#there is definitely less fanart for show!death

[awwsd]

Death Fanart part 2: The show!!!

A sequel to this post. Again, she doesn’t suffer from ‘type one’ as much. But there are. Some. So anyway heres some fanart !!!!!

This drawing by illustra.bruno, every single time someone draws show!death in the comic style I giggle and kick my feet and 19 years get added to my lifespan.

2. This lovely piece by @ square cloud, the colors r so soft and I love how the art makes reference to both the show and comics, while still maintaining a unique style!!!

3. Muzenik_’s style makes her look so ethereal n unique while still looking like her actress a lil!!!

4. They are sillies and now I crave a Cartoon Network spin-off where the endless work in an office or smth

5. This is everything to me actually and I’ll never be normal again! Give death a jacket 2023

6. Her hair!!!! Her smile!!! The flowers!!! I’m!!! Gah!!!!!

7. Love this one, which again is reminiscent of the comic’s art style and y’all already know I go insane over drawings w texture.

8. I want this in my room and as a sticker on my water bottle and the first thing I see when I wake up.

9. @ romyjonesdraws, I have never considered the gold ankh but now I can’t stop Considering it.

10. And of course my all time favorite by @ missbliss1294. Genuinely don’t think anything will be able to top it everything about it is perfect and I’d like to inject it into my bloodstream.

I have absolutely zero ability to be normal about death and my brain will explode when season 2 comes out 😊👍

[raivenantcravings]

Round 6 Reaction/Analysis

SDFFSDHFLSDHF ROUND 6 FSDHKFDSH ROUND 6 FSDKFSDHFDS ROUND 6

I woke up to twitter analysis saying that Till never even looked at Ivan until his final moments. And I made pre round 6 fanart titled "look at me." Couldn't manifest it. He never looked at him in the end,,,

broo dont look so happy. oh my god you lovesick fool.

reaction and analysis under the cut

First detail I noticed was that are the mics clear because both Ivan and Till are being vulnerable? They have nothing to hide anymore, so they'll show the world their whole being.

Anyways, to my main point,,

My interpretation of the ending was that Ivan was really trying to "cure" Till.

Till opens up with wanting to feel pain, to feel hurt.

"Please, leave me scars"

"Please, hurt me so that not a single drop of me remains"

Which, I realize he's talking to Mizi, but it's a cry for "help" either way.

Ivan's part goes:

"Notice my pain and mend me right now"

Again, he's talking about himself, but I think it could apply to what he does to Till.

So they kiss.

And, I've seen a lot of other people already say this, but I also do feel the kiss was not only meant to be for Ivan to selfishly show his love for Till.

Like bro don't go nonconsensually kissing your crush, what are you doing!?

When the scores came out, Ivan was much lower than Till than I expected. I thought it'd be a Mizi-Sua situation where the scores were close, but Mizi barely edged it out.

But Till almost had 20 points over Ivan.

And I know it's because Till is a rising star. And his new image change would really garner the attention of everyone. But it's not like Ivan is a nobody either. I didn't expect the scores to be so different.

I do think its because Ivan kissed Till. As a final nail in the coffin that guarantees his loss.

Alien Stage is commentary on the idol industry. One of the most prevalent issues in the idol industry is the romantic lives of the idols. Idols are not supposed to be in relationships, at least not outwardly. Their whole image is for the fans. Nothing they do should ruin that public image as an idol.

Much less in a in a queer relationship.

Now I don't believe the universe of Alien Stage cares about LGBTQ+ issues because there's bigger issues surrounding their human pets. But I think that it is an issue that Vivinos is trying to address because they certainly never shy away from queer issues in their other works.

And I feel the idea that idols/pets should not be swayed by their romantic emotions is still prevalent in their society.

So for the audience to see Ivan kiss Till, in one of the most outrageous and public displays possible, further pushes the votes in Till's favor.

And yeah, I also do believe that he kissed Till for him to finally look at him, but I also feel that it was a self-sacrifice too.

And then Ivan violently chokes Till.

Possibly, as another way to give Till votes. Since when Mizi started punching Luka, the audience was outraged at her actions.

Violence is definitely frowned upon on the stage.

More on the choking scene,,

I also saw some people saying that it's because Ivan wanted Till to die with him, which may be part of it. I don't think everything Ivan did was completely selfless.

But

Till accepts it. Earlier when he is at the bar (party? venue? the private show either way), he fights the alien who tries to punch him.

He did show him Mizi's missing image, so he is enraged in this moment, but he does have fight left in him even then.

He doesn't resist when Ivan chokes him just closes his eyes and awaits death. Perhaps if Mizi was already dead, he can just join her in the afterlife since he had no way of knowing she was still alive.

In this way, Ivan is his savior. The one who is finally freeing him from all this pain he felt after losing Mizi. This is his "cure."

And for Ivan, he sorta wants to be a savior to Till. He has freed him on multiple accounts from his shackles. Even helping him run away with him, so they can experience freedom together.

They both get what they want, but,,

Ivan lets go of Till and Till, with an expression that feels like shock, finally looks at Ivan.

Killing him would not give him the freedom that Till needs

that Ivan wants Till to have.

So, like the countless times Till has been chained around his neck, Ivan gives him his chains:

hurting him like he desires.

A scar around his neck.

(Where the scar from his name is)

And mending him,

by taking away the final chain that Ivan could release from Till.

His "cure."

It felt like his final desire was to get Till to snap out of it, to realize that he needs to find true freedom, to not get apathetic at the situation, to keep on going and to live.

He really, truly loves Till even if Till does and never will understand it.

Also final thoughts, is it not strange that Ivan is able to release Till's bindings so easily?

No one else is shown releasing the bindings, so maybe it is just as easy as a press of the button. Yet, I don't feel like it's just poorly designed if that's the case. Because you literally have a person like Ivan releasing a dangerous human like Till. Shouldn't a cautious society like the world of Alien Stage made sure it wouldn't be super easy to get out of.

If there is more to it, I wonder if that'll be a plot point later on. With Ivan leaving behind the secret to getting out of the bindings for Till. So, when a character maybe Till or even Hyuna or Mizi have been captured, they're able to escape since they know how to remove them.

Maybe, I'm just being delulu

And final final thoughts, the kiss was great and definitely made me almost scream. But the way Ivan nuzzled Till has got me acting up.

Like, it's just so soft and sweet and not a big show of it like when Ivan kisses Till on stage.

It feels so intimate, so personal, so full of love.

I just, I just can't. They'll be the death of me.

[jellolegos]

I love your Rhaenicent fanart of them with their baby but I do find it interesting you made Alicent the birther when in canon Rhaenyra’s the one who wanted children whilst Alicent was forced to.

I think Alicent’s happy ending is the poem: “in a dream i saw my mother with the love of her life and no children it was the happiest i'd ever seen her”.

With Rhaenyra on the other hand she needs her boys, that’s why most fanart of her death is her running to them.

Either way I’m loving your fanart, I just wonder if the reason you think Alicent would be the one giving birth instead of Nyra is because she tends to be portrayed as the “feminine” one in the relationship.

I mean, the baby is just sitting in Alicent’s lap, i didn’t/don’t conceive of either of them as necessarily birthing the baby so you’re welcome to interpret it as you wish (they also have white hair and are reading a book about dragons, although it got washed out, so they’re definitely rhaenyra’s kid).

I think the only thing going through my brain was that it would be cute for rhaenyra to greet her wife and kid after a small council meeting :) a monarch is busier than their consort, always!

I wrote a little bit about this on the twitter post of this art but I agree with you, I really hard time with fitting rhaenicent kids into my own interpretation because I don’t really know if either of them but especially alicent would want kids. I’ve been drawing them for 2+ years and I think this is the only baby I’ve drawn for them! (So like less than 2% of the time, lol) it’s definitely been something I’ve watched and have watched evolve over the course of the show.

here was what I wrote in the thread, which is probably the extent of my thinking into rhaenicent kids (as always, subject to change):

*I would probably change my phrasing from ‘not space or even a vernacular’ to ‘alicent lacks completely the ability to conceptualise or express her thoughts on motherhood or potential queerness outside of her circumstances’.

I think Alicent’s repression is pretty intentionally designed as a foil to rhaenyra’s expressiveness. I’ll default to something Emma has said which is that Rhaenyra is a ‘super-embodied’ character, and so I think even if, in a perfect world where she wasn’t forced to marry and birth the babies of an older man, alicent did really crave motherhood, would we know? Whilst rhaenyra is able to, to me, enjoy motherhood and express both a dislike and an acceptance of it despite constraints placed on her, we don’t really see anything of that magnitude with alicent (I think she struggles with her motherhood, but would she have in another world?).

The same goes for their respective queernesses. Rhaenyra may not know the word for what she’s feeling with mysaria, she’s willing and able to explore it, Alicent isn’t; she finds spiritual relief from it in extreme religious zealotry, emotional relief through her husband (‘my husband would not wish for the death of his daughter’), and physical relief through Rhaenyra’ ex lover, but she is unable to take that final step. Maybe she will though! i could totally see rhaenicent being DINKs and absolutely being the rich gay aunts for gwayne’s kids tbh, that’s my usual headcanon for them

[mossy123302]

I am not exactly entirely good with character or relationship analysis (A reason why my dumb fox head is aroace because I am not good w/ navigating romantic relationships)

So this is just my best effort writing the dynamic Q! Philza and Q! Missa have.

I do like to headcanon, like others, that Philza is indeed aroace, but not in a way, that like he doesn't understand what platonic or romantic means. Sure, it's funny to tease Philza about it, but it's also true that close friends could very much do so. I think Philza is quite aware of what is romantic and platonic, he knows the boundaries of it. I mean Philza is literally married to the Goddess of Death (implied) Kristin. It's more or less that Philza doesn't simply care for such labels. (I very much hc that Philza could probably be genderfluid, like me- Peeposmile)

It's something Philza even mentioned in the live stream when talking about the deities in hardcore world. It's something they don't care about and just vibe with whatever they're vibing with. They don't care and I think Philza is the same in that mindset. He just doesn't care, and will be blunt about it, if he needs to actually talk about it.

Philza seems to deeply cherish those that are ... similar to himself from what I can tell. I don't fully watch Fit or other POV to get a clear understanding of Phil's relationship w/ others so I'm sorry if I don't include them, same with Technoblade. I've recently started watching mcyt again and I don't want to talk about something I don't have a full understanding of.

Anyways, Phil deeply connects with those that share similar traits to him in some regard. Techno whose the Blood God, who clearly has an understanding of death, war and loyalty and this clearly shows via Missa too. Missa, while not a fighter, does understand death and how important it is... He literally is a gentle grim reaper. He understands death much clearly, because his mother is also a Goddess tied to Death as well. Missa is also fiercely loyal to Phil and his children, because honestly, he was so busy! He didn't have to return to Quesadilla Island but he did because he cares about Phil and his children, quickly adopted Tallulah and he hadn't even seen her yet.

Whoever Phil trusted and guards with his life, Missa will guard that person with his life as well. Of course, unless, we talk about BadboyHalo then that's another discussion LOL. Such a mess between the demon (?) and grim reaper.

Anyways, we know how much Phil values such loyalty that, I cannot remember what Tubbo said, but he immediately locked Tubbo out of his own home because of what he said about someone and while despite implied flings with others. Philza never spoke about others the way he speaks about Missa.

Their relationship definitely...crosses the line of platonic and romantic. I can see why it would be considered queer platonic relationship, but also at the same time, it's like there is some line being breached which makes everyone raise an eyebrow cause sir, what do you mean platonic-

Philza is clearly...possessive over Missa, because the way he got so defensive when Bagi mentions Antoine (right?) and Missa should date. Philza didn't have to get so defensive, because Missa already immediately denied. Philza could have kissed anyone else, like Fit, but chose Missa instead. He even demanded Tall Missa to the admins, got jealous over any shipping fanart and acts like he's fine and doesn't miss Missa at all. *Coughs in* "I'm going to f*cking off myself. Did Missa log on again?!" (Side eye Philza)

Like he's done lots of things that makes everyone just raise an eyebrow- Philza is fooling no one but himself (& Missa)

I also enjoy the lore Missa has going on with accepting that he is indeed a part of the family and isn't alone. Missa had just lost Spreen, and suddenly, he had no one but the Angel of Death as his assigned partner. Missa must have felt so unmatched compared to Philza because what could he even offer to the family? He had nothing but his music and kind words, which is everyone that Death Family wanted. Missa brought a different change to the family that makes them be vulnerable, to not be so serious all the time and to actually just relax and be like a family that's just on vacation.

I mean, and just talking about loyalty and kindness. Missa never gave up... He fought his way back, despite getting taken away by wolves and suddenly Badboyhalo being so cruel. He always made sure his family was safe and always brought something for them.

Didn't Missa say he got lost because he tried to find a gift for Philza?! Like...the commitment to find a perfect gift for Philza, and still returning (sure, without the gift). While it's hilarious, Missa doesn't run away because of his wet cat behavior. He runs away because he doesn't want to put his family in danger, he cannot fight as well as others can. He relies on others to fight for him and then he jumps in to help, but because the time zone doesn't allow such things. Missa is forced to run.

And Missa is good at it. He will run as far as he can, if it means his family will be safe. He isn't running away from his family, but the danger because at the end of it all, he will return back to his family, no matter how long it takes.

And Missa casually admitted to Chayanne that he needs Philza more than he realized, the same way Philza realizes he needed Missa but didn't dare admit, whether it is out of fear or something else that he couldn't voice it. But Philza clearly showed it through his actions, that he brought/dragged Missa to Rose's Sanctuary before they went to sleep forever. He didn't have to do so, but he did... indicating their bond is much deeper because Rose's Sanctuary is literally a pocket dimension that no one cannot access.

Missa has access. Now he sleeps eternally with his family...

Also their whole dynamic just being Sun/Moon. Fated to never see each other at times, until an eclipse and yet...they still leave signs to let the other know that they're still remembered. This also brought to my attention how Missa is afraid of the sky, while Philza yearns for the sky/to fly.

You think The Sun (Philza) misses the Moon (Missa) so much, because of how far they are, instead of just not seeing each other. The Moon clings to Earth, because they're afraid to go beyond...to something unknown while the Sun cannot stay still, and yearns to burn and be free.

Deathduo/Pissa has me on chokehold.

I do hope this was an interesting analysis, I'm not very good at this..honestly it's probably just me rambling if anything.

[professoruber]

Hazbin Hotel Season 1 Finale Thoughts (and a few hopes for Season 2)

Spoilers for Hazbin Hotel Season 1 Episodes 7 & 8

That finale was amazing. The season as a whole was amazing, even if it felt kinda rushed/fast-pace, which is admittedly most likely a symptom of the episode count they were given so I don't mind it too much. But still.

Anyway. the finale was great, and it does seem like its setting up quite a bit of stuff of future season(s). Between the exterminations getting cancelled, the successful fighting off of the exorcist army, and death of Adam, the deal between Charlie and Alastor, Lilith's role in all this and most of all....

MY BOY SIR PENT GOOD HIMSELF A REDEMPTION! GOOD FOR HIM!

Emily is (naturally) completely ecstatic at a sinner getting redeemed and ending up in Heaven. Sera meanwhile seems... crossed between confused, concerned and maybe a tad horrified (hard to say).

Honestly was kinda hoping for Emily to have been more involved in the finale or even go behind Sera's back to intervene in the extermination and/or help the hotel in some manner, but I suppose sneaking out to help is easier said than done.

Nonetheless; Emily is so adorable in this short scene that I don't mind her lack of presence in the finale too much.

I suppose part of my mild disappointment is a symptom of getting slightly invested in some of the theories and fanart which has been made over the past week. There's been a lot of discussion and fanart of her becoming fallen; based on her condemnation of Sera and Heaven during "You didn't know", her insistence that she'd figure something out to help Charlie and that Sera warns her of the possibility of becoming fallen.

(I've even seen it pointed out that Emily looks like she has horns here; which seems like foreshadowing so hm.)

So It does arguably feel a tad anticlimactic that Emily apparently wasn't able to do anything even after promising she'd figure something out.

So... I don't know; it did seem like they were setting up for Emily to do something but in the end she didn't really do anything. She was quite willing to very strongly call out Sera and Heaven via song, but didn't seem able to do much more considering that the Hazbin crew had to rely solely on themselves and other denizens of Hell.

But still, there's a lot of room her character in season 2 especially now that its been proven sinners can become winners.

As I noted above; Sera looks much less happy than Emily at Sir Pentious' arrival. Is this just guilt/horror that her 'necessary evil' wasn't so necessary after all? Will she change her mind or will she continue to be an antaongist?

Hard to say at this point; but considering how they spent time showing the cracks forming between the two seraphim; it feels like that probably has to build up to something?

Anyway, the hotel is definitely getting some credibility/notoriety now. Not only due to ending the exterminations and killing Adam, but also because one of their patrons did indeed get redeeemed.

On that note; if a sinner can become a winner, does that mean a winner can become a sinner? Because Adam's been committing a lot of sins in his every appearance, so much so that now that he's double dead he might go through divine judgement again and end up in hell as a sinner. In which case he could still be quite the problem (although if other demons work out who he is, he'd have a pretty massive target on his back considering all the exterminations). If Adam does become a demon, I wonder if the same would happen to the other dead exorcists? Hm.

Also there's her. Lilith.

...

Honestly right now I'm still not sure if I know enough to really make much of a judgement. She's been a mysterious and enigmatic figure from the start and the fact she's apparently been in Heaven and made a deal with Adam is... uh... I'm not sure.

Did she sell out her family/people for a life in paradise? Does she have some kind of grand plan? Are there more unseen forces/plots we don't know yet? Is she the one who owns Alastor's soul?

Who knows!

Alastor shows again he's not the all-powerful enigmatic badass he initially presented himself as. He narrowly escaped double-death at the hands of Adam and still has soul owned by another. Still, he definitely does appear to have some serious ambitions to rise in his station.

He managed to make a deal with Charlie for a favour (presumably freeing his soul?) and also talks with Rosie about how powerful Charlie is and how he'd like to be the one to guide her. So hm... I do think Alastor is aiming high, not only intending to free himself but also use Charlie as a vehicle to achieve even greater heights.

To finish off with some final few thoughts (this post ended up getting a tad bigger than I intended, but eh)...

Lucifer was great, seeing him go full King of Hell on Adam was amazing.

I mentioned it before, but Emily was adorable as always - Can't wait to see more of her, including her interactions with Sir Pent

I wonder if Sera will face any consequences now that its been shown the exterminations are not as necessary as she thought

Emily becoming fallen (either getting casted out or choosing to leave) was a really fascinating idea and I do still feel there was a bit much build up for it.

Lucifer apparently got together with Eve at some point. I'd like some more details on that.

Going to be interesting to see what kinda upheaval the finale has in Heaven and Hell; with redemption being proven and new threats likely emerging.

Even if redemption's possible, not everyone wants to be redeemed... and now that its been proven angels can be killed, that might lead to some ambitious figures (such as the Vees) making ambitious plots. Especially since Lucifer is an angel and that's why he's king (of course, Lucifer's probably not as easy to kill as exorcists).

There's other stuff I haven't really discussed, but these are my main fresh thoughts for now.

Can't wait for next season!

[dastardly-ethereal-love]

So I have to admit something - Podfixx’s amazing Soundcloud account of gorgeous Podfics has turned me into a Sherlock fan. I got Stan so I could watch it and see them play out in the TV show and see how it compares to the lovely fanfic I am listening to. It’s good. I mean I think Cumberbatch is beautiful and the chemistry on screen between him and Freeman is good. It’s not hitting anywhere near the high notes of Tennant and Sheen with their roles - holy hell, can anyone ever be more electric than them? But it’s a nice place to stay for a while… it’s less fraught with tension with Season 3 drama, Gaiman being a disappointment and disgrace, and yeah… it���s good? Good enough? Uhh… or just good? I’m still getting used to being a fan of stuff in my own right.

I feel like I’m cheating on them a little bit. Whenever I go back and read GO fanfic or see them on fanart or read stuff in this fandom by the beautiful people in the community… I’m reminded that I really can never replace them.

It’s just funny because I’ve never really been kind of a fan of stuff to the extent I am of GO. I used to love heaps of TV shows as a teenager and watched them religiously. Shows like Buffy, Stargate, Dawson’s Creek, Neon Genesis and even the dumb dumb South Park. I made sure I watched those shows but then when I dated guys I tended to watch stuff with them and for them. It became a group activity. But now I’m watching solo and I’m working out what I like and what I want to watch just for me… it’s interesting, watching myself unfold.

I definitely have a thing for gay men. Haha Our Flag Means Death was the absolute proof of that. Haha It’s such a delightful show. Super funny and adorable and gay! I’m not gay but I bloody love gay love. I think it’s the rising above societal pressures that really clinches it for me. It just intensifies that love so much - no easy path stuff. Fighting for your love is stuff that makes me swoon.

PS - Listen to this piece of fic by flawedamythyst and read by Podfixx. It destroyed me. Fighting to be together. Fighting to believe in each other. Hard won love is gold.

[mistresscitrusslice]

jinx dying is not at all a resolution to her arc or to the story. even if you ignore league and jinx as a champion, her death would be unsatisfying as a conclusion to the story. her death would solve nothing and as s2 is the final season, they wouldnt have enough tjme to fully explore the impact of her death on the other characters, on society, etc. fundamentally the story is about the two sisters, and i think a much likelier conclusion is some reparation of the bond they shared as children? i'm not entirely sure and it'll definitely be bittersweet, esp looking at their relationship in league, but there is absolutely no way jinx dies

Jinx dying would solve like half the cities’ problems. In fact, keeping her alive would mean keeping alive the conflict between the cities. There seems to be no feasible way to have Jinx live AND tie up a resolution to the show because as long as she lives, she wreaks havoc, thus causing more plot.

Let me be clear, I love Jinx and don’t want to see her dead. I want there to be a way for her to live. It just doesn’t seem like there is one right now.

We SAW ALREADY the sisters almost reconciling and we were shown exactly why that wouldn’t work. With Vi allying herself with the enforcers, they stray even further away from any sort of truce.

Arcane is inherently a tragedy. Main characters have a tendency to die in tragedies. Sorry, Jinx.

The problem is, Arcane isn’t just a tragedy. It’s also an adaptation of League of Fucking Legends. And Jinx isn’t dead in League of Fucking Legends. Sorry again, Jinx. Therein lies the contradiction.

You sound a lot like me back when I was convinced Mel would live. Her dying wouldn’t be satisfying or good for the story, but you know whose story it would be good for? Ambessa’s. I still don’t fully understand why they’re also killing off Jayce and Viktor, especially since the Hexcore is still active and volatile, but I get that there’s so much going on with everyone else’s arcs and plot that they don’t have time for these two stooges’ bullshit. There’s simply no room for a divorce arc amidst the Zaun family drama, as sad as I am that we won’t get to see more of Viktor and Mel.

A lot of things can be implied from the context around it, and a lot of stories conclude with an open or partially open ending. We may leave it off with Jinx’s dead body and a grieving Vi above her, Cait at her side mourning on her behalf but resolute that it had to be done. Whatever the ending, it has to be bittersweet. It’s an ending we’ve all felt so many times before in many different stories. A lot of good can come from leaving the audience to ponder on how the characters carry on after that, how the cities get rebuilt, who ends up in power after all is said and done, how the inventions that came as a result of war changed the world for better or worse…

Arcane is a tale that may actually benefit from exploring less of the result of its resolution. It would open up more avenues for fanfiction and fanart, get more people talking and hypothesizing for other shows Riot and Fortiche may make, generally increase engagement and hype for future projects.

[goingferalapparently]

Do you want to hear me talk about The Animatic? No? Well that sucks because I'm talking about it anyway.

I don't know what made me suddenly want to make a full length animatic, but the urge descended upon me and I did anyway, despite my horrible horrible track record.

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I'd actually had a couple voice clips cut out since July (because that's when I started Jealousy), but the bulk of it was done 15/16 August. And! This song (Pentatonix's God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen) is actually the second one I tried piecing together.

The first song was AURORA's Runaway! I swapped songs pretty early on because

Runaway was 4 minutes long and God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen was 2.5 minutes long

3 minutes in, I ran out of voice clips.

I used a lot more voice clips for Runaway than God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, not just because it's longer but also because the song is significantly slower and thus easier to fit voice clips in it. Not just more voice clips, but the voice clips were longer too.

(God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen had 9 source clips. Runaway had 15.)

Hindsight is 20/20 though, because due to the slow-paced nature of Runaway in comparison to God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen would have resulted in far less frames needing to be drawn, or precise cuts or-

Well, you get the point.

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I have two files for this project! Yes, it was pure Medibang. The reason for the two files is that there were so many layers that the first file was lagging to hell and back and I couldn't even draw a straight line because of how bad it was.

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This was the actual first frame I ever drew for this! If it looks familiar, it's because I was mirroring this. It's my first ever fanart for QSMP.

At the time of starting this, I had maybe 3 pieces of QSMP fanart and was super uncertain of what I was doing, so it definitely happened again - mirroring a piece of fanart into an animatic frame.

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This was the first time I ever drew Cucurucho. I had an idea and it was simple to execute but over time I forgot about the voice box.

This, on the other hand, was the last frame I ever drew. The Cucurucho designs are largely the same, with some minor differences (bigger eyes, more stitches, no voice box, thinner tube).

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This was the first time I successfully drew Cellbit. Emphasis on successfully because even this one bit took me forever. I never really had to redraw any frame once I drafted it, but this. This took me 5 redraws. It was my greatest nightmare.

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I've said it before but these two frames side by side?

It was my favourite part of the animatic for the longest time. Hands down, no debate, I adored it.

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You may notice that most frames had the subjects coloured in a lighter colour, but a couple didn't. Some were intentional, to better show off lighting and backgrounds and depth and stuff.

Some.... were not.

(Oops.)

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Some of my other favourite frames include:

Which would have been better if I hadn't messed up the shading.

Because this was so many characters. And Cellbit.

And the Bagheras, which I really had a ton of fun drawing near the end. Because these two were drawn at the end. The same day, actually. The first one did have a draft already, though.

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Some little details:

Between these two frames, BBH and Cellbit pop up in the background. There's a flash of white immediately after, which is supposed to be the camera flash when BBH takes a photo.

••●••

Jaiden (and Roier) in the early scenes have perfectly normal eyes.

This changes immediately after Bobby's death, albeit rather subtly.

By the time the beginning of the Cucurucho tasks rolls around, the shadows under their eyes have had time to develop and become more prominent.

••●••

Roier does a little rooftop espionage.

••●••

Similar/Similarly located scenes have similarly coloured backgrounds!

It's most prominent with Bobby Fields' Rose/Lavender palette, with a few (not all) examples.

(The words associated with this last image are actually from when Jaiden got stuck on a ladder on her way down from the sunset tree while trying to chase Cucurucho. I just found that funny.)

But the colour thing is also key with Baghera and Jaiden's conversation with Pomme's non-canon death.

The colours used for 1) the gradient background 2) the lineart and 3) the subject base colour are identical in both images, even if they're a third of the video apart.

●～●～●～●～●

Anyway, this was made with Medibang and iMovie, even if I do have Krita and DaVinci Resolve and FlipaClip and-

.........Yeah.

Tried and true basics, I guess.

(Krita and DaVinci both cause my laptop to overheat. I struggle with Krita so incredibly badly, even though I have friends who swear by it.)

●～●～●～●～●

Also I maxed out the image count on this post.

[cedarbranch]

twenty questions for fic writers!

tagged by @sunriseverse thank you!!

tagging: @figbian @shark-myths @stoplightglow @zipegs and anyone else who wants to participate (with no pressure if you don't!) questions below the cut :-)

1. how many works do you have on ao3?

currently 65! i've orphaned several over the years though. unfortunately i am an Extremely Slow Writer so i always wanna see this number go up and it never goes as fast as i want it to :') we can hit 67 this year... surely....

2. what's your total ao3 word count?

847,778! used to be higher (more in the 950k range) prior to orphaning, i'm not sure if i've actually written over a million words or not at this point? v excited for the day that milestone actually shows up in my stats though! my current wips could tip me over, we'll see how it goes... 👀

3. what fandoms do you write for?

currently hannibal and stranger things! i've bounced around many fandoms in my day, but my most significant contributions thus far have been for mcr/bandom and the magnus archives. really hoping i end up writing enough for my current fandoms that i can consider them part of that shortlist too!! :-)

4. top five fics by kudos

like a moth to light (like a beast to bait) / 2117 kudos, save that heart for me / 1480 kudos, how particular, my fondness of you / 1445 kudos, convicted criminals of thought / 1177 kudos, and questionable decisions / 847 kudos! wow, that last one took me by surprise, it was such a jokey little fic i often forget about it. nice to look back at these and see things with over 1k kudos though, i remember that being an unattainable pipe dream back when i was writing mcr in the dead era that was 2017 :')

5. do you respond to comments?

i often do! i try to respond to every comment i get when a fic is published, and i like to respond much later on as well, it just tends to slip my mind if it's an older fic. stuff gets lost in my inbox. i certainly read every comment though, and the comments left on older fics are often the ones that make me happiest!

6. what is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

hmmm... i mostly write happy endings unless they're character studies. the true angstiest ending i've written is for a fic i haven't posted yet (hint: it's a sequel to a oneshot of mine!) but i do have short fics about both michael and gerry's deaths in tma? i'll go with the gerry death fic, thinking of the sun.

7. what's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

they're mostly happy!!! but the one that ends most on a note of Joy, i think, would be rosemary and thyme, my fae!martin au :-)

8. do you get hate on fics?

nah. i have an extremely vague memory of getting a comment that made me go "omg my first hate comment" but like it's so vague that i can't tell if it's a false memory or not 😭 people have always been quite nice to me, thankfully!

9. do you write smut?

i do! i tried to avoid it whenever i could when i was younger but these days i've actually become super interested in sex as a vehicle for character studies. that tumblr post that's like "the plot of this smut fic is that character A believes himself abandoned by god" is one HUNDRED percent my approach recently, definitely expect some of that upcoming on my ao3 lolll

10. craziest crossover?

i don't really write crossovers! i like them in comic/fanart form, but i tend to be less interested in crossover fic (unless it's HEU, i do quite like spacedogs)... the only times i've ever thought about creating crossover content myself were for a couple pacrim fusion ideas!

11. have you ever had a fic stolen?

eh, not really. a long time ago i did have someone basically rip the worldbuilding from one of my AUs with the serial numbers filed off, but they did ask permission - i said yes because i was like 16 and felt too awkward saying no. so that was weird! but not quite stealing.

12. have you ever had a fic translated?

yes!! to steal a kiss from borrowed lips was translated into russian, such an honor :D

13. have you ever co-written a fic before?

i have, a really long time ago. i don't think i would do it again (unless it was with, like, one of two specific irls) bc i think i'd struggle with figuring out a collaborative workflow. part of me also thinks it could be a fun exercise though...

14. all time favorite ship?

OUGH..... mannnn what a question. it changes every few years and i feel like my response is influenced by not just the source material, but the quality of the fan content and the fandom interactions i've had... you know what? i know i have current-hyperfixation bias, but for now i am gonna say hannigram. it's just too peak.

15. what's a wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Too Many Of Them - but in particular, my chrissy cunningham-centric longfic. it's an entire treatise on sapphic loneliness and small-town queer isolation and i do think it'd be a fucking masterpiece if i ever managed to commit to it, but it's on the forever back-burner i think.

16. what are your writing strengths?

hmm... characterization through dialogue is the main thing, i'd say. i'm always thinking about how to match a given character's speech patterns and i think i tend to capture their voices pretty well!

17. what are your writing weaknesses?

i'm my own biggest critic so i could list a bunch, but pacing is a big one. i tend to let things run too long and i feel like i've only just managed to balance it better in my current wip... only took a decade of fic-writing to get there 😭

18. thoughts on dialogue in another language?

depends a lot on context. honestly too many thoughts to condense well into an answer for this djglfg but in short: usually nice if it's just a few words, but can get unwieldy otherwise

19. first fandom you wrote in?

kuroshitsuji 💀 self-insert and OC-centric fic. how very unlike me

20. favorite fic you've written?

moth to light has been the reigning champ for a while now, but i think several of my current wips could potentially unseat it!

[iamsonormalaboutninjago]

I severely headcanon that Harumi is autistic, and the show provides enough proof:

1. Before the great devourer attacked we see Harumi playing with her ninja action figures, in her own world making dialogue to herself. This is common with kids, yes, but as an autistic person I used to do the same thing with my Legos when I was her age.

2. After the attack we see her in the back of the van unable to talk to the paramedics, where she got her nickname. Becoming nonverbal after intense emotions is a clear autistic trait. In Garmadon Rulez we also got in her own words that after the attack she didn’t want to talk about what happened.

3. Hyperfixation with Garmadon. Often due to important childhood events, autistic people can develop hyperfixations relating to them, Harumi’s in this case is Garmadon. After the battle Harumi gained what seems to be a hyperfixation around Garmadon. She hailed him as a hero, wrote about him in her journal, fantasized and daydreamed about him being her new family. This obsession went on for years and encompassed hours of reasearch on how to bring him back, forming a gang around his revival, and a lot of fanart.

4. Inability to let go of a hyperfixation. Oftentimes when autistic people get hyperfixations they can get stuck in the belief that they have to stick to it. Harumi can be seen clearly questioning if what she did was right during S9 when Garmadon destroys Mr.E. We can further see this is s16 when she’s weary to trust the overlord to the point he has to threaten her life to get her to bring him back. After his reveal she is very hesitant to work for the overlord, another being that caused untold destruction to her home city, which she clearly witnessed as a child. It was only when the overlord threatened Lloyd’s life (even due to lack of screen time you can see that Harumi becomes less involved with the Overlord in the episodes she is in) and when it was revealed that he caused her parents deaths that she finally let go.

5. As well part of her getting “stuck in her ways” is her hatred of Lloyd. She demonized him as a kid because she used to think of the ninja as being an unstoppable force, but when she saw Lloyd during the battle she realized that he was just as scared as she was, and she took it very badly. This fixation that Lloyd was a weak and vulnerable ninja who got more praise than he deserved continued only until he proved her wrong, by being courageous against his father, standing up against the Colossus, and continuing on when all hope was lost. It’s clear due to season 16 that when the building fell on her she was incredibly disappointed that Lloyd didn’t come and save her; because of that we can estimate that during S8 and S9 before her death she started to realize she was wrong about Lloyd and started to even gain some feelings for him.

Some other small things I’ve noticed:

1. Her rooms a mess, common autism trait but also could’ve been just to throw off Lloyd

2. Great at art, we can clearly see how detailed her sketches are in Garmadon Rulez

3. She has a very fine sense of what’s good and what’s not, viewing things in definites/ black and white is very common for some autistic people

[another-clive-blog]

Waiwaitwait what if Clive got killed in his own fake shootout at the casino?

You got Clive thinking about how he didn’t plan on dying, Luke seeing “himself” die, Dimitri wondering where his accomplice is when they show up at the pagoda, and the mobile fortress… uh. I don’t know what happens to it since Clive is dead.

Claire could come in as their guide where Clive would have been.

technically i used this for a story about claire in a time loop where clive keeps dying despite her trying to stop it but it’s fun as a standalone idea

!!! Oooh this is the good good stuff. I know you're here for Clive dying so I focused on that, but I am definitely doing a Dimitri part in the future 👀 Thank you for the idea !! (Also I'm keeping this fic rec hehe)

List of TW : Gunshots, gun wound, mention of death, blood. No graphic injury description besides the blood, no medical stuff (this takes place in a casino after all). Also I've never died before so this may not be accurate, my apologies

(On a very related note and contrary to what these past few days may indicate, I am not stopping the silly meme redraws and regular fanarts. I'm back from work so I can start working on these again !!)

Layton hid behind a slot machine, clenching his teeth as bullets wheezed all around him. He hated the very thought of leaving Luke alone in the middle of this battlefield, but he couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong.

The other Luke should have been close by. He had taken a late start because of that punch, yes, but he should have been able to catch up : and yet, Hershel couldn't see him anywhere.

He had a feeling the solution to this puzzle wouldn't be a pleasant one.

Seeing an opening, Layton left his hiding spot to run across the casino, his focus split between the bullets flying by and the person he was looking for. A blue silhouette, probably hiding behind another slot machine, most definitely near the entrance of the casino-

There.

He almost missed him because he wasn't wearing his blue hat -it must have fallen at some point when he ran for cover-, but once he had spotted him, Hershel didn't waste any time. Stepping next to Future Luke, the professor immediately pressed his back against the slot machine to occupy less space, to make himself harder to spot too. This hiding spot was- well, not quite good, to put it that way. Bullets were flying dangerously close. Machines were falling apart, revealing their presence to their enemies. They had to move fast or they would soon be cornered.

A swear caught his attention, and Hershel turned to his apprentice with a frown.

When he saw the state he was in though, it seemed to him that the bullets were so far away all of a sudden, even though they had suddenly gotten far too close at the same time.

Future Luke sat on the ground next to him, shaking and sweating and swearing under his breath. His clumsy hands were trying and failing to compress a specific spot on his chest, one that was turning more and more crimson each passing second.

The professor stopped thinking.

"When did you get hit ?" he asked quickly while taking the younger man's jacket off, making sure not to add to his tremors.

Future Luke watched as Layton pressed the blue fabric against his stomach. "A- I-," he struggled to mutter, which was both ridiculous and humiliating, "Few minutes- I think"

The professor only nodded, brows furrowed in silence.

Clive could see the math the professor was doing, the way he was recalling knowledge about biology and firearms and fatal injuries- although this injury was hardly fatal, really, not with the professor here.

"Professor-" he wheezed, "You have- to save me"

Layton's eyes went up, watching his face for a second, then down again, to the blue fabric that wasn't blue anymore. "I am trying to, my boy."

Oh, funny. Did he call Luke his boy ? Did he see Luke as some sort of son, or was it more of a mentor-apprentice kind of thing ? Had this been a slip-up, or was he too his boy, despite not being this professor's apprentice ?

Wait. He wasn't anyone's apprentice. He wasn't Luke, he meant nothing to them, the professor didn't even remember him. He could die here and no one would mourn him- the actual him. "You- you have to," he muttered in panic because it was finally kicking in, the realization that all of this was play pretend but the bullet wasn't, he was going to die, he was going to actually die here in this stupid and meaningless place- "Professor you have to- you have to save me again-"

Layton put a hand on his shoulder, trying to calm the boy. "Not so loud, they could hear you."

Oh right, because the shooting was still going on, the plan was still going on, it didn't matter if Clive died in the middle of it now did it ? Dimitri didn't need him, right ? None of them had bothered to spare him, to give him enough time to stand up after that first punch because it was so much easier to shoot him while he was down.

"I- I can't die. It can't end like- like this," Layton heard the young man say- but it didn't sound like denial this time.

It sounded like anger.

It was odd, Layton realized, how different he was. So commanding and self-righteous. Without the blue hat and the blue vest, now entirely red, he almost looked like someone else entirely- like he had never been Luke in the first place.

Layton was glad that Luke wasn't here.

Of course, that was the moment the boy chose to arrive.

"Professor !!" Luke was breathless, panicked tears in his eyes : he was looking back in fear because the bullets had not stopped, how long could they keep going for ? "Professor, you-"

Luke's eyes fell upon his dying future self.

Layton loosened his grip on the vest as he tried to divert his apprentice's attention instead.

Clive did not look at either of them, too busy bleeding out on the ground.

He felt very weak suddenly, which was definitely because the professor wasn't compressing his wound anymore. He tried to do it himself, but his arms remained still on the ground.

"Professor-" He needed him to compress the wound. Why was he talking to the kid ? Clive was right there, bleeding out, and he needed the professor to save him- why wasn't the professor saving him ?? Layton was supposed to do something, to make him all better and maybe things would finally go well then !

"You can't die !!" The kid was at his side now, and yep, he was crying. Marvelous. "You are me, and therefore you can't die !!"

That didn't make any sense, but he couldn't even tell him that much. He felt weak- no actually, he wasn't even sure he felt weak anymore. He couldn't feel much of anything in his body and mind, even the pain seemed like a distant memory now.

"Luke, you shouldn't look-" The professor said, and was he trying to hold the kid back ? Why had he let go of the vest ? Why wasn't anything working ?

Dimitri would make fun of him- he could already hear him. He would say that he was always trying to be dramatic, and that maybe this would teach him a lesson. And Clive would answer that Dimitri was wrong because well, Clive was right, had been right all along, the professor had saved him and Dimitri really couldn't say the same, now could he ? The professor had always been there to fix Dimitri's mistakes. He had always made the world a better place. He had come here of all places to play his part, play his role, and stop them- save them. He would save Clive, just like he always had. And then Dimitri would feel stupid, like he deserved to, and he would apologize. And Layton-

"I am sorry," Clive heard somewhere next to him, and farther away there was crying. Turning his head with great pain, he managed to see the professor looking at him regretfully, holding back a devastated teenage boy in his arms. "I can't help you."

Clive watched the professor. His sorrow. His grip on the young boy who was fighting to try and do something, anything.

An image formed in his mind. He couldn't see it. It was already too dark.

The last words his brain registered were an apology.

[darkfire359]

I think it’s impressive how fond I’ve managed to become of Calico Jack over time. I pretty much 100% disliked him in the show, but there’s been a lot of good fanfic of him caring about Izzy and/or Ed underneath his assholish demeanor, and he’s grown on me. Also, there’s just a lot of well-drawn Calicohands fanart.

Rewatching the show several times, I find myself appreciating him more as more of a manipulator than a true idiot, and I definitely prefer that in a villain. I like the headcanon that he’s been calling Stede “Steve” as payback for the “Iggy” comments, and it seems clear now that a lot of his assholery is *actually* calculated to drive Ed and Stede apart. I can appreciate that.

But the thing that really gets me is him killing Karl. And not just that, but also seeing how upset Buttons is about it and still not giving a shit. Cruelty to animals and lack of caring when you’ve made someone cry are kind of hard to get past for me. At least theoretically.

Because the thing is, Ed did something arguably much worse—not just killing Fang’s pet, but FORCING him to do it himself. Then he watched Fang cry about it, and he was not only unapologetic, but he seemed to barely remember the fact that he’d done such an awful thing. And it’s implied that he made his owner crewmembers do the same! I feel like in fiction, something like that generally makes a character rank well past regular torture and murder in terms of evilness.

So, why is Ed still one of my favorite characters? Is it really just because his instance of pet-killing happened off screen? Or is it because we see Ed look so vulnerable in certain scenes (e.g. crying in the bathtub or by the window of Stede’s cabin) that he just mentally registers as being more similar to “cute fluffy puppy” than “killer of cute fluffy puppies”? I don’t know.

In lieu of any actual conclusion to this train of thought, I’m going to muse about Stede and Izzy:

Stede: People have done a lot of compilations about what a bitch he can be, and how he can be shockingly uncaring about his crew (not caring about Swede’s scurvy, thinking of Lucius’s death as simply “bad for morale”). And of course leaving Ed at the docks was astoundingly hurtful. But also, whenever Stede manages to notice that he’s hurt someone else, he actually feels super guilty about it. I feel like his obliviousness makes it easier to forgive him.

Izzy: Izzy goes around being an asshole for the entire show, but also, basically no one cares. Fang seems briefly hurt by the beard-pulling, but we see in e5 that he basically laughs Izzy off and calls him hurtful names in turn. Izzy threatens the crew while they’re eating in e4 and they return to what they’re doing as soon as he leaves. Stede manages to mostly forget Izzy exists unless Izzy is actively complimenting his theatrical skills. Lucius is a bit intimated at first, but quickly flips the tables by the end of e5. Ed seems completely unphased by Izzy’s yelling in e4.

It’s only in e9 where he finally hurts someone emotionally (Ed watching Stede about to be executed), but Izzy looks equally miserable himself with what Ed does that episode. In e10, he truly does hurt Ed’s emotions—but Ed covers it up with threats and acts of control to the degree that I’m not sure Izzy realizes the impact of what he’s done. After all, Ed hasn’t seemed particularly hurt by his yelling before. If Izzy actually saw Ed when he was curled up and crying, what would he do, I wonder?

In conclusion: I would have thought that things like “animal cruelty and unapologetically making other people cry” would be important things to me in a character, but it’s maybe less so than I thought (e.g. I like Ed more than Stede). It’s unclear why. I’m curious if other people who like Jack or Ed in spite of the Buttons+Karl and Fang+dog situations (and expect that you normally would care about those situations) have thoughts on this.

[litterateur97]

I am going to cause riot 😌😉

Question 1, 2, 5 and 6 for death note please.

Question 8 for atla.

Lol, thank you for the ask!

1. What OTPs in your fandom(s) do you just not get?

For Death Note specifically, I'd say the only OTPs I don't really get are Light x Misa and then when Ryuk gets shipped with anybody. I'm not against anyone shipping these pairings, I just personally don't see it. The entire story of Death Note to me shows that Light x Misa are not good together, and Light doesn't love her, and Light comes across as gay or asexual in my opinion. But I guess if people are just shipping them in an unhealthy way I can understand it. And then Ryuk just doesn't make sense with anyone to me lol. I mean I'm down for monster fucking type ships (I enjoy Rem x Misa), but Ryuk comes across as asexual and I just can't see him ever being interested in anyone like that.

2. Are there any popular fandom OTPs you only BroTP?

I'm not sure there's any pairing that I only see as a BroTP, but I guess I see L x Matsuda as more of a BroTP than an OTP. I like the idea of them as L as the older brother who is condescending towards his younger brother Matsuda. L does bully Matsuda quite a bit throughout the series lol so I can see them more as family or close friends in some ways.

5. Do you have a NoTP in Death Note?

I don't personally enjoy any incest type ships, so anything where it's like Light with his family or L with Watari is a no go for me.

6. Has fandom ever ruined a pairing for you?

Oh boy you might get me in trouble with this one lmao. Yeah, the Death Note fandom definitely ruined lawlight for me for awhile there. When I first joined the fandom, I was really into the fanart and most of the fanfics for lawlight, but idk it felt so everywhere and in my face all the time, so I started to get bored of it. I was more interested in the crack ships or rare pairs for the series because I didn't see them as often. And lawlight never quite gave me the same emotions lawmane did anyway. But then some folks would accuse you of homophobia if you shipped something other than lawlight, and that particularly annoyed me because I am gay. I think the fandom has gotten a lot less intense about it now though, so I'm enjoying lawlight again even if it's not one of my favorite pairings, but I definitely don't have the enthusiasm for it that I could have if the ship hadn't been ruined for me in my starting days in the fandom.

8. Unpopular opinion about ATLA?

I'm not sure how unpopular this opinion is (I always feel like there's a lot of hate towards Katara for this but I don't really know for sure if there is), but I very firmly believe that Katara had every right to threaten to kill Zuko and not accept him with open arms when he first joined the gaang. I mean I think people really ignore her perspective on this. She was the first one to trust Zuko, and then he immediately betrayed her, a betrayal that led to her best friend, who she saw as the only hope for fixing her world, dying. And so many people gloss over that fact, but Aang did in fact die at the end of season 2 and was revived by her when she used the spirit water. And then it took forever (months?) for Aang to wake up from his coma and can you imagine how scary that must have been for Katara? She was probably thinking about when she lost her mother or how the world was about to lose its only hope for peace or about how she'd never have fun penguin sledding with Aang again. Of course she threatened Zuko when he joined the gaang, she couldn't let him hurt Aang ever again. And the scene where she tells Zuko "bring my mother back" is obviously her response to the trauma of almost losing Aang reminding her of the trauma of her mother's death. Aang dying in front of her retraumatized her and reminded her of her mother dying in front of her. She sees Zuko as responsible for Aang's death, which I think is fair considering the betrayal, and because Zuko couldn't bring back Aang (Katara already did that herself), she tells him to bring her mother back. It makes complete sense to me.

[vilevexedvixen]

Like OG Fallout? Play Pathologic!

I've been a fan of various things for literal decades now, but not really participated in any fandom communities until literally this year. I've just been making cosplays, watching videos, drawing fanart and writing fan theories / fiction in my own time. So the very heated aspects of fandom flew me by until now ^^' I do completely get the more angry fellow FNV fans for what Bethesda has done to Fallout (regarding all entries after FNV), and some of the aspects I see people praising most about OG Fallout and FNV are mainly the roleplaying, writing, and bleak setting / vibe.

And to that I can't help but go "Have you heard of our Lord and Saviour Icepick Lodge?"

Pathologic classic HD and Pathologic 2 are the closest games (in my opinion) that capture the same aspects of OG Fallout and FNV the more angry fans feel they've lost.

You play as one of three healers in an isolated Russian town ravaged by plague. This is going to be more of a ramble of me gushing about various aspects of the game, so I've included a less popular review (love this guy's stuff) to more concisely discuss the game in a more structured way and give an accurate picture of gameplay (which I only really discuss in terms of combat, which is frankly a really small part of it compared to the resource and survival stat management, semi-present fast-travel (at a cost, which changes as circumstances get worse and forces the player to choose between loss of time, energy, money, or risk of infection, when deciding how to get from a to b by forcing players to only fast travel between certain points if they have the right resources, or walk through infected or ransacked districts).

Never before have I sympathised so much with a certified twat (The Bachelor), or been so genuinely excited to discover my character's bf-turned-bitter enemy isn't dead but finally taking a nap.

Admittedly, Classic HD is more linear but that doesn't detract from the story for me, but I definitely think 2 actualises the player freedom classic HD pretended to have.

Also both soundtracks are bangers, but quite different (tribal electronica versus shamanistic horror).

An aspect of gameplay that took a hot minute to learn but is very engaging is the hobo economy bartering system, which subtly changes as time goes by. Different resources such as medicine (which are obviously used up a lot in a plague) become more scarce and expensive. As people get more desperate for essentials like food, they start trading more valuable items like jewellery for it. Kids want seemingly valueless things like marbles and nuts for very valuable items (food and meds - yeah, besides the pharmacies, children carry the most drugs and knives; take that as you will). Inflation goes through the roof, money is no longer accepted in some shops later on. The economy is extremely dynamic, but not overly difficult to navigate so forces the player to adapt alongside it. You can never be certain what resources will be accessible the next day, which further makes when and where you decide to use what resources you have on others an engaging moral and practical decision. Unscripted, might I add!

Leading players to act like this when rare things like Schmowder (a near-fatal cure to the plague) show up by chance:

And if you don't stay on top of your stats and resources (which is very easy to do) you end up in binds like this:

The diagnostic and treatment system is also fairly intuitive, in that there are humor-specific tinctures, and others that can be used to treat two different humors. The more resources you use trying to diagnose where the infection has settled, the more pain you'll caused the patient, which you can lower (to prevent death) by using vials or morphine. Accurate diagnosis is important to avoid wasting resources by using the wrong antibiotics (which is less effective). You can't be in two places at once, so every patient you treat is a drain on time and resources you could be using somewhere else. Sometimes it's better to let a patient be if the risk of death is too high for your treatment to have a worthwhile impact on their chances for survival.

Given how stretched thin your time and resources always are, even if the opportunity for tender downtime catching up with old friends arises it is all to easy to pass up because you're too busy. A cruel reality most people face these days irl. What's more, if you happen to die before deciding to go to this meetup, there is a chance that Mark Immortal will tie your character's hands behind their back which then prevents you from being able to hug you friends when you meet them.

Oh yeah, forgot to say but death has permanent consequences across all saves so reloading to before you died doesn't undo any penalty Mark curses you with unless you start a whole new run. Early on, you may be asked to help with a task which ends up not helping in the way expected (to help solve Burakh's father's murder or to help cure the plague) but does act as a small tutorial on how to listen / look for herbs you can use in remedies. You still feel irritated that a child wasted your time / was just playing with you, at least initially, so you learn to really consider what's worth chasing up and what might be a waste of time / red herring when deciding what trails in your mind map task menu to chase up. Especially since if you don't pursue them, they WILL happen without you and the consequences of your intervention or not remain uncertain until they crop back up in unexpected ways.

Admitedly, the endings in 2 are binary (though what you do in the wider world and story do effect the ending / what happens to specific characters) which I found very disappointing, especially given how much less effort it takes to do one over the other, like the game is encouraging you to pick the diurnal ending. The game is also a bit janky, but no moreso than FNV. Combat is not satisfying mechanically, especially if you opt for using guns, though that's kind of the point. You're a doctor (admittedly Artemy was a military medic, so he has some combat training, but still). Though sometimes it can seem (but isn't) unavoidable in the early game when you're public enemy number one. The combat feels like if OV Fallout's combat was in first person.

There aren't technically "factions" per se, but rather bodies of power in the town the approach both its running and the crisis at hand from different angles. To be honest, I completely sidestepped the Saborovs for my first two playthroughs entirely. Bad Grief says I'm a fool to try and clear my name to the man who effectively runs the police force? Sure! Unless you take interest in investigating your father's death, or frequently save babies (long story), I didn't cross their path except in the town hall meeting. Which is a shame, but honestly the other families interested me more. The Kains have a lot going on and are the most philosophically driven family both in their architectural choices and in how they utilize the polyhedron. The Kains and the Olgimskies are more interlinked than the Saborovs are with anyone, especially regarding the town's children and their seperate factions (Notkin's Soul-and-a-halves and Khan's Dogheads, whom you'll likely encounter early on to help settle some gang warfare). In fact the town children functionally operate a seperate society divided between the town and the polyhedron.

I quite like the fact that the Olgymskies (responsible for the town's main / only industry of slaughterhouses, which repeatedly overlap with the older practice of bull worship and sacrifice by The Kin - wait, I haven't even mentioned them yet wtf) aren't just treated as evil robber barons (though Big Vlad absolutely partakes in corruption and prioritising the health of his children over the town / his worker, especially when investigating The Termitary and the circumstances around its closure), but people navigating stopping the spread of plague while still trying to meet the very real problem of food scarcity now that the Town's been effectively cut off from the rest of the world and their lifeline industry has been halted.

Something I really appreciate is that they show the children have agency and act by their own judgement, and that the adults of the town aren't inherently wiser. Early on in the game the leaders of the town main child gangs will go in search of a way to help stop the plague's spread and WILL get infected unless you intervene. They also keep track of the plague's spread, for their own sake but the player can take head of what they learn to plan their routes through the town ahead of time. They also aren't treated like untouchable saints either. Death is very much a reality for EVERY character, no matter how young, both by natural and unnatural causes from the get-go. There are several occasions where the player character will be taught by child characters, such as Sticky, about how to survive in ways they've had to as orphans. I also love how the main child factions have their own distinct philosophies that help (alongside more specific characters that play carer / leadership roles outside of the Doghead and Soul-and-a-half factions, like Capella and Maria Kaina) inform your late-game decisions, since the children are very much the town's future, and how you endorse them will inform how the town operates going forward. I especially love the dogheads, and how they see themselves as not quite fully human yet. Striving for humanity and to be better, such as the utopian future promised by their home The Polyhedron. Meanwhile Notkin's soul-and-a-halves are far more grounded in the here and now, and the fact we need to rely on each other (and our animal companions) to be whole. The two aren't a dichotomy either and work together on a few occasions since, at the end of the day, surviving the plague is a shared goal.

Good luck trying to save everyone! It is genuinely difficult and just deciding who to use resources on and choosing what to use resources for actively effect the story and roleplaying, not just dialogue. Supplies are limited and sometimes it's better to focus on self-preservation just to live another day because it's better others die than the town to go without a doctor. The game mocks and derides players who engage in combat, but you're never barred from it and there are very good reasons to engage in it (obtaining more medical supplies to keep people alive, saving babies from infected buildings, self-defence, protecting people who would otherwise be wrongfully executed, etc.)

I think it's important to seek out the good that still exists in the world rather than stew over the bad. Ironic, I know, given I'm recommending a bleak tragedy of a game / story, but my point that it's good still stands.

So yeah, if you're a disgruntled Fallout fan please give Pathologic (especially Pathologic 2) a shot. I really think you'll like it!

Edit: I keep adding stuff to this post. Originally tried to keep it brief but kept thinking of stuff worth talking about that it's beginning to get bloated ^^'

[acanvasofabillionsuns]

navigation

the self explanatory

art - all the art i reblog comic - similarly, all the art i reblog that is a comic animatic - any animation video - videos music - songs creation - videos of people creating things, be it art, sculpture, chocolate guy, etc. poetry - poetry, using a loose definition of the term abcdefghijklmnop queue - my queue tag long post - posts that are long puns - puns :D cheesy jokes - cheesy jokes <3 polls - tumblr polls tumblr rp - when people on tumblr roleplay dancing - videos of people dancing!! fairytale rewrites - different takes on fairytales cats - cats current events - things that are happening in the world

the less self explanatory

fic recs - all the stories i reblog fic snippets - encompasses bullet point stories, story ideas, and bits of writing that aren't really a full story original story - the stories that aren't fanfics, whether that be original fiction or personal stories original work - the art that (at least as far as i can tell) isn't fanart tumblr famous - ranges from posts that i've seen at least twice to the truly iconic (for some reason on my blog this tag has a column running through the posts. not sure how to fix it) once a week once a month once a year - all the time-based posts, like thursday the 20th, saturday shorts, the Mar 10 Mario billboard, etc. humanity - people being lovely and good, actually <3 :^) - my smile tag! silly and delightful stuff here signal boost - kind of goes hand in hand with current events; less news and more just info i want to/i think should be share(d)? like, interest checks for fan stuff and commissions posts and petitions and so on liveblogging - this would be in the self explanatory bc it's exactly what it sounds like, but so far i've only liveblogged the enola holmes movie and salted about it being different from the books laksdjf;alj wizardry - wizard posting a good reminder - positivity/self care/genuine reminders à la 'turn over your laundry' 'it's okay to be sad sometimes' etc.

the personal

my fics - all my published stories my writing - includes my fics and various bits of writing (and, if you scroll back to late 2020, a choose your own adventure thing i did) meri monologues - my talk posts m mumbles - when i do a little storying in the tags of a post tk got tagged - tag games! this is a relic from when i went by tk for the first few months of having this blog, but i haven't switched it over bc alliteration it's a good good good good good good morning - sometimes i write about the good things in my day and then schedule it to post the following morning :] an ask & an-on ask - my ask answering tags! an ask is on all of them but an-on ask is for. anon asks kind words - a collection of nice things people have said about me/my writing (mostly on this list so i remember it exists)

all my friends are tagged with (one of) their names and that's it

the warnings*

reblog bait - those "reblog if/reblog for" posts. i usually don't reblog the "reblog within ten seconds for good luck" type posts, but it's there to block if you don't want to see those cursing - if there is profanity in a post it will almost certainly have this tag suggestive - the more nsfw posts i reblog. it's not very often, and it'll almost never be explicit, but this is my tag for that flashing cw & eye strain - the more eye hurty posts

*there's not really anything else that i reblog and warn for with any regularity, but i'm willing to go back and tag posts if you send me an ask requesting it! additionally, my warning tagging convention is [thing cw] or just [thing mention] if it's not depicted. so for example if there was an art post showing blood i'd tag it "blood cw", but a story that briefly discussed someone dying would have "death mention."

the references

reference - just general stuff i want to hold on to for reference baking reference - baking but also recipes in general art reference writing reference job reference ^ all fairly self explanatory

the religious

greek mythology - all the greek mythology related posts i reblog christianity - mostly memey christian stuff tbh judaism - happy holidays reblogs + info about it

the fandoms

my general tagging convention for fandoms is [media name] for any posts featuring it, [abbreviated media name + character name] or [character's full name] for any characters in the post, and [ship name] for any featured ships. so a prinxiety post would be tagged with "sanders sides," "ts virgil," "ts roman," and "prinxiety," along with any other relevant tags. or a post featuring phineas and perry would be tagged with "phineas and ferb," "phineas flynn," and "perry the platypus," because for the p&f fandom i tag characters' full names. exceptions include rottmnt, because i didn't want to type out the full show name, but the characters are all tagged [rise character name] & the mxtx fandoms like the untamed and svsss, they're all under "mxtx" bc i haven't actually consumed any of the stories

i have a lot of fandoms i reblog stuff for but the main ones are sanders sides, miraculous ladybug, mcyt*, dnd podcasts (the adventure zone**, legendlark, and spell check mostly) A:TLA, and dp x dc (danny phantom/dcu crossovers - those posts get tagged "dp x dc," "danny phantom," AND "dcu" (i might omit one fandom or the other if the post is, say, a fic that mostly only talks about one fandom, but it'll have the "dp x dc" tag still))

*similar to dp x dc, mcyt posts will always have the "mcyt" tag, and if there's an associated smp with it, i'll tag that as well. i think the only smps i've tagged are dsmp, qsmp, hermitcraft, and life smps. ngl, my character tags for mcyt stuff is a mess and i don't feel like fixing it legendlark is also similar - each post has the 'legendlark' tag and then the og campaign is tagged 'dames and dragons' and any hrose camp posts are tagged as such

**i don't have one unifying tag for all adventure zone content. each campaign has its own tag - so like "taz balance" is the main taz tag you'll see on my blog - and then the characters are all just [taz character name] (e.g. "taz taako")

[siege-gunn]

I will say the way Rosie calls him ace heavily implies he’s also aro, I think denying that is probably very silly.

That being said, the whole thing of fanfics and fanart is that it doesn’t actually have to adhere to canon. That’s more or less the point really. Even if it’s sexual or romantic, it’s just fanworks.

A lot of aspec people are using RadioApple (and probably other Alastor ships) to look at their own feelings on sex and sexuality and romanticism.

Being ace doesn’t necessarily mean you don’t have sex; and being ace doesn’t automatically mean sex-repulsed. Narrowing ones entire definition of asexual to sex-repulsed asexuals is reductive, we’re not a monolith.

If folks go check the polls for RadioApple, you’ll see most of us identify as aspec, in fact most of us are somewhere on the asexual spectrum.

No one reasonable is expecting the show to make RadioApple canon. I personally would hate if it was canon.

But I love all the non-canon fics and fan art, I love that Alastor has given aspec folks, especially asexual spectrum folks, an avenue for us to explore ourselves and our own views on things.

There is a whole range of ways you can be asexual, or aromantic, or both, and if people can’t respect that, they don’t actually give a damn about aspec people.

If anyone reading this didn’t realize asexual doesn’t automatically mean sex-repulsed, I highly recommend doing some reading.

Additionally, to reiterate the OPs main point here: There is no excuse ever to send death threats to someone over a work of fiction, grow the fuck up, it isn’t real. I don’t care what they have Alastor doing, it’s fiction. Don’t like it, don’t read it, don’t look at it. Filtering on most websites is remarkably easy.

But hey, if folks out there really want to target someone over RadioApple fanworks or shipping Alastor. Please do come at me with your best, I’m right here, my asks are open, let’s make it public and showy!

It sounds like it’ll be very funny for me. Probably less so for those who are “big mad” as the kids say over shipping Alastor, but hey, I’m not going to tell you how to spend your energy.

Okay. Im just gonna say this right now.

If you send death threats to people for shipping Radioapple

Get. The. Fuck. Off. My. Page.

As long as it isn’t sexual. RadioApple is a fine ship

Do not attack people for shipping a perfectly legal ship.

And before y’all spit out the “Oh, but Al is canonically Aroace!” No he isn’t. He is only confirmed Ace.

This paragraph from the wiki sums it up pretty well.

I AM NOT TELLING YOU HAVE TO SHIP RADIOAPPLE

I am simply saying not to attack people over it.