#me if it was illegal to not have a consistant artstyle

[kelongt]

must have heard that through the grapevine ...

[lemonisntreal]

heyo! Just found your blog and I was scrolling through your stuff and noticed your AU tone deaf. And I haven't found anything about what it is or what your idea is behind it. So I wanted to ask if you could give me an introduction to your AU!

Oh! And I absolutely love your artstyle and how you draw Buster! Anyway, hope you drink enough water and have a good day/night! ;)

Dear god this has been in my drafts for a while-

Hiya! Sorry for that lack of info lol, I'd been inactive for a long time, and the time that I actually WAS posting consistently was back when things were still being sorta fleshed out. But I've got a pretty good idea of how every single part moves at this point, so sure :D I'll give a not-so-brief summary lol [under a cut because I couldn't not dump multiple paragraphs teehee ~_~]

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Tone Deaf is like a dystopian version of Sing, if I were to put it super duper simply. One where Buster's issues get more emotional focus, and we get actual bonds with the cast because the movie forgot to do that.

Buster is, also, a lot more unhinged, fair warning. This fic's gonna contain violence and tackle some darker subjects [adjacent to grief and denial more specifically] so if it feels like I jumped a lot of sharks, it's because I 100% did.

It kinda started with me noticing how, in the actual movies btw, smaller characters like Buster and Mike had more difficulty getting around places. This led me to ask myself about how species differences could lead to struggles for certain animals since the city just isn't built for everyone [this is NOT Zootopia]. Ash's quills, and Meena's towering size were things I noticed too that would be massive problems, realistically. So after a lot of pondering, now we're here.

The world of Tone Deaf in present day is in a post-war period that's lasted about 50 years now [Crawly is actually a veteran from this war- which was more like complete and total anarchy if I'm being real, since there weren't really any sides until near the end...]

Long story short, the wealthy capitalized off of the war and taking people prisoner- so they purposefully kept it going. A resistance ended up forming to stand against this [Miss Crawly being one of the generals, with that classic missing eye] and after their army stormed the unsuspecting stronghold, the war finally began to conclude. It still took around a year after that to release all of the prisoners of war, and by the end of it all, the damage that had been done to some races was permanent. Even extinction-level in some cases- some animals just straight up don't exist anymore because of it.

Back to Calatonia. Laws that are in place to protect animals from tearing eachother apart are still relatively new, and the criminal underbelly of Calatonia is kinda out of control. Animals get kidnapped/poached, smaller animals are at a huge disadvantage and have basically no power [politically or otherwise], endangered species are a very real thing, poverty is a huge issue for most of the population- and in the middle of all this is Buster Moon.

He's gonna be the main perspective. And the story will also serve as a slight character study on him, mixed with my own grittier and batshit insane changes/headcanons/alternate universe ideas on his backstory. He's a ray of sunshine with a lot of bottled-up feelings that will kinda really take control of the story.

Buster has been arrested multiple times. He's been put in unsuccessful therapy. He's still grieving his dad. He's committing crime and compulsively lying about those illegal actions too. He has emotional difficulties that he hasn't dared try touching on in years, and he has issues with letting go- which, is kinda how all of his new problems come to be.

The threat of his theater being repossessed if his show isn't a success gets a LOT more emphasis too.

But on top of that is the added threat of Buster getting sent out of the city if he can't get his business up and running. Remember how I mentioned endangered animals?? Well Koalas are one of them. One of the big ones, actually. He's the only Koala in a city of almost five hundred thousand, and it's been that way for almost half a decade now. It's been causing issues for the people in charge for half a decade now. Koalas have government-protected settlements far away from here due to their numbers being so few, so if Buster loses the theater? That's the next step for him.

But, to help this poor dude through all the stress of life is the found-family he develops with the cast he hired. He helps them for a lot of the first act, and then they give back his kindness in the second. They connect through their similar experiences, as well as their shared passion for music and performance. And by the end, maybe Buster's okay. Or maybe he's had a complete downward spiral [not gonna speak of act three 🥰]

Other characters have also had a shift in their dynamics. Things in the story have changed. Like for instance- Gunter already knew Buster and was a close friend of him and Eddie before the show, Judith is now the mayor and a main character, Pete has been put in place of the banker in charge of Buster's accounts, Buster unfortunately gets involved in politics, Mike actually gets to bond with the cast- actually the cast gets to bond with the cast point blank period [idc what you say, this just straight up doesn't happen in the canon movies], and to top it all of is a generous helping of angst with a few acts of violence sprinkled in 🤭

The actual Act I summary is this right now:

Buster had been in tight situations before-- suffocating situations, even. He’d been in every kind of trouble imaginable, he thought. With family, friends, local businesses, the law. But he'd always wormed his way out, either through loopholes or by charm. Or usually just by stacking another lie on top of his already crumbling facade. But this time it's gonna take more than a cover-up to fix this. ‏‏‎ Buster’s dishonesty takes him too far once again, a simple typo causing him to unintentionally land himself in a wager that could cost his very life. He has two months to fix this- to ACTUALLY fix this. And the worst part is that he hadn't even meant to lie this time. ‏‏‎ The First Act of Tone Deaf.

TLDR; Buster learns to love again after experiencing the horrors of animalkind firsthand and being healed by theater kids LMFAO

[merenq]

- Hi hi! Welcome to my art blog -

I'm Nico AKA Merenq (Also go by Merenqwoo on certain medias). I'm mostly a digital artist, but I also do other stuff at times! (RU/ENG) My Ko-fi in case you want to support me or interested in commissions! And my side blog where I reblog whatever seems interesting and useful to me @merenqwoo BEFORE YOU FOLLOW

I mostly draw anything related to my current obsessions (which I cannot control), so do expect to see various fandoms!

I draw whenever possible, so don't expect consistency.

Same goes for my artstyle: I may and will change it at times as I keep experimenting with it.

Do not interact with me if you support anything illegal and/or problematic. Also DNI if you support NFT or crypto in general. Just be a good person and we're even.

If I have interacted with anyone who's related to the topics mentioned above, please tell me! Please do tell me if I need to add certain warning tags! Also feel free to suggest ALT text as I struggle with describing things properly.

[purpleoffbeat]

holy shit op my brain grew 3 sizes every second i spent reading this post. took me a long while but,

so all those years ago when i read the comment or w/e abt the designs being so consistent, all i could notice that seemed intentional was the white across all designs, so its rly funny that thats the first thing u mention lmaoo

re: the mg's madoka saves in ep12. only a couple of them seem to have white in their mg costumes: the viking girl and the volcanic area girl. so the theory that white as a unifying color is a holy quintet thing seems to hold up! for the record (ha), magia record doesnt have a modicum of design consistency, because a bunch of different artists do their own magical girls. theres a lot of (too much?) variety of different artstyles, to the point where if you just look at the difference in eye designs u could swear its not the same media. and as far as i give a shit magireco isnt madomagi...

i think its hilarious that you say mami "ties everyone together" considering at least part (if not all) of her magic is about manipulating ribbons. i fully believe that mamis entire magic is just ribbons maniulated into different kinds of those muskets she has (note the big twin guns she has during the charlotte fight, plus tiro finale itself). regarding the soul gem containers, theyre gold for every magical girl, including non-holy quintet so im not sure abt that part. but sayaka having only mamis color on her is so on brand oh my god, during her whole "thankless vigilante" crusade shes always going on and on about how "its how mami-san wouldve done" or whatever, except she doesnt have the maturity and levelheadedness mami had which is why she refuses grief seeds even when its killing her. when sayaka tells kyouko shes grown more mature since the final timeline pre-rebellion i really feel like that was more than just about moving on from kyousuke. and i agree 1000% that madokas ideals didnt influence sayaka as much as mamis did, but it seems like sayaka also doesnt influence the others quite as much: while a few colors are shared here and there, nobody but sayaka has blue. poor kid lmao

so kyouko having pink on her outfit, ive never thought that could be because of momo (not that thats a bad interpretation, its actually super interesting! i also didnt know kyoukos name meant apricot, despite knowing momo can mean peach ahaha~). instead ive always felt it was more of a reference to how kyouko is religious, and when shes talking abt her dad im p sure he foretells madokami (even if maybe the move there was more abt the writers going "ohoho the foreshadowing is gonna make everyone freak out when they realize!" but idk). kyouko prays just before taking oktavia with her, which to me is clear proof shes always stayed religious even after her dads murder suicide. but what i mean is, she mightve been praying to madoka all along...

(side note: its imo mega interesting because it seems to me that despite homura apparently also having attended a christian school before mitakihara junior high, she clearly worships madoka at least after her godtiering, and then literally becomes the devil herself like some chuunibyou. and kyouko may be a shoplifter but shes a christian shoplifter dammit. my point being, kyouko may have done some things that are illegal (stealing), or immoral and dangerous (remember she lets go of familiars so they drop grief seeds? that crayon familiar mighta killed someone), but shes always remained devout. homura on the other hand, while most likely being raised religious, ended up being a devil of sorts against the one god she always worshipped, she always loved, and who she considers her enemy now too.)

homuras black being found in mamis and kyoukos outfits but not in madokas or sayakas also makes a shitload of sense. shes the one who knows the truth of magical girls the best, shes the only one who at the beginning of the anime is fully aware of the entirely of the system. she knows all about the corrupt system the kyuubeys invented, and while mami and kyouko dont know abt the whole witching out thing, they know firsthand of the dangers of making a bad wish and the magical girl infighting. on the flip side, i would say homura has the most white in her mg outfit as well. to me this makes sense considering homura held out hope for a ludicrous amount of time, ironically having unwavering hope until the timeline where a kyuubey tells her shes the one who caused madokas abnormal karmic destiny. i like to think of it as, to counterbalance the bleakness of her situation, she kinda has to have enormous hope. much like the magical girl system operates on a sorta-law of equivalent exchange, except not really, homura had to have unbreaking resolve, except not really, because of course it would run out at some point.

a wonderful segway into my next point, which is that its a metaphor for capitalism and how the supposed-neverending cycle of work to profit to more work to more profit is bound to collapse at some point since humans arent machines we are flawed and uh

oh yeah colors. so madokami is an interesting case on all fronts, and first off i love how u see the literal universe being the underside of her dress as a way to say "homura did an incomprehensible amount of stuff for her sake and now she finally understands" like YES madoka is her whole world! literally? anyway!

i only made this headcanon like a couple days ago, but i rly like to think that junko choosing the red ribbons as opposed to the yellow ones is indicative of her not wanting madoka to... do something. she never finds out abt magical girls and she doesnt seem to be opposed to madoka growing into her own person, but i mean, she does slap her at the first act of defiance. granted, she was abt to casually walk into a supercell storm, so that scene is always kinda ruined for me. but junko does trust her, because she knows her daughter has a good reason. nevertheless, i genuinely believe if only junko knew what she was gonna do to her own existence she woulda slapped her again. what mother wants to lose her child? in other words, if junko can choose, she chooses to keep madoka. just as she is. this brings me to the ribbons: she chooses the red ones because theyre in a way reminiscent of "plain ol madoka", being more in line with her pink than a yellow. its the predictable choice, the closest to her natural tendency. it should be noted madokas eyes are a darker pink than her hair...

and if yellow is indicative of mamis ideals of justice, then its a no brainer that madoka becomes justice for all magical girls and their wishes when she was so heavily influenced by her. its also kinda tragic, since madoka appears to feel like shes directionless in life and has no strong points, but she chose a radical path to achieve a purpose. anyways, my point is that madoka effectively became more mami-like due to her wish, and whether thats accurate or not, its undeniable that she erased her own existence as a human, aka she kinda died, aka no mother would approve of such a thing. of course junko prefers the red ribbons. and its no wonder homura does too. since i somehow forgot to mention it, yes this does tie into the eyes changing colors thing.

but about her hair, i only found out some weeks ago due to some post that reached my dash, that the girls' hair colors change when theyre transformed. its veeery slight, but they become more saturated. madokamis hair also changes a tiny tiny amount, the pink becomes "less red" and "more purple". im not a color scientist so i have no clue how to put that eloquently... but the difference is so negligible that im sure its not even visible in most official art.

and that concludes my obnoxiously long thesis on how madomagi applies color theory like its fucking breaking bad.

So I recently noticed something about Homura Akemi’s magical girl outfit that I’ve never seen anyone else mention. Probably because it’s honestly a bit of a stretch but I think it’s fun.

So in her magical girl design she has this weird chain of diamonds down her leggings (boots??? Both???) that always confused me because of how much it looked like Kyoko’s chains. It’s was then also realized that she and Mami are the only girls to have a ribbon neck tie and a bow at the back of their dress. And I tried to see if she had design aspects that aligned with Sayaka and Madoka, and I think sayaka’s is a little bit of a stretch, but they both wear a pleated skirt that is their theme color with a white trim at the end of it.

But I realized something fun when I got to thinking about madoka’s outfit and seeing if anything matched, and I realized that both she and Madoka have a hairstyle that comes in two and are tied with ribbons (Madoka has twin tails, Homura has twin braids). Homura later wears Madokas red ribbons after she becomes Madokami. And then I realized that Homura doesn’t have anything matching Madoka for most of the series. The only thing that tied her to Madoka she renounced to try to save her, and she only gets something that ties back to her after she failed.

Anyways again bit of a stretch but I think it’s fun :)