#why can't we redesign them based on that without saying 'i think it's weird that this decision was made for this character's design'

[jinxed-sinner]

Alright here's my full (possibly hot) take on redesigning Hazbin Hotel characters and making a video showcasing those redesigns while you criticize the official designs.

First and foremost, you are redesigning someone else's OCs. Hazbin Hotel is, in essence, a passion project for Viv. How she talks about it makes that incredibly clear to me. The only difference between Hazbin Hotel and, for example, the story I'm developing surrounding some of my D&D OCs is that Hazbin Hotel got picked up by a streaming service and is significantly more popular than most passsion projects get.

Personally if someone wanted to redesign my D&D OCs, I wouldn't mind it, in fact I'd probably think it was really cool that someone would want to redesign one of my OCs to be closer to their tastes in terms of what they like to draw. I would, however, be made incredibly uncomfortable if someone made a video redesigning them where they also pointed out everything they thought was wrong with the designs. I didn't design these specific D&D characters to be 1-to-1 accurate to their classes in D&D or to look professionally designed. I designed them how I wanted them to look for the story I'm telling because I don't plan to ever play them in a campaign. The main character Avlan is a paladin, and I can acknowledge that his design might not look exactly like a paladin. One of the tabaxi in the story (Ice) is a bard and the other (Spark) is a ranger, and I acknowledge that their classes might not come across well in their designs. The single tiefling I've designed for this story (Tragedy) is a cleric but might not come off as one in their design. But I specifically designed them to be easy for me to draw because I want to be able to tell this story through my art. Having someone say "oh, Avlan's armor isn't paladin enough!" or "Avlan's fur colors and patterns should be closer to a wild rabbit's because harengon shouldn't be based on domestic rabbit colors!" would fucking hurt (especially because I'm so attached to Avlan, but it would hurt just as much if similar comments were made about Ice, Spark, or Tragedy). I am so passionate about these characters and being told their designs are bad or wrong in some way would be like a stab in the heart, and it would still feel like a stab in the heart if this story ever got a massive fandom behind it. Giving Avlan more complex armor because you think it'd look cool or just want to see what it'd look like? Sure, if I could draw more complex armor I'd give him more complex armor too. Giving him more complex armor but also shitting on the armor I decide to draw him with? My motivation to draw him in his armor, potentially draw him period, would be dead for WEEKS.

Why is it suddenly okay just because someone's passion project was picked up by Amazon Prime? Why is it suddenly okay to be "fixing" someone's character designs just because the project has a much bigger budget than most artists get and is on a popular streaming service? It's not. I don't care if you're a professional character designer, or think a specific character would look better with certain traits, or just don't like the character designs.

Hazbin Hotel is still Vivienne Medrano's passion project, and redesigning her characters and making videos talking about everything you think is "wrong" with them is, honestly, disgusting. You can make videos explaining your choices in your redesigns without putting down the designs that already exist, whether you like them or not. Me thinking Lucifer looks better with his tail not restricted to his full demon form doesn't suddenly mean I don't like his official design, because I fucking love it. If you wouldn't do it to an artist whose passion project is just a webcomic here on Tumblr, don't fucking do it to an artist whose passion project got picked up for a cartoon by a big streaming service (or any company for that matter).

[dollsonmain]

I'm going to start staying in bed in the mornings so That Guy can't use morning time as Captive Audience Lecture time.

That's why I don't eat with him anymore, and why I don't talk to him at all in the car.

It's different than "There is a problem and we need to discuss it." because I'm not allowed to speak and any point I manage to interject with is disregarded or talked over.

A cut, though, because this is going on main instead of my whining side blog because it's about me, and it'll be long.

Last night I was thinking about how useless I am. I'm saying it that way just to get the point across as quickly as possible, I'm not being self-deprecating.

To elaborate, I was thinking about the jobs I've done in the past and my ability to function in general. Life in general seems unreasonably too hard.

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My first job was bussing tables and that was fine but I got fired because my manager played favorites and scolded me for crying because my bandaged wrist hurt, which made me cry harder while bussing tables.

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Then I was in the military and I was very bad at it. Physically, for now-obvious reasons, and mentally. I could never memorize the ranks, for example, or the weird little rules like "If you're the first to see Smadge in the morning, you call at ease as loud as you can to welcome him to the office" or the "Address superiors by their rank, don't talk to them like companions" and that kind of thing.

I did fine doing the mail.

I struggled in the office where I was the personnel database manager. There wasn't enough work to do and I could never make myself look busy. When I first took over the database I rewrote it all so that it was accessible to each of the companies in my unit to add and adjust things and then I wasn't needed anymore. I was there for two years with nothing to do.

At one point I started leaving to do the mail as early as possible with the excuse that I was taking other unit's mail clerks with me (true), and then after mail time was over, I'd just leave and go back to my room.

No one really noticed or cared because I wasn't providing anything to the office anyway.

My First Sargent griped about it one time, but I kept leaving anyway and no one bothered me about it.

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Then I worked at Walmart behind the jewelry counter and that was fine. I liked it enough. Being a smaller department there never was anything like having to pull palettes around and the stuff on the shelves didn't change too much. There was a lot of time standing behind the counter doing nothing.

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Then Wegman's selling cheese and that was fine, too. I got up, put on my uniform, went to work, did what I was told, and went home. Annetta made the mistake of asking me to redesign the cheese display once and I was like "Um.... I can't.... do that, sorry." After I left (I was impregnated by That Guy when he ejaculated inside me without permission, then he moved me away from my job or I'd probably still be there), she said she'd asked some of the younger boys in the department to take over and they were doing very well with it.

My managers at Wegman's gave me a lot of opportunities for advancement and to learn new skills and I had to decline because my brain couldn't do anything more than the lowest base-line work in the department. I mean, I tried. I did what was asked, and then I wasn't asked to do those things again.

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Since then it's been house-mom.

I'm very bad at that.

I don't clean enough, I don't cook at all, I don't do That Guy's laundry so he can't blame me when something goes wrong with it (he blames me anyway because if HE ruins his laundry it's because I refused to do it), I'm not super involved with my Son.

If I'm not specifically told "Do this." I don't think to do it. It's not by choice. I can't.

Son struggles with hygiene. I've mentioned that before. I've come here and asked for help. I've asked the IEP team at school for help.

Lately, Son stinks.

This morning That Guy had me captive audience for a lecture and said that he got a lot of answers out of Son about his hygiene last night which he waited to even ask until I'd gone to bed because he knows that if he starts being an un-constructive asshole about it I'll put a stop to it.

He said Son isn't changing his underwear and was like "I KNOW I've talked to him about this AND YOU..... You have to constantly be on him about it."

When I tried to say "I don't even think about his underwear because I never see them. He comes downstairs dressed every morning." he said "You have to struggle against that compulsion."

How, after 20 years, does he still not understand that my entire day every day is struggling against that kind of thing and always has been?

There are times I want to take the whole world, hold their faces between my hands, put my face right up in theirs and say

"You don't understand.

It's not that I don't want to.

I would give almost anything to function. I don't like to be like this. I don't like to be trapped here needing someone else to keep me alive.

I.

Can't."

That Guy still doesn't understand that I can't. He thinks I choose not to. He thinks I don't care enough.

I never could think of like, that extra little something that would make something better or whatever it is that makes some people really good at aesthetics, or anything outside of what I've been told to do.

When I say "I don't exist" I can't put into words what I really mean.

I am nothing more than a worker ant.

I really do often think I should have been let to die in infancy when I couldn't keep milk down. That should have been in indicator that I wasn't fit for survival. I've been consistently miserable my whole life because of this.