#sorry to make such a long post in the reblog gfdfg I just thought about this a lot and wanted to comment on the representation and even jus

[hellocatbruhbi]

…You know what's funny ? Your post (great post by the way, don't worry this won't be a rant against it) made me think about this situation even more. I've seen thousand of posts and complains, and yeah I've think about it a lot already and saw multiple perspectives on it, but I don't know, reading yours made me think about all the things we lost frome the books for one, and how it's stupid to not include any minorities for the reasons you included, but also because it flesh out the charactes so much more.

For example, let's take Thomas, who outside of the discussion with Sammy, also had other signs in the other books he was black. One of the most important thing the books flesh out about him is why would he works for Joey in the first place (outside of "well it's his job") but also why would he KEEPS working for him for years. Because he wanted respect. He wanted to be treated with respect, something he says he didn't have often except when working on planes in WWII. And wouldn't you know it, if he's black in the 40s, it makes so much more sense.

In makes more sense ESPECIALLY to why he keeps working with Joey even though he hated his guts (Other than the Ink Machine stuff). Part of it was proabably because he wanted respect, and Joey treated him with it (at first sight), and even though the situation was bad, taking all this into account, especially if he's black, it's obvious one of the reason he stayed was because he knew he could get worst elsewhere, if he even get another job.

And heck, one of my absolute favourite thing in the books (thing we lost since it isn't canon, thanks Mike) was seeing and overanalysing Allison's character in the books. Because it was so fun to read between the line, because it flesh her out so much, and did a thing that made her one of my favourite : It insinuate multiple times that she isn't just innocent and happy. That there's more going on

In DCTL, she knows the purpose of the Ink Machine. Something not so many people actually know. And she even explain it to Buddy better than Thomas did. Which is kinda suspicious for a voice actress. But also, it adds about her relationship with Joey, he fired her because she told both him and Thomas to calm down, because she took Thomas' side. (Adding even a "I excpected better of you Allison") And she immediatly see through his bullshit and say very calmly they're gonna talk about it tomorrow morning. In just one book. In just one book you have all that to analyse already.

Should I also mention how in Fade To Black, who you know, already gave so much depth and poetic irony to the creation of the Cycle, also give us more insight on Allison's perspective of her life and friendship with Joey ? Like how she kinda seems depressed ? And probably because of Joey ?

Because Joey doesn't allow Thomas to come to parties anymore, something she seems used to, she's alone, and is alone most of the party because Joey is too busy going left and right to talk to people. Which yeah already a great way to treat your friend Joey. It's even worst when you realize he basically chooses her dress, and how much he refers to her as "an angel", which is very clearly Joey projecting the image he has of her more than who she is. Also note the fact that she doesn't even feel confortable in her own dress but Joey insisted to "go all out". Even just her conversation with Rose is full of lines to dissect and analyse, like this one :

Sorry for the picture's quality, but do I even NEED to explain how much this "always have to be on" perspective flesh her out SO MUCH and put SO MANY THINGS ABOUT HER IN A DIFFERENT LIGHT. DO I, REALLY ?

And heck while I'm at it, it even gives some people a reaction to the events after Susie's death, showing she was beloved and missed after she was gone, but even though nobody probably know exactly what happens (except maybe Allison seeing how quickly she changed the subject after a sad look) they at least know they didn't see her anymore and missed her.

All of this adds so much to the World of Bendy, and it's very intersting to build theory with and analyse the characters right ? Especially when they build little by little more insight on how our big bad Joey was at the time ? And it's really fun right ?

Well that's the moment I remind you that yeah, Mike confirmed the books aren't canon. A classic way to shoot yourself in the foot.

I don't know why Mike feel the need to say their characters are defined by their actions, not who they are, when ironically these two things overlap more often than not. Who you are (especially if you are a minority rejected by society) can defined your action and even explain them. And it aligns too with Joey being described as taking people who are desesperate. Really desesperate. So much stuff lost with a tweet. Amazing.

Wow, so umm... This looks bad, not only is it inaccurate due to using the wrong ink demon design [unless this is confirmation BATIM Ink Demon has been outright retconned... Which would make me pissed enough to make a new post just about THAT] but from an art standpoint this is just... Confusing and poorly done.

I wouldn't care if this was fanart, of course you should support young, indie artists... But for a Graphic Novel making sure your cover doesn't look like something Butch Hartman shat out in an afternoon is kind of important. Remember they're going to be asking us to give money to them to read this. The artist likely won't see any of that money and neither do the authors most of the time, not to mention this art screams of the artist being underpaid and overworked.

Like they Had to get something on someone's desk and their boss said 'good enough'. A concept Joey Drew Studios is very familiar with considering the allegations of poor working environments that Kindly Beast. Not to mention Mike Mood admitting in a Reddit AMA that they did in fact rush projects like Showdown Bandit. [Which they sold at full price]

He also says they can in fact say no or yes to designs involving their IP. Either Mike or Meatly had to say yes to this cover, according to his own damn words.

And do you really think this company in particular would care enough about its fanbase to not sell them garbage? They have done exactly that on several occasions. It's not like they care particularly about art either, considering their previous use of AI Art. There was no apology or even posts addressing it... Instead, they just rushed out an archives update to their game to get people to stop talking about it... Even forgetting an entire character in it. Again

This company is [or at least SHOULD BE] on thin ice when it comes to being suspected of misleading their fans or rushing out crappy products to them.

So with all that context in mind, I'm gonna talk about why this cover sucks ass.

The light sources are all over the place? Why does it look like someone put maces or knight armor on his shoulders but it's just flesh?? It looks both gross and weird [not in a good way either]

To explain more I'm going on a rant below but sadly this seems to have been confirmed to not just be a rough pass but the final cover and man... I am not excited about this graphic novel just at all. This felt like it really drained any possibility of it turning out good for me and I already had expectations low.

Okay first point, the light sources?? And there is no consistency here with the shadows or lighting, it looks like there's a hundred light sources all at once but none of them are even consistent!

the arrows here represent all the different light sources I can make out and yet the the shadow clearly implies there's only one. I understand wanting to use highlights to give the character a more clear shape but then just give him one or two lights behind him or in front of him? No matter how u follow the light sources, the highlights make no sense and the shadows make even less sense.

Why are the shoulders like that? Like on the legs it's a little understandable, at least those are clearly very heavily affected by perspective, for me I think they are so exaggerated it makes it look like one of the legs is either huge or one is small but that's maybe subjective.

However, the shoulders are unjustifiable, what happened there, what did they do??

I could pick on so much more honestly, how the color choices of piss yellow with no other colors being used, and the harsh pitch black being used for every part of his body is weird. How it looks straight out of Butch Hartman's recent crappy art. But to put bluntly bad start! Also what the HELL is going on with this background??

Seems once again the Bendy team is fine with sending out stuff thinking it's "Good Enough" for Bendy fans and honestly the people trying to tell me to "Be Grateful" for this are just proving that no matter how many times you betray your audience some of em will defend you!

Which is sad tbh. If anything we should be putting MORE pressure on the Bendy team to do better. Cause we deserve better than this, honestly we do. There are amazing artists in the bendy community who could do so much better for a cover. They've employed their fan artists before... Wouldn't it be great to do that for such a lore important book? The book that gives us the identity of one of the main characters in BATIM? The character you spend the entirety of Chapter 4 fighting to save? Not to mention will give several major characters their human designs?

But I guess this is... Good enough...