#im so fond of all of them

[everythingiguess]

Thamepo is just so interesting to me. I enjoy this show a lot and I need to talk about it.

It may seem like a pretty common plot —which could have something to do with the fact that it had been in the works for about 5 years before its actual release- but personally I feel like that's what makes it so enjoyable. You can't really go wrong with this kind of plot if it's handled correctly.

And I actually love all the main characters, which is something I usually have trouble with. In most cases I start liking them a lot but as the show progresses I notice that I don't really know all of them as I would like to.

And that's not the case with Thamepo! It makes me so happy; the fact that the show took its time to let us know each of them individually is one of the best things they could've done. This gave them a strong foundation to tell their story.

I know some people feel frustrated about Thame and Po not having scenes together as much as other bls, which is understandable, but I think that with a show like this it's the right way to go. I feel like it was necessary to focus on establishing the whole story and the environment, otherwise it wouldn't be believable. That includes getting to know all the band members, the people around them and the roles they play in their lives. Now that it's all established, they can focus on Thame and Po's relatioship more, which is what it looks like they're going to do; I remember seeing a clip of the actors talking about how surprised they were fans were so invested in the first half of the show because they thought people would start tuning it for the second part, so I'm guessing it's because that's where we have all the romance.

It's great and I love it because once Thame and Po are in a relationship, their dynamic will be very different from those in other shows; Thame is a popular idol and Po is not and that's a problem. This by itself should let us know that they will have a lot of difficulties and we've been given a glimpse of it in the Pepper-focused episode. Once it all begins, as an audience we'll completely believe in everything that happens because we're now immersed in the story and how everything works for people like the Mars' members. They won't need to explain every single thing to us because we already know and understand their situation.

We know because they took their time with the story, and they've done it so naturally. So of course I love it, and I think a lot of hard work has gone into this series and it shows.

I'm confident that if they hadn't done it like this it would have felt weird, absurd and careless.

[hinamie]

to moving forward

[itty-bitty-sunshine]

Felt like drawing the human staff and accidentally just drew these gayasses a billion times

Close up of the tiny ones

[pigeonsareevil]

Pet rats are so silly because of how they interact with you. When touching your skin they will act like it's the most delicate thing in the world, they will lick you like crazy but wouldn't dare to even graze their teeth on it, let alone bit you. But the moment they come in contact with your clothes, suddenly all that softness is forgotten and they transform into a vicious beast ready to bite and scratch and destroy everything that comes into their way

Anyway, look at this God of destruction

[peachypine]

the roomies!!! i originally designed this ososan oc trio in full about a year ago to write on an rp blog. it's not really active rn, but i still want to talk and post about 'em, so here they are! just basic rundowns, but i'd be curious to hear which one (if any) is your fav of the three (feel free to leave it in the tags?? if u want!)

bonus transparent of them all together:

aaand some rambling under the cut about their designs

anzu:

i wanted to use orange as a character colour bc it's one that wasn't already used in the matsu rainbow, and i had a concept of a gyaru character named anzu kicking around in my head for a long time as well, so here we are. miwa from the mixer ep inspired the eyeshadow (orange rather than miwa's blue obv, to keep with her colour theme) and delinquent totoko's design inspired her ombre dyejob! i went with a blonde-to-orange look as a nod to anzu's namesake fruit (apricot).

the strands framing her face are split into 3 sections at the end (2/3 are grouped together and 1/3 flips in the other direction) which is a little nod to her being one of 3 siblings (eldest), as well as the "三" character used in her surname (mikado) meaning 3. the rest of her hairstyle is just because i thought it looked cute, though.

ososan's style is more simplified, but i wanted to convey makeup that was a little bold, but cute (long false lashes, eyeshadow, & and a soft pink or nude glossy lip). clothing-wise, she mixes and matches a few different substyles (agejo and onee are prominent, with some ane, tsuyome, and general old school gal influences as well?), with a particular fondness for animal prints, esp. tiger print. (that said, orange tiger print doesn't seem all that common in gyaru clothes, so in-universe i like to think that the top pictured above was originally a black-and-white zebra(?) stripe print she thrifted and dyed at home--close enough!)

her nails day to day are usually medium length since she has a lot of hobbies that involve her hands and anything longer makes those things a bit more cumbersome. sometimes they're decoden/bedazzled, sometimes they're just painted a cute colour/pattern, depends on the day! and i think she opts for press-ons over extensions for longer nails, since it's cheaper.

ran:

i'm just a bitch who loves purple, that's the reason for this one. i think the hime cut with shorter bangs is nice because you can showcase the eyebrows (i think eyebrows can really elevate a character design so i gave all 3 their own brow shape) without worrying about the lines for the eyebrows and bangs intersecting in an annoying way when you draw it. i like shorter, slightly sharp eyebrows like these because they're easy to draw, lol. i think they're usually furrowed like she's displeased with something, but that may just be her resting face. i also thought this blunter, sharper-looking cut (bold, standoffish) was a fun contrast to anzu's flippy half-updo (bright, bouncy) and yuzu's short, wavy hair (languid, relaxed).

5 piercings on each ear (2 spiked helix & 3 lobe) = 5 siblings including ran (4 older brothers). the other reason for this number of piercings was that her namesake flower (orchid) had--i thought--5 petals, but as it turns out i'm a fool, it's actually 3 petals (including the lip) and 3 sepals??? ah, well.

clothing-wise, influences from various punk/vkei styles alongside some rokku gyaru. (maybe anzu introduced her to this one?) this brash style is the total inverse of how she was expected to dress growing up. (when she and anzu first met, she was an OL with no piercings, undyed hair, and positively miserable, but that was a number of years ago now.) i'm really not reinventing the wheel with "small and angry", but y'know, we have fun here.

yuzu:

is teal distinct enough from blue to count as its own colour? i think so. for yuzu, i really loved the concept of a deadpan-looking character who is very much not the straightman, who in fact wants very badly to be the funnyman 99% of the time. that kind of straight-faced but silly comedic character is always really fun to me.

half-lidded/heavy-lidded eyes paired with thick brows are always a winner to me fsr, and i wanted to give her a more "handsome" looking face with a bit more of a defined jaw than you typically see on women in ososan. as a treat. i wanted her to look a bit like a mysterious prettyboy, but she's not actually mysterious, she's just a space cadet. (and very straightforward about her thoughts and feelings, saying them with little fuss or thought.) expectation vs reality, people deciding what you're like based on their own perception vs what you're actually like, etc. etc.

i don't have anything deep to say about her hairstyle, but maybe that's how yuzu would like it, what you see is what you get. (again, eyebrows vs hair... let that eyebrow scar that i gave her for no reason shine.) as for clothing, she prefers things that are easy to move around in, so her style is the most "matsuno"-like (t-shirts, hoodies, basketball shorts, sweats, etc.). in particular, she likes shirts with phrases, usually in english, that are funny or almost make sense but not quite ("for background visual gags" and "for the english speakers in the audience").

[gunsatthaphan]

"I will let you know."

[turtleblogatlast]

Things I make for myself when insomnia kicks in

Just a chart about what I wanna change up and keep consistent in my art - I mainly wanna draw Raph with a tail because he deserves one, it fits too well. Donnie gets a long tail too because I didn’t realize how dino-like he looks until I gave him one, and now it’s a must for me haha.

[rotomicity]

TGCF art from 2021 which were very experimental and very much something out of my comfort zone but am still so satisfied with

(gonna ramble more under the cut 👉 )

My main inspiration for these were definitely classic storybook illustration styles and the watercolor-like illustrations included inside the tgcf books which depict hualian's daily slice of life routines as seen below

I wanted to capture that feeling of warmth i got from reading but i also went with the storybook look because their relationship (and by extension broad strokes of the entire plot) really did feel like something out of actual myth or legend; i'm chinese indonesian and was raised surrounded by chinese culture + values so tgcf felt VERY familiar to me, it threw me back to my childhood reading or listening to tales about chinese deities, i'd say the storybook image definitely came into my mind pretty quickly bc of this

I find this style somewhat hard to replicate now but if i could or have the time to, i really want to continue the 'companion pieces to chapter titles ' concept i did with the last 2 pieces (which are of the same chapter title but i was just indecisive 😭😭), i even had 3 more planned based on my favorite titles before burning out back then

[puppppppppy]

doodles of my fav sillies

anton belongs to @poicyss

[maflufla]

I just finished rereading LN 3 of the apothecary diaries and I need to ramble for a bit

One of the things that is clear and emphasized a lot in the these initial volumes is how much maomao is scared of accidentally committing an infraction unknowingly and been punished (killed) because of this. That is her reasoning behind wanting clear limits and direct orders, as in her narration she mentions multiple times that that makes her life easier.

Even in situations where the people in higher station are clearly showing signs of affection towards her (I'm thinking about when the emperor pats her head in the labyrinth-shrine), she has her guard up and is still very aware of the image she presents as to not "accidentally offend a noble and get killed".

And then we get at the end of volume 3, where the hunting trip offers more proof than ever that Jinshi is much more important and high up in the chain than she had previously thought, and that the whole situation is VERY messy. And she is obviously resentful and stressed for being dragged into this, because the undeniable truth is that she is the one that stands to lose the most. But still, when Jinshi offers her the ox bezoar she then SHUTS THE DOOR IN HIS FACE and it's such a funny and very maomao way of showing that she is a little bit closer to him and can let her guard down enough to let her excitement for pharmaceutical ingredients consume her necessity to maintain propriety (lest she gets beheaded for being accidentally rude as she always thinks????).

She knows that her own feelings about people are not something she is very in tune with (she knows how she feels about her dad and maybe her sistersand thats about how much she recognizes), so we the readers are not going to get a direct declaration from maomao about how she feels about jinshi. I like then that we get progressive and subtle glimpses of how she starts to let her guard down and feel more at ease in jinshis presence, that she becomes a little bit more rude, outspoken, direct with her observations and conclusions in her investigations. We get to see her talk more and narrate less, and I find it such clever and subtle way to show that she is warming up to him.

[dustykneed]

warning for scantily clad bones ahead. mcspirkiness too. nothing overtly suggestive because he's actively willing the ground to swallow him whole but rest assured the follow up (if any. i haven't drawn it just yet) will be very much so <33

live spirk reaction (AWOOGA):

there's actually another follow up in the works with uhura. maybe i'll post both at the same time or somethin.

[volivolition]

ough. it's been a long day, pass the volistry 💜❤️

[ganondoodle]

(Original art) Xaror, any pronouns, species (?), age (?)

short summary about them; they act as both an antagonist and an ally since they are only really interested in what they want or whats fun to them, they are immortal and call themselves 'death itself' since they have a special connection to souls (being the only one able to communicate with them) and the ability to seperate souls from their bodies in such a way that nothing can harm the soul afterwards their main goal is to .. bother and disturb the 'celestials'*, which they hate, as much as they can, breaking into their palace, freeing prisoners, destroying research, destroying the place, and most importantly, making as many souls unusable to them as possible-

they dont want to destroy the celestials though, they cant fight them anyway and this game of doing 'good' only with the goal of annoying them is their most treasured activity, so Xaror doesnt intend to stop them from killing or hurting anyone, only from harvesting what they are actually after (though Xaror doesnt actually care as little as they think they do about people, and has a soft spot for demons)

most of their appearance is later into the story; Zaphira (the empress) had been in coma and the medical facility she was treated in was destroyed by Shargon (orange eyed demon who acts as her bodyguard for the first part) in an attempt to save her from her estranged relatives taking over her country after they heard of her decline in health, she is believed dead but washes up on the shore of the mountain Xaror resides at years later (it has a reason, too much to write here) and they slowly nurse her back to health, the reason they give for it is that they found their first encounter very fun, thats all (is it?)

(more lore under the cut bc this is already so long .. im trying to keep it short q-q ......... this is stuff i have been working on since i was a kid so uh, some things might be cheesy but i cant change them anymore ..)

just to get some basics out of the way; theres three worlds, the celestials palace, human world and demon world, each are their own planet connected via different gateways

*celestials (possibly not final name, loosely based on angels) are the last remaining "survivors" of their planets demise, when their world died the most powerful among them cannibalized the weaker to sustain themselves until there were only less than 10 left, who each turned into different beings from it and dont resemble their own people much anymore, they built a palace from what was left on their world that protects them from space as its atmosphere collapsed shortly after- however they still needed something to live off; they discover the human world and are delighted to find rather short lived people with powerful souls, the best kind of sustenance for them (now), they aim to herd them like cattle, but a problem arose when it turned out another world has long been in contact with the human world; demons

demons are semi immortal creatures that act as protectors for their world, protection they extended, more or less secretely, to the human world ensuring them a long and secure life- the celestials need them to die at their whim though (demons are few in numbers, hard to kill and rarely have offspring, not an ideal target); as they worked out a plan on how to get rid of demons one of the celestials, Xanthriel (time) grew somewhat fond of people as they spent alot of time in the human world to observe and research them; in the end turning on their own completely, but losing the fight against Uriel (knowledge)

Xanthriel was supposed to be executed for their betrayal, but it doesnt work, instead they are splintered into many parts after a lot of struggle, most body, memory and most strength is one part (ending up as motionless forever bleeding corpse kept locked up in the palace), the rest is some time later gathered together and reforms as a seperate, weak mockery of them, they embody Xanthriels emotion- Xaror, without memory, strangely cut to pieces (hence all the missing limbs and broken halo) but driven by an unstoppable desire to disturb the celestials (they live seperate long enough to each become their own person, at some point Xaror discovers Xanthriels body after all and they merge back together, though as they are now two, Xanthriel only takes over once directly after merging, stays silent for a long time and lets Xaror be themselves, only later revealing that they are there at all .. hiding perhaps- i rarely have specific ideas for voices, but Xanthriels is like, like coarse rocks being violently rubbed against each other, less voice more noise)

(also, the celestials use Xanthriels blood from the day of their execution to create a plague that nearly wipes out all demons, only the youngest of them survived, effectively robbing them of everything, culture, history, knowledge etc- as demons rarely have children, like a complete restart of their society, they disappeared from the human world, and over time being largely forgotten as actually existing- the celestials wanted them all gone however, so they kept kidnapping them to try and find somethign that would work similarly against the young ones too (and then in general, bc the only usable blood of Xanthriel was from the day of their fall, and that has long since been used up) one of the young ones was Shargon, he was the only one still alive from his group

(also, the celestials use Xanthriels blood from the day of their execution to create a plague that nearly wipes out all demons, only the youngest of them survived, effectively robbing them of everything, culture, history, knowledge etc- as demons rarely have children, like a complete restart of their society, they disappeared from the human world, and over time being largely forgotten as actually existing- the celestials wanted them all gone however, so they kept kidnapping them to try and find somethign that would work similarly against the young ones too (and then in general, bc the only usable blood of Xanthriel was from the day of their fall, and that has long since been used up) one of the young ones was Shargon, he was the only one still alive from his group (he wasnt the strongest or special, he was jsut the last in the row and always got the lowest dosage) when Xaror found them in yet another break in into the palace and got him back to the demon world .. where he was promptly blamed for the others that were taken and treated like a pretender/fake/spy bc what he got put through changed his eye color (something that demons cannot change in any form) to one that does not exist among 'real' demons (orange ... notice the inner color of Xarors broken halo? :) ), some even suggesting killing him, but none of them were brave enough to do it (they were all kids still) .. except Eadrya (the big blue-ish one, largely regarded as the strongest demon alive) but Shargon managed to escape, and since then lived largely in isolation- this is part of why he is so hated, and why he starts to spend so much time in the human world after rediscovering the pathway there)

[styck-figure]

do you have any fic recommendations for ava? gen or rom

Gen

They're Sticks, Probably (Anima Virus) by @hakureiryuu

just take my hand and we'll abandon this world by @zishu-arts

Security Deposit by @inksandpensblog

sin pena ni sin gloria by @nyagrounds

catharsis by @nononameme07

Super Sticks - Arc One by @dynamic-k

romance

this is not a romance, there is no happy ending by @flareboi (vicagent)

like a moth in the night by @/zishu-arts (grapeduo)

I also highly recommend rooting around and finding more fics by these authors that you may like, but these are my favorite fics of all time.

[crescentfool]

the persona 3 protagonist 25th anniversary nui in food appliances!

[cupiidzbow]

im not sure if this has been asked before, but whats your favorite primate?

i like orangutans cuz theyre so smart and cool :p

HI RAD!!!! OUGHHH I LOVEEE ORANGUTANS SO MUCH TOOO!!!!!! they’re my favorite of the larger primate groups they’re known to be very sweet and gentle to the point where some of them can get along with littler primates of different species!!! I always love these pictures in particular 🥹🥹🥹

I THINK SOME OF FAV PRIMATES ARE DEFINITELY TITI MONKEYS ( they’re so round 🥹) black and white colobus monkeys ( I LOVEE their little white babies 🥹) AND SQUIRREL MONKEYS! (so ears! 🥹)

I ALSO LOVEEE CAPUCHINS ( especially white headed capuchins!! ) ( the brown capuchin is the specific species my sona usually is !!! :D ) CHIMPS, GIBBONS AND JAPANESE SNOW MACAQUES!! 🥹🥹🥹