#i used design aspects from both tbh

[luvdsaturnn]

reverence

[the-somwthing]

Sorry but I’m not getting over the person who basically implied that headcanoning Jimmy as taller than Tango is thinly veiled rpf and they’re not REALLY separating cc from character. Like WHAT are you cooking

[buginacup]

I just played through essentially all of what was available in the playtest, and as someone who IMMEDIATELY loved Collarva (which I believe you said you worked on?) on sight in both moves and visual design (I LOVE that wiped pose out in the field of pulling down their silk hoodie, and using hunker/grit is just kind of insane tbh) I'm curious what parts exactly you worked on (I don't even know if you got to work on its not-evolutions [metamorphs?] tbh) Also, any favorite beasties of yours that were in the Playtest?

I did the whole metamorph line! There was a while in development where we could pitch beasties that matched roles we were looking to fill, rather than what we do otherwise where we turn an extant concept (created by Greg or Alexis) into a design. The ones from the pitching period often had the same artist throughout, though I'd say even with the concept beasties it often worked out that way!

(Not to mention we often gave feedback to one another in the design process! Nobody is working entirely alone.)

I pitched these all at once!

We weren't super satisfied with the face of Collarva so I did a few iterative takes on new directions we could take them. As you might tell we wound up going for something around B!

With Collarva->Plumask they were looking for an early game lepidopteran (butterfly/moth) and I'm the go-to bug girl. There are a lot of moths and butterflies in monster games (bugs are the origins of the genre nobody is surprised) and I wanted to represent a type of moth that hadn't gotten much love yet. Plume moths are dusty looking creatures that don't look like they should be able to fly at a glance, it pulled me towards making something eerie and ghostly!

Image source here.

I don't want to color anyone's read of the line too much, but my general overarching theme was about picking up various personas/behaviors/aspects like a mossy rock until you find yourself as an adult and shed what you don't need. Both Axolati and Collarva are pulling from my teenage theatre kid life, uhuhu.

You can actually see the concept art for most beasties in the Beastiepedia under Morphology->Visual Studies. It even lists concept artists and sprite artists! (Research is concept/pose work and Videography refers to their in-game sprite and animation based off those poses)

In terms of mechanics/design we often don't have too much direct say. Since the color palette is often relevant we typically know what types of moves they'll specialize in. In my experience I'll pitch a concept and then give a narrative/emotional description that they use to inform stats/moves/etc. There are maybe one or two times where I lent a hand with stats/moves but I don't have a ton of time to play the game outside of work so I was always a bit too behind on the meta to contribute much, personally.

Yueffowl and Collarva are both favorites of mine! There are three or four beasties/beastie lines that are my precious babies and they're both included. They're among the ones where I really felt the most like I was expressing myself in the design. They definitely feel like designs I'll be remembered for.

[skygemspeaks]

NEW ONE PIECE TRAILER LET'S GOOOOO

we got the roger execution scene!!! he looks fantastic, and he did SO well with the speech!

there's an older marine in a suit standing on the execution platform and i'm like 95% sure it's garp???? and if so, i love that they made that decision, hell yeah, it makes SO MUCH SENSE

luffy's little "Mutiny" joke when he asked the news coo to join his crew and it flew away....i found that way funnier than i should have 😂

the scene where luffy paints the first version of their jolly roger!! i loved it SO MUCH especially with the little detail of him having paint splatters on his face 🥺iñaki has impeccable luffy vibes and i can tell i'm gonna adore him in this role

we got to see buggy's devil fruit in action! i'm surprised they didn't lean more into the body horror aspect of it, but i still adore buggy. i wasn't sold on his hair last time, but it looks a lot better in this trailer tbh.

there's a scene where it looks like garp's ship is firing canonballs at the straw hats? which, unless it's a misdirect due to clever editing, that's a bit surprising that we get an altercation so early in the series. though i doubt they'd reveal the relationship between luffy and garp this early on in the series...hopefully

the scene where sanji is fighting kuroobi is really interesting because it looks like it's taking place in the baratie! my best guess is that they're overlapping baratie and arlong park a little? maybe nami spent too long away from arlong park so he sent kuroobi and/or chew to go fetch her back, instead of her voluntarily betraying the straw hats?

on that note, we get our first look at the fishmen, and they look surprisingly decent!! i don't have any complaints about their designs, and i'm a huge fan of arlong especially. no signs of hachi though...🥲

we finally got a sanji voice line, as well as some banter between him and zoro which was hilarious!! looks like they let taz keep his british accent, which i know some people were curious about last time.

the scene of nami sitting next to bellemere's grave 😭😭😭

"you're my captain. from now...until the end" HELLO? I'm gonna be PHYSICALLY ILL. I love him so fucking much, I'm never gonna get over this fucking line. I'm guessing it's probably after the mihawk fight

we got a good look at both mihawk and shanks! they are both, of course, absolutely stunning. Yoru looks really good too

the CGI on luffy's arms when he's fighting against arlong looks a LOT better than what we saw in the previous trailer against alvida!! it's a bit reassuring. i guess that one scene was just weird because of how much they were focusing on it. they probably did it that way because it was the first time we saw luffy really use his power in the series so they wanted to make a big deal of it

the scene where shanks puts the hat on baby luffy...😭😭

maybe i'm a bit late but in the logo, where it has luffy standing in the nose of the jolly roger, i only just realized it's manga luffy and not iñaki 😂

we got a good look at Coby!!!! Morgan looks absolutely flawless, they were definitely the right choice for the role. Also, in the last trailer we got a split second glimpse of Coby when Luffy was punching Alvida and his hair looked pale blonde due to the lighting, which I was a bit sad about. Glad we got to see in this trailer that they did actually keep his hair pink! phenomenal!

[genericpuff]

saw this pop up on /r/UnpopularLoreOlympus and I-

Full analysis post that inspired this post can be read here, it's a good read, go check it out!

Now my natural reaction to not assume the worst (shocking, I know) is that what Rachel's actual intention behind making Leto a sun god was due to her being Apollo's mother and her clearly having a stronger relationship with him rather than Artemis. I'm abiding by Occam's Razor here, it's the simplest answer and it keeps my brain from getting too riled up right off the bat LMAO

There's a lot of emphasis put on Apollo being the god of the sun in LO, despite the fact that Apollo is one of the MOST prolific gods in the Greek pantheon, Rachel only ever really focuses on him being god of the sun with some loose references to him also being the god of music (as we see with him playing his lyre). There's really no real referencing to him being the god of medicine though (aside from that scene of him condom-bandaging Persephone's hand in Episode 22 ?? which is silly now in hindsight because she's a fertility goddess who can heal herself but ok lmao and the fact that Rachel established him as a LITERAL DAD with his doctor son Asclepius which ... just feels weird to have in LO tbh) and there's absolutely no referencing (from what I can find or recall) of him being a protector of the young, god of prophecy (for some reason he just magically gives Kassandra the ability to read prophecies... just so she can read his prophecy ??) or archery. Like, he's shown doing a lot of these things but they come across more as just side hobbies or extensions of him being Artemis' brother (like his archery) rather than aspects of his godliness or domains that he presides over. It's just like yeah, Apollo can shoot arrows and bandage people's hands I guess LMAO

All that said, I can see Rachel deciding to make him primarily the god of the sun and then going "oh! let's make his mom a sun god! then she could be a common enemy for both Persephone and Hades!" because Hades doesn't like sun gods yadda yadda.

But... we know Rachel has used front page Google sourcing in her comic before.

(literally the 'source' was copy pasted from a 2004 study guide for Princeton.edu. And we KNOW this was taken right from the first result because it just says 'www.princeton.edu' with no slug attached, which is what showed up back when we first looked into this, the princeton version was deadass the first result with this definition word for word. She didn't even remove the typo where there's no space between Xenios:"Zeus !!!).

And while a bit more into sus territory rather than outright confirmed like the xenia thing above, there's the whole Metis / Métis theory, that has us wondering if Rachel seriously googled "Metis" on its own and accidentally used Indigenous Métis cultural depictions in her version of Metis, the Greek God.

The fringe in her outfit, finger wings, and dark orange/red color really got my attention the first time I saw her design years ago, because she set off so many, "Wait a minute, is that an Indigenous woman???" bells in my Mi'kmaq/Cree brain LMAO And not even in a bad way, but now it feels a little :/ because of how much her character has been assassinated and how clearly accidental it was for her to look like that.

Of course, there's still a more likely explanation that her design was based on this vase:

But IDK y'all. That vase is very distinctly orange while the character itself is depicted in dark garbs and with light skin, so Metis being distinctly red-toned with finger wings and fringe?

While the Xenia thing is definitively copy pasted from the first search result on Google (literally there's no denying that at this point, Rachel's REALLY bad at doing research and then pretending like she was being smart by sourcing it from a university website... completely ignoring the fact that that website literally hasn't been updated since Rachel was working on The Doctor Pepper Show) the Metis and Leto depictions are definitely a lot more up for debate as to what 'research' Rachel did and whether or not they got confused with something else during her searching.

And really, the whole thing with Leto being a "sun god" doesn't make sense really when you think about it. Why is Leto a sun god? It's not even like you could argue there are "some versions" of the myths where she's a god of the sun, or other translations out there, or whatever vague source that could be used like what has been used for other gods like Hades and Persephone. Leto is not affiliated with the sun in any shape or form. Remove Apollo, her eventual son, who didn't exist when she was born and given the title of 'sun god', and it quickly falls apart as to why she would be a sun god in the first place.

She is a goddess of motherhood though, and that's NEVER mentioned in LO. If anything, Rachel makes her a terrible mom on purpose. Because god knows we can't have anyone in this comic be a good mom except for Persephone and Rhea (who are literally just carbon copies of one another). Basically the only thing Rachel gets right with Leto is the fact that she's a Titan and that she had Apollo and Artemis after sleeping with Zeus. That's it.

Unfortunately, unlike the xenia thing, there's no outright proof of what Rachel's reasoning was behind these designs or sources. So I'm not gonna accuse or outright state it as fact that Rachel confused Metis for Métis or ripped the idea for Leto being a sun god from an anime, because the odds of that being true in any way are fairly low.

But they're never zero.

[rockybloo]

You joked yesterday about the Bitterbat/Sweetheart romance having "chaotically problematic" aspects, and I was curious if you could expand on that. TBH so far, they don't really seem especially unhealthy towards one another and as far as I can tell, it's not like Amara is letting Bitterbat kill/hurt innocents.

The chaotically problematic aspects come from how they are just a romanticization of stalking and obsession.

Bitterbat is a yandere. He'd never hurt Sweetheart - that is the biggest rule of writing him. Even when they do their mock battles, he may scratch her up some but that's only because she explicitly told him to beforehand.

Bitterbat is madly in love with Sweetheart. He thinks about her every hour of the day. He wears her clothes, occasionally swipes her underwear, watches her sleep, follows her damn near everywhere she goes, and knows whenever she is thinking of him. And god forbid he ever discovers someone has done her wrong. He'd show them there are worse fates than death.

And Sweetheart finds this behavior absolutely adorable. She gets butterflies in her stomach knowing Bitterbat does this typa stuff. She absolutely fangirls and squeals.

Her reaction isn't the result of delusion, just like Bitterbat's obsession with her isn't the result of him not being in his right mind.

BOTH are self aware and know their behavior goes against the norm. BOTH do not care. They used to, but then they realized that life isn't as fun when they hold back. So they just dropped the restraints. This is their love language - if the world doesn't like it - it can fuck off. One of them is keeping it safe, and one of them is showing it mercy.

Sweetheart sees some clothes go missing, she immediately knows Bitterbat swiped them and asks him if he could return some specific ones by (insert date) because she has an event she has to go to and she had an outfit she was planning on wearing.

She notices him following her while she is on her college campus and she orders two frozen yogurt cups so he can sneak on over while he is his itty bitty self and enjoy a treat with her before she goes to class. HELL, sometimes she just notices him following her and beckons him over so she can scoop him up while he is itty bitty and slip him right into her bra so he can ride along with her throughout the day.

And whenever she feels his eyes on her whenever she's resting, she sleeps a little more soundly since she knows he won't let anything bad happen to her both in the outside world and her dreams (since Bitterbat can enter dreams - he only does such with Sweetheart's tho)

There's more examples but basically, I have absolutely no interest in writing a "yandere creeps out their crush" story. We have so many of those and, while it makes sense a lot of people enjoy that type of story, I find more fun in flipping it on its head.

The concept of a female character who is decked out in the most lovecore fit, designated as a defender of love, deemed to be a role model and the ideal heroine, being down bad and matching the freak of her obsessive villainous boyfriend who causes deaths so gruesome, it'd make a slasher flinch, just scrubs my brain right.

It fills in the gaps I always feel when I see any series and spot a villain crushing on a heroine who ain't into them.

Glitter and Guilt is basically just a "What if the heroine WAS into it tho?" story.

[rosearcanaeum]

(Ten) people I'd like to know better

Tagged by: @screechingfromthevoid <3

Last song: Far From Me by Chase Noseworthy is just on repeat. Sad boy Vax and perfect for my range!

Favorite color: it really depends on context honestly. But the most general is soft pink.

Last book: 😅 I've been struggling through Nein Eyes of Lucien for a while.... more honestly its Call of the Netherdeep and Explorers Guide to Wildemount. I truely read far more fanfic than anything else.

Last movie: I watched Night at the Museum for the first time this week. It was waaaaaay better than I ever imagined. I knew it was good and funny. It was also incredibly sincere and I can't get enough of that.

Last show: speaking of sincere, I'm about halfway through Frieren: beyond journey's end. And holy shit! I have never seen any media with a character who views and interacts with death the way i do. Its pretty heavy as shows go but its trustworthy. (I have a hard time with new stuff most of the time. Cr is one exception and this is too apparently)

Sweet/spicy/savory: no joke I've eaten salt before lol. But i prefer combos or all 3. Sweet spicy is underrated.

Relationship status: I live with my queer platonic partner. Its still just buckwild to me. As a kid i hated the idea of living with a partner cuz i didnt want so many aspects of what i was told that looked like. But hey guess what, y'all can decide what your relationships look like. We have separate rooms, are not sexually involved, rarely even touch tbh. And we love each other very much and want to grow old together in a house with cats.

They're touch averse and I'm sensory seeking. My fun Sunday night (out dancing) is their nightmare. But because we are who we are and how we understand and communicate in our relationship we rely on each other for only things that are available. I'll tell them all the dumb shit i see and do on Grindr and we'll sit on the couch and knit together.

Also my brain nearly explodes everytime I realize not only do we do couple stuff, we have couple friends we do couple stuff with. 18 year old me would have never believed you if you told them.

Last thing I looked up: I looked up the caffeine content of the thai tea concentrate I got my partner to see if i could try it. And shockingly i should be able to. Still gonna eat first and be careful though.

Current obsession: I'm pretty spread out rn, unusually. Ive got a sweater im excited about. And I'm on my 3rd attempt at a dorym water bottle sleeve I'm designing. This one should work now. Honestly dorym is probably no. 1 on my list. I shipped that back in exu, along with a bunch of stuff cuz I'm a delightful multishipper. So i feel particularly excited about dorym finally taking off. But also that while dorian was always looking to orym if anything else had come along he was there for the ride. I love robbie so so much. He is such a good character storyteller!

Looking forward to: today im hanging with 2 friends im usually in a larger group with so thats gonna be fun. Looking forward to baking off the beef wellingtons i made for my partner for xmas. And im looking forward to being able to work full time again in the new year. Ive been on part time for health reasons and stayed because i was spending hours on the phone fighting for insurance coverage. Now that both a done i can work more. I love my job and its a particular kind of boredom that i get when i cant work. Lol speaking of, im looking forward to the holidays being over. The office closures normally screw us but now im only working thurs fri for the next 2 weeks and I'll have try really hard to keep busy enough. At least my partner has 2 of the days off with me!

No pressure tags; not sure I can get to 10 and please dont feel obligated but I'd love to see yours (if you havent already. Ive been avoiding spoilers a lot recently so may not have seen it): @vigilante-apologist @standbyyourmantis @soedblackchaos @forestthechonkykitty @corrrvid @local-redhead-bookworm and luddles looks like you did already do this.

Thats all i got. If you see this and want to do it, consider yourself tagged!

[jiraisupportgroup]

Hii I'm new to jirai kei n recently I joined a group where there's a lot o jirai / landmine ppl! I was asking some questions abt how to go for the fashion part of the subculture and one of my main questions was "is there any thrift store I can go to? Can I customize some clothing to make it look jirai?" And what I got as an answer was "No. Jirai ppl only use branded clothing, you can buy it second hand but you cannot customize in any way".

Tbh I'm not in a good place economically rn and I don't have a job either, so I'm not sure what I should do. Importing clothing costs 6 times more cause of where I live.

Is it really a rule that jirai / landmine can only wear branded clothes? (Liz liza, honey wardrobe, dear my love, etc)

I know I fit in the jirai lifestyle but I wanted to fit in the fashion too T--T

Thank you for your time♡♡ asking anon cause it's for me and a frien ^^"

I would once again like to preface this (as I preface all things) with the fact that I could entirely be talking out of my ass - this is just my opinion - and I am not a spokesperson for Jirai Kei or other mentioned subcultures / fashion styles as a whole.

I wholeheartedly disagree with that but also I will caveat that with the fact that I spent most of my teenage years in menhera / goth / emo / grunge spaces and those are very DIY-heavy subcultures. I'm also super relaxed about how people choose to label themselves (to the point where I barely claim to be in any subculture because I just don't want to bother with labels so I'm probably not the best person to ask haha~)

To me personally, this feels like an argument that someone coming from Lolita would make? I kind of see a link here in the sense that the two main reasons I think people say these things about Lolita are because it is really hard to make Lolita clothing and buying lolita knock-offs is generally bad for a whole slew of reasons. Similar arguments for both subcultures I think.

Girly kei / dark girly clothing can be really hard to make or DIY. I think it is certainly very possible to do, but it might take some trial and error. Mostly because being a bit over the top is kind of the aesthetic; there are a lot of ruffles and bows and lace and ribbons and buttons and cute little accessories and cut-outs and the neckline is typically very specific with decorated collars. At its base, it is just a blouse, but it's got a LOT of aspects that go into it, and if it's "too basic" then you're not really hitting that girly kei style. The skirts too (I personally think the skirts would be a little easier to DIY but I also have experience sewing with lace / grommets & making corset ribbon designs which is mostly what stands out from them to me?) You also run into a lot of the actual hardware being specific with hearts being a really common theme for belt loops or buttons, and decorated suspenders.

I think it would be difficult to DIY girly kei or dark girly pieces but it's certainly doable. One issue is that depending on where you're getting the materials for that DIY, it might be about the same cost (or more) as just buying a blouse (although this depends on shipping cost).

The other aspect of it is the argument against fast fashion which is a little more nuanced in Jirai Kei but I see where they're coming from? I mean, to be frank, ryousangata is literally "massed produced" fashion (& to be fair the aesthetics that are labeled as “ryousangata” have varied a lot over the years - it’s not just frilly blouses & stuff that’s just kind of what it happens to be right now). It's pretty much just fast fashion. MA*RS, Liz Lisa, & DearMyLove from what I can tell are mostly produced in Japan, although they do source materials from China, like most companies do (not automatically or necessarily a bad thing imo - but I will spare you that side rant bc it’s kind of not related). I couldn't find a lot of information about their production practices? So I'm unsure about worker environments for them? Generally, the big-name brands are going to be more ethically sourced & produced than random AliExpress sellers but by how much is kind of questionable (or at least I could not find a lot of information about the production processes so I'm not sure by how much - if anyone has additional information on this I would love love love to hear).

Now am I saying "Go buy a bunch of fast fashion off of AliExpress because it's cheaper and no one cares"? No. (It's also honestly not much cheaper.) But the reality is that it generally is fast fashion, so it's a weird balancing game. I think one of the main reasons people say "only buy Liz Lisa / MA*RS / DearMyLove" is because they want to avoid fast fashion as much as possible while participating in a fashion with a LOT of fast fashion sellers, and since it can be difficult to find production information they go for the big names because they're easier to trust in that aspect. (I also have fallen into this trap & have sworn my life to DearMyLove because they're the only big-name brand that is even slightly 6-foot-tall-bitch friendly T-T)

All of that being said, if you want to attach some bows and lace to a frilly blouse and call it girly kei I am absolutely not going to stop you (or honestly even judge you, but again that's just me). The shipping costs are part of the reason why I say the clothes are secondary to the jirai kei subculture especially as a foreigner because once you consider that the clothing is significantly more expensive and difficult to obtain in foreign circles it becomes directly contradictory to some of the reasons why those same clothes are so popular in the Japanese subculture: I don't think the cultural context of the fashion translates over to foreign markets (economically or socially, but I'll spare you that entire rant lol).

ALSO! Jirai Kei Subcul is awesome and has a much more obtainable aesthetic for foreign markets. It leans more into punk and you can use a lot of different pieces for it that are more easily obtainable, so I highly recommend looking into it. It might be a good medium for being able to feel fully like you belong, but not breaking the bank for an outfit.

[achillean-knight]

MY INTERPRETATION OF SCRAPTRAP - GORE WARNING OBVIOUSLY -

Honestly, I did this just for the fun of it because of a theory video I watched detailing the OP's thoughts on why Scraptrap... looks like he does. I like Scraptrap, he's goofy but I saw potential, so I gave a crack at it :3! This took me roughly 4 days? maybe 3, to complete, Not 100% satisfied with the result but it was a blast to draw! Oh, and little theories and extras for why I did what I did with this design under the cut.

(Also, Tumblr quality is ABYSMEL OH MY GOD)

The text reads as follows: "Because of similarities, I used aspects of Golden Freddy in my design. Importantly, the more "Golden" parts are Golden Freddy, while the dark green is Spring Bonnie. (Look at Springtrap.)"

That's basically all you need to know! But other things I wanna go into more about:

The Muzzle is a weird shape that scarily resembles that of Withered Golden Freddy. We haven't seen a rabbit like Animatronic with a square-shape like that, reserved only for withered G.Freddy & withered Freddy. I wanted to emphasize the colour of the muzzle to be more golden like Scrap-traps muzzle, to both highlight its drastic change from Springtrap (where he didn't even have a different muzzle colour) and to further bring home the idea it's Golden Freddy. Also he has buck teeth probably bc Peepaw wanted it to be more rabbit like lmao

It'd make sense for Golden Freddy to be used for the repairment of the suit due to the character being from the same restaurant as Spring Bonnie, so they'd be made of the same materials and would probably be easiest to use for repairs. I also believe that Golden Freddy would be at the same location as Springtrap in FNAF 3, due to the easter egg of either shadow or golden Freddy appearing by your side in the office (idk what one it is). If that's Golden Freddy, then if the Spring Bonnie suit could survive the fire of Fazbears Fright, then why can't the Golden Freddy suit?

My last point to make about G. Freddy being used in my design, is that apparently people theorise Cassidy is the one tormenting Will in hell. After the crying child moved on in the Happiest Day minigame, Cassidy remained. IDK if it's possible, but if Will merged some of the golden Freddy suit with his own, could the soul follow suit? (Kinda a stretch but it'd explain why William is haunted by G.Freddy and also has weirdly similar design elements from Golden Freddy in his Scrap Trap design.)

Nonetheless, this was just to test my skills. Happy but not with the design overall, I like the more withered look with random pops of colour here and there to differentiate from the original Springtrap. Admittedly, I rushed the rest at the end (the legs) and it shows. Not happy with that choice, but I wanted to move on from this project, honestly.

I think the main thing I wanted to keep was the bones tbh, hence why you see more than just his skull and fingers this time around. Also yes! Goofy arm returns due to the overwhelming "Yes" on my poll JHGFDSH

[toxooz]

i dont know if you've ever said anywhere- but we know that Remy and Ollie are both half orcs and that Ollie's other half is ~Demon~

Do we know what Remy's other half is or is that a future secret?

I'm just curious cause Ollie is So Clearly Orcish so is Remy's other half just super strong blooded or is he a twink?

SHEW yall I've been sittin on a huge lore breakthrough with Ollie and Remy that my high ass accidently unlocked a few weeks ago that I've been debating on just dumping here but I'm still considering if it's too spoilery for what is literally just about to come up in the comic, but tbh it would probably just help contextualize things a little better so IDKK if i dont drop it soon it'll be after-not this update or the next-but the one after but before I slap a little snippet, the short answer is I still don't know what his other half is exactly, it's demon no doubt but a mangly unimpressive one for sure. Adding onto that I don't even know what Remy's mom is part UUH and imma have to design her up Real Soon so im still wracking my brain for that one. The closest I got right now is maybe the demon resembled a giraffe somehow hence the giraffe esque spots on Remy ??? both Ollie and Remy's "fathers" came from the same demon cave hence the kinda dark look even around Remys eyes and similar horn stripes:

believe it or not it isn't eyeliner LMFAO its basically what Ollie has horn with just to a much lesser extent (they used to be more of a brown hue to i guess show that they weren't as tough and more sensitive to the touch but making the comic i kinda dropped it oof) but anyway the whole reason Remy was born in the first place was just for a "anything you can do I can do better" attempt by Remy's mom (Mogaks sister) ie. a lil snippit from the lore dump in the drafts:

*SIDE NOTTE Remy's mom has mental issues due to the hierarchy in the orc community over being a half orc and the fact that she isn't involved in combat and just minds the village, so she already wasn't really seen highly of (Mogak would treat her equally however) meanwhile Mogak was a pretty hefty solid full blooded orc and was a warrior of sorts and a leader in that aspect (her 'occupation' for lack of better word wasn't necessarily THAT high ranking in their society considering battle fighting was a common 'career' within the orc tribe so she's still even among the orc community, but still well liked and respected regardless) but her sister was seen as less-than in subtle ways. Due to her tough upbringing she quietly dealt with jealousy of Mogak throughout her life and during their young adult years she would take up the habit of trying to outdo Mogak with little things. When she was told about Mogak being pregnant with Ollie by her quest into a demonic cave, she planned on doing the same. The demon she ended up mating with wasn't all that great to say the least and didn't put up much of a fight either (Mogak declared a battle with the demon she wanted to make the deal with and chose a Pretty Fukkin Big Ass Boi one of the biggest in the cave I'd argue) so that's why Remy turned out Like That. After everything happened and they moved Remy's mom still carried self conscious habits and would get with men who would play off of those insecurities

[revenantghost]

Hi, I'm so curious what you realized about Wolfwood's freaky vision when he delivers Knives to Vash and what it means in Tristamp!

Ok ok ok ok so, we're theory-spinning here, so keep in mind this isn't firm or anything, but! (For context to anyone reading this ask, I mention in the tags of deludedfantasy's lovely post that I had a major revelation about all this)

Alright, so Wolfwood suffers this horrifically gory vision in chapter five of volume seven, and you point out that Wolfwood doesn't think it's Knives giving him this vision. Which Wolfwood's been around both Vash and Knives's terrifying, horrible empathetic powers. He's been frozen in place by both of them, and both events are deeply ingrained in his psyche. He would know if it was the twins, they haven't been able to hide this plant ability from him.

But we do see a beyond horrific and brutal vision like this one other time.

And I remember this because it haunted me, the sudden gore made me nauseous: much later during a fight, Livio (I believe it was Livio from what I remember, but if it was Razlo and I'm misremembering, let me know and I'll correct myself) suffers a very vivid image of his spine being ripped from his body while he's still alive. During his fight with Elendira. Who Wolfwood is surprised to see and doesn't seem to have had much experience with (Chapel seems to be the GHG contact?) when he meets her way back then, so he wouldn't be familiar with her evil presence.

It's the only other character we see have this effect on people outside of the twins. Which makes me think... okay man, what the fuck, what if Orange isn't even reaching a little to make Elendira some sort of freaky plant creature??? (The trans rep is *sighs and places face in hands* yeah, but that's for another post) Nightow was a part of the design process, this is a change he would have had to be all for. But what if this aspect of her character design wasn't a big change--what if it wasn't a change at all?

We joke and lament about how none of the GHG's ridiculous powers are explained, but. We have context for this one power. We've seen it multiple times, in fact, and it's something only independent plants can use. And, truly, out of the late-game GHG, Elendira has the most lacking backstory, it drives me up a wall. So, I'm not saying this was the intent, but... it's actually possible tbh.

[aspoonofsugar]

Hello! I hope your week is good to you, and if not that it gets better. It appears that you are intrigued by Lore Olympus. May I ask if you could do an analysis on Hades there, if you have the time. I love your thoughts on Persephone, and her duality. Also, have you ever had any thoughts on changing your header and icon to prevent from being thought as a bot?

Drink water and eat vegetables regularly. Drink milk also if you could.

Hi!

My week was good, thank you! I hope yours was fine, as well :)

So, I'll start from your last question about my icon and header :P I have, but never did out of laziness tbh. Probably I will one day, when I feel like it :)

Now, for your main question... yes, I enjoyed Lore Olympus's run! I am more of a casual reader, so I do not know the story or characters, as well as I do for other series. Still, it was a very fun read to have weekly:) I love the art and I think it had some genuinely great ideas and characters. I also think there was a drop in quality at a certain point and some pacing issues, but overall it managed to stay consistent with its main themes and delivered a satisfying conclusion to the two main characters' arc... All of this to say that I think the series gets way too much hate, which is honestly disproportionate and kinda absurd tbh... Like, there are series that screwed up more than LO ever did and get waaaaaaaaaaaaay less criticism. (Also, personally I feel strongly against the whole it isn't a good representation of the original myth argument...).

Anyway, this was all to say that yes, I can do a quick analysis of Hades. Or to better say, I can share my thoughts on him and what I think his role in the story is.

In general, Lore Olympus is a revisitation of Persephone and Hades's myth, which is extremely rich. So, it can be interpreted in many ways and a retelling can focus on many different aspects of the classical story... You can focus on Demeter's point of view and explore the story of a mother losing a child to an unjust society... You can have a Persephone trapped in the Underworld who is trying to escape from an abuser... You can even have an enemy to lovers' version of the myth... It all depends on what intrigues you the most about the story.

Now, obviously what intrigued LO's author is Persephone and Hades's complementary, which gets reflected in their designs, their personalities and their arcs.

Persephone is young, linked to spring (life) and feminine (hence why she is pink and has softer lines)

Hades is old, linked to the underworld (death) and masculine (hence why he is blue and has harsher lines)

The twist is that even if superficially Persephone and Hades seem to embody their gender stereotypes to a T, they are actually more complex. Persephone angers easily and can be impulsive and violent. Hades is sensitive and dreams of romance and belonging. They are both forced to comform to their gender stereotypes by society, which we soon discover having been created through a cycle of abuse. This violence is both generational (parents abusing children, who end up abusing their own children as a result of their own trauma) and domestic. Every King is able to rise to power only by using a more powerful Goddess and stealing their agency. As a result, Hades and Persephone's stories deal with these two kinds of abuse. And they do so in a mirrored way.

Initially:

Persephone's story focuses on her complicated relationship with Demeter, who is an abusive mother

Hades's story focuses on his complicated romantic story with Minthe, which is unhealthy

As the story goes on, though, the focus shifts:

Persephone faces Demeter and the two find closure. Meanwhile, though, she ends up as the object of sexual abuse by Apollo and she has to deal with the aftermath and the complicated feelings this violence leaves her with.

Hades and Minthe's relationship comes to an end (in a rather tumultuous way) and Hades can slowly address the root of all his complexes. That is his relationship with Cronos, his violent and abusive father.

Basically, by the end Persephone deals with romantic and sexual abuse. Her conflict with Apollo is linked to the mysoginy present in Olympian society. The mysoginy that made so all fertility goddesses before her were used and eventually discarded.

Hades's storyline instead deals with generational trauma and child abuse. He faces Cronos and realizes he doesn't have to be the kind of father Cronos was. That his father's abuse does not define him and that he can be happy with his new family.

This complementarity is made very obvious in the final arc, where Persephone deals with Apollo and Hades with Cronos. Not only that, but before facing their respective abusers both Persephone and Hades help another character:

Persephone resurrects Hera and frees the potential Zeus had been suffocating in their unhealthy relationship. She helps an older woman to find her own agency again.

Hades reassures his future daughter Melinoe that it is not her fault Cronos is abusing her. He saves his inner child by helping a small girl.

Finally, they do so by inverting traditional gender roles. On the one hand Persephone is given the chance to rage. The wrath she had been accumulating (which is literally embodied by Eris) gets to come out and she gets to humiliate Apollo and to walk away. On the other hand Hades gets to forgive Cronos. He frees himself from the hate and manages to move on.

When it comes to Hades, he is also throuhgtly foiled with Hera in this. In his final moments, Cronos is still projecting gender roles on both Hades and Hera. He projects Uranus on Hades and sees his son as an extension of his father. He instead sees Hera as a feminine presence that can understand, empathize and ultimately heal him. Well, it turns out he got them both wrong. Hades is the one empathizing with him, he is the one who has tried to understand Cronos all along. Hera instead is the one who despises him and who chooses not to care nor to forgive him in the end. Cronos does not understand them, so he ultimately dies without empathy... That is because he asked it from the wrong person.

Anyway, after defeating their respective abusers, Persephone and Hades find each other again and they unite their powers. However, they do so in the opposite way all the other royal couples did. Hades is the one empowering Persephone and not the other way around. As a result, Persephone fixes the macrochosm by reliving all the other fertility goddesses. Hades instead plays a key role in the microchosm by assisting Persephone. This is even highlight by Persephone becoming a giant and Hades happily flying around her.

So, these are my general thoughts on the series, its main themes and Hades's meaning for the overal narrative.

Thank you for the ask!

[mushroom-for-art]

More clone children of @seasidemew characters, get cloned fool, this time for Eve! (obviously @seasidemew/@xhunterbeatsx is allowed to use any of these designs or the colors or names or aspects what not in his works since clones of his character and even used aspects of his canon lore for things)

I hc Diane as being cloned from modern fresh Eve dna hence being the most on model compared to her sisters with adjustments, idk if canon but I'm choosing to see it as canon in my hearts Eves big like hand paws remind me of mega Y so I'm hc imagining that's where the mega mewtwo y gets it from and this Diana gets colored finger and toe beans to symbolise that and also cause colored beans fuck tbh I'm not immune

Vicky and Silvia both came from older dna samples fossilised like Sixteen and the dna was unfortunately damaged so the scientists for Vicky plugged in ditto dna hoping it'd adapt and copy and make a perfect clone, it did not XD Genesis mew dna is far too complex and the ditto dna couldn't copy it properly maybe physical traits but definitely not power and skill so Vicky is kinda a phioni to Manaphy situation with her not having fully developed hands or fully developed feet's just kinda being a bit weird and off and her textures seeming a bit unfulfilled so no beans only little sock feetsies and she's probably constantly kinda morphing like a ditto due to delicate sensative skin or what not the jelly child of the family I know everyone and their aunt has done a ditto mew/two fusion but have u considered I'm so original and so sexy and so brave?

Silvia meanwhile her sample had Eevee dna plugged in to try to adapt in that way as Eevee is the genetics pokemon however it kinda backfired with Eves old as fuck Genesis mew genes activating Eevees old dormant thought lost Ancestor genes and making Silvia an ancestor genesis mew type fusion

Their names are from a famous set of triplets I think they were singers someone clearly was a fan I think they sang a song about going home/not going home which is ironic as these ones will never know the tree that Eve knows as home probably so they may never find their ancestral home. They were gonna be named after triplets in the bible there is non then the three witches from macbeth they're not named and then the witches familiar but their names weren't vibing so famous triplets it is.

[guildwuff2]

would you be willing to do a sort of tutorial about how sort through the shapes of charr and asura?

sure thing! i'll go to the absolute basics so folks from any art level might get something from it, so i apologize if i'm explaining something that might be obvious, but bear with me here

soOoo:

i've pulled a couple in-game screenshots! using refs to start with is gonna be the most help tbh, and it's good practice imo to get the hang of everyone's shapes this way. our models today will be Mycologist Seeli and Hazel Steelcrasher

it can help to start by just taking the characters and tracing over top of them to figure out their shapes. the way i tend to do it is with a sort of wooden art mannequin way, separating out the sections into blocks and connecting them with joints, adding median lines that help track the direction different aspects are pointing, things like that! if you're just starting out it might be really helpful to crack some art anatomy books for humans and animals before tackling funky li'l guys like these, as we can take observations from life and apply 'em fictionally

from there I can start to try and eyeball the shapes-- both of these mannequins i've drawn were just by referencing their adjacent images, and all the shapes have done for me is map out my pose as well as the characters sort of volumes so that i can get a feel for where they are in the space i've put them in, if that makes sense. all the extra little lines on the face can help me with proportions and expressions too, but i've gone a little loose with 'em here for the sake of just focusing on structure

then from there, I can apply my sketching process to freehand drawing without references! that said, there's absolutely nothing wrong and it is in fact a good thing to use lots of references to apply to your work, especially for a piece you super wanna polish

and finally!! it's very, Very helpful to figure out how both asura and charr differ from a strictly humanoid anatomical setup! admittedly i draw my charr and my asura slightly more human-proportioned (usually around the legs) but doing studies that compare and contrast certain structures, like the face or the torso and legs like i've demonstrated above, can do wonders in designing characters in the future and translating certain features between body types.

anywho!!! uuh! hopefully that's helpful, thank you for reading! if there's anything y'all can think of that you'd like me to focus on in specific, i can do my best to break it down for ya!

[doberrrman]

11 for drool :3

11) what was the inspiration for your oc?

Ehehehe so there is two versions of drool actually, one that was an edgy self insert from when I was 12 and the other when I decided I was gonna make a comic with her and completely revamped all of ALT in 2018.

I suppose there isn't a lot to say about pre 2018 drool other than she was edgy as fuck. She started out as a survivor dogs self insert and I shifted her over into warriors at some point. My plan was to make this rly sick and deep oc, but sadly my 12 year old ass didn't rly understand what that meant at the time and made an edgelord anti-sue. I'm not sure what inspired her fur colors, but I remember putting white spots around her eye resembling a cloud very early on to show her connection to SkyClan through her design alone. There's no other major design aspects I remember though mostly because I used drool as a character for rping lol

In early/mid 2018 I started rewriting all of the little bits of drool's story and put it into a new project called ALT, however drool's design itself wouldn't change until late 2018 when I started preping pages for LR. She's based on 2 things! Elkmask from Convocations and horses!

In 2018 I stumbled upon Convocations and god did elkmask's design inspire me. Creature of all time <3

I think the moment I saw them I suddenly knew exactly what I wanted drool to look like, they were such a massive inspiration to my little creature.. kinda insane tbh. The second inspiration were these two horses from the soviet film конёк-горбунок (or the humpbacked horse in english) which I watched back when I was a kid and I just loved these guys.. And idk I just tried to apply it to drool somehow. I suppose because they're both mostly black, but it rly fascinated me how their necks curved (incase you ever wondered why I refer to drool as "my horse" sometimes... this is why....)

So with both of these....

.. U get this in the end. Congratulations!!

However overall I'm pretty happy with drool's design! It's fun, unique enough, has good body language and most importantly - it's easy to draw! Which will save your sanity if you planned to make 1000+ page comic for this bitch at some point!

[spiderpussinc]

Like holy shit. Like that Poly-Anon, what the hell are they on?

You never said you hate poly people or open marriages or anything. Are they Mr. Fantastic cuz boi if that wasn’t a STRETCH!

But yeah, sure we can have the poly relationship, hell I read that shit all the time. I even have some sketches of it in progress. But by far my favorite is divorce!Peter.

You get so much more ideas and history with that. Peter dealing with no longer being with someone he loves, learning how to deal with that while getting feeling with Miguel. Maybe he never even liked MJ that way and couldn’t realize that he was gay and only saw her as a friend until recently.

Hell for extra spice and drama, have it so Mayday still exists during the divorce AU. Have Peter trying to figure out how to be a single dad while figuring himself. Maybe Miguel is fighting to understand if he likes Peter that way or if he just sees himself in him.

Divorce is so liberating for people and it can be so with these people. So many ideas can come from it. I don’t know why so many people hate it when we write or draw divorce.

I think the answer is a pretty clear and loud "homophobia" and this recent insistence on progressive circles to paint same-sex attraction as "inherently limiting" or "biased"; which are both absolutely /insane/ takes. You can't be a man and *JUST* like men, that's a waste! That's suspicious! That sounds like an ulterior motive! (Being gay is passe to a certain type of terminally online guy. Real enlightened allies would fuck anyone at any time! Words don't mean anything!!!!!)

People's insistence to read any interest in m/m relationships as a malicious attack designed to prod at *them* in particular is so fucking tiresome. The world does not revolve around you. Nobody has to care for straight ships and it's not revolutionary to try to reinforce them as a holy central aspect in characterization or storytelling. It's not more dignified or substantial. You just think straight people are inherently 'neutral' or pure because they dominate the media field.

My preferences and my gay art exist in a minuscule internet bubble that doesn't endanger or erase the fact that Marvel is a rampantly cishet company. I can do whatever I want and it doesn't matter; they will keep publishing the same thing they've been publishing. But I *HAVE* had my art stolen multiple times now to be reposted on tiktok or resold on etsy with any gay/trans elements I've put on it scrubbed out - to appeal to this very same straight audience -and that pisses me off. I am not trying to cater to these people and never will. I *HAVE* had my gay art used as a point of ridicule against me for years; and tbh it does nothing to me anymore but I refuse to quietly accept this treatment as default.

I don't have to center the experience of M/F nuclear family in my gay art and I won't; it does not appeal to me, I don't care for it, and I cannot be talked into changing my mind. Anyone finding an issue with this should go outside and touch grass.

Evergreen tweet, really:

If i say "i like these two gay dudes, I would like to see them kissing" and you hear something else about someone completely unrelated, that sounds like a skill issue