumed to be paired with his favorite girlfriend. On the other, he was heavily involved in organizing it, so he probably could have been all "yes I will take this one thankyouverymuch" and everyone else was like "fine, let him have his girlfriend".

(I mean, I think you can argue that he was a little seriously into her based on the poem he gave her when the British left. I just don't know if you can do it based on the Mischianza.)

[shiningdesignersreflections]

Chapter 2: Moonlit Memories

Narrated by Jiang Xitong.

Narrator: The venue was decorated in the manner of an ancient study, with a painting of the Lunar Goddess lying on a wooden desk.

Narrator: To its left is an exquisite jade paintbrush rack; to its right a sleek bamboo flute. Really adds to the atmosphere.

Narrator: A set worker approaches me with my outfit for the filming.

Narrator: The colors... and the patterns on the cuffs... I sigh. Whoever designed this doesn't know a thing.

Jiang Xitong: No, thanks.

Staff: But Director Jiang...

Jiang Xitong: I happen to have on me an outfit I designed recently. It'll fit this scenario perfectly.

Staff: I see. You're always prepared indeed.

Narrator: After I get changed, the director starts explaining my part to me.

Director: We know you're very busy, Ms. Jiang, so we decided to leave your parts 'til the end.

Director: Let's see... It's pretty simple. All you need to do is walk to the desk and pick up the painting. You'll be done in a jiffy.

Jiang Xitong: Thank you.

Narrator: I give the script a quick read. It's about the moon festival... the Lunar Goddess... and her bunny...

Narrator: A strange sentence catches my attention. I scowl.

Choose either "What's wrong?" or "Lunar Goddess and her bunny?"

If "wrong," ...

You: Is something in the script inaccurate?

Narrator: I wouldn't say it's a matter of accuracy.

If "bunny," ...

You: Lunar Goddess and her bunny? I think I've heard of that tale before.

Narrator: I really hope the tale you heard isn't anything like the version I'm seeing right now.

--

Director: Is there an issue with the script, Ms. Jiang?

Jiang Xitong: ...

Jiang Xitong: Let's just begin.

Narrator: Following the script, I read out my lines.

Jiang Xitong: "There are several versions when it comes to myths about the Lunar Goddess. I'm sure you've heard at least some of them."

Jiang Xitong: "But the most popular one of all is about the Lunar Goddess, her companion, the jade rabbit boy, and their... love affair?"

Narrator: I couldn't help stumbling over the term a bit.

Director: Well done! Continue.

Narrator: The director didn't even notice me cringe.

Narrator: I walk to the desk, following the script. The camera zooms in on the ancient Lunar Goddess painting.

Narrator: In the painting, the Goddess stands above a cloud, clad in a luxurious gown, a white rabbit in her arms.

Narrator: She wears a gentle smile, seeming to be graceful yet amiable. Looking at her, I suddenly recall the moment when I heard the story about the Lunar Goddess for the first time.

Narrator: It was when I used to snuggle up to my grandma on foggy, moonlit nights, demanding to be told stories.

Narrator: Grandma told me there was a goddess who lived on the moon. She helped bring messages between people who missed each other.

Narrator: She wore a soft, friendly yet awe-inspiring smile. It reminded me of the first time I heard the tale of the Lunar Goddess.

Narrator: "The moon is bright. Oh, how I yearn on this frosty night..."

Narrator: The moon in the clear sky is a symbol that represents the yearning people have for each other.

Narrator: It was how I imagined ancient Cloud Empire was like at first: a nation watched over by the moon.

Narrator: I couldn't find reliable records on the Lunar Goddess in any of the books I went through, but I knew I was getting close.

Narrator: So I really couldn't let this ridiculous "Lunar Goddess and bunny lover" thing go on.

Jiang Xitong: "In fact, myths aren't supposed to sound like tales of idle gossip."

Jiang Xitong: "Myths are evidence of history, of the beauty unique to a specific time period."

Narrator: That is what I said.

Staff: Huh?

Staff: I don't think that was in the script, Director...

Narrator: The crew began to whisper. I didn't even spare them a glance. Instead, I picked up the flute and played a tune.

Jiang Xitong: "In legends, the Lunar Goddess was an esteemed landowner back in ancient Cloud Empire."

Jiang Xitong: "During that era, songs with alternating lyric lengths were popular."

Jiang Xitong: "Many of such songs were therefore themed on the Lunar Goddess. Crescent Moon, the one I just played, for example..."

Narrator: The filming continued. The director didn't try to stop me.

Narrator: When I returned to the office, it was already time to get off work.

Choose "I thought you just needed to show up?"

You: I thought you just needed to show up?

Narrator: Yes, but I can't sit and watch Cloud Empire tradition be portrayed in such a way in a promotional video.

Chapter 1

Chapter 3

[floralovebot]

Hope you don’t mind me asking but…What do you think Riven is supposed to be in terms of coded Race or ethnicity?

When it comes to winx club and what race each character is supposed to be (or at least be coded as), its genrrally not very hard to guess. Like the winx are obvious because they’re directly modeled after real celebrities, but the specialists are a little less obvious, though still fairly easy to guess. Sky and Timmy are generally assumed to be white, it’s fairly certain amongst fans that Helia is supposed to be Asian, Nabu is South Asian, and Brandon…well he’s a little on the ambiguous side but I’ve seen a good amount of people headcanon him as Latino….and y’know what…as a latina, I’ll take it along with the canon rep that Flora (and MAYBE Stella??? I say that cause Cameron Diaz is of Cuban descent on one side, so it’s possible Stella could be read as a white passing/half Hispanic/Latina) gives us.

However with all that, Riven is really unclear to me. I see headcanons vary from him being asian, latino, white, or a mix of at least two of those…and Idk what to think tbh.

LOVE THIS

And honestly, this might be a disappointing answer, but the truth is that his race is fully ambiguous in every way possible. Sometimes fans say "ambiguous", but what they really mean is "definitely true, but not explicitly canon". For example, Nabu is South Asian in that kind of ambiguous way, where it is very, very clear, but not explicitly stated. (And let's be honest, the only reason some fans consider Nabu ambiguous is because he's dating Aisha, a black woman, and they can't imagine a non-black dark-skinned man dating a black woman, but I digress...)

Riven's race, however, is actually ambiguous in its true definition.

We don't know what planet Riven is from. It's never stated or even implied. We don't know where his family is from. It's never stated or implied. We don't know anything about his culture, how he was raised (outside of likely poor and single-parented), where he lived, if he had any friends, etcetc. Compared to other characters, we really don't know much about Riven's background other than his mom left him.

Sometimes people try to figure it out. Some people use his eye shape as evidence for him being Asian, despite the fact that other canonically non-Asian characters also have more narrow eyes (Flora being the best example). Some people use his hair color as evidence that he's from Zenith, but that really means nothing when it comes to his race, and Tecna being white isn't a good defense for that. Some people use his eye color being purple and Musa's eye color being purple as evidence that he is Asian, but considering Helia's eye color is blue and there are most definitely non-Asian characters with purple eyes too, that also means nothing. He never wears culturally significant or identifiable clothing. And no, I don't think his British flag shirt is anything more than Rainbow trying to make them look fashionable and trendy.

Riven's race is truly ambiguous. His racial identity can actually be read in more than one way. And honestly, I think this lends itself to a very impactful reading on his character as a whole. We know that Riven didn't have the best childhood. We know that he doesn't have a relationship with his mother, and he never brings up his father or anyone else in his family. It's very heavily implied that Riven's relationship with his family is rocky at best and nonexistent at worst.

Now obviously, in real life, someone having a bad relationship with their family doesn't just erase their genetics. That's true even in winx club - Musa has a fraught relationship with her father for the better part of season 1, but we can still tell she's East Asian. That being said, winx club is a fictional, animated show with drawn and intentionally designed characters. Just like Flora is designed to look sweet and girly, Riven is designed to look mysterious and angsty.

I truly believe that as an audience, we're not supposed to know much about his past, and in winx club, that includes his family, his planet, and subsequently, his race and ethnicity. Riven can be seen as Asian, White, mixed, Latino, Hispanic, mostly whatever you want, and that's on purpose. Whether or not that decision is Good is debatable, but I truly do think that was Rainbow's intention with him. He's meant to be seen as mysterious in season 1, and for Rainbow, that typically translates to knowing as little about a character's true self as possible.

Personally, I do prefer asian!Riven, but that is fully just a headcanon, and any "implication" I could find in canon is going to be dubious and easy to interpret differently. To bring back a previous point, I could say his eye shape is proof that he's Asian, and many people have, but that would mean that Flora, Palladium a la glow up design, Lucy, and Thoren are all also Asian. I could try to say that him having purple eyes is proof that he's Asian, but that would mean that Roxy is also Asian (which I would actually love but considering both of her parents are canonically white, she isn't). And tbh, these are the only solid, consistent things about his character that could be seen as proof of him being Asian coded, and that's not great in comparison to characters like Musa, Nabu, or Helia. Like,, there's a reason people make entire essays on Nabu's hair, clothing, parents, class, magic, etc, and not just one-off posts about the shape of his eyes. There's a lot to work with and a lot about him that actually correlates to being South Asian. Only being able to cite Riven's eye shape is pretty shoddy when you compare him to all the other "ambiguous" characters who have a lot more evidence supporting their coded race.

Trying to make any I'm Right statement about his race or ethnicity is always going to fail, at least regarding the first three seasons, because he doesn't have any significant or consistent racial coding. Even his characterization doesn't mean much when most, if not all, of the tropes he fits into are not race-specific, and any racial stereotype he could have can all be written off as him filling the angsty/minor antagonist/redeemed character tropes.

Anyway, again I realize this probably isn't the answer you wanted. I would love to do a full meta explaining the intricacies of his racial/ethnic coding, but he really just,,, doesn't have that. And again, we could totally have a discussion on whether or not this is even Okay; if Rainbow making his race ambiguous so he seems more mysterious is Wrong or Offensive in some way. But the truth is that Riven's race is ambiguous, and that's on purpose.

[shnowyfox]

all my mlp ocs in order of creation

DayDreamBreeze. also my original gamertag on minecraft! i uhm. shes not supposed to be a cheese changling. She's inspired by a fluttershy toy i had and the beautiful artwork for the honey queen chrysalis from ink rose's interpretation of her backstory. i swapped the honey for water and she's supposed to be a pegasus? but i drew her as a changling here for some reason and i have no clue why

Casey Cockatrice. Seeing pony youtubers discuss the show in their oc form, and thinking "wow, they're all just pegasi" i was like "i should do that but not be a pegasus" so i made an oc and never did that lol. probably a good thing though. anyhow. Casey was originally supposed to be an angel cockatrice but I didn't know how to do that without just making a chicken with a lizard tail until just now im realizing i should make it a dutchie omg. Casey enjoys the ponies and wants to befriend them but is confined to the everfree forest, so she has dawned a blindfold so she doesnt hurt anyone and she likes to hang out with zecora and collect herbs with her. she still just kinda does chicken/dragon things most of the time like pecking at the ground and sitting on treasure. The ring in her comb is supposed to be a halo. halos stuck in the character's design physically (usually through the hair or something similar) was a common thing i did for characters that were close to me at the time.

Lemon Lily. She is. very bright. she was supposed to have a much more subtle color palette but i didnt do that and now she looks like sprite lmao. anyhow. i drew her randomly when i went through a small mlp phase a few years ago, mainly just attraction for chrysalis, but i guess she exists. her cutie mark is supposed to look like a water lily made of lemons but it kinda just looks weird idk. i'd say her talent is supposed to be like.. maybe floral arrangement? i think i had some inspiration from early mlp background ponies and i remember the florists were my favorite.

JASON!! my favorite little idiot. he's a griffin i made in pony.town after realizing if i use the singular freckle and closed the eyes, it looked like he had tiny eyes and angry brows lol. all i do with him is act vaguely like skydoesminecraft and boop people with my bird fingers.

DayDreamBreeze 2.0. i literally drew this bitch and didn't do anything else with them. ever.

then is autumn breeze whom i've drawn literally in like my last post so im not doing it again rn. she's my LOE pony and if you want her lore go to the post where i drew her on my phone.

Honey Suckle. The only OC that I have surviving evidence of actually writing their backstory and whatnot. They were created with the idea of them experimenting on their body trying to turn themselves into a bee (basically beeatris as a horse, i know none of you know my persona beeatris but its pretty much her without the demonic activity and disney fairy influence), though i have thought of maybe changing it to her wanting to become a breezy or a changeling. She lost her horn because of this experimentation and is fluffier and has patches of hair on her eyes because of it. i forgot if she had a cutie mark or if i just didnt draw it or if it's overgrown? I think a lot of this character's experimentation was based off of memories of my brother who had leukemia and tried experimental treatments, mainly the fuzziness he got from his chemo or steroids i forgot which one it was. I also drew her as a kirin, idk if that was supposed to be a thing of like.. me doing it as an alternate idea of what she's aiming to achieve, as an alternate form of what she was born as.. or if it was just a doodle.. but it was pretty cool. a good quote for her is the vine thats like "i am a wolf on all levels but physical"

Next is Pegasus. I originally had a different name for them but i don't think i can share it here. Pegasus is also related to my brother though and is very cool. they're really just a celestial body as a pony like Celestia and Luna, but with more of a crystal pony inspiration. also, they speak enchanting table only and i think thats really funny. same size as Luna. also, she can hide in Luna's hair.

Stone Hoof. based somewhat off of Smokey Quartz from Steven Universe, i thought it'd be cool to also give them speckling like an appaloosa horse or vitiligo. you can't see their cutie mark but it's supposed to be a yoyo and i put it in the shape of the symbol of leo since im a leo and i designed them on the same day as pegasus lol. they are intended to be a friend to Honey Suckle.

Finally, we have... I didn't name this one actually. uhm. well! it looks kinda like scootaloo, especially g3 or 3.5. which was unintentional but she was one of my favorite ponies and i had a few toys of her so it kinda makes sense that this is what my brain thought of when i thought "well loved my little pony doll". The hair is based off of the fettucine hair on those g4 plushies and also somewhat based on dreads. the patterns on their hooves is the heartshaped horseshoe from those promotional toys where you can scan them in for video game perks. and the wings are colored after discord's wings. I also got inspo from Stitches from Animal Crossing.

those are the horses. 1 like = 1 more horse post.

i also have customs i made as a kid that i dont have pictures of but i could redraw. but they're basically just "this character but i painted this animal on their face."

[beepboop358]

I'm the anon about the queerbaiting.. What I meant was it wouldn't be queerbaiting if Byler does NOT happen because all this queer coding would turn out to have been accidental. Yes I've seen your Byler slides and to me the only real intentional hints are those about Will being gay, and maybe having a crush on Mike. The rest could just be accidental, or a case of apophenia. For example the eyewitness parallel, I'm sorry I don't think the Duffers have even seen eyewitness. They usually reference movies in ST, not TV shows (see the Video Store Friday). (Also, every person claiming Mike is gay seem to have forgotten about his reaction to seeing El looking like a girl for the first time, with the dress and wig. I'm sorry but if anything, Mike is bi). But even then, my opinion is that the writers just wanted to depict a beautiful friendship between two boys and we took it to mean something else. That being said, maybe they realized the potential of this story and decided to actually go there in ST4, which is why I still have some hope for canon Byler. But I really don't think queer Mike was intended in S1,2,3 (and yes I've seen the evidence). Too many things would have been different if they wanted to go there, and we would have the same amount of hints for Mike than we have for Will (I'm talking in quality, not quantity). Thanks for answering these asks by the way :)

hi again anon!

I don't think there's any chance it's accidental because it's just so intricate, you know? And I really don't think it's apophenia because all that queercoding stuff I talk about in the slides, is really there in the show. We're supposed to pick up on it. I don't think we are turning this into something else at all, because all the stuff we claim as proof is not made up it's really there for us to see :) And there's just so much of it.... And this all has to go through several different departments, to even happen in the first place, so everyone on set knows about it. Like the art department has to know Mike is gay to put up that rainbow heart drawing and Will's drawing in El's room, set designers have to know Mike is gay to give him rainbow bedsheets, the costume designer has to know Mike is gay to code his clothing (like dressing him in the colors of the gay men's flag), the editors have to know Mike is gay to do the music coding, the writers obviously have to know he was gay to write him as queer coded, etc, etc, everyone involved in this production has to be on the same page, and that is how we end up with so much evidence and queercoding.

I think if they wanted to just depict Will and Mike as friends, they would not use rainbow imagery for both of them, and they wouldn't put their relationship into romantic contexts. Like paralleling Will and Mike to Dana and Venkman from ghostbusters in s2, and so much more :) That's an iconic 80's classic that almost everyone watching the show knows, it's a very visible romantic parallel with Mike & Will. Like they could have written the season so Mike and El were paralleled to Dana and Venkman, but instead they chose to have El away from Mike for pretty much all but 5 minutes of screen time. Also most of the slides are actually about Mike being queer coded, Will actually has less queercoding in the show, but because he has never shown any interest or attraction to girls, I think it's much easier for people to accept that Will is not straight, than accepting that Mike isn't either.

I totally understand what you're saying about Mike possibly being bisexual, and that's a very real possibility! I personally think he's gay rather than bisexual, because of how he acts in season 3 displaying comphet and internalized homophobia. I mean...that opening make-out scene in s3 is so queer coded towards Mike I still can't believe they did that LOL. The drawing of Will's on El's wall, the rainbow drawing with his name like the one in his basement in s1, taking her hands off him as they kiss, the "just a little more time could open closing doors, just a little uncertainty can bring you down" lyrics are just so GAY omfg. I read an article once (I forget where but I'll try to find it) where someone (it might have been the music director?) saying they search for the perfect songs for months, so that song was definitely intentionally picked for queercoding that scene. And hats off to the art director for those rainbow drawings in El's room and the drawings of Will's. Which a Netflix account recently confirmed, but has since deleted (sorry the quality is so bad, this is a screenshot of a screenshot of a screenshot that wasn't loading LOL)

You could be right the Duffers themselves haven't seen eyewitness, but someone on the writers team definitelyyyyy has. That parallel is so freaking close there is no way that wasn't intentional. It's pretty much exactly the same. And just because they normally use movies in the show doesn't mean they won't or can't use TV shows too, they use Dawson's creek (as found by kaypeace) in the show, to parallel Mike to Jack, the gay boy who is *currently* dating a girl, and Matt Duffer said he was obsessed with the show (her posts here and here)

The scene of the snowball in s2 when Mike sees El is very interesting, and there's so much coding in that scene, and when Mike sees El at the dance, his face doesn't scream head over heels, he looks shocked and surprised, and then uncomfortable...

I think Mike is very heavily queer coded in the first 3 seasons, and I think everything is perfect as is :) I don't think they are trying to tell a "straight forward" (ahaha) story about sexuality with Mike at all, I think it's supposed to be a little messy and confusing, because that's what Mike is experiencing. He's confused, real life is messy, and it's sometimes HARD to figure out your sexuality, so the show reflects that. Not everyone always knows. Will and Mike imo represent two completely opposite ways of coming to terms with your sexuality. I think Will has always known, and Mike hasn't.

And, things change because life changes. What once was will not always be, especially when you are a kid. Mike dating El or finding her attractive at one point, doesn't rule out at all he could be gay (bc comphet). It's hard to figure yourself out, and Mike's story is alllll over the map with that, perfectly so. Will has less quality and quantity of queercoding than Mike does, which is actually really surprising to me. Mike's queercoding is littered everywhere in the show, but Will's is only in a few scenes...I'm not sure why most viewers accept that Will is gay, but not Mike when Mike has even more queercoding than Will does.

But again, I respect if you or anyone has a different opinion than I do :)

thanks again for the ask! I hope you're doing good! xx

[bookishfeylin]

Hi again! Thank you for responding to my question and for being so sweet! <3 I'm new to your blog and have been scrolling through your posts and I feel so seen and safe here.

To answer your question, the reason I think Bryce is a WOC is because her biological father is white and her mother's skin color was never described. Her mother's description is very short and vague (long black hair, dark eyes, full lips) I think SJM did this intentionally to leave it up to the reader's imagination (If it's supposed to be her idea of representation, it's poorly done) But Bryce must have gotten her naturally tanned skin from somewhere, so I assumed her mom was either brown or black. There are only like two artworks of Bryce's mom and she has brown/tan skin in both of them so It's nice to know I'm not the only one who imagines her like that.

Aww, I'm glad you feel welcome here anon!

So based on your response, it seems like there are several issues at work here:

A) Fandom defaulting to view undescribed characters as white. Due to white supremacy nearly all of us (in the west, at least) default to believing a character is white when they aren't properly described. We are raised thinking of white people as the default human being, and sadly this has dangerous real-world ramifications, like doctors often struggling to identify signs and symptoms of some diseases on darker skin, because they were only taught how to do so on white people, and pulse oximeters (what we use to check oxygen levels in the hospital) being more likely to get incorrect readings on darker skin because they were designed with only white people in mind. This combination is deadly in healthcare. It's not intentional malice, it's simply our society so deeply entrenching in us that the default human being has pale white skin that we don't think about developing technology like pulse oximeters that work for dark skin, or expanding medical practices to correctly identify the symptoms of certain diseases on darker skin. It's systemic racism. So yes, we live in a society that teaches us all to view white people as the default human being, and people assuming Bryce and her mother are white when they very well could not be is a minor expression of that.

B) Stans and Sarah alike using Bryce to undermine POC when we discuss the racism in her books. Sarah's books do not... treat POC well. At all. I've discussed Sarah's racism, predominantly in the ACOTAR series, here, here, here, and here, but if you want more stuff about Throne of Glass specifically I recommend checking out @battlestar-royco's old posts tagged anti sjm/anti throne of glass from around 2018 or so. The point is, Sarah is not... well she ain't doing well in the diversity department, and it's one of the main criticisms she receives. And Sarah stans despise any criticism of her books or writing. So when Bryce was described as "golden skinned," some stans used that opportunity to insist Bryce was a woman of color, despite no textual evidence to indicate that, so no one was allowed to complain about the racist writing plaguing Sarah's books anymore. As you said, it may have been purposeful on Sarah's part, but not because she truly wanted to leave Bryce's race up to the imagination--but to deflect any criticism she's faced for her poorly written characters of color.

So it's a multifaceted issue. Bryce's race isn't ever fully elaborated on, so she can be imagined as a woman of color, and the fact that most people default to seeing her as white and pale regardless speaks to a larger culture that views whiteness as the default. But some stans argue that Bryce's mother's race not being elaborated on=a person of color=amazing representation. Which it's... decidedly not.