#but im thinking maybe i can work a bit of the original vibe into this. like fairy/dragon crossover?? | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

camels-pen · 4 months

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(i haven't read Whole Cake in a while, and i never really watched it, so bear with me)

I'd love to write a fic with Usopp on Whole Cake. it'd be sooo fucking long and i'd need to refresh myself on the entire arc, but god i'd probably be so satisfied when it's done. specifically for having brought a single moment in my head to life, but we'll get to that.

On Zou, he insists to be taken along on the Sanji rescue team and has worked himself up with a whole bunch of very good reasons as to why he should go there instead of helping in Wano, but of course Luffy just immediately accepts with a "yeah sure"

With Whole Cake, I think he'd be flipping between having fun as part of the idiot trio/quartet (Luffy, Chopper, Carrot), and being terrified with Nami. There wouldn't be that many differences in the arc as a whole, though; some things would be easier/better and some things would be worse- I don't necessarily think Usopp's presence would be overall an advantage or disadvantage, just different. Like, major events would stay mostly the same, but little details would change and maybe those little details would build to a far more drastic change-

for example, maybe one of Big Mom's kids considers themself a great sniper and wants a match with Usopp, or is motivated to work harder because Usopp is around and they want to take him out and boast about it. Maybe it means Sunny takes more damage than canon, or maybe Usopp's help means less damage to Sunny. (idk if i'd really do smth like this, but it's just an example)

skjdhf fuck i'm really not equipped to try and figure this out when i don't remember shit from Whole Cake aaaa

I do know that, despite his penchant for talking and rambling, I'd probably have Usopp be dead silent after his initial shock when Sanji fights Luffy. Everything about that is the same, except Usopp is just watching Sanji the whole time- not panicking, not moving, and not speaking. He doesn't say a word the entire time, doesn't even make a sound, and that, along with Luffy's words and Nami's begging, stick with Sanji.

(Usopp is thinking of his own fight with Luffy in Water 7, he's partially wondering if this was what it was like- if it was this painful to watch from the sidelines- and partially knowing he doesn't have to say a word, because he knew, like he knew back then, that it didn't matter what was said. It wasn't quite the same, but he could tell in the way Sanji moved, in the way he spoke and held himself, that he was putting on a front, trying to be brave in all the wrong ways. Usopp didn't say a word to Sanji because there was nothing he could say that Sanji himself didn't already know. Should've known. And his quiet, direct stare, was more than enough.)

the singular moment i really wanna write, is a scene where Sanji is apologizing for dragging them into his mess- either during the big meeting in Bege's castle or some other time- and Usopp's like "I'll do what you can't, you do what I can't, right?" and Sanji pauses, a little confused, until he remembers Enies Lobby and a stupid mask and cape and-

and tears are gathering in his eyes now, fuck, but he laughs a little. It sounds wet and his face is itchy and they're surrounded by tentative allies, but he- he laughs again and he says, "Fuck, you remembered that?"

Usopp shrugs, a little smile on his face. "They were some wise words from a wise man."

Sanji laughs a third time. "You think I'm wise?"

And they banter a little more before Bege tells them to quit it since they're on a time constraint or something. Quietly, Usopp will ask, "It-it helps. On bad days. And I figured, 'what's a worse day than this?' Ah, not that you getting married would ever be bad per se-"

"Usopp," Sanji says, looking more relaxed and settled. He smiles fondly and grabs his friend in a one armed hug, crushing him to his side. "Thanks."

And yeah, don't remember much beyond that, except the whole "hiding and then busting out of the cake" bit, which would mean Usopp in a cute little tuxedo or smth- maybe with a fedora aaaaaa <- loves fedoras- helping out with the fighting and eventually sailing with everyone to Wano.

He would be so distressed about fixing up Sunny now that the whole thing with Whole Cake is over. Maybe there'd be a gag about him promising Franky to take good care of Sunny while they were gone and being confident, after being Franky's tinkering partner and learning from him over time, that he could handle minor repair work much better than he did the first time around with Merry. And so when he finally takes in all the very-not-minor repairs he has to do, he's certain Franky is gonna strangle him for not keeping his promise. Probably also try to write in some nostalgic 'repairman Usopp' vibes from pre-Water 7.

Also something something, Sanji, wanting to do more for the crew bc he still feels guilty about Whole Cake, decides to take it upon himself to help Usopp not fall into a whole anxiety spiral about the ship. In turn, Usopp ends up helping Sanji not feel so guilty- usually by handing his own words back to him on a silver platter. And, yknow, having the two of them bonding and being buddies again like they so rarely get to be in canon nowadays qwq

#one piece #usopp #whole cake island #nemotime #that bit in bege's castle isn't exactly how it would go. just kinda. trying to get the vibe. also it's wayyy too short lol #the sanuso bit can be platonic or romantic. originally when i was gonna write out this idea a while ago i was thinking romantic with my #'they get engaged/married b4 dressrosa' au but tbh platonic works just as good #im- these guys man. i hate them so much (affectionate)#i'll get to rereading whole cake and finding a way to put him in there but for now. this.#if anyone's got other ideas im all ears #edit from like march 7: thinking about this again #maybe usopp being silent is an indicator for sanji that usopp's really fucking disappointed or shocked or w/e #but for usopp himself it's like being back in water 7. he doesn't even mean to be silent. he's got words built up on the tip of his tongue #but none of them come out. and despite sanji being Right There all he wants to do in that moment. is run.#at the very least he stays and watches the whole confrontation through. but afterwards he probably feels like shit #because he's the guy who's great with words right? he's the guy that can relate the most out of the group who went to WCI. he should be abl #to make a significant difference and help convince sanji to come home. but he feels like he failed. like he's going to lose another friend #and it's going to be all his fault. (again)#[not really. we all know merry wasn't his fault but we love old insecurities rearing their head in this house]#later he'd probably end up saying the words he wanted to say. and maybe it's better that way. that he ended up waiting #until luffy's had a proper shot at scolding sanji first. because then usopp can act as support and reinforcement. which. yknow.#a sniper's duty and all #anyway i got other shit to do so i'm cutting myself off here #wci usopp

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chisatowo · 2 years

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Why am I just apparently incapable of making stories without time travel bullshit now where did I go wrong fmfndjfnd

#rat rambles #Im working on developing the story with ghost writer anf I can feel ut becoming more time travel bullshit-y every second I think abt it #it wasnt gonna be that time travel bullshit heavy but then I realised I super could so then I super did oops #also I thinkkkk I might steal some of my stuff for the aliens that misaki and pareo are in the sci fantasy au for this story maybe?#I just like the concepts behind them a lot and itd fit my image for a certain alien species concept I have for the story #the main difference would probably have to be either be home planet or population size but idk I havent fully decided to use them yet #this story is an interesting one to brainstorm for because its probably gonna be my first more purely sci fi story #pretty much all my other stories have sci fi elements but I consider most of them more fantasy or at least just not a sci fi story #and in a way this story will probably have fantasy elements but Im not imagining it as fantasy #I currently plan on it having 3 main characters total but no promises on me sticking with that #I have some other character concepts but I dont think most of them will be that massively important #I am rly loving one of my minor antag cgaracter concepts though I wanna try drawing them but idk if I wanna give them a similar vibe to #ghost writer or not since they have similar origins as far as their current forms go #also I will say yall probably shouldnt expect me to talk abt this story all that much for at least a lil while since Im rly still very #early on in the brainstorming stage and I rly dont think Ill have a solid foundation ti the story for quite a bit longer #I like to get my basic plot concept and then flesh out my main cast and from there fill in the lines of the plot through them #if that makes sense? idk #I just tend to like character driven stories so even in my stories that arent mostly character driven I still build a lot of the plot based #on the characters which then becomes a back and forth of character and plot development #Im still in the initial character development phase where Im working through the basic foubdations of the cast I want #my main struggle rn is that one of the main charaxters is the future version of the other thats not ghost so I kinda have to build one from #the other while still keeping my desired image of both in tact #and Im kinda rambling a lil but hey guess you guys get a lil insight into my story writing process lol #for the record my aus generally work similar but with more focus on the communication between character and worldbuilding instead #or just general background based on my initial concepts #for example me wanting a void like place for a lot of the random card au ppl to hang out in and using them all plus other xharacters I #decide tk involve along the way to develop botg the place and its origins along with the characters in the au and the plots they create #a lot of my worldbuilding rly is just a web of my vague concepts being brought together and bounced between to form a more choherent world #for a lot of this stuff I rly do just follow my gut concepts and slowly fill in the gap between the broader details and the finer details #and often times they meet up very nicely and then I have a very clear image of how it works in its entirety

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beatcroc · 3 months

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a year!!! as of today i have now been drawing these funny little pizza freaks, to the exclusion of almost everything else, for!!! an entire year!!! i wanted to do a nice group shot/lineup of everybody to compare to when i first started trying to draw them because oh boy were they bad. i never even posted most of them anywhere because they were so bad. but im posting them here, now, to see how everything's changed/evolved.

this is probably the hardest time i've ever had trying to figure out how to work with a style, but we got there eventually; i'm pretty happy with the handle i've got on everybody now...dont let ur memes be dreams. lots of unimportant journaling and idle thoughts abt it below.

older pics

the first one is the VERY first time i drew them, before i thought i was going to actually have any interest in drawing them [lmao]; it was just the one isolated image, for my friendserver, to illustrate the funney message, so there was no attempt to make it Good or actually understand anything going on w/ the designs or style.

second is the original run of practices sketches to start trying to figure them out for real; done after i started having ideas for the comics and such and realized oh god maybe i am actually gonna draw fanart for this. [again, lol, and lmao.]

third one is the first pt art thing i posted on here. there were a couple weeks of sprite studies between this one and the previous image. the one on the top right wasn't part of that post i just threw it on as space filler; i'd intended to shift to doing Sprite Redraws But Stylized to explore tings more, but that was the only one i did. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

individual characters

peppino: by far the hardest dear god. bro what ARE your shapes how DOES your face work. jesus christ. everything i have trouble with this style for, peppino has it in excess. i draw in polygons! i need consistency! and that is the last thing this kind of style is concerned with. they are made of squarshy clay and i do not understand how to mold them. i was really hoping trying to learn this game's style would GIVE me that kind of flexibility for fun exaggerated facial expression but i don't think much came of it in the end 😔. anyway on the bright side all this means once i got peppino figured out a little bit everybody else clicked way easier.

fake peppino: honestly i never did anything with him on purpose except for how his eyes work + the perma-smile thing. i figured ok hes supposed to look weird and off model so whatever happens with him happens. and it did. and it kept happening. it is still, in fact, happening.

noise/ette: somehow, for every bit that peppino was the least natural thing i've ever tried, these two worked pretty much right off the bat. i still don't understand it, seeing as pretty much all the things at play for peppino are also at work for them. i think the new sketches are actually a little worse than older ones but not enough that i care.

gustavo: really funny bc i drew him on model twice and just went 'okay, cool nice, easy, um. he doesn't have any fucking legs?' fortunately he was the only one i had a strong idea for how to stylize him [square] and it worked exactly as i was hoping so wahoo.

brick: is an animal and therefore 5000x easier and more natural for me to draw/stylize than anything else in the cast. that is Just a rat bro. i can draw a rat.

gerome: i think the funniest one here. the most drastic and least necessary change imo. i was gonna have him be really small at first, like smaller than the noises, but then i just... didn't. he's just peppino-sized now. also i gave him like. actual human facial structure, which is funny bc in most cases i'd do anything to avoid, but it works well for his being A Rock to give him some angles and definition like that+ to differentiate his vibe from the rest of the cast who are all very squishy. also since he is essentially Just A Head it's good to emphasize that too ig.

john: i only drew john a couple times but he gets to be here because i like him. and because most of the stuff i applied to gerome was readily applicable to john, though i did try to keep him a little more uncanny because he is a Huge And Lanky Freak. i hate that he is barefoot btw but idk how to make his color balance look right with shoes.

pizzahead: i did not want to put him on here honestly but i Have drawn him a handful of times and more importantly i didn't know what i was gonna do with john's pose if i didn't have him there to be glared at. the only thing that's different with him is giving him wider-bottomed pants, which i got from when i tried to draw these guys in clone high style [i never posted that one either][i will eventually]

snick: he gets to be here because 1. he's like 6 lines 2. i like him and 3. ive scribbled him a few times offhand and it went pretty well

misc

there are some guys missing because those are guys i didn't draw enough [or at all] to have gotten comfortable with them. sorry

i would have Liked to shade these but for the time being i have accepted that my grasp of light/shadow has decayed to the point im not going to be happy with anything i try there, so For Now i am working on my presentation with flats i guess. gerome has a shadow only because he's shaded like that ingame and looks naked without it

anyway if you are still reading [hi?] i get to shamelessly plug now. i'm over the hill of my pizza run now, and while i still have plenty of things i want to make here, most of the bigger more in-depth ones have passed. pizza tower was the first thing in THREE YEARS to get me out of my oc groove to doing fanart, and once i am done with my ideas here i will be going right back to it. if you like my art or how i write characters/interactions you should check out my oc/webcomic blog @jamverse . i can't promise people who like pizza stuff will be terribly into my designs, but i can guarantee i treat my guys with the exact same sort of tone i handle the pt guys with. and hell, i've mentioned it a few times before, but like 70% of my characterization for fake pep is just copied off one of my characters, so if u are going to miss him... he will still be there in spirit >;p

and if you dont care about any of that and are still reading thank you anyway. actually making these comics + seeing how shockingly well-received they've been has done a lot for my confidence, and for seeing that my kind of stuff IS something people enjoy :')

#pizza tower #peppino spaghetti #fake peppino #gustavo and brick #the noise #noisette #pizzahead #arting #pizzaposting

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cookii-moon · 11 months

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BE WARY OF ART STEALERS!

can’t stress this enough but I’m sure some of you have seen this person around lately

DO NOT LIKE OR REBLOG THEIR POSTS.

this account basically takes ninjago art (or what they think is ninjago art) from artists all around the internet without permission and posts them on their account in batches. When asked if the art was theirs, they said yes

This is a bold faced lie. Whoever this person was didn’t take the time to remove watermarks and it’s incredibly obvious they’re stealing other peoples work. Some watermarks are blatantly obvious.

One of them wasn’t even ninjago art, it was ATLA art I believe.

Included the full image for this one so y’all can see the account for proof (though honestly you could easily go to the account and find one with somebody else’s watermark within seconds) and also see how this person is gaining off of other peoples work. This stolen art should NOT have 35 notes.

Don’t support this person. Support the actual artists the art belongs to. Many of them can be found by the watermarks!

I recommend people block them, or if you want to keep an eye on the situation I recommend you always check the account posting the art before liking or reblogging right now. Going off of style or recognizability will NOT help you because they’re stealing from other artists with various art styles - and some of them are also here on tumblr.

I don’t like doing this and I don’t know how many people it’ll even reach but PLEASE be careful of who you support right now.

It also goes to show that you might want to do background checks if someone is acting suspicious! Obviously don’t make your judgement off of a vibe but if someone is posting with little to no words and just posting art at insane frequencies with watermarks or styles that don’t seem to line up, maybe you should look into it before supporting them. Of course, sometimes it’ll be a false alarm, but it’s better to be safe than sorry!

It’s not just this person, I’ve noticed other instances of art theft recently, so I would also like to remind artists to watermark their works!

My recommendation is to have an obvious watermark that people WILL see if it gets stolen by someone careless (I.e like this instance) and I recommend having it overlap with several different colors and shading and such so that it’s more difficult to edit out. I also might recommend hiding smaller watermarks inside your work that are less obvious so that if more careful people do edit out the first watermark, you can still have a fail safe.

UPDATE: Im pretty sure the main person behind the theft was either banned or deleted their account. I will be keeping this up for a bit so people can learn from this instance. While the original person is gone, art theft is still something that can and will happen. Let this be a reminder that you should always watermark any art you post to the internet if you don’t want it stolen! An unwatermarked piece of art is harder to trace back to the artist than a watermarked one. Even if watermarks can be removed, they discourage people from theft. If a work has no watermarks, people can and will try to get away with it, and the only way anybody will know is if they’ve seen the original artist post the work before. Of course, some people might not care while stealing, but it will tell people something’s up.

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bloggingboutburgers · 2 months

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hi! so, uh, I wasn't really sure where to send this, but you seem nice and (hopefully) have some advice. I'm aroace, specifically sapphic-oriented cupioromantic ace, and I think I have a squish on this one girl. or maybe mesh? idk. all I know is that I really like her and want to be close to her, I think the word for me is alterous attraction? or maybe platonic or aesthetic, because I think she looks really cool too. honestly, I'm not really sure what the heck I feel :') could be a crush, squish, mesh, or just wanting to be friends. uhh anyways, I'm not really sure what to do about it. idk, I guess I want to become closer to her?

anyways, sorry for bothering you. basically I was wondering if you have any thoughts on what im feeling, what I should do, and also maybe how you and your qpp got into a qpr with each other? if u dont mind.

oh! and congrats on you engagement, your 'no one can know I dont like sex' comics make me smile and also have helped me figure out myself! thanks.

Hey!! I'm so sorry I'm replying to this ask so late T^T Kinda buried myself in other projects of let myself get distracted for this blog for a lil while... Either way I hope I'm not too late TwT And don't worry, you're not bothering at all!! (Also thank you so much for the kind words, they mean a lot TwT)

I guess... Whatever you do about it is up to you honestly, as vapid as that probably sounds of me! Heck, maybe you've already taken some steps since writing to me too, late as I am...

I also don't wanna put a label on how you feel, because it's a very personal thing, but I'll say – honestly you don't even necessarily NEED to put a label on it, not yet or not ever (whatever works for you), if you're not sure how to call it. The most important thing is if you're vibing with what you are, besides that you don't owe anyone any explanation. Though I guess it's also understandable to want to know what to call it if you're gonna bring it up to her... But also (maybe I'm naive, but yeah) I think there's nothing wrong with just sincerely saying you don't know how to call things yet either, even to her. I feel it'd be fair to both of you still, personally.

As far as me and my QPP, I didn't do anything – they were the one who realized they had a squish on me and took all the steps originally to get it going 🙈 Which they told me was definitely nerve-wracking! But yeah, their handle is @civiart if you want to reach out to them too for more advice, or they can also answer further questions here on my behalf, they told me whichever is fine with them^^

But also in case it helps, I've actually drawn how it went down for us here in the past, and I tried to elaborate a bit on my own experience of a QPR here and here!

And sorry again for being late TwT I wish you the best though!

#anon #sorry i'm so late #aroace #cupioromantic #asexual

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pitchblackveins · 19 days

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HOW TTPD COULD HAVE BEEN A PERFECT ALBUM

(my song breakdown no one asked for)

GREAT SONG NO NOTES

fortnight, so long london, bdilh,* who's afraid, loml, icdiwabh, smallest man, clara bow, the black dog, how did it end?, so high school, i look in peoples windows, cassandra, peter, the bolter, the manuscript

SONGS THAT ARE SO SO SO CLOSE

- ttpd:* write a second draft of the verses hon like cmon. or at least replace charlie puth with someone who is a) good b) not the 111th most listened to artist in the world

- mbobhft, down bad, and guilty as sin?* are all great but i feel like they could be doing more melodically

- florida!!! its so good but the lines about its a hell of a drug can i use you up are not doing it for me they take me out of the murderer in hiding narrative vibe

- i can fix him* is so good the second verse is just clunky

- the albatross SO CLOSE to perfect cut the fake news line babe

- i hate it here incredible song but i just feel like the lyrics are first draft and could have had another couple passes

- thanK you aIMee literally just cut it out with the caps. if it didnt say kim in the title this song would be great but its unlistenable instead. the bridge would slap SO HARD if you had actually changed her name and any real defining clues. why did you do this

- the prophecy: nearly flawless why is the word greige in there get that out

subsection: songs that i dont really have any bones to pick with but feel a little off

- the alchemy its good i like it but the added in football lyrics to disguise that this was originally a mh song really are a bit heavy handed just write a new song? idk its discordant to me

- CoSoSoM : i actually love this song but the feeling that shes maybe outing someone does take me out but i think thats a me thing bc she does really do a lot of work to hide the muse

- robin: nothing is wrong with this song i think it does a lot for people with kids? but just does not hit at all for me like i dont dislike it im just so neutral

POSSIBLY UNFIXABLE SONGS THAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN CUT

fresh out the slammer:* the use of this phrase is so egregious that i almost want to condemn the song in its entirety but honestly the song has some really good bits so just uh rework the whole premise??

imgonnagetyouback: sorry this song isnt bad but the olivia rodrigo issue is too irredeemable its gotta get cut or entirely reworked with a new premise you cannot unreasonably sue a child to get credits on her songs and then do this. and its way worse than get him back so youre not doing yourself any favors. just cut it

** disclaimer that these songs suffer from being about matty healy but theres nothing to be done about that

#ttpd #i just wanted to write this out for myself tbh #trying to think through my album feelings #the main point here is that i agree with some critics #she could have used a couple more rounds of revisions #that would have fixed most of these #and then it would be an album with 29 perfect songs #taylor swift

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sluggintub · 6 months

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Omg!!!!!!

Haiii!!!! Elloo!!!

Im back with your semi annual Robo Mace wip :0000

Finally was able to expand upon an idea cooking in my mind for a good bit which was a kinda battle mask (Basically whenever conflict is engaged their “human” mouth would be covered with this extravagant layer o’ metal to protect em!)

Practical considering they’re mostly made up of metal?

Absolutely not

Cool?

ABSOLUTELY

Anyways thats literally the whole wip.

Ive redrawn that same pose like five million times on different canvases with every attempt so ive made like zero progress 💀

But now that I have your attention I wanted to expand on Mace’s lore cuz I feel like it and I think i promised to make a post about it

So.

I dont know about any of you you guys-

I personally feel like Darcy the core and Alderitch coulda be so much cooler!

Like dont get me wrong. I like Darcy design wise! They’ve literally been living in my head rent free ever since their first teaser! (It’s a blessing and a curse please send help hshshHahabbfnsuaha)

But I personally feel like plot wise they were kinda lacking :(

And the idea of a bucha a n c i e n t newts consciousnesses invading a 13/14 year old kids mind forcefully is kinda…gross.

So.

I was brainstorming and came up with this:

When the core was first teased. Back in the ye olde days in the pre True colors when the fandom called it the Night-

Im not the only one that thought it was some sorta god right?

A giant mass of orange eyes that a powerful King that ruled for thousands of years kneels down to and calls “Master?”

Idk about you but that gives off omnipotent eldritch horror vibes to me.

So I basically took that concept and expanded upon that and incorporated bits of the lore that Andrias dropped about his kind.

Specifically about how he said that his kind were conquerers.

Why?

Sure. It could purely be a generational trauma thing.

His father did it. His father’s father did it. And his father’s father’s father did it as well.

That could be the end of it.

No one really knows why they conquer and enslave races other than “tradition.”

Maybe Andrias only mentions it all is so he can bask in his triumph. To feel a deluded sense of pride in his lineage for finally being able to continue the work of his forefathers after thousands of years of resentment and regret planted in his mind by his own father that twisted and corrupted his perception on reality.

Maybe Matt just thought those sequences up on the spot and they sorta made sense.

Theres alotta maybes and to my knowledge thats about the extent of it

But im not satisfied with that

So I took that concept. The conquering inter dimensional newts and elevated it.

The core was never a series of Newtopia’s “greatest minds.”

It was always an omnipotent being.

An all seeing all knowing all powerful elderitch horror that is always hungry.

Thats why Andrias’ ancestors invaded other worlds!

Whether it was out of fear or necessity or a deal made with the devil

The reason they invaded is because the core is always hungry. And it needed to feed. So they sacrificed whole worlds to the core just to satiate its ravenous appetite.

And it would explain why in the last season Amphibia was being siphoned for all its resources

Not only was it for the factories, the frobo army, and the mind control devices

It was to stave off the cores hunger until the invasion of earth could surpass

And I didnt forget about all those newts that died and had their brain transferred to the core originally oh nonono

They still sacrificed themselves. But not to join the core or become anything greater. Despite what they believed or what they were promised by the core, Alderitch and all those newts who made up the canon core were nothing more than willing sacrifices to the cores endless hunger. They realistically died for nothing.

So. With this concept/au/rewrite/whatever solves alot of the inconsistencies in the plot and also gets rid of the gross old newts in 13 year olds brain plot

Lemme know what you think of this concept! Im open to criticism and any ideas anyone is willing to share and will do my best to respond to em!

#alternate universe #amphibia #marcy wu #the core #amphibia au #amphibia fanart #darcy #marcy regina wu #king andrias #andrias leviathan #amphibia andrias #work in progress #character design #rewrite #infodump #writing #fanfic

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yeyinde · 23 days

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HELLO! In 2021, I read your ao3 work, "baby, (dont) fear the reaper" for the first time. For 3 years since, i have been haunted. Occasionally i would go back and read your work front to back. Tbh, i didnt know much about dbd lore at the time. i read it bcs it has some vibes that im into, and boy oh boy, those vibes do not disappoint! Halfway through i realized that if your work was a novel, i would buy it 100%, no matter the cost. I fell in love with how the reader was portrayed, how such a somber and melancholic personality can be twisted into such a calculating, patient, and analytical character. Danny too, how the hell did you capture such a narcissist is beyond me. Reader's descend into revenge felt normal, a natural progression, like how a river flows into the sea. Though i never expected Reader to start hunting Danny back, i thought Reader will always be the prey, never the predator. Though, there are tells, from how the reader feels a bit detached (?) from their childhood, carrying heart scars from a toxic childhood friend, how Reader continues their friendship with the aforementioned toxic childhood best friend (a love for rebels, maybe? Or is it a want for the dark resulting in admiration, and then, love?) despite the harm it inflicts. (That flashback chapter to Reader's childhood will always be one of my favorite chapters!) Whatever it is, Danny is the nail in the coffin, pushing Reader into the cliff to freefall into madness. Danny is the real head scratcher, though. Even though there are whole chapters dedicated to Dannys's POV, i still cant understand why Danny is so enamored with Reader. Yes, Reader gets him in a way no one can, but what is it with Reader being a past victim of a homicide that attracts Danny so hard? He even lets his guard down around Reader-he invites her to his motel for god's sake! Albeit to craft alibi, of course, but still. There's a whole chapter on it, where Danny finds out about Reader's case, but i still cant wrap my head around it. As the author, would you mind delving into Danny's head again to explain why Reader has such a chokehold on Danny? (no pressure, of couse!)

-also sorry for bad English, love you! <3

i love talking about bdfr! it's my baby!! i still have the original Google Doc with all the chapters, the playlist, and the outline because it was one of those things i could never really part with. and i can't believe you've enjoyed it so much!!! i'm so thankful for that because this was really a labour of love. i left pieces of myself in it that i don't think i can ever get back, and i genuinely don't think i could ever write anything like it again. it was my lightning-in-a-bottle moment, for sure. and ahhhhhhhh, 2021??? has it really been that long?? it feels like it was only a few months ago that i was sitting in my car eating a lobster roll and writing out the "Home Depot" opener on my phone lmao

but Danny's obsession with their case stems largely from his own narcissism, really. it's also his eventual downfall. Danny (and most, if not all, of the Ghostface Killers) is canonically obsessed with horror. a very morbid fanboy. so him meeting a surviving victim of one spurns his curiosity but also, his competitiveness. Danny is the showstopper. everything he does is very theatrical. he can't help the nagging sense of inferiority whenever someone else comes along. so he's caught in a loop of comparing himself to this other person, and also angry that you let yourself get caught by someone so subpar.

eventually, Danny comes to the conclusion that you're supposed to be his Final Girl, but someone else got to you first. and it's the anger, the jealousy, the obsession that really kicks everything into motion between them. and the reason Danny comes to this conclusion is a bit of a misunderstanding in three parts. Cat and Mouse (killer versus spunky Everyman Journalist); the Perfect Victim (Final Girl Blueprint); and then Two Sides of the Same Coin (or: there was always supposed to be two Ghostface killers, right?). that's the outline i stuck to when writing their specific arc.

this got super long so i put my notes on all three arcs Danny goes through under the cut. i mapped this story out pretty meticulously, so i hope my initial outline sheds some light on the insanity that is Danny lmao

Cat and Mouse is just a manifestation of Danny's boredom. at this point in his life, he's pretty stagnant. this arc would be Halloween H20 for him. the Florida Murders haven't happened yet, but he's been all over the US and no one has come close to catching him. Jed is still a persona he can use without worry of being caught.

and then you come along, and you're immediately wary of Jed. this hasn't happened much for him. he's able to read people with a shocking amount of ease and knows how to tune himself to their personality. either being overly friendly (Leslie and Jed), flirtatious (Gemma and Jed), competitive (Colton and Jed), or extremely competent (Jonah and Jed), but you're the outlier. the one he can't read. he tunes himself into the Old You, but it obviously doesn't work anymore because that version of you is gone. he misreads you. this strikes a nerve. it's never happened before.

it's exacerbated by your wariness of Jed, too. the way you go out of your way to avoid him, despite how much he adjusts his supposedly infallible personality to match you, it never seems to work. you're always on edge. you never trust him.

and then you make the comment (to his face, no less) about him being a narcissist. and this shouldn't be as huge of a moment as it is. Danny's been doing this for a long time, and it's kinda crazy to assume no one has clocked his Ghostface persona. but it's the fact that you say this so openly. and given everything that's happened to you, it heightens the stakes for him. for the first time in a long time, Danny feels like he could (potentially) be cornered. he also feels seen. and for a narcissistic serial killer who craves attention and admiration and fear (as noted in his POV chap., song choices), this is straight dopamine for him. it's everything.

so, he tosses you into the role of his foil. the one who will chase him to the very brink. but he doesn't anticipate the fact that you'd almost willfully ignore the warning signs right in front of you just to remain inside this bracket of normalcy you're still desperately clinging to (which is your own narrative downfall). he goes out of his way to make you catch onto him, almost angry that you don't.

it then kicks off the second part. he starts to consider you HIS Final Girl. but there's a problem. you're not his. you'll never be his. for such an unrepentant narcissist, this is almost too much. he's bordering on the edge of utter fury and an almost noxious jealousy. he wants to be your demise so badly that it bleeds into just pure, unfettered want.

and then the final part of their story is Twisted Soulmates. it kinda struck me as odd that every single Scream film had TWO Ghostfaces. it's kind of the blueprint. but DBD does not. they just had Danny. so i started thinking about what would happen if there were always supposed to be two, and added elements of Danny's loneliness. he wants, desperately, to share his work with someone who understands but this sort of thing would never appeal to the general public that's he trapped inside. he also risks getting caught. it can never happen.

until you. your anger at the man who did this to you, who ruined your life, is as potent as his desire to kill. he can see it in you. this darkness. this shifting, ugly rage brimming just below the surface. it makes his hackles rise because you could be the perfect partner.

it's a big part of why he spends so much time trying to "show off." why he gets so jealous when you focus your attention on Michael Myers instead of him. and why he feels the need to get rid of Leslie. she's a moral obstacle in your way.

he wants your attention now. he wants your everything, but there are parts of you that he'll never have, and this loss is too great to ever let your relationship work in the "real" world. but in all honesty, he's fine with being your eventual demise if you decide not to go with him. being your FINAL killer is something he fantasises about a lot. he wants to kill you from the moment he sees your wariness over Jed to the very end when he makes you chase him all the way to Utah.

but then the Entity intervenes, and suddenly Danny has a way to have everything he wants. your death (over and over and over again), and you with him (forever, always, eternity). but his narcissism does not let him see the killer you're shaping into. and when you end up turning the plot on him, using your "friend" as bait to lure him in, Danny knows he's gravely misunderstood you. in fact, he's never really known the real you at all.

this, of course, just spurns the obsessiveness in him further, making it very unlikely that he'll ever let you go.

#and please don't feel the need to apologise at all!!! writing in a language that isn't your mother tongue can be extremely difficult esp Eng #and i wouldn't have known if you hadn't mentioned it!!#your English is perfect (and much better than mine) 🖤#also sorry this got sooo long!!!!!#i have all these extra notes that i could never really anywhere so the moment someone is like “tell me BTS about bdftr”#the lore just comes out in a flood

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memryse · 1 year

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I find it interesting that 9 times out of 10 life series grian is the antagonist but you just. wont see it from his POV because he treats the series like a let’s play and glosses over the everything else.

or maybe im wrong

it’s because he sucks ❤️

i rewrote my answer to this like three times because man. it’s such an interesting thing to get into and there are worms in my brain. this is why i absolutely love characterisation of grian in the life series that has him be kind of… detached, because as more of a let’s player than a roleplayer that means in canon he really is detached until he Really Isn’t. he cares a lot about causing chaos and murder, cares roughly the same amount about his One Guy (or sometimes two people!) of the season and boy does he get really mad when they betray him and finally he gets sad and almost.. lost? when they die, or rather when he inevitably kills them. other than this he can be a lot more divorced from the interpersonal drama of the server he just doesn’t really give a fuck. last life grian in particular feels very cold and callous and it makes me want to eat my own fist! and thus it’s hard to see him as an antagonistic role from his own videos because even though cc!grian doesn’t deliberately edit things out as much as, say, scar does, he just Kind of doesn’t care about anything else and it definitely rubs off on the viewer. him killing three people in cold blood is just funny to him because it means so little to him compared to, say, the people that actually died or the people that are a bit more into “playing the game”. and the video doesn’t really leave much room for you as the audience to think of it as anything except funny. This ramble really all comes back to last life because like yes im a 3L girlie but my true ‘expertise’ is in LL characterisation and god i love how dark and hopeless that series feels and this sort of vibe for grian works so well there. i have so many diseases about ll!grian blorbo from my miniseries This no longer has anything to do with what you originally said my point is i agree and im very not normal about what it means in universe

#ask #Im not entirely sure that this makes sense i am just rambling completely incoherently i think #my point is. If you characterise him like this especially in LL you understand me #mae analyses

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lazulian-devil · 9 months

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The Villains of Skulduggery Pleasant 2

Now before I start, I want to point out that Book 2 has an absolute myriad of Bad Guys™.

The book introduces not only Dusk (who is great at making everyones day just a whole lot worse. Just fun to be around. Only bit Valkyrie, killed the Lord Vampire of Dublin™ Moloch and is generally just... So much fun!), but also the whole Diablerie Subplot (oh look, China is getting a backstory upgrade), Billy-Ray motherfucking Sanguine (who is in one way or another responsible for a third of my favourite quotes from the books), the Torment and Roarhaven (and all that bullshit), the reflection quite literally cracking (this could never possibly become important later on), the whole Faceless One dimension and whatever was going on with Thurid Guild.

So uh, yeah. Book 2, for being actually quite short in comparison to the absolute Grimoires Derek would later be known to write, is a dense friggin book. You might ask yourself "Wow, this sure is a whole lot more dense than the first one" and thats because Landy had at this point already won and be nominated for enough awards that his writing adventures would be a solid thing for him.

The first book was a leap of faith, the second was the beginning of a saga.

(Tangent: I personally think Landy plans and writes books in pairs of threes, as even Phase 2 was originally supposed to be nine but then turned into six books by force of publisher. Because I read them on a Kindle, I am very much aware of how much longer they have gotten with each installment and I think that he, like many an author, would absolutely benefit from cutting down some of the sizes of his books. But book 2 is still very much on the shorter end, if not the second shortest book of the series).

So, after all these absolute bangers of villains, who will I focus on? The one that dies (which is honestly how I think I should do these. Just slowly talk about everyone who actually dies and leave the "I will appear in a trillion books" villains for last, in favor of my sanity).

Baron Vengous.

In a world filled with sarcastic, silly villains, Vengous is the stern military guy that doesnt talk a lot.

And I mean that literally. Besides like... One or two speeches the guy just doesnt talk much.

Ive managed to complete Book 7 in my reading insanity and have read up to 13 before that (reading them as they come out) and I can say with a solid 78% conviction that he is the most "normal" villain and antagonist the series has ever had.

Hes straightforward. Hes methodical. His status as a General of Mevolent is based not only in honestly insane levels of power, but in his pure military might brain and body.

Baron Vengous is the absolute most opposite anyone could have written to Serpine. He almost seems specifically written to oppose him in as many ways as possible. If Serpine was the Vibe, Vengous is the Antivibe.

You get my point.

We actually get an in depth look into him later (where? Leibniz. In terms of trouble, always assume Leibniz) and even among those people, he is somewhat normal. Apart from his wife.

Oh and the other character trait he has. What was that again? I can barely remember.

Ah. Right. Faceless One fanaticism to the point of self destruction.

It makes you wonder what he did after the Amnesty, as he is broken out of prison by Sanguine at the beginning of the book and its never quite explained why. Serpine was just vibin' in his castle. Maybe he did some human sacrifices to his beloved gods and got caught for it. Who knows. (Afaik, its never explained what he did after the Amnesty to end up in prison in the first place and at this point, Im convinced it doesnt really matter and was just a neat way to introduce Sanguine).

But Vengous just isnt a very... Interesting character. He only works so well because Sanguine is a delight anywhere he shows up and Dusk is just utterly terrifying. The Baron is almost too normal among them.

You need proof? Fine. Let me grab my Kindle real quick.

Insert transition music.

Alright, so. Vengous first appearance (Chapter 3: Vengous) paints him as the man in control, the guy who has been in prison for eighty years (Im sure cellphones blew his mind) is out and looking for revenge. He doesnt say a lot. His first actual words are "You're late." to Dusk (who he later points out in his internal dialogue isnt even a man to him). This gives us two insights into his character: First, his stoic mentality. He just murdered someone. Hes entirely calm. Lifes are a casualty to him. And second, he holds enough power or reputation that a very skilled vampire is not only working for him, but accepts being talked down to by this man.

Later in Chapter Ten: The Armour, Sanguines inner dialogue says "The Baron was not a man to be trifled with, especially at a time like this". Once again, we have a whole chapter that shows of several things (passively) about the Baron. He is a planner (shown by his knowledge of the armor and its requirements, the supposed knowledge of where Vile died and his general tactical demeanour being described), he is someone who seems to be in control at all times (shown by him casually watching a bunch of infected under Dusks command dig away) and he is incredibly patient (shown in previous chapters by him being able to wait 80 years and then just "get on with it. Sure, hes mad at Sanguine, but his plans are more important).

And then we add something a little spicy in the mixture: Hes not only a fanatic, hes also an asshole. Ooooohoho.

Its Chapter 18 in which our Protagonists finally meet him and he simply despises Skulduggery. But thats not whats actually interesting. The Chapter reveals him to be self important. Sure, hes a leader, stoic, goal oriented. But hes also cocksure of himself. (A trait he shares with about 84% of all characters in the SP universe).

Skulduggerys taunts go right over him.

"Skulduggery nodded. "So, you married or something? Do I hear the pitter patter of tiny evil feet?"

"I will destroy you."

Normal reaction, ey? The scene goes on quite a while longer than that, but only hammers home this point even more.

The Baron believes himself superior. Righteous. Blessed, probably.

What kills him in the end? His self importance. And how does he react to his death?

"But... But this isnt how Im supposed to die", He said weakly. "Not... Not like this. Not by your hand. You're... You're an abomination."

And then he crawls towards the actual abomination he summoned, pleads it to tell them (the Faceless Ones) that hes sorry for failing them.

The Grotesquery moved its hand so that it touches Vengous' face. It looked almost tender, until the hand gripped and wrenched and the Barons head snapped to one side.

Vengous is a fascinating villain, because he stands calmly among the flashy and vibrant. In a long line of batshit insane people, his insanity is the one that hits closest to home. Many, many villains in the future would be obsessed with religion (the Necromaner Temple, the whole Diablerie plot, later on Darquesse). But all of them are so overpainted, so saturated, that many are just that: A mockery of real life fanaticism.

And the Baron still feels like someone who is rootes in reality. He truly believes that he and the Faceless Ones are superior. His last act is - and I cannot stress this enough - apologising to his gods.

This man. This stoic, straightforward man. This absolute unit. Former General of Mevolent. Words like a scalpel, tactician, wit and gumption combined.

Hes just as insane as all of them. But his insanity is so much quieter. So much more refined.

And that makes him scary.

While I would like to end here, lets summarise real quick:

Vengous has mostly two traits that make him stand out: Straightforwardness and Fanaticism.

Hes a pretty boring villain in comparison to his counterparts.

He is - at least in my opinion - one of the most realistic villains in the series. His insanity is believable and while its not as flashy as those of others, its a kind of insane that makes your skin crawl as soon as you think about it.

He stole Skulduggerys Armor. If you know that Skulduggery is Vile, there are some really interesting scenes that allude to it.

His Leibniz counterpart, for once, seems to actually improve on the OG one. He talks more and he even shows a certain twisted kindness to Valkyrie in explaining her everything. I would almost argue that the Baron of Leibniz is more interesting than the OG Baron. Also, silly wife Eliza. Such a stupid joke.

If he had been succesful, he would have actually ruined the world. Legitimately. The stakes were so high and the man remained so calm. Imagine trying to resurrect your gods. Imagine resurrecting Jesus, all the while having the vibes of a Military Dad with PTSD.

Im afraid that I never found Vengous that compelling. The writing in Book 2 is immaculate though and Dusk and Sanguine are amazing.

I give him a... 7? 8 out of 10?

Also: remember to stay hydrated. Eat a snack. Stretch. You deserve it.

Wanna read more of my mad ramblings? Heres Part 1 with Nefarian Serpine and Part 3 with Batu!

#skulduggery pleasant #baron vengous #character analysis #ramble post #again this is way too long #literary analysis #villain #sorry y'all #SP villains

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djservo · 6 months

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HI CAS! 😁 it’s that time of month again… 🎄🎅❄️☃️ are you a christmas music enjoyer? what’s your november reading looked like? what are the final books you’ll read in 2023? any wintery vibes these are all important questions

I always think I've become indifferent to if not completely turned off by christmas music but just last weekend my coffee shop was playing 'christmas (baby please come home)' n I was like hell yeah this song rules...... & one time my crabby hater coworker put on springsteen's 'santa claus is comin to town' for me + that was such a kodak Magic Of Christmas moment for me I was like wait the grinch really does have a soul.... im a sporadic xmas music enjoyer merely by happenstance 🧘‍♀️ + my november reads were magical!!!

Regarding the Pain of Others by Susan Sontag

wanted to pair this with Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection by Julia Kristeva as a brief little study on representing/projecting and relating to terror but this one was so apt that I thought it'd be best standing alone and allowed to sink in for the month. really interesting/important points about the origins of the 24 hour news cycle + "the CNN effect" + a mass desensitization to the suffering of others, disheartening but necessary things to understand especially now when every feed is so casually interspersed with it. and ofc Sontag is just so graceful with her framing of ideas that I think this is quite an accessible read to those who've never ventured into philosophy/theory

Manila Noir edited by Jessica Hagedorn

MILF (MAN I LOVE FILIPINOS)!!! learning that I maybe love crime fiction? or maybe specifically written by Filipinos bc the Philippines is kinda the perfect place for so many intersections/dissections of class and power and exploitation and all the things that make crime/mystery so juicy to me. the selection here was so strong, I think I ended up shelving something by each of the contributors I could find english translations for. so many women too which rules x10000. also saw that this is part of a series of 'noir' collected works based around a specific area (like SF, Brooklyn, Mumbai, Istanbul, etc) which I think is a super cool concept and I can't wait to track down the others. think this is gonna have to be a noirvember tradition

With my Dog Eyes by Hilda Hilst

read this in one sitting before a wedding so it's admittedly a bit of a blur/I didn't get to sit with it as much as I should have bc Hilst's prose is so dizzying (in a good way!!!) but I've asked for one of her translated works for xmas so I'll defo be giving that one my full + stoic attention 🧘‍♀️ I can vaguely remember the shape of the story but what most sticks out to me when reflecting is really specific phrases... the gold of your name — an armless embrace of you — sado-slippery I’m sweating and laughing... I'm empty of anything good. Full of the absurd.... just really gorgeous syntax and images and I can see why Hilst + Lispector's styles are compared so often

Live Through This: On Creativity and Self-Destruction edited by Sabrina Chap

admittedly wanted to hate this from the very start with Amanda Palmer's intro ugh like I braced myself for this to be some corny contrived #AngryWomenInArt but I ended up adoring this and hating myself for my initial haterisms.... women in art is actually so real..... really great + diverse selection of artists (I was worried this would be overwhelming white + cis + het but luckily it wasn't!) and it honestly didn't even occur to me to read this as like a guide on how to work through/with creativity, but rather glimpses into other artists' processes and journeys with their own creativity (I initially picked this up for Eileen Myles I think). so personal and honest and inspiring because of that intimacy and honesty. felt good when I recognized some of the other names too, but ofc added a bunch to my TBR as well. made me miss rookiemag and generally a time when feminism didn't seem so glazed in layers of girlboss irony + terfism real bad </3

Smaller and Smaller Circles by F.H. Batacan

MILF PT. 2!!! another Filipino crime fiction win.. I did see the reveal coming the moment the character was introduced but all the build-up made it worth it. I loved that no form of power was safe from criticism—sleazy priests/prominent figures from the church, useless police, sensationalist media, mayors blind to the true needs of their community, the smaller and smaller circles (hehe) of unchecked trauma and abuse, the ways these all tie together to inevitably harm those without a voice or pedestal.. does such a great job shining a light on the hypocrisy and corruption of it all which isn't specific to the Philippines but from the few Filipino works I've read, it really does feel like a reoccurring core theme. with such a vengeance too! watched the movie adaptation last night which cut out a lot of the good/necessary stuff in my opinion but the vibes + casting were spot on so it was just cool to see the gritty world come to life in that way

Near to the Wild Heart by Clarice Lispector

BONK this was everything to me like exactly the kind of writing I've been aching for since I was a teenager........ a similar blissful dizziness that I felt reading Hilst — gorgeous sensual painfully moving prose, it's wild to me that a work of fiction could hold this much introspection, each character's state of mind so crystal clearly expressed you can't help but feel a little lost in it. and this is her first book??? I'm thrilled just thinking about how she could possibly hone her craft in later works, I'm so excited to see for myself. this is a sidebar but I pretty much lost all my steam for creative/fiction writing during the pandemic and randomly pushed myself to get back into it in october and between this + Hilst's book I rly do feel more inspired than ever..,. crazy what some beautiful & dreamy sentences can do to you!!

i DONT want to prematurely toot any horns but I think I may actually reach my original reading goal of 50 books this year? just started the last book (Something Wicked This Way Comes) in the 'dark boyhood' trio I planned with my friend and it's going by super fast (probably because it's a childrens book basically LOL) and then I checked out Nana vol 1 & 2 bc I found out my library randomly has them (despite never having anything else I'm ever looking for... like ok) and I usually whiz through graphic novels. I think I may read Powers of Horror as mentioned earlier to balance out the fiction, and I downloaded a few free books by Palestinian authors from here (free to download til Dec 5th) so I'll choose from one of those.. maybe end the year with some poetry, all of which isn't necessarily wintery but simply reading my lil book w a hot drink is cozy enough <3

#asks #cheesehair #reads

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magic-aggy · 1 year

Text

the original mlpfim lesbian ship

text id (never done one of these b4 pls let me know if im doing it wrong!)

[on the left, a fat, dainty, white unicorn with purple hair, looking flirtatious, with text indicating her that says "Trying her hardest to flirt", on the right a wiry, muscular, orange earth pony with blonde hair and brown spots like a cow looking stressed and distracted, text pointing to her that says "Oblivious, lost in thought about work she needs to do"]

uhhh, figured i needed to practise my character design somehow. redesigning official characters seemed like a good start.

idk how evident it is, but i tried to put like, some vibes of other animals into the designs for the purpose of like, trying to communicate character?

like rarity's snout/face/ear is meant to evoke a siamese or ragdoll cat, as well as an alpaca. her legs are def meant to evoke an alpaca, or maybe a poodle. shes trim and prim and manicured. alpacas tie back to fashion, w their wool being used for high end woolen clothing. and a ragdoll is a very like, iconic big pretty cat which is both elegant and very fluffy. i wanted rarity to be fat and elegant. i think i achieved that. her hair is not as good as id like but its good enough. also gave rarity a G1 style cutie mark bc its a classic look and rarity can appreciate a good bit of vintage style, plus her larger body made me think of the G1 pony toys. and i just really like big cutie marks lol.

applejack i wanted to put vibes of australian outback sheep farmer into, as well as fruitbats and australian sheepdogs. i wanted her to be muscular but not thick and overt like big mac. applejack always seems like she should be wiry and lithe. shes not the strongest pony in the world, but she might be the hardest working pony. also her snout being slightly canine ties back to the timberwolves, which for whatever reason i really associate with applejack. winona too! winona is part of the inspo here. and then i put some splotches of darker fur bc i A. wanted to continue evoking a blue heeler, but B. more importantly i wanted her to be part cow. i have this mental image of Pear Butter, her mom, being half cow and being like, very round and fat and soft and pretty. hair is cut short and a bit scruffy, bc long hair seemed impractical to me. i always think about how much applejacks hair would get in the way if things were more grounded. also she has a cow lick! and her hair is less bright, more of a dirty blonde. which just felt fitting. i imagine applejack as having rough skin from all the time she spends working in the sun.

also rarijack is just, the OG, the first thing i was like 'omg those horse fillies, theyre so gay... wow...' its a classic.

#applejack #rarity #my little pony #mlp #rarijack #hashtag blogging with aggy #horse drawn art

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liesmyth · 1 year

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I'm curious that you think that the existing lyctoral necro-cav pairs shows that John can't choose at will who is a necromancer & who is not, because to me it's the opposite! The fact that both scientists & the lawyer (of intellectual occupations) all end up as necromancers and theis companions as cavaliers strongly suggests a guiding hand. Who do you think he would array differently if he had the power?

A few different reasons! All of them boil down to #vibes. My thoughts on this are all over, and I think it IS possible he chose them. I just think it’s slightly more likely he didn’t.

tldr: if he chose who got to be an adept, I think it was more intuitive / subconscious / accidental than a planned out choice with forethought behind it.

Assuming that he absolutely wanted to create matched pairs (why though? more thoughts below) I AM a bit puzzled over the criteria. It's not just intellectuals, they all were—“a cop and six different kinds of nerd.” Anyway, here are my thoughts, one by one.

Augustine, Mercy, and G1deon: these are obvious. They were his long-time friends, unflinchingly loyal, total enablers. If he did pick and choose, they were always going to be an automatic in.

Nigella: that’s easy also; she seems to be the member of the gang John was the least close to, brought into the gang by someone who was mildly critical of him. She IS a pass.

Alfred: second to least fave, though he was the one who figured out the dirt of the FTL fleet by following the money. (He IS a nerd, and more STEM-adjacent than Cassy. Finance runs on probability theory) I can see why he’d have been left out, though; John doesn't think much of him.

Cristabel: this is harder to justify! John had a very high opinion of Cristabel. He called her ‘sister,’ he saw her as a guide, and near the end they worked closely together trying to find the soul. Maybe he resented her for the way she forced him to ascend, but I didn’t get that impression from the flashbacks + John loves having people around who have their own failings, so he can feel better about himself. If he could bestow necromancy, I don’t get why he wouldn’t have picked Cristabel.

Pyrrha and Cassiopeia: these are the ones that leave me the most perplexed. They’re both strong-willed women who weren’t afraid to stand up to John. But Pyrrha was the one who betrayed her cop friends to warn him, who stood by him even after he killed her former colleagues, who encouraged him to be a “bad wizard” — she absolutely enabled him every step of the way. Cassiopeia, by contrast, was by his side in the early stages and ditched her bosses for him, but she seems to have stuck around just as much for Nigella as for “the cause,” if not more. She drops under the radar a third into the flashback narration when things get weird, and only makes herself heard again near the end to call out John; the only one who did. I really don’t get why he’d have picked Cassiopeia. Likewise, I don’t see why he didn’t pick Pyrrha; it’s true that Gideon was always close to her and “never knew who to pick,” but when it counted Pyrrha never went against John, and also, you know. He did wipe their memory. I don't think he saw Pyrrha as a threat.

Ulysses and Titania: ????? They were science projects. He had no attachment to either of them. Why not make more of his original friends into necromancers and give them Ulysses or Titania as “companions” if he was that attached to that model? The only scenario I can see in which they were included would be if John brought them back before anyone else to serve as a test case, but I don’t get why he’d have kept them around. I can, however, see John keeping them around if they randomly came back as an adept/non-adept matched pair and he was like, oh how nostalgic, control group yet again.

More broadly—regardless of who was picked, I don't think he planned out matched adept/companion sets.

One: Lyctorhood wasn't John's initial plan. He didn't bring them back thinking “I’m going to make my besties my immortal warriors and they’ll need a loyal companion.” He brought them back planning to keep them near him, and possibly to make them immortal. He accomplished that, successfully, for hundreds of years—but their immortality was conditional on their physical proximity to him. (John being John, this would be a feature, not a bug!) and didn’t come with huge necromantic powers. They were still killable. That only became a drawback once they were “on the clock for the resurrection beasts,” when it was imperative that his friends should also be his trusted lieutenants, able to carry out missions all over the universe. “God should be able to touch all of creation,” but he can’t do that if his fingers have to stay by his side. That’s why everyone ascended at the same time and the cavaliers went to their death. Before that, though? There was no point. I doubt he knew of the RBs until after the resurrection was complete.

Two: why the necro/cav pairs? I just... don't see why he'd split his friends into matched couples. I think it’s way more likely that the concept of “death wizard and death wizard’s fighting sworn companion” as social roles and as a tradition, is something that evolved because the original disciples made it a custom, rather than because John designed it to be that way. And, if he could bestow necromancy at will, why not give it to everyone who’d stood by him? Why did it have to be an even number split in couples, everyone with their companion? Like, I don’t think it’s out of character for John to go on a godly power trip and decide who gets to have powers. But I also don’t see why he would create a divide within the group. (Later, after 200 years, I absolutely get why he’d want to be THE most important person in all his Lyctors’ lives. But I don’t get that same vibe from immediately post-apocalypse, based on the flashbacks)

Basically, it's both some of the choices in who ended up a necromancer, and just... the forethought that this decision implies. John isn't a great schemer IMO, and I doubt he was especially lucid in the time right before the resurrection; I don't think he sat down and started worldbuilding his new social order and space empire. (Yes, he very much did build the Houses like a DM worldbuilding for an RPG campaign, but that happened more gradually and his friends had a lot of influence. I don't think the beforehand had much planning involved.)

Also: a lot of what John does, power-wise, is vibes. His soul merging with Alecto was done totally on the fly. Figuring out you can bestow necromancy, figuring out how necromancy is bestowed, doing some trial and error until you know how it works, and only then resurrecting your buddies—IDK, that’s a lot of planning.

Anyway. This is why I think that if he MADE a choice, it was subconscious. That's why more in line with how John does things.

#carys-the-ninth #ask #tlt thoughts #og lyctors #ejg #tlt

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bulbabutt · 9 months

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Do you have any insight or tips on your comic-creating process?

my best tip is genuinely just try even if you dont know how, cuz (i say this a lot) but i have no real idea what im doing and ive just been trying different things for a while to have fun

as for my process, it has changed a bit since i started posting, something that made it easier early on was just saving an image of thumbnails and roughly drawing inside of them to get the vibes out

basically pretending i know how layouts work just to storyboard it out (like i never have a script i just vibe) then i can move them around if i wanna add another panel for humour sake or something with ease (like i added leo standing up w mikey on his back here just cuz i thought it would be a funny pause, and then i did end up duplicating the last panel cuz it was funnier as two)

and for the process of me trying to make a whole comic page thingy, well originally it was the same thing, just way longer

like i did this months ago to vibe out the story and get the vague visuals out and left it alone. at some point after getting csp (cuz all these were done in sai) i was like OH HEY csp can do comics ? with ease? maybe that would be a better way to do this because it is so long, lets just try it out! so i used this as like a guide for the story. it was helpful cuz i already knew the basic ideas of shots i wanted.

idk again i dont really know what im doing but theres so many people in this fandom that are so inspiring so i was taking a couple of lessons from them every time i changed my approach, but the basic tip is like scribble it out first and see if you think its worth continuing! put as much or little effort as you care to do, just as long as you have fun

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petrichoraline · 10 months

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okay I have so many thoughts on the cherry magic pilot, many of which might sound Stupid and Wrong

how can you talk about all things a person is expected to be and do and finish it off with this question

WHEN YOU TURN THE CHARACTER NOTORIOUS FOR WANTING NO RELATIONSHIP WHATSOEVER INTO A PART OF A COUPLE

when I saw the prior introduction of these two I thought they might have dropped this very stupid change but ig not, I suppose they'll give her some other type of struggle with societal expectations

not too hyped for jan and sing as a couple, I like them both so much but I have no reason to believe their chemistry would be smth special

when I saw mark i got a bit worried because ive only seen him as prince in sky in your heart but I got shocked how much he seems to resemble yutaro

i wasn't sure bout junior but they do seem to resemble the pair a lot when together and I hope their acting brings out more of the characters' charm (because I did feel a bit iffy about them in the japanese version ngl)

I also think he'll portray his character a bit differently, he seems more down-to-earth and confident so he'll probably tone down the obsessive loser vibe of the original; hopefully mark has improved

they look cute ♡

the bland backgrounds and too much voiceover kinda bored me but it's only a pilot, I'm sure it'll work better in the full episodes

as for our stars, I think new seems a bit ridiculous as achi, maybe because he's a big guy trying to make himself look small? I don't mind that the height difference that eiji and keita have isn't replicated, but new is also very broad shouldered and overall doesn't seem to give off the aura of a guy with bad self esteem issues with his acting; the way he looked almost happy in the elevator reveal scene

and some other scenes made me think new def has a different take on the character. that his version would be either 1) "no confidence in theory, way more in practice" in which case the script would be to blame or 2) developments true to the character but not acted out the right way. there's also the option that everyone makes achi a more confident guy on purpose - he's written like that and so new presents him that way. that option is a bit unlikely considering a line in the pilot related to self esteem but it already seems like the source material might've been a bit misunderstood

I think it's cause of the actors' faces just being the way they are that tay gives off "puppy wagging tail aggressively" more than keita did - tay's big eyes and smile just do it by default

it feels like his interpretation of kurosawa's character would be more innocent and playful, kind of as if he'd confess earlier than kurosawa did, I get more of a careless vibe though I'm sure they'll stick to the og motivations and doubts the character has; he doesn't contain himself the way kurosawa does:

i remain optimistic! the show is based on a manga that is drenched in multiple aspects of japanese culture, societal commentary is based on japanese society for the most part. having the story take place in thailand with thai characters will obviously have the main conflicts presented through a thai lens. you can also see the comedic editing typical for thai shows and it differs from the japanese comedic style you can see in the og adaptation. im excited to see whether trying to stick to the og yet changing other aspects will work or not. there are already things that I look forward to and things im nervous about so i hope it's anything but boring lol

these are most of my ramblings, would love to here everyone else's views on them and the pilot itself 💓

#cherry magic #taynew #cherry magoc thailand

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