#like the concept of it???? the characters????? the story????? the lore??????

[hotguycomiczine]

Is this comic anyhow related to the Double Hearted comic? Until now I thought it was the same thing 😅

Hello! The HOTGUY COMICS Zinethology has no relation to the Double Hearted comics, nor is it connected to its narrative or universe. Instead, the story and lore were conceptualized by all of our contributors and then crafted into a linear story by the moderators— hence why there are gaps in the HGCZ timeline between pieces, as well as a few questions left unanswered for the future. Very little of the HGCZ universe was decided before our contributors had the chance to collaborate on it during our creation period, which mainly took place in the full month we set for character discussion and the mutation polls. While our head moderator TJ @definitelynotshouting came up with the initial worldbuilding before the zinethology began, the only things really established were the setting, Hotguy's backstory as an actor, the concept of mutations as a whole, and the TCG— all purely as a jumping off point to get our contributors started.

It's likely that the reason DDVAU and HGCZ are often confused is because the creators of DDVAU, @kitsuneisi and @xmaruu11, were actually guest contributors for HGCZ itself! However, their lovely contribution to our zinethology was not related in any way to Double Hearted, and instead takes place early in the vigilante careers of Hotguy and Cuteguy for HGCZ's specific world. That being said, we're honored that they chose to be a part of our project on top of everything else they were working on at the time, so we're pleased to see their work get so much love.

In short, this zinethology's story was built by the community across every single one of our contributors! We're insanely grateful for their passion and commitment to telling this story, because it would have been nowhere near as rich and incredible a tapestry if they had not been so driven. Thank you for the question, and cheers!

[genericpuff]

Looking back on it, Rachel really should have called Lore Olympus something else. It really doesn't seem to want to focus on 'lore' or 'olympus' and would rather be a romance with her self insert and celebrity crush. So many plot points and characters got thrown away for her two characters. It reminds me of Twilight having interesting background characters (Rosalie deserved better) and an interesting supernatural world. Yet Stephanie just focused on the dry ass romance of Edward and Bella.

I mean, the title totally worked in the beginning, the comic just lost the plot after its first season and became more like what you're describing, a weird May December romance about a girl who's only empowered enough to wait until marriage with the first guy she ever crushed on before having sex 💀

And yeah true that, a lot of fantasy dark romances like Twilight suffer from the issue of getting too hyperfocused on the main couple doing stuff and not paying enough attention to the actually interesting stuff going on around them. Though I will say, in Twilight's case, a lot of the "interesting stuff" was grossly misrepresented from Indigenous tribes and beliefs so... maybe it's for the best Stephanie didn't expand too much on it all in the end LMAO

Of course, the same can be said for LO, there were some really interesting plot hooks happening around H x P, but by the time S2 rolled around, all of those hooks got shoved under the bed until it was time to hastily wrap them up for those of us who were waiting to see them resolved. I think the Hera and Echo plotline was one of the worst culprits for that, you can tell in S2 she had an idea for some kind of "double agent" story with Echo where Echo would slowly come around to Hera's side and have to choose between her and the job Zeus clearly hired her for (to spy on Hera) - but then it just wound up skipping all that so we could watch Hades and Persephone play golf with diamonds, go shopping, and fuck around in the Underworld, until Rachel had to suddenly wrap up the entire Hera x Echo story in the most rushed, confusing way possible just a handful of episodes before the end.

LO had a lot of interesting concepts and ideas especially with the added benefit of it being based off myths that many readers were already familiar with, but unfortunately they were in the hands of a terrible writer working for a terrible company that didn't provide her with the resources she needed and could have really benefited from to tell a better story. It clearly needed a more involved editing process, more drafts to work through and scrap and work through again, more time to really plan out the full skeleton of the story, but what we got instead was more like a rushed first draft that spent more time on the bland uninteresting DDLG couple because they were clearly the easiest things Rachel could write about - fantasy shipping scenarios of them talking romantically to each other, making out, and having sex, boom, plot 🥴

[cocsot]

Sketches for an au I’ve been working on for a while And by a while I mean three months

Anyway

Notes if anyone’s interested:

-The main concept is I have made MOST life series characters into bugs and they live in a forest yadayada I can yank these guys around like puppets now that I have a story for them

-Ive taken to calling it bug life definitely not based on the popular Pixar movie at all

-*deep inhale* Lizzie’s a moth (rosy maple) Scars a spider (there’s lore behind the arm thing) The small doodle of Joel is an owlfly (just because I wanted him to have antenna) Skizz (yes that’s Skizz I know he looks a little off) is a Leafbug and I promise to fix his design later because it is a little confusing Annd Mumbos a flying stick bug

-This is not all the designs, I just wanted to give Tumblr something to see if my weasels like them, if they do I will make more

-There will be and is shipping (of the characters not real people don’t make it weird- Joel and Lizzie as an exception however) so be aware if you ever come across this art ever again

-I’m a fast writer but never a fast artist so if this does become a thing it will be very veerrryy slow

-this is not based on one series entirely I just have to many ideas, to much time, and a not enough to give

[blueikeproductions]

Y’know thinking it over, I think one of the reasons TFONE failed, after looking at other comments, is it ultimately did nothing new. The marketing didn’t help, but I’ve noticed a lot of people be irritated at the modern 13 Prime concept and the more modern political bent (no longer Cold War inspired, but instead some mild identity politics and heavier ideological differences that modern audiences have notably struggled with) persisting, and this movie does little to change that.

The Bayformers films, love ‘em or hate ‘em, ultimately tried new things: The Allspark, reinventing the Prime mythology for its canon, Sentinel Prime as the best villain the series had, a group of ancient Autobot Knights that Optimus was apparently part of alongside the Dinobots, and so forth.

What did TFONE actually offer that was new?

Well.

Not much.

It was a complete retreading of the Aligned backstory we’ve been given for the past decade or so: Optimus and Megatron were former friends that overthrew a corrupt system that Megatron kept rebelling against, starting the Great War.

The same story that Prime did, that Cyberverse did, that IDW did, that Netflix WFC did, sure a few things were reshuffled but it’s the same, slagging story. TFONE even recycled Sentinel Prime as the main antagonist again, his motives not that dissimilar from his Spock adjacent counterpart.

People complain about the Great War being over done, but that’s clearly not stopping people eagerly tuning into Skybound’s version of it as of typing. General audiences, like it or not, vastly prefer the war between the Autobots and Decepticons, they don’t care about Grunkle Vegeta Megatron, his younger years as D-16 and his tumultuous friendship with Orion Pax.

The only thing new TFONE technically did was better establish Optimus and Megatron as being good friends originally. Aligned and the other series did a terrible job with this, with it ping pinging between Megatron already being power hungry and insane, he just hid it better, to him and Optimus being written as a couple who had a bad break up but can’t get over each other. TFONE still leans towards the later, not helping current situations but at least you do legitimately feel bad this time the friendship fell apart. The friendship was actually believable, that was the strength, but alas most people don’t really like the idea of Prime and Megs being friends.

It’s why I still feel the upcoming Age of Primes toy line will struggle, because once again, the 13 Primes are not a well known aspect of the lore, and modern shows haven’t done a great job at fleshing out Solus or Quintus, and stuff often falls back on Alpha Trion, a character from the old cartoon that people simply are more familiar with.

We desperately need to flesh these characters out better, we need to go back to a Vector Prime befriends the modern kids and Autobots plot for each Prime to make sense of them going forward. That’s the only way new fans will get to know them better and actually care.

As for TFONE, with current problems at Hasbro and Paramount, it’s not looking likely this story continues, but whether it inspires cartoons and comics after EarthSpark anyway we don’t know. Clearly the plan was to use TFONE as a springboard for future content, but it simply didn’t make money to justify it. If Hasbro is satisfied with it doing well on Paramount+, then maybe it evens out, but I legitimately believe the core problem has been trying to make the Aligned canon stick to most modern media when it clearly isn’t. I think we need a new approach, keep the Primes if you want, but don’t slavishly have it be the EXACT same story with them in each movie, comic or cartoon. TFONE DID modify the Prime backstory so that’s a good step, but whether they take that for future cartoons we don’t know.

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

Hello, Miss Raven!

I hope you are having a nice day ^^

I was wondering since you don't have a Yuusona, have you ever thought making your own Yuusona like what traits, gender and personality would you have for them?

And how would their relationship be with Miss Raven would they be friends?

Sorry if I'm asking something you don't feel comfortable answering just feel free to ignore it. I'm enjoying your work and I'm new here so I hope I wasn't a bother! Love your work 🫶

I’ve thought about making a Yuu of my own on more than one occasion. However, I’ve never been a fan of the roles designated for self-inserts… It’s hard to commit. Even if I were to make my Yuu less of a Yuusona (ie just Me but in the Twst world) and more of an OC (an entity totally separate from myself), I always lose motivation somewhere along the way.

That’s of course not to disparage anyone who has a Yuu though!! I just personally find it a struggle to design around a somewhat predetermined identity. There’s less freedom in a Yuu because they have to meet certain parameters in order to “make sense” in the story. For example, Yuus are generally from our ordinary world and magicless. I don’t like having those limitations (and though I could go against it, I’d refrain in order to not break canon lore). That’s why my first Twst OC is very far removed and exists as her own thing.

For fun, here’s some of my scraped Yuu concepts, including doodles. They're not really "Yuusonas" though, more like original characters that happen to be filing in for Yuu:

Yuu 1: Mad Scientist Yuu

The earliest iteration.

This Yuu is ~16, male. Considered nonbinary at one point too.

The notes in the image basically describe him. Germaphobe, has lots of band-aids (because he is accident-prone), constantly tired + has dark undereye circles due to excess stress and lack of sleep.

Frequently seen in face mask, lab coat, and latex gloves.

“Don’t bother me” energy. Very curt with people and just wants to be left alone.

Claims to be an egalitarian because he “hates everyone equally”.

As the story went on, he would have learned to lighten up and work with others too. Basically, the same arc the NRC students have.

I didn't think too deeply about what his relationship with Miss Raven would be like... Most likely, he just dislikes and avoids her like he does the rest of the NRC population.

Yuu 2: “Robert Philip the Divorce Lawyer” Yuu

Twisted from the divorce lawyer love interest in Enchanted 😭 YES, I SAID WHAt i SAiD…

This Yuu is 35ish, male.

Has a very girly young daughter back home. She is basically his motivation to return.

His ex-wife left him. (YES I AM KEEPING THIS LORE.) Has sworn off love since then but is dating another woman for practical reasons.

Very anti-romance and anti-fairy tales.

Somewhat grumpy.

Logical, pragmatic. Some would say calculating.

Constantly arguing with Crowley because he knows his rights and how many laws Crowley is violating/j

He wouldn’t have been a student but more like a faculty member and father figure to the NRC students. By being in Twisted Wonderland, he helps to mentor the boys as though they were his own children, and the boys in turn teach him about magic, imagination, and believing even in seemingly impossible things.

Had an idea about him finding true love in Twisted Wonderland too; this would basically be his Giselle. Maybe a kind lady from Foothill Town??

Robert!Yuu was going to be sort of a secondary father figure to Miss Raven. Crowley is her real guardian, but he's usually not fulfilling the typical duties of a guardian so Robert!Yuu has to step up. In a lot of ways, Miss Raven reminds him of an older version of his own daughter so he has a soft spot for her. He also tries his best to advise her on life and boys. I imagine that he and Miss Raven have that Hades and Megara scene where she's gushing about Hercules and Hades goes, "Please. HE'S A GUY!!"

Yuus 3 and 4: Twin Yuus

The bangs they have are borrowed from Robert!Yuu because I liked them and was too lazy to try something new out—

They’re brother and sister, both 17. I wanted to play around with the concept of multiple Yuus in Twisted Wonderland at the same time. Twins because they are supposed to be “a mirror image” of the other.

The theme these two would explore is gender, particularly expectations vs reality.

They come from an old money family; each twin has very traditionally gendered expectations placed on them but their secret is they swap places and pretend to be the other twin so as to get out of their own responsibilities, as the girl is tomboyish and the boy is more feminine.

They continue this act in Twisted Wonderland in order to "protect" one another, but their relationship becomes strained with each OB. For example, the male twin would become increasing protective, feeling like it is his responsibility to keep his sister safe. This would earn him his sister's ire since he never smothered her before. The twins would eventually reconcile and come to reach a middle ground regarding one another's expression of their gender and how that informs their behavior toward one another.

In another variation, only the male-presenting twin would be isekai'd to Twisted Wonderland. It would later be revealed that "he" is actually a "she". The explanation that she provides for acting masculine is to rebel against the expectations of her family (who had arranged a marriage for her prior to her being isekai'd).

... But then there's ANOTHER twist 🤡 and it turns out that her "masculine self" closely resembles her actual twin brother (who is now deceased). The idea is that she partly acts this way as a trauma response and relies a lot on "speaking" with her brother for advice on how to move forward in Twisted Wonderland. Like, she has pretend conversations with him in her head.

Her character arc would have been centered around detaching herself from the expectations placed on her, as well as learning to let her brother go and become her own person.

ASDSBDABSDOSA I feel like Miss Raven would be so confused trying to keep track of the twins and/or the single twin's dramatic backstory. She'd be pretty cordial with them though! Maybe even tries to counsel them when they're fighting or closed off from others.

Yuu 5: Ara Ara Onee-san Yuu (WIP name is Sumire -> Suu -> her variation of “Yuu”, lol)

The best designed one, probably.

The only one with a proper name, too :v

She's 18 and female!

Started off as a joke between me and a friend. We were talking about how we think many of the first year students would be into "onee-san" types.

As you may or may not be able to tell by the design, she's meant to be a caring big sister character. Sweet, patient, and motherly. Even gardens and bakes! The type you know you can always go to when you need advice or comforting.

YEAH I GAVE HER DEAD ANIME MOM HAIR, SO WHAT???? The bangs swooping over one side of her face gives her sort of a mysterious air!

She looks very kind (and that's because she is), but she is also very air-headed. Like she'll pick up a worm and hold it in your face and ask you if you think it's cute.

Has a secret sadistic side. Not malicious and won't go out of her way to cause problems, but she'll gush about how she thinks you being frustrated or struggling with a task is "cute".

The arc Sumire would go on is one revolving around her status as the "older sister" of the group and finding a "pure" way of loving her friends. There's nothing wrong with having that role, but her issue is that she relies on it to be her personality and often gives away too much of herself at the cost of her own mental and emotional wellbeing.

It's like... codependency. She loves you because (whether she knows it or not) she NEEDS validation from others. And because she wants that validation so much, she forces herself to be someone she's not at her core. Someone agreeable and sweet. That becomes very taxing for her.

If she feels as though someone is going to leave her, she'll either love bomb or have a mental breakdown in private. TO BE CLEAR, this is not healthy behavior and she's supposed to grow out of this obsessiveness over the course of the main story.

By that logic, she's more manipulative and selfish than she seems at a glance. I guess you could describe her true personality as being yandere or even menhara?? But she usually masks it well.

Miss Raven has a history of falling for pretty smiles, so I think she'd also be a victim of this one. She would look up to Sumire as like "the peak lady" and the big sis she's always wanted. REALLY feeding into her secret ego there, Miss Raven... and Sumire, being herself, would just giggle and pat her on the head to keep that toxic relationship going.

[asteriuszenith]

It's been years and yet my mind still keeps coming back to the VT and Montauk ARG. Your girl was fucking OBSESSED with the entire thing. Pretty sure I was even participating in events sacrificing my data while out on business because I couldn't miss a single second of it. I WAS TRYING TO MAKE DO WITH SHITTY TRAVELING BUS INTERNET WHEN I WAS ON THE WAY TO ONE OF OUR ONSITE JOB STUFF TO PARTICIPATE IN AN EVENT.

[skeletalheartattack]

have you posted about gelato before :o ?

honestly, every mention ive made of Gelato in the past month or so has just been through the tags of some posts ive reblogged on here, it's only been until now that ive gotten around to showing him off!

this is Gelato, a Flamingo/Secretarybird mix that my friend @meetthehelper put together!

for a while, i've been wanting to figure out a bird fursona for myself, and i wanted one that had a similar silhouette to that of Scratch (i.e. Scratch & Grounder), and the bird that seemed to make the most sense to me was a flamingo. it was Helper's idea to mix him with another bird species, and i really like what she ended up with :)!

[starrspice]

I just made them to get their designs out of my brain but now they have lore (which is under the cut)

A handful of poses come from Mellon_Soup's amazing pose references

Marina is the lovely princess of a small little kingdom. The subjects of her kingdom expect their greatest royal Knight Edric to eventually ask Marina's hand in marriage and become the kingdoms next ruler

Little do they realize that Marina is in love with the Outcast witch Aria who lives at the edge of the kingdom (and that she often sneaks out at night to visit Aria and learn some magic herself)

While Edric has his eyes on the Court Jester, or more accurately, the court jester's imposter

As the real court jester eloped with a woman from a band of traveling minstrels. Leaving his sibling (Colette) to take his place in hopes of keeping up their position in the castle so that they can care for their sickly mother.

Edric is the only one to catch on to the Twins' little switcheroo and is delighted to have an excuse to get closer to Colette (often in the form of teasing and fake threatening to expose their secret)

Poor Colette often has to work twice as hard as they also have to uphold their position as a royal Hand Maiden to the princeas

[icewindandboringhorror]

finally finished all of one character's entire quests/optional dialogue/questions/etc.... 100,000 words... .... aughhh

[droodlebug]

i'm for sure not finishing veilguard. i set it down a while and tried again and ahh i'm just not enjoying it. the characters dont have a depth im looking for.. the insertion of a writer's white guilt onto the elves that are based on real life indigenous people and have been in-games enslaved and treated horrifically and are the ones who don't have "real" gods that are actually just blighted tyrants. everything with taash and the qunari. the gameplay was fun for a while but then it made my hand so numb i couldnt do anything for a week. the last straw was taash's gender talk that suddenly turned into picking a cultural identity for them to align with out of nowhere and then soon after learning that Another antagonist is of course an elf. starting to feel like their implying that all elves become evil when given power jfc. i think i'm actually done with it it started making me feel gross and bored. i don't care if you enjoy it or not, everyone's got a different threshold it just crossed mine.

[rayroseu-reblogs]

omg my twitter is full of those posts policing "dont simp for skelly hes 16 weirdoo" and im just!!🔥🔥🔥

[sunnibits]

is anyone else like a huge fan of various medias, huge fan of characters, loves exploring plots and themes and character development, genuinely very enthusiastic about storytelling in general… but like, somehow physically incapable of making plot lines you care about with your own original characters. or like straight up being unable to create ocs you’re actually invested in???

like, you know what you like, you enjoy so many stories, you spend so much time digging into and delighting in the themes and tropes you like, and yet every time you try to make an original concept yourself it’s just impossible to make something compelling to you???? which makes no damn sense bc it’s literally coming from your own head so wouldn’t it be as self indulgent and perfect for you as possible??????

or is this just a unique me problem bc I swear to god it’s driving me insane

[perenlop]

havent gotten to dbz yet but truly the more i find out about dragon ball the more silly the "sonic maliciously ripped off dbz, everything parallels PERFECTLY" thing becomes to me

[starboy-squeakers]

Again not a dungeon meshi reader/watcher but every time I hear about that laois guy I get reminded of how my system had/has a hyperfixation on dragons so intense that we got that big fancy dragonology book and we treated it like the damn dragon Bible for like years

Now, obviously, we understand that there's different interpretations on mythical creatures, and no one interpretation on a dragon is necessarily gospel, but that multiple interpretations on the classic tale of beasts of scale and fire are completely valid and to be expected!

however if you call an Eastern dragon a coatl I'm going to come to your house and slaughter your family

[narwhalandchill]

btw if u equate childe and aventurines backstory in any fucking way please leave this blog and unfollow me <3 preferably block me while ur at it too uwu

[blood-ology]

Cookie run has me in such a steven universe-esque chokehold ughhhh