#i may have the most inconsistent art style ever

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Winter 2024 anime, Pt. 2: Mixed reactions, the bench, and the gems

hey y'all, this is also up on my ko-fi! it's free to read both here and there, but i'm struggling financially rn so i could appreciate if you'd throw a few bucks my way if you liked it! part 1 can be found here.

And we're back for part 2! Here's all the new stuff I finished this season, and one more I'll get back to later. As with before, these are sorted alphabetically within each category and are not ranked as of yet.

Also as before, the OP for each series is linked in the title. Check them all out if the header images aren't giving you the right feel for each show, but also check them out because most of them were actually pretty damn good this season.

[Solo Leveling OP voice] LET'S GET IT!

Mixed Bags:

Hokkaido Gals Are Super Adorable!

Your standard, quasi-harem “easily flustered Regular Guy wins over hot girls just by being really nice” shonen romcom. I really don’t have much to say about this one other than if you’ve seen My Dress-Up Darling, you’ve basically seen this already. The only thing that really sets it apart is the setting.

Tsubasa (voiced by Nobunaga Shimazaki, in a FAR cry from his turn as Mahito in Jujutsu Kaisen) is a straight-laced Tokyoite whose family situation lands him in a small city in the frozen boonies of Hokkaido. While looking for the bus to his new house, he runs into a gyaru in the snowy wild, the underdressed, hilariously-proportioned Minami, and they hit it off. It turns out they go to the same school, there are other cute girls there who take a shine to him as well, it’s nothing new.

I ultimately don’t have much to say about Hokkaido Gals, but I do have a soft spot for series like this, and after reading ahead in the manga I felt obligated to see it through. This is all junk food, but it’s all stuff you’ve seen done better in other series. I also have a soft spot for gyaru in anime and manga, and while I do like Minami just fine, she isn’t Marin Kitagawa or Rumiko Manbagi. I don’t really have it in me to recommend this show to many, though, at least not until another season rolls around, if that ever happens. The manga genuinely does get a lot better as it goes on, but the really worthwhile stuff may not happen until a third season, and I just don’t see that happening. 

The manga has issues that the anime isn’t willing or able to solve, chief of which being the visuals. The art style of the manga is wildly inconsistent, and getting a mediocre animation team on this didn’t help matters at all. While the colors often pop nicely against the pretty, snowy backdrops, nobody looks all that great overall. The characters are recognizable, but they just plain don’t look great a lot of the time, nor do they look consistent from one cut to the next; I said that Minami’s proportions are hilarious, but just as hilarious is how wildly they vacillate from one scene to the next for the sake of trying to titillate the viewer.

My biggest takeaway from both the manga and anime was everything I learned about Hokkaido in the process, and if the series is taking subsidies from the island’s tourism bureau, then it’s a job well done. I want some goddamn jingisukan now. The OP is a great time, though. I’m shocked it took over a decade for us to get a proper “Uptown Funk” knockoff in an anime.

Metallic Rouge

I’ll be upfront in saying that this was my biggest disappointment of the season by far. This show had so much going for it, and what we got was… ugh.

There was an unbelievable amount of promise from the outset: This was Studio Bones’ commemorative 25th anniversary production, and coming from the studio that gave us all-timer adaptations like Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood and Mob Psycho 100, not to mention later works from Cowboy Bebop creator Shinichiro Watanabe (including the Cowboy Bebop movie), you can’t fault anyone for having high expectations. It looked to be a fitting production as well: Watanabe’s influence shines through immediately in the gorgeous, lived-in cyberpunk off-world locales and racially diverse cast. Action takes the form of dope robo-tokusatsu transformation fisticuffs, and it’s entirely in 2D animation to boot. The first couple of episodes were killer, too; everything looked and sounded amazing, and there were just enough plot threads teased out that I just had to see how they’d unravel.

It brings me no joy, then, to say that Metallic Rouge collapses into a jumbled mess. I don’t even want to bother talking about what happens in the show because I don’t fucking care anymore. There are few media experiences more sobering than to have it dawn on you over a span of several weeks that ��oh… this isn’t actually all that good, is it?” Episode after episode piles on with sloppy lore, weak worldbuilding, warring factions whose names you immediately forget, pointless double-crosses, and the most predictable twist you’ve ever seen. For a while I was willing to accept the fact that I didn’t know what was going on half the time and expected things to become clearer, but now I’m not entirely sure the writers knew either. The stakes apparently kept rising and everything just kept getting more claustrophobic. I’m glad it’s over, if only because if I had to hear “Clair de Lune” one more fucking time, I was going to go ballistic. 

There are several attempts at emotional beats, as the story is rife with tragedy and sacrifice, and every single one lands with a wet thud. Nobody gets enough time, motivation, or characterization for any of these things to feel like they actually matter, and that’s especially a shame because the finale might have been able to stick the landing if the previous episodes were less dense and better paced. Emphasis on “almost,” though, because just before the season ends, we get the absolute most pointless fakeout I’ve seen since The Rise of Skywalker, which is the lowest point of comparison you can make for any work of sci-fi.

This is especially frustrating because on paper, there is so much to like here. Rouge and Naomi are likable-enough deuteragonists with a fun dynamic, and they’d make easy yuri bait in a better show. The characters are all pretty and uniquely designed across the board, and the overall aesthetic, almost a pastiche of late-90’s anime futurism, is undeniable. The toku suit designs are neat and several of the action scenes are gorgeous. The score and soundtrack are outstanding (except for the aforementioned Debussy indulgence). I have few complaints about how the show looks and sounds; the style is great! All of my issues lie with the substance.

Metallic Rouge may have had all the ingredients, but it just needed more time to cook; whether that would have been by doubling the episode count or by more carefully planning the pacing and trimming some of the fat from the lore, I’m still not sure. Probably both. It probably needed better writers, too. Maybe it just isn’t as smart as it acts and there was no way to satisfyingly resolve the clumsy civil rights allegories that bring it uncomfortably close to the likes of Detroit: Become Human. So all of the above, I guess. I tend to adore stories that involve artificially-intelligent beings developing their own wills and emotions and learning to cut their own strings (the likes of Blade Runner, Nier Automata, even a couple of character arcs in the Persona series), but this ain’t it. I’m not even mad anymore. I’m just disappointed.

If there are two positives that will stick with me, though, they would be the absolute banger of an OP and, of course, Naomi Orthmann herself (pictured above, left). Outstanding character design. I’m mildly obsessed. She deserved a better show.

The Unwanted Undead Adventurer

This one isn’t even worth talking about, so here’s a brief synopsis, then I’ll add some commentary, and then we’ll all move on with our lives. 

Rentt, a beloved but mediocre adventurer in a fantasy town, gets lost in the mysterious labyrinth that all adventurers explore for personal gain, gets waxed by a dragon, and awakens as a shitty-looking CGI skeleton. He notices, though, that he’s able to level up better as a skeleton than he did as a human, and with the more monsters he defeats, the more he evolves into something closer to human. The rest isn’t really worth discussing.

If I’m being honest, I should’ve dropped this show much sooner. It looks kinda lousy most of the time, the plot (inasmuch as there even is one) is boring, character designs are forgettable (except for Rentt’s closest ally, Lorraine, holy hell) and it seems wholly uninterested in actually building its own setting. If it returns for a second season, I won’t be there, nor will I feel like I’m missing anything. Each episode felt like a chore to watch. I probably only saw it through because 1) I liked looking at Lorraine, I know what I’m about, and 2) I didn’t want to lump it in with the shows I did drop. The Unwanted Undead Adventurer isn’t as patently upsetting or frustrating as those three, but it just plain isn’t a very good show.

The Witch and the Beast

This show could have been so much more. I was drawn in by the gorgeous character designs and intriguing blend of Victorian gothic aesthetics and architecture with modern infrastructure, and very quickly disappointed by just about everything else. The first episode is an exceptional proof of concept, and almost everything that follows is an upsetting showcase of what could have been.

The story centers around Ashaf, a languid, chain-smoking agent of the governing church with a big-ass coffin strapped to his back, and his partner Guideau, a snarling hyena in a young woman’s body, as they investigate abuses of magic across the continent in search of nefarious witches. Guideau in particular has a bone to pick with witches, as the body they presently inhabit is the result of a witch’s curse, and they remain in furious pursuit of the one who cursed them. The curse can be temporarily undone by a kiss with a witch, allowing Guideau’s true body, a hulking brute confined to the coffin, to escape and wreak havoc. Meaning that on a few occasions we get a girl-on-girl kiss followed by a big dude wrecking shit. There’s also other investigations of serial killings, necromancy, and a cursed sword, and here’s hoping you like those, because the coffin breaks are few and far between.

This wasn’t great! By the third episode I had the sneaking suspicion that the animation talent on hand just wasn’t enough to support the aesthetic. While the character designs are exceptional, almost everyone looks awful in any shot that isn’t completely focused on them. This is especially true of Guideau, who looks so inconsistently off-model from one shot to the next that I’m still not entirely sure what they’re supposed to look like, and that’s kind of unforgivable when we’re talking about a main character. Everything looks too dim and too shiny at the same time, and action scenes look like shit more often than they look interesting. I can see so many flickers of something excellent (or at least really good-looking) in Witch and the Beast, and everything else that keeps those flickers from actually igniting makes it so much more frustrating to watch. Maybe just read the manga instead; the panels I've seen from it were uniformly gorgeous.

Actually, yeah, you should probably just read the manga, because for a season of anime, the pacing is atrocious too. It’s clearly trying to angle for a monster-of-the-week format, but each of these mini-arcs is a little too dense for a single episode, so multiple episodes are dedicated to these one-off curiosities, most of which do nothing to advance the plot or show off what the show does best. And if one of them isn’t particularly interesting, you’re saddled with it for the next two weeks like you've been stuck munching on a mealy apple. And I know you can only adapt so much in a 12-episode season, but the decision to end the season on a flashback arc and a lore dump was baffling. That’s not world-building, that’s lazy, and it made the show’s existing pacing issues feel that much more inane.

I feel like I was sold a false bill of goods. I can only imagine how the mangaka feels about this. Dull and uninspiring all around. What a waste.

The Wrong Way to Use Healing Magic

Isekai, unassuming high school boy gains a unique power, impending war with the Demon Lord, yadda yadda yadda. The Wrong Way to Use Healing Magic isn’t anything new or special by any means, nor is it particularly well-animated or -paced, but at its best it’s silly and charming enough that it made a nice, brainless palate cleanser on Fridays.

Usato, your standard quiet high schooler, ends up walking home on a rainy evening with the popular, attractive student council president and VP, when an isekai portal happens. It turns out that it was just the seito-kai that was invited along for the ride (and President Suzune, as it turns out, is fucking psyched to get to be in an isekai), and Usato got caught along with them. When tested for magical aptitude, Suzune and VP Kazuki hit the jackpot with electric and light affinities, respectively, but things go awry when Usato’s reading turns up with healing magic. Terror strikes the palace as the intimidating dommy-mommy Captain Rose barges in to spirit Usato away from his new friends and into her squadron of goons to train him as a combat medic.

As character comedy goes, this one is actually pretty solid at times. Shogo Sakata is plenty of fun as the put-upon, lippy Usato (a much louder role than Chainsaw Man’s Aki Hayakawa), and Atsuko Tanaka (Major Kusanagi herself!) is a blast as the terrifying Rose, an uncompromising slave driver of a drill sergeant with a secret soft side. The dynamic between them is great, too; Usato is over Rose’s shit from the beginning and isn’t afraid to talk back to her, but before you know it, this transforms into friendly banter as Rose clearly takes a shine to Usato and knows he can handle any punishment she doles out. Suzune’s also a bunch of fun now that she’s broken away from having to be the competent, popular girl at school and gets to fully lean into being a complete dork.

Wrong Way also works decently as an isekai, because it makes an effort to stay rooted in high fantasy rather than fall back on JRPG mechanics, meaning there are no stat screens! It also avoids the trappings of wish-fulfillment isekai series by having Usato start out as a regular-ass guy; he’s not a Kirito type, just someone Rose sees as a rough gem in need of cutting. There are no cheat skills or OP weapons or anything, just a kid training every day to get stronger so he can protect the people close to him, and that’s the kind of anime protagonist you should want to be.

For better and for worse, I get serious mid-00s vibes from this one; watch the OP if you don’t believe me. Some of the colors pop uncannily in that early-digipaint-era way, and the animation is pretty middling; the most fluid animation we see is whenever Suzune is acting like a creep. Much like those mid-00s anime, though, Wrong Way may have benefited from being weekly (or twice as long) rather than seasonal. There’s a ton of planting with very little payoff, and it doesn’t feel like the actual scope of the story has even been addressed yet. We don’t even learn why the series has the name it does until someone literally says it aloud in the 11th episode. I may have to reevaluate this season after a possible second, if we ever get one, because this doesn’t stand too well on its own.

Of the anime in this “mixed bags” segment, I’d say I enjoyed Wrong Way the most, but it still had enough problems for me to keep it here. It’s not a particularly bad anime, but it’s not especially good either. I guess we can slot it into what Hazel refers to as “good mid.”

On Hold: 

Cherry Magic! Thirty Years of Virginity Can Make You a Wizard?! (three episodes watched)

Man, what a title. That was the main draw for this BL series, which on paper is basically a gay version of the Mel Gibson vehicle What Women Want. 

Adachi (a surname that will always make me laugh thanks to Persona 4), a gloomy salaryman, has hit the big 3-0 without getting any, and now he can somehow read anyone’s thoughts just by making physical contact with them. Just as he laments that this is his life now, he accidentally bumps into his handsome, popular coworker, Kurosawa, whom he learns has been harboring a massive crush on Adachi this whole time. Well dang, what now? Kurosawa’s a really nice, thoughtful dude, but Adachi’s never even thought about being with a man before! And isn’t there something wrong with already knowing this secret? How can he even go into the office and look Kurosawa in those big, handsome eyes… every single day…

What I’ve seen so far has been pretty solid, if not particularly well animated. The visuals are really my only gripe here; I just put it off for way too long and didn’t have it in me to finish it on time to actually get this thing written and published. Yaoi isn’t my forte, which feels like a shortcoming on my end as a fledgling bisexual, and I’ve already remarked on the solid LGBT representation this past season, so I do plan on hopping back on this one.

I gotta say, the co-leading voice actors put in serious work this season. Adachi is voiced by Chiaki Kobayashi, who continued his role as Stark in Frieren, returned to Mashle as Mash Burnedead, and contributed to Metallic Rouge’s cluttered cast as Noid. Kurosawa’s seiyuu, Ryota Suzuki (of whom I’ll always be a fan for his masterful turn as Yu Ishigami in Kaguya-sama), also held down leading roles in Bang Brave Bang Bravern and The Unwanted Undead Adventurer. They’ve been great in the few episodes of Cherry Magic! that I’ve seen so far, and they’ll be a huge part of what brings me back.

The Gems:

Bang Brave Bang Bravern

I feel like the mark of a perfectly audacious piece of media is in the moments where I find myself incredulously shouting “WHAT THE FUCK AM I WATCHING” at the screen, and Bravern made me do that at least once per episode. I have so many things to say about what makes this show great but all of it can be summed up as “it fucks so goddamn hard.”

A joint military exercise in Hawaii between Japanese and American mech pilots goes south as a sudden invasion by metalloid aliens portends certain doom for humanity. Just in the nick of time, though, a bombastic, autonomous mech named Bravern arrives from space and insists that ace pilot Isami Ao take his reins. Isami reluctantly agrees, and to his consternation, Bravern goes full tokusatsu on everyone’s asses, complete with fully-diegetic theme music, and keeps the threat at bay. With Bravern continuing to pester him to act as a pilot, Isami is forced to take up the mantle of a reluctant hero as everyone rallies around Bravern to save Earth. Tagging along is blond-haired, blue-eyed American pilot Lewis Smith, who gets to live out all of his Top Gun fantasies, right down to the latent homosexuality.

That last point isn’t a projection or anything: This show is legitimately gay as hell, and it rules. Bravern’s feelings towards Isami feel far more romantic than what you’d expect from a literal robot, and his description of how it felt to have Isami pilot him for the first time, as relayed to a grim-faced military council, is riddled with hilarious innuendo. Isami struggles not only with shouldering the burden of needing to be a hero to all of humanity, but also being beset on both sides by a loud, insistent mecha and a dewy-eyed gaijin, both of whom very well seem to want to get in his pants. Intricate rituals punctuate Isami and Lewis’ angsty relationship as these broad-shouldered, muscular men grow ever closer. It’s also worth reiterating that Isami is voiced by Ryota Suzuki, who also voiced Kurosawa in Cherry Magic!, and that may not have even been his gayest role this season. I’m not super well-versed in mecha as a genre, but I do know that there’s a lot of Warrior’s Bond-type stuff in these series, and Bravern lays it on thick. And hard.

This show looks killer, by the way. CGI implementation in 2D anime is still a touchy subject, but Bravern features some of the best I’ve ever seen. Simple cel-shading goes a long way to the point where, outside of some uncanny motion, Bravern himself feels perfectly blended into the hand-drawn animation. Mecha designs range from realistic military-style tech to otherworldly sentient robots, and battle sequences run the same gamut as the stakes rise. As goofy as all of the above may sound, it’s committed to being a grandiose, big-time mecha showcase.

This is as good as camp gets in anime; Bravern does for the mecha genre what Akiba Maid War did for yakuza film pastiche (I have also heard positive comparisons to Samurai Flamenco, which I’ll have to get on ASAP). It’s an excellent mecha show in its own right, and wildly hilarious to boot. Bravern himself is very genre-savvy and seemingly a bit of an otaku himself; he loves acting like a mecha hero, to everyone else’s chagrin. Several of the villains (also mechanical beings, voiced by an all-star seiyuu roster that includes Kenjiro Tsuda, the aforementioned Atsuko Tanaka, and Rie Kugimiya) are total dorks themselves. A CIA interrogator tries to waterboard a mecha at one point. Bravern is a deeply silly show, but its heart is planted as firmly on its sleeve as its tongue is in its cheek: For as wacky as it can get, the story still unfolds with a straight face and excellent emotional beats. 

This show also has the most unskippable ED of any anime since Chainsaw Man dropped a new one every week. I will not say what happens. You cannot predict what it is. Just watch it. One of the top YouTube comments on that video says “When I saw this ending after episode 2, I thought I was going crazy.” That’s a ringing endorsement.

Chained Soldier

On the heels of 100 Girlfriends completely rewiring my brain, I was raring for some more good old-fashioned anime trash. I was told that there would be plenty this season, but you can consult the “dropped” section to see how well that worked out for me. Chained Soldier came with some significant hype, and soon enough into the first episode I realized that I’d actually skimmed through this manga before (don’t ask why), so I was on board immediately. Now here’s some nice trashy fun.

The world is in peril thanks to creatures called Shuuki that can advance on our world via portals from another dimension. Women primarily lead the charge against these monsters, as this dimension produces a special fruit that can lend them (and not men) otherworldly powers to help them in the fight. Yuuki, a perfectly normal young man, ends up in grave danger as he stumbles into a portal, where he is saved by the beautiful Kyouka, a commander who is able to subjugate Shuuki at will and use them to fight others. In a bind, she asks Yuuki if she can subjugate him, which he agrees to by licking her finger and transforming into a monster himself, at her beck and call. Because of his utility in battle, Yuuki is enlisted into her squad of baddies (and also an 11-year-old), living in their home as a caretaker and answering directly to Kyouka as her “slave.”

I know. Hear me out.

I put “slave” in scare quotes because Chained Soldier fortunately isn’t going full Shield Hero on us; this arrangement has a give-and-take baked in. See, every time Yuuki completes his service, Kyouka (or whomever else takes advantage of this anomaly) is compelled to carry out whatever suitable “reward” springs from his unconscious, and this is where the ecchi kicks in. Sometimes it’s a kiss, and sometimes it’s something a little more; the reward corresponds to the length and intensity of Yuuki’s contributions to battle, so the heat can turn up in the form of, say, clothed face-sitting, a good scrubbing in the bath, or some nice, casual CBT. All of this is to say that “slave” is a bit of a buzzword here: It’s more of a dom/sub situationship with a lot of extra steps.

Yes, just about everything that isn’t an action setup is full-on harem trash, and Chained Soldier lays it on thick, right down to full-on nudity. Nothing about this show resembles high art, but I can’t help but admire such a high level of commitment to its aesthetic, including the sleaze. It fully commits to the bit and doesn’t even bother lampshading its own trashiness. Chained Soldier knows what it’s about, and I respect that. It also has the good sense not to sexualize the youngest girl, which is a point in its favor that I can’t award a couple other shows previously discussed.

And while this show is plenty fun, the action sequences often excellent, and the character designs usually delightful, there’s not actually a whole lot going on here. As I said with Mashle, I know that battle manga like this can take a minute to really get cooking, and as I said with Witch and the Beast, 12 episodes may not always be a sufficient runtime to adapt enough to break ground, but the debut season feels more like a proof of concept than anything else. That being said, Chained Soldier’s manga has a very effusive audience, and its praises don’t seem to entirely be about the boobs and butts, so I’ll wait patiently for the second season. I think it’s earned that much.

Delicious in Dungeon

This is the one I’m having the hardest time writing about because it so confidently and so completely speaks for itself that anything I could add would feel like scattering sawdust at the beach. Dungeon Meshi (I refuse to call it by its official English title) is a widely beloved manga among those who’ve read it, and for Studio Trigger to do an honest-to-goodness manga adaptation for the first time might as well be front page news among anime fans. 

The story follows Laios, the deeply weird human hero, as he delves back into a bizarre and mysterious dungeon to rescue his sister Falin from the belly of a dragon, along with his misfit party: The neurotic half-elven mage Marcille, the temperamental halfling rogue Chilchuck, and the dwarven warrior-slash-chef Senshi. The party is frequently low on supplies, so to survive the trip they’ll need to subsist on the most abundant resource in the dungeon: Monsters. Senshi’s aptitude in the kitchen helps ensure that everything is edible and sufficiently tasty, regardless of how nasty the monster it came from may have been. With monster obstructions out of the way and their bellies filled, our party delves deeper into the dungeon as the mysteries deepen in kind.

I love the character dynamics in this so goddamn much. Marcille and Chilchuck are frequently put off by the dubious monster food presented to them, but their consternation is worsened by the fact that Laios’ fascination with the monsters it came from annoys the shit out of them. I referred to him as “deeply weird,” but that doesn’t begin to describe his absolute galaxy brain, and I mean it as a term of endearment. Laios is deeply knowledgeable and curious about the fauna in the dungeon, and not just how they taste: He is vocally curious about how certain monster attacks may feel, sings along with siren songs, and even keeps a hardcover bestiary inside his breastplate. He’s one of those people you turn to if you have a question on a hyperspecific subject, but you have to be careful how you ask it or else you’re trapped for the next two hours. And I love him for it.

Even putting the comedy aside, there is a fascinating human element at play in Dungeon Meshi, and I can tell that that surface has barely even been scratched yet. Marcille is just as dogged in her pursuit of saving Falin as Laios is, maybe even moreso (remember what I keep saying about LGBT representation this season?). Chilchuck continues to convince himself that he’s only in the job for his own personal gain, but you can see that mask slipping. And I still wanna know what Senshi’s deal is. Even with the five major players I listed, there’s an increasingly deep roster surrounding them—showcasing a broad spectrum of races and ethnicities, both real and fantastical—each with their own histories and motivations, and I cannot wait to see how they play out and interact with one another. There seem to be much deeper themes at play here as well as we learn more about perceptions and grudges between differing races, oppositional magics, clashing ideologies, and the monetary incentives that drive both the dungeon’s exploration and its very existence. I’m here for it.

I’ve been holding off on reading the manga until the season is up in June (though I could crack any day), but I know a loving adaptation when I see one. Not that Trigger ever slacks off in the animation department, but they absolutely brought their A-game here. Everyone looks bouncy and cartoony in the way only Trigger can pull off while still looking as close as possible to Ryoko Kui’s source material (as far as I can tell). As with Frieren, the action sequences aren’t frequent, nor are they entirely what the show is about, but they look incredible every single time. And the food, of course, looks incredible, no matter how weird. This is practically a cooking anime and a fantasy dungeon anime at the same time, and both aspects are visually on point at all times.

I’m obviously speaking from my own bubble as one of the six people who still use Tumblr in 2024, but I rarely see new anime make a splash like this on social media every single week, and the ones that I do are usually the monster shonen hits like Chainsaw Man or Jujutsu Kaisen. Dungeon Meshi deserves the exposure and success it’s attained, and I’m excited to see it continue. I’d easily slot this right up there with Bravern as one of the best new anime of the season.

A Sign of Affection

I’ve seen a hell of a lot of shonen slice-of-life romances in the past year and change, so a nice fluffy shoujo like this was an excellent palate cleanser. There were a hell of a lot of Big Action Setpieces and panicky teens and grim dungeon crawlers this season, and at the end of the week I wanted to unwind with a bunch of pretty twenty-somethings falling in love with each other.

The show centers on Yuki, a young woman living with congenital hearing loss, making do at a public college after growing up at a school for the deaf. Though she’s able to get by with LINE messages and lip reading, she’s unprepared when a foreigner asks for help, but she’s saved by a handsome and mysterious young man named Itsuomi. He’s able to help out, and takes an interest in her when he realizes his fellow undergrad is deaf, and Yuki takes an interest in kind because he’s really goddamn hot. It turns out that he’s a polyglot and an avid world-traveler, but sign language is not in his purview. This mutual interest sparks the concern of her childhood friend, Oushi, one of the few people in her life who already use sign language, who wants to be sure that nothing untoward is happening. And it isn’t, because this is just a really lovely, low-stakes romance story.

This is pure, unfiltered shoujo at its best. Yuki’s internal monologue is peppered with flowery prose, and everything and everyone looks soft and beautiful. Fashionable, doe-eyed women and pillowy-lipped ikemen abound (seriously, holy shit, the lips on these boys) as the scope widens and the main love interests’ friends explore their own possible love stories. Itsuomi is very much of the “mysterious boy” archetype you’ll find in romance stories in this demographic, but he’s not hiding any sort of dark past like you’d typically expect; he’s just an interesting guy who keeps his personal life close to the vest. He’s a self-appointed world citizen who loves learning about how people of all cultures live their lives, and in Yuki he sees someone within his home turf who happens to live in her own world entirely. And it’s easy to see his forward behavior with Yuki as infantilizing at first (Oushi sure does, and I’ll get back to him in a second), but as they grow closer Itsuomi quickly becomes much more considerate of her boundaries and learns to accommodate her as he studies sign language and gestures that help ensure her comfort. This is a story about Yuki’s horizons broadening just as much as it is about Itsuomi wanting to be let into Yuki’s narrow world, and that sort of synergy makes for some exceptional romance.

A Sign of Affection deserves some credit for refusing to shy away from Yuki’s disability and making a point of depicting her world as one that does little to accommodate her. Very few people in her daily life ever bothered to learn sign language, she relies on a friend to take notes during lectures, and work is hard to come by. It’s an honest depiction that makes an effort not to be exploitative, which is a breath of fresh air. Not only that, but there’s some interesting meta-commentary in there: The only major conflict in the story stems from Oushi’s jealousy, and his reservations about Itsuomi possibly “taking advantage of” Yuki almost feel like he believes that he’s the only one who knows what’s best for her just because he’s done the bare minimum to accommodate her. He thinks he’s coming from a good place, but he winds up accidentally infantilizing her in exactly the way he thinks Itsuomi might. That’s a particularly interesting bit of irony!

I’ve seen enough shonen-oriented romcoms where an unassuming Regular Guy gets flustered as a way-too-casual girl pushes his buttons (hell, I’ve already reviewed two of those this season), so it’s nice to see the formula flipped for a shoujo as Yuki and her best friend Rin blush and squee over Itsuomi and his coworker Kyouya, respectively. A Sign of Affection isn’t afraid to get a little silly with it, either; plenty of these moments are punctuated by characters’ faces going low-detail or full chibi, and they are cute as shit every single time.

This one was just cozy as hell. If you’re into this sort of thing, swaddle yourself in it and bask.

Solo Leveling

I let this one collect dust after the third episode and didn’t pick it back up until the season was almost up, and honestly, I was kinda dreading it: The trailers didn’t look too promising, the show was slow to start, and it looked like yet another derivative JRPG-style dungeon crawler that managed to get popular. Turns out, nah, this show actually kinda fucks and the web novel series and webtoon it’s based on are popular for a reason. The story is nothing special, don’t get me wrong, but it’s a perfectly serviceable turn-your-brain-off action spectacle with a bit more lying beneath the surface.

In a modern-day South Korea where portals to mysterious dungeons open up and threaten the populace, those who can brave the dungeons, known as hunters, are an invaluable human resource. Once someone is assigned a grade as a hunter, they have that grade for life, barring some rare occurrences. Sung Jinwoo is at the lowest rung on that ladder as an E-rank, incapable of improvement, assigned the epithet “the weakest hunter of all mankind.” He mostly shows up to portal raids as a warm body to fill a quota, and one such job goes haywire as most of the raid party, Jinwoo included, is brutally slaughtered in an arcane secondary dungeon within a portal. He somehow wakes up in a hospital, unharmed, and able to access a digital menu before his eyes that exhorts him to do the One Punch Man workout every day, lest he incur punishment. He gets hilariously chadly in the span of a few days in the hospital, including an inexplicable haircut, and finds access to dungeons only he can enter and levels up within this new system.

This one gets off to a slow start and may have benefited from a longer premiere like Oshi no Ko or Frieren, but once the table is fully set, Solo Leveling really starts to cook. Jinwoo’s titular leveling process is a blast from one fight to the next, and as he moves to work in the dungeons that other hunters can access, it turns out he’s been training with the weights on. He’s suddenly fighting way above his pay grade, and after staving off attacks from hunters taking advantage of portals for nefarious ends, he is recruited by an ambitious corporate scion to make some real coin and establish an independent association of hunters.

While it can feel like there’s a whole bunch of table-setting between portal sequences, it’s some smart worldbuilding on Solo Leveling’s end to establish how portal hunting became a central pillar of this society, and doubly so how political and capitalist interests can leave a wide berth for corruption and bad actors. If there’s money to be made in hunting, of course people will find ways to make even more at the expense of others, both at the corporate and individual levels. There’s a lot of talk in there about “survival of the fittest” and “natural selection” and that… makes me nervous.

Those are terms that can be used to justify immoral actions in the name of money, sure, but Jinwoo also uses them to justify his own process. To what end is he constantly improving himself? Sure, he's doing what he can to provide for his younger sister and their ailing mother, but I see less and less humanity in him as this goes on. There are constant hints at something far more sinister at play than just a dude getting stronger for himself, not the least of which being “the system,” the UI that implores him to keep taking on these “quests.” Something, or someone, seems to be guiding him. Whenever another hunter turns on Jinwoo, of course his self-defense instincts kick in, but system pop-ups instruct him to defeat X number of hostiles like it’s a normal video game scenario. There’s something eerily depersonalized about these encounters, despite them being full-on mortal combat, that gives me serious Ender’s Game vibes. Consider me intrigued.

I’d heard that the Solo Leveling manhwa’s main draw was its visuals, and though I had my doubts early on, I'm sold now. This is a pretty solid presentation! Hiroyuki Sawano turned in yet another banger soundtrack to punctuate all the action setpieces, helping to stitch together a fairly complete tapestry. Said setpieces are exhilarating and almost impressively bloody, and while the animation is nothing impressive in the day-to-day, it goes absolutely batshit when the gloves come off. Movement is inhumanly fluid and the visuals can go into the same loose, psychedelic territories we’ve seen in the likes of Mob Psycho and the second season of Jujutsu Kaisen. If this is the new meta for shonen action, I’m not complaining.

By all rights, this is a pretty decent show, but if I’m being honest, this one just hasn’t stuck with me much. And that’s fine! Sometimes I just wanna see some nutty action stuff and move on with my day. Solo Leveling hits that spot perfectly, and I'll be right back there when it returns for its next season.

‘Tis Time for “Torture,” Princess

I was surprised to learn that the gag manga this is based on, with such a seemingly simple premise, has been running for well over 200 chapters and counting. As the anime progressed, I was far more pleasantly surprised to learn that it actually works.

In a standard anime fantasy world where the forces of good are fighting the demonic Hellhorde, an unnamed warrior princess and her talking enchanted sword are taken prisoner and subjected to torture as they’re squeezed for intel. Said “torture,” as the title’s scare quotes would suggest, is mildly unconventional, as the demon baddie inquisitor, aptly named Torture Tortura, attempts to ply the princess by presenting her with tantalizingly delicious-looking food that she can only partake in if she coughs up some info. Naturally, the princess caves every single time, but her intel is often inane and useless, so the “torture” continues. It’s not all food, though: The princess is soon held out of arm’s reach of adorable baby animals by a gyaru beastgirl, pampered into submission by a spa-loving giantess, and is faced with a tsundere vampire faildaughter, who… tries. 

And you’d think that would be it; the joke wears thin and you move onto something else. Before you realize it, though, something’s changed: The princess and her captors are quickly becoming friends. The premise almost feels perfunctory: These inquisitors are actual people just doing their jobs, and whatever happens after the princess’ myriad confessions is fair game. There’s no malice or animosity, even during the “torture” sessions themselves: Everyone will have a blast and grow closer as friends, and then the princess will voluntarily go back to her bedless cell. It’s like Sam and Ralph after they clock out, except they’re almost always off the clock. Everyone is genuinely looking out for each other in all directions, and the only thing that keeps the torture going is the need for a status quo to return to, even as it grows more elastic. If anything, Time for "Torture" is a good example of committing to the bit without having to necessarily rely on it.

The real irony in all of this is that it becomes increasingly apparent that the princess is having her needs met in captivity far better than she ever did back home. In her proud proclamations about how she’ll never cave to the temptations before her (shortly before she does just that), the princess often talks about her upbringing and her time as the head of an imperial legion, but these stories often betray her lack of friendship or any of the little things that make life worth living. Her life as royalty was one of isolation and deprivation, to the point where she finds more freedom and fulfillment as a prisoner. She truly lives in a society.

Hellholm, on the other hand, has a surprisingly healthy approach to things like work-life balance, food, and leisure, and its most valuable prisoner is no exception. The Hell-Lord himself is a surprising exemplar of this; for as much as he looks and talks like your standard terrifying JRPG demon king, he’s a surprisingly good dude! He looks after his family, employees, and even the captive princess as if they are all one and the same; he exhibits strong principles and an aversion to conflict, sees to his employees' needs and wants alike, and is a supportive, loving father to his unbelievably precious little daughter (who also serves as a “torturer,” to the princess’ delight). He’s also a big time anime dork, and even bonds with a knight attempting to rescue the princess over their shared otakudom before sending him off peacefully. As “villains” go, he’s top tier.

Time for "Torture" is nothing groundbreaking by any stretch, but it’s a cute, silly time and it plays with anime fantasy tropes in the same way a six-month-old German shepherd “plays” with a cheap stuffed toy. How long the premise holds up is entirely up to you, but I had a lot of fun with it. I have no idea how this ended up being one of the better shows this season, but I guess it just scratched the right itch for me.

[citrus-cactus]

Citrus' Art Summary 2023!

The year is almost over, so here's my art summary for 2023! I got this template from here. This is my third year in a row being able to populate every month with a finished(/digital) piece (and really, I did a LOT more than what's shown here!), so that feels like something to celebrate!

Technically some of these choices don’t match up with their post dates; I counted some months as “when I was primarily working on them” and some as “when I actually published them,” but the sentiment remains. Like I said, it was a busy year! :)

Some more rambling + links to all featured artwork beneath the cut:

I remember last year I was quite worried about/was actually teetering on the edge of artistic burnout. There were definitely some months during this year that I felt a bit overwhelmed (particularly during the summer, when I was working on a 5-illustration series in a style that was DEFINITELY outside my norm, PLUS a bunch of other stuff), but I also appreciated the stylistic variety, and doing a lot of sketchbook drawings/marginalia that were(/are) just for me, so they never had to be "finished” or even "good." Even though almost everything pictured here is Digimon(/anime) art, I did experiment with a more "realistic" style for the Dracula Daily series (Aug/Sept), as well as trying to relearn the "Disney" style I started drawing in waaaaaaay back in high school, only now with a LOT more understanding of facial structure and anatomy. Largely, this style shake-up has been incredibly freeing (these are still sketchbook-only studies at this point, but I'm planning on some digital illustrations in the Disney style in 2024). I'm sure they still look pretty anime-influenced, and I'm not sure I'll ever truly be able to escape that, but honestly I don't mind; the anime aesthetic IS a part of my preference/style!

Let's see, the prevailing fandoms for what's shown here are Digimon Survive and Adventure 02. I really want to draw more Survive art next year!! Really happy with the collabo between @vidramon and myself (July), and honestly most (if not all) of these pieces. I worked hard, I branched out, I took on some really ambitious projects, and finished a ton of things (looking at you, March! That Knight drawing was a WIP for an entire year, but I finished it instead of abandoning it, which is what usually happens when things sit around that long!). Ultimately, I believe I told (and helped tell!) some great stories through my creative projects and art this year, which is my true goal forever and always.

Honestly I'm happiest with April's drawing. That one was a ton of fun to do, but I would have to work really hard to replicate that coloring style because I don't remember my brushes/settings, ahaha. Sadly this is how it usually goes with coloring for me; I make it up as I go almost every single time, which is why series are so difficult for me. I am nothing if not inconsistent -_-;

I would be remiss to mention that a huge part of my productivity this year was due to setting and tracking monthly goals for myself. I gotta thank everyone on the @campdigimonth server for their help in keeping me organized and motivated throughout the year! I plan on continuing my creative check-in posts in 2024.

Next year, I want to a) make more Survive art (particularly with Survive Week coming up), b) draw some more flippin' gargoyles (CRIIIINGE, but no, cringe is dead, I'mma do what I want!), and c) keep working on my personal project! And I am, once again, thinking about bookbinding. That's a "maybe" for next year as well!

Descriptions and links to the full artwork pictured for each month:

January: Survive Week, Day 5

February: Survive Gang Aromantic Week

March: Knight Unryuuji and Friend

April: “Rose-Tinted” fic illustration

May: Happy Birthday Vi!

June: Happy Birthday Haru Shinkai!

July: Happy 1st Anniversary Survive! (aka BEST SOCK FRIENDS)

August: Dracula, September 13

September: Dracula, September 20

October: Adv 02 Countdown Event, Day 7

November: “Boo!” on the Cob

December: Digimon Secret Santa 2023

[cadybear420]

Cadybear's Tumblr Top 5 2024

@choicesficwriterscreations

So I used the "Tumblr Top 10" on jetblackcode, had to use the "by month" feature because when I counted through all my posts, no creations of mine came up lol. I've gone through each of the lists and here are my Top 5 most popular creations of 2024. Please ignore the fact that the large note counts on some of these are kinda inflated by a bunch of self-reblogs lmao.

In the reblogs, I will also add a list of honorable mentions that are the leftover results from the jetblackcode searches.

1. Terror Fest- Edits- Genderswapping the entire Terror Fest wardrobe. 74 notes. Posted Jul 14 2024.

Very proud of this one for sure. I remember jumping to make these the instant the outfit transparents were posted because this had to be PB's most r/PointlesslyGendered wardrobe yet. I love how pretty much the entire fandom just responded with a resounding NO to that wardrobe. And it makes me very happy to see these edits do so well.

2. OG High School Story- Edits- Evie and the gang in pajamas I headcanon for them. 66 notes. Posted Jan 15 2024.

For some reason I wasn't expecting this one to get a lot of notes haha. Nevertheless, I am very proud of it. I also got to solidify some headcanons for what the LIs' bedrooms look like, because honestly we needed more time with them and more chances for our MC to visit their houses and hang out and stuff like that lol.

I still hope to do a sleepover fic for them one day.

3. OG High School Story x It Lives in the Woods- Edits- Aiden Zhou possesed by Redfield. 51 notes. Posted Jun 18 2024.

Definitely proud of this one. Arguably my trickiest edit yet, I had to crop the eye transformations from Dan and fit them onto Aiden's eyes. And considering the transformation had a lot of vein-looking details there was quite a bit of inconsistency. But somehow I pulled it off.

Also, I quite enjoy imagining a corrupted, possessed, and/or evil Aiden.

4. Ride or Die- Art- Genderswapped ROD loading screen. 45 notes. Posted Mar 18 2024.

My first art on this blog! Honestly I was very nervous about sharing art for Choices. My style can be very hit-or-miss to me, and even for the ones that I think did turn out well like this one... IDK. IDK how to put it. But eventually I decided fuck it, I wanna share visual depictions of certain ideas and edits are too limiting for that. I was definitely surprised at how relatively well this piece did, but I'm proud nonetheless and now I am indeed making Choices art more regularly.

Also fun fact, this was made back when I thought ROD was annoying and poorly paced and melodramatic. But I replayed it this past May, and I actually found it an enjoyable, not-that-hard-to-follow, solid story.

5. Immortal Desires- Gift Edits- Jiwon and Cas outfit swap. 42 notes. Posted Feb 14 2024.

My second ever Secret Pal event! I love participating in these events and I definitely had fun making this gift. Editing MAH Donovan's hands holding the camera from his CG onto ID Gabe's football CG was... surprisngly not super difficult (though placing the ring I should do more edits that take on a comic format with funny little stories/dialogues like this, honestly. It would be fun.

Thanks again to @hydn-jpg for this opportunity (as well as the wonderfully sexy Aidevie art you made me for the most recent Secret Pal exchange, I have it like permanently open on my laptop haha) <3

Happy New Year everyone! <3 <3

[ozwuv]

I would like to draw more but I find myself overthinking it and then losing motivation. So, I was wondering if you ever had a similar issue and if so what do you do to stay motivated and not overthink?

Really good question actually!

What nipped the overthinking for me was just completely dropping the planning stage of drawing. I don't put much thought into composition, colors, etc. I don't have any solid ideas of how I want things to look before I begin. Obligatory disclaimer that this is from my perspective as a hobbyist and therefore not practical for an aspiring professional, & this is gonna sound like BS but hear me out lol

Most of the time the only things I have in mind are 1. What character(s) I want to draw and 2. A vague idea of the atmosphere I want the finished product to convey. And "finished" can mean a lot of things -- a messy sketch can be finished, a fully rendered piece I spent an entire day could be finished. A common pitfall people fall into is having an impractically rigid idea of what a "finished" drawing is and subsequently what they want their art to look like, all the bells and whistles etc, when realistically your art is never going to look exactly how it did in your head. But is that really such a bad thing?

I guess the overarching concept is to just fall in love with the process and enjoy the journey rather than the destination. This obviously sounds easier than it is in reality, but imo people focus way too hard on what they're producing rather than how and why they're producing it. Other people loving what you draw and praising it is wonderful, but if you don't enjoy the process, what was the point? Drawing (and I would venture to say most other forms of art in general) becomes a chore with that mindset applied.

A lack of planning may very well mean you wind up drawing a lot of stuff that doesn't seem interesting, maybe haphazard, difficult to parse, etc, but this is all your perception. It's cliché, but there is always going to someone out there that adores something you think looks like a dumpster fire, and that applies to the things you draw too. Over time, just doing whatever you want and enjoying the process has this trickle effect that will improve your output. In the same vein, constantly overthinking will also inevitably trickles into your output. You can often tell when someone enjoyed the process of something they drew vs when it was just a slog for them to get through (at least relative to their other works).

I would venture to say that you could spend your entire life studying and could be the most technically knowledgeable person about illustration ever in the world, but if you don't genuinely love the process, your work will never be as good as it could be if you did.

If you finish something and think it looks like shit that's always a bummer, but if you had fun with it, I think that was time worth spending. I've said this before, but most of the time I only truly dislike something I've drawn when I spent any part of the process frustrated with how it was going. It's counterintuitive, but I really think that placing so much emphasis in how you want the finished product to look is what ultimately is going to make it look like shit to you.

All that being said, once you do get past that initial overthinking phase, you can start to get more specific with planning and whatnot. The key is to just stop holding onto the idea of what you want and allowing things to develop as you go. Your art will naturally improve this way since you're actually enjoying it. To me, that's what people mean when they say they can tell something was made with love.

Side note: Let go of the need to be consistent/have a developed style. Just let yourself be inconsistent. You don't need strict consistency unless you're like an animator who needs to keep characters on-model or something. Experimenting is not only way more fun, but leads to improvement and discovering new things to implement into your process/style at large.

Tl;dr just get a lil silly w it :3c

[theysangastheyslew]

Hey!!!

I want to share more suffering with you, homie haha *crying*

What do you think of the episode? Especially 132 part ofc!

Hi friend! :'))))))))) Ooooooh honey that gif is such a mood XD I’ve been trying to collect my thoughts and this is the best I can do atm. Sorry it’s kind of wordy but here we go 🥲

Ok! So ever-present pacing issues aside, the overarching story made for a solid episode and the animation was incredible. Hell, even the things I disliked objectively looked well-done out of context. Overall, that was no small feat to pull off, especially in such harsh working conditions. I truly do want to acknowledge that.

But in regards to 132, you guys already put into words how I feel better than I could. I may not have anything new to add, but I’ll say what I liked first and then put my issues under a cut.

As someone who actually really likes Yams’ art style, I loved that they consistently kept Hange’s face accurate to the manga. It was really inconsistent throughout the final season and they struggled to not make it too short a lot of times. Hange was always still stunning of course but the difference always stuck out to me. Here everyone was drawn well, but you can tell she got some extra attention.

The way they inched Levi closer to where Hange was sitting while talking with Yelena. Insignificant yeah but consistent with their past behavior. Also I’m glad they tweaked the position of his bandages so it looked less like they were painfully tugging upwards on his nose.

The pained expressions of the kids and Hange watching Levi struggle to even hold his gear

The “unrequited love” exchange. It had most of the softness and emotion from the manga even though the weight of that line will never be realized in non-written form. The camera lingered on each frame in a way that conveyed the sentiment. This is what got my hopes up that they would stay truer to the source material with DYH.

I'm so glad they left in Hange's lines to Flochroach about not giving up. Helps show—once again—that they wanted to live

The choked way Levi said “Devote your heart” + Hange’s widened eye and soft gasp at his words. Though not tearing up like in the manga, the shot still looked lovely for the half second it lasted. He doesn't pause halfway through saying it though so this one I'm still wrestling with.

Of course, the last stand. Onscreen, Hange took out at least 16 colossals (including the ones we see trip and get trampled) and definitely more offscreen (when they cut away to show other characters) and for the last few, did it while in the most pain a human body can feel. 7/10 for combat, my ass. Idk about y’all but I can’t stop hearing Romi Park’s screams in my head. I knew it would be nauseating and brutal but dear God. At the same time I cannot put into words how proud I am of them. That's my commander 💜

Ok “like” is definitely not the right word for this but I had wondered when I first read 132 how Hange’s gas tank was so well-insulated that it didn’t ignite, and.. well I got my answer.

I’m thankful that they didn’t show a glimpse of Hange’s bloody, crushed remains the way you see in the og panel. That at least felt respectful to me. This is wishful thinking I know but the defined charred outline makes me choose hope they fell more off to the side from where the titans were walking so at least there was maybe still a body left to recover someday.

The afterlife scene, the kids all sobbing their hearts out, Levi holding his own hand in the aftermath trying to process what just happened, and Onyankopon confirming the plane’s significance all really were appropriately gut-wrenching.

I really recommend taking a little break between The Rumbling and Sinners. It definitely makes the shift in emotion less jarring and less

When I did that with my rewatch it helped with the flow of things.

Ok, now twist me up and call me a pretzel bc here there be some salt :|

I’ll try to leave out my og issues with the manga chapter itself (like how painfully obvious it was all just to make Armin commander and how unnecessary Hange dying was IN THE FIRST PLACE and IF it had to happen at all how it could have been done at the final boss skelepalooza showdown, etc.) and just focus on the episode.

Goes without saying but it bears repeating: pacing. 75% of my issues with the execution of DYH would be gone if they just slowed down a bit. Just let the weight of it sink in a little. That this moment —all shreds of shipping aside— is the end of the line for these two heroes who have been supporting each other for ten years while bearing the weight of the world on their shoulders. But Mappa completely reversed the timing of the sequence of events. In the manga we had a longer, more intimate farewell followed by a last stand that was so short even when you knew it was coming it left you reeling from how fast it was from start to finish. Whereas here they hurried it along to get to the “main event”. Hell, it flows better in gif sets than it does in the actual show.

To me, it felt like Hange’s demeanor didn’t really change from talking with the kids to speaking with Levi, making their false bravado seem like less of a front. I know their tone was meant to sound like they were keeping up appearances, but with how often Hange just gets reduced solely to being a titan freak the way they had Romi say the lines made it sound like actual excitement, especially with the way they drew Hange's facial expressions (more on that next)

Hange’s little smirk after the salute. I kinda get what they were trying to do here but to me it came off as very flippant and dismissive of Levi’s choice of words, especially since they all but got rid of their lips trembling and eye beginning to well up with tears. I wish we’d gotten the big fake smile and laugh because that would have shown better that Hange was overcompensating by trying to put their brave face back on after starting to lose their composure. Their fear is obvious in the manga but it just simply didn’t come through as well throughout this entire exchange.

Sooo Hange almost tears up when Pieck said their words inspired her yet minutes later when their Best Friend tries to say goodbye there’s nowhere near that kind of reaction? Sure, Jan

Levi’s face. Ok look. It’s not a lack of emotion on his part that bothers me. It’s that it’s an entirely different one to begin with. He looks bummed at first yes, but then that changes to what I’m guessing is supposed to be determination which comes off as anger or annoyance (kinda like what changed with his scene with Armin on the stairs). They removed what made this parting different from previous ones, which was the sense of open vulnerability and the dawning realization that now he’s going to have to let Hans go too. See it's not like they were in the middle of the battle just yet. This situation came on suddenly and unexpectedly; it wasn't "supposed" to happen. One second they were on track and the next Hange is being torn away by fate. And yes, the highlights play a part in that transition. Anyone who draws eyes knows the importance of placement and intensity and the major impact they have over the final expression. And when drawing a comic you certainly don’t take up valuable page space with three panels focusing on the hope draining out of someone’s eyes if it wasn’t supposed to be the focus. I mean for fuck's sake, even the Final Season!Nendoroid Levi got it right. Plus, if they could make a point of getting Eren's eyes right during the raid on Liberio they could have gotten it here.

When the camera cuts to the kids watching the titans fall the angle doesn’t let you see that Levi can’t bring himself to watch for more than just a second

NOT MAPPA’s FAULT but since I’m being whiny right now I’m going to add that while ACWNR is a mixed bag to begin with, WIT’s adaptation not including Levihan’s introduction saddens me bc Levi asking Hange to keep watching loses a bit of extra oomph.

Really it just comes down to the fact that there was nothing wrong with the original page. It wasn’t overdone or dragged out by any means but considering many other scenes got shot-for-shot depictions I don’t think we were asking for anything outrageous by wanting a faithful adaptation. The couple frames we got that were almost perfect were so freakin fast you barely had time to process them before it cut away.

I wanted to like it, I really did. Especially since MAPPA did so many things so incredibly well as a whole. My expectations weren’t high, and I did want to give it the benefit of the doubt. But when it came to DYH, it felt both watered down and disjointed, like a completely different scene.

But so it goes. At the end of the day, Hange still dies a horrifying, demeaning death for plot convenience, and Levi is left behind to suffer once again. It was always going to hurt and I was never going to be ready for it, no matter how it was done.

[nintendowife]

I completed Piofiore: Fated Memories on Nintendo Switch about a month ago. Piofiore is a popular otome visual novel about mafia in 1920's Italy. The promise of a mature story paired with beautiful art style enticed me to buy the game. I was also curious to find out why the otome fandom calls a certain love interest in the game a "trashbando".

The protagonist Liliana "Lili" Adornato is an upstanding young woman raised by church and she gets tangled in the world of organized crime. Most of the love interests in the game represent three competing mafia families: Falzone, Visconti and Lao Shu. The mafia setting lends a natural frame for mature themes that include violence, human trafficking, torture and sexual assault.

Each love interest has a bad ending, good ending and best ending. In addition to this they all have a short after story. Yang's route was easily my favorite - lots of action and fun events. Orlok's bad ending was memorable with its brutality - poor guy. Some of the routes weren't super interesting. Dante's route had the ingredients to grab my attention but the execution wasn't the best. I ended up slightly disappointed with the overall story not completely revealing a certain key factor of the plot. Maybe the rest of the "mystery" is reserved for the sequel, Piofiore: Episodio 1926? I could have done with less romance and more story even though Piofiore apparently isn't that loaded with romance fluff.

I found it interesting how a character could appear wildly different on a different route. Some may claim this is inconsistent writing but I find it logical to incorporate different points of view to characters' personality and have them act differently according to their motives in different situations. Being a loving and caring person towards someone doesn't mean they couldn't have a sadistic tendency towards people who oppose them.

What comes to favorite characters, at first glance I thought Gilbert would be my top pick - manly man with a badass eye patch. Gilbert had his moments with some funny light-hearted scenes and his gentlemanly ways. Especially the way he spoke to Dante made me chuckle: "Yo Dante! What's with the face? You sick or something?". But I ended up liking Yang the most. Yang was such a peculiar character and his attitude and dialogue made me laugh. I guess I'm part of the trashbando-loving "Yang gang" now. My husband pointed out that it's usually the bald 50+ year-olds or the red-haired ones that strike my fancy and that was true in this case too. The various side characters were a good addition to the cast.

There's a good amount of high quality CG images to unlock in the game. I was especially impressed with the intricate details in clothing and jewelry. A common occurrence was me commenting "oo wow, look at those amazing details in the dress" during a scene where the protagonist and a love interest kiss.

The game's user interface is pure eye candy. The usual quality of life features like skipping previously read content, dialogue history, quick save/load and chapter select are present. The music was pretty good too. Voice acting was top notch but I was unhappy the protagonist wasn't voiced (and her portrait wasn't shown during her dialogue). I recall a few typos and grammar mistakes in the game but overall I'd say the localization was done well.

My top complaint is that there was an absurd amount of dialogue about food but they hardly ever showed it in pictures. All kinds of delicious dishes and desserts kept being mentioned but I think they showed food only twice. Show me the food, dammit! Oh, and Nicola's fashion sense irked me. His outfit was so classy and then he had to accessorize with a tie that looks like it was barfed on.

Finishing all the routes and unlocking all content in the game took me 55 hours. I started playing in February and finally finished in October. I'm not the fastest reader and I have a chronic case of falling asleep when I try to play in bed in the evenings.

I liked the game but at some points I felt like the story was dragging. I didn't enjoy Piofiore quite as much as I did Café Enchanté and Variable Barricade for example. Maybe it's because Piofiore is a lot more serious in tone and doesn't have much in the way of humor. The art and Yang's route were the highlights for me. I'm still keen on playing the sequel at some point.

If you like some darker themes in your visual novels, Piofiore may be worth giving a shot.

[phenomenalcosmicpowers]

THE ANCIENT EQUESTRIAN ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM - POST-MAKE YOUR MARK CHAPTER 4 EDITION

Hello there! I’m here to sort of give a follow-up to a post I made a while back about G5 after having established it has a connection with G4 how it might have to go forward about it. Ever since then, the G4-G5 connection  has been… inconsistent at best. The comics perhaps have the most direct link what with the Mane 5 meeting Discord which is never referred to in either Make Your Mark and presumably not in Tell Your Tale (I have not watched much tell your tale, though sorry. I feel like I just can’t get past the art style and the fart jokes I heard about they did with Sparky (Did they really have to do that to one of the most sympathetic characters in all of MLP? Misty did not deserve that one iota) absolutely was a deal breaker for me.)

And Chapter 3 while it did have the Twilight cameo and maybe a vague idea of how Opaline rised to power… it didn’t really give us a whole lot to go off of it feels like. So I didn’t really feel like giving much thoughts on it.

But Chapter 4 has certainly provided something that’s substantial enough to discuss… but I’m not confident it’s for all the right reasons.

For the sake of those who have not seen Chapter 4 of Make your Mark, I shall put the rest after a Keep reading line section. As the first thing you’ll see.. is a very significant image that is a pretty direct spoiler from Make Your Mark Chapter 4. If you have already seen Chapter 4, or don’t really care enough to avoid spoilers feel free to continue reading.

^Probably most G4 fans reaction to this image

Before I really dig into this thing, there is some speculation that this is all just more gas lighting by Opaline about her origins to Misty and none of the details are true since there seems to be multiple versions of how Opaline came to be a threat. But… I’m not sure I see any intentional use of the “Joker origin story” trope where everything Opaline has said about her origin is a lie. I’m not sure the writers will actually make that a plot point when it seems like they have it all simplified for children watching (They won’t even share what Zipp knows about alicorns to the audience for crying out loud!). I feel like the idea that Opaline may be lying about this entirely may be giving the writers of G5 a little too much credit here. If I’m wrong, I’ll fully own up to it. But for now, let’s presume that Opaline is telling the truth or at least mostly the truth.

So to get this out of the way…

WHAT THE BUUUUUUUCCCCCKKKKK?!

So… let me get this straight… Opaline has been around ever since Celestia and Luna were fillies. That in itself is hard to map out the time for that. But then you gotta start thinking. If she’s been around for that long? What in Equestria was she doing in the time since the royal sisters were kids up until G5? In short, what was she doing DURING the events of Friendship is Magic and so on and so forth? Why didn’t she say take advantage when the Celestia was the only ruler for about 1000 years?

And if she’s the one that ruined the peace in Equestria ultimately, why does she feel way too incompetent to have been the one to to have done so? Opaline doesn’t even find out Misty has betrayed her at the end, if she can’t even keep track of her ONE AND ONLY MINION. How in Equestria did she end the most peaceful era in Equestria’s history?

Another question that might be even worse? How come Celestia and Luna didn’t tell Twilight or the rest of Equestria about Skyros? I mean yeah, obviously neither Opaline or Skyros actually existed meta-wise when developing Friendship is Magic. But this is the kind of stuff that seems to prove that the idea of connecting G4 and G5 was always just an afterthought. This just doesn’t work with what Friendship is Magic has established even with it’s vague look at Alicorn lore. Apparently a land of the Alicorns exists now? Just how many Alicorns are there actually? Apparently the Journal of Two Sisters implied there was a place of Alicorns, but the problem of course is Friendship is Magic contradicted said journal with Flurry Heart’s birth in Season 6.

Also, if Opaline has lived that long. That actually makes it very possible for Celestia, Luna, Twilight, Cadence, and Flurry Heart to all be still around somewhere. Cause I guess G5 just confirmed that alicorns are truly immortal in terms of dying from old age. Honestly, at this point I wonder if things are about to get crazy and it turns out the rest of the Mane 6 got to become Alicorns too and are hanging out in Skyros or whatever just for an excuse to return all the beloved characters to G5. It’d be an utterly stupid thing to do, but it almost feels like it isn’t impossible the way they’ve approached the connection between G4 and G5 so far.

It’s just… ugh, ridiculous. Opaline was ignored by Celestia and Luna as fillies and she waits like how ever many years before bringing Equestria down during TWILIGHT’S reign rather then while Celestia (The one she probably blames more for why she plotted to take magic away) wasruling. Like why? Why did she wait so damn long? Perhaps it’s another case of simply being sealed somewhere for a definite amount of time just like Luna on the moon for a thousand years for all we know. But right now the details are sparse about this and it’s never been said that Opaline got out of some sealed space like Limbo or Tartaurus

But what is perhaps the absolute worst crime of the image…

WHY IS YOUNG CELESTIA’S HAIR NOT PINK?! RUINED FOREVVVVVVVVVVVEEEEERRRRRRRRR! #NOTMYMLP

(I’m kidding by the way, that’s just nitpicking lol)

Regardless, while Chapter 4 of Make Your Mark has some pretty decent and cute moments. It might even be the best piece of G5 media ever since the movie came out. However, any connection they make with G4 continues to be a headache that adds more questions than answers. There has been nothing to really downplay the idea that it’d have been much better if they had made sure G5 was it’s own universe just like G1 and G3 are entirely different universes from G4.

Another worry I have about G5 is actually something that might be out of Hasbro’s control. Netflix has a tendency to cancel shows, even if they’re doing well. How much time does G5 have before Netflix decides it’s done? Supposedly Make Your Mark has 1 more special and probably another Chapter/Season to go. But I wonder if the team behind G5 are going to be under the possibility that this next batch of Make Your Mark could be the last one if Hasbro and/or Netflix decide they’re not renewing for another season. Granted, even Friendship is Magic had to deal with that possibility. As Magical Mystery Cure would have been the series finale had FiM not been as successful as it was to get renewed for Season 4 and so on. But that was a time where Hasbro still had been very profitable, where as lately there’s been reports of them possibly selling some of their properties, not to mention laying off employees. How much can G5 of MLP carry on under these circumstances? There’s even fears that My Little Pony as a whole may end altogether based on how bad Hasbro has fallen financially. I don’t know if it’s quite that bad for them. But I wonder if it really says something for the company now that it looks like it has clearly not captured the same lightning in a bottle that G4 did.

Now obviously, I’ve said before that even if G5 turned out to be amazing it’d still have a hard time living up to G4 just because the peaks FiM achieved are unsustainable. Part of the reason FIM was so successful was the surprise that an MLP show grew such a diverse audience in the first place. But now that MLP has attracted a larger amount of fans then expected, it just becomes… the status quo that there are people who you normally wouldn’t think be watching a show about cartoon ponies. It’s no longer a shock that a grown man is watching a show about ponies with G5, that was part of what made G4 successful. People wondering why adults of all ages were watching a show presumably for little girls, some of whom became fans of the shows themselves as their curiosity grew. G5 wasn’t going to be able to capture that feeling all over again as a grown man watching MLP is now old news. That’s why even if it was great, it’d have a hard time repeating what brought so many to G4. 

It’s even harder when… it just doesn’t feel like G5 stands out much in my opinion. The Mane 5 (Or well, new Mane 6 now after the end of this chapter. In fact Misty just may very well be G5’s best character) are all fine characters in their own right, but the Equestria in G5 seems… lifeless compared to the one in G4. They’re almost always in the same 3 locations that have been there since the movie. There’s no sense of real exploration and real fantasy like there was in G4. While most of FiM takes place in Ponyville there was still the very idea that Equestria is a wide map, with even locations that are only mentioned and not ever actually gone to. That was a disappointment before in G4 where we never got see like Saddle Arabia for instance. But we still got plenty of other areas throughout G4’s run besides Ponyville, Canterlot, and Cloudsdale. And that's also ignoring the fact that besides Sparky and the animals, we've really not seen any other species from G4 still. (The cliffhanger of Chapter 4 seems to imply more dragons are coming but... I wonder if it's too little, too late at this point)

It feels like for me, the only reason to keep watching G5 is to see how Misty’s story plays through. And whatever is going to be Opaline’s final comeuppance. (Granted her own idiocy seems to be a comeuppance for her every episode). Izzy can still be fun to watch too, but otherwise the only other interest in terms of tying things with G4 just often makes things worse as with the story about Opaline knowing Celestia and Luna when they were fillies. Perhaps I’m just overthinking things too much, and I’m sure some may just insult me by simply calling me a G4 purist. Call me one all you like if you want. But something about G5 has not left me as invested with the series as I was with Friendship is Magic. I’ve given it a chance to try to warm up on me over time. But not much is doing it for me right now. I’ll continue to watch to see how Make Your Mark proceeds, as I mentioned earlier the next set could even be the end of G5 since I’m very aware of how much Netflix has canned things early alongside with Hasbro facing financial problems. I won’t say if I have a solution for MLP’s future as I don’t think I have a real solid idea. Every possibility runs it’s own risk. Like if G5 is considered a failure, and Hasbro decides Gen 6 is basically a reboot of Gen 4 with the Mane 6 we knew and loved for one last attempt to keep the Gen 4 fans invested or just pulling the plug and letting Gen 6 be entirely new even at the risk that it interests almost nobody.

Maybe it’s not quite THAT bad for G5 as of yet as it’s still only a few years since it started and I apologize if it maybe I'm overreacting to a small scene. Maybe depending on how many views Chapter 4 of Make Your Mark gets we’ll soon get news if Make Your Mark has been green lighted for more past what we know is still coming. For now though, G5’s only added more questions then answers for me personally since the last time I talked about the link between it and G4. And it may be at a point where it’s just too late to fix anything. Perhaps it’d be a smarter move to just try to ignore any reference to G4, or just to try to consider it an AU future of G4. Because I still have the same conclusion I had whenI last covered the “Ancient Equestrian Elephant in the Room”, G5 has some fine characters and content on it’s own. But if you take it as a Friendship is Magic sequel, then it has many shortcomings that currently look like they just can’t try to fix without making things worse.

I wouldn’t fault the G5 staff if they decided that they want to try to ignore G4 altogether. But I feel like at this very moment, Hasbro execs are breathing down their throats, and telling them that they must write a way to say… fit in the return of Twilight Sparkle in G5. And the dread of what else they could fuck up about the connection between the two generations getting even worse as a result.

[bogsleep]

a note about sources: when i reblog things that do not have a source or credit in the caption, it is because i have checked out the blog that originally posted it and determined that the OP appears to be the originator of the image (artist/photographer/maker). obviously i'm not perfect and sometimes my assessment is wrong or sometimes i don't check as well as i should, but if you ever see something i've reblogged that appears to have a questionable source feel free to send me an ask (or dm if we're mutuals).

how to identify stolen images: it is typically not very difficult to tell whether you are looking at the blog of an artist or photographer who posts their own work with no caption, or a reposter who uploads images taken from pinterest/reddit/instagram/other blogs without citing a source. blogs run by the artist or photographer will generally include the name of the creator as the blog title or url or in the description, or at the very least have a recognizable "digital identity" to which their work is attached. their work will also typically be consistent in style, technique, and subject matter. also many (though not all!) original artists/photographers will tag their original uploads of their work as "my work", "my art", "original photography", or something similar that implies creation of the image. most third party uploaders will either include very few tags solely for organization in order to preserve their aesthetic, OR tag with a big pile of buzzwords but generally avoid ones that directly claim authorship of the image. some will even add "artist credit" by putting the artist's name in the tags of the original post (not a good way to add credit btw since those don't carry over to reblogs and thus an image can circulate for years with no source, and also if the OP deactivates or tumblr breaks the original post view function again then the source is just gone forever). also the tags "found", "upload", "upl" etc (when combined with a post that lacks a source/artist credit) are often indicators that this is a stolen image pulled from somewhere else rather than an upload directly from the photographer or artist.

if you're still not sure whether a blog is being run by an artist or just a particularly choosy reposter who is maintaining a very consistent aesthetic/persona while posting other people's work with no source, save one of their images to your device and try reverse image searching using tineye, google reverse image search, or labnol (website that allows you to use google reverse image search on mobile, which google does not allow by default for some stupid reason). those all have different areas of expertise so if you have trouble with one, try the others. this is how i have found nearly all the artist credits i have added to other posts in my "source added" tag. sometimes you need to really investigate the results to find the original source. duplicate results does not always equal stolen - you may be able to find the same image posted by the same creator across multiple platforms (in which case you'd expect the digital identity of the poster to match across all those platforms) or it may have been stolen and posted elsewhere AFTER the original post you are looking at, but if you're seeing other instances of the same image being posted across the web that are older than the post you're looking at, and they don't appear to all be posted by the same person, you're probably looking at a stolen repost. this is especially true if the blog posting it is mostly faceless and/or posts things of an inconsistent style and subject matter. even photographers who remain intentionally faceless will still post a large number of similar-looking photos - photographers don't generally go out to take one photo and go home, they take a large number of photos in the same general area under the same lighting conditions, then sift through to edit and post the best ones. you should be able to discern some kind of generally unified sense of place from a photographer's portfolio.

of course these aren't hard-and-fast rules, just general patterns to look for if you care about identifying sources. thank you for coming to my ted talk

[yegormirnov]

Danny Brown: Quaranta



Detroit musician Danny Brown is a contemporary representative of hardcore rap and experimental abstract hip-hop. Personally, I haven’t listened to many of his projects, and “Quaranta” became my second solo listen of his.

The follow-up to my second experience with Danny Brown was an album by JPEG Mafia & Danny Brown, “Scaring The Hoes,” with an all-over-the-place production and other psychedelic attributes. I was pleasantly surprised by that record; nevertheless, I still felt that I wasn’t the demographic for this project.

Despite Danny’s deviation from accepted norms of melody and tone, I was never a fan of his vocal performance. My experience with his best-acclaimed work, “Atrocity Exhibition,” was itself one big atrocity. Constantly repeated utilization of his specific and, to some extent, annoying voice drove me crazy throughout the whole thing. After that unpleasant experience, I just accepted that this guy is not for me. His yodeling left me off-put, despite the avant-garde production and experimental delivery style.

Who knew that this wouldn’t age well?

His brand new LP, “Quaranta,” gave me another perspective on who Danny Brown truly is, or at least brought me closer to understanding him.

A cinematic, rich, elegant sound is all over the place. I don’t feel as much of the experimental hip-hop production on this one as on his previous records, so I would rather define this album as something delicate and prosperous. I have never heard Danny’s "real" raw voice. His tangible Detroit accent fills up the runtime of majestic chords and the hardcore part of the record. From time to time, the artist comfortably mixes his style with beats, combining more soft and fuzzy bass notes. Additionally, a note I made during the listen is that Danny is a big fan of progressive rock. His production selection frequently leans towards art/progressive rock, which helps him maintain tension and tempo.

As far as I am concerned, on this album, Danny reaches his peak at the confessions and brings out new introspective material. I may assert that this record is an emotional rollercoaster. The artist brings out the best in himself when it comes to reaching the emotional climax of the song. The way his burden is released isn’t the same as I have seen before. In numerous conceivable ways, Danny ranges from aggressive, ominous flow to someone who is already defeated and has lost all of his young hunger.

Furthermore, after the furor that this album induced, I ought to find some drawbacks. A certain number of people believe that this album will lack replayability; however, I believe it comes down to personal preferences. Yes, tracks are hefty and complicated, but they stand out. Overall, the album is only 34 minutes long, which doesn’t allow you to reach a stage of boredom yet and I would say is ideal in terms of mainstream music.

Nowadays, many albums struggle with feeling more like a mixtape than an actual album. Let me explain. Consistency in a record is a mandatory aspect of a well-curated and produced album. For example, "Pink Tape" had lots of potential and experimental sound, with Uzi going beyond acceptable bounds, but it was bloated. Fillers and inconsistent track listings buried the album. Although, this one might be one of the most consistent releases I have ever heard. The artist commences the album with a hard-hitting and bustling record that smoothly transitions to softer, more gentle cuts of the album. Due to the help of his cinematic and breathtaking performance, the album serves as an impressive dopamine booster.

In conclusion, I was left awestruck. This release lifted my hopes for hip-hop and once again demonstrated that there is a place for this genre to evolve. I plan to explore Danny’s discography further in search of another hidden gem.

Final grade: 8.5/10

[dashawfrostart]

This Week In "Time & Again" #30: Gettin' There Little By Little 💪 And About The Inevitability Of Inconsistencies

(look, look! He CAN be cute sometimes, I swear!.. Not always terrible)

Well... I was hoping to make another post before the New Year's, but failed at it. Those were not fake promises: that's just adult's life, and it's totally normal 😁 Happy New Year everyone!!! I hope that the new year brings you a lot of wonderful achievements!!!

And here's the happy news right away! I made my way through the majority of the lineart for Chapter 6.1!!! 🥳

As indicated earlier, there are still some parts that I will have to come back to and address later on after a satisfactory amount of research. But the majority is done. I am very happy. I will miss you dearly, [redacted], until you appear in the story again. So I'm moving on to Part 2 now 😁

Oh irony! Even with Lothar's anger outbursts that I teasingly mentioned in the previous post, Chapter 6 is going to feel quite tranquilized. Oftentimes, I think about that awesome Evangelion meme with Kermit The Frog that fantastically pinpoints the difference between the opening mood and that of the rest of the show (and unfortunately, no matter how much I try, I cannot find that meme anywhere in the internet or even on my phone... I swear I did NOT fantasize it). Up to this day and since forever ago, that is one of my absolute favourite Evangelion memes. Well, aside from "I'm not getting in the effing robot: change my mind". So, I see a strong resemblance between that meme, Evangelion, and "Time & Again". Evangelion was and still is one of the biggest inspirations for "Time & Again", and you will see it very clearly in Chapter 6. There's a little bit of everything. A story about two contract killers in love?! With time travel, and tagged as "action"?! And "aliens"?! And "comedy", on top of that?! Gee, that must be intense!.. But no! Instead, you're thrown directly into Lothar's broken head and showered with his countless, repetitive, tedious thoughts on the meaning of existence and sour memories of the love that is irreversibly (?!) gone. Welcome to "Time & Again", folks 😁. The story that most likely will break your expectations. Because expectations always only prematurely limit and therefore ruin our experience and enjoyment, so it's better to go without them at all 😝 (the statement has been 100% proven by my own experience)

Anyways, here's "a fun ruiner" (those of you who want to solve all the puzzles in the story by themselves - please skip this paragraph): even though the chapter is gonna be focused primarily on Lothar's stuttering and ever-multiplying thoughts, there's still gonna be a lot of pop-culture references. Again, including subtle Evangelion references. And references to Easter eggs from another certain franchise. Mystery and mystification? Yes please!!!

Now, one more thing. I keep repetitively mentioning the importance of consistency in one's art style in my blog posts. So here's more on the topic.

I take 3 4 sketchbooks with me all the time: one has the storyboard, and the other 2 3 have designs of the characters and their outfits (both require a certain consistency when drawing, as you may have guessed. Lothar might be a rich guy after all, but he won't change his shirt every hour). I remember reading about Naoko Takeuchi's work and how she mentioned that she used to forget to draw certain elements on the outfits of Sailor senshi here and there because those designs were so complex and highly detailed. This fact entertains me... Because I can totally relate. Especially since my outfit designs are also getting progressively complex, and some invisible hand (must be my subconscious) just keeps pushing me to do that despite my clear logical intention to simplify things. Darn it. It's like when you fight [redacted] in [also redacted] in Vampire Survivors, and they just keep pulling White Reaper from the side of the screen to insta-kill the players. In other words, I'm getting really carried away sometimes, when I'm having a lot of fun. It's hard to keep up with fizzingly explosive nature of creativity, because there is nothing rational about it by default. Art is weird. That's why I bring my sketchbooks with me to my studio room, so that I could look at them and make sure I'm not missing another button, zipper or a part of embroidery on anybody's outfit... And, last but not the least, to also make sure that I draw the shape of Beatnik's nose right on every panel. After all, that guy cannot have his facial features altered with a plastic surgery on every panel. I'm still a human tho, and I'm destined to fail at times, for nobody's perfect. In fact, just today I noticed a mistake in Chapter 4 when checking for something - that is, about a year and a half after release 😱💀 Peck! Now that needs to be fixed and updated on GlobalComix and Itch. 🤦‍♀️ *sigh*

Now, time for some weird musings - for your amusement (pun most certainly intended). I already talked numerous times to virtually everybody I know about my experience of how one's art style changes almost every drawing session (even over the course of 24 hours). By a little bit, perhaps unnoticeable to the majority of the viewers - but the artist themselves can definitely spot the difference, subtle and ghastly, but it's certainly still there. I don't know if that happens to absolute 100% of the artists, but I can definitely see that this happens TO ME. Since a giant comic chapter cannot be done in one sitting neither hypothetically nor physically, the tiny, miniscule fluctuations in the art style will be inevitably present - even though they could be easily omitted/ignored by the readers. Come to think of that: that entertaining observation correlates with the bizarre idea of us dying every time we go to sleep and becoming different "ourselves" (or just flat out different people, to take it to the extremes) as we wake up. Every drawing session is an act of feverish madness driven by the hand of a higher entity (there are multiple interpretations of the aforementioned theory in cultorology), every each one of them has nothing to do with the subsequent ones. We can talk about some ephemeral, general "art style" of a certain artist, and yes indeed, these variations of the same art style have a lot in common - and yet, they're still different, slightly or vastly - depending. Or at least that's what is feels like to me.

Finally, to the less complex stuff to wrap up the post 😁 There's a lot of black colour in Chapter 6. Even though I listen to happier music, such as vaporwave and new wave. Although Marc Almond's music is not exactly giving me that even and steady cathartic feeling that is incredibly useful when drawing but rather strikes hard and loud as thunder at times, I still really appreciate it. I do need to switch back to Floral Shoppe and the albums of Nmesh sometimes to maintain the solid steadiness of my work. Vaporwave is so darn good for this chapter every time when [redacted] or [redacted] appear on the pages. It just fits so perfectly. But, looking forward to working on the excruciatingly dark Chapter 6.2 further, I also mentally prepare myself to industrial, metal and twisted creative electronic with a chaotic, horror-esque elements to establish that direct connection between my mind and my drawing stylus that I really need. So, basically, back to Skinny Puppy again. And no, I said Skinny Puppy, not Fat Dog (although the latter are very good!).

P.S. I don't think I've ever mentioned that before, but drawing female characters is incredibly difficult for me 😅 but I'll write more about that later.

P.P.S. Lothar is sure an attractive character... When you don't know him close enough. And when you DO know him close enough, he's still attractive... but he's also begging for a punch in the throat. Or a kick in a lower area. Something like that, anyway.

P.P.P.S. The first video game I beat this year was Fatum Betula. It's an absolutely fantastic little experience in another world, with multiple endings. It's quite artistic, bizarre, and quirky sometimes, a little dark but also fun at times. The skeleton ending was simply wonderful. I highly recommend!

[squ1shsqu4sh]

MY XENOS!!!

This post isn't style related, but I've been itching to talk about my xenos somewhere! And ppl here seem nice enough so I thought I'd indulge :>>

This post is gonna be kind of long?? And it's no specific order, they're all just the ones I identify with the most out of the ones i have!!

Last thing, i got these from Pintrest, so I might not have all descriptions/creds atm :,<

1. Celestial nonhuman

There's no description, but from what I saw this means your gender feels sort of god/godess like, nonhuman, Angelical, or creature like. Unfortunately there were no specific creds either but I believe this was posted by duskprince on pintrest!

I already know my gender feels very non-human, but if I were to specify it it would be with this xeno(or at least this one would be in the top 3 or so~)!!

2. Inkongender

- desc from pintrest: "someone who has a vague inconsistent relationship with gender! Sometimes they may feel like gender doesn't apply to them at all and other times feel like they may have a gender but can't describe the gendered experience they are having. Despite the vague connection/overall disconnect from gender, they still use gender tables that fit them best and/or collect genders they have a connection to!"

Posted by __ Victor on pintrest!!

My gender has always felt kind of wishy-washy and even though I sort of have a grasp on it more now, it's definitely still blurry and inconsistent!! :>

3. Anomalyic

- desc from pintrest: "a gender term for those who want to be perceived as something beyond human, non-human, or “anomalous” in nature, and for other’s perception of them to be full of uncertainty or as to whether or not they can clearly be defined as human. A desire to have their identity be so shrouded in mystery or so cryptid that it’s unclear if they’re truly from this standard plane of existence."

Coined by snowymogai here on Tumblr

This is probably in the top two for "genders I feel most connected to". Like, I read the desc and was like "yes!! Absolutely!!! This is what I've been looking for!!!!"

4. Humanthing

- desc from pintrest: "a gender relating to feeling like a human but not, as if you know you're human but you don’t feel human. you feel separated from your human identity and you feel comforted / more comfortable being seen as a thing &&/or non-human better."

Coined originally by maidish, but they've moved to engagedkiss I belive :>

Obviously there's a pattern going on lol. My (art) persona actually very much reflects how I interpret my gender now, as in though they appear to be human they are very much not, and that's how I feel!! I think I'll post them here one day :33

5. Universpacic

- desc from pintrest: "a xenogender encompassing the entirety of space and the universe. It is space itself as well as stars, planets, black holes, nebulas, and even the space between those galaxies"

Coined by Jolie ♡ on pintrest

This is actually the first ever xeno I identified with!! I thought for awhile about weather or not it was right for me to seek out xenos to really explain how I experienced my gender, but as soon as I found this one the list kept growing and I don't think I'll ever regret that decision :33

6. Clouvoidic

- desc from pintrest: "a xenogender that is or is connected to clouds and voids. This gender can feel like a void with random floating clouds or the feeling of falling through clouds into a void"

This was posted by Will on pintrest, but they dont own this, so if anyone knows who coined this pls lmk!!!

I saved this one when I started to move on from space genders and started to really notice the nonhuman aspects of my gender (at this time I actually used to send my friends tiktoks of art of these very beautiful creature like beings and would text "gender envy" immediately after, and even tho my tone was jokey I very much felt that way and still do!!)

7. HumanDisconnect

- disc from pintrest: "a gender relating to not feeling human anymore. Feeling totally disconnected with humanity despite still appearing human"

Coined by rottinggri on Tumblr

This is definitely the gender I connect with the most out of all the ones I've got saved up. I feel so inhuman and unnatural (in terms of gender mostly), but in a form that's comprehensive to ppl I guess? Not sure how else to explain it :,>

TYSM FOR READING ALL OF THIS IF U DID!!

I love the way I experience my gender so so much. I love how it connects to my audhd and how it doesnt feel restricted by anyone or anything. It's so freeing to me I can't imagine ever going back to just being a girl and being that way forever. I've felt this way since I was at least 9 or 10, and to be able to put it into words today is amazing. Hopefully one of these days I'll transform into something the human eye can't even comprehend and fly off into space somewhere. But for now, my human body is great and I love it lots (this is all jokes!!....mostly jokes-) <333

Pls lmk if I missed any credit, or if you know any of the ppl I wasn't able to credit so I can edit it asap!! Oh, and srry for any typos :,>

Again ty for reading :>>

Tags 4 reach :P

[writerscraftartblog]

Art Evolution Talk

Getting to a point where you are satisfied with your art is a long, grueling process. In fact, I think it's impossible. As artists, we strive for perfection and our expectations for ourselves are always impossible to reach.

However, I feel like I've gotten close to being happy with my art.

For years, I have struggled with inconsistency in my art and never being happy with anything I create. My art just didn't feel like ME. That's the only way I can describe it.

But over time, I started recognizing the traits of my art that I just couldn't let go of; the ones that appeared the most, no matter how far I drifted from my typical style. When I realized this, I also realized that if I stopped trying to stray from what I like about my own art (and what I see in others' art that inspires me), I would probably feel a little more confident about my art.

(VERY) Wide-set eyes

Round faces

Sketchy lines

Soft shading

Yellow/Green colours/lighting

Here's some art that showcases these traits. You may have to look a little closely for some.

Some people may dislike my art style or find it odd. I've gotten a lot of comments about the eyes being too far apart. But... I can finally say that I like my art. And that makes me feel proud. Being an artist is hell sometimes. It often feels like nothing you do will ever be good enough. But, I'm beginning to view my art in a different light which is very exciting!

When comparing this to art that I've done for others (like commissions) or art where I tried out a different style, I just never felt satisfied with those drawings. One notable thing is that I have a really hard time drawing cutesy characters. It just doesn't suit me, and whenever I do draw something like that, I hate it. I hate the process of drawing it, and I hate the aftermath.

You're probably wondering, then why did you? And the reason is that I was trying to expand my art in new directions. However, looking back, I think I was going in the completely wrong direction. Maybe I'll try doing some more creepy horror stuff instead, since that's more my style!

[doom-nerdo-666]

I like how Doom fanart always changes designs one way or another

(Image from thread post above and the design comes from the link below)

Even when redesign is not even the main point in a drawing.

Sometimes, it's just an artist's personal touch/creative liberties but it also kinda reminds you of how classic Doom had a few inconsistencies like Doomguy's design in the cover and the ingame sprites having some differences.

Or even the sprites being reinterpretated into HD, since even HD "remaster" mods and fanmade 3D models feel like they also take some liberties.

But it kinda also comes from a general view on the series' identity: It's not that "story doesn't matter", it's that the setting and premise is empty and "lacking" enough to inspire creativity or allow people to fill in blanks, which explains other types of fanmade content and even discussion (Anyone having their own interpretations of "what is Doom" and "Doom is not just a painting, it's also a brush and canvas etc").

It's also interesting that no matter how creative or unfaithfull a design is, it can still be recognizable or fitting to the series, as a way to stretch Doom's likeness or something.

And then you have clear/literal redesigns/reinterpretations of Doomguy, demons, weapons etc which feel like extreme creativity and an impact from Doom 3's art direction, where people try to imagine a Doom game that reinvents the series' identity again.

Not only do fan redesigns get to look very different, you also wonder if they could also have different gameplay and ideas too.

(Since custom/mod enemies tend to have a lot of mechanical liberties depending on engine/source ports but high quality sprites like those in Hell-Forged may not be as common as basic Imp recolors/edits you see in Realm667)

(In fact, most people who do cool Doom redesigns are not really in the same area as sprite makers, so that's another thing)

2016/Eternal are kinda special in a case, because from the bigger focus on lore, to stuff like photo mode and model viewer modes, the overall details and features seem to be more important than ever (From both an art direction, world building and game engine focus).

So some fanart will aim to get most of that detail and some people will end up not getting all of it (Or sometimes either use references a lot or maybe trace over some renders, but you can't blame them).

This also makes Eternal's "classic" designs interesting because they still have differences from the originals.

And then you have a situation where the Hellknights carry that D3-inspired brute design while their classic look is influenced in the Gladiator.

Or even armor customization in stuff like 2016's MP and Quake Champions, because of the things that can be changed/mixed around.

Even a series like Marathon had official art where designs like those of the main character look different, despite being a series that always had lore.

Even Castlevania has like a lot of variations of Simon Belmont, that even Smash's design kinda has some unique features.

Another thing to look at is concept art and unused designs too.

As if something would still fit the style or setting, for a series that already changed looks.

[guhudude]

PSA About AI "Art"

dear people who care about human artists,

the main purpose of this post is to help you learn to identify AI generated images from human art.

you have probably heard about the ethical issues AI art presents, but I encourage you to look into it if you haven't. the main points I'm aware of...

AIs are trained on databases of human made art, many of whom are living breathing creating people in the present day, without the artists' consent, which is... art theft, plain and simple.

AI art can be created for basically free and passed off as real human-made art, so people can make money off of it which should be going to real artists, ESPECIALLY because of the aforementioned art theft.

and let's face it the main reason art is so amazing is cause you can look at it and go wow. a person made this. however much time it took and however much thought and detail they put into it. and you can think about what they meant in each detail and what it means to you. that's an important part of like, all human culture no matter how bad times get or how "unessential" the creation of art supposedly is.

in this controversy there have been real artists who get thrown under the bus for having a realistic style because it looks like ai. but don't get it twisted! AI is the copycat here and it can and will copy ANY style.

so if supporting real human artists is important to you, I implore you to learn how to differentiate human creations from AI art. just now I saw AI art being passed off as real art with some 30,000 notes praising it.

this is by no means going to be a comprehensive guide but I have a few tips to help you tell the real from the fake.

1. check for inconsistencies.

while human art is imperfect by nature, the best way I've found to tell it from AI art is by looking at the details. especially when the art is otherwise very realistic, signs such as architecture that doesn't make sense spatially, reflections that are partial or distorted when they should be whole, and especially little floating bits of things are giveaways of art being AI generated.

you might see little wisps of what look like hair trailing away from a person as if they're being blown away, or some tree branches floating in the sky. AI art is made up of patterns so if you see a repeating, often swirling pattern that makes details appear difficult to distinguish, it MAY be AI.

of course, there are artists who do these things intentionally. so how can you be sure? you can't 100% be sure unless the artist posts videos or stages of their process, but something that helps is

2. look for intention.

this is a good idea when analyzing art anyway. not all art has a moral theme or message, but all art has intention. the intention may be simply "to be aesthetically pleasing" or "to make the viewer question their definition of beauty" or even "to fill the viewer with disgust!"

think about this and, especially if the answer is "to be aesthetically pleasing" think about how they intended to achieve this. depending on what type of image it is, it may be more likely to be AI generated. if the image lacks a clear deeper meaning...

3. consider the target audience.

is the image typical "Tumblr aesthetic"? it's a lot easier to get followers if you post a lot of the same visuals and colors. AI is good at creating unique images with the same "vibe" without the need for expensive photography equipment, photo editing or art skills.

is it a cute anime girl? do they ever draw the same character or similar looking characters and if so, are they consistent in character details? or are different characters a little Too similar? again check for weird details like hair floating unattached to anything or body parts like extra eyes where they shouldn't be (i.e. in buttons on a shirt or hidden in the background).

And most importantly

take this with a grain of salt. there are some artists whose style looks very similar to AI images and it may be difficult to tell them apart! but I really hope this helps some of you out there who might be struggling with this.

if anyone has any better guides especially with examples please feel free to link them on this post or send them to me. also feel free to elaborate on what I've said here and correct me if necessary. If you've made it this far thank you so much for reading!

[eldritch-spouse]

Ey, I was thirsting for your tall horny stalker at first, but the deeper I dived into your blog, the more lore I craved.

So got any concept arts of The Clergy for lore starved anon?

[This one's long, boys and girls and thems... TL;DR: The Clergy is like a compact version of the backrooms.]

Concept art? No, I'm sorry, I am extremely incompetent at drawing buildings in general. I only have a couple of images that I use for reference when writing about it, as well as a couple of core ideas that I can detail here if you want! I'm afraid I can't offer much more than that with my current level of ""artistic skill"".

For starters, something that I think is necessary to mention regarding The Clergy's Eye's appearance is that it's never the same. Every single week or so, the establishment takes on a different outer look. This is done on purpose by Krulu, so as to keep the place masked and relatively ambiguous. In general, The Clergy's exterior often takes on the appearance of a distorted manor, sometimes an oversized gothic chapel, a small dark castle- It varies. The outside perimeter of the establishment also never matches the true size of the place itself. There is no way it can accommodate the overall area of the many floors inside. It's a paradox of sorts, it makes no sense for the common person, and it's a complex design only someone of Krulu's species can achieve.

You can sort of assume you're near The Clergy's Eye if you're seeing a strangely distorted dark building. Something with muted colors, surrounded by a strange nebulous fog and an electrifying heaviness in the air. Sometimes sparks of purple light will be visible. You'll begin to notice even more inconsistencies the closer you get to the building. Maybe the bars in the gates are crooked, the flowers in the garden aren't quite stuck to the grass, there's too many windows on the left side of the place, the ground is uneven, there's something black and pulsing writhing on the walls. Two people staring at the establishment may not see the same thing.

However, no one ever describes hearing animals nearby, or much sound at all. People always feel uneasy in its vicinity and report seeing strange gargoyle-like beings perched around.

At that point, if you're human, you'll start feeling some form of immense, inexplicable trepidation. Some voice of reason in the back of your mind will urge you to back off, which most people tend to listen to, and you'll forget ever seeing the place within hours. Here's an image that I think embodies the general idea.

(Obviously, this is not of my own making. It's the product of an AI image blender.)

The inside of each floor hardly ever changes in terms of design, furniture and overall feel. Each floor does have its own style, but dim lights are almost always a feature, as well as the repetition of the color purple. Particularly frail-minded humans will continue to view the inside of The Clergy as a distorted mess that they cannot visually interpret, often leading them to quickly spiral into manic states.

It's worth noting that the floors in The Clergy will often change positions from day to day, as I've mentioned in another ask. This is done because The Clergy itself is a living entity that requires adjustments here and there, position switching acts as its form of "refreshing". The main floor, where the bar is located, is usually always Floor 0. The restaurant varies between Floor 1 and -1. Krulu has a specific floor for himself which is always either really high up or the lowest one available. The shop floor is pretty high as well. Certain specific events The Clergy hosts also feature their own temporary floors. Every single day there's a specific layout which is detailed in the entrance to the establishment and inside the three elevators (sometimes two. Again, the place is inconsistent.).

As you might already know by now, the establishment has its own symbol, which is used by members (staff and clientele) to identify each other. This is it-

Krulu spends a lot of time inside the establishment but he rarely ever shows himself to the groups within it, preferring to use the Admin (his vessel), who he is physically connected to, as a representative instead.

I can go into more details, but I think this covers the basics. Sorry if this sounds disorganized.