#they really do not get along in mainline

[egalitarian-tomboy]

"The body language was intentional." Body Language Difference Between Sonic & Amy vs. Sonic & Tails

Although the DC x Sonic the Hedgehog 4 part mini series is non canon to the mainline story (as far as we know at least...) in one of the previews we got for the first issue we get a moment where we see Sonic grab Tails and Amy for a retreat.

However the difference in how he grabs them is interesting enough to warrant a post of its own.

ABT (Adam Bryce Thomas, artist for the crossover) said the body language was intentional and later on went on to elaborate that Sonic is simply being more gentle with one than the other and that he's not interested in shipping theories nor does he have any personal stake in that realm of fandom. He just said that it'd be more in character for him to have a little tact.

First off: HARD AGREE!

Like don't get me wrong, I've been a Sonamy shipper since I was in Middle School when Sonic X was still on 4Kids TV and SA2 was on the Game Cube but I'm against shipping theories / fan shipping wars getting heated between fans. Like y'all lets calm down these are fictional characters.

Secondly: I'm making this post specifically to talk about the body language in terms of how Sonic personally interacts with Amy vs. Tails in different situations. Because they're both close to Sonic but their bonds differ to an extent. So this is really my excuse to talk about something I've wanted to for a while.

Whether you ship Sonamy platonically, romantically, or you just consider them to be friends. I hope you can at least appreciate the observations in this post. Because it also has some appreciation for Sonic & Tails brotherly relationship as well.

So let's start off with the above body language in question and focus strictly on the hands.

The lines in the panel signify the strength of the grip he has on Amy's hand vs. Tails' wrist. With Amy, Sonic is holding onto her hand gently yet with enough grip to get her attention and to draw her close. While his grip on Tails' wrist is more firm with more like a "Get over here!" level of urgency to it. They both convey the same intention yet Sonic's touch differs depending on the person. Which it should because you don't act the same way towards everyone regardless of who they are 100% of the time. Sonic's no different. Sonic has always been protective of Amy and Tails but with Amy he won't physically harm her or act aggressively with her unless it's for her safety (Like pushing her out of harms way or keeping her from running into danger). So his gentle hold of Amy's hand is a good example of that level of softness he treats her with even though he knows how she's able to handle herself. With his grip on Tails' wrist, it's done in a way that screams "Brothers" to me. The older brother pulling his little brother out of harms way and getting his attention when he's too focused on the wrong thing at the wrong time. He's not being as gentle with him because sometimes Tails requires a bit more force to get his attention when he's invested in what he's doing. But the intention is still the same: Getting him out of danger and taking him along with Amy out of danger.

Next we have this scene from the main series:

Now in this scene, as they're confronting Eggman, the body language between the three of them says a lot more about their feelings in the moment. Sonic is ready to fight and protect, Amy is slightly concerned for Sonic, and Tails is nervous but ready to fight by Sonic's side to stop Eggman. The difference between this scene in the previous scene however boils down to Tails' junction to Sonic in the situation. Instead of being brought out of a situation, Tails is preparing himself to work as a tag team with Sonic or provide backup in a fight. For a while now Tails has been wanting to prove he can be useful to Sonic and help him on his adventures. Which is one of the big motivations for him in the first Sonic Adventure game that rolls into SA2. Most recently in Sonic Frontiers he's expressed his desire to be a hero that Sonic can be proud of, that doesn't need to rely on his help 100% of the time anymore. Which Sonic encourages but reminds him that growing up is learning also that it's OK to rely on others even when you're capable of being a hero that helps everyone. One way that Sonic is letting Tails grow into his own hero is by letting him fight with him and on his own two feet (or in his case with his two tails). Now when you focus on Sonic's body language with Amy close by, he's taking more of a defensive stance with her. Again, even though he knows damn well that she's very capable of handling herself with that hammer of hers, he is still very protective of her. One of his arms is slightly in front of her and he's positioning himself for an attack but he's also capable of taking the full brunt of Eggman's attack if he has a weapon or robot shoot at them. Just because Amy is capable of defending herself that doesn't mean that Sonic will stand by and let her be attacked.

One more scene from the mainline series and then I wanna wrap up this post by talking about the inherent difference between Sonic's relationships with Tails and Amy.

After everything is said and done with the Phantom Rider arc, when they all prepare to head home, Sonic puts his hands around Tails and Amy as they smile and leave together. The thing I want to point out is, similar to the difference in where Sonic grabs them in the DC crossover first issue, Sonic's hand placement is tactful yet at the same time very indicative of his relationships with them. Albeit maybe even a little subconsciously. With Tails his arm is wrapped around his shoulder with his hand wrapped around his arm. Very big brother like and sweet, the clear difference in height is also more pronounced in this interaction. Overall if you were to look at them acting like this and Amy wasn't there it gives the air of two brothers who just got done on an adventure. But when you look at his hold on Amy, you can tell Sonic has a different kind of relationship with her compared to Tails. First off his arm is behind her back with his hand either firmly on her lower back or just close enough to be around her waist. Generally speaking it's traditional for a guy to escort a lady with a hand on her back or around her waist to keep her protected and close so she's safe until she gets where she's supposed to be. But it's worth pointing out that Sonic is becoming more comfortable with his physical interactions with those he's close with. He's a very private guy who doesn't do a lot of PDA with friends, especially with Amy when he knows that she's in love with him and he's "runned away" from her advancements in the past. But after everything is over and the battle has been won, he happily holds her close and walks with her back home. And look at her! She's so happy that he's safe and sound she leans her head against his with her eyes closed. Like she's enjoying the fact he's holding her so tenderly and protectively. If this shot was just him and Amy walking together like this, you would say his smile here was a comfortable yet nervous smile like we've seen in the past where she's given him a hug and he looks a little nervous yet happy.

There are many moments in the Sonic Franchise where we get glimpses into the personal relationships Sonic has with his friends and unfortunately there are a lot of people who think that body language doesn't matter when it comes to understanding a relationship. But body language plays such a huge part when it comes to SEEING how close characters are to each other and how they truly feel about each other. With Tails, Sonic's relationship is that of a brotherhood by bond rather than blood. Sonic's always been there for him and yet he respects and encourages his desire to become more independent as he grows up. He will always be there to help him when he needs help and he will always stand up for him but he won't stop him from becoming a hero himself to fight by his side on equal footing in his own way. Sonic calling him "Little Brother" and "Little Bro" openly and more frequently truly shows how he really considers Tails his family.

With Amy, there is a friendship with her but he doesn't view her in the same sibling way he sees Tails. She's straightforward in her love for him and has openly asked him in the past if he would marry her. She's confessed her love for him openly and maturely to him in the IDW series saying she loves him and she doesn't WANT to change him. He's offered her to come with him on his adventure at the time but she had to help out with the struggling resistance. For Sonic, shyly telling her it isn't ALL or NOTHING is HUGE. Because he wasn't against the idea of her being by his side or adventuring with him after she candidly said she loved him for him. After that there's been a lot more flirting from Sonic's end that can be read as just being playful like he is with others. But when you consider in the past he wasn't the type to flirt back or first AT ALL with Amy, there is an inherent romantic undertone to their interactions. But it shows...if ever so slowly (how ironic)...that Sonic is either becoming more comfortable / open to the idea of a public romantic relationship with her or he's becoming more honest with himself since he's always been interested in her but has always been too shy to confess.

If that was too long for you, TL;DR end summary: Sonic's relationship with Tails is a brotherhood, Sonic's relationship with Amy is a slow burn love story.

Hope you enjoyed reading that because I had fun writing it.

[helps-the-writing-brain-go]

Billy - The Gamer

I don't think I've seen one of these yes, but I really love this trope

Billy wakes one day, finding his HP and MP restored to 50% for sleeping in a nest of cardboard boxes.

His minor scratches are gone along with his twisted ankle though he's still suffering from hunger and malnutrition

His usual quests are things he does anyway, though gamified I.e. picking up the trash he sees becomes a cleaning mini game in the park, he has a quota of newspapers to sell as a newsboy but if he sells over quota, he gets a bonus amount from the Game.

Getting his powers from the Wizard is part of a Mainline Quest

To access it, though, he had to be in the right place and time to help with an optional side quest of helping Tawny, either helping him escape from the zoo in his animal form or in his human form from being menaced by thugs

Billy can and has died, but idk whether to make it thar he wakes up from his last bed in the same timeline or if he reverts to last save, thus going back in time a bit

Becoming the Champion unlocks new magic side quests and more of the Main Storyline as well as a new map to the magical areas around the world, especially around Fawcett that he hadn't been able to access before

There are various skill trees that Billy works on and unlocks

Maybe Freddy helps him work out what kind of Builds he should go for and what Perks to unlock because he can be more than one as the Game affects him as both Billy and Cap

Maybe a secret third identity where he keeps going out with identity obscuring items and becomes known as a hard to find but always accurate appraiser (Because of the skill 'Observe') and a seller of rare and incredible goods like healing items or MP potions that have no side effects.

(Will probably write a part 2 some other time bc this is getting long but do u see my vision??)

[thankskenpenders]

IDW's Knuckles 30th Anniversary special

I'm still working on finishing Shadow Generations and writing up a big thing about it (yes, yes, it's taken me a month to finish a four hour game, I know), but in the meantime we've got another new Classic era comic out from IDW! Let's talk about that.

The last Classic era release we got was the Fang miniseries earlier this year, which I mostly enjoyed but also found a bit underwhelming. It felt like we were getting diminishing returns with the Classic comics. Ian seemed to be struggling to make the Classic era feel fresh within Sega's current restrictions for that branch of the brand, a branch that by its very nature discourages experimentation and new ideas in a way that the ever-evolving Modern era doesn't. He was mostly just playing the hits, sticking the currently permitted Classic era characters next to each other in straightforward one-off adventures and letting the art team do their thing. We were getting the Ian who was happy to simply be able to take these toys out of the toy box. Again, these comics have been fine, and the art's always a treat, but the novelty of simply seeing a comic with the old character designs was wearing off for me when the stories didn't have as much meat as Ian's (or Evan's) excellent Modern era work.

And then along comes this Knuckles 30th Anniversary special, which is by far my favorite Classic Sonic comic Ian's written for IDW.

...I can't really talk about why it's so good without getting into spoilers, though. The short version is that it's a really nice little story about Knuckles and another character from the games, who's used as a great foil for him... except the solicit didn't even say which character it is, so I'm hesitant to say here. But if you're a fan of Knuckles, you should definitely just go read this. It's great. This one's mandatory reading to me.

And with that out of the way, let's dig deeper and get into the spoilers.

The spoiler zone

After an opening that very blatantly homages Tyson Hesse's old Knuckles comic (yes, the very same one that helped inspire the name of this blog), Knuckles realizes that Angel Island has drifted near the Northstar Islands from Sonic Superstars, and decides that the Master Emerald must be giving him a mission to train the archipelago's own resident guardian.

Yes, this isn't just a Knuckles comic. It's a Knuckles and Trip comic!

I was really delighted by this. I like Trip a lot, and it's nice to get this chance to expand upon her as a character. I think this is her first speaking role, even? I'm glad to see her stick around, and I'm glad to see her appear in the comics so soon, especially since we're still waiting for the mainline comics to incorporate Sage. She's still clumsy and fairly timid, like in the game, but without the looming thread of Eggman she gets to let loose a little. She's very exuberant and expressive and playful, especially thanks to Aaron Hammerstrom's fantastic art throughout the issue (complemented with inks by Rik Mack and colors by Valentina Pinto). It makes sense why she gets along so well with Amy. I hope we get to see those two interact more in the future!

Anyway, so Knuckles shows up on the Northstar Islands after contemplating his lot in life, and realizes that he and Trip have a lot in common. She's not as strong or confident as him, but they're both the last of their kind, these lone guardians of these ancient magical gemstones. He's showing up under the pretense of training her, but you can tell it's nice for him to have a kindred spirit, someone who might be able to really get him.

And then Trip's like... wait, you think I'm the last of my kind?

Yes, the Northstar Islands have actually been inhabited by a whole civilization of sungazers like Trip the whole time! We just didn't see them in the game because, y'know. Eggman was attacking. So Trip told everyone to find shelter and hide from the Badniks. (This actually makes a lot of sense, since you pass by this very village in Speed Jungle Zone. Somebody's gotta maintain those straw roofs and light those torches, and I can't imagine Trip managing all that upkeep herself.)

This also includes a grandfather for Trip, who's been training her as the archipelago's new guardian. Naturally, this has led to some speculation from fans about the old "mandates." In the wake of the Penders lawsuits and Archie's reboot, Sega declared that the comics could no longer create comic-original relatives for the game characters. Has that changed now?

Well, I'm hesitant to read too much into this. For one, as Ian has tried to drill into peoples' heads for years now, the so-called "mandates" aren't a set of concrete commandments from Sega, they just have some general guidelines for the brand, some of which have more wiggle room than others and some of which have changed over time. There's also the simple fact that Sega is working way more closely with the team at IDW, and that people like Ian and Evan are literally on the official Sonic lore team now. Ian can presumably work with the lore team and Sega to figure out Trip's family, and then go and work what they've decided on into a comic, so it's entirely possible Trip's grandpa isn't considered a comic-original character so much as he's a character conceptualized at Sega who just happens to have appeared in an IDW comic before anything else. The lines are a lot blurrier now with all this cross-pollination, compared to the Archie days when it was a separate creative team and a separate canon.

But, again, I don't want to speculate too heavily about what goes on behind the scenes. Regardless, Ian was able to use this comic to expand upon the world of the games and the characters that inhabit it, and I love it for that. It's the first of these Classic comics that feels like truly mandatory reading for the way it builds upon the games. These days we so rarely get to see communities like this in the Sonic world with their own cultures. It's not like we know anything about "hedgehog culture" or whatever. So this is a nice change of pace. The Northstar Islands feel totally different now that I know they've actually been inhabited the whole time, and knowing that Trip is part of an active community with their own history and customs puts a whole new spin on her as a character.

It also makes her a great foil for Knuckles here. He showed up on the island thinking he'd have a lot to teach Trip as someone who's got more life experience as a lone guardian, only to realize his assumptions about her life were completely wrong. Trip brags to her grandpa that Knuckles is gonna train her, but he quickly realizes he doesn't have much to teach her. She may be kind of cowardly, but she knows her way around the island, she can think on her feet, and she can handle herself well enough in a fight, in her own slapstick way.

He doesn't say as much, but you can tell Knuckles is embarrassed about all this. This clumsy kid is showing him up, even though she won't even really listen to his advice! He's also, perhaps, a bit jealous. It's not like he had a grandfather to train him in the ways of being a guardian. (Not in this continuity, anyway.) He doesn't get a whole village of echidnas to teach him about his heritage. He doesn't get fancy ceremonial armor. It's just him, a big green rock, and his two fists. He thought he had this whole guardian thing figured out, and he'd be able to give a kindred spirit like Trip some advice, but it turns out she's lived a whole different life, making him question if he even knows what he's doing. He quickly gets fed up with both Trip and himself, blowing up at her a little.

After reflecting a bit, Knuckles goes back to Trip and comes clean. He doesn't really know how to train her, because no one ever trained him. He figured things out on his own. If he had anyone there to raise him, they've been gone since he was too young to remember. He just knows he has to protect the Master Emerald. That's it. It's a pretty vulnerable moment for Knuckles, one where his dissatisfaction with his life comes to the surface.

Still, Trip sees things differently. He may be used to the fact that he lives on a giant floating island powered by a giant magic emerald, but she thinks that's, like, the coolest thing in the world. HER islands don't fly! And while Knuckles might wish he had someone to train him, Trip thinks that Knuckles becoming such a fearsome fighter all on his own, without even armor to protect him, makes him super awesome and admirable. With both of them feeling better, Trip takes Knuckles to Golden Capital to talk about her heritage as a guardian of the Northstar Islands a bit more, and Knuckles tells her that he thinks she'll be a great guardian before he heads home, once again feeling pretty good about himself.

While this is a pretty straightforward little story about how the grass is always greener on the other side, it's a very effective and sweet one that I enjoyed reading a ton. Aside from the fun of learning more about Trip and the Northstar Islands, it's just a great showcase for Knuckles. (It's definitely a way better showcase for him than his Paramount+ show, as much as I took sick pleasure in that show's baffling creative decisions.) There are also some fun details about his life in here, such as the fact that Sonic, Tails, and Amy have taken camping trips to hang out with him on Angel Island, and the fact that he trained Amy in using her hammer better.

It's just real good, and it feels like the most meaningful addition to The Canon out of any of these Classic era comics Ian's written. We're still gonna be getting more in the future, so hopefully this is a sign that Ian and the lore team have found that happy middle ground where they can keep the Classic comics familiar and nostalgic while also being able to branch out and expand upon things.

Speaking of future comics!

Coming attractions

The end of this issue confirms some things that are in the works for IDW Sonic. For one, we're getting a Chaotix 30th Anniversary special next year. Neat! They also mention some kind of Shadow one-shot dropping following the movie, however fans seem split on whether this is referring to a new story or just the "Best of Shadow" compilation one-shot that's coming out next month. So don't get your hopes up about that in case it's the latter, I guess.

And while we're still waiting for issue #75 of the main series, the IDW team is already thinking all the way ahead to #100, which should drop sometime during the 35th anniversary of the franchise in 2026. Clearly the team's still confident about the longevity of IDW Sonic and excited for the future. And I am, too! Bring on #75!

[theguywithaplan]

List of Games Turning Twenty (20) Years Old in 2025

Advance Wars: Dual Strike

Advent Rising (they started planning the trilogy before the first game was out lmao)

Age of Empires III

Animal Crossing: Wild World (the DS one)

Arc the Lad: End of Darkness

Area 51 (the FPS that was low-key kinda creepy)

Banjo Pilot (the Banjo-Kazooie racing game on GBA).

Battalion Wars (the spin-off of Advance Wars).

Battlefield 2

Brothers in Arms: Road to Hill 30

Brothers in Arms: Earned in Blood (yep, they released two mainline games in one year).

Burnout Revenge (this cleared Burnout 3, and I will fight you on that).

Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth

Call of Duty 2

Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow (go play the Castlevania Dominus collection. It has this game and a few others and it's GREAT).

Castlevania: Curse of Darkness

Civilization IV

Cold Fear (answering the age old question: what if Resident Evil 4 was on a boat and not as good?)

Condemned: Criminal Origins (a launch title for the Xbox 360 and a pretty solid horror game).

Conker: Live & Reloaded (maybe a controversial opinion, but this is WAY better than the original).

Crash Tag Team Racing

Dead or Alive 4 (aka, the one with not Master Chief in it).

Destroy All Humans!

Devil Kings (all the sequels would be under it's non-translated title: Sengoku Basara).

Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening (let's rock, baybeeeeee)

Donkey Kong: Jungle Beat

Dragon Ball Z: Sagas (I saw a stream of this game a few months back, and oh my god, this looks so shitty/funny).

Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King

Dynasty Warriors 5 (who's excited for Origins???)

Far Cry Instincts (a console version of the PC exclusive original game)

Fatal Frame III: The Tormented

F.E.A.R. (if you haven't played this before, change that. it's fantastic)

Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones

Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance (the one with Ike the Bisexual in it).

Forza Motorsport (the very first one).

Gauntlet: Seven Sorrows

Geist (the rare M-rated Nintendo game).

The Getaway: Black Monday

God of War (the very first one).

Gran Turismo 4 (one of the few PS2 games that could be played in HD, along with... Jackass: The Game...)

Guild Wars

Guitar Hero (the very first one).

Haunting Ground (a very rare PS2 horror game from Capcom).

Hot Shots Golf: Open Tee

The Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction

The Incredibles: Rise of the Underminer (since the second movie came out, this game is now considered non-canon).

Indigo Prophecy/Fahrenheit (the second game from known hack/fraud David Cage).

Jade Empire (the last game that BioWare made before they got acquired by EA).

Jak X: Combat Racing

Judge Dredd: Dredd vs. Death (there was a for real-ass Judge Dredd game on the GameCube).

Kameo: Elements of Power (another Xbox 360 launch title, this one made by a post-acquisition Rare. It's pretty fun).

Killer7 (from the greatest to ever do it, Suda51)

Peter Jackson's King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie (you guys think it's based on the movie or what...?)

Kirby: Canvas Curse (a really fun DS game that only used the stylus)

Klonoa 2: Dream Champ Tournament (i think klonoa would get along really well with sonic)

The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap (the one where Link gets really small)

Lego Star Wars: The Video Game

Lunar: Dragon Song (one of the worst RPGs I've ever played. Don't play it).

Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time (the one with the Baby Mario Bros.)

Mario Kart DS (the first one with online play).

Mario Party Advance

Mario Party 7 (my personal favorite)

Mario Superstar Baseball (we didn't get a Mario Baseball game on the Switch. Because they're saving it for the Switch 2).

Mario Tennis: Power Tour (so many Mario games...)

Dance Dance Revolution: Mario Mix

Marvel Nemesis: Rise of the Imperfects

The Matrix Online (an official continuation from the movies)

The Matrix: Path of Neo

Medal of Honor: European Assault

MediEvil: Resurrection

Mega Man Battle Network 5 (the only one in the series to have a DS version)

Mega Man Zero 4

Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction

Metal Gear Acid (a launch title for the PSP, and a card game set in the Metal Gear universe. It works better than you might think).

Meteos (a puzzle game made by Masahiro Sakurai, the Smash Bros. guy)

Metroid Prime Pinball

Mortal Kombat: Shaolin Monks

Myst V: End of Ages (the final Myst game)

Need for Speed: Most Wanted (did you know that this game outsold the entire Halo series?)

Neopets: The Darkest Faerie (is Neopets still a thing?)

Nicktoons Unite! (a crossover between Spongebob, Fairly Oddparents, Jimmy Neutron, and Danny Phantom).

The Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie's Revenge (an honest to god sequel to the movie that plays like Devil May Cry).

Ninja Gaiden Black

Nintendogs

Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath

Pac-Man World 3

Perfect Dark Zero (yet another Xbox 360 launch title, also made by Rare, and a sequel to one of the best FPS games ever made. It was fine).

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (it had been out in Japan for a few years, but us Yankees got this four years after it came out).

Pokemon Dash (a Pokemon racing game. It was not very good).

Pokemon Emerald Version (I sunk like 500 hours into this game).

Pokemon XD: Gale of Darkness (a sequel to Pokemon Colosseum where you could capture other people's Pokemon).

Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones

Psychonauts

The Punisher

Quake 4

Ratchet: Deadlocked

Resident Evil 4

Serious Sam 2

Shadow of the Colossus (one of the best games ever made. Play it if you haven't yet).

Shadow the Hedgehog (pretty good to be a sonic fan right now).

Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga (parts 1 and 2).

Sly 3: Honor Among Thieves

Sonic Rush

SoulCalibur III (RIP, SoulCalibur. Tekken is just too powerful.)

Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory (RIP, Splinter Cell. Ubisoft just sucks too much to make you anymore).

Spyro: Shadow Legacy

Star Fox Assault

Star Wars: Republic Commando

Star Wars: Battlefront II (this game's story mode is permanently etched into my brain).

Stubbs the Zombie in "Rebel Without a Pulse" (presenting it to you with no context. Look it up. It's hilarious).

Super Mario Strikers

Super Monkey Ball Deluxe

Tak: The Great Juju Challenge

Tekken 5

TimeSplitters: Future Perfect (RIP, TimeSplitters. Embracer Group killed you before you could come back).

Trace Memory (got remade in 2024 as Another Code)

Twisted Metal: Head-On (another PSP launch title)

Ultimate Spider-Man (you could play as Venom in this one)

WarioWare: Touched!

WarioWare: Twisted!

We Love Katamari

Wild Arms: Alter Code F (a remake of the first game)

Xenosaga Episode II

X-Men Legends II: Rise of Apocalypse

[artbyblastweave]

🔥 Sidekicks?

Sidekicks are interesting because they were genuinely a very common type of character for a while- almost every cape in the golden age had one- but they've kind of been a dead horse trope ever since Spider-Man demonstrated that you could straight up mainline a teenage hero without making them the ward or pageboy of a thirty-something masculine power fantasy. Almost every example of the type at DC or Marvel has been allowed to age out of the role, and every contemporary sidekick character I've seen in Indie stuff is a riff on Robin specifically- the sole surviving example where they've done the legwork to justify the continued existence of that costumed identity within the fiction. I've got mixed feelings on that, because the titanic presence of Batman and Robin in the cultural imagination means that that'll basically always be a relevant target to take a swipe at, but at the same time, we get it. It would fuck you up trying to live up to the expectations of the senior superhero in the partnership. Half of all officially published plots involving Robin is about how it's fucking him up (whoever he currently is) to try and live up to the expectations of the senior superhero in the partnership. Yes there's a weird age gap, yes it's child endangerment, we get it. This is covered ground.

The controversial element is that years on, I'm still kind of fascinated by what The Dark Knight Returns has to say on this topic; despite that comic's many flaws, I'm willing to extend a handicap to a lot of its deconstructive ideas simply because they hadn't been done totally to death yet at the time of the comic's publication. I inherited an older edition of the book from an uncle, and in that edition Miller discusses in the introduction that an impetus for the comic was his realization that Batman, the thirtysomething paternal figure, never gets old or weak the way real fathers do, never receives the scrutiny a fifty-something receives from their grown children regarding how they were raised. And this line of thinking is so so visible in the book proper- At the start, Bruce is emanating intense "divorced dad who knows perfectly well why his adult children aren't calling him" vibes. The fact that Dick is clearly alive but wants nothing to do with him, just hanging over the book as this unseen presence, is really interesting (until Strikes Again came along and fucked that right to death.) Jason's involvement in this lifestyle got him killed (years before they killed him for real!) and that was a bucket of cold water that snapped Batman out of the fantasy for about ten years- but ten years on Bruce has Jason on a pedestal in his inner monologue because the dead can't question the project or distance themselves from it the way that Dick has. There's something very deliberately uncomfortable, too, about the progression of Batman's relationship with Carrie Kelley; sure, she's living out every kid's fantasy of riding out on adventures with Batman- giving children in the readership the ability to project themselves that role is the entire reason Robin exists, metatextually- but we also see in real time how near death experiences are cutting through the fantasy to fuck her up, and how there's an uncomfortable co-dependency kind of thing that's quickly forming between her and Bruce. The comic doesn't pass a clear-cut judgement on this dynamic; personally I find it difficult to cleanly separate what's deliberate commentary from Miller's habitual Weirdness About Women- but I'm compelled by it regardless.

[vicvinegarandhughhoney]

Dennis Reynolds is AUTISTIC!!!!

(At least, I headcanon him as such).

Here's why:

Sensory issues:

If you've watched the show, you probably already know what I mean, but Dennis really struggles to deal with sensory input. When there's a loud noise, he often covers his ears- like in Family Fight:

or he gets frustrated, lashing out at diners for being too loud (The Gang Dines Out), getting annoyed at Frank for chewing gum too loud.

It's worth noting that later on in this episode, Dennis can hear Frank chewing gum from the other room. He's clearly hypersensitive, and perhaps this even goes to explaining a little bit why his room is soundproofed? Could it be that rather than not wanting people to hear what's going on inside, he's desperate to block the noise coming from outside?? (this was suggested by @kod-lyoko , and I LOVE IT).

There are SO many examples of Dennis plugging his ears (often when the others don't react in such a strong way):

There are way too many examples to list here, and too many images I could give (the above were taken from @dennisboobs ' gif set) but hopefully you get the impression.

Social issues:

I feel like this one is pretty self-evident, but I find deconstructing the things Dennis does super fun, so I'm going to explain anyway: Dennis does NOT know how relationships work. There are a great deal of factors at play to cause this (I would argue that his early experiences in life definitely moulded his view in an unhelpful way) but the systematic way he looks at interactions REEKS of autism to me.

The DENNIS system is hardly peak autism representation (it's certainly not the bright and bubbly stuff people often talk about), but the fact that he has a system for romantic/sexual interactions, both for men AND women, feels super autistic-coded. He quite literally has a script which he follows to make interactions easier, one which he sticks to rigidly. And if anybody tries to implement this carefully thought out system incorrectly? Well, he'll let you know (e.g in The Dennis System episode where he blows up at Mac and Charlie for not getting it right at the fair).

He masks his social deficits well, but sometimes things don't go to plan. Sometimes, the girl on the cruise ship runs away, and Dennis announces that 'that's not supposed to happen'.

He comes off as creepy, but that's not his intention. He doesn't understand the way he's perceived by others in general- he thinks he's the King of St Joseph's, not realising he was actually an outcast all along. Just like a lot of autistic people, he didn't understand that he was on the fringes of society until it was thrust in his face, and that hurt.

Speech:

While Dennis often appears to speak pretty normally, there are a few occasions where his frustration causes this mask of normality to slip.

In The Gang Finds a Dumpster Baby, Dennis is caught off guard by the hipster's reading of him, and immediately goes back to Frank and Charlie, parroting almost the same words he heard right back to them, despite not seeming to understand them at all (perhaps a form of echolalia?).

"I'm out here trying to make a difference, and you're over here rummaging around in the trash like a couple of narcs! Okay, you can't just come down here with your mainline cashmere, mousse... quaff... hairspray, and start being like, a suburban tool!"

It's also worth noting that even the poetic way he speaks when he's angry could be a trait ?? As a recently diagnosed autistic person, in my report they spoke about how I used 'idiosyncratic' language (basically, peculiar language lol), and listed terms like 'connoisseur', which I guess were deemed pretty formal for casual conversation.

And it got me thinking, who else do we know who uses VERY idiosyncratic language? Dennis. Reynolds.

"The thunder of my vengeance will echo through these halls, like the gust of a thousand winds"

"Begone, vile man, begone from me!... I am untethered and my rage knows no bounds!"

"You didn't tell me there was to be pollen!"

Etc... etc...

The way he repeats 'savages, idiots!' during his rage at the frat bros feels very autism coded to me. Repetition of certain words and phrases is common!

Heightened emotions:

Again, something that I didn't know until I myself was diagnosed is that for a lot of autistic people, we spend most of the time at a pretty 'flat' emotional state, but when we do experience emotions, we experience them intensely. Frustration turns into anger, sadness turns into despair, happiness turns into ecstasy- it's why some autistic people might be misdiagnosed with bipolar disorder!

This, of course, fits well with the way Dennis experiences emotions. He spends a lot of the time believing he doesn't have any at all, and when he does feel something, it's overwhelming.

"And I have feelings! Of course I have feelings, I have big feelings, okay? And it hurts."

These lines hit hard regardless of the extra weight you put on them, but when you see them through the lens of autism, through the lens of a lifetime of misunderstanding and overstimulation, it makes them hit even harder.

It hurts him to feel. His emotions are so strong that they're painful, and he's never been taught how to deal with them, because nobody even knew he had them in the first place.

Stimming:

Finally, I think Dennis stims. A lot. If you search up 'Dennis Reynolds autistic' on this very site, you'll find gifsets and videos illustrating this.

He has a few very common ones, like tugging on his earlobe when he's anxious, playing with his fingers, etc, but if you pay attention to him even when he's in the background of scenes, you'll pick up on a lot. Dennis is constantly moving, and while you could suggest this is simply a result of Glenn's ADHD, I'd argue that some of these stims happen so frequently in Sunny specifically, that there's no way they're coincidental.

Glenn makes a lot of very specific acting and directorial choices in Sunny, so why dismiss these as choices too?

That's all I can be bothered to type up now, but here's my case for Autistic!Dennis ! Of course, he's a complex character so there's always room for different interpretations...

but as an autistic person, I hereby claim him as One Of Us™.

[thebibliosphere]

hello, this is just me kinda sharing unsolicited Batman related feelings that i’m wallowing in, don’t mind me

i started playing Gotham Knights after seeing a few of your posts about it, and i’ve had a bit of a Batman/Justice League/Batfam fixation for the past few weeks. i was enjoying it! the environments were interesting and the combat was cool, and i loved listening to whatever Alfred had to say.

however, i made the mistake of finding Gotham Cemetery as Nightwing and thinking, “wait, is Bruce…?”, followed my gamer instincts (which is usually something along the lines of “follow the lights”), and ended up climbing to a higher vantage point to see if i could spot Bruce’s grave.

welp, all i had to do was spin the camera a little and oh. i’m standing next it. my boy Dick is already standing next to his father’s grave. it’s cleaner, newer than the surrounding headstones, there’s fresh flowers on it, and the rain made for a scene that kinda wrote itself.

somehow that hit me harder than the video Bruce left behind, harder than the funeral. i got so sad i had to quit the game and start reading some Batman comics :’) i wasn’t expecting me the player to also process grief along with all the characters, damn.

anyway, hope you’re having an awesome day!

Oh man, yeah. I did the same thing and then spent a lot of time walking through the cemetery, looking at all the names. I really liked that they carved Wayne Tower out of his stone so that when you look through it at a certain angle, you can see the Gotham skyline through his headstone. (And then the game dragged me back there later for one of Dick's cutscenes, and I went through all the stages of grief all over again. I had a similar reaction to Barbara visiting her father's monument. I won't spoil it, but man. Man.)

The makeshift memorial outside Wayne Tower also left a lump in my throat the first time I saw it. As did the #ThankYouBruce hashtag they have on the electronic billboards showing Bruce's face in profile against the city.

IDK, just something about the idea of Dick having to walk past that every time he gets dragged into a shareholder meeting fucks me up.

The game has many issues, but its ability to wring every emotion known to man and some kaleidoscopic ones only known to shrimp out of my jaded husk of a soul is not one of them.

I hope you continue to enjoy playing it! And take breaks. I ended up mainlining an entire season of Wayne Family Adventures after I finished my first playthrough 😅

[edgy-ella]

IDW SONIC READERS, PLEASE READ THIS!!!!

I am begging you. On my hands and knees. Begging. More so than anything else I’ve asked of this fandom.

Please please buy the Fang miniseries when it comes out

Don’t just read it. Buy it. I will admit that I’m very guilty of reading through a lot of IDW Sonic through…less than legal means, and I know I’m not alone in that regard. But I think it’s really important that for this miniseries in particular, you actually go out and buy the damn thing. Show your support with your dollar.

Really think about it for a second—they gave Fang his own miniseries. Fang! An underutilized, underrated fan favorite for sure, but hardly a mainstay of the series. I’m sure that this was at least somewhat prompted by Superstars, where Fang is a major antagonist…but Bean and Bark weren’t in that game, and it already received its own online promo comic prior to the game’s release (notably, with Fang as the star).

Classic Sonic stories have also exclusively been relegated to one-shots in IDW, not a full on miniseries like what Fang is getting. Basically all of the IDW Sonic miniseries we’ve gotten so far have been plot relevant side stories to the main IDW comic that focus on side characters with little to no involvement from Sonic himself. Tangle and Whisper, Bad Guys, Impostor Syndrome…the only odd man out besides this Fang miniseries is Scrapnik Island.

Really think about it for a second. FANG is getting his own focus comic BEFORE KNUCKLES.

And that’s why it’s so important that we buy it.

I think Sega is using this comic to test the waters to see if people like Fang and want to see him in more future projects—be it comics, games, or even cartoons. But there’s more to it than just that.

See, Superstars hasn’t been doing that great. I know I said in an earlier post that people seemed to like it, but I retract that statement. It was damned by faint praise at launch, and now most of the discussion I’ve seen surrounding the game revolves around its flaws (chief among them being the middling OST and that the Steam version stealth installs an Epic Games service along with the game). No sales numbers have been projected as of writing, but it’s definitely been beaten out by Mario Wonder and Spider-Man 2.

So, Classic Sonic games aren’t doing too hot right now (I’m sure that many modern fans are jumping for joy at the prospect). But the classic characters are.

People really like the extended classic Sonic cast, just as much as they love the extended modern cast. From my experience, the two fan favorites are Mighty and Fang. Fang stands out to me in particular for a couple reasons: people were really upset that Sega specifically said no to Fang, Bark and Bean coming back after Ian snuck in a reference to them in IDW Sonic #3 (using their old team name from Archie, the Hooligans), and the fanmade 16-bit remake of Triple Trouble, Fang’s debut game, received private praise from many members of Sega and Sonic Team. People like Fang and the media he’s in, and Sega is starting to take notice. That’s why we’re getting this miniseries.

That’s why it’s so important that the miniseries sells well. If the big boys at Sega and Sonic Team see Superstars’ iffy reception but see Fang’s comic sell above expectations, then Sega will want to continue to use Fang (and potentially other “classic” Sonic characters as well) in more narrative driven projects. That means modern Sonic.

“But Sega won’t let any classic Sonic character into a modern Sonic project!” I hear you thinking. And to that I say, so? Sega changes its mind all the time. Remember that whole two worlds nonsense? That was thrown out with in Tailstube. Characters debuting in Boom and the comics were previously barred from the mainline games, but they’ve broken that “rule” in both Speed Battle and Frontiers. Hell, they’ve even been talked out of some of their sillier comic mandates, like characters not being able to wear different clothing.

For all their flaws, Sega does listen, and money speaks louder than anything. If this miniseries fails, Sega will just assume that people aren’t hot on Fang or the extended classic cast anymore and throw them back in the bar. But if the comic sells well, then Sega might take it as a sign that, hey, people like this character (and his two lackeys), we should put him in projects that fans are more interested in. Mighty and Ray probably wouldn’t be too far behind, especially given Mania’s success. Whether that means comics or games, modern or classic, who knows. What’s important is that it sends the right message to Sega, and they will listen to their consumers. That means us. If we don’t support this miniseries now, we might have to wait another thirty years for another chance.

[bladekindeyewear]

HS^2 bloggin’ mainline 2024-08-24

(Previous post - current page 666)

Section 3 of page 666 is now upd8'd, let's check it out! And as you can expect very much from the topic it's almost certainly covering, they've warned us via the twitter "Content warning for references to themes of physical and mental abuse, flashing imagery, and mild gore". By the way, when Force Refresh didn't reload the game data enough to show the new chapter in Google Chrome for me, I had to go in settings to "Delete Browsing Data" > "Cookies and other site data" for the Time Range "Last hour", because just deleting "Cached images and files" or "Hosted app data" didn't help.

(EDIT: THEY WERE NOT KIDDING AROUND ABOUT THE CONTENT WARNINGS, IF YOU HAVE ANY PERSONAL EXPERIENCE WITH ANY SORT OF ABUSE PLEASE BE CAREFUL WITH THIS ONE.)

Although, before we get into it (AND WAY BEFORE I SCROLLED BACK UP TO EDIT THAT EXTRA WARNING UP THERE), I wanted to cover something that'd been on my mind since my last post, predictionways: How IS Vriska going to escape the Plot Point?

There seem a number of obvious answers that we'll get some combination of, but the last one might not be obvious to everyone, so I wanted to cover it and flesh out / examine the possibilities so we all can feel really smart if it pans out at all the way I'm thinking it could pan out:

(1) Vriska realizes the true power and relevance she'd attained as a Thief of Light never left her heart all along, and this singularity is Nothing, a realm Void of relevance where only she exists. (Very like the Neverending Story after everything was destroyed, maybe?) If she allows herself to divest herself of some of her relevance she's been so desperately clutching onto, she can 8r8k the Plot Point.

Callie hinted that this singularity-center might need to be destroyed, and the fifth section is an 8-ball, a type of container Vriska is famously known to break. It may make a degree of sense that realizing her own power, her ultimate freedom, might be enough to do just that and free her.

(1a) Vriska becomes her Ultimate Self, and is too full of Light for the singularity to contain. This could break it or otherwise get her out of it...

...but I'm not sure it's either possible or a good thing for her to consolidate ALL of herself from the rest of Paradox Space into herself while she's trapped in here? Those versions of her perhaps deserve to keep existing rather than falling into a sea of herself that would need to hold powerfully to the self-actualization and psychological progress she's made as THIS version of her instead of the versions of her that didn't. We're not certain of all the mechanics of being an Ultimate Self, so it's hard to say whether or not it's possible... or could even see her backslide from this Therapy Session, which I really wouldn't want to see because this has been so good, and would definitely make some sense of alt!Callie / AL's warning that what was inside the Plot Point was hungry, because an Ultimate Vriska certainly could be. This doesn't seem the right choice unless in combination with one of the other options:

(2) Vriska finds the collapsed core of the Green Sun's power here and steals it for herself, a hidden treasure that could be intensely empowering, whether via Light or even giving her fancy barrier-busting Black Hole powers similar to alt!Calliope's dead!Jade body. I... feel this option is unlikely. It'd certainly count as something "greedy" inside the Plot Point that "isn't salvation" and could hasten the fragmentation of the Candy storyline because there isn't a singularity vacuuming its power all together, which could apply to breaking the Plot Point too, frankly... eh, I just still think other options seem more likely and better foreshadowed. Especially this last one:

(3) Vriska uses the same communication-across-barriers ability she used to contact (Meat)!Terezi in order to message JOHN and ask the HEIR OF BREATH to free her from the singularity as I once long ago wrongly predicted. If John is the only one who can reach in and pull her out, it would require Vriska to overcome herself enough to realize she needs -- and has the power -- to MAKE a divestment of relevance (as (1) suggested) to John from herself, and let John be the hero in her place for at least a moment. The arms he once reached everywhere with using his ultimate power suddenly become an arm reaching for another hand to pull someone to freedom.

Now on top of everything I mentioned in the old Breath, Blood, and the Flow of Reality post about John being one of the only people possibly capable of freeing someone from a singularity that "not even Light can escape", there's a bunch of EXTREMELY RECENT evidence for this, too. In addition to telling us how surprising and unlikely they would have found it to learn that Vriska messaged Terezi past the barrier sealing Candy's timeline away from the rest of Paradox Space, Callie ALSO just got done asking John to break Vriska out of jail, reinforcing it with an open statement that Breath was the aspect of Freedom, and John embodied the concept. And more importantly, John HADN'T BEEN NECESSARY to break Vriska out at all, and ended up only tagging along for conversation and fun, not even needing to tell Serket where to go! Which makes the entire relevance and narrative choice of Callie asking him to break her out better suited as foreshadowing for this exact necessity while she's trapped in the Plot Point, and all Vriska would need to do to make it happen is pull a trick (communicating across the Breach) we've already seen her pull before in the Epilogues. To have the courage and stability of mind to realize she can't do this on her own, and know who to ask for help. (Roxy, as a Rogue of Void, might even be able to lend her power to the effort too.)

Apologies for the pre-update writeup, I just really wanted to make that last John call for y'all if you hadn't realized the possibility, y'know, before we potentially see it happen a few upd8s from now. :D

Alright, on to all the trauma that Doc Scratch helped inflict on Vriska, manipulating her into actions that only injured her psyche further and her friends moreso, and all the guilt and anger she feels over it. I suspect she'll have to finally at least PARTIALLY realize the trick that's being hinted at regarding "ultimate freedom" -- ie, the answer to the Ultimate Riddle -- and just how much Doc Scratch's talk of inevitability not only gaslit her into thinking her worst instincts were unavoidable, but that even as he was TELLING her that he was manipulating her, he was admitting that he HAD to manipulate her to make this happen, meaning the power had been in HER hands all along, not his. Without Vriska provoked into being the one to inflict the injuries in the entire Team Charge vs Team Scourge cascade, without the fact that this was all FRIENDS hurting FRIENDS, none of them would have experienced enough of the severe psychological trauma required for Doc Scratch's half-Gamzee chucklevoodoos to control them into unknowingly writing his DNA code, and leaving those like Aradia in an inverted, highly manipulatable state for guiding their session into creating the Tumor that would birth the Green Sun. Let's click the White Cueball and start watching Vriska painfully confronting some serious emotional abuse and trauma from her past at the hands of a very-Dirk-Strider-like pseudo-parental figure...

*CLICKING THAT DAMNED CUEBALL NOW*

Okay, NO TIMESKIP notice this time, she looks the same in her room-- it would make sense that Doc Scratch is next on the chopping block this time and I'd WANT to see her live first reaction to it. What's with this poppy hoppy fun music? We're definitely getting something more sinister for Scratch. (Also I have to say, the music so far this entire Vriska Therapy Session flash has been... okay? But not up to the usual Homestuck banger standards the original comic's run spoiled us with constantly, in my personal view.)

VRISKA: Whew. VRISKA: Long day.

Oh gosh I hope she doesn't go into the next one IMMEDIATELY and rests first--

Oh GCATAVROSPRITE is the music this time, I get it! And he's acting more catlike than ever w/ those paws lifted!

GCATAVROSPRITE: mAYBE, yOU SHOULD TAKE A BREAK, fROM ALL THE TOTALLY AWESOME PERSONAL BREAKTHROUGHS YOU ARE HAVING, GCATAVROSPRITE: aND KICK IT WITH ME AND ERISOL FOR A WHILE, ERISOLSPRITE: yeah, you kiinda look liike 2hiit.

THANK you, get her to relax at least a BIT before tackling something harder than her freakin' abusive mother(s). Also,

--just, Erisol looking unexpectedly fly as fuck, and more Dave-like than ever. Like, I'm just surprised he looks so cool. Good damn art.

VRISKA: Says Scarfshades McLopsided.

Hey!!!

ERISOLSPRITE: 2ay2 the bu2ted a22 biitch wwearin the 2ame raggedy jacket 2he2 wworn 2ince wwe wwere liike fiivve.

FUCKIN' OWNED, GOOD SNAPBACK.

VRISKA: Says the guy who literally can't change his clothes.

That's low AND not helping your case, fuck you! You're being incredibly disrespectful AND proving him right!

ERISOLSPRITE: ii cant be held accountable for my dii2cordant cla22-2wwag diichotomy, but here you are a 2weep and a half deep iin a per2onally raiilored realm of 2elf-reflectiion and you 2tiill choo2e twwo look liike thii2.

EXACTLY, that's what we're saying!!! --Not that it can be helped TOO much, from an emotional standpoint she sorta has to take forms similar to her past to face her past to an extent, so...

Also, let me do the math on that... (6/13)*4 ≈ 1.85, so if we're still in "YEAR 4" then 1.85 solar sweeps have passed for her since she entered the Plot Point. If anything, Erisol's being generous as fuck here by rounding down instead of saying "nearly two sweeps". (And this confirms we haven't timeskipped again-- or if we have, must not have skipped MUCH.)

VRISKA: Heh.

What, can't mess with perfection?

ERISOLSPRITE: heh.

Oh shit, they're actually getting on, look at his damned animated grin. This is just some black-vibey friendly jabbing!

ERISOLSPRITE: anyway, come chiill.

Please, please do Vriska for your own damn sake.

Oh no, Tavros, don't suggest cat things.

Yeah, get some R and R. (And pointless playtime.) So you don't burn out. Good advice Tav.

FUCK IS HE STILL ALLERGIC? :C

.....okay GCATavrosprite you make a good goddamned point, you're doing pretty well against the allergies all things considered.

Oh no, she thinks she needs to keep going. :( This is gonna be even less fun for her than she thinks.

VRISKA: I'm kind of on a roll here. Gotta strike while the iron is hot!

Intense trauma-release therapy does not work that way!!! Heavy revelations have to be PROCESSED and mulled over before you subject yourself to more psychological pounding!

GCATAVROSPRITE: [...] aND IT KIND OF FEELS LIKE THE FIRE IS ABOUT TO GET REALLY REALLY HOT,

Ooh, a serious warning from Tav and Erisol that this shit is about to be some fuckin' BUSINESS. Listen to them! (Exactly as you put it Tav, that iron is gonna MELT too long in too hot a fire. I hope this doesn't knock her back at first and then we get ANOTHER TIMESKIP so soon mid-section... D: )

VRISKA: Whaaaaaaaat?

Oh she doesn't fucking see it coming, does she. She thought she just conquered the worst of her abuse with her mother(s) just now. She is NOT ready.

VRISKA: Oh 8lah 8lah 8lah, don't be such a pussy. GCATAVROSPRITE: i LITERALLY CAN'T NOT BE A CAT,

PFFF

VRISKA: How 8ad could it even 8e?

How genre savvy could you POSSIBLY have lost track of being to make such a statement?

...Welp, she's gonna try it. Let's hope it doesn't make her backslide into being too afraid to touch it for another year or two. :C :C :C

ERISOLSPRITE: ok wwell fuck u2 for tryiin ii gue22, havve fun gettiing traumatiized.

PFFFFDHF okay that was pretty funny

VRISKA: I'm not gonna get traumatized!

Lemme guess, smash cut to a dozen and change clicks from now: "...I got fucking traumatized."? X'D

Oh here we go:

{ENTER SCRATCH'S PARLOR}

OH HERE WE GO WITH SOME PROPERLY OMINOUS MUSIC. AND I LOVE THE TYPEWRITER SOUNDS AS HIS TEXT TYPES OUT AGAINST THE PURE BACKGROUND. THIS IS DONE SO GODDAMN WELL

(Even if I still think this music still doesn't measure up to original Homestuck tunes, it's still FITTING AND WORKS GREAT for the scene, and the style and art choices are top notch, especially the pure backgroundless white font.)

Yep Vriska, a "perfectly predictable inevitability", you should have seen this coming. Did you know you'd show up here, or did you not and he's rubbing it in your face? Cause I'd bet it's the latter.

It certainly has been a while, Vriska. You seem to have blossomed nicely.

CREEPY ABUSIVE UNCLE VIBES ALREADY REACHING CRITICAL LEVELS THREE CLICKS IN

Care for a piece of candy?

GOD DAMNIT

VRISKA: Oh fuck your stupid candy, you glo8e-headed little freak.

Congratulations Vriska, you've successfully lost 99% of your chill five seconds in, have fun getting traumatized

Doc hinting at the inevitability theme by saying he'd know for a fact she'd enjoy the candy.

Although it was less the wary hunch of a scared little girl than the delightful certainty that you'd come crawling back to me, sooner or later.

FUCK THIS IS JUST RAW ABUSIVE RELATIONSHIP WE ARE FULL NON-WATERED-DOWN EVERCLEAR HERE

Holy SHIT are they pulling out all the stops with his awful phrasing here, no wonder they put so big an emotional abuse trigger warning on this update on the twitter page. And it's only going to get worse.

Of course I know. I'm always watching you.

Fuck, this is just. Exposing levels of vulnerability and awful fear that Vriska had to contend with in her youth that we hadn't even PUT TOGETHER back then. Every veil of silliness has been ripped straight off to show the gory mess of how this would have psychologically affected her while she was younger, here. I used to hate the epilogues and early HS^2 a little for doing this so liberally, for making clear how RETROACTIVELY FUCKED things were in ways that made my heart ache without any balm or healing... but unlike those earlier glimpses into their past attitudes, THIS time we are fucking going to goddamn RESOLVE the psychological issues and get some clear closure on them. That's part of why the entire p666 Vriska Therapy Session / Hyperbolic Therapy Chamber is already quite nearly my favorite part of all Homestuck so far, and I DO mean ALL of Homestuck so far.

VRISKA: You know what? VRISKA: I've 8een pretty damn good. VRISKA: 8een losing track of the sweeps I've spent in here fixing pretty much everything other than the thing I actually came in here to fix, 8ut it's paying off! There's a convenient timer for the express purpose of tracking that.

Oh god don't show her. Don't make her worry about how much time she's losing in here or how much it might be reflecting out there.

VRISKA: Yeah, and I never look at it 8ecause it pisses me off!

Phew. At least she's had TIME to come to terms with worrying about it.

VRISKA: 8ut it's fine. VRISKA: It just means I've had a lot of time to think stuff over. VRISKA: Stuff that was holding me 8ack, throwing me off-course.

I get the feeling he's about to do a pretty good job trying to convince you that you can't escape this so easily. To throw the wrong sort of doubt at you about what exactly you're barreling towards. About who the real "YOU" is-- he's going to try and convince you you're the one who hurts people.

I like to think that I'm far and away the most prolific contributor to your baggage.

Fuck. This won't be good.

VRISKA: Man, I figured may8e this place was working up to something really intense, 8ut instead all I get is Glo8ehead the Gru8toucher playing puppetmaster again.

Eueuuugh that nickname D:

...Is Vriska shaking or laughing? I think she's shaking. D:

VRISKA: You fucked with a 8unch of little kids and 8lew up, then you LOST.

Lord English might have lost, but I don't feel quite like Doc Scratch really did. He pretty much gave his master the Paradox-Space-spanning story he wanted, from beginning to end.

VRISKA: You could 8arely handle me when I was six, I'm supposed to 8e scared of you NOW?

It doesn't matter that you're not six sweeps anymore, that's-- you're visibly shaking. This is a big fucking deal. This is digging into the creepiest and most disgusting parts of what was done to you.

Well, you're shaking.

There we have it.

...Vriska is pulling out the whole-ass PDF File word. I... I hope she's just trying to taunt him for manipulating children, here, and playing the uncle angle. He's not-- I mean nothing actually happened, right? Please tell me nothing physical actually fucking happened besides the cueball-explosion physical-abuse-ways, I don't want sexual abuse retconned into existence here...

Exquisite. I missed that fumbling braggadocio. It's heartening to know that this place hasn't cured you of it yet. It makes you so much fun to play with.

Yeah... the parts of Doc Scratch that Vriska is going to remember most clearly are the times where he was condescending in ways that denigrated her and confirmed her worst fears about herself, intentionally. :C

WHOA DID HE JUST SPACE SHRINK HER??? IS HE GONNA PUT HER ON THE TOY BATTLEFIELD?!

{o} ==>

Matching the scale and visuals of the situation to how she always felt. :C :C

And SICK that the music is breaking down, I'll freely give it credit for shifting to action mode.

Now then, why don't we have ourselves a little game?

Just like Dirk and Caliborn, and their union in Doc Scratch, always love to do to people.

FUCK he glitched away the "WHAT WILL YOU DO?" prompt. This is DEFINITELY about the Ultimate Riddle and Doc Scratch's ultimate lie that Vriska never had any autonomy, a lie he poisoned her with from an early age to make her even easier to manipulate both then and down the line.

DAMMIT, changing her clothes by force?! D: D: D: D:

FUCK FUCK FUCK NO THAT'S EVEN WORSE HE CHANGED HER INTO KID FORM HUGGING HERSELF FROM WHEN SHE WAS ABOUT TO BE INJURED THAT'S CREEPIER AND MORE AWFUL THAN I EVER EXPECTED NO WONDER THEY CONTENT WARNING'D THE FUCK OUT OF THIS, I'm going up there and putting some EXTRAS on there.

I don't have personal experience with this sort of abuse but I do have experience with some who HAVE and some who WORK therapeutically with those who have so this is playing out like a critical hit to triggers I can only empathize from a distance with and it's STILL getting almost too much already. Wow wow wow wow wow they didn't pull any punches.

Ah, and there she is. My favorite piece.

AAAAAA

Thief to E4; Thief takes Page.

That loud BLAM just then and the brown blood knocking her back along with her injuries, so pithy yet so HEAVY and with the meaty SFX to go with it, just, brutal, auughh.... Vriska's NOT getting out of this one lightly. She's not going to want to come back here. She's going to be too traumatized for a good while isn't she.

Thief to F5; Thief takes Maid.

Oh god I don't want to screenshot each of these...

Another meaty THUNK and some rust blood splashing her. God.

Thief to Z8; Thief takes Seer.

Even after all Terezi taunted her and so clearly loved being blind, she STILL hates herself for what she did to Terezi?? :'C

Her blood too D:

Z8 ISN'T EVEN A F8CKING P8SITION, YOU HACK!!!!!!!

She didn't even get the number of exclamation points right...

All the world's my board.

No Escape.

Thief to ∫40; Thief takes pawn.

Wait what, who?

Is that Gamzee's blood or Eridan's? She only killed Gamzee just recently in Candy... (Checks with digital color meter--) That's #680768 blood, which is closest to... Eridan's, huh, weird. Maybe Erisol will be able to help her with this later after she's run away. IF AND WHEN she can finally run away. It looks like he wants to reinforce the impression that he can make her kill ANY AND ALL of the people friends she knows, COULD have made her do it. That's horrible for her to think of herself.

Now Equius's blood. She's swearing but can't make it stop.

He even calls Kanaya (and her blood splash) nothing but her killing a pawn of his choosing.

Thief to Ω413; Thief takes pawn. Check.

This is one of the first reappearances I can remember of the arc number 413 since we started HS^2, I don't even recall it in the epilogues. What's in Check here, the kids' whole universe, the one the trolls created? Is he getting her to blame herself for that, too?

KARKAT'S BLOOD AUGH that's always tough to see whenever I have to see it, it just makes you want to protect him when you know you can't.

Vriska calling him a cheap fucking karma ghost, this a stupid fucking charade... won't stop the fact that this is real emotional pain she's feeling and real pain that was already inside her for nearly her whole life up until this vision brought it out into the open.

VRISKA: AND I'M NEVER GOING TO 8E CAUGHT UP IN YOUR FUCKING G8MES EVER AGAIN!!!!!!!!

Then why are you so afraid you will be?

Of course you will. You think you're better than me? Better than fate? Vriska, I am going to put you in situations where you have the potential to do terrible things. I am going to make things ugly. I am going to corner you. I am going to pressure you. And no matter how much "better" you claim to be, all I have to do is catch you at the wrong moment. You're one bad turn from burning all your quaint little progress to the ground. One lapse away from being mine again.

Yeah, these are ALL just more and more of her deepest fears about herself. That she can be made to kill again, so easily, no matter how far she thinks she's moved past it all. Until she internalizes the answer to the Ultimate Riddle and realizes she has the power to make the better choice-- to ALWAYS make the better choice, and he was just fooling her into thinking she never did-- how could she possibly escape this sort of trap? She can't, not yet. And that abusive cueball asshole INTENTIONALLY made sure she felt that way, because that's what kept her easy to control. Learned helplesness.

VRISKA: Get me out of here.

Fuck, she's so defeated... so helpless. Please, PLEASE let this work. Please make it so she CAN escape this memory RIGHT THE FUCK NOW and confront it later. Because I'm very afraid it won't.

VRISKA: I want a do-over. Oh, please. You of all people should know that you don't *get* do-overs. The rest of these frivolous little vision quests may feel like sparing you the effort of getting things right the first time around, but the real world doesn't work that way.

FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK THAT'S EVEN WORSE THAN I EXPECTED

No, you'll just have to endure it. This won't take long.

LET HER OUT YOU FUCK

You had a good run out there, flying solo and swashbuckling around as if Light itself were yours to command. It'd be wise to remember that it's a borrowed blessing. You flourish at its whim. Continue to spit in its face and take it for granted, and it will abandon you once again, perhaps for good.

Back to the ultimate riddle shit again. Doc Scratch conning her into thinking "everything you've achieved, I made for you, or you stole from others".

Being a true Thief of Light doesn't mean being at the whim of Light, at the mercy of what she can borrow. Kanaya tried to teach her back when she wanted her to clean her room that anybody can make their own luck.

Instead Doc Scratch is playing the role of Demiurge, standing in place of the Sun and claiming all Light radiates from him, when there was plenty inside her all along.

Do you remember who you were, before it chose you? The choices you made when luck wasn't on your side? You were such a delectable little victim.

Bluh!!!!!!

Poor Vriska, with her voracious lusus. With her demanding legacy and her uncooperative, fickle little friends. So much was out of your hands, then; how could you help but mbe my lovely assistant?

Doc Scratch inherited every last ounce of Equius's nonconsensual creep factor from Arquiusprite.

And this is going into the relationship between Light and Agency again, Void and the Lack of agency-- when Vriska felt trapped, felt she didn't have a choice, that was Void hemming her in, her "bad luck streak". Agency is your ability to choose what you do next, and so is Light. That's the privilege sometimes but not exclusively known as Luck.

Vriska: You didn't fucking own me.

Still so helpless-looking, but at least a bit of defiance in her expression. Which I expect handily crushed, unfortunately...

Exactly.

Fuck! And yeah, that's his point-- he's trying to say she CHOSE to do the wrong thing when the chips were down, which is what she's most afraid she'll do again.

But she needs to internalize the fact that it was a choice... that it HAD to be a choice... is an important flaw in the way he gaslit and conned her.

But what matters is that I might as well have. You let yourself believe you had no option other than to take me up on my hard bargains, again and again. For all your talk of independence, all your combative posturing and insistence on your own freedom, you barely bothered to put up any actual resistance to my suggestions. You took the easy way out, swearing all teh while it was your move. What a phenomenal waste of your considerable talents.

Her psyche is playing against her with the cards face up here... she just has to read them correctly. This is what she's afraid of, but it's also the flaw in his logic, the source of his power over her. The idea that she never possessed Ultimate Freedom, even though he's practically telling her that she DID, just to convince her she's an awful person.

It was an insult, and a warning. You're a trump card, Vriska, but your potency is a double-edged sword. One you've gotten far too comfortable swinging around, in the past. What do you intend to fix, when you leave this place? What, I wonder, will you break? I'd encourage you to be mindful of both. Of course, you could always cast aside those pesky trivialities and go with the flow, smashing through circumstances with nary a thought for the consequences. It'd be easier. We could dance together again, just like old times. You choose.

This isn't the real Doc Scratch-- this version of him IS, in its sick perverse way, still helping her. Still giving her the hints to realize that true balance between embracing your role and yielding agency to others is CRUCIAL to make sure you're doing your best to do the right thing. Which is especially difficult when your role, your best methodology, is that of an Agency Thief. A dangerous role which must be careful with its moves so as not to gluttonously trample over the wills of others who deserve a say.

But in order to choose, to take up the mantle of Ultimate Freedom, Vriska has to TRUST herself enough TO choose.

Trusting yourself enough to entrust yourself with CHOICE is one of the hardest decisions you can possibly make. Few ever truly make that decision.

What'll it be, Vriska? Player, or piece?

Well?

Thief to ∞108.

Whoa, what now? What the fuck is this going to be?

I look forward to finding out. Good luck.

Oh, so it's sending her back to the Plot Point. ∞108, or 8108. Is this the elusive arc number of one of our timelines, of Candy? One of infinite... or 1 and 0, creation and destruction, sandwiched between two 8s, two Vriskas with perpendicular orientations, Vriska and Vrissy? Hmm...

Oh thank fucking god we're back...

HAH

thanks so much I needed that mood lifter XD

{Level Complete!}

Thanks for ENDING it too, holy shit. I don't think I could have taken much longer of something THAT heavy tonight. Wow, that was masterfully done... not dragged out, just enough to get to the true point. To a setup for her decision, for her personal answer to the Ultimate Riddle.

Which makes plenty of sense why the NEXT section seems like it's likely a weird colorless version of one of Davepetasprite^2's feathers. They're the perfect person to talk to about her Soul/Heart, the greater self and the meaning of Ultimate Freedom, just as they hinted at during their last big talk in Homestuck.

--Yeah, she didn't get as much help from that as she would have wanted... and now the candle is ABSOLUTELY burning down.

The glimpse of the next unclaimed tiers, here... are these hinting at the start of the next section? We have her inhibitions bound, then a reference to a child development psychologist, then a somatic spark-- physical contact?! Then Deja Vu, a flash of the past (or possibly even meeting her GHOST self from the ghost rain, the more vulnerable (Vriska) inverted to Page of Void mode that she BERATED TO TEARS back toward the end of Homestuck to prove how much more (Vriska) had grown than Vriska before leaving her crying and for Ghost Terezi from the pre-retcon timeline to meet)... Heuristic Grace, getting her luck back possibly... burning, getting hotter, and then a transcendental gleam? No, no that's got to just be a candle and it burning out the rest of the singularity... I still don't think Ultimate Vriska is the solution to all this, could it be?

Oh shit, I forgot about how the BLACK CANDLE is burning down due to VRISKA'S blue flame.

Recall my proposals at the beginning of this post? I completely forgot about yet one more opportunity for her escape:

(4) That Vriska's Light has been burning away at the singularity of the Plot Point this entire time, and will naturally destroy it no matter what, especially if she embraces her Agency and her inner Light. The Green Sun was not just a symbol of Light but an ultimate manifestation of Space power... and collapsed into a singularity, it could indeed also have been not just a Void but an ultimate manifestation of Time power. The years, sweeps, that Vriska is spending inside of it could be wearing it away all on its own, rapidly exhausting a reservoir of Time that alt!Calliope preserved at the center of the singularity just to give the noncanon timeline more time to exist than it otherwise would have had?!! Instead, Vriska is burning it up, and the sprites and ghosts who fell into the Black Hole during the Ghost Rain and concentrated themselves in this singularity are helping her use that naturally limited Time to arm herself and become the best version of herself she can be, so when the Plot Point collapses and shit really starts hitting the fan for the Candy timeline, they can execute a NEW plan to breach into the Canon/Meat timeline and do something so incredibly important that it reseats the timelines outside Paradox Space in new relevance stolen out from Canon. Something incredibly important, like unexpectedly facilitating Sburb's creation in what Dirk and Rosebot are trying to do, or sendificating the kids the final frog they used to create this Universe, or something, which came from somewhere we've still never resolved...

So many interesting possibilities here. And only two or three more updates until we'll know for sure what and how!

I'll probably continue to be too busy the next week or two to be in the mood to chew through bonus material or commentary. Talk to you next upd8 instead, most likely! :D

[descendant-of-truth]

Rise of Lyric has by far some of the most consistently expressive character animation of any 3D Sonic game ever, and frankly I think Frontiers should be embarrassed that it isn't at minimum on the same level as it, if not better.

Because here's the thing: RoL still looks awkward at times. Mouth shapes can feel a little weird, the eyebrows don't always seem to know what they're supposed to be doing, little things that give off the impression that it wasn't quite as polished as it wanted to be. But it's still LEAGUES above Frontiers, even with the progress it's made over other mainline games.

And look, I really can't claim to know how the models they're using work because I don't have the ability to mess around with them myself, but at this point I'm starting to wonder if they're just... not particularly stretchy by nature?? Because I can't imagine any other reason for them to be so stiff even when the animators are doing their best.

To prove my point, let's compare a very similar expression and pose of Sonic's from Frontiers and RoL respectively.

In both of these scenes, Sonic is expressing determination to fight in order to save his friends. In Frontiers, this is from the Final Horizon update, right after Amy, Tails, and Knuckles sacrificed their corporeal forms in order to bring Sonic back from corruption. Sonic is currently feeling the weight of that sacrifice full-force, lamenting that they gave up their chance at freedom for him, and uses that pain to push himself forward to really save them this time.

In Rise of Lyric, Sonic is staring down a robot army led by Metal Sonic as the door in front of them closes. He's already ushered Amy, Tails, and Knuckles behind him into a suspicious temple of sorts, but he's prepared to fight in case it doesn't close fast enough. He was told twice not to open the door in the first place, but he was concerned for his friends, and decided to prioritize protecting them over their own desires to keep fighting.

With such similar framing, it's hard not to see how Frontiers' expressions fall short. Both Sonics have their eyes narrowed, the bridge of their eyebrows scrunched down to separate them into two distinct shapes, and they're holding their fists up. But in Frontiers, it's not very clear what emotions he's feeling just by looking at him. Sure, he looks kinda determined if you squint, but at a glance, he looks almost more neutral than anything.

And it just gets worse the more you think about it because by all accounts, he should be having a MORE intense expression than the one in Rise of Lyric! I mean come on, the guy practically died five minutes ago and is gearing himself up for another round of Titan fights. He should be looking exhausted and utterly spent but like he's still gonna keep going somehow.

It got to the point where, halfway through writing this, I decided that it wasn't enough to just talk about what his expression should have looked like, and that I was going to put my money where my mouth was and redraw it myself.

I scrunched his eyes and brows down closer to how they are in the Boom screenshot for the determined look, made him look upwards with his irises instead of staring blankly ahead, and pulled up his lower eyelids to add an edge of desperation to him.

I kept his mouth in the same position, but tried to make it look a little more... angry? by curling it up on one side and showcasing his top teeth more. Finally, I changed the position of his body and arms a bit, to make it look like his whole body was tensing up along with his face.

These are all Extremely Doable in 3D animation - the only part I'm uncertain of is the mouth, since I tend to draw mouths with a very 2D mindset. But on principle, it should not be hard to shape his eyes to match his emotions. That is the absolute bare minimum of what you want your character models to be capable of in a professional setting.

And it's driving me nuts that Frontiers, savior of the Sonic games' credibility among the masses, is still being outclassed by what's considered the "second 06" of the franchise. What is happening over there that this keeps being a problem

[crowbotss]

I forget if I already sent this ask or not but do you have a favorite Transformers dynamic between characters that you wish showed up more often in canon and/or in the fandom?

Hello anon! No, I do not recall getting any asks of the sort before, but thank you for asking nonetheless.

As for your question, I've two dynamics I absolutely crave, in fanon and canon. Number one of all time is my darling little shitstarter lambo twins!

First of all, why is it the case that, ever since the g1 cartoon and the comics, has Sunstreaker been completely left out of most canon transformer media? Sideswipe's popped up a good few times since (Armada, RiD2015, Bay movies), but they always leave Sunny out of it for whatever reason. They're a set and shouldn't be seperated :<

Maybe I'm biased because I'm a twin and a giant Sunstreaker fan, but I really wish hasbro would pick their whole dynamic back up in some mainline property (I don't even care if they're side characters, I'm desperate). They've charmed me ever since I watched the g1 cartoon, and I've always get so disappointed whenever I see Sideswipe somewhere without his brother (they don't even elude to him being somewhere off-screen or anything, he simply doesn't exist!).

As for fanon Sunny and Sides, I'm glad that fandom picks up some slack from all the lack of Sunnys, but I also feel like we could do with more Sunny&Sides-centric fanfics that aren't, ah, incest porn. Also, the commonly-referenced 'twin-bond' is very very interesting, along with their general backstory as gladiators in Kaon like Megatron. Combined with the mild consensus among fans that Sunstreaker and Sideswipe are some of the youngest Autobots, I feel like there's just so much you can do with these characters--but unfortunately, since they hardly show up in any official properties anymore, they aren't the most popular subject of fan-content.

EHEM, enough about my favorite condement-colored duo, my second pick for my favorite underrated dynamic is Starscream and Sunstorm.

I would love more of Sunstorm and. . . well, anyone (hasbro has a habit of fridging any gold-colored character that isn't Bumblebee, I assume), but I think his dynamic with Starscream would be the most interesting.

In most continuites he's in, he's a clone of Starscream, but also happens to act nothing like him most of the time (prolly due to a combination of being raised in a tube and subsisting himself primarily on religious delusions). Throw in an 'unwilling cloning experiment' spin on Starscream's part and I feel like we've got the ingredients for the world's most interesting family(ish) dynamic.

For this to even have a chance of coming to pass in canon though, hasbro would have to let Sunstorm out of the basement they locked him in and they'd have to let Starscream get within 100 feet of an interesting character arc, so chances are slim.

Fanon, however. . . the scant few media I can find focusing on Starscream and Sunstorm are always superb, but just like with Sunstreaker, I feel like there's always so little content with Sunstorm in it simply because people forget he exists, which is a shame. I love my strange radioactive catholic son.

Anyways, done rambling! Hope this answered your question fine enough.

Some underrated dynamic honorable mentions: Starscream & Optimus/Orion (In my heart of hearts I cannot let Starop go), Starscream & Prowl (I've read two [count em, two] very good fics with Prowl&Starscream interactions and they haven't left my brain since), and the Aerialbots & Stunticons (more media should focus on the fact that they're all newbuilds, for humor and/or angst purposes).

[joezworld]

Christmas Story

This chapter has aged me considerably, because today is my birthday. That's how this works, right?

The next morning bloomed cold and crisp. The temperatures had dropped to almost freezing, and while it seemed like a welcome change, to ring in the cold seasonal time of the year, nobody seemed that thrilled about it…

“It’s not even snowing!” Duck harrumphed to Oliver as they organized their coaches. “How can it be this cold and not snow?”

“I dunno.” Oliver replied, his mind far away from anything his friend was really saying. He was still mulling over yesterday. Truro really had started to call Bear a “brute”, before Oliver had accidentally cut him off. That was… well it wasn’t just out of character, but it was against type. He might not have believed Truro to be the source of all joy in the world like Duck did, but any Westerner could tell you with great reliability that Truro really was the Greatest of the Great Westerners. For him to even speak ill of Bear implied that he felt very poorly about the diesel, and, well, Oliver might believe in Truro, but he knew Bear.

“I just can’t believe he’s doing our shunting work!” Duck gushed, bringing Oliver back to reality. 

Truro had grown very bored, as his mainline running restriction had forced him to only run on the peak services when Bear was available. Last night, he’d offered to shunt the trucks in the yard, just to give himself something to do. Oliver had been pleasantly surprised to see a tender engine willing to shunt, and since they kept the yard organized in the traditional Great Western Style, it was no paint off his buffers who did the organizing. 

One need not guess how Duck felt on the matter. Truro could have offered to sort the trucks by colour and he would’ve agreed wholeheartedly. 

“Oliver, you there?” Duck asked, and Oliver realized he hadn’t actually said anything. “What? Oh, yes, how magnanimous of him.” 

Duck frowned, an uncommon expression for the past few weeks. “You alright?” 

“Yes, of course.” He lied. “I just didn’t rest very well. I’ll be fine once I wake up.”

Duck didn’t examine this too closely, and rolled away to the platforms with Alice and Mirabel. 

Oliver remained conflicted.

-

Later in the morning, Oliver was on his way to the big station with his first train of the day. There had been some delay setting out from the station, as a wagon Truro was shunting had derailed inside the station throat, but after only a few minutes delay, the wagon had been levered back onto the rails, and Oliver left. 

On the line north of Haultraugh, the line ran near the sea. It didn’t go along the shoreline, but it was close enough that passengers could see the beach from the train. This had proved to be a somewhat effective marketing tactic for that particular stretch of beach, and many years ago the railway had begun allowing for “request stops”, where passengers could ask for the train to let them off near the shore. This was quite popular in the summer - a few vacation cottages had even been built - but people usually stopped asking by October. In December, it was virtually unheard of, unless someone was staying at a cottage for the holidays. 

With this in mind, Oliver was quite surprised to find the train slowing down as they neared the general area of the cottages. “Is there someone staying at the cottages?” He asked Isobel, who was in front. “Surely not now!”

“Hold on,” She replied, sounding confused. “But you were the one who said we have to stop here!” 

“What? No I didn’t!”

“Yes you did!” She retorted. “Stationmaster said that someone had mentioned it to you yesterday.” 

“Not at all!” Oliver was now thoroughly confused, but by this point the train had come to a complete stop. 

“Right,” The guard now interjected himself into the nonsense, by opening up Isobel’s back window and speaking to Oliver directly. “Where are these people? Nobody in here needs to get out.” 

“I didn’t say anything to anyone!” Oliver was baffled. “Why wouldn’t I have said something before now?”

“Hmm,” Dulcie murmured from behind him. “You’d think that they’d have spoken to the guard or someone. I mean, how could they know that Ollie was even going to be the one taking the train? Could’ve been Duckie this morn’ or maybe Bear and Truro?”

That gave everyone pause. “Y’know, that’s pro’lly the right answer,” The guard said after a moment of chin stroking. “They might’ve taken the first train of the day.” 

“So then we stopped here for nothing?” Oliver was just starting to understand what had happened. 

“Yeah, but it happens.” Shrugged the guard. 

“Hey! Hey! Wait!” A voice called out, and everyone turned to look towards the beach. A man and a woman were scrambling up the beach towards the train. “Don’t leave yet!”

Oliver was speechless, and waited in silence as the couple ran up to the train. “Damn cottage doesn’t have a clock!” The man said as he got closer to the train. “I didn’t think you’d be here!”

“Are you staying at the cottages here?” The guard asked, pulling open Isobel’s door and extending the steps. 

“Yeah! It’s cheap in the off-season.” the man replied, ignoring his wife’s eye roll. 

“I’d imagine so!” The guard chuckled, as he sold them a pair of tickets to the big station. “And you two are very lucky you said something to the stationmaster yesterday, or we’d have kept right on going!” 

“What?” The man blinked. 

His wife grimaced. “We’re not big on advance planning.”

“Then you didn’t speak to the stationmaster at Arlesburgh?” The conductor sounded more confused than ever. 

“No! We’re from Tidmouth!”

Oliver, Isobel, and Dulcie marveled. “Then who were we supposed to stop for?”

“Nobody, I think?”

Shortly thereafter, the guard decided that they’d waited enough, and the train set off again. They all remained thoroughly confused, all the way to the big station. 

--

Later

Around mid-day, passenger traffic had died down, and Duck was able to handle the trains on his own for a few hours. Oliver was therefore tasked with a short goods train, going from Arlesburgh up to the big station. The train was mostly hopper wagons and flatbeds, carrying goods from the small harbor at Arlesburgh, but a few wagons on the end were empty, waiting to be loaded with cargo from the station at Haultraugh. (The island still did brisk business on short-haul freight, unlike the mainland, something the engines and Fat Controller were proud of.)

Truro had arranged the trucks earlier in the day, before retiring to the sheds to get cleaned and polished before his peak hour trains, so Oliver only had to connect to the train, pull a vacuum in the brakes, and leave once the signal dropped.

“Excuse me, Oliver.” The lead truck quietly said as they left the yard. Ever since his “run-in” with Scruffey, the engines and trucks of the Little Western were on much more amicable terms, and as the 1980s had ground on, some trucks had even begun to give Oliver a grudging amount of respect. “I have a question.”

“Yeah?”

“What’re ‘Crickets and Melons,’ and why would someone call us them?”

Oliver stopped to consider that for a moment, before he burst out laughing. “Ha! My goodness, who called you that?” 

The trucks chattered with irritation. 

“I told ya it was rude!”

“‘Ow can we know it’s rude iff’n he’s not said what it means yet?”

“‘O course it’s rude! Can’t ye tell it’s supposed to be an insult?”

“Mighty poor insult if none of us know what the blazes it means…”

“Ah shaddup. You got bent out o’ shape, didn’t ye?”

“So what’s it mean, Oliver?”

Oliver composed himself. “It’s an old term from the Great Western. Back in the day every kind of truck and coach had its own code name for the telegram. Melons were third class brake carriages, and Crickets were bogie coaches.”

“So what’s that got to do wit’ us?” A voice piped up from further down the train. 

“Trucks used to call each other that because they thought coaches were sensitive and soft, so if they acted sensitive they were being Crickets and Melons.” He paused for a moment. “I will admit, I don’t quite “get” that, being an engine and all, but I suppose it must mean something to you lot.”

It did, and the trucks grumbled to themselves angrily. 

“The nerve!”

“The bearings…”

“To say such things to us.”

“And not tell us what it meant!”

“We could have been using that all morning!”

Oliver rolled his eyes. “Who even told you that?” 

“We don’t know!” Piped up a flatbed from further back in the train. “It’s been bouncing around the yard all day.”

“Somebody said that you were calling us that, but that’s cobblers.” one of the hoppers chimed in. “Why would you tell us what it meant?”

“And when would he have the time?” Toad the brakevan, riding all the way in the back of the train, added. “He’s been running his wheels off since before Truro got here.”

Oliver blew off steam contemplatively. “Search me. I certainly wouldn’t have called you lot that, not unless I’d gone soft in the smokebox first. It’s not 1950 anymore - we’ve invented better insults!”

Everyone got a merry laugh out of that, and the train continued to Haultraugh without incident. 

-

The cargo in Haultraugh was a consignment of fabric bound for Barrow-in-Furness, and while the porters busily loaded one of the empty vans, the stationmaster and the guard conferred with Oliver and his driver. 

“Why’ve you got another van?” the stationmaster pointed down the train. 

“Another?” The driver’s brow furrowed.

“Yeah. We only requested one, and you’ve brought us two.”

“Is there some kind of mistake?” Oliver asked, not used to the idea of having too many trucks. 

“No…” Said the guard, paging through his manifest. “We’re only supposed to have nine. That last one is an extra.”

-

“Look,” The van said when he was questioned by the train crew. “I haven’t a bit of input where I go. Wherever the green engines put me, that’s where I end up.”

“Did anyone say anything to you?” The guard asked.

“Nope.” The van looked uncomfortable from the attention he was getting. “To be quite honest, I’m surprised you wanted me. I thought us unfitted trucks weren’t allowed on fitted trains.”

Everyone looked down at the coupling, and sure enough, the van in front had an air brake hose, while this extra van did not. 

“Excuse me sirs,” Toad said. “But I did question Mister Truro when he assembled this train, and he said that Mister Oliver needed two vans. I’m only present because this is a partially fitted train, and I’m sorry to say that I should have questioned further to see if there was another fitted truck available.”

The guard and driver comforted him. “It’s not your fault, Toad.”

-

“Well bless my boiler!” Oliver exclaimed when the crew returned to the front of the train. “Is there anything else I’ve ordered done? Am I to take the Flying Kipper next? Or the express?”

The driver rubbed his head in confusion. “I don’t know, Oliver. There’s got to be something - or someone behind this, but I’ll be damned if I know what.”

“Maybe there’s someone new on the station staff whose name is Oliver!” The guard joked, and then grew quite concerned when everyone else started giving it a bit of thought. 

Even the trucks were starting to get involved. “Maybe it was one of us, playing games.” The lead hopper said with uncharacteristic seriousness. “We get so many in from beyond the big station - even the mainland - and sometimes they just don’t know the right way to act.”

“Mercy’s sake,” blasphemed the Guard. “Even the trucks are getting serious.”

Oliver’s driver didn’t say anything, but hoped against hope that nothing new would happen once they got the clear signal… which should be any time, really. “It’s a Christmas miracle. Where is the next train? Surely they should be here by now.”

A short radio call revealed that one of Donald’s stone trucks had developed a hot axlebox, and they were on their way after mending it. 

Presently, a plume of smoke appeared over the horizon, and Donald lumbered into view, two dozen empty stone hoppers clattering behind him. Already late, and trying to gingerly keep the damaged truck upright and on the rails, he wheeshed to a stop at the end of the platform. His crew hopped out, and began inspecting the axle on the truck that had overheated. Oliver’s trucks, being the kind and gentle souls that they were, immediately began calling the hoppers Crickets and Melons. 

Oliver sighed deeply. Donald’s trucks did not fit inside the passing loop, and he was stuck there until they left.

Explanations and insults flew back and forth until both lines of trucks were cackling with laughter, and ten minutes passed before Donald’s guard deemed the train safe to depart. Eagerly, Oliver’s driver advanced the train right up to the edge of the signal, waiting for the arm to drop, but as Donald’s train rolled away, the signal stayed up. “Oh what now?!”

“Sorry!” The signalman called from his box. “Duck is on his way down. You’re just going to have to wait.”

Everyone sighed, and silence fell over the station for just a moment. “Excuse me, Mister Oliver?” 

“Yes Toad?” 

“In the future, can we please note that ten wagons, an engine, and a van is the maximum length a train can be in this siding?” Toad sounded more than a little frightened. “If you hadn’t pulled up to the signal, Mister Donald would have taken my buffers off when he passed us.”

“Sorry!” Oliver called, glad that nothing had actually occurred - that would have been all they needed!

-

It took another ten minutes for Duck’s train to come into view. 

“You’re running behind, aren’t you?” He asked as he pulled in. 

“Tell me about it.” Oliver scoffed. “Hey, do me a favour and keep your ears open. Someone is telling lies and insults in the yard.”

“Really?” 

“Yeah.” The signal dropped. “Haven’t time to explain, but this has been a strange day!” 

Oliver puffed out of the station, leaving a confused Duck behind him. 

-

The train finally arrived at the big station almost an hour late. Oliver shunted the train into the freight platforms. Almost before they could get uncoupled, the railfreight manager came out to see him. “That van on the end, is it empty? I heard it was.” 

“Yes, it is, actually.” Oliver’s driver began. “Just a-”

“Minor miracle, that’s what it is.” The man cut him off. “Get to platform three for a pickup.”

Oliver blinked as the man retreated into his office, before running around the train and getting Toad and the empty van. “Guess you’re going back with us.” He said as he moved them to platform three. 

Platform three was one of the platforms that main line trains used, and so Oliver ended up stopping right next to Gordon and the midday express. 

“Well this is a surprise…” Gordon said. “What are you doing here?” 

“Your guess is as good as mine.” Oliver said. “There’s something being loaded here.”

“Here?” Gordon’s eyebrow raised. “Well, I suppose there’s a first time for everything.”

After another minute or so, a group of porters arrived, pushing a load of furniture on a luggage trolley. “Someone’s Christmas shopping got the better of them!” They chortled. “They thought they could take this on Duck’s train!”

Oliver raised an eyebrow, but Gordon outright snorted at that. 

After a few minutes, the furniture had been loaded and strapped down, and Oliver’s guard went off to get the paperwork.

As he left, the sound of tuning instruments started up. 

“Oh,” Gordon said through gritted teeth, and the most pained smile Oliver had ever seen. “Goody. The band is starting.” 

There was a brass section now. They had a tuba.

You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch,

You really are a heel!

Gordon looked like he was going to burst into tears.

You're as cuddly as a cactus,

You're as charming as an eel, Mr. Grinch.

Oliver read him like a book. “Gordon,” He whispered. “I won’t tell Truro that you hate this as much as he does if you don’t want me to.” Gordon’s faux smile collapsed like a building demolition. “Thank you!”

[kinopioa]

It's funny how these are technically 3 different chars

But due to sheer publicity of the latter 2 and bias, no one cares!

Let's elaborate

Rise of Lyric

RoL Shadow is a dick. However his main reason for fighting Sonic is entirely due to him fucking up in releasing Lyric. Unfortunately this is poorly explained, and most only saw the boss fight, so many assume he was just a bully for no reason

Post Final boss however

The teamwork dissing is important, I'll explain

In John Melchior's draft, the game was apparently meant to be more serious, but late dev Sonic Boom's brand was suddenly meant to be a comedy, so another writer took over to insert comedic elements along with prioritizing the *teamwork* gimmick. Whether Shadow was initially planned or not is debateable, but his dissing on it seems to have been the aftermath of this gameplay focus. It's also important to note that Shadow's origin is straight up not mentioned, and he's treated as a familiar

Shattered Crystal was made likely after this shift, hence

Shattered Crystal

So taking place in its own continuity, Shattered Crystal features Lyric wanting to use Amy's archeological knowledge to access ancient tech. Shadow is captured off screen and used as a pawn

When freed, he's confused and aggravated, especially upon finding that he was mind controlled. He however has no true hostility to Sonic unlike RoL, though mad dashes off to find the snake. Lyric in the end after the boss fight is taken out by him, then we get Stixk's crack teamwork speech

Again, Shadow specifies he's a loner, and weirdly states he's superior, but just leaves harmlessly

Meh attitude, though better than RoL in execution. This was written by Warren Graff, Ken Pontac, Tin Guerrero, interesting as it means they were aware of the brand distinction given differences to mainline

Meanwhile the TV Show

TV

Everyone knows of his infamous S1 finale apparence with him coming in on Eggman's villain council, calling them shit and leaving, then aggressively targeting Sonic and beating him up, says the fucking "shame to hedgehogkind" after breaking an IKEA cabinet entirely cuz...

He's evil

Why??? I really don't know

Season 2 is even dumber, you straight up have him want to nuke the entire universe. Again, villainous for no fucking reason

Even for Boom standards this is beyond stupid. He's an anti hero in SC, and nowhere purposefully destructive in RoL

People learned later about mandates from Sega, though it's important to note 2 things

-Shadow being an edgelord is entirely the writer's idea

-Sega barely wanted to use him in general for Boom TV

I can't stress this, for as much as fans pushed the "Sega wants bootleg Vegeta" narrative, nowhere do either writers say they were forced to. It was just them taking cynical piss at the "no jokes" mandate that clearly wasn't hard pressed given what happened, and did the surface level comparison that was common in the early 2000s. For as limiting as he was, they clearly did whatever the fuck they wanted given how much this contrasts with both Boom games

Ffs, they could've just had him petty at Sonic for taking the last burger at meh burger as a concept, there's a better way to have him be a dick

I'm honestly curious if his backstory would've ever been revealed in a later Boom game (hence the show being explicitly barred from making their own), but as we know, Boom was discontinued around 2016 game wise, and the show ended 2017

[summerroseart]

Do you have any ideas about sonic boom childhood?

Okay, sO

I ABSOLUTLY do. I'm incredibly unwell about them. I'm like this constantly ⬇

I'm SO sorry this took so long for me to answer. My brain is a nightmare land, where there is no passage of time, and consistency and organization are nonexistent; but I finally got something that makes a bit of narrative sense down in docs.

I'm gonna put it under a cut, though, because it's pretty long. Enjoy my over 2k words of vaguely plot-shaped ramblings <3

Now, first off... You probably had something specific in mind when you asked, but I wasn't entirely sure if you meant backstories in my Paradise Lost AU, or just in Boom.

I'm gonna go with the latter, (the characters' childhoods in Sonic Boom) because it's… A bit simpler.

I pretty much have two parallel AUs: my general 'Boom is the Sequel to Underground' worldbuilding, which has backstories for the main Boom timeline, (what I'll be going into here); and PL, which takes place after the events of Sonic Boom, but in which most of Sonic Underground is not canon. The plot of Paradise Lost is based on Aleena not listening to the prophecy, and so the forewarned 'deadly fate' comes to fruition. (A lot of things are consistent across both stories, though, so Paradise Lost is… An AU of this AU. Sorta.)

Now, For Sonic Boom as it's own thing, I do think it's fine to leave it ambiguous, and consistent with what's established in the general Sonic canon, and to think of it as taking place a few years after the mainline games, or just letting it be what it is, because it's Very hard to tie it to anything else.

But! There's also a lot of really weird one-liners and episodes that made me think WAY too hard about the possible world building; and somehow, Sonic Underground fits really well into the vague narrative that exists in Boom. And so that's where my AU headcanons come in. :D

Anyway.

In this one, the events of Sonic Underground are pretty much all still canon. There are a few things I'd retcon (mostly just Angel Island lore– see Knuckles' section), but for the most part, it would stay as-is. Tragic Character Backstories™ for the triplets, as explained in Origins episodes, are also still the same.

After the single season of Underground that we got, I'd like to think there would still be a lot of wild-goose-chase scenarios, but a few plot-heavy ones as well.

Early on, I have the (altered) SA2 storyline. Sonic, Sonia, and Manic are all still somewhat inexperienced heroes (in comparison to Sonic in-game). There are no active Chaos Emeralds, so the crystal they're trying to prevent Robotnik from using to power the ARK, is a shard of the Master Emerald. The triplets use their music to inspire Shadow to help them redirect the ARK's crash-course for the planet, and then things go wrong, with Shadow plummeting to earth and losing his memories, while the triplets think he dies. None of them are really sure they consider it a win.

They meet Tails not too long after that, on a routine mission to Westside Island. He had been abandoned as a baby and was raised by flickies in the woods. Sonic rescued him from some bullies, and he helped Manic to fix their van after it had broken down. After growing attached, the boys convinced Sonia to let him tag along, (she gave in because he was adorable and she didn't want him to be left alone out in the forest anymore).

Even though he's brilliant, and they love having him around, they get worried about his safety after getting caught up in a few battles with SWATbots and Sleet and Dingo, (especially after what happened on the ARK) and soon decide to bring him to Sanctuary.

Tails decides he's going to prove that he can keep up with them, and ditches Sanctuary to try and infiltrate a Robotnik base. He gets caught, and the triplets have to go and save him, but he still manages to copy a bunch of plans and files onto a hard drive, and bring it back to the Resistance. The triplets reassure him that they were just trying to look out for him, and keep him safe, but ultimately they cave and let him stick with them.

As far as Eggman goes, he's a modified clone of Robotnik; created to act as an heir to his empire (in the same vein as Robotnik Jr. from AoSTH). He briefly teams up with the Freedom Fighters and helps take down Robotnik.

I'm bad at conceptualizing battles RIP but after all's said and done, Aleena reclaims the throne; Sonic, Sonia, and Manic are declared her heirs; Tails and Knuckles are honorarily knighted for their efforts, and things are on their way to officiate the Council of Four.

After all that, Knuckles returns to Angel Island, and Tails was offered a place in the palace, helping with tech and security and such.

Unfortunately for Sonic, he quickly begins to realize that this Council of Four "destiny" really isn't what he wants in life, and he doesn't think he's suited to run a kingdom. In the spur-of-the-moment decision after an argument with Sonia and Manic, he chooses to leave. Tails offers to go with him, and they steal a small fighter jet from the palace hangar and take off, with the intent to have as many adventures as possible, and learn about all that the world has to offer, before Sonic's family inevitably drags him back to Mobodoon. (They have to catch him first).

They eventually find out Eggman (who doesn't really know what to do with himself anymore because his whole purpose was to take over Robotnik's empire) is beginning to walk in Robotnik’s footsteps… Sorta. The siblings had encouraged him to follow his dreams, and make his own path in life. So, Eggman decided that what he really wanted was to build a theme park in his own image, but he goes about it in like,,, the worst way possible (If he somehow achieves world domination along the way then it's a win-win). So Sonic shows up whenever he starts wreaking complete havoc. (Which happens regularly.)

Sonic also eventually finds out Shadow is alive, but doesn't remember who he is, and he once again finds Sonic completely insufferable. So, thanks to Shadow's very thin patience, they tend to either beat each other up, or ignore each other. Sonic sort of tries to be his friend, since he knows Shadow has the potential for good, but they don't resolve their issues before the events of Boom.

Knuckles' backstory is pretty standard. He still grew up alone on Angel Island, but the differences lie in the lore of the Chaos Emeralds and Master Emerald.

The Chaos Emeralds are in stasis– think the Special Zones in the early games or like… smth like how they were kept on the Starfall Islands in Frontiers. None of the characters have access to them (yet)

The Master Emerald was shattered by the Guardian Priestess in order to keep it out of Robotnik’s hands, leaving Angel Island to fall into the ocean. The pieces were scattered, but the shards still hold a lot of power. However, because they're broken, they're incredibly unstable. Knuckles only ever found a few pieces, and just thought they were the Chaos Emeralds.

He has an extremely poor memory thanks to a head injury he received during the fight for the master emerald (he was only like 4 or smth), paired with the trauma of losing his entire tribe. He hardly remembers any of it by the time he meets the triplets. What he does know, is that he's the guardian of the island, and that he's supposed to protect the 'chaos emerald', and outsiders are bad news.

He mostly stayed away from the temples, after everyone had been killed, preferring to keep to the older city ruins, taking care of chao and his pet salamander*, and sticking to his routines, when he hasn't been called on to help the triplets.

*I've decided that Chomps, his "dinosaur" (salamander) is actually the same species as the one used to create the Bio Lizard

I'm retconning Althair being a living character because I said so. He should've been a spirit– or even better, Tikal.

Amy, I headcanon as Knuckles' sister. (I don't think it'll ever be canon, but I like having fun with the concept). They were separated as children, with Amy being taken to Mobius as a baby in order to protect her, and they don't know they're related.

- Amy is a hybrid, while Knuckles is fully Echidna. She was documented as a hedgehog because those traits were a lot more prominent when she was a baby. (General hc that mobian children tend to take after one parent species or the other, and hybrids are comparatively rare. They're often still documented as one species or the other because it's not always obvious at first or it's 'easier.' Blended species families tend to have actual last names instead of their species for consistency*.)

*I have more headcanons about naming conventions, too, but this is getting tangential <3

Their mom was a Priestess for the Master Emerald, similar to Tikal. Both Amy and Knuckles inherited her strength, though Amy's clairvoyance would end up being stronger. She was blessed by the Fates of Chaos (thing I made up) as an infant, and gifted her hammer for protection and deliverance of justice, and her fortune cards to help guide her. When the war started, Robotnik aimed to go after anyone with oracular abilities, in order to absolve himself of any possible "fated" loss. (He was unsuccessful in defeating the Oracle of Delphius).

In order to protect her, Amy's mother had her father take her back to Mobius, where she could be hidden from Robotnik under the guise of being a hedgehog.

Her father was never super hands-on, tending to leave her alone for long periods of time as he went out to aid the Freedom Fighters. Amy started visiting Vanilla when she was six, not too long after Cream was born, because she needed to borrow some vegetables, and the nice-looking lady down the road had a pretty garden.

Her dad stopped coming back when she was eight (he was caught by Robotnik and roboticized). She knew that he would stop coming home eventually– her cards had told her as much– but it was still hard to understand. She spent a lot more time with Vanilla after that, but still grew to be extremely independent.

After the war ended, Amy began helping Vanilla's friend, Vector, and his detective agency with finding people's missing family members. She would sometimes use her cards on particularly difficult cases, and in her off time, would regularly play matchmaker for Vector and Vanilla.

On her thirteenth birthday, she went to Little Planet, following her cards in search of her own destiny. Unfortunately, this was at the same time that Eggman decided it would be the perfect place to put a theme park, and so she got caught up in the crossfire of his and Sonic's ensuing battle.

She fell for Sonic pretty much immediately. He was cute, and witty, and strong, and basically the epitome of a teen hero. But he was also extremely arrogant and egotistical. Tails, she found, was pretty much Sonic's yes-man. Sonic never put him down, or anything, and obviously loved the kid a lot; but he tended to follow Sonic's lead, and both of them were fairly brash and dismissive towards her– Something she really wasn't a fan of. She still flirted with Sonic quite a bit, but her short temper meant that they end up butting heads even more.

They ultimately parted ways, though she still felt somewhat drawn to Sonic; and she was still hopeful that they could become friends. They bumped into each other a few more times after that, but they didn't stick together as an official team, until the Rise of Lyric incident.

Craving adventure, and fascinated by Little Planet and the ruins that were there before Eggman got to it, is what inspired her to pursue archeology, and anthropology.

Amy and Knuckles officially met each other for the first time on Angel Island. Amy was there on an archeological expedition, interning with Cliff, and they were exploring the ruins there. Knuckles decided to follow them around to prevent them from causing any trouble, or disturbing any remains. They spent the entire time squabbling over the 'correct' way to do things, until Cliff reassured them both that they would respect Knuckles' culture and wishes, even if that meant leaving the island altogether.

While they were there, Eggman targeted Angel Island as another Potential Theme Park Location, and Amy and Knuckles had to team up to stop him. At the end of it all, Amy invites Knuckles to go back to Seaside with her. He accepts, ultimately tired of the isolation, and figures he can be a treasure hunter like her. (The explanation that treasure hunting was a completely different thing went right over his head.)

Sticks was raised by her great aunt, who took her in after her parents died. (Mentioned offhandedly in Closed Door Policy as the one who gave her the beehive. I've decided her name was Honey, because puns.)

Honey had gone completely off-grid during the war, and taught Sticks most of her survival skills. She kept up with what was going on via newspaper, and didn't throw much of anything away because it could be useful. The paranoia, delusions, and auditory hallucinations were genetic, which contributed to both Sticks' and Honey's isolation.

Honey died of an illness when Sticks was about seven, and she was on her own after that. She rarely went into the village during the day unless it was for something she needed, or if she got lonely, but she still never really interacted with anyone. It was the villagers that regularly called her a feral, and most of them went out of their way to avoid her.

So, she had a lot of time to herself, and mostly spent it making complex traps and defense systems, or wandering around the island; having to figure out how to get herself out of countless dangerous situations on her own.

She was twelve when the others arrived on the island, and Knuckles got caught in one of her traps while exploring the jungle, and when she finally let him down, he brought her back to officially meet the others. They thought she was a little strange, but so were the rest of them. She was nice enough. She joined their team after an Eggman attack where they found she could hold her own really well against his bots, while keeping up with the rest of them.

A few other little things:

The brown scarf Sonic wears was a gift from Tails, as an easy way to hide his medallion, so they wouldn't get caught. The only reason it's brown, is because Tails is colorblind and thought it matched Sonic's red shoes. (Sonic didn't correct him.)

---

Tails' goggles in Boom are made from polarized red glass, because the tint helps to enhance the differences between red and green. He wears them when flying his plane, or engineering, in order to quickly read light signals and differentiate wiring colors.

---

Amy's bengals are also inhibitor rings, designed specifically to temper her clairvoyance, but also put a cap on her chaos energy. She can use Chaos Control to summon her hammer, and put it away, but only if she knows its exact location (which is why she keeps it on a hook near her door, and why she freaks out if she loses it). Without her inhibitors, her powers become stronger, but less stable.

---

The necklace Sticks wears is made from her mom's old wedding ring. When she was five, she turned it into a necklace with a few random beads and shells she had collected from the beach. She never takes it off, but she's had to repair and replace the cord a couple of times.

She really does keep the burrow spotless– old food draws in pests, and she doesn't actually have much trash, as most items in her home are made of natural materials. When something breaks, she either repairs it or throws it out without issue.

She's really good at spear fishing, which is the main reason she can hold her breath for so long, and dive so deep without any gear.

Idk what else to add, so I'm gonna leave it here for now. Thanks for the ask :D

[theharmonious13]

Trial of the Double Feature

Omg I love the Blurple background to honour Tsuno and Kamimura

So unreal to see the 'death portraits', Tsuno's stab trap holes and Kamimura's blood coming out of his mouth and subtle blood along the neck because of his sweater 😩

Poor Watari and Ken are inbetween two podiums of the deceased 😩

~~~

Based on the layout... if we are to assume every survivor will end up between two deceased podiums that leaves Watari, Ken, Mai, Hama, Wada, Hiroaki and Okazaki alive

Meaning Yanagi, Ojima and Tamba are getting killed off next

Probably won't happen but I LOVE theorising based off of visual elements

(Note: After learning Okazaki dies this theory is debunked immediately but I like to have fun okay? 😭😂)

~~~

Danganronpa rules for who escapes, makes sense

Omg Tamba accusing Wada, so naive but you're ded to me anyway Tamba 😩

Hanano getting coy... *yes*

I love how Mai, Yanagi, Ojima and Hiroaki agreed straight away that Wada was telling the truth and that stabbing Okazaki was deserved

Watari popping off with the voice acting and raw emotion, being on Wada's side, calling him her friend 🥺

Ken telling Tamba not to talk about Kamimura that way... thank you for showing respect

Ken saying Kamimura wasn't weak 🥺

Hama telling Wada to breathe/they just have to clear his name, he can understand what he's going through and it's a very sweet moment

Ken jabbing at Tamba (I'm using the 'exactly what it sounds like' in regards to the 3D printer' as an example) is what I live for now

Wada yelling at Tamba is deserved

Man I'm really hating how accusatory Tamba is even though this literally happens every trial

Hama guarding Wada going to the bathroom omg he's so sweet guys I love their dynamic

Why does Hiroaki even care about the above lol

Okazaki accusing Ken of murdering Kamimura and everyone else dog piling him... knew this was coming but I hate this so much anyway

DON'T INTERRUPT KEN WHEN HE DOESN'T GET A CHANCE TO BUD IN, LIKE EVERY TRUAL

I give Okazaki the middle finger while she spurts out this stupid theory

'Stop talking like you know me! Or him, for that matter! You don't know shit about either of us!' YES KEN (and voice actor) POP OFF (especially at Okazaki lmao)

Okazaki claiming to be Ken's therapist is 💀 especially after she said she was his guide councillor which is very different...?

Body discovery announcement came in clutch LET'S GO - Wada and Ken didn't kill their besties

'The infernal energy coming out of that room was disrupting my arm's structural integrity' Hama 😂

ANXIETY ATTACK? Ken nooooo

OKAZAKI WE HAVE SELF PRESERVATION HERE PLEASE, ALOT OF THE CAST THINK BADLY OF THEMSELVES

Hiroaki being blunt about the self harm isn't exactly tactful but needed for the trial

Hama says he was bopped on the head, Okazaki replying with 'he wasn't bopped' 😂

Hama saying Okazaki being in the chemlab was a violation and her agreeing 😂

Tetro is teaching me new words like flunitrazepam (also why was Okazaki keeping an eye on it, sus)

I'm with Watari, THEY HAD CYANIDE?

I've been wondering if the killer took Kamimura's tongue as a trophy too, can we just body check the entire cast right now please? Lmao

'Finally! It was poison!' Good for you Tamba but why did it have to be so ironic that it was on Kamimura's case that he couldn't shut you down 😭

Hiroaki just admitting he was going to kill himself and replying with 'why are you looking at me like that's 😭

Means Tamba was wrong about the poison though hehe, thanks Hiroaki

Yeah Tamba had a blonde moment, I'm on Okazaki's side for this one being annoyed at her

Poor Tamba is cooked, at this rate she's definitely not surviving unless Von wanted to do the stereotypical mainline Danganronpa games survivor cast archetypes trope 😭

'How did they get into Kamimura's room?' guys we LITERALLY just mentioned the 3D printed room key 😭

Omg I'm one of the biggest Hayashigeki shippers out there BUT THIS ARGUMENT IS AWESOME! I AM THRIVING! Well written for both characters and there's been chapters worth of tension stock piled out until now that they need to work through together hehe

Why are we assuming Kamimura knew about the second key? Anyways

KEN AND KAMIMURA (wholesomely and shippingly) SLEPT TOGETHER 🥺

'Do we have a pickpocket in here?' Stares intensely at Okazaki

Wada freaking out about not solving Tsuno's case, thanks guys for solving it anyway 😭♥️

If Kamimura somehow built the trap without Ken noticing that would be messed up (I've thought about Tsuno killing Kamimura because of the fandom but not vice versa)

I really want to know if Tsuno was the intended target or not, if she wasn't it'll be even more sad

I love everyone telling Tamba to shut up, especially Mai 😭

Tamba really needs to stop gunning for Ken or Imma get mad 💀

Man all of the resentment/arguments are coming out of this trial

Yanagi you don't want the reputation of throwing off trials but we're doing it a third time, that establishes a pattern 😭

'If you don't tell me where you were last night you've lost all my trust' Mai omg that sentence went HARD

Omg Yanagi was trying to get into the locked room, please don't tell me he's going to get executed for admitting it 😭

WATARI AND HAMA ARE BECOMING FRIENDS, I actually jumped for joy when I heard Hama say he was watching Watari practice fire dancing in her room

That's very vivid description from the Hall Overlord, I do have to wonder if she just so happened to peek out at all the right times and then continue to prep for the murder

Here we go, Tamba where you at 😭😂

I proceed to be so engrossed in the trial that I have no comments, I am fully obsessed

I don't want to think Tsuno is implicated, but if there isn't a second key (which there obviously isn't) then logically it makes alot of sense for her to be involved with the pre existing alibis 😩

Gets engrossed in the trial again

Okazaki has a coat THAT'S HOW IT DIDN'T GET SEEN

WE ARE ONTO YOU OKAZAKI

We have less than 20 minutes yet PLEASEEEE ISTG THIS BE THE LAST SUSSED PERSON

'Okazaki was patrolling' Nah bitch more like moving around freely without anyone suspecting you ✨

'Can you open your coat then?' OJIMA YES

Blood in the coat

SHE'S GETTING PANICKY AND BACKED INTO A CORNER, OMG MY PRAYERS MAY BE ANSWERED

OKAZAKI IS SNAPPING!? WHAT IS KONKONKONKON

FACE REVEAL WHATTTTTTT

SHE'S BEAUTIFUL! AND HAS A PAW EARRING!? OMG THE WHOLE SUIT IS BLOODY OMG

SHE'S A COMIC BOOK VILLAIN? THE EDITING OF HER NEW SPRITE/CG MOVING OMG

SHE'S MOCKING THEM FOR BEING SLOW TO SOLVE IT!? I'm actually amused at this oml

THE MUSIC IS SO DERPY, I FEEL LIKE I'M IN UNDERTALE RN HELP

'A band of dimwits this easy to kill!' Omg why am I loving Okazaki at her killer reveal

WATARI IS SO UPSET AND RIGHTFULLY SO

The way she said Oni boy got me crushing a little bit 😳

Okazaki giving vital hints because she wanted to create an extremely interesting murder case makes a TON of sense

Gdi I was fairly confident it was Okazaki but I should have been ride or die on it lol

If she somehow ISN'T THE KILLER and reveals a truth bomb right now my jaw will drop to the floor

She's talking like Gundham Tanaka and I'm loving it

THE PHANTOM THEIF OF NAGOYA!? WAS SHE TSUNO'S GREATEST ENEMY OUTSIDE OF THE KILLING GAME TOO BECAUSE SHE'S LITERALLY THE ULTIMATE SUPERHERO? THEY'RE LITERALLY BOTH FROM THE SAME AREA

OMG I WAS RIGHT

I had headcanoned she was a crime doer outside of the killing game because of the gun ownership BUT OMG IT WAS SO OBVIOUS ALL ALONG WHY DID I NOT SEE IT

WADA IS GOING TO STAB HER AGAIN, AND KEN CAN JOIN TOO

KAMIMURA MUST HAVE SEEN HER DOING SOMETHING SUS AND HAD TO BE KILLED BECAUSE WITNESS TESTIMONY

I love Okazaki's monologue so much you don't understand

She's kinda crushing on Tsuno desperately wanting attention? Must be a small town crime doer who WANTS to Tsuno to be her rival because it's not her talent

THAT LAUGH VOICE ACTING WAS AWESOME OMG

She called Hiroaki a Dunk Ass 😭😂

WADA POP TF OFF!

Tsuno cared about Kamimura and that drew her attention... Tsuno died for love? DELUSIONAL SHIP COMING ON?

Harada inspired her by saying 'life is short' and 'Kamimura is short too!' Okazaki omg you cannot be serious 😭😂

I NEED SOMEONE TO TRANSCRIBE OKAZAKI'S MURDER CASE RECAP BECAUSE I CANNOT EVEN RIGHT NOW

'When the temperature started dropping and it was clear that someone had to die I thought hey, now is my chance to end a long and tumultuous character arc!' WOAHHHHHH 😂

Okazaki calling Kamimura a Sad Sack 😩

OKAZAKI SPRITE IN THE TRIAL ROOM

THEY CUT HER SUMMARY SHORT, JUSTICE HAS BEEN SERVED 😂😂😂

Or almost lol, loved the intermission anyway

She admitted Hasegawa is smarter than everyone which is a... compliment in a weird and twisted way?

Okazaki calling Wada a sad little loser 😭

KEN BEAT UP OKAZAKI LETS FUCKING GO

WADA WAS GONNA GO TOO AND I WAS THERE FOR IT

Omg Okazaki said Watari could have been the perfect sidekick one day

Watari said she will NEVER be like her and she HATES her this is the angst I needed omg I LOVE IT

POOR WADA, KEN AND WATARI THOUGH THEY ARE ALL EMOTIONALLY DESTROYED

Okazaki's about to get the most mid execution like Celeste because she's so outlandish

Okazaki wanted to give each individual student a goodbye? How strange and unexpected

'Nishi, in our next life, we'll be foxes okay?' 😭😭😭

'In every life after, I will follow that flame too' At least Okazaki genuinely liked Watari 😭

Midas Touch

Dr Haruka is absolutely disgusted by Okazaki's actions 😂

Torturing is quite the dubbed down word for what Okazaki did lol

Is Okazaki's name Yume? Does Dr Haruka know Okazaki?

Dr Kan was disappointed Tsuno didn't kill and Dr Haruka saying Tsuno didn't seem to be the type to crack shows how strong she was 💪

This was the most unique execution I've ever seen, I love it alot

Cheap motive? Wonder what it is

Kan put on the music at the trial? LOL

264 - Regulation Review

No don't modify the body discovery it comes in clutch THEY'LL GET THROWN OFF AND BE HEAVILY MISLEAD 😭

Monomoko was smart with turning off the cold tbh

Monomoko has got ALOT of dark splotches now oml

OKAZAKI WAS DR HARUKA'S KID? AND SHE WAS JUST UPSET WITH HOW SHE DID REGARDING THE KILLING GAME INSTEAD OF LITERALLY ANYTHING ELSE ABOUT HER *CHILD!?*

Okazaki's name is Yume... or is that a dead name maybe? Disapproving parent my god...

She's trying to get Dr Kan's child in the killing game, probs because she hates Dr Kan lol 😭

265 - Tactical Retreat

Takeshi too overwhelmed, how relatable...

He finally spaced out again 😩

266 - Apology Tour

Wonder how this cat fight will go

She's done with Yanagi? NOOOOOOOO

Mai is going on her vigilante and angsty arc

Tamba's apology is making me almost cry ngl

Mai called her Rui 🥺

267 - Grieving Process

Wada's so drained, my poor boi

Hiroaki talking to Tsuno in front of Wada will be good for both of them I think, hopefully they can bond more because of this

Wada says I love you to Tsuno again 🥺😭

HE MADE WADA NEW CLOTHES? OMG

SOFT CLOTHES FOR WADA, HIROAKI IS SO THOUGHTFUL

HUG!? YESSSSSSSS

HE WOULD ALSO GIVE WADA A HAIRCUT? WHAT WOULD IT LOOK LIKE? NEW SPRITE? OMG MAKEOVER? OMG I NEED TO SEE IT NOW

[morgansorgans-org]

Alrighty! Strap in, because we're

Investigating The Way We Look

(A.K.A In Which I Ramble About How AAI Redefines Ace Attorney's Sprites)

-- PART 1: The Quirks of Investigations's Poses --

Now, the AAI games technically have TWO sets of sprites per character - one for the overworld where you conduct investigations, and another for the close-ups during certain parts of dialogue and gimmicks. You might think the former is new, and it kind of is.

However, I believe that these sets also mirror the way the mainline games split between their Investigations and Trials.

Edgeworth is already a perfect example of this, in fact - in the mainline games, he also gets two sets of sprites:

A side profile for the courtroom sections, of course, being the first game's main prosecutor...

...and a front profile for (mainly) the investigations, along with the few times he gets to take the stand.

This difference between side profile and front profile is also reflected in AAI, and here's the fun thing. Since the close-up sprites are mainly used during the interrogation and confrontation segments of the game, which play similarly to the mainline's trials, the developers chose to convey that further by angling the sprites to the side profile - that is, these sprites are drawn in a similar angle to the courtroom sprites of the mainline games!

And another thing immediately becomes apparent here. Note how this pointing sprite is nearly the exact same as the one above, from AA1.

The similarities don't end here - a handful of Edgeworth's other recognizable poses are here, too! Left is the original sprite from AA1, right is the AAI re-take.

In fact, this applies to all returning characters across both games - here's Gumshoe's excited breathing.

Of course, for the characters that only appear at the benches, some slight changes have to be made to account for the lack of a desk. For instance, Franziska's finger-wagging sprite was changed to straighten her out from leaning over the desk.

Another such change was made to Edgeworth's glare - and, fun fact! That's actually taken from his desk slam sprite! (Yes, the jacket is mirrored. That was done due to Edgeworth usually facing the other way in the game.)

The overworld sprites is where it gets a bit interesting. Of course, there's the basic animations now for walking and running around, as well as certain new poses not seen elsewhere (e.g. this sprite of Gumshoe pointing)...

...but there are still a couple recognizable sprites thrown in.

--- --- --- --- ---

-- PART 2: Recreating the Style --

I'm sure you can see where this is likely to be headed.

I decided to experiment a little with recreating some of Klavier's animations in the AAI close-up perspective - of course, using your design. I didn't draw them in too much detail here, as I'm running on a time limit, but you can imagine how it might look in the final release.

I didn't really bother with the courtroom sprites, since they can easily just be re-drawn as is. Opportunities do open up, however, for some extras from his investigation set! Most notably, the one where he's playing with his hair, of course.

However, there are two troublemakers.

The first problem is the recoil animation and consequent sweating pose, where he holds onto the desk.

Now, where have I seen that recoil animation before...? Or, at least something similar...

...Aha!

Lang does a somewhat similar pose for his recoil animation... and it ends in him reaching out with his hands to ask for an explanation.

A similar thing could, in theory, be done with Klavier - him recoiling in his usual holding-head pose, then reaching forward with his hands instead of slumping onto the nonexistent desk. Something like this:

So that's one solved. But then...

...there's the wall pound.

There isn't exactly an easy way to transition desk slam-like animations when they're this robust. And I really wanted to find a way to still convey its energy without losing its essence.

...But then it hit me. Why not use Lang again? And this time... his overworld sprites have the hint.

A foot stomp! Bold, powerful and unique all over again. On top of that, it easily transitions from Klavier's air guitar (like the wall pound), AND provides a good jumping point for the point (like Edgeworth's glare)!

It could look something like this in the close-up:

To recap: The simplest solution for returning characters is taking the already existing sprites and remaking them in the new styles. However, not all sprites will be as easy to transition in this manner, due to some courtroom elements that are not present in the open areas of Investigations. For those, some improvisation will be required, but opportunities open for even more interesting sprites!

--- --- --- --- ---

Well, that brings this mini-essay to a close. I hope you enjoyed reading through my exploration of the AAI artstyle regarding returning characters as much as I enjoyed writing and drawing it ^.^

Oh my god!!!! I am blown away by how *fast* you did this and how in-depth it is!! This is so cool, and you did little animations for it as well ahhhh!!!! I really like the foot stomp idea!! I was also thinking about how Klavier's wall slam could be translated into Investigations' open-world game style, and I never considered looking at Lang for inspiration! Same with the reaching forward with his hands sprite as well, that part also kind of stumped me. I was thinking of just making it similar to his courtroom sprite where I just... slump him over and keep his arms bent, like he's shaking his fist or something at the person, but the extending hands idea is a cool innovative spin to it that I haven't considered!

Thank you sm for this!!!